Further Foolishness

The General shook hands and seated himself again at his work. The interview was at an end. We withdrew.

The next morning we followed without difficulty the path indicated. A few hours' walk over the mountain pass brought us to a little straggling village of adobe houses, sleeping drowsily in the sun.

There were but few signs of life in its one street—a mule here and there tethered in the sun, and one or two Mexicans drowsily smoking in the shade.

One building only, evidently newly made, and of lumber, had a decidedly American appearance. Its doorway bore the sign GENERAL OFFICES OF THE COMPANY, and under it the notice KEEP OUT, while on one of its windows was painted GENERAL MANAGER and below it the legend NO ADMISSION, and on the other, SECRETARY'S OFFICE: GO AWAY.

We therefore entered at once.

"General Francesco Villa?" said a clerk, evidently American. "Yes, he's here all right. At least, this is the office."

"And where is the General?" I asked.

The clerk turned to an assistant at a desk in a corner of the room.

"Where's Frank working this morning?" he asked.

"Over down in the gulch," said the other, turning round for a moment. "There's an attack on American cavalry this morning."

"Oh, yes, I forgot," said the chief clerk. "I thought it was the Indian Massacre, but I guess that's for to-morrow. Go straight to the end of the street and turn left about half a mile and you'll find the boys down there."

We thanked him and withdrew.

We passed across the open plaza, and went down a narrow side road, bordered here and there with adobe houses, and so out into the open country. Here the hills rose again and the road that we followed wound sharply round a turn into a deep gorge, bordered with rocks and sage brush. We had no sooner turned the curve of the road than we came upon a scene of great activity. Men in Mexican costume were running to and fro apparently arranging a sort of barricade at the side of the road. Others seemed to be climbing the rocks on the further side of the gorge, as if seeking points of advantage. I noticed that all were armed with rifles and machetes and presented a formidable appearance. Of Villa himself I could see nothing. But there was a grim reality about the glittering knives, the rifles and the maxim guns that I saw concealed in the sage brush beside the road.

"What is it?" I asked of a man who was standing idle, watching the scene from the same side of the road as ourselves.

"Attack of American cavalry," he said nonchalantly.

"Here!" I gasped.

"Yep, in about ten minutes: soon as they are ready."

"Where's Villa?"

"It's him they're attacking. They chase him here, see! This is an ambush. Villa rounds on them right here, and they fight to a finish!"

"Great heavens!" I exclaimed. "How do you know that?"

"Know it? Why because I seen it. Ain't they been trying it out for three days? Why, I'd be in it myself only I'm off work. Got a sore toe yesterday—horse stepped on it."

All this was, of course, quite unintelligible to me.

"But it's right here where they're going to fight?" I asked.

"Sure," said the American, as he moved carelessly aside, "as soon as the boss gets it all ready."

I noticed for the first time a heavy-looking man in an American tweed suit and a white plug hat, moving to and fro and calling out directions with an air of authority.

"Here!" he shouted, "what in h—l are you doing with that machine gun? You've got it clean out of focus. Here, Jose, come in closer—that's right. Steady there now, and don't forget, at the second whistle you and Pete are dead. Here, you, Pete, how in thunder do you think you can die there? You're all out of the picture and hidden by that there sage brush. That's no place to die. And, boys, remember one thing, now, die slow. Ed"—he turned and called apparently to some one invisible behind the rocks—"when them two boys is killed, turn her round on them, slew her round good and get them centre focus. Now then, are you all set? Ready?"

At this moment the speaker turned and saw Raymon and myself.

"Here, youse," he shouted, "get further back, you're in the picture. Or, say, no, stay right where you are. You," he said, pointing to me, "stay right where you are and I'll give you a dollar to just hold that horror; you understand, just keep on registering it. Don't do another thing, just register that face."

His words were meaningless to me. I had never known before that it was possible to make money by merely registering my face.

"No, no," cried out Raymon, "my friend here is not wanting work. He has a message, a message of great importance for General Villa."

"Well," called back the boss, "he'll have to wait. We can't stop now. All ready, boys? One—two—now!"

And with that he put a whistle to his lips and blew a long shrill blast.

Then in a moment the whole scene was transformed. Rifle shots rang out from every crag and bush that bordered the gully.

