Reflections in a Golden Eye (7 page)

'Suppose we have some music,' she said. 'Let's hear the Brahms G Minor Quartet.'

'Fameux,' said Anacleto.

He put on the first record and settled down to listen on his footstool by the fire. But
the opening passage, the lovely dialogue between the piano and the strings, was hardly
completed when there was a knock on the door. Anacleto spoke to someone in the hall,
closed the door again, and turned off the phonograph.

'Mrs. Penderton,' he whispered, lifting his eyebrows.

'I knew I could knock on the door downstairs till doomsday and you all would never hear
me with this music going on,' Leonora said when she came into the room. She sat down on
the foot of the bed so hard that it felt as though she had broken a spring. Then,
remembering that Alison was not well, Leonora tried to look sickly also, as that was her
notion of the proper behavior in a sickroom. 'Do you think you can make it tonight?'

'Make what?'

'Why, my God, Alison! My party! I've been working like a nigger for the past three days
getting everything ready. I don't give a party like this but twice a year.'

'Of course,' said Alison. 'It just slipped my mind for a moment.'

'Listen!' said Leonora, and her fresh rosy face flamed suddenly with anticipation. 'I
just wish you could see my kitchen now. Here's the way it will go. I'm putting in all the
leaves in the dining room table and everybody will just mill around and help themselves.
I'm having a couple of Virginia hams, a huge turkey, fried chicken, sliced cold pork,
plenty of barbecued spareribs, and all sorts of little knickknacks like pickled onions and
olives and radishes. And hot rolls and little cheese biscuits passed around. The punchbowl
is in the corner, and for people who like their liquor straight I'm having on the
sideboard eight quarts of Kentucky Bourbon, five of rye, and five of Scotch. And an
entertainer from town is coming out to play the accordion '

'But who on earth is going to eat all that food?' Alison asked, with a little swallow of
nausea.

'The whole shebang,' said Leonora enthusiastically. 'I've telephoned everybody from Old
Sugar's wife on down.'

'Old Sugar' was Leonora's name for the Commanding General of the post, and she called him
by it to his face. With the General, as with all men, she had a flip and affectionate
manner, and the General, like most of the officers on the post, fairly ate out of her
hand. The General's wife was very fat, slow, gushed over, and completely out of things.

'One thing I came over about this morning,' said Leonora, 'is to find out if Anacleto
will serve the punch for me.'

'He will be glad to help you out,' Alison answered for him.

Anacleto, who was standing in the doorway, did not look so glad about it. He glanced
reproachfully at Alison and went downstairs to see about luncheon.

'Susie's two brothers are helping in the kitchen and, my God, how that crowd can eat! I
never saw anything to equal it. We '

'By the way,' said Alison, 'is Susie married?'

'Heavens, no! She won't have anything to do with men. She got caught when she was
fourteen years old and has never forgotten it. But why?'

'I just wondered because I was almost sure that I saw someone go into your house by the
back way late last night and come out again before dawn.'

'You just imagined it,' said Leonora soothingly. She considered Alison to be quite off
her head, and did not believe even the simplest remark that she made.

'Perhaps so.'

Leonora was bored and ready to go home. Still, she thought that a neighborly visit should
last at least an hour, so she stuck it out dutifully. She sighed and tried again to look
somewhat ill. It was her idea, when she was not too carried away with thoughts of food and
sport, that the tactful topic of conversation in a sickroom was an account of other
illnesses. Like all very stupid people she had a predilection for the gruesome, which she
could indulge in or throw off at will. Her repertoire of tragedies was limited for the
most part to violent sporting accidents.

'Did I tell you about the thirteen year old girl who came along with us on a fox hunt as
a whipper in and broke her neck?'

'Yes, Leonora,' said Alison in a voice of controlled exasperation. 'You have told me of
every terrible detail five times.'

'Does it make you nervous?'

'Extremely.'

'Hmmm ' said Leonora. She was not at all troubled by this rebuff. Calmly she lighted a
cigarette. 'Don't ever let anybody tell you that's the way to fox hunt. I know. I've
hunted both ways. Listen, Alison!' She worked her mouth exaggeratedly and spoke in a
deliberately encouraging voice as though addressing a small child. 'Do you know how to
hunt 'possums?'

