‘Dove,’ said Elbert.
‘Correct. You must have studied the language?’
‘Only the last few weeks. I’d like to know more. It would come handy in the leather-store. You know a lot about Mexico, don’t you?’
‘Not so much as I used to believe, young man, but I ain’t averse to these people. I used to think I was, but as I look back now, I ’casionally catch myself wishin’ I’d treated them as well as they have treated me. Just a curious feelin’ at times—’
It didn’t seem to be a deep matter to Mr. Leadley, his eyes were so pleasant.
‘They’re peaceful to be with, like cattle,’ he went on. ‘I lived on a farm back East when I was a boy, and my father and mother used to fight a whole lot—at supper, especially. I ’member often goin’ out in the barnyard, and how peaceful it was, after the supper table. I don’t mean Mexicans are cattle, you understand, only that they loll around and ruminate peaceful, like cattle.’
Elbert waited for more, and what came had a world of feeling in it that he didn’t understand. It seemed the night was chillier, but the gentle tone hadn’t changed.
‘We used to call ’em greasers and shoot ’em up a lot, not thinkin’ much about it. We used to hang ’em for hoss-thieves, when a sheriff wanted to make a showin’. Thought little more of ’em than a Chinee, only diff’rent. Young punchers and miners—we thought we was the people—’
The voice stopped so suddenly Elbert felt queer.
‘You didn’t tell me, why you have reason to remember “La Paloma,”’ he said, looking across at the red lights of ‘Estella Teatro.’