XVIIIONE SANG WITH GUITAR
Elbertarose, but before he caught himself, his fascinated glance had darted to the gloved right hand that had put the closing touch to Monte Vallejo this very day. Not a bristling murderer of outlaws, Ramon appeared, but a youth of cultured turn of thought—brown eyes and boyish lips, a face whiter than his own ... uninterested apparently in soldiers, rurales, even in bandits, but asking many questions regarding America, the States and cities, the night life, and how long it took to go from Chicago to San Francisco—
‘Not three days, Señor!’
‘Yes,’ said Elbert.
‘Not three days, at fifty miles an hour, night and day?’
Like a child—or, at least, a younger brother, was this aristocrat who had taken the job of slaying out of the hands of the despised soldiers of Cordano. How many others had this small gloved hand put to death? Elbert certainly felt under a painful pull, as they chatted and complimented. Secret stiffness was still upon him, as leisurely together, they walked out of the fonda into the starlight.
‘Si a tu ventana llega una paloma—’ from the guitars, and by this time the girls of Arecibo were moving softly by. It was their brief hour of night, and they were abroad, eyes shining, under their mantillas; all from seven to the great age of twenty-seven, passing by the beloved captain and his friend, the American who came on the magnificent horse. What did these soft-eyed girls think of the killing manner of life of their men? Doubtless that it was all that life should be.
With his absorbing interest in America, the elegant Captain Ramon would certainly have mentioned the detail—had there been an American among the seven executed this day. Was Bart more Mexican than American? Was he regarded as a native, pure and simple, by his fellow-bandits and the rurales, or had he left Sonora altogether? These questions continually hammered through Elbert’s consciousness. Meanwhile, since compliments were the order in all conversation, he was with difficulty trying to convey to Ramon Bistula how enthusiastic the trooper he had ridden with in the afternoon, had expressed himself toward his captain.
‘Do all your men feel the same toward you?’ he inquired.
‘They are pleased with small things,’ lightly said Ramon. ‘To-morrow, perhaps, you will see the rest of my troop.’
‘They are not all here in Arecibo then?’
‘Ah, no—a third party is due to report at this time. We look for further captives with them. Six more of Vallejo’s men were brought in to-day by a second squad.’
‘Six more prisoners here alive in Arecibo now?’
‘Yes, Señor, waiting death now in the patio of el cuartel yonder—a mere formality—the paper from General Cordano—any moment.’
Elbert turned his head away. ‘Great night for guitars,’ he said.
‘Ah, to hear the bands of countless pieces in the great plazas of America!’
Elbert heard his own voice reach out plaintively in the hush. ‘When do these further executions—?’
‘To-morrow—next day—who can tell? We wait the order only. You care for these things?’
‘I could hardly say that, Captain. I was only wondering at the manner in which the prisoners face the end—if an American would act the same?’
‘Ah, doubtless Americans would accept with perfect composure—it is the least a man can do—’
‘Are all these men calm?’
‘Again, please?’
‘Are they all calm?’
‘Calm. I had not thought of that! They are so-so. Why not come with me now, and let us see if they are calm.’
The Captain explained that he was due to report at el cuartel at this time, but that his personal quarters were in the fonda, the picket-line of his own men being at the other side of town. El cuartel, it was to be noted, was spoken of with faint scorn, as the home of Cordano’s soldiers—a poor-house and prison combined.
The two strolled across the plaza and the heavy wooden gate of the quarters swung wide. Only the front of the building had a second floor. It was like a tunnel of clay they entered, wide and high enough for a horseman to ride in, with a narrow door leading to the barracks on one side and to an office on the other. Elbert smelled the earthiness of the dried clay walls, as he passed through at the spurred heels of Ramon Bistula. The suggestions of underground began to haunt him—the presence of condemned men—this very day—the blank wall!
The passage opened to a large patio with low cells on all sides. The cells were open, the prisoners and Cordano’s soldiers moving freely together. Captain Ramon informed him that for a time in the cool of the day like this the cells were unlocked, but the prisoners were returned to their quarters at nine promptly. Small fires werehere and there; perhaps fifteen men in all, lounging about the fires, the guards mixed freely among them, ponies feeding in far corners. Some of the men gambled. All smoked; one sang with guitar. No sign of a face that might be an American. At least, not for Elbert’s first fierce look. He noted the inner blank wall of the barracks, but dusk covered what stains might have been on the ground.
To-morrow, the next day—six more of these men to die—and they played cards to-night. Tobacco was as good to them as ever; peace was abroad ... one boyish voice sang, but Elbert remembered the underground smell of the long clay arch.
No American save himself in the prison court—no troubled thoughts save his own apparently. He moved from knot to knot among the fires, Ramon Bistula having excused himself to enter the office. The faces turned up to him from the cards, from the interminable little match boxes and papers of tobacco. The one with his guitar looked up with a gray thin smile as he hummed, but did not lose a beat of his song....
Scarred, pocked, peaceful faces—they did not seem to know any more of what was coming than the ponies in the farther shadow. There was one with the luminous welt of a knife-wound, running down the side of his throat and vanishinglike the head of a worm under his collar ... boys and men.
All smoked, and one sang with guitar.
Ramon Bistula approached, but only to excuse himself again. Round and round among the little fires, Elbert moved. No, he was not as they were. It was as if in passing the clay tunnel to the little court, something had fallen from them—ghastly responsibility of self-preservation—the very thing that choked his throat now.
He had paused a second time, before the feet of the boyish figure with the guitar. The words of the song were of some curious provincial Spanish, and slowly uttered. It was this that the youth sang:
A girl once stood in a doorway and there was dust of corn upon her elbow, upon her cheek, and pale gold corn in a pile upon the mortar-stone at her side ... a girl with corn like sun-dust, shining on her skin ... with a golden bud springing like young corn in her breast.
A girl once stood in a doorway and there was dust of corn upon her elbow, upon her cheek, and pale gold corn in a pile upon the mortar-stone at her side ... a girl with corn like sun-dust, shining on her skin ... with a golden bud springing like young corn in her breast.
Something like that, chaste as the light of that endless summertime. And the youth strumming the guitar seemed not to feel the great wounding of separation—but to take a vague sweetness from repeating the words—as of approach to that far doorway.
Elbert could stand the tension no longer. Through his mind flicked memories of the supperin the old barefooted woman’s house in Nacimiento, of the ride afterward, of the strange, still, flowered room in Tucson. He longed to be alone, his thoughts turned yearningly toward the fonda of Arecibo; he longed to stand alone with Mamie in the clean corral behind it. A sentry, one of the soldiers of Cordano stopped him, as he started to enter the portal from the patio.
‘I am leaving,’ he said. ‘I am with the captain of the rurales—’
Ramon Bistula now came forward from the low side door in the wall, and at the same instant, the heavy wooden gate opened from the street, and Mamie veered in under the arch, led by a soldier. Another soldier followed, bearing the big stock-saddle and blankets—Mamie entering this portal of clay! He called her name; she nickered back. Now Captain Ramon was saying:
‘I trust it will not be of great inconvenience—your things being brought from the fonda for this one night—you to pass this one night here, instead of at the fonda—more air, more room—a room being prepared, in fact, for yourself quite alone.’