October had come and the rainy season was going, but still the heat of
the mid-day sun drove everybody within doors except the irrepressible
Yankee soldiery, released "on pass" from routine duty at inner barracks
or outer picket line, and wandering about this strange, old-world
metropolis of the Philippines, reckless of time or temperature in their
determination to see everything there was to be seen about the whilom
stronghold of "the Dons" in Asiatic waters.
Along the narrow sidewalks of the Escolta, already bordered by American
signs--and saloons,--and rendered even more than usually precarious by
American drinks, the blue-shirted boys wandered, open-eyed, marvelling
much to find 'twixt twelve and two the shutters up in all the shops not
conducted, as were the bars, on the American plan, while from some,
still more Oriental, the sun and the shopper both were excluded four
full hours, beginning at eleven.
All over the massive, antiquated fortifications of Old Manila into the
tortuous mazes of the northern districts, through the crowded Chinese
quarter, foul and ill savored, the teeming suburbs of the native Tagals,
humble yet cleanly; along the broad, shaded avenues, bordered by stately
old Spanish mansions, many of them still occupied by their Castilian
owners, the Yankee invaders wandered at will, brimful of curiosity and
good nature, eager to gather in acquaintance, information, and
bric-a-brac, making themselves perfectly at home, filling the souls of
the late lords of the soil with disdain, and those of the natives with
wonderment through their lavish, jovial, free and easy ways. Within a
month from the time Merritt's little division had marched into the city,
Manila was as well known to most of those far-Western volunteers as the
streets of their own home villages, and, when once the paymaster had
distributed his funds among them and, at the rate of ten cents off on
every dollar, they had swapped their sound American coin for "soft"
Mexican or Spanish _pesos_, the prodigality with which they scattered
their wealth among their dusky friends and admirers evoked the blessings
of the church (which was not slow to levy on the beneficiaries), the
curses of the sons of Spain, who had generally robbed and never given,
and, at first, the almost superstitious awe of the Tagals, who, having
never heard of such a thing before, dreaded some deep-laid scheme for
their despoilment. But this species of dread lived but a few short
weeks, and, before next payday, was as far gone as the money of the
Americanos.
Those were blithe days in Manila as the autumn came on and the
insurrection was still in the far future. There were fine bands among
the Yankee regiments that played afternoon and evening in the kiosk on
the Luneta, and every household possessed of an open carriage, or the
means of hiring one, appeared regularly each day as the sun sank to the
westward sea, and after making swift yet solemn circuit of the Anda
monument at the Pasig end of the Paseo de Santa Lucia, returned to the
Luneta proper, and wedged in among the closely packed vehicles that
covered the broad, smooth driveways on both sides of the esplanade and
for some hundred yards each way north and south of the band-stand. Along
the shaded and gravelled walks that bordered the Paseo, within short
pistol-shot of the grim bastions beyond the green _glacis_ and even
greener moat, many dark-haired, dark-eyed daughters of Spain, leaving
their carriages and, guarded by faithful duenna, strolled slowly up and
down, exchanging furtive signal of hand or kerchief with some gallant
among the throngs of captive soldiery that swarmed towards sunset on the
parapet. Swarthy, black-browed Spanish officers in cool summer uniform
and in parties of three or four lined the roadway, or wandered up and
down in search of some distraction to the deadly _ennui_ of their
lives now that their soldier occupation was gone, vouchsafing neither
glance nor salutation to their Yankee conquerors, no matter what the
rank, until the wives and daughters of American officers began to arrive
and appear upon the scene, when the disdain of both sexes speedily gave
way to obvious, if reluctant, curiosity.
South of the walls and outworks of Old Manila and east of the Luneta lay
a broad, open level, bounded on the south by the suburb of Ermita, and
in the midst of the long row of Spanish-built houses extending from the
battery of huge Krupps at the bay-side, almost over to the diagonal
avenue of the Nozaleda, stood the very cosey, finely furnished house
which had been hired as quarters for Colonel Brent, high dignitary on
the department staff.
