Part 3

"And you dare come to me with this after all the years I have waited for you? Go back to your deserts--your wild woman and her land of savages!" she had cried in a voice of suppressed indignation and contempt. After all he could not blame her, knowing as he did the world in which she had been reared. She was right. And yet, as he sat there in the desert with his back to the cliff and smoked in silence, living over again the poignant memories of the past, the bitterness he experienced at the moment was even keener than on that memorable night when they had parted.

Could he ever forget her? The memory of that night clung to him in spite of every effort to banish it from his mind.

Above them shone the stars, golden as the apples of Hesperides. He heard again the rhythmic sound of the sea and the plashing of the fountain near at hand, and noted the rose petals which the breeze had shaken from the bushes to the path where they stood; filling the soft night air with their fragrance, and she, with the white moonlight in her face and the pink rose in the golden wreath of her hair, fair as the woman of Eden.

The vision passed before him in kaleidoscopic review, warm and living and tempting and haunting, and then faded from his sight.

The shadows of evening began to lengthen. Close at hand a lizard that had been sunning itself all day against the cliff raised its head for an instant, then slipped noiselessly away with the shadows into a crevice in the rock. The Indian camp-fires flickered in the valley below, their slender, ghostlike columns of smoke, rising heavenward straight as the flight of a flock of cranes, floated away in a pale, blue white cloud on the evening. The soft, plaintive notes of the night-hawk and prairie-owl mingled with the prolonged cry of the wolf in the distant foothills. The night breeze sprang up, fanning the parched desert with its cool breath. The stars came forth and the silver rim of the moon emerged above the dark towering mass of the Sierra Madres, outlining their crests in broken silvery lines as its full white disk swept into view; flooding the valley and plains with strange ethereal light.

José's sleep seemed troubled. He moved uneasily and muttered incoherently.

Where was she now--what was she doing? The woman he still loved in spite of himself? And whither was he drifting--what was the real end in view? What subtle, irresistible influence was it that impelled him to take the step, sacrifice all that men prize and hold dear? During such moments he questioned the seemingly blind destiny by which he felt himself impelled. A thousand miles he had ridden in search of the realization of his dreams, but had not found it. That which at first had lured him on, now seemed to mock him. The vision that beckoned to him still maintained a sphinx-like attitude toward his questioning.

Where was the new life he had promised himself? Was it only a vision he had conjured up in his mind? Either he had overlooked something in his calculations, or his logic was at fault.

Was this all? Had the human race attained its zenith--was there nothing beyond, nothing to look forward to, and he merely the latest dreamer and enthusiast who was pursuing the same will-o'-the-wisp that others had sought through the ages? If so, then what fatality was it that encompassed him and continually urged him on? Doubt counseled him to return, but pride and confidence in self still cried forward. Come what would, he either must go on to the end or accept the humiliation that awaits him who turns back. But why was the realization withheld from one so willing--from one who had dared face the world alone?

For the first time the loneliness and isolation of his life was borne in upon him as he reviewed the past, step by step, and thought of the woman he had chosen to share the future with him and whom it was impossible to disassociate from his plans.

Fortune seemed to have deserted him. A sudden revulsion and sickening sense of failure swept over him, crushing and overwhelming him. Would the voices never break silence? Must he forever ride alone with the sun in his face? Save for a cricket that chirped dreamily in a cleft of the rock close at hand, and the distant, subdued sounds of voices and barking of dogs in the Indian camps below him, there was no response to his query.

Strange that he, Jack Forest, the possessor of twenty millions, the associate of the great people of this world, and who was never referred to by his family and friends as other than the Magnificent, the man who did things, should find himself in the heart of the Mexican deserts apparently as far from his goal as when he started. It was incredible, but true, nevertheless. For was he not there in the midst of the wilderness with the scent of the sage in his nostrils and the alkali dust on his boots?

He closed his eyes and let his head sink forward on his breast, wearied by the oft-repeated endeavor to solve that which was fast becoming a riddle, a chimera to him, and he probably would have fallen asleep had he not been startled suddenly into a consciousness of his surroundings by a low whinny; soft and plaintive as a child's voice. Looking up, he saw Starlight standing before him with ears erect and pointed forward, gazing inquiringly into his face.

Again the Chestnut whinnied, and lowering his head, caressed his shoulder affectionately with his nose. Then raising his head, he began to paw the ground impatiently, indicating as plainly as words that it was time to resume their journey.

The night wind sighed across the desert and there was a chill in the air as the moon mounted higher in the heavens; an ideal night for travel. José awoke with a start and sitting bolt upright on the ground, gazed about him with a dazed, bewildered air, trying to collect his scattered senses.

