CHAPTER XXI
JEAN BELIEVES THAT SHE TAKES MATTERS INTO HER OWN HANDS
After all, Jean did not have to fight her way clear through "WarringMexico" and back again, in order to reach Nogales. She let Lite takeher to the snug little apartment which she was to share with Muriel andher mother, and she fancied that she had been very crafty and verynatural in her manner all the while he was with her, and that Lite didnot dream of what she had in her mind to do. At any rate, she watchedhim stalk away on his high-heeled riding-boots, and she thought thathis mind was perfectly at ease. (Jean, I fear, never will understandLite half as well as Lite has always understood Jean.)
She caught the next down-town car and went straight to the informationbureau of the Southern Pacific, established for the convenience of thepublic and the sanity of employees who have something to do besidesanswer foolish questions.
She found a young man there who was not averse to talking at lengthwith a young woman who was dressed trimly in a street suit of thelatest fashion, and who had almost entrancing, soft drawl to her voiceand a most fascinating way of looking at one. This young man appearedto know a great deal, and to be almost eager to pass along his wisdom.He knew all about Nogales, Mexico, for instance, and just what trainwould next depart in that general direction, and how much it wouldcost, and how long she would have to wait in Tucson for the once-a-daytrain to Nogales, and when she might logically expect to arrive in thatsquatty little town that might be said to be really and truly dividedagainst itself. Here the nice young man became facetious.
"Bible tells us a city divided against itself cannot stand," heinformed Jean quite gratuitously. "Well, maybe that's straight goods,too. But Nogales is cut right through at the waist line with theinternational boundary line. United States customhouse on one cornerof the street, Mexican customhouse in talking distance on the othercorner. Great place for holdups, that!" This was a joke, and Jeansmiled obligingly. "First the United States holds you up, and then theMexicans. You get it coming and going. Well, Nogales don't have tostand. It squats. It's adobe mostly."
Jean was interested, and she did not discourage the nice young man.She let him say all he could think of on the subject of Nogales and theFederal troops stationed there, and on warring Mexico generally. Whenshe left him, she felt as if she knew a great deal about the end of herjourney. So she smiled and thanked the nice young man in that softdrawl that lingered pleasantly in his memory, and went over to anotherwindow and bought a ticket to Nogales. She moved farther along toanother window and secured a Pullman ticket which gave her lower fivein car four for her comfort.
With an impulse of wanting to let her Uncle Carl know that she was notforgetting her mission, she sent him this laconic telegram:
Have located Art. Will bring him back with me. JEAN.
After that, she went home and packed a suit-case and her six-shooterand belt. She did not, after all, know just what might happen inNogales, Mexico, but she meant to bring back Art Osgood if he were tobe found alive; hence the six-shooter.
That evening she told Muriel that she was going to run away and haveher vacation--her "vacation" hunting down and capturing a murderer whohad taken refuge in the Mexican army!--and that she would write whenshe knew just where she would stop. Then she went away alone in a taxito the depot, and started on her journey with a six-shooter jostling abox of chocolates in her suit-case, and with her heart almost lightagain, now that she was at last following a clue that promisedsomething at the other end.
It was all just as the nice young man had told her. Jean arrived inTucson, and she left on time, on the once-a-day train to Nogales.
Lite also arrived in Tucson on time, though Jean did not see him, sincehe descended from the chair car with some caution just as she went intothe depot. He did not depart on time as it happened; he was thirsty,and he went off to find something wetter than water to drink, and whilehe was gone the once-a-day train also went off through the desert.Lite saw the last pair of wheels it owned go clipping over the switch,and he stood in the middle of the track and swore. Then he went to thetelegraph office and found out that a freight left for Nogales in tenminutes. He hunted up the conductor and did things to his bank roll,and afterwards climbed into the caboose on the sidetrack. Lite hasbeen so careful to keep in the background, through all these chapters,that it seems a shame to tell on him now. But I am going to say that,little as Jean suspected it, he had been quite as interested in findingArt Osgood as had she herself. When he saw her pass through the gateto the train, in Los Angeles, that was his first intimation that shewas going to Nogales; so he had stayed in the chair car out of sight.But it just shows how great minds run in the same channel; and how,without suspecting one another, these two started at the same time uponthe same quest.
Jean stared out over the barrenness that was not like the barrenness ofMontana, and tried not to think that perhaps Art Osgood had by thistime drifted on into obscurity. Still, if he had drifted on, surelyshe could trace him, since he had been serving on the staff of ageneral and should therefore be pretty well known. What she reallyhated most to think of was the possibility that he might have beenkilled. They did get killed, sometimes, down there where there was somuch fighting going on all the time.
