Читать книгу The Crimson Conquest - Charles B. Hudson - Страница 14

Table of Contents

The entry of the Spaniards into Caxamalca had not been spirited, nor jubilant. But the rain, which had conspired with other depressing circumstances to dishearten them, ceased during the night, and the sixteenth of November broke with a cloudless sky. Its first light was greeted in the Peruvian camp by the clamor of trumpets, the wailing of conches and horns, and the thunder of drums—a warlike and mighty dissonance which struck faintly upon the listening ears of the invaders in the town, and set many a good Christian making the sign of the cross and murmuring his prayers. The army of the Inca was portentously astir.

The monarch was quartered in a villa at the edge of the eastern foothills. Not far away, their position marked by columns of rising steam, were the hot mineral springs which had made the place a resort of the Incas for generations.

The villa itself differed little in its severe simplicity from other structures of the country. It was massively built of stone, with the usual high-pitched covering of thatch—a form of roof far from primitive in this instance, for the thatches of Peru were artfully and durably constructed, often highly ornate in the weaving and gilding of their straw. The building was without exterior decoration except for the sculptured geometrical design bordering the entrance. This doorway, like the small windows set high up under the eaves, and the numerous niches with growing plants, which served to modify the severity and blankness of the walls, narrowed from threshold to lintel as in the architecture of ancient Egypt. The walls, too, broad at the base and sloping inward as they narrowed to the top, further suggested the comparison.

On either side of the villa entrance stood sentinels in the blue of the Incarial Guard, in heavily pourpointed tunics or gambesons, similar to those worn by the European men-at-arms of the fourteenth century. Each wore a casque of burnished silver, with heavy cheek-plates descending to the point of the jaw, and surmounted by the figure of a crouching panther, the device of their corps. Above the head-piece rose a high crescent-shaped crest, not unlike that on the helm of the warrior of ancient Greece. Their arms were bare to the shoulder, but encircled by heavy bands of silver above the elbow and at the wrist. Their legs were protected only by the blue and silver lacings of their sandals, which entwined them to the knees. They were armed with javelins, small round shields of polished brass, and from their broad, heavily plated belts hung small battle-axes and short swords of bronze, an alloy which the Peruvians tempered almost to the hardness of steel.

At an early hour the throne-room was filled with officers and nobles costumed as brilliantly as the court of an Oriental potentate. The majority were Quitoans, but among them were a small number of the nobles of Cuzco, recent adherents of Huascar, who had tendered their allegiance to the successful Atahualpa, or whose presence at the court the latter had commanded. All were in the sleeveless outer garment of the country, belted at the waist, with skirts falling to the knees, and not unlike the tunica of the Roman. The stuff was of wool, woven in fanciful and often elegant patterns, and not infrequently decorated with elaborate passementerie, or with braid or scale-work of gold and silver. Every stalwart form glittered with jewelled armlets, bracelets, necklaces, and girdles in the precious metals, while the nobles of Cuzco wore, as a distinguishing mark of their order, heavy discs of gold let into the lobes of their ears.

The apartment in which they awaited the coming of the monarch was no less splendid than the assemblage, and showed the same lavish use of gold and silver, which in the empire of the Incas had no value except for ornamentation. It was a lofty chamber with walls of polished porphyry, divided by pilasters into panels bordered with vines in precious metal, perfect in leaf and stem. Suspended from silver brackets wrought in forms of serpents, lizards, and fanciful monsters, were lamps burning perfumed oil, filling the room with faint aroma, and dispelling the obscurity of the early morning with their radiance. The ceiling, panelled by heavy rafters, was of rushes, gilded and elaborately woven in squares and lozenges. At intervals the walls were niched like those of the exterior, to receive natural plants or imitations of them in the metals.

In the rear of the apartment, beneath a canopy resplendent with embroidery and featherwork, was a dais of serpentine on which stood the Inca's seat, a low stool of solid gold, richly chased and jewelled. Back of this, against the wall, was the imperial standard, on whose folds blazed and sparkled in embroidery and precious stones a rainbow, the insigne of the Incas.

The room was nearly bare of furniture, but its marble floor was softened by richly dyed rugs and the skins of animals. In a word, in this country villa of the ruler of an empire of the farthest West was a wealth of decoration that would have dimmed the splendor of the palace of a maharajah.

