The Tiger Hunter. Reid Mayne

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      Notwithstanding a liberal use of the spur, his horse could not be induced to depart from a walk. If by a desperate effort he was once or twice forced into a trot it was only to return again to his old gait as soon as the spur was taken from his flanks. The painful exertions of the rider had no other result than to cause the perspiration to flow profusely over his face, rendering it necessary for him every now and then to make use of his pocket-kerchief.

      “Maldito cavallo!” (Good-for-nothing beast!) he exclaimed at intervals as his patience became exhausted; but the horse, fatigued with a long journey, was as insensible to the insults of his rider’s speech as he had been to the strokes of his spur, and moved not a whit the faster.

      Wearied with these idle efforts to increase the speed of the animal, the young traveller turned in his saddle and looked back. His object was to compare the route he had come with that which lay before him – in order to form some calculation as to the distance yet to be travelled before he could reach the other side of the desert plain.

      The observation did not appear to gratify him. On the contrary, his countenance became clouded with a still deeper shade of chagrin; and, abandoning himself to a complete despair, he made no further attempt to urge forward his unwilling roadster, but left the sorry brute to his creeping pace.

      For several hours the traveller kept on his slow course – his spirit alternately exasperated and depressed.

      Mid-day had arrived, and the tropic sun, glaring down vertically from a cloudless sky, was causing a degree of heat almost intolerable. The breeze had ceased to cool the atmosphere; and even the dry leaves of the trees hung motionless from the boughs. At every moment the horse, crawling painfully forward, threatened to become motionless as they.

      Suffering from thirst, and wearied with the journey he had already made, the young traveller at length dismounted, and threw his bridle-rein over the neck of his horse. He had no fear that the animal would take advantage of the freedom thus given him. There was not the slightest danger of its running away.

      Leaving the steed to himself, therefore, the rider walked towards a clump of nopals– in hopes of finding some fruit upon them, by which he might relieve his thirst.

      As good luck would have it, he was not deceived in his expectation. The nopals were in fruit; and having plucked a number of these “Indian figs,” and stripped them of their spinous skins, he was enabled, by swallowing a quantity of the sweetish pulp, to allay in some measure the excessive thirst that had been hitherto torturing him. Thus satisfied, he once more mounted into his saddle, and continued his interrupted journey.

      Chapter Three.

      An Enigma

      After riding several miles farther, he arrived at a small village, situated in the same plain through which he had been journeying. There, as all along the route, he found the houses deserted and abandoned by their owners! Not a soul was to be seen – no one to offer him hospitality; and as nothing could be found in the empty houses – neither food to satisfy his hunger, nor water to quench his thirst – the traveller was compelled to ride on without halting. “Cosa estrana!” muttered he to himself, “what on earth can be the meaning of this complete depopulation?”

      In addition to the desertion of the houses, another odd circumstance had struck his attention. Almost at every hut which he passed, he saw canoes and periaguas suspended from the branches of the trees, and raised many feet above the ground! In a part of the country where there is neither lake nor river – not so much as the tiniest stream – no wonder the sight astonished our traveller, considering that he was a stranger to the district, and had not yet encountered a single individual who might explain the ludicrous phenomenon.

      Just as he was pondering over an explanation of these singularities, a sound fell upon his ear, that produced within him a feeling of joy. It was the hoof-stroke of a horse, breaking upon the profound solitude. It came from behind him; and betokened that some horseman was approaching in his rear, though still invisible on account of a turning in the road, which the young traveller had just doubled.

      In a few seconds’ time the horseman appeared in sight; and galloping freely forward, soon came side by side with our traveller.

      “Santos Dios!” saluted the new-comer, at the same time raising his hand to his hat.

      “Santos Dios!” responded the young man, with a similar gesture.

      The meeting of two travellers in the midst of a profound solitude is always an event, which leads to their regarding one another with a certain degree of curiosity; and such occurred in the present instance.

      He who had just arrived was also a young man – apparently of twenty-four or twenty-five years; and this conformity of age was the only point in which the two travellers resembled each other. The new-comer was somewhat above medium stature, with a figure combining both elegance and strength. His features were regular and well defined; his eyes black and brilliant; his moustache thick and curving, and his complexion deeply embrowned with the sun. All these circumstances tended to show that he was a man of action; while a certain air of energy and command bespoke fiery passions, and the hot Arabian blood, which flows in the veins of many Spanish-Mexican families.

      His horse was a bay-brown, whose slender limbs and sinewy form declared him also to be descended from an oriental race. The ease with which his rider managed him, and his firm graceful seat in the saddle, betokened a horseman of the first quality.

      His costume was both costly and elegant. A vest of unbleached cambric suited well the heat of the climate. His limbs were covered with calzoneros of silk velvet of a bright purple colour; while boots of buff leather, armed with long glancing spurs, encased his feet. A hat of vicuña cloth, with its trimming of gold lace, completed a costume half-military, half-civilian. To strengthen its military character a rapier in a leathern sheath hung from his waist-belt, and a carbine, suspended in front, rested against the pommel of his saddle.

      “Puez, amigo!” said the newly-arrived horseman, after a pause, and glancing significantly at the back of the traveller. “May I ask if you have far to go upon that horse?”

      “No, thank goodness!” replied the other; “only to the hacienda of San Salvador; which, if I’m not mistaken, is scarce six leagues distant.”

      “San Salvador? I think I’ve heard the name. Is it not near to an estate called hacienda of Las Palmas?”

      “Within two leagues of it, I believe.”

      “Ah! then we are following the same route,” said he in the laced cap; “I fear, however,” he continued, checking the ardour of his steed, “that there will soon be some distance between us. Your horse does not appear to be in any particular hurry?”

      The last speech was accompanied by a significant smile.

      “It is quite true,” rejoined the other, also smiling, as he spoke; “and more than once upon my journey I have had reason to blame the mistaken economy of my good father, who, instead of letting me have a proper roadster, has munificently furnished me with a steed that has escaped from the horns of all the bulls of the Valladolid Circus; the consequence of which is, that the poor beast cannot see even a cow on the distant horizon without taking to his heels in the opposite direction.”

      “Carrambo! and do you mean to say you have come all the way from Valladolid on that sorry hack?”

      “Indeed, yes, Señor – only I have been two months on the way.”

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