Captain from Castile (78 page)

"Fernando, you mean?"

"Aye."

They were now close together, knee to knee. Pedro had loosened his mace from his saddlebow.

"You'll be welcome," said the other. "There're lively doings at the inn. I'm surprised the place isn't on fire yet. Cursed luck that I'm missing—"

"A ellos!" shouted Pedro, swinging his mace sideways just under the man's steel cap. At the same moment, he spurred Campeador, lifting

him to his haunches and bringing him down on another rider, who sank with his horse to be trampled under the war steed's hoofs. Davila had buried his poniard in the third fellow's face.

"Bravo!" said de Vargas. They spurred on, leaving the wreckage behind. "We'll see how that trick works in the tavern courtyard. No doubt there's someone on guard there."

Pedro's heart was in his mouth as he neared the Rosario. It looked to him curiously dead and sinister under the broken clouds. Drawing close, he thought that he heard a commotion inside; but he was evidently mistaken, for a moment later the place seemed wrapped in silence. Then with a mutter, half-oath, half-prayer, he turned through the archway into the courtyard.

It contained a number of horses tethered under the eaves of the surrounding sheds, but he could see no attendant until, glancing toward the lighted windows of the common room, he noticed a figure peering in. So absorbed was the man that he did not turn to look when Pedro and Davila dismounted. Evidently he assumed that they were a couple of the outposts. When he did turn, it was too late. Davila's heavy sword nearly severed his neck.

A muffled cry, followed by an outburst of oaths and laughter, broke the stillness inside the tavern. Paying no attention to the sprawling body of the man whom Davila had dispatched, Pedro and the squire in their turn now peered through the window.

Beyond a tangle of overturned or broken benches and tables, which, together with a couple of outstretched forms on the floor, bore witness to the desperate fight that had just taken place, de Vargas's eyes fixed themselves on a center of light, where a roaring fire swept up the chimney of the great hearth. In front of it, forming a semicircle, Pedro could see the backs of some ten men seated or standing; but instantly his attention was drawn to two dangling figures that evidently absorbed the group of onlookers.

Swung up, each by their wrists, to a beam that crossed the projecting canopy of the hearth, a couple of men hung just beyond the reach of the flames. Since their feet did not quite touch the floor, the involuntary writhing of their scorched legs gave the impression of a grotesque dance that excited the merriment of their tormentors.

"Go it, Sancho!" sounded a rough voice from the circle. "Lift up your heels! By God, for a fat man, I'll say you're nimble!"

Obviously de Silva was making good the threat that Carvajal had

overheard of burning the innkeeper at a slow fire. The clothes of the

J. victims had not yet caught but were already smoking. As Pedro looked,

one of the bodies swung around, and he recognized dimly the features of Sancho Lopez. The huge broad-shouldered figure who hung beside him was unmistakable. In the next instant, a deep voice of helpless rage brought Pedro's heart into his throat.

Juan Garcia!

Then de Vargas caught sight of another form slumped over a table, which had apparently served as a barricade. The face was hidden, but he could see the dark hair and limp hands.

Catana!

His guess had been right, but he had come too late.

An icy madness possessed him. It sharpened all his faculties and focused them. He stepped back from the window.

"Look, Davila," he said tonelessly, "there're two doors to the room. You take that one; I'll go in here. And, mind you, raise a yell as if you were ten men, when you open the door. Put the fear of God into the bastards. Whatever happens, remember de Silva—he mustn't get away. Now, then, both together!"

Fascinated by their pastime and a little drunk, the toughs in front of the fire were caught unprepared when the two doors crashed open at the same instant.

''Santiago y a ellos!"

Instinctively Pedro gave the shout of the company. A second later he had crossed the room, converging with Davila upon the startled group before it had time to face around.

"Santiagor

De Vargas had been reckoned a great swordsman even among the swordsmen of Cortes, but tonight passion turned him into something more. His broad battle blade—ax and sword in one—rose, wheeled and sank, as if it had been no more than a rapier. Two men went down in the first moment. He hammered the clenched steel gauntlet of his free hand on the head of another. His sword crashed through a fourth man's pauldron, through flesh and bone. Reaching Garcia and Lopez, he cut them free with quick jerks of his dagger, paused an instant over the motionless form of Catana, then turned again upon the panic-stricken ruffians, who were scuttling toward the doors.