A wild scamper of horses' hoofs was heard and in a moment there came tearing down the road a whole troop of mounted Mexicans, evidently in flight, for they turned and fired from their saddles as they rode. The horses that carried them were wild with excitement and flecked with foam. The Mexican cavalry men shouted and yelled, brandishing their machetes and firing their revolvers. Here and there a horse and rider fell to the ground in a great whirl of sand and dust. In the thick of the press, a leader of ferocious aspect, mounted upon a gigantic black horse, waved his sombrero about his head.

"Villa—it is Villa!" cried Raymon, tense with excitement. "Is he not magnifico? But look! Look—the Americanos! They are coming!"

It was a glorious sight to see them as they rode madly on the heels of the Mexicans—a whole company of American cavalry, their horses shoulder to shoulder, the men bent low in their saddles, their carbines gripped in their hands. They rode in squadrons and in line, not like the shouting, confused mass of the Mexicans—but steady, disciplined, irresistible.

On the right flank in front a grey-haired officer steadied the charging line. The excitement of it was maddening.

"Go to it," I shouted in uncontrollable emotion. "Your Mexicans are licked, Raymon, they're no good!"

"But look!" said Raymon. "See—the ambush, the ambuscada!"

For as they reached the centre of the gorge in front of us the Mexicans suddenly checked their horses, bringing them plunging on their haunches in the dust, and then swung round upon their pursuers, while from every crag and bush at the side of the gorge the concealed riflemen sprang into view—and the sputtering of the machine guns swept the advancing column with a volley.

We could see the American line checked as with the buffet of a great wave, men and horses rolling in the road. Through the smoke one saw the grey-haired leader —dismounted, his uniform torn, his hat gone, but still brandishing his sword and calling his orders to his men, his face as one caught in a flash of sunlight, steady and fearless. His words I could not hear, but one saw the American cavalry, still unbroken, dismount, throw themselves behind their horses, and fire with steady aim into the mass of the Mexicans. We could see the Mexicans in front of where we stood falling thick and fast, in little huddled bundles of colour, kicking the sand. The man Pete had gone down right in the foreground and was breathing out his soul before our eyes.

"Well done," I shouted. "Go to it, boys! You can lick 'em yet! Hurrah for the United States. Look, Raymon, look! They've shot down the crew of the machine guns. See, see, the Mexicans are turning to run. At 'em, boys! They're waving the American flag! There it is in all the thick of the smoke! Hark! There's the bugle call to mount again! They're going to charge again! Here they come!"

As the American cavalry came tearing forward, the Mexicans leaped from their places with gestures of mingled rage and terror as if about to break and run.

The battle, had it continued, could have but one end.

But at this moment we heard from the town behind us the long sustained note of a steam whistle blowing the hour of noon.

In an instant the firing ceased.

The battle stopped. The Mexicans picked themselves up off the ground and began brushing off the dust from their black velvet jackets. The American cavalry reined in their horses. Dead Pete came to life. General Villa and the American leader and a number of others strolled over towards the boss, who stood beside the fence vociferating his comments.

"That won't do!" he was shouting. "That won't do! Where in blazes was that infernal Sister of Mercy? Miss Jenkinson!" and he called to a tall girl, whom I now noticed for the first time among the crowd, wearing a sort of khaki costume and a short skirt and carrying a water bottle in a strap. "You never got into the picture at all. I want you right in there among the horses, under their feet."

"Land sakes!" said the Sister of Mercy. "You ain't no right to ask me to go in there among them horses and be trampled."

"Ain't you paid to be trampled?" said the manager angrily. Then as he caught sight of Villa he broke off and said: "Frank, you boys done fine. It's going to be a good act, all right. But it ain't just got the right amount of ginger in it yet. We'll try her over once again, anyway."

"Now, boys," he continued, calling out to the crowd with a voice like a megaphone, "this afternoon at three-thirty —Hospital scene. I only want the wounded, the doctors and the Sisters of Mercy. All the rest of youse is free till ten to-morrow—for the Indian Massacre. Everybody up for that."

It was an hour or two later that I had my interview with Villa in a back room of the little posada, or inn, of the town. The General had removed his ferocious wig of straight black hair, and substituted a check suit for his warlike costume. He had washed the darker part of the paint off his face—in fact, he looked once again the same Frank Villa that I used to know when he kept his Mexican cigar store in Buffalo.

