Peyton

by Max Brand

  “Ask him,” said Jerry coldly.

  “Something awful?”

  “Ask him,” repeated Jerry, and set his jaw. She found herself, in an instant, looking into an entirely different face, and it took her breath. Then that metallic light passed away from his eyes. It was a marvelous change.

  “Maybe . . . where . . . but where did you know him before?”

  “Maybe he’ll do the explaining,” said Jerry calmly.

  “Won’t you even defend yourself?” cried Patricia.

  “Defend myself?” Jerry said, and he smiled. “Why should I? Does your father do your thinkin’ for you?”

  “Of course not.”

  “Then you can make up your own mind about me out of what he says. I’ll tell you this, though . . . he thinks I’m a cross between a fool and a rattlesnake.”

  “But . . .” said the girl. She stopped, with her lips parted, and it was easy to see that she was troubled.

  “I won’t keep you,” Jerry said suddenly, and dropped his hand from the bridle. “Good bye.”

  She avoided his outstretched hand. “Why good bye?” she said.

  “Your dad won’t let you see me again.”

  “I’m not a baby,” said Patricia hotly.

  Jerry smiled.

  “What do you mean by smiling?” asked the girl.

  He shrugged his shoulders, and suddenly she had slipped her hand into his. “Adieu!” she called with a delightful accent, and went galloping down the beach.

  He stood watching her for a long time, but when, as she reached the point of the beach, she looked back, he had turned and was striding up the hill.

  “I wonder what he meant by that smile?” she repeated, and checked her horse to a hand gallop. It was easier to think at that pace.

  XX

  He did not see Don Manuel until they came to the breakfast table together. The cloth was white and crisp, and against it there were some red-hearted melons so sweet and rich that one ate them with lemon. Jerry occupied himself strictly with business, and half of his melon was gone before Señor Guzman spoke.

  “You had a long chat?”

  “Yes,” said Jerry.

  There was not another interchange of words until breakfast was ended. The Spaniard employed every second of the silence to the full.

  “Well,” he said afterward, “she is delightful, no?”

  “She?” echoed Jerry vaguely.

  “No?” insisted the Spaniard.

  “I don’t know,” Jerry replied.

  “H-m-m,” said Don Manuel. He added: “It is unfortunate that you don’t like her.”

  “Who said I didn’t like her?” Jerry exclaimed. “She’s . . . lovely.” He said after a moment: “And the daughter of Langley.”

  “Well,” declared Don Manuel after a moment, “you are a happy fellow.”

  “Do I look happy?” asked Jerry.

  “Ah, yes,” said Don Manuel steadily.

  “Well,” said Jerry, “I’m sad as the dickens.”

  “Tush! That is too bad. What makes it?”

  “I dunno.” He looked wistfully at Don Manuel. “It’s something like seasickness,” said Jerry.

  “The melon . . . yes.” He nodded.

  “No,” said Jerry, feeling for the place. “It’s not my stomach. It’s higher. It’s an ache.” He stood up. “It . . . it makes me feel as if I can’t breathe in here.”

  “We’ll step out in the patio.”

  “¡Señor! ” called Jerry.

  They were in the door; the tall old man looked down at Jerry, and his eyes burned deep in his head.

  “Why did you send me down to see that girl?”

  “To amuse you, my young friend.”

  “Don Manuel,” said the American, “you’re a clever devil.”

  “You are profane,” Don Manuel remarked dryly, “and yet in a way you honor me.”

  “She asked me to call,” Jerry went on. “I told her that her father would never let me in his house.”

  “What?” cried Don Manuel, and his bony hand dug into the arm of Jerry.

  “I told her that he hated me, but she seemed to have an idea that her father might be wrong.”

  “Kismet,” whispered Señor Guzman. He snapped his fingers loudly.

  “What’s that?”

  “You were inspired,” said the Spaniard.

  “She will never come again,” Jerry replied, and laid his hand against his throat.

  “On the third morning,” said Don Manuel. “And now, come. We will walk together.”

