At the shout which Coronado uttered on seeing Texas Smith's pistol aimed
at Thurstane, the assassin turned his head, discovered the train, and,
lowering his weapon, rode peacefully alongside of his intended victim.
Captain Phin Glover's mule was found grazing behind the butte, in the
midst of the gallant Captain's dishevelled baggage, while the robbers had
vanished by a magic which seemed quite natural in this scenery of
grotesque marvels. They had unquestionably seen or heard their pursuers;
but how had they got into the bowels of the earth to escape them?
Thurstane presently solved the mystery by pointing out three crouching
figures on the flat cap of stone which surmounted the shales and marl of
the butte. Bare feet and desperation of terror could alone explain how
they had reached this impossible refuge. Texas Smith immediately consoled
himself for his disappointment as to Thurstane by shooting two of these
wretches before his hand could be stayed.
"They're nothin' but Injuns," he said, with a savage glare, when the
Lieutenant struck aside his revolver and called him a murdering brute.
The third skulker took advantage of the cessation of firing to tumble down
from his perch and fly for his life. The indefatigable Smith broke away
from Thurstane, dashed after the pitiful fugitive, leaned over him as he
ran, and shot him dead.
"I have a great mind to blow your brains out, you beast," roared the
disgusted officer, who had followed closely. "I told you not to shoot that
man." And here he swore heartily, for which we must endeavor to forgive
him, seeing that he belonged to the army.
Coronado interfered. "My dear Lieutenant! after all, they were robbers.
They deserved punishment." And so on.
Texas Smith looked less angry and more discomfited than might have been
expected, considering his hardening life and ferocious nature.
"Didn't s'p'ose you really keered much for the cuss," he said, glancing
respectfully at the imperious and angry face of the young officer.
"Well, never mind now," growled Thurstane. "It's done, and can't be
undone. But, by Jove, I do hate useless massacre. Fighting is another
thing."
Sheathing his fury, he rode off rapidly toward the wagons, followed in
silence by the others. The three dead vagabonds (perhaps vagrants from the
region of Abiquia) remained where they had fallen, one on the stony plain
and two on the cap of the butte. The train, trending here toward the
northwest, passed six hundred yards to the north of the scene of
slaughter; and when Clara and Mrs. Stanley asked what had happened,
Coronado told them with perfect glibness that the robbers had got away.
The rescued man, delighted at his escape and the recovery of his mule and
luggage, returned thanks right and left, with a volubility which further
acquaintance showed to be one of his characteristics. He was a profuse
talker; ran a stream every time you looked at him; it was like turning on
a mill-race.
"Yes, capm, out of Fair Haven," he said. "Been in the coastin' 'n' Wes'
Injy trade. Had 'n unlucky time out las' few years. Had a schuner burnt in
port, 'n' lost a brig at sea. Pooty much broke me up. Wife 'n' dahter gone
into th' oyster-openin' business. Thought I'd try my han' at openin' gold
mines in Californy. Jined a caravan at Fort Leavenworth, 'n' lost my
reckonin's back here a ways."
We must return to love matters. However amazing it may be that a man who
has no conscience should nevertheless have a heart, such appears to have
been the case with that abnormal creature Coronado. The desert had made
him take a strong liking to Clara, and now that he had a rival at hand he
became impassioned for her. He began to want to marry her, not alone for
the sake of her great fortune, but also for her own sake. Her beauty
unfolded and blossomed wonderfully before his ardent eyes; for he was
under that mighty glamour of the emotions which enables us to see beauty
in its completeness; he was favored with the greatest earthly second-sight
which is vouchsafed to mortals.
Only in a measure, however; the money still counted for much with him. He
had already decided what he would do with the Muñoz fortune when he should
get it. He would go to New York and lead a life of frugal extravagance,
economical in comforts (as we understand them) and expensive in pleasures.
New York, with its adjuncts of Saratoga and Newport, was to him what Paris
is to many Americans. In his imagination it was the height of grandeur and
happiness to have a box at the opera, to lounge in Broadway, and to dance
at the hops of the Saratoga hotels. New Mexico! he would turn his back on
it; he would never set eyes on its dull poverty again. As for Clara? Well,
of course she would share in his gayeties; was not that enough for any
reasonable woman?
But here was this stumbling-block of a Thurstane. In the presence of a
handsome rival, who, moreover, had started first in the race, slow was far
from being sure. Coronado had discovered, by long experience in flirtation
and much intelligent meditation upon it, that, if a man wants to win a
woman, he must get her head full of him. He decided, therefore, that at
the first chance he would give Clara distinctly to understand how ardently
he was in love with her, and so set her to thinking especially of him, and
of him alone. Meantime, he looked at her adoringly, insinuated
compliments, performed little services, walked his horse much by her side,
did his best in conversation, and in all ways tried to outshine the
Lieutenant.
