The little adobe house stood flush with the street, halfway between
the business houses and the residence portion of the town which turned
its back on the sand and sage-covered hills that--breaking into gray
waves--far off cast themselves on the beach of blue skyland in great
breakers of snow-crested mountains.
At the side of the house was a dooryard--so small!--beaten hard and
smooth as a floor, and without a tree or a bush. There was no grass
even at the edge of the sturdy little stream that ran across the square
enclosure, talking all day to the old-faced baby in its high chair
under the shake-covered kitchen porch. All day the stream laughed and
chattered noisily to the owl-eyed baby, and chuckled and gurgled as it
hurried across the yard and burrowed under the weather-bleached boards
of the high fence, to find its way along the edge of the street, and
so on to the river a quarter of a mile below. But the wee woman-child,
owl-eyed and never complaining, sat through the long sunshine hours
without one smile on its little old face, and never heeding the stream.
As the days grew hotter, its little thin hands became thinner, and
it ate less and less of the boiled arroz and papas the young mother
sometimes brought when she came to dip water.
“Of a truth, there is no niña so good as my ’Stacia; she never, never
cries! She is no trouble to me at all,” Carmelita would exclaim, and
clap her hands at the baby. But the baby only grew rounder eyed as it
stared unsmilingly at its mother’s pretty plumpness, and laughing red
lips, and big black eyes, whenever she stopped to talk to the little
one.
Carmelita--pretty, shallow-pated Carmelita--never stayed long with the
tiny ’Stacia, for the baby was so good left alone; and there was always
Anton or Luciano and Monico to drop in for a laugh with the young
wife of stupid old Lucas; or Josefa coming in for a game of “coyote y
gallos.”
It was Lucas who went out to the porch whenever he could spare the time
from earning money that he might buy the needed arroz and papas, or the
rose-colored dresses he liked to see her wear.
It was for Lucas she said her first word--the only word she had learned
yet--“papa!” And she said it, he thought, as if she knew it was a
love in no wise different from a father’s love that he gave her, poor
little Anastacia, whose father--well, Lucas had never asked Carmelita
to tell him. How could he? Poor child, let her keep her secret. Pobre
Carmelita! Only sixteen and no mother. And could he--Lucas--see her
beaten and abused by that old woman who took the labor of her hands
and gave her nothing in return?--could he stand by when he saw the big
welts and bruises, and not beg her to let him care for her and the
niña?--such a little niña it was, too! Of a verity, he was no longer
young; and there was his ugly pock-marked face, to say nothing of the
scars the oso had given him that day when he, a youth, had sent his
knife to the hilt in the bear that so nearly cost him his life. The
scars were horrible to see--horrible! But Carmelita (so young--so
pretty!) did not seem to mind; and when the priest came again they were
married, so that Carmelita had a husband and the pobrecita a father.
And such a father! How Lucas loved his little ’Stacia! How tender he
was with her; how his heart warmed to the touch of her lips and hands!
Why, he grew almost jealous of the red-breasted robin that came daily
to sit by the edge of her plate and eat arroz with her! He begrudged
the bird its touch of the little sticky hand covered with grains of
rice which the robin pecked at so fearlessly. And when the sharp bill
hurt the tender flesh, how she would scold! She was not his ’Stacia
then at all--no, some other baby very different from the solemn little
one he knew. There seemed something unearthly in it, and Lucas would
feel a sinking of his heart and wish the bird would stay away. It never
came when others were there. Only from the shelter of window or doorway
did he and the others see the little bright bird-eyes watch--with head
aslant--the big black ones; or hear the baby bird-talk between the two.
Every day throughout the long, hot summer the robin came to eat from
the niña’s plate of rice as she sat in her high chair under the curling
shake awning; and all the while she grew more owl-eyed and thin. A good
niña, she was, and so little trouble!
One day the robin did not come. That night, through the open windows
of the front room, passers-by could see a table covered with a folded
sheet. A very small table--it did not need to be large; but the bed
had been taken out of the small, mean room to give space to those who
came to look at the poor, little, pinched face under a square of pink
mosquito bar. There were lighted candles at the head and feet. Moths,
flying in and out of the wide open window, fluttered about the flames.
