There is nothing so radiant, so blue and green (unless it be a
peacock), nothing so freshly washed and shining, as an early morning in
the tropics.
A new President having decided to add cavalry to the army, the recruits
were being drilled on a flat furrowed savannah outside the city limits.
Behind them a line of hills, rugged in outline but softened by heavy
vegetation, were hidden by the mist that was rolling away over the
Atlantic; and all about them, at the edge of the meadow, were tall
flat-topped trees, under which were dotted little pink and blue houses,
like toys.
The soldiers wore blue cotton uniforms, and many of them were
barefooted. Their horses were diminutive, but sure-footed and nimble,
not ill built forward of the saddle, but pitifully weak behind.
The instructor was very differently mounted. He rode a round strong bay
mare, which, in contrast to the pony-like creatures about her, looked
a hand higher than her actual height. Her rider sat still watching his
pupils. Little of his face was visible under the brim of his broad
Panama hat except a brown chin and a pair of long blond mustaches.
Now and then he shouted to the men in excellent Spanish; and once or
twice swore with the tolerant, unmistakable drawl of the Yankee. On the
whole, however, one would have said after watching him for some minutes
that his temper seemed fairly unruffled in a climate which tries men’s
tempers, and in an occupation which induces irritation.
Once, with some instinctive motion of his body, he put his horse at
a hand gallop, and riding over to one of the soldiers offered some
individual suggestions. The man plainly did not understand, and a
minute later the instructor had changed mounts with the man, and
presently the pony was wheeling hither and thither in response to his
bit, as a boat answers its rudder.
Exactly at ten o’clock the door of a square building in the town
opened; a little trumpeter came out, and the clear notes of a bugle--so
appropriate to the fierce brilliance of the morning--were flung out
like a banner upon the air. It was the signal that the lesson was over.
The men formed into fours, and jogged away under the command of a
non-commissioned officer, leaving the American alone.
He sat a moment, watching the retreating backs, as he took a grass
cigarette case from his breeches pocket, and lit a little yellow native
cigarette. Then he turned his horse with one hand, and cantered away
across the savannah. As he did so, the motion and the clear brightness
of the morning moved him to song. Pushing back his hat from his
forehead he lifted his head:
“Oh, I’m not in a hurry to fuss or to worry,
For fear I should grow too stout,
And I don’t care a bit if my boots don’t fit,
For I walk just as well without.”
He stopped in front of one of the toy houses, and shouted “Oh, Señor
Doctor.”
The door, which stood open, was at once filled by the figure of a man
in crash clothes. He was middle-aged and wore spectacles, so powerful
that the eyes appeared to glare upon you with unspeakable ferocity,
until, seeing round them or over, you found the expression friendly in
the extreme.
“Ah, ha, Don Luis,” he said, “I did not know you were a singer.”
“And a poet, my dear Doctor,” returned the other, bowing. “My own
words. Could you hear them across the savannah?”
“I could have heard them over the frontier. Will you come in?”
“No, _gracias_,” he answered. “I only stopped in to ask you to a party
this evening, Doctor, for the lovely Rosita. It became necessary to
do something to cut out that handsome young dog of a native. Will you
come?”
The doctor gave a sound indicative of hesitation.
“What kind of a party?” he asked cautiously.
“Oh, a perfectly respectable little party,” returned Vickers, “not a
bit like my last. At least it will begin respectably. It will end as my
guests please. Will you come early or late, Doctor?”
“Early,” said the doctor; “it is always permitted to go home. No, wait
a moment,” he added, as he saw Vickers preparing to go. “I want to
ask you something. Did you ever know a big American who lived on the
Pacific side--a man named Lee? Not a relation of yours, was he?”
“Certainly he is not,” retorted Vickers. “I have not many causes for
gratitude, but that is one. I met him only once, and then he borrowed
fifteen pesos from me on the strength of a hypothetical likeness
between us.”
“There is a certain resemblance,” observed the doctor.
“Is there? I never saw it. What has he been doing? Getting into
trouble?”
“Getting out of it. He died at my house this morning.”
“What of? Fever?”
“No, drink. I found him two days ago in his hut on the Pacific slope,
and brought him here. One can not drink safely in this climate. Nature
is beneficent, she gives much,” the doctor waved his hand, “but she
also exacts much. One can not drink here, and live.”
