* * * * *
* * * * *
At about six the next morning Pete Holloway woke up. He opened his eyes, groaned deeply, and closed them again.
"How are you feeling, Pete?" said I.
Pete groaned again, for memory of all that had passed came to him. With a tremendous effort he said--
"I'm dyin'!"
And he looked it.
In Miss Parkinson's bower, Jimmie Barker was saying faintly: "Kiss me good-bye, Edna; the hour has come!"
Shortly before, Mamie had whispered to Dan: "Darling, can you forgive me?" And he had replied fervently: "Mame, if Jack Rice kin make you happy, you take him."
Greiffenhagen had tried to administer more medicine. The boys refused to touch it. Pete expressed the feelings of the others when he muttered: "I ain't goin' to cross the Jordan drunk!"
It seemed to me that the three men were sinking. Mrs. Greiffenhagen, an impassioned pessimist, was of opinion that they couldn't last another hour!
At nine, when our nerves had been strained to breaking-point, Ajax and a big-bearded stranger galloped up to Greiffenhagen's house.
"It's Doc. Elkins, of San Lorenzy," said a hired man.
"The boys are sinking!" sobbed Mrs. Greiffenhagen. "Where is the Professor?"
"I left him in San Lorenzo."
Elkins and Ajax rushed upstairs and into the Greiffenhagen bedroom. Elkins glanced at Pete, felt his pulse, and then said deliberately--
"My man, you're dying of sheer funk! You've poisoned yourself with nothing more deadly than good Kentucky whisky! In six hours you'll be perfectly well again."
Pete heard, and pulled himself together. It struck him that this was not the first time that he had felt nearly dead after imbibing much whisky.
"But the Perfessor?" he asked feebly.
"Professor Adam Chawner," said Elkins in a clear voice, "is in a strait-waistcoat at the County Hospital. He will get over this, but not so quickly as you will. He is quite mad for the moment about a deadly microbe which only exists in his imagination."
The partitions in most Californian houses are indecently thin. As Elkins's voice died away--and Pete said afterwards it was like a strain of heavenly music--a feeble cheer was heard from the chamber usually occupied by Miss Mary Willing.
"Jimmie," cried Dan, "air you dead yet?"
"Not quite," came an attenuated whisper from the other side of the passage.
"We'll live to be married, old socks," continued Dan in a robuster voice, "but I've got the worst dose o' prickly heat you ever saw."
The following day our three friends were riding the range. Six months afterwards, Professor Adam Chawner resumed his work at the Smithsonian Institute.
XIITHE BABE
XII
THE BABE
One of the Britishers who came to Paradise was an Irishman, the son of an archdeacon with a large family and a small income. He was a strapping fellow, strong and sturdy as a camel--and quite as obstinate. He always spoke affectionately of his people, but I fancy they were not deeply grieved when he left England. I dare say he was troublesome at home; you know what that means. However, he was warmly welcomed in Paradise, for he brought with him two hundred pounds in cash, and a disposition to spend it as quickly as possible. Ajax christened him The Babe, because he had a milk-and-roses complexion, and a babe's capacity for, and love of, liquid refreshment. Perhaps the archdeacon thought that the West was a sort of kindergarten, where children like The Babe are given, at small expense, object-lessons and exercises peculiarly adapted to young and plastic minds. In Central America certain tribes living by the seaboard throw their children into the surf, wherein they sink or learn to swim, as the Fates decree. Some sink.
When The Babe's two hundred pounds were spent, he came to us and asked for a job. He said, I remember, that he was the son of an archdeacon, and that he could trust us to bear that in mind. We were so impressed by his guileless face and cock-a-hoop assurance, that we had not the heart to turn him away.
At the end of a fortnight Ajax took pencil and paper, and computed what The Babe had cost us. He had staked a valuable horse; he had smashed a patent reaper; he had set fire to the ranch, and burnt up five hundred acres of bunch grass; and he had turned some of our quiet domestic cows into wild beasts, because--as he put it--he wished to become a vaquero. He said that the billet of foreman would just suit his father's son.
"The equivalent of what The Babe has destroyed," said my brother Ajax, "if put out at compound interest, five per cent., would in a hundred years amount to more than fifty thousand pounds."
"I'm awfully sorry," murmured The Babe.
"I fear," observed Ajax to me later, "that we cannot afford to nurse this infant."
I was of the same opinion; so The Babe departed, and for a season we saw his chubby face no more. Then one day, like a bolt from the blue, came an unstamped letter from San Francisco. The Babe wrote to ask for money. Such letters, as a rule, may be left unanswered, but not always. Ajax and I read The Babe's ill-written lines, and filled in the gaps in the text. Connoted and collated, it became a manuscript of extraordinary interest and significance. We inferred that if the sum demanded were not sent, the writer might be constrained to cast himself as rubbish to the void. Now The Babe had his little failings, but cowardice was not one of them. Indeed, his physical courage redeemed in a sense his moral and intellectual weakness.
"There is only one thing to do," said Ajax; "we must rescue The Babe. We'll spin a dollar to determine who goes to the city to-morrow morning."
