Chapter 7 - Page 2

captivity amongst the Royalists he could
give them news of people they knew. He described their appearance; and
when he related the story of the battle in which he was recaptured the
two women lamented the blow to their cause and the ruin of their
secret hopes.

He had no feeling either way. But he felt a great devotion for that
young girl. In his desire to appear worthy of her condescension, he
boasted a little of his bodily strength. He had nothing else to boast
of. Because of that quality his comrades treated him with as great a
deference, he explained, as though he had been a sergeant, both in
camp and in battle.

"I could always get as many as I wanted to follow me anywhere,
senorita. I ought to have been made an officer, because I can read and
write."

Behind him the silent old lady fetched a moaning sigh from time to
time; the distracted father muttered to himself, pacing the sala; and
Gaspar Ruiz would raise his eyes now and then to look at the daughter
of these people.

He would look at her with curiosity because she was alive, and also
with that feeling of familiarity and awe with which he had
contemplated in churches the inanimate and powerful statues of the
saints, whose protection is invoked in dangers and difficulties. His
difficulty was very great.

He could not remain hiding in an orchard for ever and ever. He knew
also very well that before he had gone half a day's journey in any
direction, he would be picked up by one of the cavalry patrols
scouring the country, and brought into one or another of the camps
where the patriot army destined for the liberation of Peru was
collected. There he would in the end be recognised as Gaspar Ruiz--
the deserter to the Royalists--and no doubt shot very effectually
this time. There did not seem any place in the world for the innocent
Gaspar Ruiz anywhere. And at this thought his simple soul surrendered
itself to gloom and resentment as black as night.

They had made him a soldier forcibly. He did not mind being a soldier.
And he had been a good soldier as he had been a good son, because of
his docility and his strength. But now there was no use for either.
They had taken him from his parents, and he could no longer be a
soldier--not a good soldier at any rate. Nobody would listen to his
explanations. What injustice it was! What injustice!

And in a mournful murmur he would go over the story of his capture and
recapture for the twentieth time. Then, raising his eyes to the silent
girl in the doorway, "Si, senorita," he would say with a deep sigh,
"injustice has made this poor breath in my body quite worthless to me
and to anybody else. And I do not care who robs me of it."