“A drum for Benito! Oh, Mr. Barron, don’t get Benito a drum!”
He could not control his laughter at the sight of her expression of horrified protest. He laughed so loudly that people looked at him. She smiled herself, not quite knowing why, and insensibly, both feeling curiously light-hearted, they drew closer together.
“What can I get?” he said. “I looked at knives and guns, and I knew that they wouldn’t do. Benito would certainly kill Miguel and probably grandma. I thought of a bat and ball, and then I knew he’d break all the windows. The man in the store wanted me to buy a bow and arrow, but I saw him taking his revenge on the crab lady. Benito’s a serious problem any way you take him.”
They had come to the Plaza, once an open space of sand, round which the wild, pioneer city swept in whirlpool currents, now already showing the lichened brick and dropping plaster, the sober line of house-fronts, of an aging locality. Where Chinatown backed on the square the houses had grown oriental, their western ugliness, disguised by the touch of gilding that, here and there, incrusted their fronts, the swaying of crimson lanterns, the green zigzags of dwarf trees. Over the top of the Clay Street hill the west shone red through smoke which filled the air with a keen, acrid smell. It told of hearth-fires. And oozing out of a thousand chimneys and streaming across the twilight city it told of homes where the good wife made ready for her man.
“Let’s not take the cars,” said Barron. “Let’s walk home. Can you manage those hills?”
She gave a laughing assent, and they turned upward, walking slowly as befitted the climb. Chinatown opened before them like the mysterious, medieval haunt of robbers in an old drawing. The murky night was settling on it, shot through with red gleams at the end of streets, where the sunset pried into its peopled darkness. The blackness of yawning doorway and stealthy alley succeeded the brilliancy of a gilded interior, or a lantern-lit balcony. Strange smells were in the air, aromatic and noisome, as though the dwellers in this domain were concocting their wizard brews. There was a sound of shifting feet, a chatter of guttural voices, and a vision of faces passing from light to shadow, marked by a weird similarity, and with eyes like bits of onyx let into the tight-drawn skin.
It was an alien city, a bit of the oldest civilization in the world, imbedded in the heart of the newest. Touches of bizarre, of sinister picturesqueness filled it with arresting interest. On the window-sills lilies, their stalks bound with strips of crimson paper, grew in blue and white china bowls filled with pebbles round which their white roots clung. Miniature pine-trees, in pots of brass, thrust their boughs between the rusty ironwork of old balconies. Through an open doorway a glimpse was given down a dark hallway, narrow, black, a gas-jet, like a tiny golden tear, diffusing a frightened gleam of light. From some dim angle the glow of a blood-red lantern mottled a space of leprous wall. On a tottering balcony a woman’s face, rounded like a child’s, crimson lipped, crowned with peach blossoms, looked down from shadows, the light of a lantern catching and loosening the golden traceries of her rich robe, the trail of peach blossoms against her cheek.
The ascent was long and steep, and they walked slowly, talking in a desultory fashion. Mariposa recounted the trivial incidents that had taken place in the Garcia house during her companion’s absence. As they breasted the last hill the light grew brighter, for the sunset still lingered in a reluctant glow.
“Take my arm,” said Barron. “You’re out of breath.”
She took it, and they began slowly to mount the last steep blocks. She glanced up at him to smile her thanks for his support, and met his eyes, looking intently at her. The red light strengthened on her face as they ascended.