I nodded, for I was smelling the letter; the taint of opium was on it.
"Awful--isn't it?" murmured Ajax. "Do you remember those loathsome dens in Chinatown? And the creatures on the mats, and in the bunks! And that missionary chap, who said how hard it was to reclaim them. Poor Babe!"
Then we filled our pipes and smoked them slowly. We had plenty to think about, for rescuing an opium-fiend is no easy job, and reclaiming him afterwards is as hard again. But The Babe's blue eyes and his pink skin--what did they look like now?--were pleading on his behalf, and we remembered that he had played in his school eleven, and could run a quarter-mile in fifty-eight seconds, and was always cheery and good-tempered. The woods of the Colonies and the West are full of such Babes; and they all like to play with edged tools.
Next day we both went north. Ajax said that two heads were better than one, and that it was not wise to trust oneself alone in the stews of San Francisco. The police will not tell you how many white men are annually lost in those festering alleys that lie north of Kearney Street, but if you are interested in such matters, I can refer you to a certain grim-faced guide, who has spent nearly twenty years in Chinatown, and you can implicitly believe one quarter of what he says: that quarter will strain your credulity not a little.
We walked to the address given in the letter--a low dive--not a stone's-throw from one of the biggest hotels west of the Rocky Mountains. The man behind the bar said that he knew The Babe well, that he was a perfect gentleman, and a personal friend of his. The fellow's glassy eyes and his grey-green skin told their own story. A more villainous or crafty-looking scoundrel it has been my good fortune not to see.
"Where is your friend?" said Ajax.
The man behind the bar protested ignorance. Then my brother laid a five-dollar gold piece upon the country, and repeated the question. The man's yellow fingers began to tremble. Gold to him was opium, and opium held all his world and the glory thereof.
"I can't take you to him--now," he muttered sullenly.
"You can," replied Ajax, "and you must."
The man glared at us. Doubtless he guessed the nature of our errand, and wished to protect his friend from the interference of Philistines, Then he smiled evilly, and laughed.
"All right; come on. I ain't goin' to take yer to the Palace Hotel."
He opened the till and slipped some money into his pocket. Then he put on a ragged overcoat, and a hat which he drew down over his eyes with a furtive jerk of his yellow fingers. Then he went behind the bar and swallowed something; it was not whisky, but it brought a faint tinge of colour into his cheek, and seemed to stiffen his knees.
"Shall we walk, boys, or shall I send for my carriage?"
"Your carriage," repeated Ajax. "Are you speaking of the patrol- waggon? It is just round the corner."
This allusion to the police was not wasted upon The Babe's friend, who scowled and retorted glibly--
"There's better men than you, mister, who ride in that."
After this exchange of pleasantries we took the road, and followed our guide across a great thorough-fare and into Kearney Street. Thence into the labyrinth of Chinatown.
"Think ye could find yer way out of this?" asked our guide presently.
We had passed through an abominable rookery, and were walking down a narrow alley, seemingly deserted. Yet I was sensible that eyes were furtively watching us from behind barred windows, and I fancied that I heard whispers--mere guttural sounds, that conveyed nothing to the ear, save, perhaps, a warning that we were on unholy ground. The path we trod was foul with refuse; the stench was sickening; the most forlorn cur would surely have slunk from such a kennel; and here,here, to this lazar-house of all that was unclean and infamous, came of his own free-will--The Babe!
"My God!" exclaimed Ajax, in reply. "How can any man find his wayintoit? And, hark ye, my friend, for reasons that we won't trouble you with, we have not asked the police to accompany us, but if we are not back at our hotel in two hours' time, the clerk has instructions to send a constable to your saloon."
"Here we air," said our guide. "Duck yer heads."
We stooped beneath a low arch, and entered a dark passage. At the end was a rickety staircase; and already we could smell the pungent fumes of the opium, and taste its bitterness. As I groped my way down the stairs I was conscious of an uncanny silence, a silence eloquent of a sleep that is as death, a sleep that always ends in death. It was easy to conceive death as a hideous personality lurking at the bottom of those rotten stairs, waiting patiently for his victims; not constrained to go abroad for them, knowing that they were creeping to him, creeping and crawling, unassoiled by priest, hindered by no physician, unredeemed by love, deaf, and blind, and dumb!