"Well, Frank," I said, "I'm afraid I came down here under a misunderstanding."

"Looks like it," said the General, as he rolled a cigarette.

"And you wouldn't care to go back even for the offer that I am commissioned to make—your old job back again, and half the profits on a new cigar to be called the Francesco Villa?"

The General shook his head.

"It sounds good, all right," he said, "but this moving-picture business is better."

"I see," I said, "I hadn't understood. I thought there really was a revolution here in Mexico."

"No," said Villa, shaking his head, "been no revolution down here for years—not since Diaz. The picture companies came in and took the whole thing over; they made us a fair offer—so much a reel straight out, and a royalty, and let us divide up the territory as we liked. The first film we done was the bombardment of Vera Cruz. Say, that was a dandy; did you see it?"

"No," I said.

"They had us all in that," he continued. "I done an American Marine. Lots of people think it all real when they see it."

"Why," I said, "nearly everybody does. Even the President—"

"Oh, I guess he knows," said Villa, "but, you see, there's tons of money in it and it's good for business, and he's too decent a man to give It away. Say, I heard the boy saying there's a war in Europe. I wonder what company got that up, eh? But I don't believe it'll draw. There ain't the scenery for it that we have in Mexico."

"Alas!" murmured Raymon. "Our beautiful Mexico. To what is she fallen! Needing only water, air, light and soil to make her—"

"Come on, Raymon," I said, "let's go home."

XIV. Over the Grape Juice; or, The Peacemakers

Characters

MR. W. JENNINGS BRYAN.

DR. DAVID STARR JORDAN.

A PHILANTHROPIST.

MR. NORMAN ANGELL.

A LADY PACIFIST.

A NEGRO PRESIDENT.

AN EMINENT DIVINE.

THE MAN ON THE STREET.

THE GENERAL PUBLIC.

And many others.

"War," said the Negro President of Haiti, "is a sad spectacle. It shames our polite civilisation."

As he spoke, he looked about him at the assembled company around the huge dinner table, glittering with cut glass and white linen, and brilliant with hot-house flowers.

"A sad spectacle," he repeated, rolling his big eyes in his black and yellow face that was melancholy with the broken pathos of the African race.

The occasion was a notable one. It was the banquet of the Peacemakers' Conference of 1917 and the company gathered about the board was as notable as it was numerous.

At the head of the table the genial Mr. Jennings Bryan presided as host, his broad countenance beaming with amiability, and a tall flagon of grape juice standing beside his hand. A little further down the table one saw the benevolent head and placid physiognomy of Mr. Norman Angell, bowed forward as if in deep calculation. Within earshot of Mr. Bryan, but not listening to him, one recognised without the slightest difficulty Dr. David Starr Jordan, the distinguished ichthyologist and director in chief of the World's Peace Foundation, while the bland features of a gentleman from China, and the presence of a yellow delegate from the Mosquito Coast, gave ample evidence that the company had been gathered together without reference to colour, race, religion, education, or other prejudices whatsoever.

But it would be out of the question to indicate by name the whole of the notable assemblage. Indeed, certain of the guests, while carrying in their faces and attitudes something strangely and elusively familiar, seemed in a sense to be nameless, and to represent rather types and abstractions than actual personalities. Such was the case, for instance, with a female member of the company, seated in a place of honour near the host, whose demure garb and gentle countenance seemed to indicate her as a Lady Pacifist, but denied all further identification. The mild, ecclesiastical features of a second guest, so entirely Christian in its expression as to be almost devoid of expression altogether, marked him at once as An Eminent Divine, but, while puzzlingly suggestive of an actual and well-known person, seemed to elude exact recognition. His accent, when he presently spoke, stamped him as British and his garb was that of the Established Church. Another guest appeared to answer to the general designation of Capitalist or Philanthropist, and seemed from his prehensile grasp upon his knife and fork to typify the Money Power. In front of this guest, doubtless with a view of indicating his extreme wealth and the consideration in which he stood, was placed a floral decoration representing a broken bank, with the figure of a ruined depositor entwined among the debris.