“Oh, nonsense, Doctor,” said Vickers, “look at me. I’m as sound as a
dollar.”
“What I want of you,” said the other, “is to write to his family. My
English is not sufficient to make him out a hero, and,” he added, with
a smile, “when we write home they are always heroes. Will you undertake
it?”
“Sure,” said Vickers, swinging a light leg over the mare’s head. As he
stepped to the ground, one could see his great height, an inch or two
over six feet.
“You know,” the doctor went on persuasively, as they walked up the
steps into the house, “that he might just as well have died, as you
suggested, of fever.”
“Fever, pooh!” exclaimed Vickers. “How tame! We must think of something
better than that. Would fever be any consolation to the survivors?
No, no, my dear Nuñez, something great, something inspiring. ‘My dear
Madame, your son, after a career unusually useful and self-denying’
(the worthless dog), ‘has just met a death as noble as any I have
ever seen or heard of. A group of children--’ No, ‘a group of little
children returning from school were suddenly attacked by an immense and
ferocious _tigre_----’”
“Oh, come, Don Luis,” murmured the doctor, “who ever heard of a _tigre_
attacking a group?”
“My dear Señor Doctor,” replied Vickers, “I perceive with regret that
you are a realist. I myself am all for romance, pure ethereal romance.
I scorn fact, and by Heaven, if I can’t describe a _tigre_ so that
Lee’s mother will believe in it, I’ll eat my hat.”
“In that case,” returned the doctor dryly, “I suppose it is unnecessary
to mention that Lee does not seem to have a mother.”
“Oh, well,” said Vickers, in evident discouragement, “if a fellow
hasn’t got a mother, that prohibits pathos at once. A wife? At least a
sister?”
Nuñez shook his head. “Nothing but a father,” he said firmly.
Vickers flung himself into a chair with his legs very far apart and his
hands in his pockets.
“Now, how in thunder,” he said, “can I get up any interest in a father?
A father probably knew all about Lee, and very likely turned him out
of the house. A father will think it all for the best. Or no, perhaps
not. An old white-haired clergyman--Lee was just the fellow to be a
clergyman’s son.”
“I am often glad that I belong to a religion whose priests do not
marry,” said the doctor. “Let me get you Lee’s papers.”
They made but a small bundle and most of them were bills, unreceipted.
Vickers drew out one with an American stamp. It was dated Hilltop,
Connecticut. Vickers read:
“My Dear Son: I enclose the money you desire for your journey home,
which Nellie and I have managed to save during the last three months.
I can hardly realize that I am to see you again after almost ten
years.”
Vickers looked up. “Why, the poor beggar,” he said, “he was just going
home after ten years. I call that hard luck.” And then his eye lit on
the date of the letter, which was many months old. “By Jove, no. He
took the old man’s money and blew it in, instead. Isn’t that the limit?
But who is Nellie?”
The doctor shrugged his shoulders, and Vickers returned to the perusal
of the papers. “Bills, bills, notes, letters from women. I seem to
recognize that hand, but no matter. Ah, here is another from home. Ten
years old, too.”
The writing was feminine, neat, and childish.
“Dear Bob,” it said, “if you left home on my account, you need not
have gone.
“Your affectionate cousin,
“NELLIE.”
There was a moment’s silence. A feeling of envy swept over Vickers. The
mere sight of an American stamp made him homesick; the mail from the
States never brought him anything; and yet somewhere at home there was
a girl who would write like that to a worthless creature like Lee.
“They were using those stamps when I was at home,” he said
reminiscently, “but they don’t use them any more.”
“Indeed,” said the doctor, without very much interest.
“Ten years ago, just fancy it,” Vickers went on, turning the letter
over. “And he did not go back. I would have, in his place. If I had an
affectionate cousin Nellie--I have always been rather fond of the name
Nellie. Can you understand his not going?”
“We do not understand the Anglo-Saxon, nor pretend to,” returned the
doctor. “You know very well, Don Luis, you all seem strangely cold to
us.”
“Cold!” cried Vickers, with a laugh; “well, I never was accused of that
before. Wait till you see my letter to Nellie: for of course it will
be to Nellie that I shall write. Or no, I can’t, for I’m not sure of
the last name. No. I’ll write the old man after all. ‘Dear Sir: It is
my task to communicate a piece of news which must necessarily give you
pain.’ (I wish I knew how much the old boy would really care.) ‘Your
son expired yesterday in the performance of the bravest action that it
has ever been my good fortune to see, or hear tell of. As you probably
know, Mr. Lee held a position of some responsibility in the railroad.’
