The Splendid Idle Forties Part 22

Elena fell upon the floor and sobbed with rebellious mortification and terror. Her father had not uttered a word, but she knew the meaning of his summary act, and other feelings soon gave way to despair. That she should never see Dario Castanares again was certain, and she wept and prayed with all the abandon of her Spanish nature. A picture of the Virgin hung over the bed, and she raised herself on her knees and lifted her clasped hands to it beseechingly. With her tumbled hair and white face, her streaming upturned eyes and drawn mouth, she looked more like the Mater Dolorosa than the expressionless print she prayed to.

"Mary! Mother!" she whispered, "have mercy on thy poor little daughter.

Give him to me. I ask for nothing else in this world. I do not care for gold or ranchos, only to be his wife. I am so lonely, my mother, for even Santiago thinks of so many other things than of me. I only want to be loved, and no one else will ever love me who can make me love him.

Ay! give him to me! give him to me!" And she threw herself on her face once more, and sobbed until her tears were exhausted. Then she dragged herself to the window and leaned over the deep seat. Perhaps she might have one glimpse of him as he rode away.

She gave a little cry of agony and pleasure. He was standing by the gates of the corral whilst the vaqueros rounded up the cattle he had bought. His arms were folded, his head hung forward. As he heard her cry, he lifted his face, and Elena saw the tears in his eyes. For the moment they gazed at each other, those lovers of California's long-ago, while the very atmosphere quivering between them seemed a palpable barrier. Elena flung out her arms with a sudden pa.s.sionate gesture; he gave a hoa.r.s.e cry, and paced up and down like a race-horse curbed with a Spanish bit. How to have one last word with her? If she were behind the walls of the fort of Monterey it would be as easy. He dared not speak from where he was. Already the horses were at the door to carry the eager company to a fight between a bull and a bear. But he could write a note if only he had the materials. It was useless to return to his room, for Joaquin was there; and he hoped never to see that library again. But was there ever a lover in whom necessity did not develop the genius of invention? Dario flashed upward a glance of hope, then took from his pocket a slip of the rice-paper used for making cigaritos. He burnt a match, and with the charred stump scrawled a few lines.

"Elena! Mine! Star of my life! My sweet! Beautiful and idolized.

Farewell! Farewell, my darling! My heart is sad. G.o.d be with thee.

"DARIO."

He wrapped the paper about a stone, and tied it with a wisp of gra.s.s.

With a sudden flexile turn of a wrist that had thrown many a reata, he flung it straight through the open window. Elena read the meaningless phrases, then fell insensible to the floor.

IX

It was the custom of Dona Jacoba personally to oversee her entire establishment every day, and she always went at a different hour, that laziness might never feel sure of her back. To-day she visited the rancheria immediately after dinner, and looked through every hut with her piercing eyes. If the children were dirty, she peremptorily ordered their stout mammas to put them into the clean clothes which her bounty had provided. If a bed was unmade, she boxed the ears of the owner and sent her spinning across the room to her task. But she found little to scold about; her discipline was too rigid. When she was satisfied that the huts were in order, she went down to the great stone tubs sunken in the ground, where the women were washing in the heavy shade of the willows. In their calico gowns they made bright bits of colour against the drooping green of the trees.

"Maria," she cried sharply, "thou art wringing that fine linen too harshly. Dost thou wish to break in pieces the bridal clothes of thy senorita? Be careful, or I will lay the whip across thy shoulders."

She walked slowly through the willows, enjoying the shade. Her fine old head was held sternly back, and her shoulders were as square as her youngest son's; but she sighed a little, and pressed a willow branch to her face with a caressing motion. She looked up to the gray peak standing above its fellows, bare, ugly, gaunt. She was not an imaginative woman, but she always had felt in closer kinship with that solitary peak than with her own blood. As she left the wood and saw the gay cavalcade about to start--the burnished horses, the dashing caballeros, the girls with their radiant faces and jaunty habits--she sighed again. Long ago she had been the bride of a brilliant young Mexican officer for a few brief years; her youth had gone with his life.