"Capitan!" he cried, regarding him intently. "I have just dreamt that the shadow of a man came between you and a woman! I can't see their faces, but they are there!"

"Bah!" returned the Captain, rising to his feet and stretching wide his arms, preparatory to saddling his horse. "'Tis only the aguardiente, José!"

"Ah! do not jest, Capitan! Three times have I dreamed this dream--the shadow comes ever nearer!"

III

The Fiesta, the "Feast of the Corn," had been declared, and there was dancing and feasting, and song and laughter on the lips of men as Captain Forest and José rode into Santa Fé late the following morning and turned their horses' heads in the direction of the Posada de las Estrellas, the Inn of the Stars, which was situated just outside the principal entrance to the town.

The low gray adobe walls of the houses fronting directly upon the narrow winding streets leading to and from the plaza were gay with the blossoms of the pink and scarlet geranium, honeysuckle, and gorgeous magenta of the bougainvilléa and golden cups of the trumpet-vine.

Pigeons fluttered from the house-tops to the streets, or hovered about the plaza and bosky alamedas of poplar, pepper and eucalyptus trees in search of stray grains of corn. Humming-birds and butterflies flashed their wings and gorgeous plumage in the sunshine as they darted in and out among the foliage in the patios and gardens at the rear of the houses, luxuriant with fruit and flowers as was attested by the orange and lemon, pomegranate and fig trees, heavy with ripening fruit and the delicately mingled perfume of orange and lemon blossoms, hyacinth, jasmine and Castilian rose.

Through the center of the town, beneath the walls of the half-ruined convent, flowed the little river, Santa Maria, at whose banks young girls and women were wont to wash their linen and beat it out on the large, smooth stones which lay strewn along the water's edge. The notes of the wood-dove and oriole mingling with the silvery voice of the river, fell in rhythmical cadences upon the ears of the inhabitants who rested in the shady seclusion of their patios and gardens during the hour of the siesta; rolling and smoking cigarillos as they leisurely discussed the latest bit of news or gossip over their black coffee, mescal and tequila, or engaged in a game of moles.

There had been much rain that season, the best of reasons why the people should give thanks to the heavens and the fields receive the blessing of the Church as well as that of the gods of the Indios at whose altars the Red men still worship and upon which still is written "blood for blood," as in the days when the White men first came from the South, bearing the fire and thunderbolts of heaven with which they overthrew them. This was in fulfillment of the curse which the people had brought upon themselves. The fate which their ancient Sachems had foretold would overtake them in those days when they should forget the commands of the gods and neglect the land, and the hand of brother be lifted against brother until the coming of a Fair Child with a face like the sun unto whose words all men would hearken and their hearts be united in love.

According to custom, runners had been sent forth to the north, east, south and west to proclaim the annual Fiesta. For this ceremony the choicest ears were selected from the new harvest, and, after being borne aloft in the procession that took place during the benediction of the fields, were placed in the churches where they remained until the following year. The golden ears represented the sunrise, the red, the sunset, the blue, the sky, the white, the clouds, and all together, their Mother, the Earth, from which they sprang.

As the season for rejoicing drew near, the rancheros of the neighboring haciendas, together with the Indians of the distant pueblos and half-wild hill tribes, chance strangers and adventurers, streamed toward Santa Fé and swarmed within her walls; some eager for trade and barter, but most of them bent upon pleasure. Her streets and plazas became a surging mass of struggling humanity, bright with the gay costumes of men and women. In her market-booths were displayed innumerable commodities; animals, fruit, vegetables, fowl--flowers, goldfish, caged finches, canaries--jewelry, rugs, stamped leathers and drawn-linen work--bright cloths, blankets, baskets and pottery--wines, laces, silks, satins, cigarettes and cigars.

Bidding was brisk and at times vehement, but always good humored. Sellers of lottery-tickets, writers of love-letters, jugglers and mountebanks plied their trades. The cries of the water-carrier and vender of sweet-meats mingled with those of the inevitable beggar who asked alms for the love of God; invoking blessings or curses upon the head of him who gave or refused him a centavo. Babel reigned. Donkies brayed, geese and turkeys hissed and gobbled, chickens cackled and fighting-cocks, tethered by the leg, strutted and crowed, while brown children of all sizes and ages laughed and screamed as they chased one another in and out among the crowds or rolled in the dust beneath the pedestrian's feet.

Old Santa Fé, christened by the early Franciscan Friars, "City of the Blessed Faith," but in reality a fair wanton, a veritable Sodom and Gomorrha of iniquity with her corridos, her cock-pits and dance and gambling-halls, threw wide her gates and bade the stranger welcome; and if he did not receive the worth of his gold in pleasure and substance, surely it was no fault of Santa Fé's. Besides, it was only a step from a gaming-table to a Father Confessor.