Chapter 10

He accordingly dismounted, and after lighting a fresh cigar, stretched himself at full length upon the grass which grew on the river's bank, allowing his horse to graze at will. Just behind him rose the abrupt wall of the cañon some thirty or forty feet in height which, at this hour of the morning, cast a deep shadow over the spot where he lay and halfway across the river in front of him. It was just the sort of place for an Indian or one of Dick's nature to linger in and dream and muse. The tips of the tall grass and reeds which grew close to the water's edge, swayed gently in the fresh morning breeze. The song of the finch and linnet issued from the thick, low willow copse growing along the river's banks.

How peaceful it was, and how sweetly the waters sang! No wonder the Indian prized the peace and beauty of nature above all else. What was his _hacienda_ to this? He was never really happy when the roof of a house intervened between himself and the sky.

Suddenly his attention was attracted by a noise overhead, and glancing upward, he sprang to his feet just in time to avoid a mass of earth and stones that came rolling down over the face of the cliff and fell on the very spot where he had been lying. The next instant, before he had time to realize what was happening, a soft, fluffy mass dropped into his arms with an impact that nearly brought him to his knees. For some seconds Dick looked hard at the object in his arms in order to assure himself that he really was awake and not still dreaming in the grass by the side of the river.

There was no doubt about it; the woman had arrived.

Miss Van Ashton lay quite still in his arms; she had fainted. For the first time in his life, a panic seized him.

"Miss Van Ashton!" he cried excitedly, bending over her. She seemed like nothing, as light as a feather as she lay so still and pale in his strong arms. It seemed as though he could have held her thus forever, and he was almost beginning to wish that he might as he watched the pallor of her face slowly give way to its natural pink and white glow, delicate as the lining of a conch-shell. Strange that he had not noted this peculiarly piquant and attractive face before.

"Miss Van Ashton!" he cried once more. But again there was no response. He lowered her gently on one knee in order that she might breathe more freely. As he did so, one of her hands came into sudden contact with his own. Instinctively his hand closed over it and held it captive; it was so soft and warm, just like a little bird. His soul was sorely tempted, and sad to relate, he raised it to his lips and held it there, at which juncture Bessie Van Ashton slowly opened her eyes.

With a cry, she was on her feet--flushed and furious.

"Don't be alarmed, Miss Van Ashton!" he exclaimed, quite unconscious of the cause of her sudden fright. "You're not hurt a bit; you didn't touch the ground. You only fainted."

"How dare you hold me in your arms?" she cried.

"I couldn't help it, Miss Van Ashton; you dropped right into them."

"How dare you kiss me, sir?"

"I couldn't help that either," stammered Dick, covered with confusion and blushing like a school-boy.

"Insolence!" cried Bessie with increased vehemence, stamping her small foot furiously on the ground.

"Miss Van Ashton," stammered Dick again, "I apologize! I--I beg your pardon--"

"For taking advantage of a helpless woman while in an unconscious state!" she interrupted. "A most gentlemanly act!" she added contemptuously. Her words cut him like the lash of a whip, causing him to wince, his face turning a deep red.

"I'm sorry--" he began.

"You know you're not sorry at all!" she broke in again with unabated fury.

"Miss Van Ashton," he said again, with increasing embarrassment, "when you fell into my arms I was so surprised and frightened--"

"Frightened?" She laughed in his face. "A man who single handed held a furious crowd of men at bay as you did--frightened? You mean that you were so overcome with weakness and the joy at finding a helpless woman in your power you could think of nothing better to do than to kiss her," she answered with all the sarcasm she could command.

A twinkle came into Dick's dark eyes as he regarded her for some time in silence.

"Miss Van Ashton," he said, "if you only knew it, you are far more dangerous than a tame mob of boys."

