Bobo, with fixed eyes and open mouth, brought his feet together like a
soldier and stood at attention.
“Are you ready?” asked his master.
“I am.”
“Now, then, tell me, without a moment’s thought--you understand--the
first number than comes into your head.”
“76223,” answered Bobo, all in a breath. Bobo thought he would please
his master by giving him a pretty large one!
Judge Jarriquez had run to the table, and, pencil in hand, had made out
a formula with the number given by Bobo, and which Bobo had in this way
only given him at a venture.
It is obvious that it was most unlikely that a number such as 76223 was
the key of the document, and it produced no other result than to
bring to the lips of Jarriquez such a vigorous ejaculation that Bobo
disappeared like a shot!
CHAPTER XV. THE LAST EFFORTS
THE MAGISTRATE, however, was not the only one who passed his time
unprofitably. Benito, Manoel, and Minha tried all they could together
to extract the secret from the document on which depended their father’s
life and honor. On his part, Fragoso, aided by Lina, could not remain
quiet, but all their ingenuity had failed, and the number still escaped
them.
“Why don’t you find it, Fragoso?” asked the young mulatto.
“I will find it,” answered Fragoso.
And he did not find it!
Here we should say that Fragoso had an idea of a project of which he
had not even spoken to Lina, but which had taken full possession of his
mind. This was to go in search of the gang to which the ex-captain of
the woods had belonged, and to find out who was the probable author of
this cipher document, which was supposed to be the confession of the
culprit of Tijuco. The part of the Amazon where these people were
employed, the very place where Fragoso had met Torres a few years
before, was not very far from Manaos. He would only have to descend the
river for about fifty miles, to the mouth of the Madeira, a tributary
coming in on the right, and there he was almost sure to meet the head
of these -“capitaes do mato,”- to which Torres belonged. In two days, or
three days at the outside, Fragoso could get into communication with the
old comrades of the adventurer.
“Yes! I could do that,” he repeated to himself; “but what would be the
good of it, supposing I succeeded? If we are sure that one of Torres’
companions has recently died, would that prove him to be the author of
this crime? Would that show that he gave Torres a document in which he
announced himself the author of this crime, and exonerated Joam Dacosta?
Would that give us the key of the document? No! Two men only knew the
cipher--the culprit and Torres! And these two men are no more!”
So reasoned Fragoso. It was evident that his enterprise would do no
good. But the thought of it was too much for him. An irresistible
influence impelled him to set out, although he was not even sure of
finding the band on the Madeira. In fact, it might be engaged in some
other part of the province, and to come up with it might require more
time than Fragoso had at his disposal! And what would be the result?
It is none the less true, however, that on the 29th of August, before
sunrise, Fragoso, without saying anything to anybody, secretly left the
jangada, arrived at Manaos, and embarked in one of the egariteas which
daily descend the Amazon.
And great was the astonishment when he was not seen on board, and did
not appear during the day. No one, not even Lina, could explain the
absence of so devoted a servant at such a crisis.
Some of them even asked, and not without reason, if the poor fellow,
rendered desperate at having, when he met him on the frontier,
personally contributed to bringing Torres on board the raft, had not
made away with himself.
But if Fragoso could so reproach himself, how about Benito? In the first
place at Iquitos he had invited Torres to visit the fazenda; in the
second place he had brought him on board the jangada, to become
a passenger on it; and in the third place, in killing him, he had
annihilated the only witness whose evidence could save the condemned
man.
And so Benito considered himself responsible for everything--the
arrest of his father, and the terrible events of which it had been the
consequence.
In fact, had Torres been alive, Benito could not tell but that, in
some way or another, from pity or for reward, he would have finished
by handing over the document. Would not Torres, whom nothing could
compromise, have been persuaded to speak, had money been brought to bear
upon him? Would not the long-sought-for proof have been furnished to the
judge? Yes, undoubtedly! And the only man who could have furnished this
evidence had been killed through Benito!
Such was what the wretched man continually repeated to his mother, to
Manoel, and to himself. Such were the cruel responsibilities which his
conscience laid to his charge.
Between her husband, with whom she passed all the time that was allowed
her, and her son, a prey to despair which made her tremble for his
reason, the brave Yaquita lost none of her moral energy. In her they
found the valiant daughter of Magalhaës, the worthy wife of the fazender
of Iquitos.
The attitude of Joam Dacosta was well adapted to sustain her in this
ordeal. That gallant man, that rigid Puritan, that austere worker, whose
whole life had been a battle, had not yet shown a moment of weakness.
The most terrible blow which had struck him without prostrating him had
been the death of Judge Ribeiro, in whose mind his innocence did not
admit of a doubt. Was it not with the help of his old defender that he
had hoped to strive for his rehabilitation? The intervention of Torres
he had regarded throughout as being quite secondary for him. And of this
document he had no knowledge when he left Iquitos to hand himself over
to the justice of his country. He only took with him moral proofs. When
a material proof was unexpectedly produced in the course of the affair,
before or after his arrest, he was certainly not the man to despise it.