(It is a responsibility to keep the bar.) ‘Yesterday we were all
standing about after working hours’ (I wonder when Lee’s began), ‘when
a dispute arose between two of the men. In these hot climes tempers
are easily roused, and words too quickly lead to blows, and blows to
weapons. We all saw it, and all stood hesitating, when your son stepped
forward and flung himself between the two. I grieve to say that he paid
for his nobility with his life. It may be some satisfaction to you to
know, my dear sir, that one of the boys whose life he saved, for both
were hardly full grown, was the only son of a widowed mother.’ We could
not make them both only sons of widowed mothers, could we? When are you
going to bury him?”
“To-morrow.”
“Let me chip in for the funeral. We’ll have it handsome while we are
about it. I must not stay now. Give me the letters, and I’ll get it off
by to-morrow’s steamer. I’ll make it a good one, but I need time. And I
have a report to write for the President, on the progress of my troop.
Have you seen them? Don’t they do me credit?”
Doctor Nuñez looked at him gravely, as he stooped his head and passed
out into the sunlight. As he was gathering up the reins, the older man
said suddenly,
“Don Luis, would you be very much of a Yankee if I offered you a piece
of advice?”
“Very much of a Yankee? I don’t understand. I should be very uncommonly
grateful. Your advice is rare. What is it? To give up whiskey?”
“No, but to give up Cortez. He is in bad odor with the President.”
“Oh, I know, I know, but if I changed my friends in order to choose
adherents of the administration--! However, I am an administration
man. I am almost in the army.”
“Not always the safest place to be.”
“Oh, Cortez is all right, Doctor. You don’t do Cortez justice.”
“On the contrary,” said the doctor, “I do him full justice. I do him
the justice of thinking him a very brilliant man,--but I do not walk
about arm in arm with him in broad daylight. Is he coming to the party
this evening?”
“I expect him.”
“You could not put him off?”
“Hardly. He brings the phonograph to amuse the señoritas. Now, come,
Doctor, you would not cut me off from the only man in the country who
owns a talking-machine?”
The doctor sighed. “I knew you would be a Yankee,” he said, and turned
and walked into the house, while Vickers rode away, resuming his song
about his indifference as to the fit of his boots.
Vickers’s house was on the slopes of the hills, and a steep little
white adobe stairway led up to it. The house itself was a blue-green
color, and though from the outside it presented an appearance of size,
it was literally a hollow mockery, for the interior was taken up with
a square garden, with tiled walks, and innumerable sweet-smelling
flowers. Round the inner piazza or corridor there were arches, and in
these Vickers had hung orchids, of which he was something of a fancier.
In the central arch was a huge gilded birdcage in which dangled a large
bright-colored macaw.
“You beauty,” said Vickers, stopping for an instant as he crossed the
hallway.
The macaw hunched his shoulders, shifted his feet on the perch, and
said stridently,
“_Dame la pata._”
“You betcher life!” said Vickers, thrusting his finger between the
bars. The two shook hands solemnly, and Vickers went on his way to the
dining-room, shouting at the top of a loud voice,
“Ascencion, _almuerzo_.”
An instant later he was being served with coffee, eggs, and a broiled
chicken by an old woman, small, bent, wrinkled, but plainly possessed
of the fullest vitality.
“And what are you going to give us for supper to-night?” Vickers asked,
with his mouth full.
With some sniffing, and a good deal of subterranean grunting, Ascencion
replied that she did not know what to give _los Americanos_ unless it
were half an ox.
“Ah, but the lovely señoritas,” said Vickers.
A fresh outburst of grunting was the reply. “Ah, the Señorita Rosita.
I have already had a visit from her this morning. She comes straight
into my kitchen,” said the old woman. “She expects to live there some
day.”
“In the kitchen, Ascencion!” said her employer. “You talk as if she
were a rat.”
“Oh, you will see. The Señor Don Papa,--he goes about saying that he
will marry his daughter to none but foreigners,--that they make the
best husbands.”
“So they do.”