Its lower story of cut stone was pierced by the arched drive-way through
which carriages entered to the _patio_ or inner court, and, as in the
tenets of Madrid the Queen of Spain is possessed of no personal means
of locomotion, so possibly to no Spanish dame of high degree may be
attributed the desire, even though she have the power, to walk.
No other portal, therefore, either for entrance or exit, could be found
at the front. Massive doors of dark, heavy wood from the Luzon forests,
strapped with iron, swung on huge hinges that, unless well oiled, defied
the efforts of unmuscular mankind. A narrow panel opening in one of
these doors, two feet above the ground and on little hinges of its own,
gave means of passage to household servants and, when pressed for time,
to such of their superiors as would condescend to step high and stoop
low.
To the right and left of the main entrance were store-rooms, servants'
rooms, and carriage-room, and opposite the latter, towards the rear, the
broad stairway that, turning upon itself, led to the living-rooms on the
upper floor--the broad salon at the head of the stairs being utilized as
a dining-room on state occasions, and its northward end as the parlor.
Opening from the sides of the salon, front and rear, were four large,
roomy, high-ceilinged chambers.
Overlooking and partially overhanging the street and extending the
length of the house was a wide enclosed veranda, well supplied with
tables, lounging-chairs, and couches of bamboo and wicker, its floor
covered here and there with Indian rugs, its surrounding waist-high
railing fitted with parallel grooves in which slid easily the frames of
the windows of translucent shells, set in little four-inch squares, or
the dark-green blinds that excluded the light and glare of mid-day.
With both thrown back there spread an unobstructed view of the
parade-ground even to the edge of the distant _glacis_, and here it
was the household sat to watch the military ceremonies, to receive their
guests, and to read or doze throughout the drowsier hours of the day.
"Campo de Bagumbayan" was what the natives called that martial flat in
the strange barbaric tongue that delights in "igs" and "ags," in "ings"
and "angs," even to repetition and repletion.
And here one soft, sensuous October afternoon, with a light breeze from
the bay tempering the heat of the slanting sunshine, reclining in a
broad bamboo easy-chair sat Maidie Ray, now quite convalescent, yet not
yet restored to her old-time vigorous health.
Her hostess, the colonel's amiable wife, was busy on the back gallery
leading to the kitchen, deep in counsel with her Filipino major-domo and
her Chinese cook, servitors who had been well trained and really needed
no instruction, and for that matter got but little, for Mrs. Brent's
knowledge of the Spanish tongue was even less than her command of
"Pidgin" English. Nevertheless, neither Ignacio nor Sing Suey would fail
to nod in the one case or smile broadly in the other in assent to her
every proposition,--it being one of the articles of their domestic faith
that peace and happiness, truth and justice, religion and piety, could
best be promoted throughout the establishment by never seeming to differ
with the lady of the house. To all outward appearances, therefore, and
for the first few weeks, at least, housekeeping in the Philippines
seemed something almost idyllic, and Mrs. Brent was in ecstasies over
the remarkable virtues of Spanish-trained servants.
There had been anxious days during Maidie's illness. The Sacramento had
been ordered away, and the little patient had to be brought ashore. But
the chief quartermaster sent his especial steam-launch for "Billy Ray's
daughter," the chief surgeon, the best ambulance and team to meet her at
the landing; a squad of Sandy's troopers bore her reclining-chair over
the side into the launch, out of the launch to the waiting ambulance,
and out of the ambulance upstairs into the airy room set apart for her,
and, with Mrs. Brent and Miss Porter, Sandy and the most devoted of army
doctors to bear her company and keep the fans going, Maidie's progress
had been rather in the nature of a triumph.
So at least it had seemed to the austere vice-president of the Patriotic
Daughters of America, who, as it happened, looked on in severe
disapproval. She had asked for that very ambulance that very day to
enable her to make the rounds of regimental hospitals in the outlying
suburbs, and had been politely but positively refused.
