Overland Tales Part 19

"That air? Do you like it?"

He nodded his head impatiently.

"Where did you learn it? Who taught you?"

"That song? Oh, I learned that in New Mexico."

He looked at her wildly for a moment, but her gaze was so steady that he dropped his eyes and moved slowly away.

Late in the night, when Regina awoke from a sleep sweeter and sounder than any she had yet enjoyed, she heard Paul's steps in the hall-way, on his way to bed.

"You have left me alone all night again," complained his wife, when he entered the room; "and I have had one of my nervous spells."

"You keep the room so confoundedly hot and full of camphor that it smothers me to stay here," was the crusty reply.

"Would you want me to keep the windows and shutters open, so as to let the mosquitoes come in and devour us?"

"Why do you keep the light burning till twelve in the night, then?"

"But, Paul, I can't read in the dark, can I? And I want some pastime, I am sure, so sick and feeble as I am," weeping for very pity of herself.

"Throw those foolish books out of the window; the camphor-bottle, too; let air and daylight into your room, and you'll soon get well and strong," he answered, willing to be kind and anxious to hush her distracting sobs.

Regina, in her room, breathed a little sigh of satisfaction; for though she could not hear the conversation, she could guess very nearly what Paul's reception had been: "Ah! my clever brother-in-law, yours is not a bed of roses, either;" and with this comforting reflection she dropped off to sleep.

Next morning, at the breakfast-table, Regina watched with placid interest the haggard face of Paul, and the furtive looks he threw over to where she sat. During the morning his wife was attacked with sick headache, "from reading those trashy novels," he said; and by night he was wandering through the house again, groaning in very anguish of spirit, and flying, at last, to his only refuge, the piano. Through the loud clanging of the chords there breathed a strain, now and then, of the song Regina had played; but in a moment it was drowned by the louder crashes, which almost shook the house, and seemed the outpouring of some wild spirit in its abject misery. Day followed day, and as the season advanced, and autumn set in, with stormy days and long, moonless nights, Paul grew more restless; and one night, when he had wandered through the house all day--"as though driven by the Fury of Remorse," Regina said--she went, un.o.bserved, into the drawing-room, from where soon came the strains of the song that had so agitated Paul. Again his heavy steps approached the door, and, as he entered the room, Regina said to herself, "He has grown ten years older since that evening last summer, and he is ripe for my purpose now."

"You learned that song in New Mexico?" he asked, trying to speak in his usual quiet tones. "I suppose it is a popular air among the Mexicans?"

"Not a common one, though it is a Spanish song;" and she softly sang the refrain, "_Ela--Manuela!_"

Had she stabbed him to the heart he could not have turned paler, or sprung forward quicker, than at the uttering of the words.

"She taught it you! Tell me quick, for G.o.d's sake!"

He had clutched her arm, and was shaking her without knowing it.

"Gently, my dear brother-in-law," she said, sneeringly; and he shook the hair back from his forehead, and regained his self-possession by a strong effort.

"You wanted to know who taught me the song? My information has a price."

She had folded her hands in her lap, and was looking quietly into his face.

"Name it!" he burst out impatiently.

"It is a high price; but I can give you _all_ the information you may want in return. Here is a sample."

She had turned the music-stool on which she was seated, and while he paced up and down the room to hide his agitation, she continued in the tone of one holding easy converse with a good friend:

"I learned this little Spanish song from a very pretty girl in New Mexico. She said she had once taught it to an American, a tall, handsome man, with blue eyes and fair face, who must have been in love with her, I think, for he had always subst.i.tuted her name, in the refrain, for the name which the author of the song had put into it. She, too, must have been fond of this American with blue eyes and dark blonde hair; for, though not in the least conceited, or aware of her own attractions, she always sang the refrain with her own name, Manuela, instead of the original name, Juanita, simply because this American had wished her so to do. The air is beautiful, I think; and the words are very pretty too." She turned to the keys again, as though to repeat the air.