  They went again to that highest hilltop that overlooked all the valley and all the coast. Sometimes, from beneath the screen of green and out of the shadows, white spots showed in the sun, the laborers at work on the plantation. “My father, my grandfather, my great-grandfather,” said Señor Guzman, “owned all this land as far as you can see . . . and I am the fourth in the line.”

  Jerry looked at him, and saw at what a price he retained his calm. “I’m sorry,” said Jerry.

  “For what?” asked Don Manuel.

  “Because you lost it all.”

  “It shall be mine again,” said Señor Guzman.

  The American said nothing.

  “It is that which keeps me alive,” the Spaniard continued. “And the Lord sustains me to regain my heritage. I shall tell you. I am no longer a man . . . I am a ghost, with a purpose in place of life.”

  A chilly conviction came to Jerry that he had to do with a madman. That explained the fire in the eyes of the old man, if nothing else.

  “It was long ago that I lay on my deathbed,” said the Spaniard, “and, while I lay dying, the Señor Langley came to me. He had loaned me money . . . he came to have the debt discharged, and he said that since I was ill he would not burden me with matters of this world . . . the priest waited even then to give me absolution. Señor Langley was thoughtful . . . he had only some papers that I must sign and then forget about all debts. I had strength to hold a pen and therefore I signed.”

  “Ah,” said Jerry, and his voice rattled in his throat.

  “But the good priest,” continued the Spaniard, “had heard what Langley said to me. When he came in, he warned me. I looked at my copies of the papers I had signed and saw that of all my estates I now owned only a tiny corner. A weight fell upon me. I lost my senses.

  “When I awakened, they were making ready to prepare my body for burial, but I had slept and I had new strength. As I lay there, I knew that I had been spared to get my vengeance. And when after I had waited these many years, in quiet, I saw you, my son, and I knew that He had put a weapon in my hand.” He paused, then added: “The heat of the morning begins. Let us go into the house.”

  Over the valley a mist of the day’s heat was beginning to rise. It thickened, and, when Jerry looked back as they went through the trees, all the rich acres behind him and below were as mysteriously clouded as a reflection in a troubled water.

  The next morning he went to the hilltop and sat on the rocks, waiting and watching. Nothing came up the beach, and although he remained there until the heat burned his face, there was nothing to be seen but the glare of the sand and the shining water, and some gulls balancing in the northeast wind.

  On the morning after that he went again to the hilltop, but there was nothing to be seen, although he waited this time until his eyes ached from peering up and down the sand. He went back to the house, whistling.

  “My son,” said the Spaniard, “I am happy when I see that you have learned a cheerful patience.”

  “Are you?” Jerry replied, and smiled with child-like sweetness upon the old man. “Whiskey, Don Manuel.”

  The host clapped his hands twice, and in haste two little Negroes came running. “Whiskey for Señor Peyton,” said the Spaniard, “and in haste.”

  All the time that Jerry sat, looking into space, Don Manuel walked up and down the patio. He wore his long cloak, as usual, although the day was stifling hot. And when Jerry looked at the cadaverou
s face, pale as a lichen, he felt that there was truly no good warm blood in the body of the don. “A horse,” Jerry said, for the hired horse on which he had ridden had been returned long since to the stables by one of Don Manuel’s men.

  Now the Spaniard clapped his hands again. “The bay gelding,” the host ordered.

  Whereat the man started and needed a second signal and a frown before he withdrew. There was a long pause after that, with Jerry drinking steadily and alone, until four men came leading a bay horse. They led him as if he were a devil, and in truth Jerry saw a devil in the eye of the gelding. He rose and grinned once at his host. Don Manuel bowed, and Jerry vaulted into the saddle.

  There followed a terrible five minutes in which the bay became a bolt of red fire, twisting into such odd shapes as only fire can assume, shaking himself from knot to knot. Most of the time he was in the air, and, when he struck the earth, it was only to jar it and spring aloft again. At the end of the five minutes he dropped his tail, put up his head, and cantered softly down the hill. A chorus of silence followed him from the Negroes and from Don Manuel, but Jerry rode straight on. The whiskey was sending a genial warmth through his brain and heart, and there was a singular tingling in his fingertips. Jerry recognized that sensation, from old habit, as the signal of an approaching storm.

