The Complete Works of Stephen Crane (164 page)

A soldier with a polite nod and smile gave Peza a rifle, a relic of another dead man. Thus, he felt, besides the clutch of a corpse about his neck, that the rifle was as unhumanly horrible as a snake that lives in a tomb. He heard at his ear something that was in effect like the voices of those two dead men, their low voices speaking to him of bloody death, mutilation. The bandoleer gripped him tighter; he wished to raise his hands to his throat like a man who is choking. The rifle was clammy; upon his palms he felt the movement of the sluggish currents of a serpent’s life; it was crawling and frightful.

All about him were these peasants, with their interested countenances, gibbering of the fight. From time to time a soldier cried out in semi-humorous lamentations descriptive of his thirst. One bearded man sat munching a great bit of hard bread. Fat, greasy, squat, he was like an idol made of tallow. Peza felt dimly that there was a distinction between this man and a young student who could write sonnets and play the piano quite well. This old blockhead was coolly gnawing at the bread, while he, Peza, was being throttled by a dead man’s arms.

He looked behind him, and saw that a head by some chance had been uncovered from its blanket. Two liquid-like eyes were staring into his face. The head was turned a little sideways as if to get better opportunity for the scrutiny. Peza could feel himself blanch; he was being drawn and drawn by these dead men slowly, firmly down as to some mystic chamber under the earth where they could walk, dreadful figures, swollen and blood-marked. He was bidden; they had commanded him; he was going, going, going.

When the man in the new white helmet bolted for the rear, many of the soldiers in the trench thought that he had been struck. But those who had been nearest to him knew better. Otherwise they would have heard the silken, sliding, tender noise of the bullet and the thud of its impact. They bawled after him curses, and also outbursts of self-congratulation and vanity. Despite the prominence of the cowardly part, they were enabled to see in this exhibition a fine comment upon their own fortitude. The other soldiers thought that Peza had been wounded somewhere in the neck, because as he ran he was tearing madly at the bandoleer, the dead man’s arms. The soldier with the bread paused in his eating and cynically remarked upon the speed of the runaway.

An officer’s voice was suddenly heard calling out the calculation of the distance to the enemy, the readjustment of the sights. There was a stirring rattle along the line. The men turned their eyes to the front. Other trenches beneath them to the right were already heavily in action. The smoke was lifting toward the blue sky. The soldier with the bread placed it carefully on a bit of paper beside him as he turned to kneel in the trench.

VII

In the late afternoon, the child ceased his play on the mountain with his flocks and his dogs. Part of the battle had whirled very near to the base of his hill, and the noise was great. Sometimes he could see fantastic smoky shapes which resembled the curious figures in foam which one sees on the slant of a rough sea. The plain, indeed, was etched in white circles and whirligigs like the slope of a colossal wave. The child took seat on a stone and contemplated the fight. He was beginning to be astonished; he had never before seen cattle herded with such uproar. Lines of flame flashed out here and there. It was mystery.

Finally, without any preliminary indication, he began to weep. If the men struggling on the plain had had time and greater vision, they could have seen this strange tiny figure seated on a boulder, surveying them while the tears streamed. It was as simple as some powerful symbol.

As the magic clear light of day amid the mountains dimmed the distances, and the plain shone as a pallid blue cloth marked by the red threads of the firing, the child arose and moved off to the unwelcoming door of his home. He called softly for his mother, and complained of his hunger in the familiar formulæ. The pearl-colored cow, grinding her jaws thoughtfully, stared at him with her large eyes. The peaceful gloom of evening was slowly draping the hills.

The child heard a rattle of loose stones on the hill-side, and facing the sound, saw a moment later a man drag himself up to the crest of the hill and fall panting. Forgetting his mother and his hunger, filled with calm interest, the child walked forward and stood over the heaving form. His eyes, too, were now large and inscrutably wise and sad, like those of the animal in the house.

After a silence, he spoke inquiringly. “Are you a man?”

Peza rolled over quickly and gazed up into the fearless cherubic countenance. He did not attempt to reply. He breathed as if life was about to leave his body. He was covered with dust; his face had been cut in some way, and his cheek was ribboned with blood. All the spick of his former appearance had vanished in a general dishevelment, in which he resembled a creature that had been flung to and fro, up and down, by cliffs and prairies during an earthquake. He rolled his eye glassily at the child.

They remained thus until the child repeated his words. “Are you a man?”

Peza gasped in the manner of a fish. Palsied, windless, and abject, he confronted the primitive courage, the sovereign child, the brother of the mountains, the sky and the sea, and he knew that the definition of his misery could be written on a wee grass-blade.

Freddie was mixing a cocktail. His hand with the long spoon was whirling swiftly and the ice in the glass hummed and rattled like a cheap watch. Over by the window, a gambler, a millionaire, a railway conductor and the agent of a vast American syndicate were playing seven-up. Freddie surveyed them with the ironical glance of a man who is mixing a cocktail.

