Peyton

by Max Brand

  “I follow all this,” said Jerry. “Nobody likes to swim on a muddy bottom.”

  “You understand swimming, my son?”

  Jerry thought of the place where the Winton drops into a wild series of cascades. Once he had gone down those rapids, swimming. “Yes, I swim a bit,” he replied.

  The Spaniard nodded. “That is still better. So she comes back, remembering how you swim.”

  “But what the devil does that lead to?”

  “Everything. The apple of discord is thrown into the family of Don James. And the girl has kept a thing from her father.”

  “I don’t like it,” said Jerry sullenly. “I . . . don’t like that idea.”

  “Wait! The apple of discord is thrown into the family. And now the girl sees you every morning . . . for every morning she swims to keep the blossom in her cheeks that all Saint Hilaire wonders over. Ah, I know. Also, she is come to the time. It is not far distant.” He nodded, and his little, evil eyes glittered into the distance. “She knows the bees that buzz in Saint Hilaire. She keeps her petals closed. They are nothing to her. But she hears a new sound. It is a lean wasp, fierce, swift, silent, strange. She opens her heart to it.”

  “Partner,” said Jerry with concern, “this early mornin’ air must be going to your head. What the dickens are you talking about?”

  “You shall see. The day comes when the girl goes to her father again and speaks of you. Then he has been disobeyed, and the madness comes over him. Have you seen him in his madness?”

  “No.”

  “Ah, ah,” murmured the Spaniard, “you have much to learn of Don James. Well, you will see it. But now go down to the beach. Go down, my son.”

  “And in the end?”

  “In the end he will know that he has been disobeyed. He will seize his fastest horse and rush to my house. There, I trust, you will not be hard to find.”

  “Partner,” said Jerry, “I begin to get your drift. He’ll come ravin’ . . . he’ll come for the showdown?”

  “He will come and shine like a flame . . . like the flame of a candle in my patio, señor.”

  But Jerry Peyton was already on his feet and going down the sandy slope of the hill toward the beach.

  Don Manuel kneeled and pressed his face close to the rocks as he saw the lithe, muscular figure break from a walk to a jogging trot, and from a trot, as a sudden feeling of exultation came over him, into a full racing gait. A rock rose in his path. He hurdled it with a great leap and went on, his bare feet spurring the sand into little jets behind him. The old man clutched both hands to his heart.

  “God give me grace,” he whispered. “Let her see him now.”

  His prayer was answered. She rose from the sea, shaking the water off of her face, at the same time that Jerry struck the shore. Two strides brought him up to the knees in the water; he shot through the air, disappeared under the heaving front of a wave.

  Don Manuel rose and walked stolidly toward his house.

  “It is enough,” he said. “She has now seen a man.”

  XIX

  As for Jerry Peyton, the slope of the hill face had given such impetus to him that he forgot the girl, he forgot the scheme, he lost himself in the joy of speed, and, when he slipped under the wave, he came up with a long, powerful overhand stroke that shot him through the water. He had never swum in salt-water before, and his swimming muscles, hardened to the work of fresh rivers and lakes, now whipped him along through the heavier, more buoyant ocean. Also, it sent a tingle across his skin. He gave himself to his work. When a wave heaved up trembling before him, he dived and came up in the calm water beyond. Past four lines of waves he swam, and then turned and made leisurely back for the land.

  If it was pleasure to swim in the face of the sea, it was marvelous to have the big waves pick one up, unaware, and be thrown bodily toward the land. He came with a crawl stroke, now, rioting in the speed, and with foam about his shoulders. A mass of water lifted around him and tossed him up—when he came down, his knee struck sand. He staggered up the beach, panting, and there he saw the girl, with one hand on her hip and dabbling one foot in the water. He came from a land where the girls have no fear of men, and yet he was unprepared for the directness of her eyes and the fearlessness of her smile. He was striding through the surf, tingling, when her glance stopped him. His broad chest was working like a bellows, filling with that pure morning air, and then her glance stopped him.