Presently, a door in the rear swung open, and a silence fell as a grizzled veteran in the splendid uniform of a general of the Quitoan troops entered and raised his hand. He was followed by two officers of the Incarial Guard, who halted and took post at each side of the doorway. A breathless moment, then came the Inca Atahualpa, attended by his personal staff. The nobles went upon their knees, bending until their foreheads touched the floor, and so remained until the monarch, moving with brisk, soldierly pace, had gained the dais, where he turned with a brief command that they arise.

Atahualpa was then close to his thirtieth year. His countenance was one which would have been striking among men of any race. He had the warrior-face of the American aborigine—the aquiline nose, the high cheekbones and firm jaw and mouth, the calm pride and dignity of expression—but refined by generations of Inca culture. It was the face of a fighter, and a slumbering ferocity was perhaps lurking in the dark and somewhat bloodshot eyes; but it was also an intellectual one, clear-cut in line and contour, and backed by a well-formed head, handsomely poised. His complexion, of the usual bronze of the Indian, was yet not more swarthy than that of many Spaniards. His black hair was closely trimmed, and on his head was the royal diadem, the llauta, a thick cord or band of crimson, wound several times around, with a pendant fringe covering his forehead to his brows from temple to temple. Set closely in the llauta above the fringe, diverging as they rose, were two small white feathers, each with a single spot of black. These were taken from the wings of the coraquenque, a rare bird sacred to the Incas. He was simply clad in deep red, the royal color. His tunic was quite devoid of decoration, but the cloak thrown over his shoulders glittered with embroidery and scales of gold, and besides his heavy ear-ornaments he wore at his throat a collar of emeralds worth an emperor's ransom.

A powerful man, well and serenely accustomed to his power, mentally and physically equal to its exercise, and sufficiently wonted to it not to be self-conscious, is truly a fit object of admiration. There is nothing more sublime, in its way, on earth: nothing more majestic, and only suggested by the brute kingliness of the lion. Atahualpa, the descendant of a long line of absolute monarchs, a line believed by the Peruvians to have sprung from Inti, the Sun-god himself, wore his majesty as naturally as he wore his cloak and with as little thought of it.

On this occasion the audience was short, and the Inca did not seat himself. Having heard the reports of his generals, he directed that supplies be sent to the Spaniards in Caxamalca, gave a few orders concerning the disposition of his troops and the formation of his escort for the visit to Pizarro that afternoon, and retired, while the nobles went again upon their knees until he had quit the apartment. In the court outside he dismissed his staff and descended a terrace into the garden in the rear of the palace.

It was an alluring place at any hour, and to its quiet seclusion the young monarch often resorted when he wearied of councils, the affairs of government, and the endless formalities of the court. From the rear of the villa an avenue, bordered with flowering shrubbery and spreading palms backed by tall quinuars, led to an open lawn in the middle of which played a fountain. Around the margin of the green, set in shady niches in the foliage, were marble benches. Over one of these rugs had been thrown, and leaning sadly on its arm with her cheek resting on her hand sat a maiden of seventeen. A few paces away were half-a-dozen attendants, seated on the sward, arranging armfuls of flowers. So busy were they, and so deep the maiden's reverie, that the Inca's coming was unnoted, and he paused, surveying the group and hesitating to interrupt. At that moment, slightly turning her head, the girl observed him; with sudden pallor and a movement of her hand to her heart she arose.

She was handsome and womanly, and as she stood timidly awaiting her monarch's approach he did not fail to note her beauty with brotherly pride; for she was his half-sister, the Ñusta[1] Rava. Her dark eyes, heavily veiled by their lashes, were downcast, and her color came and went with every step of his advance. Her cloak, falling back as she arose, had left partly uncovered one dimpled arm and shoulder, and the low-cut white robe, or llicla. This garment, made of the soft wool of the vicuña, was loosely and gracefully draped about her form, caught in at the waist by a richly jewelled girdle, and secured by golden topus, or large, broad-headed pins. A necklace of pearls and the jewelled band of gold about her head were her only other ornaments, save those necessary to keep in place a wealth of black tresses coiled in a form of Grecian knot.