By that time, it seems, this most energetic woman had succeeded in
alienating all others in authority at corps head-quarters, to the end
that the commanding general declined to grant her further audience, the
surgeon-general had given orders that she be not admitted to his inner
office, the deputy surgeon-general had asked for a sentry to keep her
off his premises, the sentries at the First and Second Reserve Hospital
had instructions to tell her, also politely but positively, that she
could not be admitted except in visiting hours, when the surgeon, a
steward, or--and here was "the most unkindest cut of all"--some of the
triumphant Red Cross could receive and attend to her, for at last the
symbol of Geneva had gained full recognition. At last Dr. Wells and the
sisterhood were on duty, comfortably housed, cordially welcomed, and
presumably happy.
But Miss Perkins was not. She had come to Manila full of high purpose as
the self-styled, accredited representative of any quantity of good
Americans, actuated by motives, no doubt, of purest patriotism. The
nation was full of it,--of men who wanted to be officers, of women who
wanted to be officials, many of whom succeeded only in becoming
officious. There were not staff or line positions enough to provide for
a hundredth part of the men, or societies and "orders" sufficient to
cater to the ambitions of a tenth part of the women. The great Red Cross
gave abundant employment for thousands of gentle and willing hands, but
limited the number of directing heads, and Miss Perkins and others of
the Jellaby stamp were born, as they thought, not to follow but to lead.
Balked in their ambitious designs to become prominent in that noble
national association, women possessed of the unlimited assurance of Miss
Perkins started what might be termed an anti-crusade, with the result
that in scores of quiet country towns, as well as in the cities of the
East and Middle West, many subscriptions were easily gained, and
hundreds of honest, earnest women were rewarded with paper scrolls
setting forth that they were named as Sisters of the American Soldier,
Patriotic Daughters of America, or Ministering Angels of the Camp and
Cot. Shades of Florence Nightingale and Clara Barton! the very voice of
such self-appointed angels as Miss Perkins was enough to set the nerves
of strong men on edge and to drive fever patients to madness! Even the
Red Cross could not always be sure of its selection. It did prevent the
sending to Manila of certain undesirable applicants, but it could not
prevent the going of Miss Perkins at the expense of the deluded, on
ships that were common carriers, even though she were a common scold.
There she was, portentous as the British Female portrayed by Thackeray.
Backed by apparently abundant means and obviously indomitable "gall,"
she counted on carrying all before her by sheer force of her powers of
self-assertion and the name of the Patriotic Daughters of America. But
the commanding general was the most impassive of men, gifted with a keen
though little suspected sense of humor, and no little judgment in
estimating motive and character. He actually enjoyed the first call made
by Miss Perkins, suggested her coming again on the morrow, and summoned
his chief surgeon and his provost marshal, another keen humorist, to be
present at the interview. It has been asserted that this triumvirate
went so far as to encourage the lady to even wilder flights of
assertion. We have her own word for it that then and there she was
promised as offices three big rooms in the Palace,--the
Ayuntamiento,--six clerks, and a private secretary, but an impartial
witness avows that the sole basis for this was a question propounded to
the provost marshal by the chief surgeon as to whether the chief
quartermaster or the chief engineer should be called on to vacate the
rooms assigned to them as officers in order that the P. D. A. might be
properly recognized and quartered, to which the response was made with
unflinching gravity that something certainly should be vacated "P. D.