He supposed that he did outshine him. A man of thirty always believes that
he appears to better advantage than a man of twenty-three or four. He
trusts that he has more ideas, that he commits fewer absurdities, that he
carries more weight of character than his juvenile rival. Coronado was far
more fluent than Thurstane; had a greater command over his moods and
manners, and a larger fund of animal spirits; knew more about such social
trifles as women like to hear of; and was, in short, a more amusing
prattler of small talk. There was a steady seriousness about the young
officer--something of the earnest sentimentality of the great Teutonic
race--which the mercurial Mexican did not understand nor appreciate, and
which he did not imagine could be fascinating to a woman. Knowing well how
magnetic passion is in its guise of Southern fervor, he did not know that
it is also potent under the cloak of Northern solemnity.
Unluckily for Coronado, Clara was half Teutonic, and could comprehend the
tone of her father's race. Notwithstanding Thurstane's shyness and
silences, she discovered his moral weight and gathered his unspoken
meanings. There was more in this girl than appeared on the surface.
Without any power of reasoning concerning character, and without even a
disposition to analyze it, she had an instinctive perception of it. While
her talk was usually as simple as a child's, and her meditations on men
and things were not a bit systematic or logical, her decisions and actions
were generally just what they should be.
Some one may wish to know whether she was clever enough to see through the
character of Coronado. She was clever enough, but not corrupt enough. Very
pure people cannot fully understand people who are very impure. It is
probable that angels are considerably in the dark concerning the nature of
the devil, and derive their disagreeable impression of him mainly from a
consideration of his actions. Clara, limited to a narrow circle of good
intentions and conduct, might not divine the wide regions of wickedness
through which roved the soul of Coronado, and must wait to see his works
before she could fairly bring him to judgment.
Of course she perceived that in various ways he was insincere. When he
prattled compliments and expressions of devotion, whether to herself or to
others, she made Spanish allowance. It was polite hyperbole; it was about
the same as saying good-morning; it was a cheerful way of talking that
they had in Mexico; she knew thus much from her social experience. But
while she cared little for his adulations, she did not because of them
consider him a scoundrel, nor necessarily a hypocrite.
Coronado found and improved opportunities to talk in asides with Clara.
Thurstane, the modest, proud, manly youngster, who had no meannesses or
trickeries by nature, and had learned none in his honorable profession,
would not allow himself to break into these dialogues if they looked at
all like confidences. The more he suspected that Coronado was courting
Clara, the more resolutely and grimly he said to himself, "Stand back!"
The girl should be perfectly free to choose between them; she should be
influenced by no compulsions and no stratagems of his; was he not "an
officer and a gentleman"?
"By Jove! I am miserable for life," he thought when he suspected, as he
sometimes did, that they two were in love. "I'll get myself killed in my
next fight. I can't bear it. But I won't interfere. I'll do my duty as an
honorable man. Of course she understands me."
But just at this point Clara failed to understand him. It is asserted by
some philosophers that women have less conscience about "cutting each
other out," breaking up engagements, etc., than men have in such matters.
Love-making and its results form such an all-important part of their
existence, that they must occasionally allow success therein to overbear
such vague, passionless ideas as principles, sentiments of honor, etc. It
is, we fear, highly probable that if Clara had been in love with Ralph,
and had seen her chance of empire threatened by a rival, she would have
come out of that calm innocence which now seemed to enfold her whole
nature, and would have done such things as girls may do to avert
catastrophes of the affections. She now thought to herself, If he cares
for me, how can he keep away from me when he sees Coronado making eyes at
me? She was a little vexed with him for behaving so, and was consequently
all the sweeter to his rival. This when Ralph would have risked his
commission for a smile, and would have died to save her from a sorrow!
Presently this slightly coquettish, yet very good and lovely little
being--this seraph from one of Fra Angelica's pictures, endowed with a
frailty or two of humanity--found herself the heroine of a trying scene.
Coronado hastened it; he judged her ready to fall into his net; he managed
the time and place for the capture. The train had been ascending for some
hours, and had at last reached a broad plateau, a nearly even floor of
sandstone, covered with a carpet of thin earth, the whole noble level bare
to the eye at once, without a tree or a thicket to give it detail. It was
a scene of tranquillity and monotony; no rains ever disturbed or remoulded
the tabulated surface of soil; there, as distinct as if made yesterday,
were the tracks of a train which had passed a year before.
"Shall we take a gallop?" said Coronado. "No danger of ambushes here."
Clara's eyes sparkled with youth's love of excitement, and the two horses
sprang off at speed toward the centre of the plateau. After a glorious
flight of five minutes, enjoyed for the most part in silence, as such
swift delights usually are, they dropped into a walk two miles ahead of
the wagons.
"That was magnificent," Clara of course said, her face flushed with
pleasure and exercise.
"You are wonderfully handsome," observed Coronado, with an air of thinking
aloud, which disguised the coarse directness of the flattery. In fact, he
was so dazzled by her brilliant color, the sunlight in her disordered
curls, and the joyous sparkling of her hazel eyes, that he spoke with an
ingratiating honesty.
