Jules Verne (36 page)

"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.

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!"