From time to time a swarthy Mexican waiter came with his tray from the rooms at the rear and called his orders across the bar. The sounds of the indolent stir of the city, awakening from its siesta, floated over the screens which barred the sun and the inquisitive eye. From the faraway kitchen could be heard the roar of the old French chef, driving, herding and abusing his Mexican helpers.

A string of men came suddenly in from the street. They stormed up to the bar. There were impatient shouts. “Come, now, Freddie, don’t stand there like a portrait of yourself. Wiggle!” Drinks of many kinds and colors, amber, green, mahogany, strong and mild, began to swarm upon the bar with all the attendants of lemon, sugar, mint and ice. Freddie, with Mexican support, worked like a sailor in the provision of them, sometimes talking with that scorn for drink and admiration for those who drink which is the attribute of a good bar-keeper.

At last a man was afflicted with a stroke of dice-shaking. A herculean discussion was waging and he was deeply engaged in it but at the same time he lazily flirted the dice. Occasionally he made great combinations. “Look at that, would you?” he cried proudly. The others paid little heed. Then violently the craving took them. It went along the line like an epidemic and involved them all. In a moment they had arranged a carnival of dice-shaking with money penalties and liquid prizes. They clamorously made it a point of honor with Freddie that he too should play and take his chance of sometimes providing this large group with free refreshment. With bended heads like foot-ball players they surged over the tinkling dice, jostling, cheering and bitterly arguing. One of the quiet company playing seven-up at the corner table said profanely that the row reminded him of a bowling contest at a picnic.

After the regular shower, many carriages rolled over the smooth calle and sent a musical thunder through the Casa Verde. The shop-windows became aglow with light and the walks were crowded with youths, callow and ogling, dressed vainly according to supposititious fashions. The policemen had muffled themselves in their gnome-like cloaks and placed their lanterns as obstacles for the carriages in the middle of the street. The City of Mexico gave forth the deep mellow organ-tones of its evening resurrection.

But still the group at the bar of the Casa Verde were shaking dice. They had passed beyond shaking for drinks for the crowd, for Mexican dollars, for dinner, for the wine at dinner. They had even gone to the trouble of separating the cigars and cigarettes from the dinner’s bill and causing a distinct man to be responsible for them. Finally they were aghast. Nothing remained within sight of their minds which even remotely suggested further gambling. There was a pause for deep consideration.

“Well -”

“Well -”

A man called out in the exuberance of creation. “I know! Let’s shake for a box to-night at the circus! A box at the circus!” The group was profoundly edified. “That’s it! That’s it! Come on now! Box at the circus!” A dominating voice cried: “Three dashes - high man out!” An American, tall and with a face of copper red from the rays that flash among the Sierra Madres and burn on the cactus deserts, took the little leathern cup and spun the dice out upon the polished wood. A fascinated assemblage hung upon the bar-rail. Three kings turned their pink faces upward. The tall man flourished the cup, burlesquing, and flung the two other dice. From them he ultimately extracted one more pink king. “There,” he said. “Now, let’s see! Four kings!” He began to swagger in a sort of provisional way.

The next man took the cup and blew softly in the top of it. Poising it in his hand, he then surveyed the company with a stony eye and paused. They knew perfectly well that he was applying the magic of deliberation and ostentatious indifference but they could not wait in tranquility during the performances of all these rites. They began to call out impatiently. “Come now - hurry up.” At last the man with a gesture that was singularly impressive, threw the dice. The others set up a howl of joy. “Not a pair!” There was another solemn pause. The men moved restlessly. “Come, now, go ahead!” In the end the man, induced and abused, achieved something that was nothing in the presence of four kings. The tall man climbed on the foot-rail and leaned hazardously forward. “Four kings! My four kings are good to go out,” he bellowed into the middle of the mob and although in a moment he did pass into the radiant region of exemption he continued to bawl advice and scorn.

The mirrors and oiled woods of the Casa Verde were now dancing with blue flashes from a great buzzing electric lamp. A host of quiet members of the Anglo-Saxon colony had come in for their pre-dinner cocktails. An amiable person was exhibiting to some tourists this popular American saloon. It was a very sober and respectable time of day. Freddie reproved courageously the dice-shaking brawlers and, in return, he received the choicest advice in a tumult of seven combined vocabularies. He laughed; he had been compelled to retire from the game but he was keeping an interested, if furtive, eye upon it.

Down at the end of the line, there was a youth at whom everybody railed for his flaming ill-luck. At each disaster, Freddie swore from behind the bar in a sort of affectionate contempt. “Why this Kid has had no luck for two days. Did you ever see such throwin’.”

The contest narrowed eventually to the New York Kid and an individual who swung about placidly on legs that moved in nefarious circles. He had a grin that resembled a bit of carving. He was obliged to lean down and blink rapidly to ascertain the facts of his venture but fate presented him with five queens. His smile did not change but he puffed gently like a man who has been running.

The others, having emerged scatheless from this part of the conflict, waxed hilarious with the Kid. They smote him on either shoulder. “We’ve got you stuck for it, Kid! You can’t beat that game! Five queens!”