"Pshaw!" she exclaimed, turning her back upon him, and tapping the ground nervously with her daintily shod foot. Dick regarded her narrowly during the pause that ensued. She seemed taller than he at first had thought her, and was as slender as a birch. The sun, which by this time had begun to peep over the top of the cañon wall, cast a golden aureole about her head. Again he heard the waters sing and the notes of the birds issuing from the willow copse.

"Well! how much longer are you going to stand there? Why don't you say something?" she snapped, still keeping her back turned toward him. Her words inspired him with fresh confidence. He recognized in them a faint glimmer of interest which even her fierce spirit of resentment had not entirely succeeded in overcoming.

"Miss Van Ashton, ignore me, trample me in the dust if you like, but do you know, if it had been any other woman than yourself, I should have laid her quietly down upon the ground and left her to regain consciousness as best she could!" She wheeled around abruptly, looking him straight in the eyes. There was no mistaking the sincerity of his words, or the look that accompanied them. And she instinctively felt that an impulsive, passionate nature like his could not have helped doing what he did.

"I don't believe a word you say," she said, softening somewhat, a faint smile lurking about the corners of her mouth. Then, as the ludicrousness of the situation came over her, she burst into fit after fit of laughter until the tears rolled down her cheeks.

"Oh, dear!" she sighed at length.

"You do forgive me!" he pleaded, picking up her dainty straw hat which lay on the ground close by and handing it to her.

"No, I don't forgive you. I don't think I ever shall," she answered in the severest tone she could command. "It was foolish of me to wander away from the others," she continued. "I might have known that something would happen, because something is always happening in this country. It's perfectly marvelous!" Then, after a pause, during which she placed her hat rakishly on one side of her head, she added: "As a punishment, Mr. Yankton, I'll allow you to accompany me back to the _Posada_." Her words caused his heart to jump.

"I don't deserve it," he answered, assuming an air and tone of humility.

"I'm glad you realize that," she returned. "I suppose I'm indebted to you for saving my life," she went on. "And I don't want you to think me ungrateful. Perhaps it would have been better though--" She broke off abruptly, and then laughed a strange little laugh that puzzled him greatly. She had at least grown communicative again, and he heaved a sigh of relief. He had gotten off so much easier than he expected.

"One moment, Miss Van Ashton," he said, as she was about to take the lead. He turned and gave a shrill whistle. His horse which had been feeding quietly the while on the grass a short distance from them, raised his head at the sound, and giving a low whinny, came trotting up to them.

"Won't you ride?" he asked, turning to her. "He's quite gentle."

"No," she answered rather curtly, "I prefer to walk."

"Just as you say," he answered in a tone of complete submission, taking his place quietly by her side.

"No--not that way!" she said. "We'll keep the horse's head between us."

XVI

There had been no more shooting or attempts at murder. The mail began to arrive from home, and Colonel Van Ashton and Mrs. Forest began to breathe easier.

Life at the old _Posada_ had settled down once more to its accustomed calm and routine. The sun shone benignly and the birds sang daily in the garden where the guests were wont to pass the greater part of the day. The gay little songsters were a veritable revelation to them--especially to the Colonel. How could such gentle creatures go on singing with such indifference to the future in a land where life was held so cheap and all things so uncertain?

Blanch had turned a deaf ear to the others' entreaties to return home at once. The more they talked, the firmer she became, and finally, taking matters into her own hands, settled the question by telegraphing home for the twenty trunks of clothes she left there on her departure.

"Can't you see," she said by way of explanation, "how disastrous it would be to leave Jack alone in this country with that--"

"Don't mention her!" interrupted Mrs. Forest.

"I don't see how we can help it," replied Blanch, "since fate has thrust her unbidden into our lives. We might as well recognize facts first as last since we are no longer in a position to choose either our surroundings or the persons with whom we are to associate. There is only one way to avert the catastrophe threatening us, and that is--by my marrying Jack."

