A First Family of Tasajara

by Bret Harte

  CHAPER XI.

  "Readers of the 'Clarion' will have noticed that allusion has beenfrequently made in these columns to certain rumors concerning the earlyhistory of Tasajara which were supposed to affect the pioneer record ofDaniel Harcourt. It was deemed by the conductors of this journal to beonly consistent with the fearless and independent duty undertaken by the'Clarion' that these rumors should be fully chronicled as part of theinformation required by the readers of a first-class newspaper, unbiasedby any consideration of the social position of the parties, but simplyas a matter of news. For this the 'Clarion' does not deem it necessaryto utter a word of apology. But for that editorial comment or attitudewhich the proprietors felt was justified by the reliable sources oftheir information they now consider it only due in honor to themselves,their readers, and Mr. Harcourt to fully and freely apologize. A patientand laborious investigation enables them to state that the alleged factspublished by the 'Clarion' and copied by other journals are utterlyunsupported by testimony, and the charges--although more or lessvague--which were based upon them are equally untenable. We are nowsatisfied that one 'Elijah Curtis,' a former pioneer of Tasajara whodisappeared five years ago, and was supposed to be drowned, has not onlymade no claim to the Tasajara property, as alleged, but has given nosign of his equally alleged resuscitation and present existence, andthat on the minutest investigation there appears nothing either in hisdisappearance, or the transfer of his property to Daniel Harcourt,that could in any way disturb the uncontested title to Tasajara or theunimpeachable character of its present owner. The whole story now seemsto have been the outcome of one of those stupid rural hoaxes too commonin California."

  "Well," said Mrs. Ashwood, laying aside the 'Clarion' with a skepticalshrug of her pretty shoulders, as she glanced up at her brother; "Isuppose this means that you are going to propose again to the younglady?"

  "I have," said Jack Shipley, "that's the worst of it--and got my answerbefore this came out."

  "Jack!" said Mrs. Ashwood, thoroughly surprised.

  "Yes! You see, Conny, as I told you three weeks ago, she said she wantedtime to consider,--that she scarcely knew me, and all that! Well, Ithought it wasn't exactly a gentleman's business to seem to stand offafter that last attack on her father, and so, last week, I went downto San Jose, where she was staying, and begged her not to keep me insuspense. And, by Jove! she froze me with a look, and said that withthese aspersions on her father's character, she preferred not to beunder obligations to any one."

  "And you believed her?"

  "Oh, hang it all! Look here, Conny,--I wish you'd just try for once tofind out some good in that family, besides what that sentimentalyoung widower John Milton may have. You seem to think because they'vequarreled with HIM there isn't a virtue left among them."

  Far from seeming to offer any suggestion of feminine retaliation, Mrs.Ashwood smiled sweetly. "My dear Jack, I have no desire to keep you fromtrying your luck again with Miss Clementina, if that's what you mean,and indeed I shouldn't be surprised if a family who felt a mesallianceas sensitively as the Harcourts felt that affair of their son's, wouldbe as keenly alive to the advantages of a good match for their daughter.As to young Mr. Harcourt, he never talked to me of the vices of hisfamily, nor has he lately troubled me much with the presence of his ownvirtues. I haven't heard from him since we came here."

  "I suppose he is satisfied with the government berth you got for him,"returned her brother dryly.

  "He was very grateful to Senator Flynn, who appreciates his talents,but who offered it to him as a mere question of fitness," replied Mrs.Ashwood with great precision of statement. "But you don't seem to knowhe declined it on account of his other work."

  "Preferred his old Bohemian ways, eh? You can't change those fellows,Conny. They can't get over the fascinations of vagabondage. Sorry yourlady-patroness scheme didn't work. Pity you couldn't have promoted himin the line of his profession, as the Grand Duchess of Girolstein didFritz."

  "For Heaven's sake, Jack, go to Clementina! You may not be successful,but there at least the perfect gentlemanliness and good taste of yourillustrations will not be thrown away."

