Louis Dodge

“ There may be two or three of the people who know him best who will give him credit for certain things—if he denies himself to pay a debt, or forfeits his rest to sit up with a sick neighbor. But take the world as a whole, doesn’t it ride over the man who’s got nothing? Isn’t he dreaded like a plague? Isn’t he a kill-joy? I don’t care what a woman’s been, she’s as well off. A few people will give her credit for the good she does, and that’s all a man can hope for, if he’s been generous enough or enough alive to let his money go. No, you can’t build up any fences, Sylvia. ”

“ A soldier doesn’t desert his wounded comrade in battle. He bears him to safety—or both perish together. And by such deeds is the consciousness of God established in us.”
“Wait!” commanded Harboro. He clinched his fists. A phrase had clung to him: “He bears him to safety or both perish together!”
He arose from the seat he had taken and staggered away half a dozen steps, his hands still clinched. Then, as if remembering, he turned about so that he faced the man who had talked to him. Beyond loomed the ancient church in which Sylvia had said it would seem possible to find God. ”

“ Mendoza made no sign of recognition of Harboro’s displeasure. He arose with a purposeless air and went farther along the stockade wall. Sylvia’s glance followed him. She had not taken in the fact that the man’s presence, or anything that he had done, had annoyed Harboro. She was wondering what 200 kind of man it was who had captivated and held the woman who had filled her boudoir with passionate music, and who knew how to keep an expressionless mask in place so skilfully that no one on the border really knew her. ”

“ You might think little creatures—ants, or the silly locusts that sing in the heat—might have need of such a word. You wouldn’t blame an apple for being deformed, would you?—or the hawk for killing the dove? We are what we are—that’s all. I don’t blame any one.”
The bewildered Harboro leaned forward, his hands on his knees. “We are what we make ourselves, Sylvia. We do what we permit ourselves to do. Don’t lose sight of that fact. Don’t lose sight of the fact, either, that we are here, man and wife, to help each other. I’m waiting, Sylvia, for you to tell me what has gone wrong.” ”

“ The rebozo was pinioned behind them and under their feet. The finest dust could not penetrate its warp and woof. The wind was as a mighty hand, intent upon bearing them to earth, but it could not harm them.
Sylvia heard Runyon’s musical laugh. He bent his head close to hers. “We’re all right now,” he said.
He had his arm across her shoulder and was drawing her close. “It’s going to be cold,” he said, as if in explanation. He seemed as joyous as a boy—as innocent as a boy. She inclined her head until it rested on his shoulder, so that both occupied little more than the space of one. ”

“ A gleam of satisfaction shone in his inscrutable eyes—as when a current of air removes some of the ash from above a live coal. “Will you dance with me?” he asked. “When the young fellows overlook so charming a partner, surely an old man may become bold.”
She arose with warm responsiveness, yet with undefined misgivings. He had an arm about her firmly in an instant, and when they had caught step with the music he held her close to him. He was an excellent dancer. Sylvia was instantly transported away from the world of petty discretions into a realm of faultless harmony, of singing rhythm. ”

“ Valdez, she had been informed, was to be a sort of best friend to the family 194 of the bride, and it would be his duty to remain for the next day’s ceremonies—the feasting and the marriage itself.
The dusk deepened, and a new light began to glow over the desert. A waxing moon, half-full, rode near the zenith; and as the light of day receded it took on a surprising brilliance. The road seemed in some strange way to be more clearly defined than under the light of day. It became a winding path to happiness. It began to beckon; to whisper of the delights of swift races, of coquetries. ”

“ But Valdez thought of no menaces in connection with the border folk. He was a kind-hearted fellow, to whom all men were friends.
“Travellers, or a party camped for the night,” he said interestedly, as if the presence of other human beings must be welcomed gladly. He rode out toward the sound of that tinkling bell, and in a moment he was guided more certainly by the blaze of a camp-fire.
Harboro and Sylvia followed, and presently they were quite near to two quaint old carts, heaped high with mesquite fagots destined for the humbler hearths of Eagle Pass. ”