But if, on account of regrettable circumstances, the proof disappeared,
he would find himself once more in the same position as when he passed
the Brazilian frontier--the position of a man who came to say, “Here is
my past life; here is my present; here is an entirely honest existence
of work and devotion which I bring you. You passed on me at first an
erroneous judgment. After twenty-three years of exile I have come to
give myself up! Here I am; judge me again!”
The death of Torres, the impossibility of reading the document found on
him, had thus not produced on Joam Dacosta the impression which it had
on his children, his friends, his household, and all who were interested
in him.
“I have faith in my innocence,” he repeated to Yaquita, “as I have
faith in God. If my life is still useful to my people, and a miracle is
necessary to save me, that miracle will be performed; if not, I shall
die! God alone is my judge!”
The excitement increased in Manaos as the time ran on; the affair was
discussed with unexampled acerbity. In the midst of this enthralment of
public opinion, which evoked so much of the mysterious, the document was
the principal object of conversation.
At the end of this fourth day not a single person doubted but that it
contained the vindication of the doomed man. Every one had been given
an opportunity of deciphering its incomprehensible contents, for the
“Diario d’o Grand Para” had reproduced it in facsimile. Autograph copies
were spread about in great numbers at the suggestion of Manoel, who
neglect nothing that might lead to the penetration of the mystery--not
even chance, that “nickname of Providence,” as some one has called it.
In addition, a reward of one hundred contos (or three hundred thousand
francs) was promised to any one who could discover the cipher so
fruitlessly sought after--and read the document. This was quite a
fortune, and so people of all classes forgot to eat, drink, or sleep to
attack this unintelligible cryptogram.
Up to the present, however, all had been useless, and probably the most
ingenious analysts in the world would have spent their time in vain. It
had been advertised that any solution should be sent, without delay, to
Judge Jarriquez, to his house in God-the-Son Street; but the evening
of the 29th of August came and none had arrived, nor was any likely to
arrive.
Of all those who took up the study of the puzzle, Judge Jarriquez was
one of the most to be pitied. By a natural association of ideas, he also
joined in the general opinion that the document referred to the affair
at Tijuco, and that it had been written by the hand of the guilty man,
and exonerated Joam Dacosta. And so he put even more ardor into his
search for the key. It was not only the art for art’s sake which guided
him, it was a sentiment of justice, of pity toward a man suffering under
an unjust condemnation. If it is the fact that a certain quantity of
phosphorus is expended in the work of the brain, it would be difficult
to say how many milligrammes the judge had parted with to excite
the network of his “sensorium,” and after all, to find out nothing,
absolutely nothing.
But Jarriquez had no idea of abandoning the inquiry. If he could only
now trust to chance, he would work on for that chance. He tried to evoke
it by all means possible and impossible. He had given himself over to
fury and anger, and, what was worse, to impotent anger!
During the latter part of this day he had been trying different
numbers--numbers selected arbitrarily--and how many of them can scarcely
be imagined. Had he had the time, he would not have shrunk from plunging
into the millions of combinations of which the ten symbols of numeration
are capable. He would have given his whole life to it at the risk of
going mad before the year was out. Mad! was he not that already? He had
had the idea that the document might be read through the paper, and so
he turned it round and exposed it to the light, and tried it in that
way.
Nothing! The numbers already thought of, and which he tried in this new
way, gave no result. Perhaps the document read backward, and the last
letter was really the first, for the author would have done this had he
wished to make the reading more difficult.
Nothing! The new combination only furnished a series of letters just as
enigmatic.
At eight o’clock in the evening Jarriquez, with his face in his hands,
knocked up, worn out mentally and physically, had neither strength to
move, to speak, to think, or to associate one idea with another.
Suddenly a noise was heard outside. Almost immediately, notwithstanding
his formal orders, the door of his study was thrown open. Benito and
Manoel were before him, Benito looking dreadfully pale, and Manoel
supporting him, for the unfortunate young man had hardly strength to
support himself.
The magistrate quickly arose.
“What is it, gentlemen? What do you want?” he asked.
“The cipher! the cipher!” exclaimed Benito, mad with grief--“the cipher
of the document.”
“Do you know it, then?” shouted the judge.
“No, sir,” said Manoel. “But you?”
“Nothing! nothing!”
“Nothing?” gasped Benito, and in a paroxysm of despair he took a knife
from his belt and would have plunged it into his breast had not the
judge and Manoel jumped forward and managed to disarm him.
“Benito,” said Jarriquez, in a voice which he tried to keep calm, “if
you father cannot escape the expiation of a crime which is not his, you
could do something better than kill yourself.”
“What?” said Benito.
“Try and save his life!”
“How?”
