Although the lower counties of southwest Texas are flat and badly
watered, they possess a rich soil. They are favored, too, by a kindly
climate, subtropic in its mildness. The days are long and bright and
breezy, while night brings a drenching dew that keeps the grasses
green. Of late years there have been few of those distressing droughts
that gave this part of the state an evil reputation, and there has been
a corresponding increase in prosperity. The Rio Grande, jaundiced,
erratic as an invalid, wrings its saffron blood from the clay bluffs
and gravel cañons of the hill country, but near its estuary winds
quietly through a low coastal plain which the very impurities of that
blood have richened. Here the river's banks are smothered in thickets
of huisache, ebony, mesquite, oak, and alamo.
Railroads, those vitalizing nerve-fibers of commerce, are so scarce
along this division of the border that even in this day when we boast,
or lament, that we no longer have a frontier, there remain in Texas
sections larger than some of our Eastern states which hear the sound of
iron wheels only on their boundaries. To travel from Brownsville north
along the international line one must, for several hundred miles, avail
oneself of horses, mules, or motor-cars, since rail transportation is
almost lacking. And on his way the traveler will traverse whole
counties where the houses are jacals, where English is a foreign
tongue, and where peons plow their fields with crooked sticks as did
the ancient Egyptians.
That part of the state which lies below the Nueces River was for a time
disputed territory, and long after Texans had given their lives to
drive the Eagle of Mexico across the Rio Grande much of it remained a
forbidden land. Even to-day it is alien. It is a part of our Southland,
but a South different to any other that we have. Within it there are no
blacks, and yet the whites number but one in twenty. The rest are
swarthy, black-haired men who speak the Spanish tongue and whose
citizenship is mostly a matter of form.
The stockmen, pushing ahead of the nesters and the tillers of the soil,
were the first to invade the lower Rio Grande, and among these "Old Ed"
Austin was a pioneer. Out of the unmapped prairie he had hewed a
foothold, and there, among surroundings as Mexican as Mexico, he had
laid the beginnings of his fortune.
Of "Old Ed's" early life strange stories are told; like the other
cattle barons, he was hungry for land and took it where or how he
could. There are tales of fertile sections bought for ten cents an
acre, tales of Mexican ranchers dispossessed by mortgage, by monte, or
by any means that came to hand; stories even of some, more stubborn
than the rest, who refused to feed the Austin greed for land, and who
remained on their farms to feed the buzzards instead. Those were crude
old days; the pioneers who pushed their herds into the far pastures
were lawless fellows, ruthless, acquisitive, mastered by the
empire-builder's urge for acres and still more acres. They were the
Reclaimers, the men who seized and held, and then seized more,
concerning themselves little or not at all with the moral law as
applicable to both Mexican and white, and leaving it to the second
generation to justify their acts, if ever justification were required.
As other ranches grew under the hands of such unregenerate owners, so
also under "Old Ed" Austin's management did Las Palmas increase and
prosper. The estate took its name from a natural grove of palms in
which the house was built; it comprised an expanse of rich river-land
backed by miles of range where "Box A" cattle lived and bred. In his
later years the old man sold much land, and some he leased; but when he
handed Las Palmas to his son, "Young Ed," as a wedding gift, the ranch
still remained a property to be proud of, and one that was known far
and wide for its size and richness. Leaving his boy to work out of it a
fortune for himself and his bride, the father retired to San Antonio,
whither the friends and cronies of his early days were drifting. There
he settled down and proceeded to finish his allotted span exactly as
suited him best. The rancher's ideal of an agreeable old age comprised
three important items--to wit, complete leisure, unlimited freedom of
speech, and two pints of rye whisky daily. He enjoyed them all
impartially, until, about a year before this story opens, he died
profanely and comfortably. He had a big funeral, and was sincerely
mourned by a coterie of gouty old Indian-fighters.
Las Palmas had changed greatly since Austin, senior, painfully scrawled
his slanting signature to the deed. It was a different ranch now to
what the old man had known; indeed, it was doubtful if he would have
recognized it, for even the house was new.
Alaire had some such thought in mind as she rode up to the gate on the
afternoon following her departure from the water-hole, and she felt a
thrill of pride at the acres of sprouting corn, the dense green fields
of alfalfa so nicely fitted between their fences. They were like clean,
green squares of matting spread for the feet of summer.
A Mexican boy came running to care for her horse, a Mexican woman
greeted her as she entered the wide, cool hall and went to her room.
Alaire had ridden far. Part of the night had been spent at the Balli
goat-ranch, the remainder of the journey had been hot and dusty, and
even yet she was not wholly recovered from her experience of the
outward trip.
The house servants at Las Palmas were, on the whole, well trained, and
Mrs. Austin's periodic absences excited no comment; in the present
instance, Dolores fixed a bath and laid out clean clothes with no more
than a running accompaniment of chatter concerned with household
affairs. Dolores, indeed, was superior to the ordinary servant; she was
a woman of some managerial ability, and she combined the duties of
personal maid with those of housekeeper. She was a great gossip, and
possessed such a talent for gaining information that through her
husband, Benito, the range boss, she was able to keep her mistress in
fairly intimate touch with ranch matters.
Alaire, however, was at this moment in no mood to resume the tiresome
details of management; she quickly dismissed her servitor and proceeded
to revel in the luxury of a cool bath, after which she took a nap.
Later, as she leisurely dressed herself, she acknowledged that it was
good to feel the physical comforts of her own house, even though her
home-coming gave her no especial joy. She made it a religious practice
to dress for dinner, regardless of Ed's presence, though often for
weeks at a time she sat in solitary state, presiding over an empty
table. Nevertheless, she kept to her custom, for not only did the
formality help her to retain her own self-respect, but it had its
influence upon the servants. Without companionship one needs to be ever
upon guard to retain the nice refinements of gentle breeding, and any
one who has exercised authority in savage countries soon learns the
importance of leaving unbridged the gulf of color and of class.