Q." if it took all his clerical force to effect it, but this was _sotto
voce_, so to speak, and presumably unheard by the general commanding. It
was gall of another kind, and wormwood, after these first few flattering
receptions, to be greeted thereafter only by aides-de-camp or a military
secretary; then to be told by the chief surgeon that, under instructions
from Washington, only those nurses and attendants recognized and
employed by the general government could be permitted to occupy quarters
or walk the wards about the hospitals. It was bitter to find her
criticisms and suggestions set at naught by "impudent young quacks," as
she called the delighted doctors of the reserve hospitals, to see the
sisterhood of the Red Cross presently clothed with the purple of
authority as well as white caps and aprons, while she and, through her,
the P. D. A.'s were denied the privilege of stirring up the patients and
overhauling the storerooms. Then in her wrath Miss Perkins unbosomed
herself to the press correspondents, a few of whom, seeking sensation,
as demanded by their papers, took her seriously and told tremendous
tales of the brutal neglect of our sick and wounded boys in hospital, of
doctors and nurses in wild debauch on the choice wines and liquors sent
for the sole use of the sick and wounded by such patriotic societies as
the P. D. A.'s, and hinting at other and worse debaucheries (which she
blushed to name), and involved in which were prominent officers and
favorite members of a rival society "which shall be as nameless as it is
shameless." All this had Miss Perkins accomplished within the first
eight days of her sojourn, and by way of Hong-Kong the unexpurgated
edition of her romance, thrown out by the conscienceless censor at
head-quarters, eventually found its way to the United States. It was
while in this uncharitable frame of mind that Miss Perkins caught sight
of the little procession up the Santa Lucia when Maidie was transferred
from ship to shore, and the refusal of the best looking of the "impudent
young quacks" to permit her to see his patient that afternoon augmented
her sense of indignity and wrong. Miss Ray herself went down in the
black book of the P. D. A.'s forthwith.
But all this time the officials remained in blissful ignorance of the
tremendous nature of the charges laid at their door by this much injured
woman, and Maidie Ray, while duly informed of the frequent calls and
kind inquiries of many an officer, and permitted of late to welcome
Sandy for little talks, had been mercifully spared the infliction of the
personal visitation thrice attempted by her fellow-traveller on the
train. That awful voice, however, uplifted, as was the habit of the
vice-president when aroused, could not fail to reach the sick-room, and
when convalescence came and Miss Perkins came not, Maidie made inquiries
both of Dr. Frank and of her hostess. Frank showed his handsome teeth
and smiled, but Mrs. Brent showed fight. "I won't have such a creature
within my doors!" said she. "I don't believe you were ever intimate
friends, and that she nursed and cared for you in the cars when you were
suffering from shock and fright because of a fire. That's what she says
though. What was it, Maidie? Was it there Mr. Stuyvesant got that burn
on his face?--and lost his eyebrows?"
And then it transpired that Mr. Stuyvesant had been a frequent and
assiduous caller for a whole fortnight, driving thither almost every
evening.
But Maidie was oddly silent as to the episode of the fire on the train.
She laughed a little about Miss Perkins and her pretensions, but to the
disappointment of her hostess could not be drawn into talk about that
tall, handsome New Yorker.
And what seemed strange to Mrs. Brent was that now, when Maidie could
sit up a few hours each day and see certain among the officers' wives,
arriving by almost every steamer from the States, and have happy chats
with Sandy every time he could come galloping in from Paco, and was
taking delight in watching the parades and reviews on the Bagumbayan,
and listening to the evening music of the band, Stuyvesant had ceased to
call.
Had Maidie noticed it? Mrs. Brent wondered, as, coming in from her
conference with the House of Commons, she stood a moment at the door-way
gazing at the girl, whose book had fallen to the floor and whose dark
eyes, under their veiling lids were looking far out across the field to
the walls and church towers of Old Manila.
It was almost sunset. There was the usual throng of carriages along the
Luneta and a great regiment of volunteers, formed in line of platoon
columns, was drawn up on the "Campo" directly in front of the house.
Sandy had spent his allotted half hour by his sister's side, and,
remounting, had cantered out to see the parade. Miss Perkins had
declared on the occasion of her third fruitless call that not until Miss
Ray sent for her would she again submit herself to be snubbed. So there
seemed no immediate danger of her reappearance, and yet Mrs. Brent had
given Ignacio orders to open only the panel door when the gate bell
clanged, and to refuse admission, even to the drive-way, to a certain
importunate caller besides Miss Perkins.