  “That last wave nearly tumbled you on your head, didn’t it?” said the girl.

  “Did it? I don’t know. I was having too good a time to see. Never swam in the ocean before.”

  “You let them take you and float you,” said the girl, “and you can ride them in . . . like a horse, almost.”

  He had stopped panting enough to look more closely at her now. He saw that her eyes were black, but they had not the glitter of her father’s eyes. He was deeply grateful for that. He had an odd desire to step back so that he could throw her into a perspective and see her clearly—as if she were a mountain. He was surprised by the small, cold touch of awe—something that the Spaniard had said was true, something about flowers between the bud and the blossom.

  “Show me how, will you?” said Jerry.

  “Of course. Come on.”

  They went into the water, side-by-side.

  “Who are you?” asked the girl.

  “I’m Jeremiah Peyton.”

  “I’m Patricia Langley. Come on, here’s a bully wave.”

  He was amazed by the ease with which she cut the water. Her round, active arms plied the water just ahead of him, and he held back to watch. She stopped in a rocking trough, treading the water. “How far out shall we go?”

  “As far as you like,” said Jerry.

  “Oh, I don’t care. I never get tired in the water.”

  “As far as you like,” he repeated, treading water, also.

  “But there’s the Long Reach,” she said.

  A wave obliterated them, but, when he came up again, he followed her gesture and saw a white streak out to sea. “What’s the Long Reach?”

  “I don’t know exactly. Some kind of a cross-current, or something like that. It forms from the mouth of the cove, several times a day, and then goes swirling out to sea. If you get caught in it, it’s all day with you. Takes you miles and miles out. Billy de Remi was caught in it . . . poor Billy.”

  The top of a wave spilled over her as she spoke. She came up laughing, and then struck out. “You say when you want to turn back!” she called back over her shoulder, and then the red cap was submerged as she struck out with a driving crawl stroke.

  He could see that she was challenging his speed, and she slid through the water with remarkable rapidity, but half a dozen strokes convinced Jerry that he could overhaul her when he chose. He drifted back, and then cut in around her and drew up on the side of the white line of water. Once or twice, as she turned her head for breath, her eye caught his and she flashed a smile at him, but on the whole she was strictly serious business.

  She headed straight out to sea, and now Jerry could hear, louder than the noise of the surf behind them, the rushing of the white waters ahead of him. The girl also heard them, but she went straight on, lifting her head clear, now and then, to gauge the distance. An odd thought came to Jerry that she was testing him in this manner, and with a few hard strokes he pulled up even with her.

  She came up, treading water, at that. She was white, but her eyes danced and she was smiling. “Shall we go on?”

  “Just as you say,” said Jerry, and smiled back.

  She cast one gloomy look at him and immediately struck out again. Now the sound of the waters ahead filled Jerry’s ears, but he kept even with her, and a little ahead, until an arm of boiling water reached out at them. They were swept far from their course and close together. Over the sound of the rushing he heard her cry, then she turned like an eel and hit out for the shore. It was a full minute of hard labor before she made headway. The current came
foaming about her neck and made a wake behind her shoulders; once she turned her head and cried again to Jerry, but he, swimming with comparative ease close by, made no effort to aid her.

  They were clear of the danger as suddenly as it had come upon them, and she brought her head up, treading water again.

  “Why . . . ?” she began angrily.

  “Well?” said Jerry, and grinned at her white face.

  “It nearly got us!” panted the girl.

  “I knew we were all right,” he said. “You told me you knew these waters.”

  All at once she was laughing. “You’re a queer one!” she called, and headed back for the line of the surf. He remembered, as he followed, that Don Manuel had said she would find him different. In fact, he was so full of many thoughts that he by no means grasped her lessons in surf riding. He saw a big wave take her and shoot her toward the shore, she riding lightly in the crest, and then the same wave caught Jerry, doubled him up, and rolled him over and over like a ball. He came up with sand in his ears, his nose, his mouth, and, in his blindness, staggered toward the waves again, but Patricia came, laughing, and led him up the beach. That misadventure seemed to restore her good humor. She was still laughing when he had washed himself clean again and turned on her.