“That is for you to discover,” answered the magistrate, “and not for me
to say.”
CHAPTER XVI. PREPARATIONS
ON THE FOLLOWING day, the 30th of August, Benito and Manoel talked
matters over together. They had understood the thought to which the
judge had not dared to give utterance in their presence, and were
engaged in devising some means by which the condemned man could escape
the penalty of the law.
Nothing else was left for them to do. It was only too certain that for
the authorities at Rio Janeiro the undeciphered document would have no
value whatever, that it would be a dead letter, that the first verdict
which declared Joam Dacosta the perpetrator of the crime at Tijuco
would not be set aside, and that, as in such cases no commutation of the
sentence was possible, the order for his execution would inevitably be
received.
Once more, then, Joam Dacosta would have to escape by flight from an
unjust imprisonment.
It was at the outset agreed between the two young men that the secret
should be carefully kept, and that neither Yaquita nor Minha should be
informed of preparations, which would probably only give rise to
hopes destined never to be realized. Who could tell if, owing to
some unforeseen circumstance, the attempt at escape would not prove a
miserable failure?
The presence of Fragoso on such an occasion would have been most
valuable. Discreet and devoted, his services would have been most
welcome to the two young fellows; but Fragoso had not reappeared. Lina,
when asked, could only say that she knew not what had become of him, nor
why he had left the raft without telling her anything about it.
And assuredly, had Fragoso foreseen that things would have turned out
as they were doing, he would never have left the Dacosta family on an
expedition which appeared to promise no serious result. Far better
for him to have assisted in the escape of the doomed man than to have
hurried off in search of the former comrades of Torres!
But Fragoso was away, and his assistance had to be dispensed with.
At daybreak Benito and Manoel left the raft and proceeded to Manaos.
They soon reached the town, and passed through its narrow streets, which
at that early hour were quite deserted. In a few minutes they arrived in
front of the prison. The waste ground, amid which the old convent which
served for a house of detention was built, was traversed by them in all
directions, for they had come to study it with the utmost care.
Fifty-five feet from the ground, in an angle of the building, they
recognized the window of the cell in which Joam Dacosta was confined.
The window was secured with iron bars in a miserable state of repair,
which it would be easy to tear down or cut through if they could only
get near enough. The badly jointed stones in the wall, which were
crumbled away every here and there, offered many a ledge for the feet to
rest on, if only a rope could be fixed to climb up by. One of the bars
had slipped out of its socket, and formed a hook over which it might
be possible to throw a rope. That done, one or two of the bars could be
removed, so as to permit a man to get through. Benito and Manoel would
then have to make their way into the prisoner’s room, and without much
difficulty the escape could be managed by means of the rope fastened to
the projecting iron. During the night, if the sky were very cloudy, none
of these operations would be noticed before the day dawned. Joam Dacosta
could get safely away.
Manoel and Benito spent an hour about the spot, taking care not to
attract attention, but examining the locality with great exactness,
particularly as regarded the position of the window, the arrangement of
the iron bars, and the place from which it would be best to throw the
line.
“That is agreed,” said Manoel at length. “And now, ought Joam Dacosta to
be told about this?”
“No, Manoel. Neither to him, any more than to my mother, ought we
to impart the secret of an attempt in which there is such a risk of
failure.”
“We shall succeed, Benito!” continued Manoel. “However, we must prepare
for everything; and in case the chief of the prison should discover us
at the moment of escape----”
“We shall have money enough to purchase his silence,” answered Benito.
“Good!” replied Manoel. “But once your father is out of prison he
cannot remain hidden in the town or on the jangada. Where is he to find
refuge?”
This was the second question to solve: and a very difficult one it was.
A hundred paces away from the prison, however, the waste land was
crossed by one of those canals which flow through the town into the Rio
Negro. This canal afforded an easy way of gaining the river if a pirogue
were in waiting for the fugitive. From the foot of the wall to the canal
side was hardly a hundred yards.
Benito and Manoel decided that about eight o’clock in the evening one
of the pirogues, with two strong rowers, under the command of the pilot
Araujo, should start from the jangada. They could ascend the Rio
Negro, enter the canal, and, crossing the waste land, remain concealed
throughout the night under the tall vegetation on the banks.
But once on board, where was Joam Dacosta to seek refuge? To return to
Iquitos was to follow a road full of difficulties and peril, and a long
one in any case, should the fugitive either travel across the country or
by the river. Neither by horse not pirogue could he be got out of danger
quickly enough, and the fazenda was no longer a safe retreat. He would
not return to it as the fazender, Joam Garral, but as the convict, Joam
Dacosta, continually in fear of his extradition. He could never dream of
resuming his former life.
To get away by the Rio Negro into the north of the province, or even
beyond the Brazilian territory, would require more time than he could
spare, and his first care must be to escape from immediate pursuit.