The rose-colored dress had been exchanged for one that was white and
stiffly starched. Above the wee gray face was a wreath of artificial
orange blossoms, but the wasted baby-fingers had been closed upon some
natural sprays of lovely white hyacinths. The cloying sweetness of
the blossoms mingled with the odor of cigarette smoke coming from the
farther corners of the room, and the smell of a flaring kerosene lamp
which stood near the window. It flickered uncertainly in the breeze,
and alternately lighted or threw into shadow the dark faces clustered
about the doorway of the second room. Those who in curiosity lingered
for a moment outside the little adobe house could hear voices speaking
in the soft language of Spain.
To them who peered within with idle interest, it was “only some Mexican
woman’s baby dead.” Tomorrow, in a little white-painted coffin, it
would be born down the long street, past the saloons and shops where
the idle and the curious would stare at the procession. Over the bridge
across the now muddy river they would go to the unfenced graveyard on
the bluff, and there the little dead mite of illegitimacy would be
lowered into the dust from whence it came. Then each mourner in turn
would cast a handful of earth into the open grave, and the clods would
rattle dully on the coffin lid. (Ah, pobre, pobre Lucas!) Then they
would come away, leaving Carmelita’s baby there underground.
Carmelita herself was now sitting apathetically by the coffin. She
dully realized what tomorrow was to be; but she could not understand
what this meant. She had cried a little at first, but now her eyes
were dry. Still, she was sorry--it had been such a good little baby,
and no trouble at all!
“A good niña, and never sick; such a good little ’Stacia!” she
murmured. Carmelita felt very sorry for herself.
Outside, in the darkness of the summer night, Lucas sat on the kitchen
porch leaning his head against the empty high chair of the pobrecita,
and sobbed as if his heart would break.
* * * * *
That had happened in August. Through September, pretty Carmelita cried
whenever she remembered what a good baby the little Anastacia had been.
Then Josefa began coming to the house again to play “coyote y gallos”
with her, so that she forgot to cry so often.
As for Lucas, he worked harder than ever. Though, to be sure, there
were only two now to work for where there had been three. With Anton,
and Luciano, and Monico, he had been running in wild horses from the
mountains; and among others which had fallen to his share was an old
blaze-face roan stallion, unmanageable and full of vicious temper. They
had been put--these wild ones--in a little pasture on the other side of
the river; a pasture in the rancho of Señor Metcalf, the Americano. And
the señor, who laughed much and liked fun, had said he wanted to see
the sport when Lucas should come to ride the old roan.
Today, Lucas--on his sleek little cow-horse, Topo--was riding along the
river road leading to the rancho; but not today would he rope the old
blaze-face. There were others to be broken. Halfway from the bridge
he met little Nicolás, who worked for the señor, and passed him with
a pleasant “Buenos dias!” without stopping. The boy had been his good
amigo since the time he got him away from the maddened steer that would
have gored him to death. There was nothing ’Colás would not do for his
loved Lucas. But the older man cared not to stop and talk to him today,
as was his custom; for he was gravely thinking of the little dead
’Stacia, and rode on. A hundred yards farther, and he heard the clatter
of a horse’s hoofs behind him, and Nicolás calling:
“Lucas! Lucas!”
He turned the rein on Topo’s neck, and waited till the boy came. In
the pleasant, warm October sunlight he waited, while Nicolás told him
that which would always make him shiver and feel cold when afterward
he should remember that half-hour in the stillness and sunshine of the
river road. He waited, even after Nicolás (frightened at having dared
to tell his friend) had gone.
The señor and Carmelita! It was the truth--Nicolás would not lie. The
truth; for the boy had listened behind the high fence of weather-beaten
boards, and had heard them talk together. He, and the little stream
that gurgled and laughed all day, had heard how they--the señor and
Carmelita--would go away to the north when the month should end. For
many months they two had loved--the Señor Metcalf and the wife of
Lucas; had loved before Lucas had made her his wife--ay! even before
the little ’Stacia had come. And the little ’Stacia was the señor’s----
Ah, Lucas would not say it of the dead pobrecita! For she was
his--Lucas’s--by right of his love for her. Poor little Anastacia! And
but that the little one would have been a trouble to the Americano,
they--the woman and the man--would have gone away together before;
but he would not have it so. Now that the little one was no longer to
trouble them, he would take the mother and go away to the new rancho he
had just bought far over on the other side of the mountains.
[Illustration: “Their eyes met.”--Page 65]
“Go!”--said Lucas, when the boy had finished telling all he had
overheard--“Go and tell the señor that I go now to the corral to ride
the roan stallion. And--’Colás, give to me thy riata for today.”
* * * * *
Lucas had driven the horses into one of the corrals. Alone there he
had lassoed the old blaze-face; and then had driven the others out.