  "I think of going to San Francisco tomorrow, anyway," returned Jack withaffected carelessness. "I'm getting rather bored with this wild seasidewatering place and its glitter of ocean and hopeless background ofmountain. It's nothing to me that 'there's no land nearer than Japan'out there. It may be very healthful to the tissues, but it's wearinessto the spirit, and I don't see why we can't wait at San Francisco tillthe rains send us further south, as well as here."

  He had walked to the balcony of their sitting-room in the little seasidehotel where this conversation took place, and gazed discontentedly overthe curving bay and sandy shore before him. After a slight pause Mrs.Ashwood stepped out beside him.

  "Very likely I may go with you," she said, with a perceptible tone ofweariness. "We will see after the post arrives."

  "By the way, there is a little package for you in my room, that camethis morning. I brought it up, but forgot to give it to you. You'll findit on my table."

  Mrs. Ashwood abstractedly turned away and entered her brother's roomfrom the same balcony. The forgotten parcel, which looked like a rollof manuscript, was lying on his dressing-table. She gazed attentively atthe handwriting on the wrapper and then gave a quick glance around her.A sudden and subtle change came over her. She neither flushed nor paled,nor did the delicate lines of expression in her face quiver or change.But as she held the parcel in her hand her whole being seemed to undergosome exquisite suffusion. As the medicines which the Arabian physicianhad concealed in the hollow handle of the mallet permeated the languidroyal blood of Persia, so some volatile balm of youth seemed to flowin upon her with the contact of that strange missive and transform herweary spirit.

  "Jack!" she called, in a high clear voice. But Jack had already gonefrom the balcony when she reached it with an elastic step and a quickyouthful swirl and rustling of her skirt. He was lighting his cigar inthe garden.

  "Jack," she said, leaning half over the railing, "come back here in anhour and we'll talk over that matter of yours again."

  Jack looked up eagerly and as if he might even come up then, but sheadded quickly, "In about an hour--I must think it over," and withdrew.

  She re-entered the sitting-room, shut the door carefully and locked it,half pulled down the blind, walking once or twice around the table onwhich the parcel lay, with one eye on it like a graceful cat. Then shesuddenly sat down, took it up with a grave practical face, examined thepostmark curiously, and opened it with severe deliberation. It containeda manuscript and a letter of four closely written pages. She glanced atthe manuscript with bright approving eyes, ran her fingers through itsleaves and then laid it carefully and somewhat ostentatiously on thetable beside her. Then, still holding the letter in her hand, she roseand glanced out of the window at her bored brother lounging towards thebeach and at the heaving billows beyond, and returned to her seat. Thisapparently important preliminary concluded, she began to read.

  There were, as already stated, four blessed pages of it! All vital,earnest, palpitating with youthful energy, preposterous in premises,precipitate in conclusions,--yet irresistible and convincing to everywoman in their illogical sincerity. There was not a word of love in it,yet every page breathed a wholesome adoration; there was not an epithetor expression that a greater prude than Mrs. Ashwood would have objectedto, yet every sentence seemed to end in a caress. There was not aline of poetry in it, and scarcely a figure or simile, and yet it waspoetical. Boyishly egotistic as it was in attitude, it seemed to bewritten less OF himself than TO her; in its delicate because unconsciousflattery, it made her at once the provocation and excuse. And yet sopotent was its individuality that it required no signature. No one butJohn Milton Harcourt could have written it. His personality stood out ofit so strongly that once or twice Mrs. Ashwood almost unconsciouslyput up her little hand before her face with a half mischievous,half-deprecating smile,
as if the big honest eyes of its writer wereupon her.

