"I know not why you should have Donna de Lara against her will, and when better men are here," answered the Frenchman, staring with bold, cruel glances at her, beautiful in her disarray, "and if you keep her you must fight for her. Mademoiselle," he continued, baring his sword gracefully and saluting her, "will you have me for your champion?"

[Ill.u.s.tration: "Hast another weapon in thy bodice?"]

His air was as gallant as if he had been a gentleman and bound in honor to rescue a lady in dire peril of life and honor, instead of another ruffian inflamed by her beauty and desirous to possess her himself.

"Save me! Save me," she cried, "from this man!"

She did not realize the meaning of de Lussan's words, she only saw a deliverer for the present. It was ten minutes past the hour now. She welcomed any respite; her lover might come at any moment.

"I will fight the both of you for her," cried the Frenchman; "you, Black Dog, and you, Master Morgan. Draw, unless you are a coward."

"I ought to have you hanged, you mutinous hound!" shouted Morgan, "and hanged you shall be, but not until I have proved myself your master with the sword, as in all other things. Watch the woman, Carib, and keep out of this fray. Lay hand on her at your peril! Remember, she is mine."

"Or it may be mine," answered de Lussan, as Morgan dashed at him.

They engaged without hesitation and the room was filled with the sound of ringing, grating steel. First pulling the pins from her glorious hair, Mercedes shook it down around her bare shoulders, and then stood, fascinated, watching the fencers. She could make no movement from the wall as the negro stood at her arm. For a s.p.a.ce neither of the fighters had any advantage. De Lussan's skill was marvelous, but the chief buccaneer was more than his match. Presently the strength and capacity of the older and more experienced swordsman began to give him a slight advantage. Hard pressed, the Frenchman, still keeping an inexorable guard, slowly retreated up the room.

Both men had been so intensely occupied with the fierce play that they had not heard the sound of many feet outside, a sudden tumult in the street. The keen ear of the half-breed, however, detected that something was wrong.

"Master," he cried, "some one comes. I hear shouts in the night air. A shot! Shrieks--groans! There! The clash of arms! Lower your weapons, sirs!" he cried again, as Spanish war cries filled the air. "We are betrayed; the enemy is on us!"

Instantly Morgan and de Lussan broke away from each other.

"To-morrow," cried the buccaneer captain.

"As you will," returned the other.

But now, Mercedes, staking all upon her hope, lifted her voice, and with tremendous power begot by fear and hope sent ringing through the air that name which to her meant salvation--

"Alvarado! Alvarado!"

CHAPTER XIX

HOW CAPTAIN ALVARADO CROSSED THE MOUNTAINS, FOUND THE VICEROY, AND PLACED HIS LIFE IN HIS MASTER'S HANDS

The highway between La Guayra and Venezuela was exceedingly rough and difficult, and at best barely practicable for the stoutest wagons. The road wound around the mountains for a distance of perhaps twenty-five miles, although as the crow flies it was not more than five miles between the two cities. Between them, however, the tremendous ridge of mountains rose to a height of nearly ten thousand feet. Starting from the very level of the sea, the road crossed the divide through a depression at an alt.i.tude of about six thousand feet and descended thence some three thousand feet to the valley in which lay Caracas.

This was the road over which Alvarado and Mercedes had come and on the lower end of which they had been captured. It was now barred for the young soldier by the detachment of buccaneers under young Teach and L'Ollonois, who were instructed to hold the pa.s.s where the road crossed through, or over, the mountains. Owing to the configuration of the pa.s.s, that fifty could hold it against a thousand. It was not probable that news of the sack of La Guayra would reach Caracas before Morgan descended upon it, but to prevent the possibility, or to check any movement of troops toward the sh.o.r.e, it was necessary to hold that road.

The man who held it was in position to protect or strike either city at will. It was, in fact, the key to the position.

Morgan, of course, counted upon surprising the unfortified capital as he had the seaport town. It was the boast of the Spaniards that they needed no walls about Caracas, since nature had provided them with the mighty rampart of the mountain range, which could not be surmounted save in that one place. With that one place in the buccaneer's possession, Caracas could only rely upon the number and valor of her defenders. To Morgan's onslaught could only be opposed a rampart of blades and hearts.

Had there been a state of war in existence it is probable that the Viceroy would have fortified and garrisoned the pa.s.s, but under present conditions nothing had been done. As soon as a messenger from Teach informed Morgan that the pa.s.s had been occupied and that all seemed quiet in Caracas, a fact which had been learned by some bold scouting on the farther side of the mountain, he was perfectly easy as to the work of the morrow. He would fall upon the unwalled town at night and carry everything by a _coup de main_.

Fortunately for the Spaniards in this instance, it happened that there was another way of access to the valley of Caracas from La Guayra.

Directly up and over the mountain there ran a narrow and difficult trail, known first to the savages and afterwards to wandering smugglers or masterless outlaws. Originally, and until the Spaniards made the wagon road, it had been the only way of communication between the two towns. But the path was so difficult and so dangerous that it had long since been abandoned, even by the cla.s.ses which had first discovered and traveled it. These vagabonds had formerly kept it in such a state of repair that it was fairly pa.s.sable, but no work had been done on it for nearly one hundred years. Indeed, in some places, the way had been designedly obliterated by the Spanish Government about a century since, after one of the most daring exploits that ever took place in the new world.

Ninety years before this incursion by the buccaneers, a bold English naval officer, Sir Amyas Preston, after seizing La Guayra, had captured Caracas by means of this path. The Spaniards, apprised of his descent upon their coasts, had fortified the mountain pa.s.s but had neglected this mountain trail, as a thing impracticable for any force. Preston, however, adroitly concealing his movements, had actually forced his men to ascend the trail. The ancient chroniclers tell of the terrific nature of the climb, how the exhausted and frightened English sailors dropped upon the rocks, appalled by their dangers and worn out by their hardships, how Preston and his officers forced them up at the point of the sword until finally they gained the crest and descended into the valley. They found the town unprotected, for all its defenders were in the pa.s.s, seized it, held it for ransom, then, sallying forth, took the surprised Spanish troops in the pa.s.s in the rear and swept them away.