She avoided the company and went round to the buildings at the back of the house. Approving here, reproaching there, she walked leisurely through the various rooms where the Indians were making lard, shoes, flour, candles. She was in the chocolate manufactory when her husband found her.

"Come--come at once," he said. "I have good news for thee."

She followed him to his room, knowing by his face that tragedy had visited them. But she was not prepared for the tale he poured forth with violent interjections of English and Spanish oaths. She had detected a flirtation between her daughter and the uninvited guest, and not approving of flirtations, had told Joaquin to keep his eyes upon them when hers were absent; but that the man should dare and the girl should stoop to think of marriage wrought in her a pa.s.sion to which her husband's seemed the calm flame of a sperm-candle.

"What!" she cried, her hoa.r.s.e voice breaking. "What! A half-breed aspire to a Cortez!" She forgot her husband's separateness with true Californian pride. "My daughter and the son of an Indian! Holy G.o.d! And she has dared!--she has dared! The little imbecile! The little--But,"

and she gave a furious laugh, "she will not forget again."

She caught the greenhide reata from the nail and went up the stair.

Crossing the library with heavy tread, as if she would stamp her rage through the floor, she turned the key in the door of her daughter's room and strode in. The girl still lay on the floor, although consciousness had returned. As Elena saw her mother's face she cowered pitifully.

That terrible temper seldom dominated the iron will of the woman, but Santiago had shaken it a few days ago, and Elena knew that her turn had come.

Dona Jacoba shut the door and towered above her daughter, red spots on her face, her small eyes blazing, an icy sneer on her mouth. She did not speak a word. She caught the girl by her delicate shoulder, jerked her to her feet, and lashed her with the heavy whip until screams mingled with the gay laughter of the parting guests. When she had beaten her until her own arm ached, she flung her on the bed and went out and locked the door.

Elena was insensible again for a while, then lay dull and inert for hours. She had a pa.s.sive longing for death. After the suffering and the hideous mortification of that day there seemed no other climax. The cavalcade rode beneath her windows once more, with their untired laughter, their splendid vitality. They scattered to their rooms to don their bright evening gowns, then went to the dining room and feasted.

After supper Francisca unlocked Elena's door and entered with a little tray on her hand. Elena refused to eat, but her sister's presence roused her, and she turned her face to the wall and burst into tears.

"Nonsense!" said Francisca, kindly. "Do not cry, my sister. What is a lover? The end of a little flirtation? My father will find thee a husband--a strong fair English husband like mine. Dost thou not prefer blondes to brunettes, my sister? I am sorry my mother beat thee, but she has such a sense of her duty. She did it for thy good, my Elena. Let me dress thee in thy new gown, the white silk with the pale blue flowers.

It is high in the neck and long in the sleeves, and will hide the marks of the whip. Come down and play cascarones and dance until dawn and forget all about it."

But Elena only wept on, and Francisca left her for more imperative duties.

The next day the girl still refused to eat, although Dona Jacoba opened her mouth and poured a cup of chocolate down her throat. Late in the afternoon Santiago slipped into the room and bent over her.

"Elena," he whispered hurriedly. "Look! I have a note for thee."

Elena sat upright on the bed, and he thrust a piece of folded paper into her hand. "Here it is. He is in San Luis Obispo and says he will stay there. Remember it is but a few miles away. My--"

Elena sank back with a cry, and Santiago blasphemed in English. Dona Jacoba unlocked her daughter's hand, took the note, and led Santiago from the room. When she reached her own, she opened a drawer and handed him a canvas bag full of gold.

"Go to San Francisco and enjoy yourself," she said. "Interfere no farther between your sister and your parents, unless you prefer that reata to gold. Your craft cannot outwit mine, and she will read no notes. You are a foolish boy to set your sense against your mother's. I may seem harsh to my children, but I strive on my knees for their good.

And when I have made up my mind that a thing is right to do, you know that my nature is of iron. No child of mine shall marry a lazy vagabond who can do nothing but lie in a hammock and bet and gamble and make love. And a half-breed! Mother of G.o.d! Now go to San Francisco, and send for more money when this is gone."

Santiago obeyed. There was nothing else for him to do.

