Part 25

We took a photograph of Guadalupe, standing on a little outer stairway leading to the _entresol_, where the family sleep and the girl dreams her dreams. I was only sorry some Prince Charming had not been with us. She had a distinctly yearning expression as we drove away into the great world; there was, probably, far back, some venturesome blood, but she will doubtless get the functionary.

_September 29th._

Last night, one of Von Hintze's big dinners. He has been such a good friend from the first, and we have been a part of all his dinners, which have been many. _Paso á paso se va llegando_, and this is likely to be the last. I felt as if I were back in Vienna, as Auersperg sat on one side of me and Riedl took me out. A handsome Captain Bazaine was also there. That name found in Mexico awakens historical thoughts, and now that I am to leave it all, perhaps forever, the least tap on memory and a thousand things spring into consciousness.

Mrs. Stronge presided; Hohler was there, the Hugo Scherers, Mr. Carlos de Landa, Mr. Hewitt, the Von Hillers, and we played bridge till late. Conditions are going from bad to worse here, and I feel an increasing sadness at leaving all this touching, appealing beauty of Mexico to the powers of darkness, or if not of darkness, of such uncertainty that evil only can come.

The "Apostle" has become the _mono de Coahuila_. The favor of republics is more short-lived than that of princes. How true a word La Rochefoucauld spoke when he said, "_On loue et on blâme la plupart des gens parce que c'est la mode de les louer ou de les blâmer_."

Gustavo, _ojo parado_, would perhaps like to be President, and feels himself superior in intelligence and will to his brother, who is, as a fact, decidedly under his dominion.

If "Panchito" did not feel that he is upheld by the world of spirits, and I should add by a passionate, resolute consort, he might abdicate; everything here is possible except peace, and it is still "up" to the heavens to perform miracles and so relieve the Mexicans themselves of the tedium of installing a stable government.

[60] A Mexican herb inducing insanity.

[61] Gustavo Madero was apprehended, as he was lunching in this restaurant in the Avenida San Francisco in company with General Huerta, February 18, 1913, and was shot while attempting to escape early the next morning. _Vide A Diplomat's Wife in Mexico._

[62] "Step by step one reaches the end."

[63] Bean soup.

[64] Turkey stew with Chile gravy.

_Receipt for the famous "mole de guajolote"_

Pepper and salt Cinnamon Grains of sesame Chile ancho } Chile mulato } Three kinds of peppers Chile verde } Anis Almonds One piece of chocolate One piece of sugar Laurel Cloves

All ground separately on the _metate_, then ground together and put into the saucepan, where the turkey already boiled is waiting, cut up in bouillon.

I don't know if _mole_ must be made from the second joint of the turkey leg, but my pieces always prove to be that when scraped. The sauce is so thick that the anatomy is completely masked when one helps oneself.

[65] Boxes of sweets from Celaya.

XXVIII

Good-by to Mexico, and a special farewell to Madame Madero--Vera Cruz--Mexico in perspective

_October 1st._

We take the _Mexico_ of the Ward Line on the 10th. So sorry not to be going with Madame Lefaivre straight to France, but we think it will be well to wrap the Stars and Stripes about us for a space.

This is only a word. I sit among open boxes in what will never again be my home, "things I have known and loved awhile." Through it runs my Mexican _étape_, my "rosary of the road."

_October 3d._

Madame Lefaivre and I have each received diplomas and testimonials from the Red Cross, and a very polite note from Madame de Palomo. It was a curious and salutary experience in things human.

The ambassador sent N. a really beautiful letter of appreciation. He has a quite perfect epistolary turn--finished off by a very chic signature, and has been all that a chief could be during the long, strange Mexican months, while Mrs. Wilson has been the kindest, most considerate of friends.

_October 5th._

This morning I went up to Chapultepec to say good-by to Madame Madero. As I drove up the winding way in the white morning the flowers were shining softly along the embankments, the trees were feathery, unsubstantial, the birds singing "like to burst their little throats." It might have been the road to Paradise instead of to the abode of care.

I went in through the great iron gate, the guard saluting, across the flat, stone terrace where some cadets were at drill, and got out at the glass doors leading up to the big stairway. The President was standing there as I drove up, his auto waiting to take him to the palace to a Cabinet meeting. I thought he looked slightly--very slightly--troubled, though I had a feeling that his head was still in the morning clouds of the dazzling day. He wished me a _bon voyage_ and _prompt retour_ and drove away. Our personal relations with them both have always been most friendly.[66]

I imagine there has been little or no change in his psychology along the lines of practical statecraft. His true habitat is the world of fancy, where he feels himself protected and led on by benign powers as definitely as was Tobias by the angel. A state of mind like that can be very compelling, and he _may_ witness what the unkind say is his pet ambition--his own apotheosis.

The dim progression of Mexican events seems to have left his spirits untouched, though his fleshly being must be a mass of black-and-blue spots from the hard facts he bumps into. "One man with a dream at pleasure," but I felt like leaving him a pocket edition of _Le Prince_.