Chiquita's beauty filled Mrs. Forest with a vague and nameless terror. But a glimpse of that dark siren was enough to apprise her of her son's peril, and she unhesitatingly implored Blanch not to let him out of her sight--to go off with him alone as often as possible and flirt with him to any length; a tremendous concession on Mrs. Forest's part--nothing less than a complete surrender, she being one of those proud but insipid mortals whose temperature could be easily gauged by the inclination of her long, slender, slightly upturned nose which seemed to be forever pointing toward a better world. For her, it was not enough that one's appearance and innate refinement marked one as a lady or a gentleman, but it must be proven by a long deduction beginning with some obscure ancestor of whom the world has never heard and whose shortcomings have been happily buried in the oblivion of time. Could she have had her way, the world would have been long since wrapped in pink tissue paper, tied with blue ribbon and labeled safe. How she ever came by her dauntless son remains a mystery; it certainly was no fault of hers.

Somebody of a pessimistic turn of mind once remarked that, if the human race were suddenly stripped naked, it would be impossible to distinguish the refined from the vulgar. A truly inspired utterance. For as Captain Forest viewed his family from his plane of vantage, especially after the leveling process had set in, they strangely reminded him of a flock of tame geese rioting in a pond. They made a great noise and stir, but convinced nobody.

Everybody having reached his level and been shorn of airs and affectations, it no longer remained a question of what one was, but what one could do. Consequently, it became daily more and more difficult to distinguish between personalities. It is true there were occasional flashes suggestive of submerged, latent faculties, but only flashes; stupidity and the commonplace were the dominating notes.

It was a wonderful study in human nature, and hopeless though the general outlook appeared, the future was not entirely without its promise. The souls of Blanch and Chiquita shone like radiant twin stars from out the gloomy, abysmal depths of the Egyptian darkness that had settled over the world.

Perhaps the most remarkable and amusing feature of it all was that, with the exception of Blanch, the others still seemed able to take themselves seriously. They regarded the Captain's new outlook upon life as a complete reversion to the primitive type, but luckily for them, he had not yet lost his sense of compassion.

Recognizing the deplorable mental state to which his uncle was fast sinking, he kept him supplied with wines and cigars, obtained from his friend, Pedro Romero, the gambler. No man can partake of excellent wines and cigars for any length of time without feeling his oats, as the saying goes; and the Colonel proved no exception to the rule.

He had just finished a bottle of Burgundy and, as he sat in the garden with his sister, sipping his _demitasse_ and inhaling the fragrant aroma of a Havana, he began to feel the return of his nerve. In fact, had he been approached on the subject, he would have admitted that he felt like a fighting-cock, in just the proper condition to quarrel with his nephew. Happily for the Colonel, the subject of his thoughts came sauntering into view at this juncture, and he squared himself, assuming an aggressive attitude preparatory to the encounter which he intended to precipitate with all possible dispatch.

The disgusting complacency with which his nephew had taken to wearing long trousers over his riding-boots in place of those precious balloon breeches originally designed for lackeys but since adopted as a becoming apparel for a gentleman, affected the Colonel's tender susceptibilities to an extent almost inducing nausea. He quite forgot that he had been guilty of a similar offense during his campaigning in the Civil War, and naïvely imagined that his nephew had acquired this vulgar habit from his friend, Mr. Yankton; a person whose lack of etiquette and easy-going ways were enough to set his teeth on edge.

The Captain was looking for Blanch whom he had seen entering the garden with his mother and the Colonel, but whose return to the house he had not noticed, and he, therefore, walked unsuspectingly into the arms of his uncle.

"I wish you would get rid of that infernal horse of yours," began the Colonel by way of a preliminary to the skirmish, while his nephew seated himself unconcernedly in a chair opposite him, tilting it backwards and leisurely crossing his legs. "He positively threatened to devour me bodily as I passed the corral this morning."

"I suppose it's because he has not yet learned that you are my uncle," replied the Captain, suppressing a smile. "It's strange what dislikes he takes to certain persons when one considers that he's as gentle as a kitten when children are around; but I'll try to teach him to distinguish members of the family in the future."

