Through stained glass
Page 8
CHAPTER VIII
The Leightons, who settled at Nadir after a long year of pilgrimage,looked, back upon the happy years at Consolation Cottage as the deadmight look back upon existence. They were changed indeed. Ann's skin hadlost the pale pink of transplanted Northern blood. Her sweet face hadalmost lost the dignity of sorrow. It was lined, weather-beaten, attimes almost vacant. The Reverend Orme's black mane had suddenly turnedwhite in streaks. A perpetual scowl knitted his brows. To mammy's broadcountenance, built for vast smiles, had come a look of plaintivedespair.
Natalie and Lewis were at the weedy age of nine. It was natural thatthey should have changed, but their change had gone beyond nature. Uponthem, as upon their elders, had settled the silences and the vaguelywondering expression of those who live in lands of drought and hardship,who look upon fate daily.
Both of the children had become thin and hard; but to Lewis had come agreater change. His brown hair and eyes had darkened almost to black,his skin taken on an olive tinge. His face, with its eager eyessometimes shining like the high lights in a deep pool or suddenly grownslumberous with dreams, began to proclaim him a Leighton of theLeightons. So evident became the badge of lineage that Ann and theReverend Orme both noticed it. To Ann it meant nothing, but in theReverend Orme it aroused bitter memories of his own boy. He began toavert his eyes from Lewis.
It was about this time that Natalie and Lewis cut their names to Lew andNat. The two were inseparable. Each had a pony, and they roved at willuntil the sad day when a school was first opened in that wilderness.
It happened that Dom Francisco, the cattle king from whom Leighton hadpurchased Nadir, was a widower twice over and the father of twentychildren, many of them still of tender years. When he learned thatLeighton had been a schoolmaster, he did not rest until he had persuadedhim to undertake the instruction of such of his children as were notalready of use on the ranch. The Reverend Orme consented from necessity.His cash from the sale of Leighton Academy was gone; the rents fromConsolation Cottage were small and reached him at long intervals.
Once more routine fell upon the Leighton household; once more the yearsstole by.
Lewis's school days were short. The Reverend Orme found that he couldnot stand the constant sight of the boy's face. To save himself from theshame of an outburst, he had bought a flock of goats and put Lewis incharge. Sometimes on his pony, sometimes on foot, Lewis wandered withhis flock over the low hills. When the rains had been kind and thewilderness was a riot of leaf and bloom above long reaches of verdantyoung grass, his journeys were short. But when the grass was dry, theendless thorn-trees leafless, and the whole earth, stripped of Nature'sawnings, weltered under a brazen sky, the hardy goats carried him far intheir search for sustenance.
When he was near, Natalie joined him as soon as school and householdduties would let her. Those were happy, quiet hours. Sometimes shebrought cookies, hot from mammy's oven, sometimes the richer roly-poly,redolent of cinnamon and spice, a confection prized to this day, openlyby the young, secretly by the old. Nor did Lewis receive her with emptyhands. One day a monster guava, kept cool under moist leaves, greetedher eyes; the next, a brimming hatful of the tart imbu. If fruit failed,there was some wondrous toy of fingered clay or carved wood, or,perhaps, merely a glimpse of some furry little animal drawn to Lewis'sknee by the power of vast stillness.
Lewis could not have told what it was he felt for Natalie. She was notbeautiful, as children of the world go. Her little nose was saddled withfreckles. Her eyes were brown, with a tinge of gold, but they were toobig for her pale face. She was thin and lanky. Her hair, which matchedthe color of her eyes, might have been beautiful, but hair done in hard,tight braids has no chance to show itself. Lewis only knew that evenwhen most grave Natalie's note was a note of joy--the only note of joyin all Nadir. To hear her cry, panting from her haste, "What is itto-day, Lew? A guava? O, Lew, what a _beauty_!" was ample reward for thelongest search.
But there were days when Lewis and his goats were too far afield forNatalie to come. On those days Lewis carried with him sometimes a book,but more often a lump of clay, wrapped in a wet cloth. He would capturesome frolicking kid and handle him for an hour, gently, but deeply,seeking out bone and muscle with his thin, nervous fingers. Then hewould mold a tiny and clumsy image of the kid in clay. No sooner was itdone than idleness would pall upon him. Back would go the clay into thewet cloth, to be kneaded into a shapeless mass from which a new creationmight spring forth, a full-grown goat, his pony, any live thing uponwhich he could first lay his hands.
Even so, those days were long. The books he had read many, many times.Sometimes the clay would turn brittle under the morning sun, sometimeshis fingers forgot what cunning they had, sometimes black thought fellupon him and held him till he felt a vague despair. He stood within thethreshold of manhood. Who was he? What was life? Was this life?
About him men married and begat children, goats begat goats, cattlebegat cattle, one day begat another. Lewis sat with hands locked abouthis knees and stared across the low hills out into the wide plain. "TheBible is wrong," he breathed to himself. "The world will never, neverend."
Little do we know when our present world will end. A day came when DomFrancisco, the cattle king, whose herds by popular account were as thesands of the desert, asked in marriage the hand of Natalie.
As, toward evening, Lewis headed his flock for home, he saw in thedistance a pillar of dust. It came rapidly to him. From it emergedNatalie on her pony. She jumped down, slipped the reins over her arm,and joined him.
"You have come far and fast," he said, glancing at the sweating pony."Is anything the matter?"
"No," said Natalie, hesitatingly, and then repeated--"no. I've just cometo talk to you."
For some time they walked in silence behind the great herd of nervousgoats, which occasionally stopped to pasture, but more often scamperedahead till a call from Lewis checked them. Natalie laid her hand on thesleeve of Lewis's leather coat, a gesture with which she was wont toclaim his close attention.
"Lew," she said, "what is marriage?"
Lewis turned and looked down at her. They were both seventeen, but hisinch start of her had grown to half a foot.
"Marriage? Why, marriage----" He stopped. A faint color flared in hischeeks. He looked away from her. Then he said calmly: "Marriage, Nat, isjust mating--like birds mate. First you see them flying about anyhow;then two fly together. They build a nest; they mate; they have littlebirds. The little birds grow up and do the whole thing over again.That's--that's marriage."
"So?" said Natalie. A little frown came to her brows. Was that marriage,indeed? Then she shook the frown from her. "Lew," she said gravely, butplacidly, "they tell me I'm to marry Dom Francisco. Isn't it--isn't it_funny_?"
Lewis stopped in his tracks and shook her hand from his arm. His eyesflared.
"What did you say? They tell you--_who_ told you?"
"Why, Lew!" cried Natalie, tears in her eyes and her lips twitching.
"There, there, Nat," said Lewis, softly. He laid his arm across hershoulders in an awkward gesture of affection. "Tell me, Nat. Who was ittold you--told you that?"
"Father," sobbed Natalie.
Before she knew what he was doing, Lew had leaped upon her pony and wasoff at a gallop.
"Lew!" cried Natalie, "Lew! Shall I bring in the goats?"
He did not heed her.