Clara, who was in one of her unconscious and innocent moods, simply
replied, "I suppose people are always handsome enough when they are
happy."
"Then I ought to be lovely," said Coronado. "I am happier than I ever was
before."
"Coronado, you look very well," observed Clara, turning her eyes on him
with a grave expression which rather puzzled him. "This out-of-door life
has done you good."
"Then I don't look very well indoors?" he smiled.
"You know what I mean, Coronado. Your health has improved, and your face
shows it."
Fearing that she was not in an emotional condition to be bewildered and
fascinated by a declaration of love, he queried whether he had not better
put off his enterprise until a more susceptible moment. Certainly, if he
were without a rival; but there was Thurstane, ready any and every day to
propose; it would not do to let _him_ have the first word, and cause the
first heart-beat. Coronado believed that to make sure of winning the race
he must take the lead at the start. Yes, he would offer himself now; he
would begin by talking her into a receptive state of mind; that done, he
would say with all his eloquence, "I love you."
We must not suppose that the declaration would be a pure fib, or anything
like it. The man had no conscience, and he was almost incomparably
selfish, but he was capable of loving, and he did love. That is to say, he
was inflamed by this girl's beauty and longed to possess it. It is a low
species of affection, but it is capable of great violence in a man whose
physical nature is ardent, and Coronado's blood could take a heat like
lava. Already, although he had not yet developed his full power of
longing, he wanted Clara as he had never wanted any woman before. We can
best describe his kind of sentiment by that hungry, carnal word _wanted_.
After riding in silent thought for a few rods, he said, "I have lost my
good looks now, I suppose."
"What do you mean, Coronado?"
"They depend on my happiness, and that is gone."
"Coronado, you are playing riddles."
"This table-land reminds me of my own life. Do you see that it has no
verdure? I have been just as barren of all true happiness. There has been
no fruit or blossom of true affection for me to gather. You know that I
lost my excellent father and my sainted mother when I was a child. I was
too young to miss them; but for all that the bereavement was the same;
there was the less love for me. It seems as if there had been none."
"Garcia has been good to you--of late," suggested Clara, rather puzzled to
find consolation for a man whose misery was so new to her.
Remembering what a scoundrel Garcia was, and what a villainous business
Garcia had sent him upon, Coronado felt like smiling. He knew that the old
man had no sentiments beyond egotism, and a family pride which mainly, if
not entirely, sprang from it. Such a heart as Garcia's, what a place to
nestle in! Such a creature as Coronado seeking comfort in such a breast as
his uncle's was very much like a rattlesnake warming himself in a hole of
a rock.
"Ah, yes!" sighed Coronado. "Admirable old gentleman! I should not have
forgotten him. However, he is a solace which comes rather late. It is only
two years since he perceived that he had done me injustice, and received
me into favor. And his affection is somewhat cold. Garcia is an old man
laden with affairs. Moreover, men in general have little sympathy with
men. When we are saddened, we do not look to our own sex for cheer. We
look to yours."
Almost every woman responds promptly to a claim for pity.
"I am sorry for you, Coronado," said Clara, in her artless way. "I am,
truly."
"You do not know, you cannot know, how you console me."
Satisfied with the results of his experiment in boring for sympathy, he
tried another, a dangerous one, it would seem, but very potent when it
succeeds.
"This lack of affection has had sad results. I have searched everywhere
for it, only to meet with disappointment. In my desperation I have
searched where I should not. I have demanded true love of people who had
no true love to give. And for this error and wrong I have been terribly
punished. The mere failure of hope and trust has been hard enough to bear.
But that was not the half. Shame, self-contempt, remorse have been an
infinitely heavier burden. If any man was ever cured of trusting for
happiness to a wicked world, it is Coronado."
In spite of his words and his elaborately penitent expression, Clara only
partially understood him. Some kind of evil life he was obviously
confessing, but what kind she only guessed in the vaguest fashion.
However, she comprehended enough to interest her warmly: here was a
penitent sinner who had forsaken ways of wickedness; here was a struggling
soul which needed encouragement and tenderness. A woman loves to believe
that she can be potent over hearts, and especially that she can be potent
for good. Clara fixed upon Coronado's face a gaze of compassion and
benevolence which was almost superhuman. It should have shamed him into
honesty; but he was capable of trying to deceive the saints and the
Virgin; he merely decided that she was in a fit frame to accept him.
"At last I have a faint hope of a sure and pure happiness," he said. "I
have found one who I know can strengthen me and comfort me, if she will. I
am seeking to be worthy of her. I am worthy of her so far as adoration can
make me. I am ready to surrender my whole life--all that I am and that I
can be--to her."
Clara had begun to guess his meaning; the quick blood was already flooding
her cheek; the light in her eyes was tremulous with agitation.
"Clara, you must know what I mean," continued Coronado, suddenly reaching
his hand toward her, as if to take her captive. "You are the only person I
ever loved. I love you with all my soul. Can your heart ever respond to
mine? Can you ever bring yourself to be my wife?"