When the shadows of the giant cactus stretched mutilated hands acrossthe desert sand, and she believed that Nogales was near, Jean carriedher suit-case to the cramped dressing-room and took out her six-shooterand buckled it around her. Then she pulled her coat down over it witha good deal of twisting and turning before the dirty mirror to see thatit looked all right, and not in the least as though a perfect lady waspacking a gun.
She went back and dipped fastidious fingers into the box of chocolates,and settled herself to nibble candy and wait for what might come. Shefelt very calm and self-possessed and sure of herself. Her only fearwas that Art Osgood might have been killed, and his lips closed for alltime. So they rattled away through the barrenness and drew near toNogales.
Casa del Sonora, whither she went, was an old, two-story structure ofthe truly Spanish type, and it was kept by a huge, blubbery creaturewith piggish eyes and a bloated, purple countenance and the palsy. Asmuch of him as appeared to be human appeared to be Irish; and Jean,after the first qualm of repulsion, when she faced him over the hotelregister, detected a certain kindly solicitude in his manner, and wasreassured.
So far, everything had run smoothly, like a well-staged play. Absurdlysimple, utterly devoid of any element of danger, any vexatious obstacleto the immediate achievement of her purpose! But Jean was not thrownoff her guard because of the smoothness of the trail.
The trip from Tucson had been terribly tiresome; she was weary in everyfibre, it seemed to her. But for all that she intended, sometime thatevening, to meet Art Osgood if he were in town. She intended to takehim with her on the train that left the next morning. She thought itwould be a good idea to rest now, and to proceed deliberately, lest shefrustrate all her plans by over-eagerness.
Perhaps she slept a little while she lay upon the bed and schooledherself to calmness. A band, somewhere, playing a pulsing Spanish air,brought her to her feet. She went to the window and looked out, and sawthat the street lay cool and sunless with the coming of dusk.
From the American customhouse just on the opposite corner came LiteAvery, stalking leisurely along in his high-heeled riding-boots. Jeandrew back with a little flutter of the pulse and watched him, wonderinghow he came to be in Nogales. She had last seen him boarding a carthat would take him out to the Great Western Studio; and now, here hewas, sauntering across the street as if he lived here. It was likefinding his bed up in the loft and knowing all at once that he had beenkeeping watch all the while, thinking of her welfare and never givingher the least hint of it. That at least was understandable. But toher there was something uncanny about his being here in Nogales. Whenhe was gone, she stepped out through the open window to the verandathat ran the whole l
ength of the hotel, and looked across the streetinto Mexico.
She was, she decided critically, about fifteen feet from the boundaryline. Just across the street fluttered the Mexican flag from theMexican customhouse. A Mexican guard lounged against the wall, hisswarthy face mask-like in its calm. While she leaned over the railingand stared curiously at that part of the street which was anothercountry, from the hills away to the west, where were campedsoldiers,--the American soldiers,--who prevented the war from sloppingover the line now and then into Arizona, came the clear notes of abugle held close-pressed against the lips of a United States soldier insnug-fitting khaki. The boom of the sundown salute followedimmediately after. In the street below her, Mexicans and Americansmingled amiably and sauntered here and there, killing time during thatbored interval between eating and the evening's amusement.
Just beyond the Mexican boundary, the door of a long, adobe cantina wasflung open, and a group of men came out and paused as if they werewondering what they should do next, and where they should go. Jeanlooked them over curiously. Mexicans they were not, though they hadsome of the dress which belonged on that side of the boundary.
Americans they were; one knew by the set of their shoulders, by thelittle traits of race which have nothing to do with complexion orspeech.
Jean caught her breath and leaned forward. There was Art Osgood,standing with his back toward her and with one palm spread upon his hipin the attitude she knew so well. If only he would turn! Should sherun down the stairs and go over there and march him across the line atthe muzzle of her revolver? The idea repelled her, now that she hadactually come to the point of action.
Jean, now that the crisis had arrived, used her woman's wile, ratherthan the harsher but perhaps less effective weapons of a man.
"Oh, Art!" she called, just exactly as she would have called to him onthe range, in Montana "Hello, Art!"
Art Osgood wheeled and sent a startled, seeking glance up at theveranda; saw her and knew who it was that had called him, and liftedhis hat in the gesture that she knew so well. Jean's fingers wereclose to her gun, though she was not conscious of it, or of thestrained, tense muscles that waited the next move.
Art, contrary to her expectations, did the most natural thing in theworld. He grinned and came hurrying toward her with the long, eagersteps of one who goes to greet a friend after an absence that makes ofthat meeting an event. Jean watched him cross the street. She waited,dazed by the instant success of her ruse, while he disappeared underthe veranda. She heard his feet upon the stairs. She heard him comestriding down the hall to the glass-paneled door. She saw him comingtoward her, still grinning in his joy at the meeting.
"Jean Douglas! By all that's lucky!" he was exclaiming. "Where in theworld did you light down from?" He came to a stop directly in front ofher, and held out his hand in unsuspecting friendship.