The Heart's Secret - Maturin Murray Ballou (book recommendations txt) 📗

soldier he feared not death; his profession and experience, which had already made him familiar with the fell destroyer in every possible form and shape, had taught him a fearlessness in this matter; but to leave the air that Isabella Gonzales breathed, to be thus torn away from the bright hopes that she had given rise to in his breast, was indeed agony of soul to him now. In the horizon of his love, for the first time since his heart had known the passion, the sun had risen, and the genial rays of hope, like young spring, had commended to warm and vivify his soul.

Until within a very short time she whom he loved was to him as some distant star, that might be worshipped in silence, but not approached; but now, by a series of circumstances that looked like providential interference in his behalf, immense barriers had been removed. Thinking over these matters, he doubly realized the misstep he had taken, and the heart of the lone prisoner was sad in the depths of his dreary dungeon.

Many days passed on, and Lorenzo Bezan counted each hour as one less that he should have to live upon the earth. At first all intercourse was strictly denied him with any person outside the prison walls, but one afternoon he was delighted as the door of his cell was thrown open, and in the next moment Ruez sprang into his arms.

"My dear, dear friend!" said the boy, with big tears starting from his eyes, and his voice trembling with mingled emotions of pleasure and of grief.

"Why, Ruez," said the prisoner, no less delighted than was the boy, "how was it possible for you to gain admittance to me? You are the first person I have seen, except the turnkey, in my prison."

"Everybody refused me; General Harero refused father, who desired that I might come and see if he could not in some way serve you. At last I went to Tacon himself. O, I do love that man! Well, I told him General Harero would not admit me, and when I told him all--"

"All of what, Ruez?"

"Why, about you and me, and sister and father. He said, 'Boy, you are worthy of confidence and love; here, take this, it will pass you to the prison, and to Captain Bezan's cell;' and he wrote me this on a card, and said I could come and see you by presenting it to the guard, when I pleased."

"Tacon is just, always just," said Lorenzo Bezan, "and you, Ruez, are a dear and true friend." As the soldier said this, he turned to dash away a tear-confinement and late sickness had rendered him still weak.

"Captain?"

"Master Ruez."

"I hate General Harero."

"Why so?"

"Because sister says it is by his influence that you are here."

"Did Isabella say that?"

"Yes."

"Well, tell me of your father and sister, Ruez. You know I am a hermit here."

Lorenzo Bezan had already been in prison for more than ten days, when Ruez thus visited him, and the boy had much to tell him: how General Harero had called repeatedly at the house, and Isabella had totally refused to see him; and how his father had tried to reason with General Harero about Captain Bezan, and how the general had declared that nothing but blood could wash out the stain of insubordination.

With the pass that the governor-general had given him, Ruez Gonzales came often to visit the imprisoned soldier, but as the day appointed for the trial drew near, Ruez grew more and more sad and thoughtful at each visit, for, boy though he was, he felt certain of Lorenzo Bezan's fate. He was not himself unfamiliar with military examinations, for he was born and brought up within earshot of the spot where these scenes were so often enacted by order of the military commission, and he trembled for his dearly loved friend.

At length the trial came; trial! we might with more propriety call it a farce, such being the actual character of an examination before the military commission of Havana, where but one side is heard, and condemnation is sure to follow, as was the case so lately with one of our own countrymen (Mr. Thrasher), and before him the murder by this same tribunal of fifty Americans in cold blood! Trial, indeed! Spanish courts do not try people; they condemn them to suffer--that is their business.

But let us confine ourselves to our own case; and suffice it to say, that Captain Bezan was found guilty, and at once condemned to die. His offence was rank insubordination, or mutiny, as it was designated in the charge; but in consideration of former services, and his undoubted gallantry and bravery, the sentence read to the effect, as a matter of extraordinary leniency to him, that it should be permitted for him to choose the mode of his own death-that is, between the garote and being shot by his comrades.

"Let me die like a soldier," replied the young officer, as the question was thus put to him, before the open court, as to the mode of death which he chose.

"You are condemned, then, Lorenzo Bezan," said the advocate of the court, "to be shot by the first file of your own company, upon the execution field."

This sentence was received with a murmur of disapprobation from the few spectators in the court, for the condemned was one of the most beloved men in the service. But the young officer bowed his head calmly to the sentence, though at close observer might have seen a slight quiver of his handsome lips, as he struggled for an instant with a single inward thought. What that thought was, the reader can easily guess,--it was the last link that bound him to happiness.