“ That had happened a good many months ago; and Sylvia remembered now, with a feeling as of an icy hand on her heart, that if her relationships with many of the others in those old days were innocent enough—or at best marred only by a kindly folly—there had been that in her encounters with Fectnor which would forever damn her in Harboro’s eyes, if the truth ever reached him. He would have the right to call her a bad woman; and if the word seemed fantastic and unreal to her, she knew that it would not seem so to Harboro. ”

“ The road was perfect. It stretched, smooth and white, away into the dusk. The air was clear as on a mountain top, with just enough crispness to create energy. Of wind there was scarcely a breath.
She was not pleased at all with Harboro’s friend. He had assumed the attitude of a deferential guide, and his remarks were almost entirely addressed to Harboro. But she was not to be put out by so small a part of the night’s programme. After all, Valdez was not planning to return with them, and they were likely to have the ride back by themselves. ”

“ That night of their wedding he had lifted her in his powerful arms and had given her a man’s assurance: “I mean that you’re to have all the help you want—that you’re to look to me for your strength.”
She reasoned shrewdly: Harboro wasn’t the sort of man people would tell things to—about her. They would know what to expect: intense passion, swift punishment.
And yet as she watched Antonia go away down the road, suggesting supine submission rather than a friend in need, her heart failed her. Had she done wisely? Fectnor had never stepped aside for any man. ”

“ Sylvia sat in her boudoir by an open window and watched him approach. She immediately guessed 182 that it was Runyon. The remarkable manner in which he had conquered the town had made him an occasional subject for comment between Sylvia and Harboro, and he had described the man to her.
Sylvia thought that the rider and his horse, with the sun on the man’s flashing blue eyes and the horse’s golden dapples, constituted the prettiest picture she had ever seen. Never before had she observed a man who sat his horse with such an air of gallantry. ”

“ Here, of course, the street broadens and skirts the plaza where the band plays of an evening, and where the town promenades round and round the little square of palms and fountains, under the stars. You may remember that a little farther on, on one side of the plaza, there is the immense church which has been building for a century, more or less, and which is still incomplete.
There were a few miserable-looking soldiers, with shapeless, colorless uniforms, loitering 50 in front of the cuartel as Harboro and Sylvia passed. ”

“ She might have derived a great deal of tumultuous joy from Runyon’s friendship for her if it could have been manifested in secret, but she could feel only a sense of duplicity and shame if his friendship included Harboro, too. The wolf does not curry favor with the sheep-dog when it hungers for a lamb. Such was her creed. In brief, Sylvia had received her training in none of the social schools. She was a daughter of the desert—a bit of that jetsam which the Rio Grande leaves upon its arid banks as it journeys stealthily to the sea. ”

“ A group of soldiers from the post were present, and Jesus Mendoza, a Mexican who had accumulated a competency by corralling his inebriated fellow countrymen at election times, and knowing far more about the ticket they voted than they could ever have learned, was resting a spurred boot on the bar railing, and looking through dreamy eyes and his own cloud of cigarette smoke at the front door. Mendoza always created the impression of being interested in something that was about to happen, or somebody who was about to appear—but never in his immediate surroundings. ”

“ But Sylvia scarcely saw the picture now. She was recalling the words she had written in that message to her father. If only she had not defied Fectnor; if only she had made a plea for pity, or suggested a fear of her husband—or if she hadn’t sent any answer at all!
It occurred to her that the exposure which menaced her was as nothing to the perils to which she had subjected Harboro. She knew instinctively that Harboro was not a man to submit to deliberate injury from any source. He would defend himself in the face of any danger; he would defend that which belonged to him. ”

“ He had an idea that he could now understand the sensations of people who had indulged too freely in some sort of drug. He had temporarily lost the power to feel. Here was Sylvia, a self-confessed wanton—and yet here was Sylvia as deeply intrenched in his heart as ever. This was a monstrous contradiction. One of these things must be a fact, the other a fantastic hallucination.
The waiter brought food which he looked at with distaste. It was a typical frontier meal—stereotyped, uninviting. ”

“ She was standing by her front gate when Harboro first saw her—and when she first saw Harboro. The front gate commanded an unobstructed view of the desert. It was near sundown, and far across the earth’s floor, which looked somewhat like a wonderful mosaic of opals and jade at this hour, a Mexican goatherd was driving his flock. That was the only sign of life to be seen or felt, if you except 11 the noise of locusts in the mesquite near by and the spasmodic progress of a horned toad in the sand outside Sylvia’s gate. ”