"Look here, Jack! I've had enough of this beating about the bush. It's time we came to an understanding."

"There's nothing to prevent it that I can see," answered the Captain with maddening coolness. "I was merely apologizing for an ill-mannered horse."

"Damn your horse, sir!" cried the Colonel with increasing choler.

"Any time you are ready, dear Uncle," replied the Captain calmly, taking a cigarette from his case and lighting it. The Colonel ground his teeth in silence. His first encounter with his nephew could hardly be called satisfactory and he did not wish a repetition of it. He had come to argue his nephew out of his folly through sheer force of logic and it behooved him to remain as calm as possible during the interview, for his nephew had a most surprising way of answering back and turning the argument against one.

"Tell me," he began, "what possible attraction this country can have for you?"

"It would be quite as impossible to explain that satisfactorily to you as to make my reasons clear for being here at all. But since you again ask me for those reasons, I can only answer as I did before. I have exhausted that felicitous state called civilization. I want to be free."

"Rot!" cried the Colonel, literally snorting and bounding into the air. "You've no right to be free! Only savages and criminals want to be free! If that's all you have to say--" but his voice choked and he resumed his seat in silence.

"I've never heard anything quite so silly!" exclaimed Mrs. Forest who up to this point had maintained a discreet silence.

"It's true nevertheless," continued the Captain composedly, blowing a ring of blue smoke into the air. "Civilization, you know, is practically the same the world over. I have seen and heard everything, read everything, and met everybody that's worth meeting, and I'm tired of seeing and hearing them over and over again, year in and year out, with always the dead certainty of their return to look forward to. Our lives have become too stilted, too artificial--we lack poise, we live in grooves. Everything is overdone--there is nothing left for us to enjoy--our finer sensibilities have become dulled--the simplicity and refinements of life have been swallowed up by luxury, tawdry display and prudism."

"Bosh!" cried the Colonel.

"Everybody," the Captain went on, "knows exactly what his neighbor thinks and is going to say, and should anybody by any chance begin to think differently and seriously on life, society instantly brands that person as stupid, if not a little queer. We have lost our independence."

"Nonsense!" said Mrs. Forest.

"Granted for the sake of argument," broke in the Colonel, flipping the ash from off his cigar. "But what about art, science and literature, the real things which stand for civilization?"

"Oh! as to them, they are all right in themselves. It is fortunate that man has an outlet through these manifold channels of expression.

"They are the best part of our lives so far as they go, but all art and science and no nature, and what becomes of man? Have they made the world happy, and is there any immediate prospect of their ever doing so? Did the Greeks, who attained the supreme heights in art, find happiness in their art? Their history is the record of one long struggle; and so it was with the renaissance of the Middle Ages, and so it is with us; our sciences and arts can never change the complicated conditions in which we live. They have never developed the sympathy and brotherly love which should exist between man and man; we are still barbarians.

"The most miserable wretches that ever lived were the very ones that passed their lives creating and theorizing. They all forgot and are still forgetting like the rest of the world to-day that, these things, no matter how great, amuse and interest for a time only; that once they are absorbed, their original charm and novelty are gone forever. They become worn and threadbare like all of man's inventions, and humanity is ever left searching for the great panacea of life.

"The God-inspired sing and talk of the great life, but they do not live it themselves, and that is why they never really succeed in delivering their messages. And they may continue to write books and compose music, to paint pictures and build temples and hew statues so long as this planet is habitable, but these things are merely an imitation of the reality--a reflection of the ideal in man. The delivered man must stand above his art and science. He must recognize that he himself is the well-spring, the source of his inspiration and is greater than his emotional expressions. The true message can never be delivered to the world until the life for which these things stand is actually lived out, becomes a part of man's daily life."

"And you intend to deliver that message, I suppose?" observed the Colonel sarcastically, smiling compassionately and twirling the end of his mustache.

"In my own humble way, yes, but I ask no man to follow me!" A chorus of laughter, in which were mingled the voices of Blanch and Bessie who had just joined the group, greeted this confession.