Alison nodded shortly and straightened the counterpane. 'You tree them.'

'On foot,' said Leonora. 'That's the way to hunt a fox. Now this uncle of mine has a
cabin in the mountains and my brothers and I used to visit him. About six of us would
start out with our dogs on a cold evening when the sun had set. A colored boy would run
along behind with a jug of good mellow corn on his back. Sometimes we'd be after a fox all
night long in the mountains. Gosh, I can't tell you about it. Somehow ' The feeling was
in Leonora, but she had not the words to express it.

Then to have one last drink at six o'clock and sit down to breakfast. And, God! everybody
said this uncle of mine was peculiar, but he sure set a good table. After a hunt we'd come
in to a table just loaded with fish roe, broiled ham, fried chicken, biscuits the size of
your hand '

When Leonora was gone at last, Alison did not know whether to laugh or cry; she did a
little of both, rather hysterically. Anacleto came up to her and carefully beat out the
big dent at the foot of the bed where Leonora had been sitting.

'I am going to divorce the Major, Anacleto,' she said suddenly when she had stopped
laughing. 'I will inform him of it tonight.'

From Anacleto's expression she could not tell whether or not this was a surprise to him.
He waited for a time and then asked: 'Then where shall we go after that, Madame Alison?'

Through her mind passed a long panorama of plans which she had made dining sleepless
nights tutoring Latin in some college town, shrimp fishing, hiring Anacleto out to
drudge while she sat in a boarding house and took in sewing

But she only said: 'That I have not yet decided.'

'I wonder,' Anacleto said meditatively, 'what the Pendertons will do about it.'

'You needn't wonder because that is not our affair.'

Anacleto's little face was dark and thoughtful. He stood with his hands resting on the
footpiece of the bed. She felt that he had some further question to put to her, and she
looked up at him and waited. Finally he asked hopefully, 'Do you think we might live in a
hotel?'

In the afternoon Captain Penderton went down to the stables for his usual ride. Private
Williams was still on duty, although he was to be free that day at four o'clock. When the
Captain spoke, he did not look at the young soldier and his voice was high pitched and
arrogant.

'Saddle Mrs. Penderton's horse, Firebird.'

Private Williams stood motionless, staring into the Captain's white, strained face, 'The
Captain said?'

'Firebird,' the Captain repeated. 'Mrs. Penderton's horse.'

This order was unusual; Captain Penderton had ridden Firebird only three times before,
and on each of these occasions his wife had been with him. The Captain himself did not own
a horse, and used the mounts belonging to the stable. As he waited out in the open court,
the Captain nervously jerked the fingertips of his glove. Then, when Firebird was led out,
he was not satisfied; Private Williams had put on Mrs. Penderton's flat, English type
saddle, while the Captain preferred an army McClellan. As this change was being made, the
Captain looked into the horse's round, purple eyes and saw there a liquid image of his own
frightened face. Private Williams held the bridle as he mounted. The Captain sat tense,
his jaws hard, and his knees gripping the saddle desperately. The soldier still stood
impassive with his hand on the bridle.

After a moment the Captain said:

'Well, Private, you can see that I am seated. Let go!'

Private Williams stepped back a few paces. The Captain held tight to the reins and
hardened his thighs. Nothing happened. The horse did not plunge and strain at the bit as
he did each morning with Mrs. Penderton, but waited quietly for the signal to start. When
the Captain realized this, he quickened with a sudden vicious joy. 'Ah,' he thought. 'She
has broken his spirit as I knew she would.' The Captain dug in his heels and struck the
horse with his short, plaited crop. They started on the bridle path at a gallop.

The afternoon was fine and sunny. The air was bracing, bitter sweet with the odor of
pines and rotting leaves. Not a cloud could be seen in all the wide blue sky. The horse,
which had not been exercised that day, seemed to go a little mad from the pleasure of
galloping with unchecked freedom. Firebird, like most horses, was apt to be hard to manage
if given free rein immediately after being led out from the pasture. The Captain knew
this; therefore his next action was a very curious one. They had galloped rhythmically for
perhaps three quarters of a mile when suddenly, with no preliminary tightening of the
reins, the Captain jerked the horse up short. He pulled the reins with such unexpected
sharpness that Firebird lost his balance, sidestepped awkwardly and reared. Then he stood
quite still, surprised but tractable. The Captain was exceedingly satisfied.