"Stop!" he said hoa.r.s.ely, arresting her hand; "you will kill me. What is the price you ask?"

"The price is high," he groaned, when she had coolly and in unfaltering tones stated her conditions to him. "But if you promise to keep to your word, I will do my best."

"You will succeed, then," she said, holding out her hand, and speaking almost cordially as they parted for the night.

When she reached her room she seemed for once to have fallen into Paul's _role_ of Wandering Jew; but her steps were noiseless, though the thoughts that danced and chased through her brain _would_ come to her tongue, in quick, triumphant words.

"My upright, truthful judge and brother-in-law--to bring about a reconciliation between his best friend, my husband, and his 'erring but loving wife.'" A haughty look flashed in her eyes: "Regina--and pleading for forgiveness! Ah, well--even a queen must sometimes stoop to conquer!"

The weeks pa.s.sed slowly on; and, absorbed though Laura was in her camphor-bottle and her novels, she could not but notice that Paul had altogether changed in his behavior toward her sister; and she rejoiced over this in her own fashion:

"I always told Regina that her innocence would come to light, and she would triumph over the machinations of her enemies, and get married to a--But she _is_ married--I forget. Well, it will all come right, and she'll be ever so happy, I know."

Poor thing! She could not live to see her so. The camphor-bottle, the close, dark room, and the Frenchy novels were too much for her; and before the spring had brought any flowers to strew on her grave, they had laid her in a darker, closer room than she had yet been in. Her husband and Regina followed the coffin, dressed in deep mourning; and Regina's face, as well as Paul's, was paler and sadder by a good many shades than usual.

Meanwhile, letters pa.s.sed frequently between Paul and his friend and brother-in-law; and one day, when the roses and lilacs that bordered the lawn were shedding fragrance and beauty together over the old homestead-grounds, Paul announced to his sister-in-law that he would accompany her on her journey to New Mexico.

How the wind of the plains through Paul's hair made it look more than ever like a lion's mane! and how like the Paul of long ago he looked, mounted on his fiery black horse! Something like pity for him sometimes stole into Regina's heart; but she would sneer at herself for the feeling. "Did he pity me when I came home broken-hearted--repentant?"

The long hours of their rest--for the colonel had seen to it that his wife had not to travel in the plebeian stage, but was furnished train and escort at Fort Leavenworth--she beguiled with telling, bit by bit, the story of her acquaintance with Manuela, who had found her way to the fort on the Rio Pecos, one day, where they had been stationed. Regina had been captivated at once by the girl's gentle face and soft black eyes; and when, after an acquaintance of some weeks, she surmised that the girl was looking for the man who had once loved and then, unaccountably, deserted her, she felt only pity for one who could so unselfishly and devotedly love any man as to give up home and friends, and wander through what must seem the wide world to this poor girl, in search of him. That the man was Paul, she felt quite sure; though she had never expressed the least suspicion of this to the colonel.

This much only could Paul learn from his sister-in-law; and that she knew, even now, where the girl could be found; further than this she would not say; would not tell him that Manuela had lived in her own household, half as domestic, half as companion; that she had been induced to this by the vague hope that while with Americans she might more easily learn of those who arrived, or returned, from the States to the Territories; that on leaving Santa Fe she had exacted a promise from the girl to remain in the colonel's quarters and employ until she should send her permission to leave her post.

And so they reached Santa Fe--Paul hopeful and expectant as a young bridegroom; Regina calm and thoughtful, but trying to look cheerful when she knew of Paul's eyes resting on her; when un.o.bserved, the dreary, despairing look crept back into her eyes, and her face, white as marble, grew rigid as the face of a statue. When the cl.u.s.ter of square, low-built adobe houses, called Santa Fe, rose up before them, Paul could hardly restrain his impatience; but he had promised to be guided in all things by his sister-in-law, and he had now to abide by her decisions. "It would be painful and embarra.s.sing to have any one, even her own brother-in-law, present at her first meeting with the colonel,"

she said, and therefore requested Paul to remain over night in Santa Fe, and ride over in the morning to where Fort Marcy lay, on the low rise of the hills bordering the plain.

