Sard Harker

“ Wrattson & Willis’s sugar-clippers, then regularly trading to the ports of Santa Barbara. Later in his time Sard followed Captain Cary into the Pathfinder and remained with him in her as third, second and at last as chief mate. He was mate of the Pathfinder and had been for ten years at sea when this tale begins. He was called “Sard” Harker (though seldom to his face) because he was judged to be sardonic. He, too, has been described in a sonnet:
A lean man, silent, behind triple bars
Of pride, fastidiousness and secret life. ”

“ Harker,” Margarita said. “Then, when the lights went on, I saw him lying dead on the floor; the Indians dragged him out.”
“Correct,” the Holy One said. “He is dead. And you are helpless. Your fleet can’t help you, nor your Minister, nor your Consul, nor your State, nor any other of those things you believe in. You are in the hands of power. You are elements for power to sacrifice. You, man, are bread; you, woman, are wine; and I shall sacrifice your bread and wine, your blood and honour, your life and your chastity.”
“I knew a dirty talker like you once before,” Sard said. ”

“ From under this awning they could see the sky, intensely blue, the Coloured Men in the opposite seats, some palms rattling the metal of their leaves, and grasses, sprouted in the tiles on the adobe top, being hovered over by black and scarlet butterflies.
“Now, Mr. Harker,” Captain Cary said, “we seem to be in plenty of time. Since you know Spanish so well, here’s one of their programmes or bills of fare. You might read it over and let me know what it is that we are to expect.”
Sard took the sheet of coarse yellowish paper printed in blunt old type which had once printed praise of Maximilian. ”

“ A man hailed him by name.
“Hullo, Harker!”
It was Billy Binge, his old captain of the main.
“I say, Harker,” he said, “are you ashore here? Yes? What topping luck! Could you take the Yuba to Santa Barbara?”
“Yes.”
“Sir James has sacked his old man for crooking his little finger: going on the jag, in other words. He wants a new old man, muy pronto, and the worst of it is all the masters on the beach here are out at elbows.”
“So am I,” Sard said.
“Only in your gear,” Billy said. “These other fellows are in their souls. I can vouch for you personally. ”

“ Behind it, far away, were the mountains, peak upon peak, some of them forested, some snowy; one, with a brow of crag, streaked with cataracts.
The Dictator pointed towards the sea, now shut from sight by many snowy branches. “That is shut from you now, Harker mio,” he said; “but when one door shuts another opens. Here is all this land waiting for you. To me, this land has only given work; to you, I see, it has already given all things; let me then add work to those.”
“When my arm is mended,” Sard said. ”

“ His wrath like lightning: he is King: indeed
He is much more, a King with gratitude.
* * * * *
Chisholm Harker, rector of Windlesham, in Berkshire, wrote a pamphlet on English Mediæval Mystical Romances, and died young, leaving a widow and one son, Chisholm, the “Sard” Harker of these pages, who was thirteen at his father’s death.
Mrs. Harker married again two years later. Sard, at his own request, went to sea, sailing first in the barque Venturer, Captain Cary, mentioned a page or two back. He was on his first voyage in her when Don Manuel took refuge in her. She was one of Messrs. ”

“ It’s too late now. We’re here now. We may as well stay here now we are here. It’s a dock badly needed in Las Palomas and I wanted to see it. It’s like the one they have at San Agostino.”
They sat talking while they waited, but there was always a professional restraint about their talk. Captain Cary ashore was still “the old man,” Sard Harker, the mate, was still, in the captain’s eyes, the boy whom he had taught to steer. Both found themselves staring ahead over the further wall of the arena, at the old Spanish fortifications as white as spray beyond. ”

“ There came a crash both behind and in front of Sard: there was a deafening bang: someone fell over the brazier, which upset. All the stinking and smouldering carib leaf rolled from its metal pot. The room at the instant filled with men: they were all in green and silver. Sagrado whirled about to face them: one of them with a rifle beat the sword out of his hand: it broke below the hilt and fell in two pieces. After the crash, there came a silence so great that the double tinkle and clatter of the broken sword was memorable. ”