Three days previous there had presented himself a young man in the white
dress of the tropics and a hat of fine Manila straw, a young man who
would not send up his card, but in very Mexican Spanish asked for Miss
Ray. Ignacio sent a boy for Mrs. Brent, who came down to reconnoitre,
and the youth reiterated his request.
"An old friend" was all he would say in response to her demand for his
name and purpose. She put him off, saying Miss Ray was still too far
from well to see anybody, bade him call next day when Dr. Frank and her
husband, she knew, would probably be there, duly notified them, and
Frank met and received the caller when he came and sent him away in
short order.
"The man is a crank," said he, "and I shall have him watched." The
colonel asked that one or two of the soldier police guard should be sent
to the house to look after the stranger. A corporal came from the
company barrack around on the Calle Real, and it was after nightfall
when next the "old friend" rang the bell and was permitted by Ignacio to
enter.
But the instant the corporal started forward to look at him the caller
bounded back into outer darkness. He was tall, sinewy, speedy, and had a
twenty-yard start before the little guardsman, stout and burly, could
squeeze into the street. Then the latter's shouts up the San Luis only
served to startle the sentries, to spur the runner, and to excite and
agitate Maidie.
Dr. Frank was disgusted when he tried her pulse and temperature half an
hour later and said things to the corporal not strictly authorized by
the regulations. The episode was unfortunate, yet might soon have been
forgotten but for one hapless circumstance. Despite her announcement,
something had overcome Miss Perkins's sense of injury, for she had
stepped from a carriage directly in front of the house at the moment of
the occurrence, was a witness to all that took place, and the first one
to extract from the corporal his version of the affair and his theory as
to what lay behind it. In another moment she was driving away towards
the Nozaleda, the direction taken by the fugitive, fast as her coachman
could whip his ponies, the original purpose of her call abandoned.
As in duty bound, both Mrs. Brent and Dr. Frank had told Sandy of this
odd affair. Mrs. Brent described the stranger as tall, slender, sallow,
with big cavernous dark eyes that had a wild look to them, and a
scraggly, fuzzy beard all over his face, as though he hadn't shaved for
long weeks. His hands--of course, she had particularly noticed his
hands; what woman doesn't notice such things?--were slim and white. He
had the look of a man who had been long in hospital; was probably a
recently discharged patient, perhaps one of the many men just now
getting their home orders from Washington.
"Somebody who served under your father, perhaps," said Mrs. Brent
soothingly to Marion, "and thought he ought to see you."
"Somebody who had not been a soldier at all," said she to Sandy. "He had
neither the look nor the manner of one." And Sandy marvelled a bit and
decided to be on guard.
"Maidie," he had said that afternoon, before riding away, "when you get
out next week we must take up pistol practice again. You beat me at
Leavenworth, but you can't do it now. Got your gun--anywhere?--the one
Dad gave you?" And Dad or Daddy in the Ray household was the "lovingest"
of titles.
Maidie turned a languid head on her pillow. "In the upper drawer of the
cabinet in my room, I think," said she. "I remember Mrs. Brent's
examining it."
Sandy went in search, and presently returned with the prize, a short,
big-barrelled, powerful little weapon of the bull-dog type, sending a
bullet like that of a Derringer, hot and hard, warranted to shock and
stop an ox at ten yards, but miss a barn at over twenty: a woman's
weapon for defence of her life, not a target pistol, and Sandy twirled
the shining cylinder approvingly. It was a gleaming toy, with its ivory
stock and nickeled steel.
"Every chamber crammed," said Sandy, "and sure to knock spots out of
anything from a mad dog to an elephant, provided it hits. Best keep it
by you at night, Maidie. These natives are marvellous sneak-thieves.
