an american outlaw by john stonehouse

About the beginning of the year eighteen hundred and ninety-eight, there had been aroused in the hearts of the people of the United States a strong feeling of pity and compassion toward the inhabitants of the Island of Cuba who were under the ironshod heel of Spain and who had made many appeals for help to our own government in one way and in another.

The time was ripe for a revolution among the dark-skinned populace of the large cities of the Island Empire and many confusing circumstances combined to add to the confusion of sentiments entertained toward the government by those who suffered from its rulings.

Many indignities had been heaped upon the Cubans by those who claimed to represent the young King Alfonso XIII, who, in his far-away palace in old Madrid was as unconscious of what was done in his name, very many times, as he would have disapproved of it had he known it.

The young King and his mother, the Queen regent, tried, in every way within their power, to adjust matters amicably between their rebellious subjects and those whom they had sent across the sea to govern them, but they found this a very difficult matter indeed, and between the fiery tempers of the natives and the over-bearing arrogance of the officers who represented them, the poor crowned heads of sunny Spain certainly had a pretty hard time of it.

The Queen mother was naturally a gentle and a very highly educated and studious woman, while the boy King was as far from being the typical idea of a reigning tyrant as a handsome, well-trained young fellow could well be.

But those who represented these two crowned heads were of quite another pattern as to character and disposition and many were the cruelties charged to the account of certain ones among their number due to the opportunities afforded them of gratifying their lowest impulses and following along the paths that led, for the time being, into what seemed to them to be very pleasant pastures and beside very still waters, which, as is well known, often, besides being still, run deep.

One evening, just as dusk was falling over the little town of San Domingo, there appeared, passing along one of the quiet, shadowy narrow streets, a rather strange procession ... well in advance of the rest of the motley company appeared a village Priest bearing in his hand a crucifix which he held before him as if to fend off something evil ... he was dressed, as is the custom of the Catholic Priests of Cuba, in the flowing vestments of his office and the long cord that was knotted round his ample waist had a huge cross dangling from the end of it which struck against his well-formed legs as he strode along with head held high as if he saw beyond the things of earth and gazed upon some beatific vision which upheld him and lifted him above his immediate environment.

Indeed, there was one who walked beside him though he, himself, was unaware of it, except subconsciously, for Father Felix, as this Priest was known, was wandering among strange thoughts as he passed along that almost silent little street, that one sad evening.

He had been, for many peaceful years, the Priest who had officiated at almost all the public meetings of the village, but, never in his life devoted, as it was to the consideration of holy, high and spiritual matters, had he been called upon to conduct so weird a service as he was, then, about to do.

He wondered, as he marched along, whether he was doing just exactly right in leading these, his simple-minded followers, into what it seemed to them they must do, that night ... he wondered whether, even now, he would not better turn to those who followed after him and call to them to halt and to consider well before they took another single step that might, each one of them, be an irrevocable and a much-to-be-regretted step, for it might lead to what they could not know of ways that might, as well as not, prove very winding and even thorn-strewn ways for those who followed along them. And Father Felix knew that he, alone of all that little company, was gifted with the power to reason out a fair and just conclusion from the premises presented to them all; he knew that he alone had enough of education to even understand the meaning of the words that had been spoken to them all ... he knew that those who came along that little street behind him had trusted to him most implicitly, for many years, in matters that required thought, and, although they had been the ones to beg him to take the step that they were then about to take, he knew that, even then, right at the last, had he been minded to, he might, yet, turn their minds away from what they seemed to be so set upon.

He knew that, if he wished to do so, he could make them see the matter under their consideration in quite another light from what they saw it in at that time ... he knew that he could bend their wills to make them match with his own will for he had done this very many times before ... he was a natural leader, and being well equipped for leadership, he took that place as if it were his natural right ... and so it seemed to be.

Any stranger, glancing along the line of human beings that followed Father Felix and his upheld crucifix, would have noticed many weak and vacillating faces ... many weak and vacillating wills as evidenced by the expressions on those weak and vacillating faces ... many wills that could be bent by anyone who had a strong and capable and domineering mind, and Father Felix had a mind like that ... a natural leader's most commanding mind ... he was a man to win respect wherever he might go ... a man to dominate the wills of those about him ... a man to lead the crowd ... a man to guide the minds of those he met, and, after having occupied the one place in the village that commanded the respect of all, for long, of course they looked to him for guidance and followed where he led as little children follow after the one full-grown human being in their midst.

But, as they marched along, full many whispers ran along that motley little company and gave some prescience of the clamor that would come if all their bridled tongues should really become loose again, for, now, they only spoke in whispers dreading discovery of what they were about to do by some of those against whose orders they were doing it.

"I wonder what the Governor would say if he could know the thing that we're about to do," a beardless youth began, as he edged a little nearer to his mother's side, "I wonder what would happen to us, now, if he discovered our intention."

The mother only put her finger on her lips and shook her head at him, but, later on, when they had gone a little further on their journey, she whispered to him:

"I hope the Governor will never know who did what we're about to do, at least, for, if he should discover which of us accomplished the purpose that all the villagers are interested in, we would suffer for our temerity in doing this ... I almost wish we had not joined this mob, my boy ... I almost wish, at least, that I had left you home to mind the house while I will be away from it," and, then, she ended, sadly, "God knows if we shall ever be allowed to see our home again."

There was one who walked among that little company, that evening, who was not as the rest in very many ways, and, yet, her lot was cast in with the rest for she had lived in that small village since her infancy, and, so, it seemed to her and them as well, that she was one of them and, so, must be among them even then, when they were casting in their lots, at Father Felix' instigation, with the ones who so violently opposed the reigning powers that they were held, then, and had been so held, for many weary months, as incommunicado in the village jail or prison in the wide and beautiful and picturesque great prado in the very centre of the town.

The girl who, in very many ways, was different from all the rest was walking in the very centre of the little crowd and, as the others jostled against her, her great blue eyes stared almost vacantly, as it seemed, around her like a startled fawn's when something unknown ventures near to its retreat within its native forest.

She drew her slender figure up to its full height, and she was taller than the rest of those who walked beside her, when someone whispered to her:

"What think you of all this, Estrella? Is it to your taste to be a part of those who, in their puny strength, contend against the strong? Do you think that you'll enjoy the future that we are advancing to? What do you think will happen to us when we reach the prado, anyway? Do you think the Governor has found out what we are going to do and if he does what action will he take? I'm more than half afraid myself ... I don't deny that I'm afraid ... how do you feel about it all?"

"I don't believe I know just how I do feel, Tessa," said the taller girl, "I think that I'm afraid, too ... I know my knees are trembling a very little, so I must be scared the same as you say you are. Let us keep as close together as we can, so, if anything happens to one it will be sure to happen to us both ... it seems to me ..." she ended, dreamily, "that even death itself could not be much worse than the things that we've endured just lately, here."

And then the two young creatures shuddered at the very thought of death and huddled just as close together as they could and marched along among the rest as quietly as if they had not been afraid of anything at all.