“Oh, very well, very well, if you are satisfied. It makes no difference
to me. It is all the same to me that every one says this is a betrothal
party, and the _niña_ does not deny it.”
“Ah, you know very well, proud beauty,” said Vickers, waving a fork at
her, “that there is only one woman in all Spanish-America for me--the
only woman who knows how to cook, this side of the San Pedro. If you
choose to call this our betrothal party, yours and mine, Ascencion----”
It was a perfectly safe joke, for Ascencion was a wife, the mother of
fourteen, and the grandmother of a whole village. She did not even
notice the last part of his sentence.
“And who is there can cook like me on the other side of the San Pedro?”
she asked. “I don’t know her;” and she hobbled away.
After breakfast, Vickers with the assistance of two or three native
boys, Ascencion’s grandchildren, who came and went about the house like
stray dogs, hung the court and corridors with paper lanterns, and moved
the furniture so as to leave the _sala_ free for dancing.
These preparations occupied so much time that he was barely able
to finish his report for the government before dinner, and almost
immediately afterward his guests began to arrive. He had not had time
to write the letter, and he could not now catch the mail unless he
sent a boy down the trail to the coast. He actually thought of doing
this in order to catch the steamer, for his conscience reproached him,
but Ascencion absolutely refused to be deprived of any of her working
staff on so great an occasion.
Cortez was the first to arrive. He was carrying his talking-machine in
his arms as he entered, and he and Vickers had a great many jokes to
exchange as to the rolls fit for the ears of the señoritas.
“It is going to be the making of the party,” Vickers exclaimed, “and I
can’t thank you enough for bringing it.”
Cortez replied politely that everything he had was equally at the
disposition of his friend, but presently it appeared that it was within
the power of Vickers to do a reciprocal favor. Cortez was going the
very next day on a long shooting trip. But he feared he would be short
of cartridges. Doubtless Don Luis knew the delays in the custom-house.
Was it possible that he could borrow a hundred or so?
Vickers asked the caliber, and noted that it was the same as the new
government rifle.
Cortez shrugged his shoulders. “It may be,” he said. “You forget that I
am not in the confidence of the government. But we will say no more. If
it is not convenient----”
“My dear fellow,” cried Vickers, clapping him on the shoulder, “it is
perfectly convenient; take as many as you want,” and summoning one of
Ascencion’s descendants he gave orders that as many boxes as the señor
might want should be carried out and put in his _coche_.
Almost every one had come before the arrival of the Señorita Rosita and
her papa, which partook of the nature of a rite. He was a little man,
very erect, possessed, in Vickers’s eyes, of that inscrutability which
even the remnant of an older civilization has for a new one.
The girl was reputed a beauty, small, round, barely seventeen, with a
pair of black eyes which languished so sweetly and so easily that one
scarcely wondered that their owner never used them for anything else.
As his eyes met hers, Vickers cursed Ascencion in his heart for having
instilled her suspicions into his mind, for it seemed to him that the
lovely Rosita had never languished quite so openly upon him before. The
thought affected the cordiality of his manner. His greeting was formal.
Then seeing that she looked hurt, and reflecting that, if she had given
her friends the notion that he was hers for the asking, it was very
hard to be contradicted by his manner, he sprang forward and led her
away to dance.
Soon afterward, having surrendered her to another partner, he found
himself standing beside her father, and never at a loss for a pleasant
word he observed that the señorita was undoubtedly the handsomest girl
he had ever seen, and how did any one support the responsibility of
having such a pretty daughter?
The old gentleman smiled.
“It is not a responsibility which I look forward to supporting very
much longer, Don Luis.”
“Oh, I suppose not,” said Vickers, and he thought with some annoyance
of the good-looking native for whose destruction the party had been
planned.
“You give me,” went on the other, “an opportunity of saying what has
long been in my mind. You know, Don Luis, that many of my countrymen
are not friendly to the North Americans. I do not share the prejudice.”
Vickers bowed in his most florid manner. “I felt sure of that, sir,
when you did me the honor of accepting my invitation for this evening.”
“Yes,” said the other thoughtfully, “the acceptance was as significant
as the invitation itself.”
The phrase struck Vickers disagreeably, but he bowed again, and
prepared to move away, but the old man stopped him.