Of these nameless guests, two individuals alone, from the very significance of their appearance, from their plain dress, unsuited to the occasion, and from the puzzled expression of their faces, seemed out of harmony with the galaxy of distinction which surrounded them. They seemed to speak only to one another, and even that somewhat after the fashion of an appreciative chorus to what the rest of the company was saying; while the manner in which they rubbed their hands together and hung upon the words of the other speakers in humble expectancy seemed to imply that they were present in the hope of gathering rather than shedding light. To these two humble and obsequious guests no attention whatever was paid, though it was understood, by those who knew, that their names were The General Public and the Man on the Street.

"A sad spectacle," said the Negro President, and he sighed as he spoke. "One wonders if our civilisation, if our moral standards themselves, are slipping from us." Then half in reverie, or as if overcome by the melancholy of his own thought, he lifted a spoon from the table and slid it gently into the bosom of his faded uniform.

"Put back that spoon!" called The Lady Pacifist sharply.

"Pardon!" said the Negro President humbly, as he put it back. The humiliation of generations of servitude was in his voice.

"Come, come," exclaimed Mr. Jennings Bryan cheerfully, "try a little more of the grape juice?"

"Does it intoxicate?" asked the President.

"Never," answered Mr. Bryan. "Rest assured of that. I can guarantee it. The grape is picked in the dark. It is then carried, still in the dark, to the testing room. There every particle of alcohol is removed. Try it."

"Thank you," said the President. "I am no longer thirsty."

"Will anybody have some more of the grape juice?" asked Mr. Bryan, running his eye along the ranks of the guests.

No one spoke.

"Will anybody have some more ground peanuts?"

No one moved.

"Or does anybody want any more of the shredded tan bark? No? Or will somebody have another spoonful of sunflower seeds?"

There was still no sign of assent.

"Very well, then," said Mr. Bryan, "the banquet, as such, is over, and we now come to the more serious part of our business. I need hardly tell you that we are here for a serious purpose. We are here to do good. That I know is enough to enlist the ardent sympathy of everybody present."

There was a murmur of assent.

"Personally," said The Lady Pacifist, "I do nothing else."

"Neither do I," said the guest who has been designated The Philanthropist, "whether I am producing oil, or making steel, or building motor-cars."

"Does he build motor-cars?" whispered the humble person called The Man in the Street to his fellow, The General Public.

"All great philanthropists do things like that," answered his friend. "They do it as a social service so as to benefit humanity; any money they make is just an accident. They don't really care about it a bit. Listen to him. He's going to say so."

"Indeed, our business itself," The Philanthropist continued, while his face lighted up with unselfish enthusiasm, "our business itself—"

"Hush, hush!" said Mr. Bryan gently. "We know—"

"Our business itself," persisted The Philanthropist, "is one great piece of philanthropy."

Tears gathered in his eyes.

"Come, come," said Mr. Bryan firmly, "we must get to business. Our friend here," he continued, turning to the company at large and indicating the Negro President on his right, "has come to us in great distress. His beautiful island of Haiti is and has been for many years overwhelmed in civil war. Now he learns that not only Haiti, but also Europe is engulfed in conflict. He has heard that we are making proposals for ending the war —indeed, I may say are about to declare that the war in Europe must stop—I think I am right, am I not, my friends?"

There was a general chorus of assent.

"Naturally then," continued Mr. Bryan, "our friend the President of Haiti, who is overwhelmed with grief at what has been happening in his island, has come to us for help. That is correct, is it not?"

"That's it, gentlemen," said the Negro President, in a voice of some emotion, wiping the sleeve of his faded uniform across his eyes. "The situation is quite beyond my control. In fact," he added, shaking his head pathetically as he relapsed into more natural speech, "dis hyah chile, gen'l'n, is clean done beat with it. Dey ain't doin' nuffin' on the island but shootin', burnin', and killin' somethin' awful. Lawd a massy! it's just like a real civilised country, all right, now. Down in our island we coloured people is feeling just as bad as youse did when all them poor white folks was murdered on the Lusitania!"

But the Negro President had no sooner used the words "Murdered on the Lusitania," than a chorus of dissent and disapproval broke out all down the table.