  “In my part of the country,” Jerry said, “they don’t treat a tenderfoot this way. Five minutes after I meet you, you take me within a yard of drowning, and then you roll me in the sand.”

  She was pulling on her shoes and lacing them. The instant before she had seemed more boy than girl; now she was wholly woman. And when she smiled up at him, absent-mindedly, he searched his mind for something to say. But his brain was a perfect blank. He looked around him—the sea, the hills, the wind, the sky, the sunrise rushed upon him, and he rejected them all. He wanted to say something, in fact, which would make her forget all those very things. A great gray bird flew in from the sea, and she raised her head slowly up and up, watching its flight—until he was conscious only of her parted lips, her eyes, and the line of her throat.

  “I wonder what it is?” said Patricia, standing up and catching her cloak about her. The cream-colored horse came up to her; he was evidently her pet. “It’s not a gull,” she said.

  “Damn the bird,” said Jerry with warmth. “I beg your pardon,” he added hastily as she glanced at him. “I wasn’t thinking of what I said.”

  “I think you were,” Patricia replied not altogether coldly. She surveyed him anew and liked him. “What in the world made you say that?”

  “I don’t know,” said Jerry miserably. “I guess you’re pretty peeved about it, eh?” He began to explain with a frown: “You see, I was about to say something when that bird flew over, and . . .”

  “And then I interrupted you?” She observed him still again, for men did not usually tell her when she interrupted them. She had never seen a man who looked quite like that in a bathing suit. His face and neck were tanned and his hands were even darker to the wrist. But the rest of his body was as white as snow, and, whenever he moved, she could see long, unobtrusive, efficient-looking muscles at play. “What was it you were going to say?” she added.

  “That’s the point,” and Jerry sighed. “You’ve made me forget it.”

  “You are queer,” the girl commented with a light laugh.

  “I had an idea you’d think that,” said Jerry gloomily.

  “Why?”

  “Because I feel mostly like a fool.” She had a wonderful resource of laughter, effortless and sweet to hear. “Do that again,” said Jerry.

  “Do what?”

  And he answered: “Laugh again . . . it’s great to hear you.”

  She looked beyond him and saw that the sun was about to rise, her signal to depart for a beauty sleep before breakfast time, but she saw that he was enjoying her immensely, and, for some reason, it meant a good deal to see this fellow look at her with intense eyes. It seemed important, indeed, just to keep that big, powerful body at play.

  “I’m sorry that I made you forget that thing,” said the girl.

  “So’m I,” Jerry replied unaffectedly.

  “No idea what it was about?”

  “It was about you.”

  “Oh,” murmured Patricia. She had been talked to so much by men that she was long past the stage when she glanced away or had to summon a flush when they talked personalities. Instead, she was able to look directly at them, and that always gave her a vast advantage. It always made the men feel that they were inane and that Patricia was formidably clever. But when she looked at Jerry, he seemed too much absorbed in his own reflections to note her. A surmise struck her that he had not consciously intended a compliment—that he was talking as naturally and as simply to her as he would talk to another man—that under the surface of those keen gray eyes and behind that rather ugly face there was simply the heart of a boy. The moment she surmised these things something like a pang went through Patricia. She leaned against the side of the cream-colored horse and she watched Jerry with a wonderful, still look.

  “It was about you,” he was saying, “and it was important. I’ll tell you,” he continued, gathering head, “you’re harder to talk to than most girls . . . do you know that?”

  “No,” said Patricia. She even forgot to smile, she was so intent studying him, and she was beginning to wonder why she usually was fencing with words when she talked, to men—even the boys of the island, who she had known ever since they were mere infants.