“I was glad it should be so, Don Luis,” he said. “There is no one
to whom I should more trustfully confide my daughter’s future. I am
sufficiently Americanized to believe that marriages of the heart are
the best marriages. My wife cries out for a man of our own country,
but I say, ‘No, let the hearts of our children speak.’ I do not mind
telling you that the heart of the little Rosita _has_ spoken. Her
mother has not the pleasure to know you, Don Luis, but we must alter
that, we must alter that.” He smiled up at Vickers and perhaps saw
something written upon his countenance, for he added hastily:
“Perhaps I mistake your sentiments. I have been warned that it is
the habit of your countrymen to engage a young lady’s affections and
to ride away. But I can not think that of you, my friend. I can not
believe that I have mistaken your sentiments.”
“Oh, my sentiments,--not a bit,” said Vickers hastily. Even in English
he might have found himself at a loss for the right word in which to
decline an offer of marriage, but in Spanish, well as he knew the
language, he floundered hopelessly. “My sentiments are as I told you,
that the señorita is the most adorable young lady in the world, but----”
“Enough, enough, my young friend,” said his companion, laying a
hand for an instant on Vickers’s arm with an incomparable gesture.
“Obstacles are for old heads, love for young ones. See, she glances in
our direction. She perhaps guesses what is the only topic that would
keep you from her. Go to her. I will not be cruel. Go to her.” And he
turned away, waving his hand.
Vickers sprang after him, but as he did so he felt his arm caught, and
turning saw Doctor Nuñez.
“I must see you alone for an instant, but at once,” he said, in a low
tone.
“More trouble!” said Vickers, leading the way to his old bedroom, which
was the only spot in the house secure from the inroads of the party.
He shut the door behind them, and invited the doctor to sit down, but
Nuñez did not notice the suggestion.
“I have just come from town,” he said. “Your immediate arrest is
decided on. The police may be here in a few minutes.”
“My arrest? Well, what the-- Why in thunder am I to be arrested?”
“On suspicion of conspiring against the government. You are thought
to have great influence with the men, which, taken in conjunction with
your friendship for Cortez, makes you dangerous.”
“Well, if that isn’t the darndest,” said Vickers. “I have not conspired
against their old government.”
“That, my dear Luis,” said the doctor gravely, “has nothing whatsoever
to do with it. They are coming to arrest you. The mere presence of
Cortez in the house will be enough. They can not arrest him without
precipitating immediate trouble, but they can arrest any one who will
be of assistance to him. It seems he has boasted openly that he could
get all the ammunition he wanted from you. I do not say I believe it.”
“I have just sent all the cartridges he wanted out to the _coche_ which
is at this moment standing before my door,” said Vickers.
“Then you must certainly go at once.”
“Do you really advise me, Doctor, to run away from a couple of
policemen with handcuffs and a warrant? No, no, I shall stay. My
conscience is clear. I shall appeal to my own government. You know
they can’t go about arresting innocent Americans without getting into
trouble.”
Nuñez raised his eyebrows. “And through whom will you appeal? Your
American consul?”
“I suppose so.”
“And do you happen to remember the last time you saw Meester B. Wilkins
Smith?”
“Oh, thunder!” returned Vickers, “that was the time I dipped him in the
San Pedro, for saying I cheated at cards. Well, he richly deserved it,
Doctor. No one could deny that.”
“Perhaps not,” returned the doctor, “but I do not think he will
break his neck to save you. I think he will write home that it is
unfortunate that a better type of Americans do not come down here. I
think he will think it right to let our law take its course.”
Vickers had begun to look grave, but at the word law his face
brightened. “Ah, there you are,--law!” he cried. “They can not prove
anything against me. They will not dare to ventilate their case in
court.”
“I do not think they will try,” replied Nuñez gently. “I think they
will send you down to a little prison on the island of Santa Maria,
while they investigate your case. And I do not think, my dear Don Luis,
that you will ever come back from that little island. A lovely spot, a
paradise, but not healthy, it seems. It is very far away,--so far that
sometimes the jailers forget to come to feed the prisoners for months
at a time.”
“Well, in that case,” said Vickers, with a laugh, “I should think the
prisoners would not have very much trouble in making their escape.”
“Not the least; they do not have the least, not the least little bit.
But the channel is broad there, and the sharks are very hungry, Don
Luis.”