  He rode straight across the island to the town of St. Hilaire and across St. Hilaire to the house of the author. It was nearly noon, but the author was not yet up. Jerry moved two servants from the door and entered.

  “Hello!” greeted the author, after being lifted through the air and replaced on his bed. “What the devil?”

  “Jeremiah Peyton,” said the other.

  The consul rubbed his eye open.

  “You must have a pretty bad town here,” said Jerry.

  “Why?” the consul inquired.

  “They give you work that keeps you up all night,” said Jerry with sympathy. He bound a wet towel around the author’s head.

  The consul found himself able to see, and therefore leaned out the window and gasped for breath. Presently he stood up again. “Isn’t that Don Manuel’s Lightning that I see down there in the street?”

  “No, that’s my horse.”

  “Good heavens,” said the consul, clasping his head, which seemed to reel with a thought, “did you ride him here?”

  “I asked you about the town,” Jerry replied. “How bad is it . . . to keep you up all night?”

  “It isn’t so bad,” the consul answered, and smiled. “I’m glad to see you riding Don Manuel’s horse. How are things going?”

  “Fair.”

  “Climbed any fences? Busted through any?”

  “No. I’m diggin’ under one, though. About this town . . .”

  “It’s a quiet place.” Again the consul sighed. “But I ran into a bunch of Irishmen last night. I wanted to go home but they wanted to stay out. I didn’t feel like hurting their feelings. You know?”

  “Sure,” Jerry agreed. “How many are there? I like Irishmen.”

  “Three,” said the consul. “They’re at the hotel. They have some Irish whiskey, too.”

  “Only three?” said Jerry sadly. “What do they look like?”

  “Their names are Sweeney, Murphy, and Smythe,” the consul replied. “They’re all over six feet and built right. Why do you ask?”

  “You’ll hear later,” Jerry retorted, and went on his way.

  Later he stood at a door of the hotel.

  “Are you Sweeney, Murphy, or Smythe?” said Jerry.

  “Maybe I’m all three,” said the black-headed man at the door.

  “Maybe you ain’t,” Jerry remarked, who lost his sense of grammar when he was happy.

  “What the devil is it to you?” asked the black-headed man.

  “I’ve just come from the consul,” said Jerry, “and he says you’re three fellows . . . with good whiskey.”

  The black-headed man did not hear the last part of the sentence. He reached swiftly through the door and dragged Jerry into the room by the nape of the neck. When he was fairly inside: “Now, son, talk sharp. Who told you you were a man?”

  “My mamma told me,” said Jerry, and smote him upon the root of the nose.

  Two large men in pajamas rose on either side of the room out of their beds and watched the fight. Afterward they laid out the black-headed man on the carpet and fell upon Jerry from both sides. The tingle had left the tips of his fingers and was in his shoulders. He hit hard and fast to get it out of him. Finally he sat on a table, looking at his knuckles, which were raw.

  “Who told you to come here?” queried the black-headed man, sitting up suddenly on the carpet.

  “The author,” said Jerry.

  “Oh,” the black-headed man ejaculated. “I had an idea that he moved in the best circles.” He added: “Why don’t you have a drink?”

  “I was waiting for you to pour it,” said Jerry.

  “Lift my friends off me,” the black-headed man requested, for Jerry had made a heap of the three.

  Jerry made a way for the black-headed man.

  “Are you feeling better?” asked the Irishman.

  “Lots.”

  “It’s this climate,” commented the Irishman. “It makes a man nervous in the fists. Here’s to you.”

  XXI

  That day was a joyous oblivion, at the end of which Lightning carried Jerry softly and safely out to the house of Don Manuel. The don came out and superintended while three of his boys carried Jerry into the house and put him to bed. Afterward he sat up all night beside the bed, listening to Jerry snore. At the first coming of gray light he wakened his guest. “It’s the third morning,” said Don Manuel. “Get up.”