* * * * *
* * * * *
At the foot of the stairs was another passage, darker and filthier than the one above; the walls were streaming with moisture, and the atmosphere almost unendurable. At that time the traffic in opium was receiving the serious attention of the authorities. Certain scandalous cases of bribery at the Custom House had stirred the public mind, and the police were instructed to raid all opium dens, and arrest whomsoever might be found in them. The devotees of the "pipe" were accordingly compelled to lie snug in places without the pale of police supervision: and this awful den was one of them.It was now so dark that I could barely distinguish the outlines of our guide, who walked ahead of me. Suddenly he stopped and asked me if I had any matches. I handed him my box, which he dropped, and the matches were scattered about in the mud at our feet. He gave me back my box, and asked Ajax for his matches. I dare say older and wiser men would have apprehended mischief, but we were still in our salad days. Ajax gave up his box without a protest; the man struck a match, after some fumbling lit a piece of candle, and returned to my brother his box. It was empty--for he had cleverly transferred the matches to his own pocket--but we did not know that then. By the light of the candle I was able to take stock of my surroundings. We were facing a stout door: a door that without doubt had been constructed for purposes of defence, and upon the centre of this our guide tapped softly--three times. It opened at once, revealing the big body of a Celestial, evidently the Cerberus of the establishment. Upon his fat impassive face lay the seal of an unctuous secrecy, nothing more. Out of his obliquely-set eyes he regarded us indifferently, but he nodded to our guide, who returned the salutation with a sly laugh. For some inexplicable reason that laugh fired my suspicions. It was--so to speak--an open sesame to a chamber of horrors, the more horrible because intangible and indescribable. Ajax said afterwards that he was similarly affected. The contagion of fear is a very remarkable thing, and one little understood by the physiologists. I remember I put my hand into my pocket, because it began to tremble, and I was ashamed of it. And then, as I still stared at the fat Chinaman, his smooth mask seemed to drop from his face, and treachery, cunning, greed, hatred of the "white devil" were revealed to me.
At the foot of the stairs was another passage, darker and filthier than the one above; the walls were streaming with moisture, and the atmosphere almost unendurable. At that time the traffic in opium was receiving the serious attention of the authorities. Certain scandalous cases of bribery at the Custom House had stirred the public mind, and the police were instructed to raid all opium dens, and arrest whomsoever might be found in them. The devotees of the "pipe" were accordingly compelled to lie snug in places without the pale of police supervision: and this awful den was one of them.
It was now so dark that I could barely distinguish the outlines of our guide, who walked ahead of me. Suddenly he stopped and asked me if I had any matches. I handed him my box, which he dropped, and the matches were scattered about in the mud at our feet. He gave me back my box, and asked Ajax for his matches. I dare say older and wiser men would have apprehended mischief, but we were still in our salad days. Ajax gave up his box without a protest; the man struck a match, after some fumbling lit a piece of candle, and returned to my brother his box. It was empty--for he had cleverly transferred the matches to his own pocket--but we did not know that then. By the light of the candle I was able to take stock of my surroundings. We were facing a stout door: a door that without doubt had been constructed for purposes of defence, and upon the centre of this our guide tapped softly--three times. It opened at once, revealing the big body of a Celestial, evidently the Cerberus of the establishment. Upon his fat impassive face lay the seal of an unctuous secrecy, nothing more. Out of his obliquely-set eyes he regarded us indifferently, but he nodded to our guide, who returned the salutation with a sly laugh. For some inexplicable reason that laugh fired my suspicions. It was--so to speak--an open sesame to a chamber of horrors, the more horrible because intangible and indescribable. Ajax said afterwards that he was similarly affected. The contagion of fear is a very remarkable thing, and one little understood by the physiologists. I remember I put my hand into my pocket, because it began to tremble, and I was ashamed of it. And then, as I still stared at the fat Chinaman, his smooth mask seemed to drop from his face, and treachery, cunning, greed, hatred of the "white devil" were revealed to me.
I was now convinced we had come on a fool's errand that was like to end evilly for us, but, being a fool, I held my peace and said nothing to Ajax, who confessed later that if I had spoken he would have seconded a motion to retreat. We advanced, sensible that we were being trapped: a psychological fact not without interest.
Opposite the door through which we had just passed was another door as stout as the first. The Chinaman unlocked this with a small key, and allowed us to enter, the guide with the candle leading the way. And then, in a jiffy, before we had time to glance round us, the candle was extinguished; the door was closed; we heard the click of a patent lock; and we knew that we were alone and in darkness.
The first thing that Ajax said, and his voice was not pleasant to hear, was: "This serves us right. Of all the confounded fools who meddle with what does not concern them, we are the greatest."
Then I heard him fumbling for his matchbox, and then, when he discovered that it was empty, he made some more remarks not flattering to himself or me. I was more frightened than angry; with him rage and disgust were paramount.
We stood there in that squalid darkness for about a hundred years (it was really ten minutes), and then the voice of our guide seemed to float to us, as if from an immeasurable distance.
"Boys," he said. "How air ye makin' it?"
Ajax answered him quite coolly--
"What do you want? Our money of course. What else?"
The fellow did not reply at once. These opium fiends have no bowels of compassion. He was doubtless chuckling to himself at his own guile. When he did speak, the malice behind his words lent them point.
"Your money? The five you gave me'll keep me a week, and after that I'll come for more."
With that the voice died away, and Ajax muttered: "It looks to me as if this were a case of putting up the shutters."
We had forgotten all about The Babe, which is not surprising under the circumstances.
"Puttingupthe shutters? Pulling them down, you mean! there must be a window of sorts in this room."