Unaided, he had tied the old stallion down. As he lay there viciously
biting and trying to strike out with his hind feet, Lucas had fastened
a halter on his head and had drawn a riata (sixty feet long, and strong
as the thews of a lion) tight about him just back of the forelegs.
Twice he had passed it about the heaving girth of the old roan, whose
reeking body was muddy with sweat and the grime and dust of the corral.
The knots were tied securely and well. The rope would not break. Had
he not made it himself from the hide of an old toro? From jaw-piece
to jaw-piece of the halter he drew his crimson silk handkerchief,
bandaging the eyes that gleamed red under swollen and skinned lids.
Then, cautiously, Lucas unbound the four hoofs that had been tied
together. The horse did not attempt to move, though he was consumed by
a rage against his captor that was fiendish--the fury of a wild beast
that has never yet been conquered.
Lucas struck him across the ribs with the end of the rope he was
holding. The big roan head was lifted from the ground a second and
then let fall, as he squealed savagely. Again the rope made a hollow
sound against the heaving sides. Again the maddened horse squealed.
When the rope struck the third time, he gathered himself together
uncertainly--hesitated--struggled an instant--staggered to his feet,
and stood quivering in every muscle of his great body. His legs shook
under him; and his head--with the bandaged eyes--moved from side to
side unsteadily.
Then Lucas wound the halter-rope--which was heavy and a long
one--around the center-post of the corral where they were standing.
As he finished, he heard someone singing; the voice coming nearer and
nearer. A man’s voice it was, full and rich, caroling a love song, the
sound mingling with that of clattering hoofs.
Lucas, stooping, picked up the riata belonging to Nicolás. He was
carefully re-coiling it when Guy Metcalf, riding up to the enclosure,
looked down into the corral.
“Hello, Lucas! ‘Going to have some fun with the old roan,’ are you?
Well, you’re the boy to ride him. ‘Haven’t got the saddle on yet, hey?’
Hold on a minute---- Soon as I tie, I’ll be with you!”
Lucas had not spoken, neither had he raised his head. He went to where
little Topo was standing. Shaking the noose into place by a turn or
two of the wrist, while the long loop dragged at his heels through the
dust, he put his foot in the stirrup and swung himself into the saddle.
He glanced at the gate--he ran the noose out yet a little more. Then he
began to swing it slowly in easy, long sweeps above his head while he
waited.
The gate opened and Metcalf came in. He turned and carefully fastened
the gate behind him. He was a third of the way across the corral when
their eyes met.
Then--with its serpent hiss of warning--the circling riata, snake-like,
shot out, fastening its coils about him. And Topo, the little cow-horse
trained to such work, wheeled at the touch of the spur as the turns
of the rope fastened themselves about the horn of the saddle, and the
man--furrowing the hoof-powdered dust of the corral--was dragged to
the heels of the wild stallion. Lucas, glancing hastily at the face,
earth-scraped and smeared and the full lips that were bleeding under
their fringe of gold, saw that--though insensible for a moment from
the quick jerk given the rope--the blue eyes of the man were opening.
Lucas swung himself out of the saddle--leaving Topo to hold taut the
riata. Then he began the work of binding the doomed Americano. When
he had done, to the doubled rope of braided rawhide that was about
the roan stallion, he made Carmelita’s lover fast with the riata he
had taken from Nicolás. He removed it slowly from the man’s neck (the
señor should not have his eyes closed too quickly to the valley through
which he would pass!) and he put it about the body, under the arms.
Lucas was lingering now over his work like one engaged in some pleasant
occupation.
The halter-rope was then unknotted, and the turns unwound from the
center-post. Next, he pulled the crimson handkerchief from the horse’s
eyes--shouted--and shook his hat at him!
Maddened, terrified, and with the dragging thing at his heels, the
four-footed fury fought man, and earth, and air about him like the very
demon that he was till he came to the gate that Lucas had set wide for
him, and he saw again the waves of sage and sand hills (little waves
of sweet-scented sage) that rippled away to the mountains he knew. Out
there was liberty; out there was the free life of old; and there he
could get rid of the thing at his heels that--with all his kicking, and
rearing, and plunging--still dragged at the end of the rope.
Out through the wide set gate he passed, mad with an awful rage, and
as with the wings of the wind. On, and on he swept; marking a trail
through the sand with his burden. Faster and faster, and growing dim to
the sight of the man who stood grim and motionless at the gate of the
corral. Away! away to those far-lying mountains that are breakers on
the beach of blue skyland!
[Illustration]