The Lost Gold of the Montezumas: A Story of the Alamo Read online

  CHAPTER III.

  THE DREAM OF THE NEW EMPIRE.

  Neither of the two stories of the solid, ancient-looking convent wasvery high. Both were cut up into rooms, large below and smaller above.The convent roof was nearly flat, with a parapet of stone, and it wasone hundred and ninety-one feet long by eighteen wide.

  In one of the upper rooms, at the southerly corner of the building, sata sort of frontier Committee of Ways and Means, having very importantaffairs of state and war under discussion.

  The session of the committee began with a general statement byex-Congressman David Crockett of the condition of things both in Texasand in Mexico.

  "You see how it is," he said, in conclusion. "The United States can'tlet us in without openin' a wide gate for a war with Mexico. Some o'the folks want it. More of 'em hold back. The trouble with 'em isthat sech a scrimmage would cost a pile of money. I don't reckon thatmost o' the politicians keer much for the rights of it, nor for howmany fellers might git knocked on the head."

  That was the longest speech yet made by anybody, but the next was short.

  "Ugh!" said Great Bear.

  "Ugh!" said Castro, also; but he added, "Heap far away. No care much.Stay home. Boil kettle. No fight."

  The next speaker was the old Tlascalan. He did not try to express anyinterest in either Texas or the United States, for he was asingle-minded man. He declared plainly that he had come to stir uprecruits for his life-long war with Mexico, regarded by him only as acontinuation of Spain, and with Santa Anna as a successor of HernandoCortez. The white rangers and the red warriors were all alike to him.Their value consisted in their known faculty for killing their enemies.

  "It's all very well," remarked Travis, at the end of the old man'stalk, "but we've enough to care for at home. We haven't a man tospare."

  The Big Knife had been stretching his tremendously muscular frame upona low couch, and he now sat up with a half-dreamy look upon his face.

  "I'm kind o' lookin' beyond this fight," he said. "We don't want anyUnited States fingers in our affairs. What we want is the old idea ofAaron Burr. He knew what he was about. He planned the republic of theSouth-west. He wanted all the land that borders the Gulf of Mexico.We want it, too. Then we want to strike right across the continent tothe Pacific Ocean. I've been to California and into the upper Mexicanstates on that side. We'll take 'em all. That 'll be a country worthwhile to fight for. Texas is only a beginning."

  "Just you wait," said Crockett. "It's no use to kill a herd of bufflerwhen you can't tote the beef. You're in too much of a hurry. The timehasn't come."

  "I don't agree with you," said Travis, with energy. "What we want isUncle Sam and a hundred thousand settlers."

  "No! no!" interrupted Tetzcatl. "Gold! Show gold. Talk gold. Bringall the men from all lands beyond the salt sea."

  "About that thar spelter," replied Crockett, "I'll hear ye. Tell thewhole story. I've only heard part of it. Biggest yarn! Spin it!"

  A great many other people had heard the old legend, or parts of it. Itwas an historical record that Cortez had been accused before the Kingof Spain of having himself secreted part of the plunder, won during hiscampaigns against the Aztecs and other tribes. It had brought him intoa great deal of trouble, but, after all, the fact that he had seemed toprove his innocence did but tend to build up and afterwards to sustainquite another explanation of the absence of the reported gold andsilver. It had never been found, and therefore every ounce of it wasnow lying hidden somewhere, only waiting the arrival of a discoverer.

  Tetzcatl was not an eloquent man, and he spoke English imperfectly, buthe was nevertheless a persuasive talker. Somehow or other a pebble aslarge as a dollar had wandered into that room, and he put it down uponthe floor, declaring it to be the City of Mexico. He evidentlyexpected them, after that, to imagine about a square yard around it tobe a kind of map, with the Rio Grande at its northern edge and Texasbeyond. He proceeded then as if he had all the mountains and passesmarked out, but he had not gone far before Crockett broke in.

  "Hullo," he said. "I see. Cortez didn't find the stuff in the city,because it wasn't thar. It was up nearer whar it was placered out,hundreds of miles away."

  "I never thought of that," remarked Travis. "There's sense in it."

  "Bully!" said Bowie. "And all they had to do was to cart it farther."

  "No carts," said Crockett. "No mules, either. Not a pony among them."

  "That makes no difference," replied Bowie. "Those Indian carriers cantote the biggest loads you ever saw. One of 'em can back a man rightup a mountain."

  "That's it," said Crockett. "A thousand dollars' worth of gold weighsthree pounds. Sixty pounds is twenty thousand. A hundred men couldtote two millions. That's what I want."

  "All right," laughed Travis, "but only part of it was gold. Part of itwas silver. But, then, Guatamoczin could send a thousand carriers andkeep 'em going till 'twas all loaded into his cave."

  Tetzcatl understood them, and he not only nodded assent, but went on todescribe the process of transportation very much as if he had beenthere. According to him, moreover, the largest deposit was within afew days' ride of what was now the Texan border. A great deal of it,he said, had not come from the south at all, but from the north, fromCalifornia, New Mexico, and Arizona.

  They could not dispute him, but at that day all the world was still inignorance of the gold placers of the Pacific coast. California was asyet nothing more than a fine country for fruit, game, andcattle-ranches.