But after careful search we came to the conclusion that we were directly under the road-bed, and that the only opening of any kind was the door through which we had passed. I thought of that door and the face of the man behind it. For what purpose save robbery and murder was such a room designed? I could not confront the certainty of violence with a jest, as Ajax did, but I was of his opinion otherwise expressed: we had been trapped like rats in a blind drain, and would be knocked on the head--presently.
The uncertainty began to gnaw at our vitals. We did not speak, for darkness is the twin of silence, but our thoughts ran riot. I remember that I almost screamed when Ajax laid his hand on my shoulder, and yet I knew that he was standing by my side.
"I shall try the heathen Chinee," he whispered. So we felt our way to the door and tapped three times, very softly, on the centre panel. To the Oriental mind those taps spell bribery, but the door remained shut.
"What have you been thinking about?" said Ajax, after another silence.
"My God--don't ask me."
"Brace up!" said my brother. I confess that he has steadier nerves than mine, but then, you see, he has not my imagination. I put my hand into his, and the grip he gave me was reassuring. I reflected that men built upon the lines of Ajax are not easily knocked on the head.
"It's a tight place," he continued. "But we've been in tight places before, although none that smells as close as this infernal hole. Now listen: I'm prepared to lay odds that The Babe is not an opium fiend at all, and has never been near this den. He wrote that letter at the saloon, didn't he? And ten to one he borrowed the paper from the bar- tender. That's why it smelled of opium. The handwriting was very shaky. Why? because The Babe was only half alive after a prolonged spree. That accounted for the tone of the letter. The Babe was thinking of the parsonage, and his mother's knee, and all that. You follow me--eh? Now then, I think it barely possible that instead of our rescuing The Babe, he will rescue us. We got in late last night, but our names were chronicled in the morning papers, for I saw them there. If The Babe sees a paper he will go to our hotel, and----"
"If we're hanging by that thread to eternity, God help us," I replied bitterly, for the grim humour of my brother's speech chilled my marrow.
"Itisa slim chance, but--hang it--a slim chance is better than none."
So we hugged that sorry comfort to our hearts and fell again into silence.
* * * * *
* * * * *
I remember that the folly, the fatuity of what we had done, oppressed me like an iron band around the skull. Common sense told me that the man who had decoyed us into Chinatown would not be satisfied with robbery. And what were the lives of two "white devils" to the owner of this den? Suffered to escape, we might inform the police. The logical conclusion of my reflections is not worth recording.
"When that scoundrel emptied the till into his pocket he made up his mind there and then never to come back," said Ajax in my ear. His thoughts had been travelling along the same lines as mine, and at about the same pace. I was convinced of this when he added slowly: "Starvation may be their game. It would be the safest to play."
Then the mad, riotous desire to fight got hold of both of us. We began to search for a weapon: anything--a stick, a stone, a bit of iron. But we found nothing.
We had never carried pistols, and our pocket knives were hardly keen or strong enough to sharpen a pencil.
Despair was again gripping me when Ajax touched my arm. We had examined the filthy floor of the room very systematically, kneeling side by side in the darkness and groping with eager fingers in the dirty sand, for there was no floor.
"I have something," he murmured. Then he seized my right hand in his left and guided it to some solid object lying deep in the sand.
The object proved to be a log. San Francisco is built on sand dunes, and in early days the houses were log-cabins for the most part, constructed of logs that two stout men could handle. After many minutes of silent but most vigorous excavation we joyfully decided that one of these very logs had come into our possession.
We worked steadily for about half an hour, pausing now and again to listen. We were practically certain that the opium fiend had gone to his pipe, and it was more than probable that the fat Mongol was no longer on guard, knowing that we were safe in a strong-box to which he alone held the key. Events proved we were wrong in both conjectures.
When the log was ready for use as a battering-ram we held a council of war, which lasted about half a minute. If there is obviously only one thing to be done, the sooner it is done the better. I grasped the forward end of our weapon, Ajax, being the heavier, took the other, and we charged that door with such hearty goodwill that at the first assault it yielded, lock and hinges being torn from the woodwork, and the door itself falling flat with a crash like the crack o' doom. Ajax, the log, and I rolled into the next room, and as we were grovelling on the floor I saw that the room was full of Chinamen, and that our late guide was in the middle of them. The light was so bad that I was unable to see more than this. It was plain that we had to deal with an organised gang of criminals. Thugs who practised their trade as a fine art. Despite all proverbs the foreseen is what generally happens; and our amazing advent in their midst created a sort of panic whereby we took advantage. The Celestials carried knives, but they dared not use them, because the light was so dim and the room so crowded. The first thing that I saw when I scrambled to my feet was the fat dull face of the guard shining like a harvest moon, and presenting a mark for my fist as round and big as a punching-bag. I hit him once--and that was enough. Then I began to hear the measured thud of my brother's blows, the blows of a workman who knows how to strike and where to strike.
At first they took their medicine without a whimper. Then they began to squeal and chatter as the fear of the "white devils" got hold of them. Very soon I saw "red," as our Tommies say, and remembered nothing till I came to myself in the passage at the foot of the rotten stairs. We scurried up these and through the warren above like rabbits when the pole-cat pursueth, and finally found ourselves in the alley, where we called a halt.