  And Jerry rose like a lark, singing. “She’s going to come,” he said to Don Manuel.

  “I know,” the Spaniard replied. “I was twenty, once.”

  Jerry had hardly reached the top of the hill when he saw her come riding around the point of the beach and he ran down to meet her. He stood, panting and holding her hand, while he said: “It’s taken three days to get you back, but it’s worth the wait.”

  Then he saw that she was not in a bathing suit, but was dressed formally for riding, with shining leather boots and trousers and a derby hat. There was only one touch of color, and that was a crimson blossom at her waist.

  “You were seen in Saint Hilaire yesterday,” said the girl coldly.

  “It’s a fine little town, isn’t it?”

  “I suppose what’s left of it is,” she observed.

  “I was killing time until you came again,” explained Jerry.

  “H-m-m,” said Patricia, but his smile was irresistible.

  “Why aren’t you going to swim this morning?” asked Jerry.

  “Because I have a sore foot,” answered Patricia gloomily. She stared accusingly at him. “I cut it on a piece of coral at the other beach yesterday.”

  “Yep. None of the other beaches are any good.”

  She remembered something and said, flushing: “Were you so sure I’d come back?”

  “I knew you couldn’t stand the mud and the coral rocks,” said Jerry. “Won’t you get off your horse?”

  “I have to go right on,” said Patricia.

  “We could walk the horse the way you’re going. It would rest him . . . besides, he looks sort of winded.”

  She glanced sharply at him, but he was looking only at the horse. “All right,” said Patricia, and got down from the saddle. First she scanned all the hilltops swiftly.

  “Are they following you?” asked Jerry.

  “Why?”

  “To find out if you see me.”

  “Do you think I’ve come out this morning just to see you?”

  “Sure,” said Jerry. “Take my arm.”

  The sand was deep, and she took his arm, but it was only to steady herself until she could find the right thing to say. “I think you’d better leave Saint Hilaire,” she said.

  “I’m going to,”
Jerry replied.

  “Aren’t you happy here?” asked Patricia suddenly, unreasonably.

  “Are you?” asked Jerry.

  “Why do you say that?”

  “You have big shadows under your eyes. You haven’t been sleeping.”

  “Insomnia is an old trouble of mine,” answered the girl, watching him. She sighed when he did not look back.

  “I’m glad your foot doesn’t bother you in the sand,” said Jerry.

  “There’s a bandage on it,” Patricia said instantly.

  “Let’s stop walking.”

  “Why?” But she paused with him.

  “I’ll tell you. The crunching of the sand starts breaking in on what I think.”

  “They must be light thoughts,” the girl commented idly.

  “They’re still thoughts,” said Jerry, lowering his voice.

  “Go on,” Patricia urged.

  “It’s not a story I’m telling,” Jerry replied, frowning. He began to look straight into her eyes.

  “I have to go home,” said Patricia suddenly.

  “You don’t.”

  “How do you know?”

  “The sun isn’t up.”

  Patricia swallowed. “You can’t dictate, you know,” she said.

  “I’m studying up, though,” answered Jerry.

  “What d’you mean?”

  “Why are you afraid?” asked Jerry in return.

  “I’m not afraid.”

  “You look pretty white.”

  All at once she was leaning back against the shoulders of the cream-colored horse, and he turned his head and looked at her with his big, bright eyes. “I’m unhappy,” said Patricia, with her gloved hand at her breast.

  It was a glove of some rough, soft leather. At the wrist it wrinkled into many folds, and it was loose over the hand. It fascinated Jerry. He pored over it with a sort of sad delight. For one thing, it was a deep yellow, and the color seemed to him pleasant next to the crimson blossom.

  “Is it connected up with me?” asked Jerry.

  “I don’t know,” said Patricia.

  “Are you kind of hollow inside?” inquired Jerry.

  “Yes. How do you know?”

  “Is it something like seasickness?”

  “Yes, but worse . . . it . . . it stays with me.”

  “I know,” said Jerry.

  “What’ll I do?”