I thought Madame Madero showed the strain of that climb from obscurity and prison up the _via triumphalis_ to the presidential peaks. The flood of morning light, as we sat on the terrace, did not spare her worn and anxious face. I have an idea that she is very practical, but it is not her practicality, but her husband's dreams, that brought them to Chapultepec. It's a situation to discourage common sense.

She was, as always, courteous and friendly, but a puzzled look was on her face, and I felt that there were questions that she would have liked to put to me, that the circumstances forbade. We spoke of the work she is just now especially interested in, for the amelioration of the Mexican woman's lot--the organizing of the lace and embroidery industry, _à la_ Queen Elena, in Italy, several years ago. There is a really lovely product here, the drawn linen work--_deshilados_, it is called--introduced by the Spaniards and practised through generations in cloisters and religious schools.

She told me that in Puerto Rico one hundred thousand women had been organized, and she wanted to do the same here, asking me if I could not interest people in New York in the industry.

I felt how frail her body, but how determined her will as we embraced in the dazzling morning. About us was the perfume of the rare and lovely shrubs of the _patio_, the splash of the fountain, the singing of birds, the lustrous hills, the shining volcanoes; that crystal air enfolded us, closer than human touch, but beneath us was the restless city and the shifting will of the Mexican people.

On board the _Mexico_ in Vera Cruz Harbor. _October 10th._

We got down last night over the International; so many friendly faces at the station--_une belle gare_--reminding me of the unforgetable going away from Copenhagen. The Minister for Foreign Affairs, and the _Chef du Protocole_, nearly all the colleagues, Mr. and Mrs. Wilson, Aunt Laura, and many American friends were there.

The train departed at last without the slightest warning, but, the hour being at hand, we were standing near the steps, and as it quite slyly began to move out I was pushed into it by friendly hands with my load of flowers. Various other passengers had only time to scramble into the baggage and rear cars; and so, without any sound except those of friendly adieux, we slipped out of the station into the starlit valley, toward the hills that hold the splendors of this Indian world.

I had a feeling as of some one who leaves treasure behind, and the thought that my eyes will probably never again rest on the beauty of Mexico gives me a clutching at the heart. "_Heureux ceux qui n'ont pas vu la fumée de la fête de l'étranger et qui ne se sont assis qu'aux festins de leurs pères._"

It is seventeen months since we landed, but changing governments have not changed Mexico.

On arriving, at 7.30, we repaired to the Arcades of the Hotel Diligencias of somewhat branded reputation, in one of the little rickety cabs. If its back flap is loose, you have a lovely breeze. If not, you feel as if you were in a "hot country" _not_ of earth.

I asked for tea, but when it was poured out I decided 'twere better to do in Vera Cruz as the Veracruzanos do, and ordered, as a farewell tribute, "chocolate Mexicano," which, though it brought my own temperature up to the boiling-point, was very good.

The dissolving sensation is not unpleasant after having one's nerves screwed up to the last turn by all those "high" months. Something thick and stiff, in very small cups, being served on an adjacent table to a couple of _indigènes_, was "chocolate español."

Afterward I went across the palm-planted Plaza, that I had only seen in the dim light of my arrival, to the old cathedral--wind-swept, sun-enveloped, rain-deluged, the patine of centuries making it lovely beyond description, with its flying buttresses and quaint gargoyles, and its pink belfry, in which swing old, green-bronze bells.

Inside, the modern Veracruzanos have let themselves "go" as regards art. Cheap stained-glass windows, "made in Germany," and realistic portrayals of saints in agony, one more appalling than the other, encumber the chapels, and, I hate to record it, only paper and tinsel flowers were on the altars. But I turned my thoughts to One who walked upon the waters, and prayed for a safe voyage.

They tell me there are fish as beautiful as flowers to be seen in the market, but instead of continuing the investigation of Vera Cruz in the garish light of its October day we went back to the ship. On our way we met an Oxford friend of N.'s, a young Englishman, perfectly turned out in spotless white, who might have been called suddenly before the viceroy (I find myself getting a little wild) without the slightest change in his raiment. He hadn't spoken with one of "his kind" for weeks, and was not expecting any one. England's true conquest of the world, it seems to me, identity, habits, customs, unchanged by that most potent of all alchemies--the tropics.

The German and Russian ministers take the _Mexico_ as far as Progreso, whence they depart on some sort of hunting expedition, and promise aigrettes and similar vanities. We have all been sitting on the breezy side of the boat, sipping lemonade, talking of Mexico in perspective and "letting him who will be wise." Vera Cruz is a memory of color, green and pink and white, merciless sun, refreshing breeze, and the Veracruzanos, of all shades and origins, coming and going, carrying on their heads the abundances of earth and sea. I post this in Havana.

_October 12th._

Last night, in the dim prow, some Indians were chanting in mournful, wailing voices, a half-sensuous, half-imploring air of sad peoples. As it floated toward me in the soft, thick darkness it possessed me with its melancholy--but I must trim my lamp for other nights.

[66] Francisco I. Madero and José María Pino Suarez were killed when being transferred from the palace to the Penitenciaría on the night of Saturday, February 22, 1913. _Vide_ page 215, _A Diplomat's Wife in Mexico_.--E. O'S.

THE END