"By Jove!" said Ajax, "that was a ruction."
I looked at him and burst out laughing: then he looked at me and laughed louder than I. Our clothes were in rags; our faces were red and black with blood and grime; every bone and sinew and muscle in our bodies ached and ached from the strain of strife.
"It is not time to laugh yet," said my brother; and we ran on down the alley, out into a small by-street, and straight into the arms of a policeman, who promptly arrested us.
* * * * *
* * * * *
The rest of the story was in the newspapers next day, although there was no mention of our names. When the police reached the battlefield they found one dead man--the opium-eating and smoking bar-tender. He had died--so said the doctor--of heart failure. Few whites can smoke the "pipe" with impunity, and he was not of their number. The wounded had been carried away, and, despite the strenuous endeavours of the police, not one was arrested, which proves that there is honour amongst these yellow-faced thieves, for a handful of gold-pieces and "no questions asked" was well known in Chinatown to be the price offered for any information that would lead to the capture of one or more of the gang.
When we reached our hotel we found The Babe patiently awaiting us. His complexion was slightly the worse for wear, but his eyes were as blue as ever and almost as guileless. How wide they opened when he listened to our story! How indignant he waxed when he learned that we had condemned him, the son of an archdeacon, as an opium fiend. However, he was very penitent, and returned with us to the ranch, where he dug post-holes for a couple of months, and behaved like a model babe. Ajax wrote to the archdeacon, and in due season The Babe returned to England, where he wisely enlisted as a trooper in a smart cavalry regiment, a corps that his grandfather had commanded. The pipeclay was in his marrow, and he became in time rough-riding sergeant of the regiment. I am told that soon he will be offered a commission.
This story contains two morals: both so obvious that they need not be recorded.
XIIITHE BARON
XIII
THE BARON
Of the many queer characters who took up land in the brush hills near our ranch none excited greater tongue-wagging than the Baron. The squatters called him the Baron. He signed his name--I had to witness his signature--Réné Bourgueil.
The Baron built himself a bungalow on a small hill overlooking a pretty lake which dried up in summer and smelled evilly. Also, he spent money in planting out a vineyard and orchard, and in making a garden. What he did not know about ranching in Southern California would have filled an encyclopaedia, but what he did know about nearly everything else filled us and our neighbours with an ever-increasing amazement and curiosity.
Why did such a man bury himself in the brush hills of San Lorenzo County?
More, he was past middle-age: sixty-five at least, not a sportsman, nor a naturalist, but obviously agentilhomme, with the manners of one accustomed to the best society.
Of society, however, he spoke mordant words--
"Soziety in Europe, to-day," he said to me, shortly after his arrival, "ees a big monkey-house, and all ze monkeys are pulling each ozer's tails. I pull no tails,moi, and I allow no liberties to be taken wiz my person."
About a month later the Baron was dining with us, and I reminded him of what he had said. He laughed, shrugging his shoulders.
"Mon cher, ze monkeys in your backwoods are more--diable!--moch more aggr-r-ressive zan ze monkeys in ze old world."
"They pull tails there," said Ajax, "but here they pull legs as well-- eh?"
The Baron smiled ruefully, sticking out a slender, delicately formed foot and ankle.
"Yes," he said thoughtfully, "old man Dumble, he pull my leg."
The Dumbles were neighbours of the Baron, and their sterile acres marched with his. John Jacob Dumble's word might be as good or better than his bond, but neither was taken at par. It was said of him that he preferred to take cash for telling a lie rather than credit for telling the truth. Dumble, as we knew, had sold the Baron one horse and saddle, one Frisian-Holstein cow, and an incubator. The saddle gave the horse a sore back, the horse fell down and broke its knees, the cow dried up in a fortnight, and the incubator cooked eggs to perfection, but it wouldn't incubate them.
"I use it as a stove," said the Baron.
Next summer, when the pretty lake dried up and began to smell, we advised the Baron to take a holiday. We told him of pleasant, hospitable people in San Francisco, in Menlo, and at Del Monte, who would be charmed to make his acquaintance.
"San Francisco?Jamais, jamais de la vie!"
"Come with us to Del Monte?"
"Del Monte?"
We explained that Del Monte was a huge hotel standing in lovely gardens which ran down to the sea.
"Jamais--jamais," repeated the Baron.
"We don't like to leave you at the mercy of John Jacob Dumble," said Ajax.
"You have right. I make not harmony wiz ze old man Dumble."
We went home sorely puzzled. Obviously the Baron had private reasons, and strong ones, for keeping out of San Francisco and Del Monte. And it was significant--as Ajax said to me--that a man who could talk so admirably upon art, politics, and literature never spoke a word concerning himself.
At Del Monte we happened to meet the French Consul. From him we learned that there was a certain Réné, Comte de Bourgueil-Crotanoy. The Château Bourgueil-Crotanoy in Morbihan is nearly as famous as Chaumont or Chénonceau. The Consul possessed anAlmanack de Gotha. From this we gleaned two more facts. Réné, Comte de Bourgueil, had two sons, and no kinsmen whatever.