To start again down the Amazon? But stations, village, and towns
abounded on both sides of the river. The description of the fugitive
would be sent to all the police, and he would run the risk of being
arrested long before he reached the Atlantic. And supposing he reached
the coast, where and how was he to hide and wait for a passage to put
the sea between himself and his pursuers?
On consideration of these various plans, Benito and Manoel agreed that
neither of them was practicable. One, however, did offer some chance of
safety, and that was to embark in the pirogue, follow the canal into the
Rio Negro, descend this tributary under the guidance of the pilot, reach
the confluence of the rivers, and run down the Amazon along its
right bank for some sixty miles during the nights, resting during the
daylight, and so gaining the -embouchure- of the Madeira.
This tributary, which, fed by a hundred affluents, descends from the
watershed of the Cordilleras, is a regular waterway opening into the
very heart of Bolivia. A pirogue could pass up it and leave no trace of
its passage, and a refuge could be found in some town or village beyond
the Brazilian frontier. There Joam Dacosta would be comparatively
safe, and there for several months he could wait for an opportunity of
reaching the Pacific coast and taking passage in some vessel leaving one
of its ports; and if the ship were bound for one of the States of North
America he would be free. Once there, he could sell the fazenda, leave
his country forever, and seek beyond the sea, in the Old World, a final
retreat in which to end an existence so cruelly and unjustly disturbed.
Anywhere he might go, his family--not excepting Manoel, who was bound
to him by so many ties--would assuredly follow without the slightest
hesitation.
“Let us go,” said Benito; “we must have all ready before night, and we
have no time to lose.”
The young men returned on board by way of the canal bank, which led
along the Rio Negro. They satisfied themselves that the passage of the
pirogue would be quite possible, and that no obstacles such as locks or
boats under repair were there to stop it. They then descended the left
bank of the tributary, avoiding the slowly-filling streets of the town,
and reached the jangada.
Benito’s first care was to see his mother. He felt sufficiently master
of himself to dissemble the anxiety which consumed him. He wished to
assure her that all hope was not lost, that the mystery of the document
would be cleared up, that in any case public opinion was in favor of
Joam, and that, in face of the agitation which was being made in his
favor, justice would grant all the necessary time for the production
of the material proof his innocence. “Yes, mother,” he added, “before
to-morrow we shall be free from anxiety.”
“May heaven grant it so!” replied Yaquita, and she looked at him so
keenly that Benito could hardly meet her glance.
On his part, and as if by pre-arrangement, Manoel had tried to reassure
Minha by telling her that Judge Jarriquez was convinced of the innocence
of Joam, and would try to save him by every means in his power.
“I only wish he would, Manoel,” answered she, endeavoring in vain to
restrain her tears.
And Manoel left her, for the tears were also welling up in his eyes
and witnessing against the words of hope to which he had just given
utterance.
And now the time had arrived for them to make their daily visit to the
prisoner, and Yaquita and her daughter set off to Manaos.
For an hour the young men were in consultation with Araujo. They
acquainted him with their plan in all its details, and they discussed
not only the projected escape, but the measures which were necessary for
the safety of the fugitive.
Araujo approved of everything; he undertook during the approaching night
to take the pirogue up the canal without attracting any notice, and he
knew its course thoroughly as far as the spot where he was to await the
arrival of Joam Dacosta. To get back to the mouth of the Rio Negro was
easy enough, and the pirogue would be able to pass unnoticed among the
numerous craft continually descending the river.
Araujo had no objection to offer to the idea of following the Amazon
down to its confluence with the Madeira. The course of the Madeira was
familiar to him for quite two hundred miles up, and in the midst of
these thinly-peopled provinces, even if pursuit took place in their
direction, all attempts at capture could be easily frustrated; they
could reach the interior of Bolivia, and if Joam decided to leave his
country he could procure a passage with less danger on the coast of the
Pacific than on that of the Atlantic.
Araujo’s approval was most welcome to the young fellows; they had great
faith in the practical good sense of the pilot, and not without reason.
His zeal was undoubted, and he would assuredly have risked both life and
liberty to save the fazender of Iquitos.
With the utmost secrecy Araujo at once set about his preparations. A
considerable sum in gold was handed over to him by Benito to meet all
eventualities during the voyage on the Madeira. In getting the pirogue
ready, he announced his intention of going in search of Fragoso, whose
fate excited a good deal of anxiety among his companions. He stowed away
in the boat provisions for many days, and did not forget the ropes and
tools which would be required by the young men when they reached the
canal at the appointed time and place.
These preparations evoked no curiosity on the part of the crew of the
jangada, and even the two stalwart negroes were not let into the secret.
They, however, could be absolutely depended on. Whenever they learned
what the work of safety was in which they were engaged--when Joam
Dacosta, once more free, was confided to their charge--Araujo knew well
that they would dare anything, even to the risk of their own lives, to
save the life of their master.
By the afternoon all was ready, and they had only the night to wait for.
