Bennington, Vermont

“ Now he was going in for the landed-proprietor stuff, citrus fruits, peon servants, hammocks in the shade of palms, with the Missus in a rocking-chair on a broad piazza under the roses Oh, boy, that would be the life! (Any tropic prospectus will prove it! )
“When I get the finca all jazzed up, right,” said Bennington, I’ll send for Beatrice, and she’ll have to admit I was right!”
Bennington gazed out over the patio at the shimmering plain, the range of the Sierra Hedionda, the buzzards volplaning far aloft. He felt all manner of exotic things. One just bit him under the shirt. ”

“ The widow blew a ribbon of smoke from those red lips into the sunlit air under the palm-tree, kissed her slim hand at Benninglon, and laid that hand on her heart.
“Good night!” gulped Bennington, and fled.
BENNINGTON spent three weeks of toils and complications incredible to one who knoweth not the ways and customs of folk in the spig belt. He wrote, however, enthusiastic letters home to Beatrice, all about the land flowing with milk and honey. In case something might yet be salvaged from the wreck, he might never have to own the awful truth. ”

“ He therefore passed an unusually peeved evening in the posada bar, his heart filled with un-Lincolnian “malice toward all and charity toward none”—least of all toward café-au-lait widows with hibiscuses and jasmines in their hair.
Bennington retired early to theoretical rest under the ragged mosquito-bar in his white-walled cell off the patio. He was poison-mad. His sleep was a nightmare of heat, bugs, peevishness. ”

“ The air was full of tingling life. Altogether a morning to cry one to leap eagerly from bed, to rush to the window, to drink in deep draughts of electric balmy ozone, and to thank heaven for the grace of mere existence.
That at least is what Bennington did. And he did more. He despatched a hasty breakfast, and went forth and saddled his steed, and rode away down the gulch, with never a thought of sample tests, and never a care whether the day's work were done or not. ”

“ A length of the corral had succumbed to the flood, many valuable tools in the blacksmith shop were in danger of rust from the dampness, and Arthur and his wife had been completely washed out. All three men worked hard setting things to rights. The twilight caught them before their work was done.
Bennington found himself too weary to attempt an unknown, débris-covered road by dark. He played cribbage with Old Mizzou and won. ”

“ How is it that this girl could cry at having to tell Sam Bannett she could not think of him, and then treat another lover as she treated the Virginian? I cannot tell you, having never (as I said before) been a woman myself.
Bennington opened its arms to its venturesome daughter. Much was made of Molly Wood. Old faces and old places welcomed her. Fatted calves of varying dimensions made their appearance. ”

“ And as the deep bell boomed on through all the vision, like a subtle thrilling presence, Bennington seemed to himself to stand, finger on lip, the eternal custodian of the Secret of it all—the secret that each of these cowled figures was a Man—a divine soul and a body, with ears, and eyes, and a brain; that he had thoughts, and his life that is and is to come was of these thoughts; that there beat hearts beneath that gray, and that their voices must not be heeded ”

“ You’re lucky to be goin’ north, with a skin that don’t look like a sheet o’ postage-stamps. It’s me that’s gotta stay here an’ catch it. Here, here’s a souvenir for you.” He slid a shriveled lemon into Bennington’s hand. “You’ll prize it—it’ll prove to your friends that you got somethin’ off your finca, anyhow. Good luck to you. S’iong!”
Bennington pocketed the lemon. He felt grateful for even that. At all events he would have something for Beatrice; he was not going home completely goose-egged. Smeady, meantime, slipped out of the freight-port into the launch, cast off and departed. ”

“ He visited the horses, standing disconsolate under an open shed in the corral; he slopped, with constantly accruing masses of sticky earth at his feet, to the chicken coop, into which he cast an eye; he even took the kitchen pails and tramped down to the spring and back. In the gulch he did not see or hear a living thing. A newly-born and dirty little stream was trickling destructively through all manner of shivering grasses and flowers. The water from Bennington's sleeves ran down over the harsh canvas cuffs and turned his hands purple with the cold. ”