“ And Harboro began vaguely to understand. Runyon was popular, not because he was a particularly good fellow, but because he was so supremely cheerful. And he seemed entirely harmless, despite the glamour of him. After all, he was not a mere male coquette. He was in love with the world, with life.
Wayne was reproaching him for not having come sooner. He should have been there for the beginning, he said.
And Runyon’s response was characteristic enough, perhaps: “Everything is always beginning.”
There was gay laughter at this, though the meaning of it must have been obscure to all save Sylvia. ”

“ He approached Harboro leisurely.
“Stand aside, Dunwoodie,” commanded Harboro harshly.
“Well, wait a minute,” insisted Dunwoodie. “Calm yourself, man. I want to talk to you. Fectnor’s not in the saloon. He went on through and out the back way.”
Harboro wheeled with an almost despairing expression in his eyes. He seemed to look at nothing, now—like a bird-dog that senses the nearness of the invisible quarry. The thought came to him: “Fectnor may appear at any point, behind me!” The man might have run back along the line of buildings, seeking his own place to emerge again. ”

“ Harboro was hurrying down toward the Rio Grande bridge. He was trying to put a curb on his emotions, on his movements. It would never do for him to hurry through the streets of Eagle Pass like a madman. He must walk circumspectly.
He was planning for the future. He would take Sylvia away—anywhere. They would 302 begin their married life anew. He would take her beyond the ordinary temptations. They would live in a tent, an igloo, in the face of a cliff. He would take her beyond the reach of the old evil influences, where he could guide her back to the paths she had lost. ”

“ Some women of my kind would have lied or stolen, or they would have made mischief for people. And then there were the young fellows, the mere boys.... It’s a real injury to them to find that a girl they like is—is not nice. They’re so wonderfully ignorant. A woman is either entirely good or entirely bad in their eyes. You couldn’t really do anything to destroy their faith, even when they pretended to be rather rough and wicked. I wasn’t that kind of a bad woman, at least.”
Harboro’s brow had become furrowed, with impatience, seemingly. “But your marriage to me, Sylvia?” ”

“ And they went down the stairs as if they were four; the young woman walking with Despair, the old woman moving side by side with Knowledge.
It was then that the telephone rang and Sylvia went to the instrument and took down the receiver with trembling fingers. If it were only Harboro!... But it was a woman’s voice, and the hope within her died. She could scarcely attend, after she realized that it was a woman who spoke to her. The name “Mrs. Mendoza” meant nothing to her for an instant. And then she aroused herself. She must not be ungracious. ”

“ His imagination travelled on beyond the bull-pen, to the shabby dance-halls along the river. It was a custom for Americans to visit the dance-halls at least once. He had gone into them repeatedly. Other railroaders who were his associates enjoyed going into 60 these places, and Harboro, rather than be alone in the town, had followed disinterestedly in their wake, and had looked on with cold, contemplative eyes at the disorderly picture they presented: unfortunate Mexican girls dancing with cowboys and railroaders and soldiers and nondescripts. ”

“ He belonged to the States, somewhere, but he would come back by way of El Paso, if he ever came back; or he would drift over toward Vera Cruz or Tampico.
Fectnor was one of those who had trod that path through the mesquite to Sylvia’s back door in the days which were ended. But he was different from the others. He was a man who was lavish with money—but he expected you to pick it up out of the dust. He was of violent moods; and he had that audacity—that taint of insanity, perhaps—which enables some men to maintain the reputation of bad men, of “killers,” in every frontier. ”

“ The people of quality of either side of the river rarely ever set foot on the bridge, or on those malodorous streets of Piedras Negras which lay near the river. Such people employed a cochero and drove, quite in the European style, when business or pleasure drew them from their homes. There was an almost continuous stream of peones on the bridge in the mornings and evenings: silent, furtive people, watched closely by the customs guard, whose duties required him on occasion to examine a suspicious-appearing Mexican with decidedly indelicate thoroughness. ”