"Did you ever hear the like of the conceit?" exclaimed Mrs. Forest as the laughter subsided.

"Excuse my frankness, Jack, but you're an ass," said the Colonel tartly.

"You set an example to the world? Why, you're as spoiled as the rest of us!" cried Bessie.

"Quite true, Cousin, but with this difference, I realize that fact and the rest of you do not."

"What a charming pedestal you have placed yourself upon, Jack," said Blanch, seating herself beside Mrs. Forest.

"Perhaps," returned the Captain dryly, "but of one thing I am certain. Few people are better prepared to speak on this matter than I am."

"What an interesting lot we women must be in your eyes," broke in Bessie, digressing from the subject. Captain Forest smiled.

"Don't misunderstand me," he went on. "You are trumps, every one of you, if you only knew it, but unfortunately you do not. You are the most attractive women in the world, but you are spoiled--utterly spoiled. You are the well-groomed, lovely curled and pampered darlings of society, but alas! utterly superficial, just like those brilliant women of the great French revolutionary period."

"I admire your frankness, Jack; but what do you really intend doing? What sort of a life do you intend to lead?" asked Blanch.

"Cease chasing will-o'-the-wisps about in the vain pursuit of happiness, and live as man was intended to live by substituting nature's realities for man's creations; those things which we prize most--which please for a time, but which in the end leave us as empty handed as the day we first started in quest of the _golden fleece_. Live as close as possible to nature; cultivate the soil, watch the fruit and the flowers and the grain grow, and roam throughout the length and breadth of the land when the longing seizes me."

"What!" cried the Colonel, unable to contain himself any longer. "Is this the inane, prosaic existence for which you have given up one of the most brilliant careers the world had to offer a man? It's bad enough to have wrecked that, but for one possessing the wealth you do to waste his life after such fashion; it's simply disgusting! Think of what you might do in the financial world!"

"That's just the sort of answer one might expect from you," replied the Captain, taking a fresh pull at his cigarette. "You talk like a stockbroker. That phase of labor brings no real happiness to any one. Besides, it would be absurd for one possessing the money I do to spend his days earning more. Of course as things are constituted to-day, it is difficult to get along without money, but in reality I don't consider it has anything to do with happiness. Lasting pleasure and peace can only be found in the verities of nature; her beauties and realities are the only satisfying and enduring things.

"What can you who pass your days amid the noise and dirt of cities, breathing their tainted atmosphere, and your intellects nourished upon artificialities and the creations of men's minds, know of nature? How many of you have ever gazed long enough at the stars to appreciate their beauty and mystery, or listened to the sound of the wind and tried to guess its meaning?"

"Bah! you are as sentimental as a school-girl!" ejaculated the Colonel. "You talk like one who has just taken a short course in Thoreau or Rousseau."

The Captain only laughed in return. He rose from his seat and began striding up and down before them with his hands clasped behind his back and his gaze fixed on the ground.

"Who are you," he continued passionately, stopping abruptly before them, "to assume that others should live according to your lackadaisical, sensuous sentimentality--your divan, boudoir conceptions of life? Thoreau and Rousseau and Emerson and Ruskin were great men, but had they talked less and actually lived out the life they preached, the world might possibly have been aroused to a consciousness of something higher by this time; but they were too small for the task. It requires a man cast in a bigger mold to perform the work--it is only in men like me that the future hope of the race lies. I must _live_ the life they preached. Do you understand? Why, I could crush you and the world you represent in the hollow of my hand! You seek happiness in the evanescent wine and laughter of the illusive, superficial life. I, too, sought it there, but like you, I did not find it."

His words sank deep into the soul of Blanch. She admired his strength and yet hated him for it. Why, she asked herself again, as she did on the day he first imparted his new views of life to her, was she not moved? Why was she still unable to thrill at the sound of his words?

She could not understand it. There seemed to be something lacking either in him or in her.