"Your man," said the Consul discreetly, "must be somebody--you say he issomebody--well, somebody else!"
"Another Wilkins," said I.
"Pooh!" ejaculated Ajax.
"No Frenchman of the Comte de Bourgueil's position and rank--he is a godson, you know, of the Comte de Chambord--would come to California without my knowledge," said the Consul.
The day after our return to the ranch we rode over to see how the Baron fared. We found him in a tent pitched as far as possible from the evil-smelling lake. Passing the bungalow, we had noted that six weeks' uninterrupted sunshine had played havoc with the Baron's garden. The man himself, moreover, seemed to have wilted. The sun had sucked the colour from his eyes and cheeks. Of a sudden, old age had overtaken him.
He greeted us with his usual courtesy, and asked if we had enjoyed our holiday. We told him many things about Del Monte, but we didn't mention the French Consul. Then, in our turn, we begged for such news as he might have. He replied solemnly--
"I speak no more wiz ze Dumbles. Old man Dumble ees a fraud.Moi, I abominate frauds--hein?He obtain my money onder false pretences, is it not so? Ah, yes; but I forgive 'im, because he is poor. But also, since you go, he obtain my secret--I haf a secret-- under false pretences. Oh, zecanaille! I tell 'im that if 'e were my equal I would wiz my sword s-spit 'im. Because 'e iscanailleI s-s-spit at 'im.Voilà!"
The old fellow was trembling with rage and indignation. Ajax said gravely--
"We foreigners mustn't spit at free-born American citizens. What spitting is done here, they do themselves."
"You have right. Zecanaillesay to me, tome, 'Come,' he say, 'come, Baron, I have one six-shooter, one shot-gun, two pitchfork, three spade, and one mowing-machine. Take your choice,' he say, 'and we can fight till ze cows come home!' He use zose words,mes amis, 'till ze cows come home!'Tiens!Ze Frisian- Holstein cows, who go dry when zey do come home--hein?"
He was so furiously angry that we dared not laugh, but we were consumed with curiosity to know what secret Dumble had stolen. The Baron did not inform us.
Fortunately for our peace of mind, Dumble came to us early next morning. He went to the marrow of the matter at once.
"Boys," said he, "I want you to fix up things between me an' that crazy Frenchman. How's that? Your friend. Wal, heisa Frenchy, an' he's crazy, as I'm prepared to prove. But I don't want no trouble with him. He's my neighbour, and there ought to be nothin' between me an' him."
"There'll always be a barbed wire fence," said Ajax.
"Boys, when that ther' pond o' the Baron's tuk to smellin' like dead cats, he come to me and asks me to find someone to take keer o' the bungalow. I undertook the job myself. I was to water them foreign plants o' his, do odd chores, and sleep in the house nights. He offered good pay, and I got a few dollars on account. I aimed to treat the Baron right, as I treat all my neighbours. I meant to do more, more than was agreed on. That's the right sperit--ain't it? Yas. An' so, when I found out that there was a room in that ther' bungalow locked up, by mistake as I presoomed, and that the key o' the little parlour opened it, why, naterally, boys, I jest peaked in to see if everything was O.K. As for pryin' and spyin', why sech an idee never entered my head. Wal, I peaked in an' I saw----"
"Hold on," said Ajax. "What you saw is something which the Baron wished to be kept secret."
"I reckon so, though why in thunder----"
"Then keep it secret----"
"But, mercy sakes! I saw nothing, not a thing, boys, save two picters and a few old sticks of furniture. An' seeing that things was O.K., I shet the door, but doggone it! the cussed key wouldn't lock it. Nex' morning the Baron found it open, and, Jeeroosalem! I never seen a man git so mad."
"And that's all?"
"That's all, but me an' the Baron ain't speakin'."
We promised to do what we could, more, it must be confessed, on the Baron's account than for the sake of old man Dumble. Accordingly, we tried to persuade the Baron that his secret at any rate was still inviolate. He listened incredulously.
"He says he saw nothing--but some pictures and old furniture."
"Mon Dieu!an' zey tell 'im nossing.Saperlipopette!Come wiz me. I can trust you. You shall know my secret, too."
We followed him in silence up the path which led to the bungalow, and into the house. The Baron unlocked a door and unbolted some shutters. We saw two portraits, splendid portraits of two handsome young men in uniform. Above the mantelpiece hung an emblazoned pedigree: the family tree of the Bourgueil-Crotanoy, peers of France. The Baron laid a lean finger upon one of the names.
"I am Réné de Bourgueil-Crotanoy," he said.
We waited. When he spoke again his voice had changed. It was the voice of a very old man, tired out, indifferent, poignantly feeble.
