He was seen, moreover, by them, and after they had mounted and were riding side by side at the head of the funeral procession Sebastien spoke. “Your gringo was at the station.”
Don Luis nodded. “Sí, he came down on the train.”
After a silence Sebastien spoke again. “It seems that he has been having trouble with his freight.”
Ignoring the subtle suggestion conveyed by the accent, Don Luis laconically answered, “He is not the first.”
“But will be the last. Ernestino Chávez, my second cousin, is in the department of freights. Yesterday he told me that, by special order, there are to be no more miscarriages of this man’s freight.”
The heavy brown mask refused even a sign. “This had better happened a year ago.”
“Then he is near the end of his rope?” Sebastien leaped to the conclusion.
“His first note of hand to me is due next month.”
“And—”
Don Luis’s massive shoulders rose. “How should I know, amigo, what money he has?”
“But if he pay not?”
Again Don Luis shrugged. “Sebastien, how often am I to tell it—that no gringo shall force in on my lands.”
In happy ignorance as yet of the significance implied in their conversation, Seyd at that moment was reading and rereading, with incredulous joy, a newspaper clipping which had been forwarded by a friend in Albuquerque.
Mrs. Robert Seyd, wife of prominent mining engineer, granted divorce
The content below ran as is usual when feminine enthusiasm over its wrongs has been unchecked by fear of a reply, and in handing down his decision the local Dogberry—who was unaware that the notice of the plaintiff’s remarriage would appear in the same issue with his remarks—had pronounced it the most heartless case of desertion in all his experience upon the bench. Reading a second clipping which set forth the marriage, Seyd indulged in a grin. But this quickly faded. Pity and sympathy colored his remark.
“Poor thing! I hope she’ll be happy.” Self reproach vibrated in the addition, “She was not, never could have been, with me.”
With that she passed out of his thought just as she had already gone from his life. His mind leaped to review the consequences. Free! Free! In the first flush of his joy he exulted over the fact that his intended confession was now unnecessary. But later and more sober reflections caused him to shake his head.
“No!” He laid down the law peremptorily for himself. “There’s been enough and to spare of shilly-shallying. You will go to her and tell her—all! And if she refuses you there’ll be no one to blame but yourself.”
XVIII
In the calendar of love days count as weeks, months as years; but, though the following week conformed to this universal law, Seyd managed to extract from its laggard hours his modicum of joy. Following the mules on two trips between the mine and station he lived in a glow of feeling, the natural reaction of his late despair. By turns relief, joy, hope governed his reflections, finally uniting in optimism that drowned his customary caution. Whereas only a week ago he had begun to plan for a trip home to California to raise money to meet their first note he now determined to put it off until he should have seen Don Luis, and then, if necessary, send Billy.
“I’ll call on him immediately after the funeral,” he said, talking it over with Billy. “If he demands his pound of flesh there’ll still be time for you to go north.”
This settled, he had gone about his business in happier mood than he had known for many a year. It seemed to him as if the tangled run of his life was beginning to unfold straight and plain. But while he worked, the evil fates which had made such a ravel in his personal skein were equally busy inventing fresh tangles. On the day that saw at once the delivery of the last piece of machinery and the arrival of the first seasonal rain Sebastien and Francesca joined battle at the El Quiss hacienda.
Until, the morning after the funeral, Sebastien called her aside to thank her for her care of his mother she had shown him only the sympathy due his sorrow. But under it resentment still smoldered, and it was fanned to a flame by his accidental expression.
“It was the kinder because I had forced you away. If I can make any return—”
“You can.” She filled his pause. “During the last six months I had time for reflection, and the more I thought of it the more I wondered at myself for my easy yielding to your will. It is not that I was unwilling to do that or more for your mother. But to be sent away like a naughty school girl under a solemn vow against correspondence—”
“The price of your consent, you remember, was the gringo’s life?” His eye lit with the old saturnine sparkle. “As you see, he still cumbers good Mexican earth.”
“You dared not have harmed him in any case.”
“No?”
“No.” She met without flinching his look of sarcastic interrogation. “Porfirio Díaz will not stand for the killing of Americanos. As you well know, Sebastien, he would surely have hunted you down.”
“If there had been any to tell? Even your folly would hardly have arisen to that.”
“ ’Twould not have been necessary. If I had warned him, placed your threat on record with his friends, ’twere sufficient. If not, there is still another argument that would have held you.”
“And that?”
“The sure knowledge that I would hate you forever.”
“Good reasons, both of them.” He shrugged. “But you overlook the fact, my cousin, that a whisper in the ear of the good uncle would have taken the matter out of my hands.”
“That would not have cleared you—with me. Now listen, Sebastien. I yielded because at the time it seemed the only way, and after I realized my folly I still lived up to