Up to this time, the Kid had displayed only the temper of the gambler but the cheerful hoots of the players supplemented now by a ring of guying non-combatants caused him to feel profoundly that it would be fine to beat the five queens. He addressed a gambler’s slogan to the interior of the cup.   “Oh, five white mice of chance,

Shirts of wool and corduroy pants,

Gold and wine, women and sin,

All for you if you let me come in –

Into the house of chance.”  

Flashing the dice sardonically out upon the bar, he displayed three aces. From two dice in the next throw, he achieved one more ace. For his last throw, he rattled the single dice for a long time. He already had four aces; if he accomplished another one, the five queens were vanquished and the box at the circus came from the drunken man’s pocket. All of the Kid’s movements were slow and elaborate. For his last throw he planted the cup bottom-up on the bar with the one dice hidden under it. Then he turned and faced the crowd with the air of a conjuror or a cheat. “Oh, maybe it’s an ace,” he said in boastful calm. “Maybe it’s an ace.” Instantly he was presiding over a little drama in which every man was absorbed. The Kid leaned with his back against the bar-rail and with his elbows upon it. “Maybe it’s an ace,” he repeated.

A jeering voice in the background said: “Yes, maybe it is, Kid!”

The Kid’s eyes searched for a moment among the men. “I’ll bet fifty dollars it is an ace,” he said.

Another voice asked: “American money?”

“Yes,” answered the Kid.

“Oh!” There was a genial laugh at this discomfiture. However no one came forward at the Kid’s challenge and presently he turned to the cup. “Now, I’ll show you.” With the manner of a mayor unveiling a statue, he lifted the cup. There was revealed naught but a ten-spot. In the roar which arose could be heard each man ridiculing the cowardice of his neighbor and above all the din rang the voice of Freddie berating everyone. “Why, there isn’t one liver to every five men in the outfit. That was the greatest cold bluff I ever saw worked. He wouldn’t know how to cheat with dice if he wanted to. Don’t know the first thing about it. I could hardly keep from laughin’ when I seen him drillin’ you around. Why, I tell you, I had that fifty dollars right in my pocket if I wanted to be a chump. You’re an easy lot -”

Nevertheless the group who had won in the circus-box game did not relinquish their triumph. They burst like a storm about the head of the Kid, swinging at him with their fists. “Five white mice!” they quoted choking. “Five white mice!”

“Oh, they are not so bad,” said the Kid.

Afterward it often occurred that a man would suddenly jeer a finger at the Kid and derisively say: “Five white mice.”

On the route from the dinner to the circus, others of the party often asked the Kid if he had really intended to make his appeal to mice. They suggested other animals - rabbits, dogs, hedgehogs, snakes, opossums. To this banter the Kid replied with a serious expression of his belief in the fidelity and wisdom of the five white mice. He presented a most eloquent case, decorated with fine language and insults, in which he proved that if one was going to believe in anything at all, one might as well choose the five white mice. His companions however at once and unanimously pointed out to him that his recent exploit did not place him in the light of a convincing advocate.

The Kid discerned two figures in the street. They were making imperious signs at him. He waited for them to approach, for he recognized one as the other Kid - the ‘Frisco Kid - there were two Kids. With the ‘Frisco Kid was Benson. They arrived almost breathless. “Where you been?” cried the ‘Frisco Kid. It was an arrangement that upon a meeting the one that could first ask this question was entitled to use a tone of limitless injury. “What you been doing? Where you going? Come on with us. Benson and I have got a little scheme.”

The New York Kid pulled his arm from the grapple of the other. “I can’t. I’ve got to take these sutlers to the circus. They stuck me for it shaking dice at Freddie’s. I can’t, I tell you.”

The two did not at first attend to his remarks. “Come on! We’ve got a little scheme.”

“I can’t. They stuck me. I’ve got to take’m to the circus.”

At this time it did not suit the men with the scheme to recognize these objections as important. “Oh, take’m some other time. Well, can’t you take’m some other time? Let ’em go. Damn the circus. Get cold feet. What did you get stuck for? Get cold feet.”

But despite their fighting, the New York Kid broke away from them. “I can’t, I tell you. They stuck me.” As he left them, they yelled with rage. “Well, meet us, now, do you hear? In the Casa Verde as soon as the circus quits! Hear?” They threw maledictions after him.

In the City of Mexico, a man goes to the circus without descending in any way to infant amusements because the Circo Teatro Orrin is one of the best in the world and too easily surpasses anything of the kind in the United States where it is merely a matter of a number of rings, if possible, and a great professional agreement to lie to the public. Moreover the American clown who in the Mexican arena prances and gabbles is the clown to whom writers refer as the delight of their childhood and lament that he is dead. At this circus the Kid was not debased by the sight of mournful prisoner elephants and caged animals forlorn and sickly. He sat in his box until late and laughed and swore when past laughing at the comic, foolish, wise clown.