  It began by an elaborate apology for declining the appointment offeredhim by one of her friends, which he was bold enough to think had beenprompted by her kind heart. That was like her, but yet what she mightdo to any one; and he preferred to think of her as the sweet and gentlelady who had recognized his merit without knowing him, rather than thepowerful and gracious benefactress who wanted to reward him when she didknow him. The crown that she had all unconsciously placed upon his headthat afternoon at the little hotel at Crystal Spring was more to himthan the Senator's appointment; perhaps he was selfish, but he could notbear that she who had given so much should believe that he could accepta lesser gift. All this and much more! Some of it he had wanted to sayto her in San Francisco at times when they had met, but he could notfind the words. But she had given him the courage to go on and do theonly thing he was fit for, and he had resolved to stick to that, andperhaps do something once more that might make him hear again her voiceas he had heard it that day, and again see the light that had shone inher eyes as she sat there and read. And this was why he was sending hera manuscript. She might have forgotten that she had told him a strangestory of her cousin who had disappeared--which she thought he mightat some time work up. Here it was. Perhaps she might not recognize itagain, in the way he had written it here; perhaps she did not reallymean it when she had given him permission to use it, but he rememberedher truthful eyes and believed her--and in any event it was hers to dowith what she liked. It had been a great pleasure for him to write itand think that she would see it; it was like seeing her himself--thatwas in HIS BETTER SELF--more worthy the companionship of a beautiful andnoble woman than the poor young man she would have helped. This was whyhe had not called the week before she went away. But for all that, shehad made his life less lonely, and he should be ever grateful to her. Hecould never forget how she unconsciously sympathized with him that dayover the loss that had blighted his life forever,--yet even then he didnot know that she, herself, had passed through the same suffering. Butjust here the stricken widow of thirty, after a vain attempt to keep upthe knitted gravity of her eyebrows, bowed her dimpling face overthe letter of the blighted widower of twenty, and laughed so long andsilently that the tears stood out like dew on her light-brown eyelashes.

  But she became presently severe again, and finished her reading of theletter gravely. Then she folded it carefully, deposited it in a box onher table, which she locked. After a few minutes, however, she unlockedthe box again and transferred the letter to her pocket. The serenityof her features did not relax again, although her previous prettyprepossession of youthful spirit was still indicated in her movements.Going into her bedroom, she reappeared in a few minutes with a lightcloak thrown over her shoulders and a white-trimmed broad-brimmed hat.Then she rolled up the manuscript in a paper, and called her Frenchmaid. As she stood there awaiting her with the roll in her hand, shemight have been some young girl on her way to her music lesson.

  "If my brother returns before I do, tell him to wait."

  "Madame is going"--

  "Out," said Mrs. Ashwood blithely, and tripped downstairs.

  She made her way directly to the shore where she remembered there wasa group of rocks affording a shelter from the northwest trade winds.It was reached at low water by a narrow ridge of sand, and here she hadoften basked in the sun with her book. It was here that she now unrolledJohn Milton's manuscript and read.

  It was the story she had told him, but interpreted by his poetry andadorned by his fancy until the facts as she remembered them seemed tobe no longer hers, or indeed truths at all. She had always believedher cousin's unhappy temperament to have been the result of a moral andphysical idiosyncrasy,--she found it here to be the effect of a lifelongand hopeless passion for herself! The ingenious John Milton had given apoet's precocity to the youth whom she had only known as a suspicious,moody boy, had idealized him as a sensitive but songless Byron, hadgiven him the added infirmity of pulmonary weakness, and a handkerchiefthat in moments of great excitement, after having been hurriedly pressedto his pale lips, was withdrawn "with a crimson stain." Opposed to thisinteresting figure--the more striking to her as she had been hithertohaunted by the impression that her cousin during his boyhood had beensubject to facial eruption and boils--was her own equally idealizedself. Cruelly kind to her cousin and gentle with his weaknesses whilecalmly ignoring their cause, leading him unconsciously step by step inhis fatal passion, he only became aware by accident that she nourishedan ideal hero in the person of a hard, proud, middle-aged practicalman of the world,--her future husband! At this picture of the late Mr.Ashwood, who had really been an indistinctive social bon vivant, hisamiable relict grew somewhat hysterical. The discovery of her realfeelings drove the consumptive cousin into a secret, self-imposed exileon the shores of the Pacific, where he hoped to find a grave. But thecomplete and sudden change of life and scene, the balm of the wild woodsand the wholesome barbarism of nature, wrought a magical change in hisphysical health and a philosophical rest in his mind. He married thedaughter of an Indian chief. Years passed, the heroine--a rich andstill young and beautiful widow--unwittingly sought the same medicinalsolitude. Here in the depth of the forest she encountered her formerplaymate; the passion which he had fondly supposed was dead revived inher presence, and for the first time she learned from his bearded lipsthe secret of his passion. Alas! not SHE alone! The contiguous forestcould not be bolted out, and the Indian wife heard all. Recognizing thesituation with aboriginal directness of purpose, she committed suicidein the fond belief that it would reunite the survivors. But in vain; thecousins parted on the spot to meet no more.