But before making a start Manoel wished to call on Judge Jarriquez for
the last time. The magistrate might perhaps have found out something new
about the document. Benito preferred to remain on the raft and wait for
the return of his mother and sister.
Manoel then presented himself at the abode of Judge Jarriquez, and was
immediately admitted.
The magistrate, in the study which he never quitted, was still the
victim of the same excitement. The document crumpled by his impatient
fingers, was still there before his eyes on the table.
“Sir,” said Manoel, whose voice trembled as he asked the question, “have
you received anything from Rio de Janeiro.”
“No,” answered the judge; “the order has not yet come to hand, but it
may at any moment.”
“And the document?”
“Nothing yet!” exclaimed he. “Everything my imagination can suggest I
have tried, and no result.”
“None?”
“Nevertheless, I distinctly see one word in the document--only one!”
“What is that--what is the word?”
“‘Fly’!”
Manoel said nothing, but he pressed the hand which Jarriquez held out to
him, and returned to the jangada to wait for the moment of action.
CHAPTER XVII. THE LAST NIGHT
THE VISIT of Yaquita and her daughter had been like all such visits
during the few hours which each day the husband and wife spent together.
In the presence of the two beings whom Joam so dearly loved his
heart nearly failed him. But the husband--the father--retained his
self-command. It was he who comforted the two poor women and inspired
them with a little of the hope of which so little now remained to him.
They had come with the intention of cheering the prisoner. Alas! far
more than he they themselves were in want of cheering! But when they
found him still bearing himself unflinchingly in the midst of his
terrible trial, they recovered a little of their hope.
Once more had Joam spoken encouraging words to them. His indomitable
energy was due not only to the feeling of his innocence, but to his
faith in that God, a portion of whose justice yet dwells in the hearts
of men. No! Joam Dacosta would never lose his life for the crime of
Tijuco!
Hardly ever did he mention the document. Whether it were apocryphal or
no, whether it were in the handwriting of Torres or in that of the real
perpetrator of the crime, whether it contained or did not contain the
longed-for vindication, it was on no such doubtful hypothesis that Joam
Dacosta presumed to trust. No; he reckoned on a better argument in his
favor, and it was to his long life of toil and honor that he relegated
the task of pleading for him.
This evening, then, his wife and daughter, strengthened by the manly
words, which thrilled them to the core of their hearts, had left him
more confident than they had ever been since his arrest. For the last
time the prisoner had embraced them, and with redoubled tenderness. It
seemed as though the -dénouement- was nigh.
Joam Dacosta, after they had left, remained for some time perfectly
motionless. His arms rested on a small table and supported his head. Of
what was he thinking? Had he at last been convinced that human justice,
after failing the first time, would at length pronounce his acquittal?
Yes, he still hoped. With the report of Judge Jarriquez establishing
his identity, he knew that his memoir, which he had penned with so much
sincerity, would have been sent to Rio de Janeiro, and was now in the
hands of the chief justice. This memoir, as we know, was the history of
his life from his entry into the offices of the diamond arrayal until
the very moment when the jangada stopped before Manaos. Joam Dacosta was
pondering over his whole career. He again lived his past life from the
moment when, as an orphan, he had set foot in Tijuco. There his zeal had
raised him high in the offices of the governor-general, into which he
had been admitted when still very young. The future smiled on him; he
would have filled some important position. Then this sudden catastrophe;
the robbery of the diamond convoy, the massacre of the escort, the
suspicion directed against him as the only official who could have
divulged the secret of the expedition, his arrest, his appearance before
the jury, his conviction in spite of all the efforts of his advocate,
the last hours spent in the condemned cell at Villa Rica, his escape
under conditions which betokened almost superhuman courage, his flight
through the northern provinces, his arrival on the Peruvian frontier,
and the reception which the starving fugitive had met with from the
hospitable fazender Magalhaës.
The prisoner once more passed in review these events, which had
so cruelly marred his life. And then, lost in his thoughts and
recollections, he sat, regardless of a peculiar noise on the outer wall
of the convent, of the jerkings of a rope hitched on to a bar of his
window, and of grating steel as it cut through iron, which ought at once
to have attracted the attention of a less absorbed man.
Joam Dacosta continued to live the years of his youth after his arrival
in Peru. He again saw the fazender, the clerk, the partner of the old
Portuguese, toiling hard for the prosperity of the establishment at
Iquitos. Ah! why at the outset had he not told all to his benefactor? He
would never have doubted him. It was the only error with which he could
reproach himself. Why had he not confessed to him whence he had come,
and who he was--above all, at the moment when Magalhaës had place in his
hand the hand of the daughter who would never have believed that he was
the author of so frightful a crime.
And now the noise outside became loud enough to attract the prisoner’s
attention. For an instant Joam raised his head; his eyes sought the
window, but with a vacant look, as though he were unconscious, and the
next instant his head again sank into his hands. Again he was in thought
back at Iquitos.