But where was de Silva? Had he somehow slipped past? Had he been out of the room? Where was Davila?

Emerging from beyond the threshold, a couple, locked together, reeled back toward the center of the room; and Pedro saw his squire grappling with a tall figure in light harness. One steel arm was about the other's waist, but de Silva's grip immobilized Davila's sword hand,

while the former's dagger could find no mark on the squire's cuirass. Then, with a trip and a twist, de Silva got his opponent off his feet and fell on top of him, his knife poised above the young man's vizor slit.

Pedro sprang forward with a shout. But the blow never fell. Instead, a bench hurled by someone from behind caught de Silva on the side of the head, throwing him off balance for a second; and in that second Davila, rolling over like a cat, locked his gauntlets around de Silva's throat.

Pedro was dimly aware of Garcia, followed by Sancho Lopez, hurtling past him and out through the door in pursuit of the remaining bandits. The vizor of his helmet, which had been cut loose during the fight, slanted in front of his eyes, and he paused in exasperation to tear off his helmet, calling at the same time, "Hold, Cipriano! You've won the reward, but leave the dog to me!" And prying loose Davila's grip, he hauled de Silva to his feet.

For an instant, the two foes stood facing each other, the years of hatred and treachery between them, between them too the consciousness of Catana's motionless body at the near-by table.

"Remember," said Pedro half under his breath, "when I made you renounce God in order to save your pitiful life? Eh? Remember? I thought I had paid you then for my sister. But you lived to run up the score. I wanted you to roast in hell then. I suppose if I set you to roast before that fire now, I could make you curse God again. It's well for you that I've taken a foolish vow. So now pray for your soul if you have one. I tell you pray."

De Silva's white face seemed impassive. Then a sudden grimace convulsed it. "Pray yourself, you obscenity!" he snarled and, leaping forward, plunged his knife point down on Pedro's bare head.

The steel bit in, but a backward jerk turned the blow into only a gash across the forehead. Though half-blinded by the rush of blood, de Vargas could still see well enough to swing his sword with every ounce of strength behind it against the angle of his opponent's neck and shoulder.

De Silva staggered, sank to his knees, then plunged forward. It took an instant to free the blade from the already lifeless body.

"God's justice," said de Vargas. "You've witnessed an execution, friend Davila."

Pedro sheathed his sword and stood looking down at de Silva, but at the moment he did not think of him. He thought of Catana. Vengeance and, indeed, everything else seemed unimportant.

"Seiior!"

Startled, Pedro turned and, hardly believing his eyes, saw Catana supporting herself with one hand on the table edge. Her lips were parted, her cheeks white. He gazed at her as if she were a vision.

"Catana!" he breathed.

The smile he had thought of so often lighted her face. "I wonder if I'm dead and in heaven," she faltered. "It was a bad knock I got when the fighting started.''

He was already in front of her. At the sight of his face, she exclaimed:—

"Ay Maria! You're hurt!"

"It's nothing. It's you—"

But before he could finish, she drew a kerchief from her belt pouch. "Sit down, senor, and I'll bind up your head."

"Rubbish! It's you who need tending. I want to know—"

"Sit down, querido. How can we talk, and you blinking from that cut?"

Straddling a bench, Pedro obeyed. Suddenly he felt as if they had never been separated. It was so familiar, the touch of her fingers. He caught one of her hands and kissed it. Then, when the bandage was finished, he sprang up and took her in his arms.

"Sweetheart!"

Her head sank on his shoulder. "It's been so long, seiior."

"Long? An eternity! But I've a lot to settle with you, muchacha. Why did you come back to Spain after leaving me?"

"Because of you."

"Well, in that case, por Dios, why did you hide?"

"Because of you."

"Hell! Can't you explain, dammit!"

Catana looked past him. "Yes, senor—but who is this gentleman?"

Pedro had forgotten Davila, whom he now beckoned to and introduced. The young man bowed, his eyes curious. The words "Seiiora Perez, a member of the company," did not explain either his master's excitement or this tall, sunburned girl in boy's clothes.

"What's happened to Juan and Sancho?" Catana asked anxiously.