  “Well, you are hard enough,” said Jerry. “I never had any trouble chatting with other girls. Nope, not a bit. Any old thing would do to start with.”

  “Oh,” said Patricia.

  “But just now,” went on Jerry, “I had an idea that you were about to get on your horse and go.”

  “I am,” said Patricia, starting and gathering up the reins. But she did not turn toward the horse.

  “I was afraid of that,” said Jerry, “so I hunted around for something to talk about. I saw the ocean and the sky and the hills and the sunrise and all those things. You see?”

  “Weren’t they good enough to talk about?”

  “If you’re laughing at me inside,” Jerry said, “just do it right out loud. I don’t mind. In fact, I like it.”

  She did laugh at that, but not very long. “Go on,” said Patricia. For she felt as if she were hearing a story. There was an element of suspense about everything he said.

  “What I wanted wasn’t any sea or sky stuff,” said Jerry. “I wanted to say something about you.”

  “Oh!”

  “Because,” explained Jerry, “you seemed more important.”

  “Oh!” repeated the girl.

  “Say,” said Jerry, “d’you mind tellin’ me what you mean by saying oh, so much?”

  “I don’t know,” murmured Patricia, then added hastily: “I mean, it seems to me that you started the conversation very nicely without that lost remark.”

  “D’you think so?” said Jerry, and smiled with pleasure. “I’m no end glad of that. I’ll tell you something,” he said confidentially.

  “What?”

  “Oh, it isn’t important. But I saw you go in swimming from the top of that hill, and, when I came down, I was hoping that I’d be able to talk to you.”

  “When you came down the hill,” said the girl thoughtfully, “were you trying to catch my eye?”

  “As a matter of fact,” confessed Jerry, “when I came down the hill, my legs got to going so fast that I didn’t think about anything but running. D’you ever try it? If it’s steep, your legs get a funny feelin’ around the knees.”

  “I’ll try it, someday,” Patricia said, and smiled. “I’m glad you did talk to me. How old are you?” she asked, apropos of nothing.

  “I’m twenty-four,” he said, as if it were the most natural question in the world. “How old are you?”

  “You look more like eighteen or thirty-five, somehow,” said Patricia, thinking aloud. And then: “What did I say?”

>   “That I looked sort of young,” said Jerry. “I don’t mind, because I’m growing older every day.”

  “You have a way of saying things,” said the girl, “that makes me want to think them over. I’m still sorry about that lost remark.”

  “I can’t remember what it was about,” he answered, studying. “But I can tell you what I meant.”

  “All right.” She kept continually breaking out with eagerness and then checking herself. Perhaps she felt from time to time that she was compromising her dignity.

  “It was something to this effect . . . that it makes me happy to be here talkin’ to you.” He was looking down at the ground in his brown study as he said this, and she was glad that she did not have to answer. Also, it gave her a chance to look at his face without passing the barrier of his glance. “So happy,” said Jerry, looking up quickly, “that I feel sort of grateful.”

  She put her foot in the stirrup and swung up.

  “What’s wrong?” asked Jerry, looking behind him.

  “The sun,” panted Patricia. “It’s a way up high.”

  “Isn’t that natural for it to be there?”

  “I have to go home. Mister Peyton, why . . . ?”

  “Yes? Stand still, fool horse.” He caught the bridle close to the bit and took every tremor out of the horse with a twist of his fist. “Go on,” said Jerry.

  “Why don’t you come to call?”

  “At your house?” said Jerry.

  “Of course.”

  “I’ll tell you,” Jerry said, and grinned. “If your dad ever saw me come through the door of your house, he’d start r’aring.”

  “Do you know Dad?”

  “Sure I do.”

  “Then you knew me all the time!”

  “I never saw you before,” Jerry replied with equal truth and evasion.

  She admitted this with a nod, but now she was frowning as she looked at him; she was concentrating mightily on him. He had been interesting before, but, if her father hated him, he must be important.

  “What’s Dad got against you?”