“ She was much interested, inquiring of his colour, his size, his gaits, whether he had been tried.
"I'll tell you what we will do," she suggested; "we'll go on an expedition some day. I have a pony too. We will fill up our saddlebags and cook our own dinner. I know a nice little place over toward Blue Lead."
"I've one suggestion to add," put in Bennington, "and that is, that we go to-morrow."
She looked a trifle doubtful.
"I don't know. Aren't we seeing a good deal of each other?"
"Oh, if it is going to bore you, by all means put it off!" cried Bennington in genuine alarm. ”

“ Even the lightning gets tired and quits before it hits the ground. There was a boit of it got stuck that way, lawst week, on Armstrong’s Lago Viscoso finca. Stuck, sir, twenty feet above his house. Armstrong had to make an hombre go up on the blinkin’ roof and lasso it. Burned up seven ropes before they got it down. Oh, a bally hole!”
BENNINGTON wiped sweat and flies from his worried brow and departed in quest of the agent for the property, one Smeady by name. ”

“ He deposited the stake in its proper place, and returned to find her seated on the ground, plucking a handful of the leaves of a little erect herb that grew abundantly in the hollow. These she rubbed together and held to her face inside the sunbonnet.
"Who are you, anyway?" asked Bennington abruptly, as he returned.
"D' you ever see this before?" she inquired irrelevantly, looking up with her eyes as she leaned over the handful. "Good for colds. Makes your nose feel all funny and prickly." ”

“ Yes, he would accept the hundred.
After a few epochs, eons, and eras, the launch emerged into a dark inlet from the sea. Tiny lights winked and beckoned, far ahead. These lights turned out to be those of the Cristóbal Colón, taking wood at La Fiebre. Smeady brought the launch up under the port bow of the steamer and knotted the painter to the cable-chain. Then he and Bennington scrambled in at an open, black-yawning, freight-port. Smeady gave a handful of loose change to a vague figure there, for silence. Under the gleam of a lantern he scrawled a bill of sale on a wrinkled sheet of paper. ”

“ Through the rich intervales of the broad basin, the winding Walloomscoick, traversed by the highway, glistened at various points among the groves that shade its banks; and the whole valley, dotted with farm-houses, presents one picture of peaceful industry. On the right, seven miles distant, and nestled among the hills near the Green Mountains, lies Bennington, the white spire of whose church was seen above the intervening forests. From the heights we could plainly discern a brick house in the valley, that belonged, during the Revolution, to a Tory named Mathews. ”

“ It may as well be remarked here that Bennington knew all about the West before he left home. Until this excursion he had never even crossed the Alleghanies, but he thought he appreciated the conditions thoroughly. This was because he was young. He could close his eyes and see the cowboys scouring the plain. As a parenthesis it should be noted that cowboys always scour the plain, just as sailors always scan the horizon. He knew how the cowboys looked, because he had seen Buffalo Bill's show ”

“ Then the right hand rose to the full, ripe, red, moist lips, the cigarette was set between them; the widow took a deep chestful of smoke and let it drift from those lips, as per above, all round Bennington’s dizzy head. The smoke enveloped him like Circean censers on the Isle of What’s-Its-Name, when Ulysses and his men had the Big Picnic. ”

“ He looked up, and then still up, until, at the flat top of the castellated dike that stood over him, he caught a gleam of pink. The contrast between it, the blue of the sky, and the dark green of the trees, was most beautiful and unusual. Nature rarely uses pink, except in sunsets and in flowers. Bennington thought pleasedly how every impression this girl made upon him was one of grace or beauty or bright colour. ”

“ How was he to get gas? Only one possibility remained. Even as travelers across the steppes of Russia fling supernumerary infants to the wolves, for a getaway, so now Bennington understood he would have to sacrifice a few of his precious, prize Buff Orpingtons.
It took him not long to open the crate, in the darkness and extract four fine but vociferous birds, tie their legs with a cord rummaged from a side-pocket of the car, and start hiking toward Porterville. But all at once, as he bore his loud burden down the tenebrous road, doubts and fears assailed him. ”