This procedure was repeated twice. The Captain gave Firebird his head just long enough
for the joy of freedom to be aroused and then checked him without warning. This sort of
behavior was not new to the Captain. Often in his life he had exacted many strange and
secret little penances on himself which he would have found difficult to explain to others.

The third time the horse stopped as usual, but at this point something happened which
disturbed the Captain so that all of his satisfaction instantly vanished. As they were
standing still, alone on the path, the horse slowly turned his head and looked into the
Captain's face. Then deliberately he lowered his head to the ground with his ears
flattened back.

The Captain felt suddenly that he was to be thrown, and not only thrown but killed. The
Captain always had been afraid of horses: he only rode because it was the thing to do, and
because this was another one of his ways of tormenting himself. He had had his wife's
comfortable saddle exchanged for the clumsy McClellan for the reason that the raised
saddlebow gave him something to grasp in case of an emergency. Now he sat rigid, trying to
hold to the saddle and the reins at the same time. Then, so great was his sudden
apprehension, he gave up completely in advance, slipped his feet from the stirrups, lifted
his hands to his face, and looked about him to see where he would fall. This weakness
lasted only a few moments, however. When the Captain realized that he was not to be thrown
after all, a great feeling of triumph came in him. They started at a gallop once more.

The path had been leading steadily upward with the woods on either side. Now they
approached the bluff from which could be seen miles of the reservation. Far in the
distance the green pine forest made a dark line against the bright autumn sky. Struck by
the wonder of the view, the Captain had it in his mind to pause for a moment and he drew
in his reins. But here a totally unexpected happening occurred, an incident that might
have cost the Captain his life. They were still riding hard when they reached the top of
the ridge. At this point, without warning and with the speed of a demon, the horse swerved
to the left and plunged down the side of the embankment.

The Captain was so stunned that he lost his seat.

He was hurled forward on the horse's neck and his feet dangled stirrupless. Somehow he
managed to hold on. With one hand grasping the mane and the other feebly holding to the
reins, he was able to slide himself back into the saddle. But that was all he could do.
They were riding with such dizzying speed that his head swam when he opened his eyes. He
could not find his seat firmly enough to control the reins. And he knew in one fateful
instant that even so it would be of no use; there was not the power in him to stop this
horse. Every muscle, every nerve in his body was intent on only one purpose to hold on.
With the speed of Firebird's great racing sire they were flying over the wide open space
of sward that separated the bluff from the woods. The grass was glinted with bronze and
red beneath the sun. Then suddenly the Captain felt a green dimness fall over them and he
knew that they had entered the forest by way of some narrow footpath. Even when the horse
had left the open space, he seemed hardly to slacken his speed. The dazed Captain was in
half crouching position. A thorn from a tree ripped open his left cheek. The Captain felt
no pain, but he saw vividly the hot scarlet blood that dripped on his arm. He crouched
down so that the right side of his face rubbed against the short stiff hair of Firebird's
neck. Clinging desperately to the mane, the reins, and the saddlebow, he dared not raise
his head for fear it would be broken by the branch of a tree.

Three words were in the Captain's heart. He shaped them soundlessly with his trembling
lips, as he had not breath to spare for a whisper: 'I am lost'

And having given up life, the Captain suddenly began to live. A great mad joy surged
through him. This emotion, coming as unexpectedly as the plunge of the horse when he had
broken away, was one that the Captain had never experienced. His eyes were glassy and half
open, as in delirium, but he saw suddenly as he had never seen before. The world was a
kaleidoscope, and each of the multiple visions which he saw impressed itself on his mind
with burning vividness. On the ground half buried in the leaves there was a little flower,
dazzling white and beautifully wrought. A thorny pine cone, the flight of a bird in the
blue windy sky, a fiery shaft of sunshine in the green gloom these the Captain saw as
though for the first time in his life. He was conscious of the pure keen air and he felt
the marvel of his own tense body, his laboring heart, and the miracle of blood, muscle,
nerves, and bone. The Captain knew no terror now; he had soared to that rare level of
consciousness where the mystic feels that the earth is he and that he is the earth.
Clinging crabwise to the runaway horse, there was a grin of rapture on his bloody mouth.