There the old fazender was dying; before his end he longed for the
future of his daughter to be assured, for his partner to be the sole
master of the settlement which had grown so prosperous under his
management. Should Dacosta have spoken then? Perhaps; but he dared not
do it. He again lived the happy days he had spent with Yaquita, and
again thought of the birth of his children, again felt the happiness
which had its only trouble in the remembrances of Tijuco and the remorse
that he had not confessed his terrible secret.
The chain of events was reproduced in Joam’s mind with a clearness and
completeness quite remarkable.
And now he was thinking of the day when his daughter’s marriage with
Manoel had been decided. Could he allow that union to take place under a
false name without acquainting the lad with the mystery of his life? No!
And so at the advice of Judge Ribeiro he resolved to come and claim the
revision of his sentence, to demand the rehabilitation which was his
due! He was starting with his people, and then came the intervention of
Torres, the detestable bargain proposed by the scoundrel, the indignant
refusal of the father to hand over his daughter to save his honor and
his life, and then the denunciation and the arrest!
Suddenly the window flew open with a violent push from without.
Joam started up; the souvenire of the past vanished like a shadow.
Benito leaped into the room; he was in the presence of his father, and
the next moment Manoel, tearing down the remaining bars, appeared before
him.
Joam Dacosta would have uttered a cry of surprise. Benito left him no
time to do so.
“Father,” he said, “the window grating is down. A rope leads to the
ground. A pirogue is waiting for you on the canal not a hundred yards
off. Araujo is there ready to take you far away from Manaos, on the
other bank of the Amazon where your track will never be discovered.
Father, you must escape this very moment! It was the judge’s own
suggestion!”
“It must be done!” added Manoel.
“Fly! I!--Fly a second time! Escape again?”
And with crossed arms, and head erect, Joam Dacosta stepped forward.
“Never!” he said, in a voice so firm that Benito and Manoel stood
bewildered.
The young men had never thought of a difficulty like this. They had
never reckoned on the hindrances to escape coming from the prisoner
himself.
Benito advanced to his father, and looking him straight in the face, and
taking both his hands in his, not to force him, but to try and convince
him, said:
“Never, did you say, father?”
“Never!”
“Father,” said Manoel--“for I also have the right to call you
father--listen to us! If we tell you that you ought to fly without
losing an instant, it is because if you remain you will be guilty toward
others, toward yourself!”
“To remain,” continued Benito, “is to remain to die! The order for
execution may come at any moment! If you imagine that the justice of
men will nullify a wrong decision, if you think it will rehabilitate you
whom it condemned twenty years since, you are mistaken! There is hope no
longer! You must escape! Come!”
By an irresistible impulse Benito seized his father and drew him toward
the window.
Joam Dacosta struggled from his son’s grasp and recoiled a second time.
“To fly,” he answered, in the tone of a man whose resolution was
unalterable, “is to dishonor myself, and you with me! It would be a
confession of my guilt! Of my own free will I surrendered myself to
my country’s judges, and I will await their decision, whatever that
decision may be!”
“But the presumptions on which you trusted are insufficient,” replied
Manoel, “and the material proof of your innocence is still wanting! If
we tell you that you ought to fly, it is because Judge Jarriquez himself
told us so. You have now only this one chance left to escape from
death!”
“I will die, then,” said Joam, in a calm voice. “I will die protesting
against the decision which condemned me! The first time, a few hours
before the execution--I fled! Yes! I was then young. I had all my life
before me in which to struggle against man’s injustice! But to save
myself now, to begin again the miserable existence of a felon hiding
under a false name, whose every effort is required to avoid the pursuit
of the police, again to live the life of anxiety which I have led for
twenty-three years, and oblige you to share it with me; to wait each
day for a denunciation which sooner or later must come, to wait for the
claim for extradition which would follow me to a foreign country! Am I
to live for that? No! Never!”
“Father,” interrupted Benito, whose mind threatened to give way before
such obstinacy, “you shall fly! I will have it so!” And he caught hold
of Joam Dacosta, and tried by force to drag him toward the window.
“No! no!”
“You wish to drive me mad?”
“My son,” exclaimed Joam Dacosta, “listen to me! Once already I
escaped from the prison at Villa Rica, and people believed I fled from
well-merited punishment. Yes, they had reason to think so. Well, for the
honor of the name which you bear I shall not do so again.”
Benito had fallen on his knees before his father. He held up his hands
to him; he begged him:
“But this order, father,” he repeated, “this order which is due
to-day--even now--it will contain your sentence of death.”
“The order may come, but my determination will not change. No, my son!
Joam Dacosta, guilty, might fly! Joam Dacosta, innocent, will not fly!”
The scene which followed these words was heart-rending. Benito struggled
with his father. Manoel, distracted, kept near the window ready to carry
off the prisoner--when the door of the room opened.