They go all through these ramshackle upper stories like so many ghosts.
No one can hear them."
Then, when he took his leave, the pistol remained there lying on the
table, and Frank, coming in to see his most interesting patient just as
the band was trooping back to its post on the right of the long line,
picked it up and examined it, muzzle uppermost, with professional
approbation.
"Yours I see, Miss Ray;--and from your father. A man hit by one of
these," he continued musingly, and fingering the fat leaden bullets,
"would drop in his tracks. You keep it by you?--always?"
"I? No!" laughed Maidie. "I'm eager to get to my work,--healing--not
giving--gunshot wounds."
"You will have abundant time, my dear young lady," said the doctor
slowly, as he carefully replaced the weapon on the table by her side,
"and--opportunity, if I read the signs aright, and we must get you
thoroughly well before you begin. Ah! What's that? What's the matter
over there?" he lazily asked. It was a fad of the doctor's never to
permit himself to show the least haste or excitement.
A small opera-glass stood on the sill, and, calmly adjusting it as he
peered, Frank had picked it up and levelled it towards the front and
centre of the line just back of where the colonel commanding sat in
saddle. A lively scuffle and commotion had suddenly begun among the
groups of spectators. Miss Ray's reclining-chair was so placed that by
merely raising her head she could look out over the field. Mrs. Brent
ran to where the colonel's field-glasses hung in their leathern case and
joined the doctor at the gallery rail.
Three pairs of eyes were gazing fixedly at the point of disturbance,
already the centre of a surging crowd of soldiers off duty, oblivious
now to the fact that the band was playing the "Star-Spangled Banner,"
and they ought to be standing at attention, hats off, and facing the
flag as it came floating slowly to earth on the distant ramparts of the
old city.
Disdainful of outside attractions, the adjutant came stalking out to
the front as the strain ceased, and his shrill voice was heard turning
over the parade to his commander. Then the surging group seemed to
begin to dissolve, many following a little knot of men carrying on
their shoulders an apparently inanimate form. They moved in the
direction of the old botanical garden, towards the Estado Mayor, and
so absorbed were the three in trying to fathom the cause of the
excitement that they were deaf to Ignacio's announcement. A tall,
handsome, most distinguished-looking young officer stood at the wide
door-way, dressed _cap-a-pie_ in snowy white, and not until, after a
moment's hesitation, he stepped within the room and was almost upon
them, did Miss Ray turn and see him.
"Why, Mr. Stuyvesant!" was all she said; but the tone was enough. Mrs.
Brent and the doctor dropped the glasses and whirled about. Both
instantly noted the access of color. It had not all disappeared by any
means, though the doctor had, when, ten minutes later, Colonel Brent
came in.
At the moment of his entrance, Stuyvesant, seated close to Marion's
reclining-chair, was, with all the doctor's caution and curiosity,
examining her revolver. "Rather bulky for a pocket-pistol," he remarked,
as, muzzle downward, he essayed its insertion in the gaping orifice at
the right hip of his Manila-made, flapping white trousers. It slipped in
without a hitch.
"What was the trouble out there a while ago?" asked the lady of the
house of her liege lord. "You saw it, I suppose?"
"Nothing much. Man had a fit, and it took four men to hold him. Maidie,
look here. Captain Kress handed this to me--said they picked it up just
back of where the colonel stood at parade. Is he another mash?"
Marion took the envelope from the outstretched hand, drew forth a little
_carte-de-visite_, on which was the vignette portrait of her own face,
gave one quick glance, and dropped back on the pillow. All the bright
color fled. The picture fell to the floor. "Can you--find Sandy?" was
all she could say, as, with imploring eyes, she gazed into honest
Brent's astonished face.
"I can, at once," said Stuyvesant, who had risen from his chair at the
colonel's remark. With quick bend he picked up the little card, placed
it face downward on the table by her side, never so much as giving one
glance at the portrait, and noiselessly left the room.