Since Regina so wished it, let the meeting between herself and husband be entirely private. We will not draw aside the veil till the next morning, which came up with a blaze of broad, staring sunshine, promising an unpleasantly hot day. The commanding officer's quarters, though surrounded by a neat paling-fence, was as bare and innocent of the least attempt at a garden as all the rest of the quarters were. The red, hard earth alone stared up at the hard blue sky; outside the fortress walls, ungainly cactus and stunted mesquit bushes made the plain look only the more inhospitable and barren.

The quarters were low, but cool; and as the doorways were only hung with curtains, the breeze that swept over the plain had free access to every room in the house. The large sitting-room at the colonel's quarters had been darkened since early morning, and the heat excluded as much as possible, for the colonel was threatened with a severe attack of the torturing headache that sprang from the badly-healed wound in his forehead. As the sun rose higher, he succ.u.mbed to the pain; and as he threw himself on the wide, low lounge, in intolerable suffering, Regina stepped lightly to his side, to supply the usual remedies. But a cold look and colder words drove her back from his couch; and as he called to Manuela to bathe his head, in gentle, almost tender tones, she for the first time felt a deadly hatred toward this girl, whom she knew still to be an angel in virtue and purity.

Struck to the heart, she left the room, only to throw herself on the hard floor of the next apartment, where she grovelled in an agony of anger and pain. Suddenly the sound of horses' hoofs fell on her ear, and she sprang up with one wild bound, and flew to the door, just in time to motion Paul, who had already dismounted, into her presence.

"Now has my time come!" She could hardly restrain herself from crying it out aloud to the frowning mountain and the arid plain. "Ricardo, thou shalt be avenged! avenged thou, my poor heart, for the tears and the blood wrung from thee for many, many bitter days!"

The light of the sun shining into Paul's eyes, blinded him; and though he saw the finger laid on her lips, he could not see the dishevelled hair and bloodshot eyes, and approached her, looking for some glad surprise. He had donned a Mexican costume, and the little silver bells on the outside seam of his pantaloons jingled musically at every step; while the short jacket, showing the pistol-belt under the red sash, set his figure off to full advantage.

He spoke laughingly: "You see I have turned Mexican, every inch of me!"

then he caught the wild eyes, with their frenzied look, and he grasped her hand, exclaiming, "Good G.o.d! what has happened?"

"Happened?" she echoed with a demoniac laugh; "we have been deceived--outraged--cheated out of our life's happiness--both you and I!

Behold the traitor and the serpent!"

Drawing aside the curtain that hung in the door-arch between the two rooms, she beckoned him to approach, and pointed silently to the group in the next room. Bending over the reclining form of the man on the lounge stood a girl, whose face, of angel goodness, was turned in profile to the two intruders at the doorway. The man's eyes were closed; and as the girl stooped lower, his hand stole softly around her form, and nestled there, lovingly, tenderly, as though it had found a long-sought resting-place. Pliant braids of glossy black hair fell far below the girl's waist; and her eyes were of the almond shape, that we find in the faces of those descended from the people of Castile.

In a moment Paul's burning eyes had taken in the picture, and an inarticulate sound came over his lips. The woman beside him watched him with the eyes of a tigress; and he never knew--was it _her_ touch that guided him, or did his own evil pa.s.sions move his hand from his reeking brow to the pistol in his belt? There was a sharp report, a shriek and a groan, and the next minute Paul Kennerly was dashing over the plain, mounted on his fleet black horse, the wind tossing through his hair, and raising it from his bare brow, where it reared itself proudly, like the mane of a lion when he flies from captivity and death.