After this exploit some desultory efforts had been made by the Spaniards to render the trail still more impracticable with such success as has been stated, and it gradually fell into entire disuse. By nearly all the inhabitants its very existence had been forgotten.

It was this trail that Alvarado determined to ascend. The difficulties in his way, even under the most favorable circ.u.mstances, might well have appalled the stoutest-hearted mountaineer. In the darkness they would be increased a thousand-fold. He had not done a great deal of mountain climbing, although every one who lived in Venezuela was more or less familiar with the practice; but he was possessed of a cool head, an unshakable nerve, a resolute determination, and unbounded strength, which now stood him in good stead. And he had back of him, to urge him, every incentive in the shape of love and duty that could move humanity to G.o.dlike deed.

Along the base of the mountain the trail was not difficult although it was pitch-dark under the trees which, except where the mighty cliffs rose sheer in the air like huge b.u.t.tresses of the range, covered the mountains for the whole expanse of their great alt.i.tude, therefore he made his way upward without trouble or accident at first. The moon's rays could not pierce the density of the tropic foliage, of course, but Alvarado was very familiar with this easier portion of the way, for he had often traversed it on hunting expeditions, and he made good progress for several hours in spite of the obscurity.

It had been long past midnight when he started, and it was not until daybreak that he pa.s.sed above the familiar and not untrodden way and entered upon the most perilous part of his journey. The gray dawn revealed to him the appalling dangers he must face.

Sometimes clinging with iron grasp to pinnacles of rock, he swung himself along the side of some terrific precipice, where the slightest misstep meant a rush into eternity upon the rocks a thousand feet below.

Sometimes he had to spring far across great gorges in the mountains that had once been bridged by mighty trunks of trees, long since moldered away. Sometimes there was nothing for him to do but to scramble down the steep sides of some dark canon and force himself through cold torrential mountain streams that almost swept him from his feet. Again his path lay over cliffs green with moss and wet with spray, which afforded most precarious support to his grasping hands or slipping feet. Sometimes he had to force a way through thick tropic undergrowth that tore his clothing into rags.

Had he undertaken the ascent in a mere spirit of adventure he would have turned back long since from the dangers he met and surmounted with such hardship and difficulty; but he was sustained by the thought of the dreadful peril of the woman he loved, the remembrance of the sufferings of the hapless townspeople, and a consuming desire for revenge upon the man who had wrought this ruin on the sh.o.r.e. With the pale, beautiful face of Mercedes to lead him, and by contrast the hateful, cruel countenance of Morgan to force him, ever before his vision, the man plunged upward with unnatural strength, braving dangers, taking chances, doing the impossible--and Providence watched over him.

It was perhaps nine o'clock in the morning when he reached the summit--breathless, exhausted, unhelmed, weaponless, coatless, in rags; torn, bruised, bleeding, but unharmed--and looked down on the white city of Caracas set in its verdant environment like a handful of pearls in a goblet of emerald. He had wondered if he would be in time to intercept the Viceroy, and his strained heart leaped in his tired breast when he saw, a few miles beyond the town on the road winding toward the Orinoco country, a body of men. The sunlight blazing from polished helms or pointed lance tips proclaimed that they were soldiers. He would be in time, thank G.o.d!

With renewed vigor, he scrambled down the side of the mountain--and this descent fortunately happened to be gentle and easy--and running with headlong speed, he soon drew near the gate of the palace. He dashed into it with reckless haste, indifferent to the protests of the guard, who did not at first recognize in the tattered, b.l.o.o.d.y, wounded, soiled specimen of humanity his gay and gallant commander. He made himself known at once, and was confirmed in his surmise that the Viceroy had set forth with his troops early in the morning and was still in reaching distance on the road.

[Ill.u.s.tration: ... he reached the summit--breathless, exhausted, unhelmed, weaponless, coatless, in rags; torn, bruised, bleeding, but unharmed.]

Directing the best horse in the stables to be brought to him, after s.n.a.t.c.hing a hasty meal while it was being saddled, and not even taking time to re-clothe himself, he mounted and galloped after. An hour later he burst through the ranks of the little army and reined in his horse before the astonished Viceroy, who did not recognize in this sorry cavalier his favorite officer, and stern words of reproof for the unceremonious interruption of the horseman broke from his lips until they were checked by the first word from the young captain.

"The buccaneers have taken La Guayra and sacked it!" gasped Alvarado hoa.r.s.ely.

"Alvarado!" cried the Viceroy, recognizing him as he spoke. "Are you mad?"

"Would G.o.d I were, my lord."

"The buccaneers?"

"Morgan--all Spain hates him with reason--led them!"

"Morgan! That accursed scourge again in arms? Impossible! I don't understand!"

"The very same! 'Tis true! 'tis true! Oh, your Excellency----"

"And my daughter----"

"A prisoner! For G.o.d's love turn back the men!"

"Instantly!" cried the Viceroy.

He was burning with anxiety to hear more, but he was too good a soldier to hesitate as to the first thing to be done. Raising himself in his stirrups he gave a few sharp commands and the little army, which had halted when he had, faced about and began the return march to Caracas at full speed. As soon as their manoeuvres had been completed and they moved off, the Viceroy, who rode at the head with Alvarado and the gentlemen of his suite, broke into anxious questioning.

"Now, Captain, but that thou art a skilled soldier I could not believe thy tale."

"My lord, I swear it is true!"