I think, perhaps, of all the unpleasant positions a man can get himself into, that of a playful friendly fit gone wrong will bring the sweat out the quickest--you do feel such a fool!

"Beg your pardon, Arthur," says I, fairly cool, as really I hadn't done anything for him to get so wrathy about.

But he got the best of himself at once, and the old, kind smile came, taking out the lines that changed his face so.

"What are you talking about?" says he, playful in his turn--forced playful, painful to see. He gave me a slap on the back and I let her flicker at that--always willing to take a friend's intentions rather than the results. I never went into friendship as a money-making business.

"I thought I startled you," I said. He laughed loud, so loud that I looked at him and backed away a little. "Startled me!" he says. "What nonsense! When did you come in? How do you like your job? Going to stay long?"

He fired these questions at me as fast as he could talk. I, dumb-struck, answered somehow, while I felt around for something to think with.

He was here and there and all over, doing everything with the same fever-hurry. Popping a string of questions at me and away before I could answer the half of them, as if he couldn't hold his mind to one thing more than a minute--and this was Arthur Saxton!

Part of my mind talked to him, part wrastled with Mary's hints and the other part kept up a wondering why and what, for I felt for that man a whole-hearted kid's worship.

A sack of flour fell from the wagon and split. Instantly Sax broke out into a fit of cursing. I never heard anything like it. He cursed the flour, the man that dropped it, Panama, the business, and everything above and below, his eyes two b.a.l.l.s of wild-fire.

The man jumped back scared. Sax's jaws worked hard; he got back an outside appearance of humanity.

"This heat makes me irritable, Bill," he said. "Besides, there's lots of annoyance in a new business."

"Sure," says I. I saw the flour sack was only an excuse--a little hole to let out the strain. A person's wits will outfoot his judgment sometimes. I had no experience to guide me, yet I knew Saxton needed humoring.

I've heard people say that things--like liquor, for instance--couldn't get the best of such and such a man, because he was strong-willed. What kind of argument is that? Suppose he _wants_ to drink. Ain't his strong will going to make him drink just that much harder, and be that much harder to turn back, than a man with a putty spine? The only backbone some men has is what their neighbors think. Them you can handle. But the man that rules himself generally finds it quite different from being the lady boss of an old woman's home. Just because he's fit to rule, he'll rebel, and he'll sc.r.a.p with himself till they put a stone up, marking the place of a drawn battle. But the neighbors won't know it. They'll envy him the dead easy time he had, or get mad when he does something foolish--loses one heat out of many that the neighbors didn't even dare to run--and gossip over him. "Who'd think a man that's lived as good a life as Mr. Smith would," and so forth. But you can't blame the neighbors neither. Most people reasonably prefer peace to war, and with a man like Sax it's war most of the time. You have to care a heap to stay with him.

Well, he was in a bad way for sure. He talked fast--often not finishing what he had to say. He laughed a great deal, too, and when the laugh pa.s.sed and the dreary look came on his face again, it was enough to make you shiver.

Presently a nice little man came up--a Spaniard and a gentleman.

From the time I took hold of his hand I felt more cheerful. You knew by his eye he understood things.

Sax introduced him as an old friend and as his partner in the business.

"Perez puts up the money and the experience," says he, "and I put up a bold front."

"After I've begged you not to speak in that way?" says Perez, smiling, but reproachful.

"I'm not sailing under false colors," says Sax, sharp. "You've made an asylum for an empty head--you'll have to listen to it."

Perez dropped the subject at once.

The Spaniard turned to me and asked me most courteously about my aims in the country. We were talking along when Saxton interrupted us. "We'll never get enough to drink this way," says he; "come into the office."

We went back into the little room where they entertained the big customers. Saxton called a boy and ordered brandy. When it came he grabbed the bottle feverishly. As he did so, Perez glanced at me. We understood each other.

Sax couldn't drink until we joined him--habit again--how she pulls! He wanted that drink. It was the one thing he did want in the world, yet there he waited while we fooled away as much time as we could.

"Well, here's regards!" he said at last, and his lower jaw trembled with eagerness. Perez drank and I made the motions.

"That's the stuff!" says Sax, with a cheap swagger that knocked me harder than anything I'd seen so far. "The good old truck that you Spaniards mollify under the name of aguardiente is the solution of all problems, Perez."

"_Si, si_, Senor?" says Perez. "It is a great solvent." He stirred the red sugar in the bottom of his gla.s.s. "I have seen it dissolve many a good manhood--like that."

"None of your friends, I hope?" sneers Sax.

"I hope not."

Saxton looked at him a minute; a hundred different fits showed in his eye, but the hurry of his mind let none stay long enough for action.

The shadow settled on him again. I never in my life saw more misery in a human face, and to save me I couldn't tell you where the expression came from, because the man kept his muscles in an iron grip. There wasn't a droop of the mouth, nor a line in the forehead, nor a twitch of the eye--it was just powerful enough to make itself felt, without signs.

He came back again with a snap.

"Why, you're not drinking, Bill!" says he, noticing my gla.s.s. It was not Arthur Saxton, to urge a boy to drink.

"No," I says, easy, "I'm not used to tropical beverages--I expect to find it full of red peppers. Lord, what a dose I got in my first _chile con carne_--"

He cut into my attempt at a diversion.

"Why don't you drink?" he asked.

"Because I promised Mary not to."

The mention of the name was too much. He took a quick breath.

"Oh, I wouldn't mind that," he says, light enough on the outside, but beginning to heat up inside again.

"I mind my word," I answered.

Perez looked quickly across at me and smiled.

"She makes mistakes like the rest of us," says Saxton.

"She makes mistakes," says I, "but _not_ like the rest of us."

Perez stretched out his hand. "I am again glad to have met Mr.

Saunders," he said.

Sax looked from one to the other of us. Suddenly he sprang up, giving the table such a push it landed on its back against the wall. "I hate to be the _only_ blackguard in the party," he said, and stood furious, panting.

Perez slipped to me and whispered, "Mind him not--for two weeks, day and night, brandy, brandy, brandy--it has not drunken him--but the man is mad."

"What are you whispering about?" demanded Sax, so savagely I got ready for action. "If you've anything to say about me, let me hear it--I yearn for interesting news." He had his fist drawn back as he came up to Perez.

The little man's face went white. "Arthur," he said, "would you strike me?"

"I'd strike any one--any dirty sneak who'd talk about me behind my back."

"Arthur," said Perez, slowly, "when I was a poor, sickly, sad little boy at a Northern school I had a friend who protected me, who took many a blow for my sake; when I was a young man, sick with _la viruela_, I had a friend who risked his life to save mine; as an older man, I have a friend who can take my life if he wishes--strike."