"My boys," said he, indicating the two young men, "zey are dead; no one of ze old Bourgueil-Crotanoy is left except me--and I, as you see, am half dead. Perhaps I was too proud; my confessor tell me so, always. I was--I am still--proud of my race, of my château. I was not permitted to serve Republican France, but I gave her my boys. They went to Tonquin; I remained at home, thinking of ze day when zey would return, and marry, and give me handsome grandchildren. Zey did--not-- return. Zey died. One in battle, one of fever in ze hospital. What was left for me,mes amis? Could I live on in ze place where I had seen my children and my children's children? No. Could I meet in Paris ze pitying eyes of friends?"
* * * * *
* * * * *
Years afterwards, Ajax and I found ourselves in Morbihan. We paid a pilgrimage to the Château de Bourgueil-Crotanoy, and entered the chapel where the last of the Bourgueil-Crotanoy is buried. A mural tablet records the names, and the manner of death, of the two sons. Also a line in Latin:
"'Tis better to die young than to live on to behold the misfortunes and emptiness of an ancient house."
XIVJIM'S PUP
XIV
JIM'S PUP
Jim Misterton was a quiet, reserved fellow, who had come straight to Paradise from a desk in some dingy London counting-house. He told us that something was wrong with his lungs, and that the simple life had been prescribed. He was very green, very sanguine, and engaged to be married--a secret confided to us later, when acquaintance had ripened into friendship. Every Sunday Jim would ride down to our ranch, sup with us, and smoke three pipes upon the verandah, describing at great length the process of transmuting the wilderness into a garden. He built a small board-and-batten house, planted a vineyard and orchard, bought a couple of cows and an incubator. Reserved about matters personal to himself, he never grew tired of describing his possessions, nor of speculating in regard to their possibilities. If ever a man counted his chickens before the eggs had been placed in the incubator, Jim Misterton was he.
Ajax and I listened in silence to these outpourings. Ajax contended-- perhaps rightly--that Misterton's optimism was part of the "cure." He bade me remark the young fellow's sparkling eyes and ruddy cheeks.
"He calls that forsaken claim of his Eden," said my brother. "Shall we tell him what sort of a Hades it really is?"
One day, some months after this, we rode up to Eden. It presented the usual heart-breaking appearance so familiar to men who have lived in a wild country and witnessed, year after year, the furious struggle between Man and Nature. Misterton had cleared and planted about forty acres, enclosed with a barb-wire fence. Riding along this, we saw that many of his fruit trees had been barked and ruined by jack-rabbits. The month was September. A rainless summer had dried up a spring near his house, which, against our advice, he had attempted to develop by tunnelling. The new chicken-yards held no chickens.
Nevertheless, Jim welcomed us with a cheery smile. He had made mistakes, of course--who didn't? But he intended to come out on top, you bet your life! Western slang flowed freely from his lips. The blazing sun, which already had cracked the unpainted shingles on his roof, had bleached the crude blue of his jumper and overalls. His sombrero might have belonged to a veteran cowboy. Jim wore it with a rakish list to port, and round his neck fluttered a small, white silk handkerchief. He looked askance at our English breeches and saddles. Then he said pleasantly, "I've taken out my naturalisation papers."
After lunch, he told us about his Angela, and displayed her photograph.
"She's coming out," he added shyly, "as soon as I've got things fixed."
"Coming out?" we repeated in amazement.
"It's all settled," said Jim. "I'm to meet her in 'Frisco; we shall be married, and then I'm going to bring her here for the honeymoon. Won't it be larks?"
Ajax answered, without any enthusiasm, "Won't it?" and stared at the young, pretty face smiling up at him.
"Angela is as keen about this place as I am," continued the fond and beaming Jim. "It's going to be Eden for her too, God bless her!"
Ajax said thoughtfully, "Misterton, you're a lucky devil!"
We gleaned a few more details. Angela was the daughter of a doctor at Surbiton, and apparently a damsel of accomplishments. She could punt, play tennis, dance, sing, and make her own blouses; in a word, a "ripper," "top-hole," and no mistake! Ajax slightly raised his brows when we learned that the course of true love had run smooth; but the doctor's blessing was adequately accounted for--Angela had five sisters.
"But when your lungs went wrong----?"
Misterton laughed.
"Being a doctor, you see--and a devilish clever chap--he knew that I'd be as right as rain out here. 'If you want Angela,' he said, 'you must go full steam for fresh air and sunshine.'"
Riding home through the cactus and manzanita Ajax said irritably, "Is there any Paradise on earth without a fool in it?"
* * * * *
* * * * *
The following spring, Angela came out. We attended the wedding, Ajax assisting as best man. Afterwards, somewhat reluctantly, we agreed that Angela's photograph had aroused expectations not quite satisfied. She was very pretty, but her manners were neither of the town nor of the country. Ajax said, "There must be hundreds like her in Upper Tooting; that's where she ought to live."
Because I was more than half assured of this, I made a point of disputing it.
"She's plastic, anyway; a nice little thing."
"Is a nice little thing the right sort of a wife for a squatter?"
"If she loves him--"
"Of course she loves him--now."
"Look at her pluck in coming out!"
"Pluck? She has five sisters in Upper Tooting."
"Surbiton."