"My dear sir, my dear sir," protested Mr. Bryan, "pray moderate your language a little, if you please. Murdered? Oh, dear, dear me, how can we hope to advance the cause of peace if you insist on using such terms?"

"Ain't it that? Wasn't it murder?" asked the President, perplexed.

"We are all agreed here," said The Lady Pacifist, "that it is far better to call it an incident. We speak of the 'Lusitania Incident,'" she added didactically, "just as one speaks of the Arabic Incident, and the Cavell Incident, and other episodes of the sort. It makes it so much easier to forget."

"True, quite true," murmured The Eminent Divine, "and then one must remember that there are always two sides to everything. There are two sides to murder. We must not let ourselves forget that there is always the murderer's point of view to consider."

But by this time the Negro President was obviously confused and out of his depth. The conversation had reached a plane of civilisation which was beyond his reach.

The genial Mr. Bryan saw fit to come to his rescue.

"Never mind," said Mr. Bryan soothingly. "Our friends here, will soon settle all your difficulties for you. I'm going to ask them, one after the other, to advise you. They will tell you the various means that they are about to apply to stop the war in Europe, and you may select any that you like for your use in Haiti. We charge you nothing for it, except of course your fair share of the price of this grape juice and the shredded nuts."

The President nodded.

"I am going to ask our friend on my right"—and here Mr. Bryan indicated The Lady Pacifist—"to speak first."

There was a movement of general expectancy and the two obsequious guests at the foot of the table, of whom mention has been made, were seen to nudge one another and whisper, "Isn't this splendid?"

"You are not asking me to speak first merely because I am a woman?" asked The Lady Pacifist.

"Oh no," said Mr. Bryon, with charming tact.

"Very good," said the lady, adjusting her glasses. "As for stopping the war, I warn you, as I have warned the whole world, that it may be too late. They should have called me in sooner. That was the mistake. If they had sent for me at once and had put my picture in the papers both in England and Germany, with the inscription 'The True Woman of To-day,' I doubt if any of the men who looked at it would have felt that it was worth while to fight. But, as things are, the only advice I can give is this. Everybody is wrong (except me). The Germans are a very naughty people. But the Belgians are worse. It was very, very wicked of the Germans to bombard the houses of the Belgians. But how naughty of the Belgians to go and sit in their houses while they were bombarded. It is to that that I attribute—with my infallible sense of justice—the dreadful loss of life. So you see the only conclusion that I can reach is that everybody is very naughty and that the only remedy would be to appoint me a committee—me and a few others, though the others don't really matter—to make a proper settlement. I hope I make myself clear."

The Negro President shook his head and looked mystified.

"Us coloured folks," he said, "wouldn't quite understand that. We done got the idea that sometimes there's such a thing as a quarrel that is right and just." The President's melancholy face lit up with animation and his voice rose to the sonorous vibration of the negro preacher. "We learn that out of the Bible, we coloured folks—we learn to smite the ungodly—"

"Pray, pray," said Mr. Bryan soothingly, "don't introduce religion, let me beg of you. That would be fatal. We peacemakers are all agreed that there must be no question of religion raised."

"Exactly so," murmured The Eminent Divine, "my own feelings exactly. The name of—of—the Deity should never be brought in. It inflames people. Only a few weeks ago I was pained and grieved to the heart to hear a woman in one of our London streets raving that the German Emperor was a murderer. Her child had been killed that night by a bomb from a Zeppelin; she had its body in a cloth hugged to her breast as she talked—thank heaven, they keep these things out of the newspapers—and she was calling down God's vengeance on the Emperor. Most deplorable! Poor creature, unable, I suppose, to realise the Emperor's exalted situation, his splendid lineage, the wonderful talent with which he can draw pictures of the apostles with one hand while he writes an appeal to his Mohammedan comrades with the other. I dined with him once," he added, in modest afterthought.

"I dined with him, too," said Dr. Jordan. "I shall never forget the impression he made. As he entered the room accompanied by his staff, the Emperor looked straight at me and said to one of his aides, 'Who is this?' 'This is Dr. Jordan,' said the officer. The Emperor put out his hand. 'So this is Dr. Jordan,' he said. I never witnessed such an exhibition of brain power in my life. He had seized my name in a moment and held it for three seconds with all the tenaciousness of a Hohenzollern.