The old man"s countenance fell; he wanted to call his nephew a pig, a dog, and everything else that is villainous; but he restrained himself and merely whimpered, "It would be better than nothing. You could help me."
"There is little chance of it," said Coronado, seeing that the proposition was not approved. "She likes the American lieutenant much, and does not like me at all."
"Then--" began Garcia, and stopped there, trembling all over.
"Then what?"
The venomous old toad made a supreme effort and whispered, "Suppose she should die?"
Coronado wheeled about, walked two or three times up and down the room, returned to where Garcia sat quivering, and murmured, "It must be done quickly."
"Yes, yes," gasped the old man. "She must--it must be childless and intestate."
"She must go off in some natural way," continued the nephew.
The uncle looked up with a vague hope in his one dusky and filmy eye.
"Perhaps the isthmus will do it for her."
Again the old man turned to an image of despair, as he mumbled, "O Madre de Dios! no, no. The isthmus is nothing."
"Is the overland route more dangerous?" asked Coronado.
"It might be made more dangerous. One gets lost in the desert. There are Apaches."
"It is a horrible business," growled Coronado, shaking his head and biting his lips.
"Oh, horrible, horrible!" groaned Garcia. "Munoz was a pig, and a dog, and a toad, and a snake."
"You old coward! can"t you speak out?" hissed Coronado, losing his patience. "Do you want me both to devise and execute, while you take the purses? Tell me at once what your plan is."
"The overland route," whispered Garcia, shaking from head to foot. "You go with her. I pay--I pay everything. You shall have men, horses, mules, wagons, all you want."
"I shall want money, too. I shall need, perhaps, two thousand dollars.
Apaches."
"Yes, yes," a.s.sented Garcia. "The Apaches make an attack. You shall have money. I can raise it; I will."
"How soon will you have a train ready?"
"Immediately. Any day you want. You must start at once. She must not know of the will. She might remain here, and let the estate be settled for her, and draw on it. She might go back to New York. Anybody would lend her money."
"Yes, events hurry us," muttered Coronado. "Well, get your cursed train ready. I will induce her to take it. I must unsay now all that I said in favor of the isthmus."
"Do be judicious," implored Garcia. "With judgment, with judgment. Lost on the plains. Stolen by Apaches. No killing. No scandals. O my G.o.d, how I hate scandals and uproars! I am an old man, Carlos. With judgment, with judgment."
"I comprehend," responded Coronado, adding a long string of Spanish curses, most of them meant for his uncle.
CHAPTER III.
That very day Coronado made a second call on Clara and her Aunt Maria, to retract, contradict, and disprove all that he had said in favor of the isthmus and against the overland route.
Although his visit was timed early in the evening, he found Lieutenant Thurstane already with the ladies. Instead of scowling at him, or crouching in conscious guilt before him, he made a cordial rush for his hand, smiled sweetly in his face, and offered him incense of grat.i.tude.
"My dear Lieutenant, you are perfectly right," he said, in his fluent English. "The journey by the isthmus is not to be thought of. I have just seen a friend who has made it. Poisonous serpents in myriads. The most deadly climate in the world. Nearly everybody had the _vomito_; one-fifth died of it. You eat a little fruit; down you go on your back--dead in four hours. Then there are constant fights between the emigrants and the sullen, ferocious Indians of the isthmus. My poor friend never slept with his revolver out of his hand. I said to him, "My dear fellow, it is cruel to rejoice in your misfortunes, but I am heartily glad that I have heard of them. You have saved the life of the most remarkable woman that I ever knew, and of a cousin of mine who is the star of her s.e.x.""
Here Coronado made one bow to Mrs. Stanley and another to Clara, at the same time kissing his sallow hand enthusiastically to all creation. Aunt Maria tried to look stern at the compliment, but eventually thawed into a smile over it. Clara acknowledged it with a little wave of the hand, as if, coming from Coronado, it meant nothing more than good-morning, which indeed was just about his measure of it.
"Moreover," continued the Mexican, "overland route? Why, it is overland route both ways. If you go by the isthmus, you must traverse all Texas and Louisiana, at the very least. You might as well go at once to San Diego.
In short, the route by the isthmus is not to be thought of."
"And what of the overland route?" asked Mrs. Stanley.
"The overland route is the _other_," laughed Coronado.
"Yes, I know. We must take it, I suppose. But what is the last news about it? You spoke this morning of Indians, I believe. Not that I suppose they are very formidable."
"The overland route does not lead directly through paradise, my dear Mrs.
Stanley," admitted Coronado with insinuating candor. "But it is not as bad as has been represented. I have never tried it. I must rely upon the report of others. Well, on learning that the isthmus would not do for you, I rushed off immediately to inquire about the overland. I questioned Garcia"s teamsters. I catechized some newly-arrived travellers. I pumped dry every source of information. The result is that the overland route will do. No suffering; absolutely none; not a bit. And no danger worth mentioning. The Apaches are under a cloud. Our American conquerors and fellow-citizens" (here he gently patted Thurstane on the shoulder-strap), "our Romans of the nineteenth century, they tranquillize the Apaches. A child might walk from here to Fort Yuma without risking its little scalp."
All this was said in the most light-hearted and airy manner conceivable.
Coronado waved and floated on zephyrs of fancy and fluency. A b.u.t.terfly or a humming-bird could not have talked more cheerily about flying over a parterre of flowers than he about traversing the North American desert.
And, with all this frivolous, imponderable grace, what an accent of verity he had! He spoke of the teamsters as if he had actually conversed with them, and of the overland route as if he had been studiously gathering information concerning it.
"I believe that what you say about the Apaches is true," observed Thurstane, a bit awkwardly.
Coronado smiled, tossed him a little bow, and murmured in the most cordial, genial way, "And the rest?"
"I beg pardon," said the Lieutenant, reddening. "I didn"t mean to cast doubt upon any of your statements, sir."
Thurstane had the army tone; he meant to be punctiliously polite; perhaps he was a little stiff in his politeness. But he was young, had had small practice in society, was somewhat hampered by modesty, and so sometimes made a blunder. Such things annoyed him excessively; a breach of etiquette seemed something like a breach of orders; hadn"t meant to charge Coronado with drawing the long bow; couldn"t help coloring about it. Didn"t think much of Coronado, but stood somewhat in awe of him, as being four years older in time and a dozen years older in the ways of the world.
"I only meant to say," he continued, "that I have information concerning the Apaches which coincides with yours, sir. They are quiet, at least for the present. Indeed, I understand that Red Sleeve, or Manga Colorada, as you call him, is coming in with his band to make a treaty."
"Admirable!" cried Coronado. "Why not hire him to guarantee our safety?
Set a thief to catch a thief. Why does not your Government do that sort of thing? Let the Apaches protect the emigrants, and the United States pay the Apaches. They would be the cheapest military force possible. That is the way the Turks manage the desert Arabs."
"Mr. Coronado, you ought to be Governor of New Mexico," said Aunt Maria, stricken with admiration at this project.
Thurstane looked at the two as if he considered them a couple of fools, each bigger than the other. Coronado advanced to Mrs. Stanley, took her hand, bowed over it, and murmured, "Let me have your influence at Washington, my dear Madame." The remarkable woman squirmed a little, fearing lest he should kiss her ringers, but nevertheless gave him a gracious smile.
"It strikes me, however," she said, "that the isthmus route is better. We know by experience that the journey from here to Bent"s Fort is safe and easy. From there down the Arkansas and Missouri to St. Louis it is mostly water carriage; and from St. Louis you can sail anywhere."
Coronado was alarmed. He must put a stopper on this project. He called up all his resources.