Elena lay in her bed, scarcely touching food. Poor child! her nature demanded nothing of life but love, and that denied her, she could find no reason for living. She was not sport-loving like Joaquin, nor practical like Francisca, nor learned like Santiago, nor ambitious to dance through life like her many nieces. She was but a clinging unreasoning creature, with warm blood and a great heart. But she no longer prayed to have Dario given her. It seemed to her that after such suffering her saddened and broken spirit would cast its shadows over her happiest moments, and she longed only for death.

Her mother, becoming alarmed at her increasing weakness, called in an old woman who had been midwife and doctor of the county for half a century. She came, a bent and bony woman who must have been majestic in her youth. Her front teeth were gone, her face was stained with dark splashes like the imprint of a pre-natal hand. Over her head she wore a black shawl; and she looked enough like a witch to frighten her patients into eternity had they not been so well used to her. She prodded Elena all over as if the girl were a loaf of bread and her knotted fingers sought a lump of flour in the dough.

"The heart," she said to Dona Jacoba with sharp emphasis, her back teeth meeting with a click, as if to proclaim their existence. "I have no herbs for that," and she went back to her cabin by the ocean.

That night Elena lifted her head suddenly. From the hill opposite her window came the sweet reverberation of a guitar: then a voice, which, though never heard by her in song before, was as unmistakable as if it had serenaded beneath her window every night since she had known Dario Castanares.

EL ULTIMO ADIoS

"Si dos con el alma Se amaron en vida, Y al fin se separan En vida las dos; Sabeis que es tan grande Le pena sentida Que con esa palabra Se dicen adios.

Y en esa palabra Que breve murmura, Ni verse prometen Niama.r.s.e se juran; Que en esa palabra Se dicen adios.

No hay queja mas honda, Suspiro mas largo; Que aquellas palabras Que dicen adios.

Al fin ha llegado, La muerte en la vida; Al fin para entrambos Muramos los dos: Al fin ha llegado La hora c.u.mplida, Del ultimo adios.

Ya nunca en la vida, Gentil companera Ya nunca volveremos A vernos los dos: Por eso es tan triste Mi acento postrere, Por eso es tan triste El ultimo adios."--

They were dancing downstairs; laughter floated through the open windows.

Francisca sang a song of the bull-fight, in her strong high voice; the frogs chanted their midnight ma.s.s by the creek in the willows; the coyotes wailed; the owls hooted. But nothing could drown that message of love. Elena lit a candle and held it at arm's length before the window.

She knew that its ray went straight through the curtains to the singer on the hill, for his voice broke suddenly, then swelled forth in pa.s.sionate answer. He sat there until dawn singing to her; but the next night he did not come, and Elena knew that she had not been his only audience.

X

The week of festivity was over; the bridal pair, the relatives, the friends went away. Quiet would have taken temporary possession of Los Quervos had it not been for the many pa.s.sing guests lavishly entertained by Don Roberto.

And still Elena lay in her little iron bed, refusing to get out of it, barely eating, growing weaker and thinner every day. At the end of three weeks Dona Jacoba was thoroughly alarmed, and Don Roberto sent Joaquin to San Francisco for a physician.

The man of science came at the end of a week. He asked many questions, and had a long talk with his patient. When he left the sick-room, he found Don Roberto and Dona Jacoba awaiting him in the library. They were ready to accept his word as law, for he was an Englishman, and had won high reputation during his short stay in the new country.

He spoke with curt directness. "My dear sir, your child is dying because she does not wish to live. People who write novels call it dying of a broken heart; but it does not make much difference about the name.

Your child is acutely sensitive, and has an extremely delicate const.i.tution--predisposition to consumption. Separation from the young man she desires to marry has prostrated her to such an extent that she is practically dying. Under existing circ.u.mstances she will not live two months, and, to be brutally frank, you will have killed her. I understand that the young man is well-born on his father's side, and possessed of great wealth. I see no reason why she should not marry him.

I shall leave her a tonic, but you can throw it out of the window unless you send for the young man," and he walked down the stair and made ready for his departure.

Don Roberto translated the verdict to his wife. She turned very gray, and her thin lips pressed each other. But she bent her head. "So be it,"

she said; "I cannot do murder. Send for Dario Castanares."