490

Pedro replied with a jerk of his head toward the courtyard.

The uproar was subsiding. A last flurry of panic-stricken hoofbeatj: dashed out through the archway, pursued by a bellow of jeers and maledictions. Then a moment later a deep voice sounded beyond the threshold.

"Ah, the cockroaches! We scotched all but three of them. By God, Sancho, the rascals got their bellyful at the Rosario! But, man, it was a close call! If it hadn't been for those cavaliers—"

And the bulk of Juan Garcia filled the doorway. His big face was beet-red. His touseled black hair stood upright. He carried a bloodstained ax in one hand and a sword in the other. But at the sight of Pedro, both sword and ax thumped to the floor. He stood speechless a moment, then, stretching out his arms, he roared, "Ho, by the saints! Who else could it have been! Now, by glory!" and came on like an avalanche.

He folded Pedro in an embrace that bent the cuirass. He kissed him on both cheeks, and ended by rubbing his hair back and forth with the palm of one hand.

"By glory!"

"Hey!" protested Pedro. "Misericordia!"

"I knew it was you," Garcia announced. "That is, I'd have known it if I'd had time to think—even with your vizor down. Lord! I'll never forget that yell when you came in! . . . How did you happen to turn up tonight? Ha, comrade! Comrade!"

He had reached the pommeling stage, regardless of his bare knuckles on the steel of Pedro's harness.

"Hold, for God's love!" laughed de Vargas. "It's lucky I'm in armor. But how is it with you and Sancho—after the fire, I mean?"

"Still alive, boy. Still alive, as you see, thanks to you. It was a near thing, though."

He broke off to throw an arm around Catana. "I thought you were sped, lass, when that dog felled you with his knife hilt." And exploring with one finger, he added, "You've a bump on your head like an egg." His glance rested on de Silva's body across the room. "But I see that the whole reckoning's paid. . . . Comrade," he went on apologetically, "we were taken by surprise. We did not put up a fight worthy of the company."

"It seems to me you did well enough," remarked Pedro, eying the wreckage of the room. "Exactly what happened?"

Between Garcia, Catana, and Lopez, the story was told: the sudden clatter outside, the inrush of armed men. Taken unawares and without

weapons except their knives, the chosen victims had been overpowered after a brief but sharp resistance. ("The girl and I got two of the rats anyhow," put in Garcia, extenuating the defeat.) There had been only a few guests that evening. Terror-stricken, these, together with the servants, had been herded down into the cellar.

"Then it went as Your Excellency saw," added Lopez. "Ay de mi, I'm a ruined man. My furniture! My crockery! And who'll ever stop at the Rosario after this? A sad name, it will have."

De Vargas laid a hand on his shoulder. "Take heart, Sancho. I'll foot the expense, with five hundred pesos to boot. After your service to me, I could do no less. As to the name, my friend, it hadn't so much to lose that it can't recover. Fetch up your guests from the cellar, fill their bellies free of charge; and they'll spread your praise through Andalusia."

"But now," demanded Garcia, "I want to know how you came to be here tonight. I ask it again. And I want to know how it feels to be a Don and an Excellency and a Commander of Santiago, by God."

"I want to know more than that," de Vargas answered. "I want to know whether Catana's your wife."

The grin vanished from Garcia's mouth. He frowned. "What do you think?"

Catana smiled, and Pedro needed no other assurance.

"I think you're a fool, Juan, to have missed a chance you'll never have again."

"A fat chance!" rumbled the other.

"But I want to know still more," continued Pedro, his eyes on Catana. "And it's going to cost someone a whacking if she can't satisfy me. . . . Sancho, light candles in the back room. I've a word to say to this wench. And let no one interrupt if they hear sounds of grief."

"That's the talk!" approved Garcia.

When he had closed the door of the room, Pedro stood looking at Catana, trying to realize that it wasn't a dream.

Then he burst out, "Well, Mistress, have you nothing to say?" But belying the roughness of his voice, he caught her to him and held her a long while, until her hair was ruffled and her face red.

She looked down before the blaze in his eyes. "I wish I was wearing the beautiful dress I bought in Seville, not these things." He smothered her voice again. ''Amado mio!"

"But can't you explain?"

"You don't give me a chance."