  "I've heard enough," said Travis, at last. "It's as good as a novel.But I guess I won't go."

  "I think I'll take a ride with Castro, anyhow," replied Bowie. "Ifit's only for the fun of it. Great Bear and his Comanches can have ahunt after Bravo's lancers. But it's awfully hot in here. I'm goingto have a siesta."

  That meant a sleepy swing in a hammock slung in one of the lower rooms,and the other white men were willing to follow his example.

  It was pretty well understood that the proposed raid into Mexico was tobe joined by several paleface warriors. Castro wore a half-contentedface, but the great war-chief of the Comanches stalked out of thebuilding uttering words of bitter disappointment and anger. He hadhoped for hundreds of riflemen, with whose aid he could have swept onacross a whole Mexican state, plundering, burning, scalping.

  The Lipans and Comanches were not at peace with each other. They neverhad been, and nothing but a prospect of fighting their common enemy,the Mexicans, could have brought them together.

  During all this time, however, one Lipan, and a proud one, had beenvery busy. Red Wolf, with a name of his own that any Indian boy mightenvy him, did not need a siesta. He had a whole fort to roam aroundin, and there were all sorts of new things to arouse his curiosity.

  The walls themselves, particularly those of the fort and the church,were wonders. So were the cannon, and he peered long and curiouslyinto the gaping mouth of the solitary eighteen-pounder that stood inthe middle of the enclosure, ready to be whirled away to its embrasure.It was a tremendous affair, and he remarked "heap gun" over it againand again.

  He was having a red-letter day. At last, however, he was compelled togive up sightseeing, and he marched out through the sentried gate withhis father toward the place where their ponies had been picketed.

  Great Bear and his chiefs also left the fort, but they went in anopposite direction. If there had been any thought of a temporaryalliance between them and their old enemies, the Lipans, for Mexicanraiding purposes, it had disappeared in the up-stairs council. Ofcourse they parted peaceably, for even according to Indian ideas thefort and its neighborhood was "treaty ground," on which there could beno scalp-taking. Besides that, there were the rangers ready to act aspolice.

  As for Tetzcatl, he and his mule were nowhere to be seen.

  Siestas were the order of the day inside the walls of the Alamo, butone man was not inclined to sleep.

  Out by the eighteen-po
under stood the tall form of Colonel Travis, andhe was glancing slowly around him with a smile that had anxiety in it.

  Near a door of one of the lower rooms of the convent swung the hammockthat contained Davy Crockett. He was lazily smoking a Mexicancigarette, but he was not asleep. He could see a great many thingsthrough the open door, and he was a man who did a great deal ofthinking.

  "What's the matter with Travis?" he asked. "What's got him out thar?Reckon I'll go and find out if there's anything up."

  In half a minute more the two celebrated borderers were leaning againstthe gun, side by side, and there was a strong contrast between them.

  Travis was not without a certain polish and elegance of manner, for hewas a man of education and had travelled. If, however, Crockett wassaid to have killed more bears than any other man living, Travis wasbelieved to have been in more hard fights than any other, unless, itmight be, Bowie. Utterly fearless as he was, he nevertheless commandedthe Alamo, and he could feel his military burdens.

  "What's the matter with me?" he replied to Crockett's question. "Lookat this fort. If I had five hundred men I could hold it against thewhole Mexican army. That is, unless they had heavy guns. But I'veless than a hundred just now. We couldn't work the guns nor keep menat all the loop-holes."

  "That's so," said Crockett. "The Greasers could swarm over in onto ye.But Sam Houston could throw in men if Santa Anna should cross intoTexas. I don't reckon he'd try to haul heavy cannon across country.He'd only leave 'em in the sloughs if he did."

  "That's so," said Travis. "But he's coming some day. I want to behere when he comes. I want you and Bowie and all our old crowd."

  "I'll be fifin' 'round," said Crockett; "but just now I've got to goand blow my whistle in Washington. Durned long trip to make, too."

  "Come back as soon as you can," replied Travis, with unusualearnestness. "I've a job on hand. Houston has ordered me to scoutalong the Nueces. I'll only take a squad, but it weakens the garrison.Bowie has made up his mind to take a ride with Castro. Some of the menthat are not enlisted yet will go with him, most likely."

  "Let him go," said Crockett. "He'll learn a heap of things. He kindo' gets me as crazy as he is about our new Southwest enterprise. Tellyou what! Just a smell o' gold 'd fetch the immigrants in like blazes.Prairie fire's nothin' to it."

  "He won't smell any," laughed Travis; but they had turned away from thegun, and were pausing half-way between the Alamo and the church. Theywere glancing around them as if to take a view of the militarysituation.

  It was quiet enough now, and there was no prophet standing by to tellthem of the future. What their cool judgment now told them as entirelypossible was surely to come. From beside that very gun they were tosee the "Greasers," as they called the soldiers of Santa Anna, comeswarming over the too thinly guarded wall. There, at the left, by thefour-pounder, was Travis to fall across the gun, shot through the head.Here, on the spot where he now stood, was Crockett to go down, fightingto the last and killing as he fell. In the upper corner room of theAlamo, where the conference with Tetzcatl and the chiefs had been held,was Bowie himself to perish, like a wounded lion at bay, the last manin the Alamo.