On the threshold appeared the chief of the police, accompanied by the
head warder of the prison and a few soldiers. The chief of the police
understood at a glance that an attempt at escape was being made; but he
also understood from the prisoner’s attitude that he it was who had
no wish to go! He said nothing. The sincerest pity was depicted on his
face. Doubtless he also, like Judge Jarriquez, would have liked Dacosta
to have escaped.
It was too late!
The chief of the police, who held a paper in his hand, advanced toward
the prisoner.
“Before all of you,” said Joam Dacosta, “let me tell you, sir, that it
only rested with me to get away, and that I would not do so.”
The chief of the police bowed his head, and then, in a voice which he
vainly tried to control:
“Joam Dacosta,” he said, “the order has this moment arrived from the
chief justice at Rio Janeiro.”
“Father!” exclaimed Manoel and Benito.
“This order,” asked Joam Dacosta, who had crossed his arms, “this order
requires the execution of my sentence?”
“Yes!”
“And that will take place?”
“To-morrow.”
Benito threw himself on his father. Again would he have dragged him
from his cell, but the soldiers came and drew away the prisoner from his
grasp.
At a sign from the chief of the police Benito and Manoel were taken
away. An end had to be put to this painful scene, which had already
lasted too long.
“Sir,” said the doomed man, “before to-morrow, before the hour of my
execution, may I pass a few moments with Padre Passanha, whom I ask you
to tell?”
“It will be forbidden.”
“May I see my family, and embrace for a last time my wife and children?”
“You shall see them.”
“Thank you, sir,” answered Joam; “and now keep guard over that window;
it will not do for them to take me out of here against my will.”
And then the chief of the police, after a respectful bow, retired with
the warder and the soldiers.
The doomed man, who had now but a few hours to live, was left alone.
CHAPTER XVIII. FRAGOSO
AND SO the order had come, and, as Judge Jarriquez had foreseen, it was
an order requiring the immediate execution of the sentence pronounced on
Joam Dacosta. No proof had been produced; justice must take its course.
It was the very day--the 31st of August, at nine o’clock in the morning
of which the condemned man was to perish on the gallows.
The death penalty in Brazil is generally commuted except in the case of
negroes, but this time it was to be suffered by a white man.
Such are the penal arrangements relative to crimes in the diamond
arrayal, for which, in the public interest, the law allows no appear to
mercy.
Nothing could now save Joam Dacosta. It was not only life, but honor
that he was about to lose.
But on the 31st of August a man was approaching Manaos with all the
speed his horse was capable of, and such had been the pace at which
he had come that half a mile from the town the gallant creature fell,
incapable of carrying him any further.
The rider did not even stop to raise his steed. Evidently he had asked
and obtained from it all that was possible, and, despite the state of
exhaustion in which he found himself, he rushed off in the direction of
the city.
The man came from the eastern provinces, and had followed the left bank
of the river. All his means had gone in the purchase of this horse,
which, swifter far than any pirogue on the Amazon, had brought him to
Manaos.
It was Fragoso!
Had, then, the brave fellow succeeded in the enterprise of which he had
spoken to nobody? Had he found the party to which Torres belonged? Had
he discovered some secret which would yet save Joam Dacosta?
He hardly knew. But in any case he was in great haste to acquaint Judge
Jarriquez with what he had ascertained during his short excursion.
And this is what had happened.
Fragoso had made no mistake when he recognized Torres as one of the
captains of the party which was employed in the river provinces of the
Madeira.
He set out, and on reaching the mouth of that tributary he learned that
the chief of these -capitaes da mato- was then in the neighborhood.
Without losing a minute, Fragoso started on the search, and, not without
difficulty, succeeded in meeting him.
To Fragoso’s questions the chief of the party had no hesitation in
replying; he had no interest in keeping silence with regard to the few
simple matters on which he was interrogated. In fact, three questions
only of importance were asked him by Fragoso, and these were:
“Did not a captain of the woods named Torres belong to your party a few
months ago?”
“Yes.”
“At that time had he not one intimate friend among his companions who
has recently died?”
“Just so!”
“And the name of that friend was?”
“Ortega.”
This was all that Fragoso had learned. Was this information of a kind to
modify Dacosta’s position? It was hardly likely.
Fragoso saw this, and pressed the chief of the band to tell him what
he knew of this Ortega, of the place where he came from, and of his
antecedents generally. Such information would have been of great
importance if Ortega, as Torres had declared, was the true author of
the crime of Tijuco. But unfortunately the chief could give him no
information whatever in the matter.
What was certain was that Ortega had been a member of the band for many
years, that an intimate friendship existed between him and Torres,
that they were always seen together, and that Torres had watched at his
bedside when he died.
This was all the chief of the band knew, and he could tell no more.
Fragoso, then, had to be contented with these insignificant details, and
departed immediately.