But Alaire looked forward to no lonely dinner to-night, for Ed was at
home. It was with a grave preoccupation that she made herself ready to
meet him.
Dolores bustled in for a second time and straightway launched herself
into a tirade against Juan, the horse-boy.
"Devil take me if there was ever such a shameless fellow," she cried,
angrily. "He delights in tormenting me, and--Dios!--he is lazier than a
snake. Work? Bah! He abhors it. All day long he snaps his revolver and
pretends to be a bandido, and when he is not risking hell's fire in
that way he is whirling his riata and jumping through it. Useless
capers! He ropes the dog, he ropes the rose-bushes, he ropes fat
Victoria, the cook, carrying a huge bowl of hot water to scald the
ants' nest. Victoria's stomach is boiled red altogether, and so painful
that when she comes near the stove she curses in a way to chill your
blood. What does he do this morning but fling his wicked loop over a
calf's head and break off one of its little horns. It was terrible; but
Señor Austin only laughed and told him he was a fine vaquero."
"Has Mr. Austin been here all the time?"
"Yes."
"Has he--drunk much?"
"Um-m. No more than common. He is on the gallery now with his
cocktails."
"He knows I am at home?"
"I told him."
Alaire went on dressing. After a little she asked: "Has Benito finished
branding the calves in the south pasture?"
"He finished yesterday and sent the remuda to the Six Mile. José
Sanchez will have completed the rodeo by this afternoon. Benito rode in
last night to see you."
"By the way, you know José's cousin, Panfilo?"
"Si."
"Why did he leave Las Palmas?"
Dolores hesitated so long that her mistress turned upon her with a look
of sharp inquiry.
"He went to La Feria, señora." Then, in a lowered tone: "Mr. Austin
ordered it. Suddenly, without warning, he sent him away, though Panfilo
did not wish to go, Benito told me all about it."
"Why was he transferred? Come! What ails your tongue, Dolores?"
"Well, I keep my eyes open and my ears, too. I am no fool--" Dolores
paused doubtfully.
"Yes, yes!"
Dolores drew closer. "Rosa Morales--you know the girl? Her father works
the big pump-engine at the river. Well, he is not above anything, that
man; not above selling his own flesh and blood, and the girl is no
better. She thinks about nothing except men, and she attends all the
bailes for miles around, on both sides of the river. Panfilo loved her;
he was mad about her. That's why he came here to work."
"They were engaged, were they not?"
"Truly. And Panfilo was jealous of any man who looked at Rosa. Now you
can understand why--he was sent away." Dolores's sharp eyes narrowed
meaningly. "Señor Ed has been riding toward the river every day,
lately. Panfilo was furious, so--"
"I see! That is all I care to hear." Alone, Alaire stood motionless for
some time, her face fixed, her eyes unseeing; but later, when she met
her husband in the dining-room, her greeting was no less civil than
usual.
Ed acknowledged his wife's entrance with a careless nod, but did not
trouble to remove his hands from his pockets. As he seated himself
heavily at the table and with unsteady fingers shook the folds from his
napkin, he said:
"You stayed longer than you intended. Um-m--you were gone three days,
weren't you?"
"Four days," Alaire told him, realizing with a little inward start how
very far apart she and Ed had drifted. She looked at him curiously for
an instant, wondering if he really could be her husband, or--if he were
not some peculiarly disagreeable stranger.
Ed had been a handsome boy, but maturity had vitiated his good looks.
He was growing fat from drink and soft from idleness; his face was too
full, his eyes too sluggish; there was an unhealthy redness in his
cheeks. In contrast to his wife's semi-formal dress, he was
unkempt--unshaven and soiled. He wore spurred boots and a soft shirt;
his nails were grimy. When in the city he contrived to garb himself
immaculately; he was in fact something of a dandy; but at home he was a
sloven, and openly reveled in a freedom of speech and a coarseness of
manner that were sad trials to Alaire. His preparations for dinner this
evening had been characteristically simple; he had drunk three dry
cocktails and flung his sombrero into a corner.
"I've been busy while you were gone," he announced. "Been down to the
pump-house every day laying that new intake. It was a nasty job, too. I
had Morales barbecue a cabrito for my lunch, and it was good, but I'm
hungry again." Austin attacked his meal with an enthusiasm strange in
him, for of late his appetite had grown as errant as his habits. Ed
boasted, in his clubs, that he was an outdoor man, and he was wont to
tell his friends that the rough life was the life for him; but as a
matter of fact he spent much more time in San Antonio than he did at
home, and each of his sojourns at Las Palmas was devoted principally to
sobering up from his last visit to the city and to preparing for
another. Nor was he always sober even in his own house; Ed was a heavy
and a constant drinker at all times. What little exercise he took was
upon the back of a horse, and, as no one knew better than his wife, the
physical powers he once had were rapidly deteriorating.
By and by he inquired, vaguely: "Let's see, ... Where did you go this
time?"
"I went up to look over that Ygnacio tract."
"Oh yes. How did you find it?"
"Not very promising. It needs a lot of wells."
"I haven't been out that way since I was a boy. Think you'll lease it?"
"I don't know. I must find some place for those La Feria cattle."
Austin shook his head. "Better leave 'em where they are, until the
rebels take that country. I stand mighty well with them."
"That's the trouble," Alaire told him. "You stand too well--so well
that I want to get my stock out of Federal territory as soon as
possible."