"I'm sure it's Upper Tooting."
"And she can make her own blouses."
"Can she cook, can she milk a cow, can she keep a house clean?"
"Give her time!"
"Time? I'd like to give her father six months. What's the use of jawing? We've been aiding and abetting a crime. We might have prevented this slaughter of the innocents. What will that skin be like in one year from now?"
"If she were sallow, you would be less excited."
We spent a few days in San Francisco; and then we returned to the ranch to give a luncheon in the bride's honour. The table was set under some splendid live-oaks in the home-pasture, which, in May, presents the appearance of a fine English park. A creek tinkled at our feet, and beyond, out of the soft, lavender-coloured haze, rose the blue peaks of the Santa Lucia mountains.
"Reminds one a little of the Old Country," I remarked to Angela, who was all smiles and quite conscious of being the most interesting object in the landscape.
"Oh, please, don't speak of England!"
Her pretty forehead puckered, and her mouth drooped piteously. Then she laughed, as she launched into a vivid description of her first attempt to bake bread. Whenever she spoke, I saw Jim's large, slightly prominent eyes fix themselves upon her face. His beaming satisfaction in everything she did or said would have been delightful had I been able to wean my thoughts from the place which he still believed to be- -Eden. At intervals I heard him murmur, "This is rippin'!"
After luncheon, Angela asked to see the ranch-house, and almost as soon as we were out of hearing, she said with disconcerting abruptness--
"Does your ranch pay?" She added half-apologetically, "I do so want to know."
"It doesn't pay," I answered grimly.
"You are not going--behind?" she faltered, using the familiar phrase of the country in which she had spent as yet but three weeks.
"We are going behind," I answered, angry with her curiosity: not old enough or experienced enough to see beneath it fear and misery. Angela said nothing more till we passed into the house. Then, with lack- lustre eyes, she surveyed our belongings, murmuring endless commonplace phrases. Presently she stopped opposite a photograph of a girl in Court dress.
"What a lovely frock!" she exclaimed, with real interest. "I do wish I'd been presented at Court. Who is she? Oh, a cousin. I wonder you can bear to look at her."
Without another word she burst into tears, heart-breaking sobs, the more vehement because obviously she was trying to suppress them. I stared at her, helpless with dismay, confronted for the first time with an emergency which seemed to paralyse rather than stimulate action. Had I sympathised, had I presented any aspect other than that of the confounded idiot, she might have become hysterical. Without doubt, my impassivity pulled her together. The sobs ceased, and she said with a certain calmness--
"I couldn't help it. You and your brother have this splendid ranch; you have experience, capital, everything looks so prosperous, and yet you are going--behind. And if that is the case, what is to become of us?"
"I dare say things will brighten up a bit."
"Brighten up?" She laughed derisively.
"That's the worst of it. The brightness is appalling. These hard, blue skies without a cloud in them, this everlasting sunshine--how I loathe it!"
Again I became tongue-tied.
"Jim thinks itisEden. When he showed me that ugly hut, and his sickly fruit trees, and that terrible little garden where every flower seemed to be protesting against its existence, I had to make- believe that it was Eden to me. Each day he goes off to his work, and he always asks the same question: 'You won't be lonesome, little woman, will you?' and I answer, 'No.' But I am lonesome, so lonesome that I should have gone mad if I hadn't found someone--you--to whom I could speak out."
"I'm frightfully sorry," I stammered.
"Thanks. I know you are. And your brother is sorry, and everybody else, too. The women, my neighbours in the brush-hills, look at me with the same question in their eyes: 'What are you doing here?' they say.
"How impertinent!"
"Pertinent, I call it."
From that moment I regarded her with different eyes. If she had brains to measure obstacles, she might surmount them, for brains in a new country are the one possession which adversity increases.
"Mrs. Misterton," I said slowly, "you are in a tight place, and I won't insult your intelligence by calling it by a prettier name; but you can pull yourself and Jim out of it, and I believe you will."
"Thanks," she said soberly.
For some weeks after this we saw little of the Mistertons. Then Jim rode down to the ranch with an exciting piece of news.
"I've got a pup coming out."
A "pup" in California means a young English gentleman, generally the fool of the family, who pays a premium to some fellow-countryman in return for board and lodging and the privilege of learning not so much how to do things as how not to do them--the latter being the more common object-lesson afforded him. Ajax and I had gleaned experience with pups, and we had long ago determined that no premium was adequate compensation for the task and responsibility of breaking them in. Jim went into details.
"It's Tomlinson-Thorpe. You fellows have heard of him, of course?"
"Never," said Ajax.
"The International! You ought to see him go through a scrum with half a dozen fellows on his back."
"A footballer," said my brother thoughtfully.
"One of the best. Naturally he puts on a little side. He has money, and I told him he could double it in a year or two."
"Youtold him that? Have you doubled your capital, Jim?"
"Well--er--no. But I'm rather a Juggins. Thorpe is as 'cute as they make 'em."
"A man of mind and muscle," murmured Ajax.
"And my greatest pal," added the enthusiastic James.