  Even Mrs. Ashwood's predilection for the youthful writer could notoverlook the fact that the denouement was by no means novel nor thesituation human, but yet it was here that she was most interested andfascinated. The description of the forest was a description of the woodwhere she had first met Harcourt; the charm of it returned, until shealmost seemed to again inhale its balsamic freshness in the pages beforeher. Now, as then, her youth came back with the same longing and regret.But more bewildering than all, it was herself that moved there, paintedwith the loving hand of the narrator. For the first time she experiencedthe delicious flattery of seeing herself as only a lover could see her.The smallest detail of her costume was suggested with an accuracy thatpleasantly thrilled her feminine sense. The grace of her figure slowlymoving through the shadow, the curves of her arm and the delicacy of herhand that held the bridle rein, the gentle glow of her softly roundedcheek, the sweet mystery of her veiled eyes and forehead, and theescaping gold of her lovely hair beneath her hat were all in turnmasterfully touched or tenderly suggested. And when to this was addedthe faint perfume of her nearer presence--the scent she always used--thedelicate revelations of her withdrawn gauntlet, the bracelet claspingher white wrist, and at last the thrilling contact of her soft hand onhis arm,--she put down the manuscript and blushed like a very girl. Thenshe started.

  A shout!--HIS voice surely!--and the sound of oars in their rowlocks.

  An instant revulsion of feeling overtook her. With a quick movement sheinstantly hid the manuscript beneath her cloak and stood up erect andindignant. Not twenty yards away, apparently advancing from the oppositeshore of the bay, was a boat. It contained only John Milton, resting onhis oars and scanning the group of rocks anxiously. His face, which wasquite strained with anxiety, suddenly flushed when he saw her, and thenrecognizing the unmistakable significance of her look and attitude,paled once more. He bent over his oars again; a few strokes brought himclose to the rock.

  "I beg your pardon," he said hesitatingly, as he turned towards her andlaid aside his oars, "but--I thought--you were--in danger."

  She glanced quickly round her. She had forgotten the tide! The ledgebetween her and the shore was already a foot under brown sea-water. Yetif she had not thought that it would look ridiculous, she would haveleaped down even then and waded ashore.

  "It
's nothing," she said coldly, with the air of one to whom thesituation was an everyday occurrence; "it's only a few steps and aslight wetting--and my brother would have been here in a moment more."

  John Milton's frank eyes made no secret of his mortification. "I oughtnot to have disturbed you, I know," he said quickly, "I had no right.But I was on the other shore opposite and I saw you come down here--thatis"--he blushed prodigiously--"I thought it MIGHT BE you--and Iventured--I mean--won't you let me row you ashore?"

  There seemed to be no reasonable excuse for refusing. She slippedquickly into the boat without waiting for his helping hand, avoidingthat contact which only a moment ago she was trying to recall.

  A few strokes brought them ashore. He continued his explanation with thehopeless frankness and persistency of youth and inexperience. "I onlycame here the day before yesterday. I would not have come, but Mr.Fletcher, who has a cottage on the other shore, sent for me to offerme my old place on the 'Clarion.' I had no idea of intruding upon yourprivacy by calling here without permission."