Lorenzo Bezan had no fear of death, and perhaps estimated his life quite as lightly as any other person who made a soldier's calling his profession; but since his heart had known the tender promptings of love, life had discovered new charms for him; he lived and breathed in a new atmosphere. Before he had received the kind considerations of the peerless daughter of Don Gonzales, he could have parted the thread of his existence with little regret. But now, alas! it was very different; life was most sweet to him, because it was so fully imbued with love and hope in the future.

Wild as the idea might have seemed to any one else, the young officer had promised his own heart, that with ordinary success, and provided no extraordinary difficulty should present itself in his path, to win the heart and love of the proud and beautiful Isabella Gonzales. He had made her character and disposition his constant study, was more familiar, perhaps, with her strong and her weak points than was she herself, and believed that he knew how best to approach her before whom so many, vastly higher than himself, had knelt in vain, and truth to say, fortune seemed to have seconded his hopes.

It was the death of all these hopes, the dashing to earth of the fairy future he had dreamed of, that caused his proud lip to tremble for a moment. It was no fear of bodily ill.

General Harero had accomplished his object, and had triumphed over the young officer, whose impetuosity had placed him within his power. The sentence of death cancelled his animosity to Lorenzo Bezan, and he now thought that a prominent cause of disagreement and want of success between the Senorita Isabella Gonzales and himself was removed. Thus reasoning upon the subject, and thus influenced, he called at the house of Don Gonzales on the evening following that of Captain Bezan's sentence, expecting to be greeted with the usual courtesy that had been extended to him. Ruez was the first one whom he met of the household, on being ushered to the drawing-room by a slave.

"Ah! Master Ruez, how do you do?" said the general, pleasantly.

"Not well at all!" replied the boy, sharply, and with undisguised dislike.

"I'm sorry to learn that. I trust nothing serious has affected you."

"But there has, though," said the boy, with spirit; "it is the rascality of human nature;" at the same moment he turned his back coldly on the general and left the room.

"Well, that's most extraordinary," mused the general, to himself; "the boy meant to hit me, beyond a doubt."

"Ah, Don Gonzales," he said to the father, who entered the room a moment after, "glad to see you; have had some unpleasant business on my hands that has kept me away, you see."

"Yes, very unpleasant," said the old gentleman, briefly and coldly.

"Well, it's all settled now, Don Gonzales, and I trust we shall be as good friends as ever."

Receiving no reply whatever to this remark, and being left to himself, General Harero looked after Don Gonzales, who had retired to a balcony in another part of the room, for a moment, and then summoning a slave, sent his card to Senorita Isabella, and received as an answer that she was engaged. Repulsed in every quarter, he found himself most awkwardly situated, and thought it about time to beat a retreat.

As General Harero rose and took his leave in the most formal manner, he saw that his pathway towards the Senorita Isabella's graces was by no means one of sunshine alone, but at that moment it presented to his view a most cloudy horizon. The unfortunate connection of himself with the sentence of Captain Bezan, now assumed its true bearing in his eye. Before, he had only thought of revenge, and the object also of getting rid of his rival. Now he fully realized that it had placed him in a most unpleasant situation, as it regarded the lady herself. Indeed he felt that had not the matter gone so far, he would gladly have compromised the affair by a public reprimand to the young officer, such as should sufficiently disgrace him publicly to satisfy the general's pride. But it was too late to regret now, too late for him to turn back-the young soldier must die!

In the meantime Lorenzo Bezan was remanded to his dismal prison and cell, and was told to prepare for the death that would soon await him. One week only was allowed him to arrange such matters as he desired, and then he was informed that he would be shot by his comrades in the execution field, at the rear of the city barracks. It was a sad and melancholy fate for so young and brave an officer; but the law was imperative, and there was no reprieve for him.

The cold and distant reception that General Harero had received at Don Gonzales's house since the sentence had been publicly pronounced against Captain Lorenzo Bezan, had afforded unmistakable evidence to him that if his victim perished on account of the charge he had brought against him, his welcome with Isabella and her father was at an end. But what was to be done? As we have said, he had gone too far to retrace his steps in the matter. Now if it were but possible to get out of the affair in some way, he said to himself, he would give half his fortune. Puzzling over this matter, the disappointed general paced back and forth in his room until past midnight, and at last having tired himself completely, both mentally and physically, he carelessly threw off his clothes, and summoning his orderly, gave some unimportant order, and prepared to retire for the night.