“ You’ve got one chance in eighty-seven thousand! Next minute, it’ll be one in eighty-eight thousand! For the love o’ Pete, hombre, pronto on the fade-away!”
Smeady shook him again, so that Bennington’s teeth did a bolero with castanet accompaniment. Yes, it must have been the shake that caused the chatter. Surely, who could have suspected that Bennington would be afraid? Even if he were, it must have been fear of hurting Sanchez that made Bennington’s Angers tremble so that he could hardly fasten his buttons or tie his shoes. Howbeit, he dressed in record time. No commuter ever did better. ”

“ You have seen what my family is."
"I don't know, Mary, that I can make you understand at all," began Bennington helplessly. "I can't express it even to myself. Our people are so different. My training has been so different. All this sort of thing means so much to us, and so little to you."
"I know exactly," she interrupted. "I have read, and I have lived East. I can appreciate just how it is. See if I can not read your thoughts. My family is uneducated. If it becomes your family, your own parents will be more than grieved, and your friends will have little to do with you. ”

“ Bennington reached the finca after a blistering walk past all the attractions mentioned by Smeady, and then some, including a hut where he inquired the way. Inside the hut a citizen was dining, with wife and offspring. Two chickens, on the table, likewise dined. One dog, lying on the earthen floor, likewise dined on bones flung down. One chick, standing on said dog, likewise dined, entomologically. There were pigs, too. Bennington hastened on.
Without the widow to overcome the effect of Finca Rica, the blow—after that lathering, blistering walk—would have put Bennington to the mat. ”

“ Darkness and mystery, emptiness, heat and the terror of a sudden, violent death brooded. How easy an ambuscade in the night, from behind any wall—a knife-thrust—a body slid into the river! Then the alligators would take charge of the undertaking-job. Mysterious disappearance of one Americano. No one would ever know, but Smeady—and fear would seal his lips. Bennington gulped dryly and stumbled on. ”

“ As to the assessment work, Old Mizzou had already assured him there was no immediate hurry; men were cheaper in the fall. As to investigating, he started in on that at once. He and Davidson climbed down shafts, and broke off ore, and worked the gold pan. It was fun.
In the morning Bennington decided to work from seven until ten on Aliris. Then for three hours he and Old Mizzou prospected. In the afternoon the young man took a vacation and hunted Wild Western adventures. ”

“ Says she’s a widow, anyhow. Search me!”
“If I did, I know what I’d find, same as on me,” said Bennington, scratching again.
“She’s got no husband, anyhow,” continued Smeady, unmoved. “So that prob’ly makes her a widow. She’s an all-right party, even if she is a little back on her rent, that’s four pesos a month.”
“Back on her rent, is she? How far back?”
“From now, continuous. Back to when she moved in. That’s seven months ago, the third of last August.” '
“Great business! Why the devil don’t you get a tenant that’ll at least pay enough to keep up the taxes and insurance and goat-bills?” ”

“ Bennington mounted a pile of molds and raised his hand. The murmur of voices dwindled away into silence. The sun came in through the spreading skylights, and Bennington stood in the center of the radiance. He was a man, every inch of him, and not a man among them could deny it. There are many things that are recognizable even to crass minds, and one of these is a man. Genius they look upon with contempt, but not strength and resolution; they can not comprehend what is not visible to the eye.
"Fire away, boss!" ”

“ As Bennington had for some time tentatively revolved in his mind the desirability of something to ride, this struck him as being a good idea. All Westerners had horses—in the books. So he abandoned Aliris: A Romance of all Time, for the morning, and drove down to Spanish Gulch with Old Mizzou.
He was mentally braced for devilment, but his arch-enemy, Fay, was not in sight. To his surprise, he got to the post office quite without molestation. There he was handed two letters. One was from his parents. The other, his first business document, proved to be from the mining capitalist. ”

“ The newcomer was a child, a little girl about eight or ten years old. Bennington liked children as a usual thing. No one on earth could have become possessed in this one's favour. She was a creature of regular but mean features, extreme gravity, and evidently of an inquiring disposition. On seeing her for the first time, one sophisticated would have expected a deluge of questions. Bennington did. ”