“Gee, you are a cheerful companion! You put new life in a man, don’t
you?” said Vickers.
“You must go, and go at once.”
“I suppose,” he answered, “that I might slip over the border for a day
or two.”
“You would be sent back at once. We have a treaty with our neighbors,
and it is strictly kept,--especially in regard to those they have no
interest in protecting. You must go home, Don Luis. You can catch
to-morrow morning’s steamer, if you are quick.”
For the first time the countenance of Vickers really clouded. “I can’t
go home,” he said; and then, noting the surprise on the doctor’s face,
he burst out: “Why, Heaven help you, don’t you suppose I would have
gone home long ago, if I could? Did you think I was here for love of
the damned country?”
“I did,” returned the other simply. “Yes, I am not ashamed to admit
that I did. I find my country beautiful,--my countrymen attaching. I
believed that you felt it too.”
“And so I do, so I do,” said Vickers, “but, man, I’m a northener, and
I’d give every palm and orchid in the place for the noise of wheels
creaking on packed snow.”
“All the more reason, then, why you should go home.”
“Look here, my friend,” the other answered, “if I go home I run a fair
chance of being electrocuted. If I stay here the sharks get me, or if I
escape the sharks, the Señor Don Papa is going to marry me to Rosita.
There are three uncomfortable alternatives for a man to choose from.”
“I should choose electrocution,” said the doctor.
“I think I shall choose a pot shot at the police.”
There was a moment of silence, then the doctor asked,
“Did you send that letter to Lee’s family?”
Vickers shook his head absently.
“Then,” cried the other, with decision, “you shall go home as Lee.
Ten years might change a man so that not even his own father would
know him,--especially ten years in this climate. Beside, there was a
resemblance, you know.”
Vickers had lifted his head to laugh at the project for its
impossibility, and paused to listen further, attracted by its sheer
folly.
“You must have observed,” the doctor continued, “that fugitives are
caught for the simple reason they go into a new country as strangers,
and strangers are always objects of suspicion. Strangers always are
called upon to give an account of themselves; strangers always have to
explain why they have come. Now all these difficulties are obviated if
only you can take up the life and personality of some one else. You are
Lee, you go home to see your father. Nothing could be simpler. Well,
yes, I admit that there is a risk, but----”
“But,” said Vickers, “there is also a Nellie. I told you, didn’t I,
Doctor, that it is a name I am fond of?”
“It is a risk,” Nuñez went on, “but to stay here is a certainty.”
“To go back,” murmured Vickers, “to a real home, even if it belongs to
another man, and a father, and above all an affectionate cousin----”
“Order your horse,” said Nuñez, “and I’ll take care of your guests, and
of the police, and of Rosita, and Cortez, and all the other follies
you have committed.”
“And of Ascencion,” Vickers added. “She is worth all the rest, the nice
old hag. Well, I’ll try it, Doctor, on your advice. By the way, thank
you for not asking why I don’t go home under my own name.”
The doctor smiled. “We learn not to ask that question of our visitors,”
he said; and then at Vickers’s request he went and routed out a small
boy and gave orders to bring the _patron’s_ mare at once to the front
of the house.
When he returned to the bedroom, Vickers had changed into his riding
clothes, and was stuffing a pair of saddle-bags.
“I want you, Nuñez,” he said, “to take anything you have a fancy for
in the house, and give the rest to Ascencion. There’s a check for
her, and here’s another for all I have in the bank. It will more than
pay my bills. If not, write me to an address I will send. Be kind
to Ascencion. She won’t like my going off like this, without saying
good-by, but I don’t dare. She will have hysterics, as sure as Fate.
Tell her I love her fond. Good-by, Doctor.”
The last Nuñez saw of him was a long leg quickly drawn over the
window-sill.
The night, fortunately, was fair, for the rainy season had not
regularly set in. As Vickers rode, he thought neither of the dangers he
had left behind nor of the risk before him. It seemed as if the fierce
homesickness of the last five years had suddenly broken out now and
that his face was for the first time turned northward. He could not
believe that within a week he would see the tops of New York’s tall
buildings rise over the horizon like an immense castle set on a hill.
He reached the sea at four o’clock; at sunrise the vessel sailed. Then
only, as he saw the gray water opening out between him and the shore,
he felt an emotion of gratitude to the country that had sheltered him
and which he never expected to see again.