“ Harker. I have never boxed, myself, but I have sometimes had to hit men. The principle I have always gone upon is, to be first.”
“It is a very sound principle, sir.”
After breakfast, Captain Cary had his look-see from the dinghy, and as a result of it Mr. Hopkins went below with the hands to trim her by the head. Sard, with the third mate and the best of the boys, got the main-royal mast down on deck. He himself went to the top-gallant cross-trees at the beginning of the work. Up there in the wind he had a good view of Los Xicales. ”

“ The sea was not yet breaking with any violence upon the beach. It was white as far as the eye could see, as though the heads of every wave had been whipped off and flogged into foam which shone as though with moonlight from the phosphorescence. Washes of breaker burst and rushed up the sand to Sard’s feet, like washes of fire in which all the marvellous shells of which the beach was composed, were lit up like jewels. Far away to the right, out at sea on the edge of the sky, there was, as it were, a shaking wall of white from the sea already running upon the Rip-Raps. ”

“ There were patches of chaparral, a few mezquite trees, a few giant cactuses. The most of it was empty shining sand, many-coloured, flitting, sometimes danced over by eddies. Rocks of violent colours rose out of it like the bones of dead beasts. Parts of it seemed to be alive and thinking, other parts of it seemed dead from old time, all parts of it drew Sard like a temptation.
He knelt on his tarpaulin to stare at it. He had known the desert of the sea for a good many years. There men exist by effort and strength, pitting their worth against it day by day. ”

“ Sard turned at the angle of the barracks into a sandy street of adobe houses, some of which had white canvas screens spread across their stoops. The street was like a street of the dead in the siesta. A few dogs, the exact colour of the sand, lay in the sun as though killed by a pestilence. Sard dodged their bodies, darted down a lane to the right, and found himself barred by a wall, which was topped by spikes. He got hold of a spike, swung himself up and scrambled over, into a graveyard in which the dead seemed to be coming out of their graves. ”

“ They were handed over to Sard.
“You can take your own time, of course, Mr. Harker,” the captain said. “Let me see, you never got ashore here in the Venturer?”
“No, sir.”
“And I think you were only ashore once this time since the anchors were down. You ought to see the place; not that there’s anything to see: so stay out of the ship if you wish, till the tug’s alongside. I have always gone by the maxim, Mr. Harker, that one ought to see everything that one has the chance of seeing; because in life not many have one chance and none has two.”
“Thank you, Captain Cary. Are we to heave in, sir?” ”

“ Sard said.
“No?” Sagrado said. “Yet I stand free, while you are bound, you and your romantic one. Which of us has the power, Margarita?”
“He has,” she answered. “And you know it.”
“I do not know it,” he said, “nor do events show it. I wanted you in my hands by a certain day: there was nothing that you wanted less. Yet you came to my hands, to the very moment planned. This sailor, or second mate, if I understand him, has wanted you for fifteen years: there was nothing that you wanted more, if I overheard correctly. Are you in his hands, or arms, or in mine? Which of us has the power over you?” ”

“ I’m going to start business in New York City on my own account. And I suppose you are Captain Harker now?”
“No, just mate; with Captain Cary still. And now I want you to help me. Do you know of any man in this Club, a courtesy member probably, of the name of Kingsborough?”
“Why, sure, Mr. Harker. A young fellow, Mr. Hilary Kingsborough. If that’s the man, he was in here for his mail only half an hour ago. He’s been here about three weeks. He’s staying at a place up the coast, General Martinez’ place, Los Xicales.”
“Los Xicales,” Sard said, startled. “That house near the beach?” ”

“ Sard growled that reefers generally answer to the name of Smith.
“Not this one,” Don Manuel said. “Por Dios, Captain Harker, it was you did that charity, you, then a boy. In the dusk, you remember, by the deckhouse, under the chocks of the boats, I know not the right name of it: you remember? Por Dios, I remember.
“Yes, yes, yes, por Dios; never will I forget. £2,000 to give me up, and I all in rags and bloody and shaking, with nothing but my personal charm, what?
“Ay de mi, one is slow in being grateful, too slow; but always in life the present is so full, the past drops, fades. ”

