The Rover of the Andes: A Tale of Adventure on South America. Robert Michael Ballantyne
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as he spoke. She was riding behind with an air of perfect ease and self-possession.
“Fall to the rear, Quashy,” said Pedro.
The black obeyed at once, and a minute later they turned the corner of a jutting rock, which had hitherto shut out from view the lower part of the gorge and the track they were following.
The sight that met their view was calculated to try the strongest nerves, for there, not a hundred paces in advance, and coming towards them, were ten of the most villainous-looking cut-throats that could be imagined, all mounted, and heavily armed with carbine, sword, and pistol.
Taken completely by surprise, the bandits—for such Pedro knew them to be—pulled up. Not so our guide. It was one of the peculiarities and strong points of Pedro’s character that he was never taken by surprise, or uncertain what to do.
Instantly he drew his sword with one hand, a pistol with the other, and, driving his spurs deep into his mule, dashed down the steep road at the banditti. In the very act he looked back, and, in a voice that caused the echoes of the gorge to ring, shouted in Spanish—
“Come on, comrades! here they are at last! close up!”
A yell of the most fiendish excitement and surprise from Quashy—who was only just coming into view—assisted the deception. If anything was wanting to complete the effect, it was the galvanic upheaval of Lawrence’s long arms and the tremendous flourish of his longer legs, as he vaulted over his mule’s head, left it scornfully behind, uttered a roar worthy of an African lion, and rushed forward on foot. He grasped his great cudgel, for sword and pistol had been utterly forgotten!
Like a human avalanche they descended on the foe. That foe did not await the onset. Panic-stricken they turned and went helter-skelter down the pass—all except two, who seemed made of sterner stuff than their fellows, and hesitated.
One of these Pedro rode fairly down, and sent, horse and all, over the precipice. Lawrence’s cudgel beat down the guard of the other, flattened his sombrero, and stopping only at his skull, stretched him on the ground. As for those who had fled, the appalling yells of Quashy, as he pursued them, scattered to the winds any fag-ends of courage they might have possessed, and effectually prevented their return. So tremendous and sudden was the result, that Manuela felt more inclined to laugh than cry, though naturally a good deal frightened.
Lawrence and Pedro were standing in consultation over the fallen bandit when the negro came back panting from the chase.
“Da’s wan good job dooed, anyhow,” he said. “What’s you be do wid him?”
“What would you recommend?” asked Pedro.
The negro pointed significantly to the precipice, but the guide shook his head.
“No, I cannot kill in cold blood, though I have no doubt he richly deserves it. We’ll bind his hands and leave him. It may be weakness on my part, but we can’t take him on, you know.”
While Pedro was in the act of binding the robber, a wild shriek, as of some one in terrible agony, startled them. Looking cautiously over the precipice, where the sound seemed to come from, they saw that the man whom Pedro had ridden down was hanging over the abyss by the boughs of a small shrub. His steed lay mangled on the rocks of the river bank at the bottom. There was an agonised expression in the man’s countenance which would have touched a heart much less soft than that of Lawrence Armstrong. Evidently the man’s power of holding on was nearly exhausted, and he could not repress a shriek at the prospect of the terrible death which seemed so imminent.
Being a practised mountaineer, Lawrence at once, without thought of personal danger, and moved only by pity, slipped over the crags, and, descending on one or two slight projections, the stability of which even a Swiss goat might have questioned, reached the bush. A look of fierce and deadly hate was on the robber’s face, for, judging of others by himself, he thought, no doubt, that his enemy meant to hasten his destruction.
“Here, catch hold—I’ll save you!” cried Lawrence, extending his strong right hand.
A glance of surprise told that he was understood. The bandit let go the hold of one of his hands and made a convulsive grasp at his rescuer. Their fingers touched, but at the same moment the branch gave way, and, with a cry of wild despair, the wretched man went headlong down.
Not, however, to destruction. The effort he had made threw him slightly to one side of the line which his horse had taken in its fall. The difference was very slight indeed, yet it sufficed to send him towards another bush lower down the cliff. Still, the height he had to fall would have ensured the breaking of all his bones if the bush had not hurled him off with a violent rebound.
Lawrence almost felt giddy with horror. Next moment a heavy plunge was heard. The man had fallen into a deep dark pool in the river, which was scarce distinguishable from the cliffs above. Being fringed with bushes, it was impossible to note whether he rose again. Lawrence was still gazing anxiously at the pool, when something touched his cheek. It was a lasso which Pedro had quietly dropped over his shoulders.
“Hold fast to it, senhor, you’ll never get up without it,” he said, in tones so earnest that the youth became suddenly alive to the great danger of his position. In the haste and anxiety of his descent he had failed to note that one or two of the slight projections on which he had placed his feet had broken away, and that therefore a return to the top of the almost perpendicular precipice by the same route was impracticable. Even the slight ledge on which he stood, and from which the little shrub grew, seemed to be crumbling away beneath his great weight. With that feeling of alarm which the sudden and unexpected prospect of instant death brings, we presume, even to the stoutest hearts, Lawrence clutched the line convulsively. He was ignorant at that time of the great strength of the South American lasso, and hesitated to trust his life entirely to it. Pedro guessed his feelings.
“Don’t fear to trust it,” he said, “many a wild bull it has held, four times your size; but wait till Quashy and I get our feet well fixed—we’ll haul you up easily.”
“Have you made the end fast?” cried Lawrence, looking up and encountering the anxious gaze of the Indian maiden.
“Yes, massa, all fast,” answered Quashy, whose look of horror can be more easily imagined than described.
“Hold on, then, and don’t haul.”
The two men obeyed, and the active youth pulled himself up hand over hand, making good use in passing of any hollow or projection that afforded the slightest hold for his toes. At the top he was roughly grasped by his rescuers and dragged into safety.
“Poor fellow!” he exclaimed, on reaching the top.
“Well, massa,” said Quashy, with a broad grin, “das jist w’at I’s agwine to say, but you’s too quick for me.”
“I meant the bandit, not myself,” said Lawrence, looking over the cliff at the pool with an expression of great pity.
“Ha! don’t be uneasy about him,” said Pedro, with a short laugh, as he resumed the binding of the stunned robber. “If he’s killed or drowned he’s well out o’ the way. If he has escaped he’ll be sure to recover and make himself a pest to the neighbourhood for many a day to come.—No, no, my good man, it’s of no use, you needn’t try it.”
The latter part of this speech was in Spanish, and addressed to the robber, who, having recovered consciousness, had made a sudden struggle to shake off his captor. As suddenly he ceased the effort on finding that the strength of the guide was greatly superior to his own.
In another minute Pedro stood up, having bound the bandit’s hands in front of him in a manner that rendered any effort at self-liberation impossible—at least in a short space of time.
“There,” said Pedro to Lawrence, “I’ll warrant him to lead a harmless life until to-morrow at any rate.”
As he spoke he drew the man’s pistols, knife, and carbine, and handed them to Quashy.
“There,” he said, “you may find these useful.”
Meanwhile the robber lay quietly on his back, glancing