Children of the Desert Part 7

When she climbed on his knees with kisses for Leander he pretended to be surprised. "More kisses?" he asked.

"But these are the first."

"And those other kisses?"

"They? Oh, they were for Antony."

"Ah, but if you have kissed Antony, Leander does not want your kisses."

Her face seemed to fade slightly, as if certain lights had been extinguished. She withdrew a little from him and did not look at him.

"Why?" she asked presently. The gladness had gone out of her voice.

"Well ... kisses should be for one lover; not for two."

She pondered, and turned to him with an air of triumph. "But you see, these are new kisses for Leander. They are entirely different. They've never been given before. They've got nothing to do with the others."

He pretended to be convinced. But the kisses she gave to Leander were less rapturous. She was thinking.

"I'm afraid you don't think so highly of ... Leander," he suggested.

"Suppose I be ... Samson?"

She leaned her head on his shoulder as if she had grown tired.

"Samson was a very strong man," he explained. "He could push a house down."

That interested her.

"Would you like to be Samson?" she asked.

"I think it might be nice ... but no--the woman who kissed Samson betrayed him. I think I won't be Samson, after all."

She had been nervously fingering the necklace of gold beads at her throat; and suddenly she uttered a distressed cry. The string had broken, and the beads fell in a yellow shower to the rug.

She climbed down on her knees beside him and picked up the beads, one by one.

"Let them go," he urged cheerfully, noting her distress. "Come back. I'll be anybody you choose. Even Samson."

That extinguished light seemed to have been turned on again. She looked up at him smiling. "No, I don't want you to be Samson," she said. "And I don't want to lose my beads."

He regarded her happily. She looked very little and soft there on the rug.

"You look like a kitten," he declared.

She picked up the last bead and looked at the unstable baubles in her pink left palm. She tilted her hand so that they rolled back and forth. "Could a kitten look at a king?" she asked with mock earnestness.

"I should think it could, if there happened to be any king about."

She continued to make the beads roll about on her hand. "I'm going to be a kitten," she declared with decision. "Would you like me to be a kitten?"

She raised herself on her knees and propped her right hand behind her on the rug for support. She was looking earnestly into his eyes.

"If you'd like to be," he replied.

"Hold your hand," she commanded. She poured the beads into his immense, hard palm. "Don't spill them." She turned about on the rug on hands and knees, and crept away to the middle of the floor. She turned and arose to her knees, and rested both hands before her on the floor. She held her head high and _meowed_ twice so realistically that Harboro leaned forward, regarding her with wonder. She lowered herself and turned and crept to the window. There she lifted herself a little and patted the ta.s.sel which hung from the blind. She continued this with a certain sedateness and concentration until the ta.s.sel went beyond her reach and caught in the curtain. Then she let herself down again, and crawled to the middle of the floor. Now she was on her knees, her hands on the floor before her, her body as erect as she could hold it. Again she _meowed_--this time with a certain ennui; and finally she raised one arm and rubbed it slowly to and fro behind her ear.... She quickly a.s.sumed a defensive att.i.tude, crouching fiercely. An imaginary dog had crossed her path. She made an explosive sound with her lips. She regained her tranquillity, staring with slowly returning complacency and contempt while the imaginary dog disappeared.

Harboro did not speak. He looked on in amazed silence to see what she would do next. His swarthy face was too sphinx-like to express pleasure, yet he was not displeased. He was thinking: She is a child--but what an extraordinary child!

She crawled toward him and leaned against his leg. _She was purring!_

Harboro stooped low to see how she did it, but her hair hid her lips from him.

He seized her beneath the arms and lifted her until her face was on a level with his. He regarded her almost uncomfortably.

"Don't you like me to be a kitten?" She adjusted her knees on his lap and rested her hands on his shoulders. She regarded him gravely.

"Well ... a kitten gets to be a cat," he suggested.

She pulled one end of his long mustache, regarding him intently. "Oh, a cat. But this is a different kind of a kitten entirely. It's got nothing to do with cats." She held her head on one side and pulled his mustache slowly through her fingers. "It won't curl," she said.

"No, I'm not the curly sort of man."

She considered that. It seemed to present an idea that was new to her.

"Anyway, I'm glad you're a big fellow."

As he did not respond to this, she went on: "Those little shrimps--you couldn't be a kitten with them. They would have to be puppies. That's the only fun you could have."

"Sylvia!" he remonstrated. He adjusted her so that she sat on his lap, with her face against his throat. He was recalling that other Sylvia: the Sylvia of the dining-room, of the balcony; the circ.u.mspect, sensible, comprehending Sylvia. But the discoveries he was making were not unwelcome. Folly wore for him a face of ecstasy, of beauty.

As she nestled against him, he whispered: "Is the sandman coming?"

And she responded, with her lips against his throat: "Yes--if you'll carry me."

Antonia was wrong. This was not the time of ashes. It was the time of flame.

PART III.

FECTNOR, THE PEOPLE'S ADVOCATE.

CHAPTER X.

And then Fectnor came.

The date of the election was drawing near, and a new sheriff was to be jockeyed into office by the traditional practice of corralling all the male adult Mexicans who could be reached, and making them vote just so.

The voice of the people was about to be heard in the land.

It was a game which enjoyed the greatest popularity along the border in those years. Two played at it: the opposing candidates. And each built him a corral and began capturing Mexicans two or three days before the election.

The Mexicans were supposed to have their abodes (of a sort) in Maverick County; but there was nothing conservative in the rules under which the game was played. If you could get a consignment of voters from Mexico you might do so, resting a.s.sured that your opponent would not hesitate to fill his corral with citizens from the other side of the river.

The corrals were amazing places. Dispensers of creature comforts were engaged. Barbecued meat and double rations of _mezcal_ were provided. Your Mexican voters, held rigorously as prisoners, were in a state of collapse before the day of the election. They were conveyed in carryalls to the polls, and heads were counted, and the candidate got credit for the full number of const.i.tuents he had dumped out into the suns.h.i.+ne.