  Mrs. Ashwood had resumed her conventional courtesy without howeverlosing her feminine desire to make her companion pay for the agitationhe had caused her. "We would have been always pleased to see you," shesaid vaguely, "and I hope, as you are here now, you will come with me tothe hotel. My brother"--

  But he still retained his hold of the boat-rope without moving, andcontinued, "I saw you yesterday, through the telescope, sitting in yourbalcony; and later at night I think it was your shadow I saw near theblue shaded lamp in the sitting-room by the window,--I don't mean theRED LAMP that you have in your own room. I watched you until you put outthe blue lamp and lit the red one. I tell you this--because--because--Ithought you might be reading a manuscript I sent you. At least," hesmiled faintly, "I LIKED to think it so."

  In her present mood this struck her only as persistent and somewhategotistical. But she felt herself now on ground where she could dealfirmly with him.

  "Oh, yes," she said gravely. "I got it and thank you very much for it. Iintended to write to you."

  "Don't," he said, looking at her fixedly. "I can see you don't like it."

  "On the contrary," she said promptly, "I think it beautifully written,and very ingenious in plot and situation. Of course it isn't the story Itold you--I didn't expect that, for I'm not a genius. The man is not atall like my cousin, you know, and the woman--well really, to tell thetruth, SHE is simply inconceivable!"

  "You think so?" he said gravely. He had been gazing abstractedly at someshining brown seaweed in the water, and when he raised his eyes to hersthey seemed to have caught its color.

  "Think so? I'm positive! There's no such a woman; she isn't HUMAN. Butlet us walk to the hotel."

  "Thank you, but I must go back now."

  "But at least let my brother thank you for taking his place--in rescuingme. It was so thoughtful in you to put off at once when you saw I wassurrounded. I might have been in great danger."

  "Please don't make fun of me, Mrs. Ashwood," he said with a faintreturn of his boyish smile. "You know there was no danger. I haveonly interrupted you in a nap or a reverie--and I can see now that youevidently came here to be alone."

  Holding the manuscript more closely hidden under the folds of her cloak,she smiled enigmatically. "I think I DID, and it seems that the tidethought so too, and acted upon it. But you will come up to the hotelwith me, surely?"

  "No, I am going back now." There was a sudden firmness about the youngfellow which she had never before noticed. This was evidently thecreature who had married in spite of his family.

  "Won't you come back long enough to take your manuscript? I will pointout the part I refer to, and--we will talk it over."

  "There is no necessity. I wrote to you that you might keep it; it isyours; it was written for you and none other. It is quite enough for meto know that you were good enough to read it. But will you do one thingmore for me? Read it again! If you find anything in it the second timeto change your views--if you find"--

  "I will let you know," she said quickly. "I will write to you as Iintended."

  "No, I didn't mean that. I meant that if you found the woman lessinconceivable and more human, don't write to me, but put your red lampin your window instead of the blue one. I will watch for it and see it."

  "I think I will be able to explain myself much better with simple penand ink," she said dryly, "and it will be much more useful to you."

  He lifted his hat gravely, shoved off the boat, leaped into it, andbefore she could hold out her hand was twenty feet away. She turned andran quickly up the rocks. When she reached the hotel, she could see theboat already half across the bay.

  Entering her sitting-room she found that her brother, tired of waitingfor her, had driven out. Taking the hidden manuscript from her cloakshe tossed it with a slight gesture of impatience on the table. Then shesummoned the landlord.

  "Is there a town across the bay?"

  "No! the whole mountain-side belongs to Don Diego Fletcher. He livesaway back in the coast range at Los Gatos, but he has a cottage and millon the beach."

  "Don Diego Fletcher--Fletcher! Is he a Spaniard then?"

  "Half and half, I reckon; he's from the lower country, I believe."

  "Is he here often?"

  "Not much; he has mills at Los Gatos, wheat ranches at Santa Clara, andowns a newspaper in 'Frisco! But he's here now. There were lights in hishouse last night, and his cutter lies off the point."

  "Could you get a small package and note to him?"

  "Certainly; it is only a row across the bay."

  "Thank you."