But if the devoted fellow had not brought back the proof that Ortega was
the author of the crime of Tijuco, he had gained one thing, and that was
the knowledge that Torres had told the truth when he affirmed that
one of his comrades in the band had died, and that he had been present
during his last moments.
The hypothesis that Ortega had given him the document in question had
now become admissible. Nothing was more probable than that this document
had reference to the crime of which Ortega was really the author,
and that it contained the confession of the culprit, accompanied by
circumstances which permitted of no doubt as to its truth.
And so, if the document could be read, if the key had been found, if the
cipher on which the system hung were known, no doubt of its truth could
be entertained.
But this cipher Fragoso did not know. A few more presumptions, a
half-certainty that the adventurer had invented nothing, certain
circumstances tending to prove that the secret of the matter was
contained in the document--and that was all that the gallant fellow
brought back from his visit to the chief of the gang of which Torres had
been a member.
Nevertheless, little as it was, he was in all haste to relate it to
Judge Jarriquez. He knew that he had not an hour to lose, and that was
why on this very morning, at about eight o’clock, he arrived, exhausted
with fatigue, within half a mile of Manaos. The distance between there
and the town he traversed in a few minutes. A kind of irresistible
presentiment urged him on, and he had almost come to believe that Joam
Dacosta’s safety rested in his hands.
Suddenly Fragoso stopped as if his feet had become rooted in the ground.
He had reached the entrance to a small square, on which opened one of
the town gates.
There, in the midst of a dense crowd, arose the gallows, towering up
some twenty feet, and from it there hung the rope!
Fragoso felt his consciousness abandon him. He fell; his eyes
involuntarily closed. He did not wish to look, and these words escaped
his lips: “Too late! too late!” But by a superhuman effort he raised
himself up. No; it was -not- too late, the corpse of Joam Dacosta was
-not- hanging at the end of the rope!
“Judge Jarriquez! Judge Jarriquez!” shouted Fragoso, and panting and
bewildered he rushed toward the city gate, dashed up the principal
street of Manaos, and fell half-dead on the threshold of the judge’s
house. The door was shut. Fragoso had still strength enough left to
knock at it.
One of the magistrate’s servants came to open it; his master would see
no one.
In spite of this denial, Fragoso pushed back the man who guarded the
entrance, and with a bound threw himself into the judge’s study.
“I come from the province where Torres pursued his calling as captain of
the woods!” he gasped. “Mr. Judge, Torres told the truth. Stop--stop the
execution?”
“You found the gang?”
“Yes.”
“And you have brought me the cipher of the document?”
Fragoso did not reply.
“Come, leave me alone! leave me alone!” shouted Jarriquez, and, a prey
to an outburst of rage, he grasped the document to tear it to atoms.
Fragoso seized his hands and stopped him. “The truth is there!” he said.
“I know,” answered Jarriquez; “but it is a truth which will never see
the light!”
“It will appear--it must! it must!”
“Once more, have you the cipher?”
“No,” replied Fragoso; “but, I repeat, Torres has not lied. One of his
companions, with whom he was very intimate, died a few months ago, and
there can be no doubt but that this man gave him the document he came to
sell to Joam Dacosta.”
“No,” answered Jarriquez--“no, there is no doubt about it--as far as
we are concerned; but that is not enough for those who dispose of the
doomed man’s life. Leave me!”
Fragoso, repulsed, would not quit the spot. Again he threw himself at
the judge’s feet. “Joam Dacosta is innocent!” he cried; “you will not
leave him to die? It was not he who committed the crime of Tijuco; it
was the comrade of Torres, the author of that document! It was Ortega!”
As he uttered the name the judge bounded backward. A kind of calm
swiftly succeeded to the tempest which raged within him. He dropped the
document from his clenched hand, smoothed it out on the table, sat down,
and, passing his hand over his eyes--“That name?” he said--“Ortega? Let
us see,” and then he proceeded with the new name brought back by Fragoso
as he had done with the other names so vainly tried by himself.
After placing it above the first six letters of the paragraph he
obtained the following formula:
O r t e g a
-P h y j s l-
“Nothing!” he said. “That give us--nothing!”
And in fact the -h- placed under the -r- could not be expressed by a
cipher, for, in alphabetical order, this letter occupies an earlier
position to that of the -r.-
The -p,- the -y,- the -j,- arranged beneath the letters -o, t, e,-
disclosed the cipher 1, 4, 5, but as for the -s- and the -l- at the end
of the word, the interval which separated them from the -g- and the -a-
was a dozen letters, and hence impossible to express by a single cipher,
so that they corresponded to neither -g- nor -a-.
And here appalling shouts arose in the streets; they were the cries of
despair.
Fragoso jumped to one of the windows, and opened it before the judge
could hinder him.
The people filled the road. The hour had come at which the doomed man
was to start from the prison, and the crowd was flowing back to the spot
where the gallows had been erected.
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