“ Sard remembered what he had heard of these northers: how the children are kept from school lest they should mutiny, and how men, maddened by that insistent patting, will strike and kill. The thought crossed his mind that if he had to walk back along the track in that pelting, that annoyance of the tiny hands pat-pat-patting on face and hands would be soon unbearable. Even there, sheltered in the truck, it came pat-pat-patting, flying like a little dry-shot over the sides, filtering up through cracks in the bottom, and dancing there, like grains in a spring, till they were flung away. ”

“ Harker, I’ll go right now. But how are you going to Los Xicales? Not in that shay, I guess, if you’re in any hurry. You’d best take my bicycle if you’re hurrying. Say, George, rouse up the bicycle for Mr. Harker.”
While the negro went into the basement for the bicycle, Sard said that the crowd on Las Palomas beach seemed tougher than formerly.
“That is so,” Richard said. “These rum-runners have made it a tough joint. They run rum in and they run guns out. That mush-nosed maggot, Don José, is doing it all, to rouse up trouble in Santa Barbara.” ”

“ After a few days at the reef, she sailed for Santa Barbara, where she arrived at noon just nineteen days from Sard’s going ashore at Las Palomas.
Sir James stood at his side as he brought the Yuba into Santa Barbara harbour.
“You’ve not been here recently, Captain Harker,” he said. “You’ll not know the place; it’s a different place: almost a different city. They’re making this place the Athens of the West: I say they, but it’s really he, the Dictator, Don Manuel. Look at the cathedral; there’ll be nothing so beautiful in the New World when it’s finished. Do you see your ship, the Pathfinder?” ”

“ I may be able to unlock your padlocks.”
“Try your sister’s padlocks first.”
“No, no,” Margarita said, “try Mr. Harker’s padlocks first. He is a man. He can help.”
“Your sister first,” Sard said. “I’ll not be set free first. And as for helping, I have not helped anyone, so far as I can see.”
Hilary tried the keys in the padlocks of his sister’s chains. He tried eleven without success; then, at the twelfth, the locks clicked back and the chains could be cast aside. She was still bound to the pillar by a thong of hide. “I cannot undo this knot,” Hilary said, “my fingers are too weak.” ”

“ Sard said. “A few feet more, and I will be there.”
He said these words aloud, for the comfort of hearing a voice. Instantly, from in front of him, came a splash and scutter: things were swimming away from something dark in the water; he could not see what the things were nor the thing from which they swam. “They are snakes,” he said, “and here is one of them coming at me.”
He struck at it. To his great relief, it gave a squeal and dived from him. “Rats,” he said. “They have a carcase here. I’ll get out of this.”
He saw that the dark thing was a body. ”

“ The worst thing about the gale was the cold. Far south as it was, the wind came down directly from the northern icefields. To Sard, who was thinly clad and wet through, it was piercing. He stumbled along against it, keeping his direction by the pale flame of the breakers which roared at his side and flung their fire at his feet.
When he had gone about a mile, he saw the stretch of the salt-pans like a patch of white heather away ahead, distant he knew not how far. It might be a mile, or it might be two miles; no man could judge distance on a sand so flat. ”

“ Sard had no time to dodge or hide; any movement of the sort would have betrayed him. He stood where he was, somewhat bent and peering towards Martin’s hut, with his left hand shading his face and eyes. Half-a-dozen people, children and grown-ups, passed him on their way to their huts. They looked at him rather hard, but no one spoke to him. A man and boy, as they passed, looked perhaps harder than the others. ”

“ Now while the deepness of a tenor bell was toning, there came, from Cachopos, perhaps a quarter of a mile away, the exquisite song of the nuns of Santa Alba at their midnight office. Sard was spellbound. All the night had ceased to be of men and folly: it had become suddenly a thing of stars and flowers and of the joy of the soul in her God. ”

“ Sard said.
“It’s the finest life on earth. That dam’ terrier is an ambitious swine, but even he can’t spoil it. I count all my life just wasted till I began rousting rum. I’ve been at it seven years.”
“You’ve got a ticket, haven’t you?”
“Ticket, hell. Yes, I’ve got a dam’ fine second mate’s ticket, for which I could get four pounds a month and find my own tobacco. Ticket, hell! Watch and watch, when it isn’t all hands, boxing another man’s yards around. Ticket, hell! At this job I’m pretty well my own master; sleep when I like, get drunk when I like, and see my girl when I like.” ”