  Without removing her hat and cloak she sat down at the table and began aletter to Don Diego Fletcher. She begged to inclose to him a manuscriptwhich she was satisfied, for the interests of its author, was better inhis hands than hers. It had been given to her by the author, Mr. J. M.Harcourt, whom she understood was engaged on Mr. Fletcher's paper, the"Clarion." In fact, it had been written at HER suggestion, and from anincident in real life of which she was cognizant. She was sorry to saythat on account of some very foolish criticism of her own as to theFACTS, the talented young author had become so dissatisfied with it asto make it possible that, if left to himself, this very charming andbeautifully written story would remain unpublished. As an admirer ofMr. Harcourt's genius, and a friend of his family, she felt that such anevent would be deplorable, and she therefore begged to leave it toMr. Fletcher's delicacy and tact to arrange with the author for itspublication. She knew that Mr. Fletcher had only to read it to beconvinced of its remarkable literary merit, and she again would impressupon him the fact that her playful and thoughtless criticism--which waspersonal and confidential--was only based upon the circumstances thatthe author had really made a more beautiful and touching story than thepoor facts which she had furnished seemed to warrant. She had onlyjust learned the fortunate circumstance that Mr. Fletcher was in theneighborhood of the hotel where she was staying with her brother.

  With the same practical, business-like directness, but perhaps a certainunbusiness-like haste superadded, she rolled up the manuscript anddispatched it with the letter.

  This done, however, a slight reaction set in, and having taken off herhat and shawl, she dropped listlessly on a chair by the window, but assuddenly rose and took a seat in the darker part of the room. She feltthat she had done right, that highest but most depressing of humanconvictions! It was entirely for his good. There was no reason why hisbest interests should suffer for his folly. If anybody was to sufferit was she. But what nonsense was she thinking! She would write to himlater when she was a little cooler,--as she had said. But then he haddistinctly told her, and very rudely too, that he didn't want her towrite. Wanted her to make SIGNALS to him,--the idiot! and probably waseven now watching her with a telescope. It was really too preposterous!

  The result was that her brother found her on his return in a somewhatuncertain mood, and, as a counselor, variable and conflicting injudgment. If this Clementi
na, who seemed to have the family qualities ofobstinacy and audacity, really cared for him, she certainly wouldn't letdelicacy stand in the way of letting him know it--and he was thereforesafe to wait a little. A few moments later, she languidly declared thatshe was afraid that she was no counselor in such matters; really shewas getting too old to take any interest in that sort of thing, and shenever had been a matchmaker! By the way now, wasn't it odd thatthis neighbor, that rich capitalist across the bay, should be calledFletcher, and "James Fletcher" too, for Diego meant "James" in Spanish.Exactly the same name as poor "Cousin Jim" who disappeared. Did heremember her old playmate Jim? But her brother thought something elsewas a deuced sight more odd, namely, that this same Don Diego Fletcherwas said to be very sweet on Clementina now, and was always in hercompany at the Ramirez. And that, with this "Clarion" apology on the topof it, looked infernally queer.

  Mrs. Ashwood felt a sudden consternation. Here had she--Jack'ssister--just been taking Jack's probable rival into confidentialcorrespondence! She turned upon Jack sharply:--

  "Why didn't you say that before?"

  "I did tell you," he said gloomily, "but you didn't listen. But whatdifference does it make to you now?"

  "None whatever," said Mrs. Ashwood calmly as she walked out of the room.

  Nevertheless the afternoon passed wearily, and her usual ride into theupland canyon did not reanimate her. For reasons known best to herselfshe did not take her after-dinner stroll along the shore to watch theoutlying fog. At a comparatively early hour, while there was still aroseate glow in the western sky, she appeared with grim deliberation,and the blue lamp-shade in her hand, and placed it over the lamp whichshe lit and stood on her table beside the window. This done she sat downand began to write with bright-eyed but vicious complacency.

  "But you don't want that light AND the window, Constance," said Jackwonderingly.

  Mrs. Ashwood could not stand the dreadful twilight.

  "But take away your lamp and you'll have light enough from the sunset,"responded Jack.

  That was just what she didn't want! The light from the window was thathorrid vulgar red glow which she hated. It might be very romantic andsuit lovers like Jack, but as SHE had some work to do, she wanted theblue shade of the lamp to correct that dreadful glare.