For that matter the cactus patch was endurable because of its singular beauty. Adam could not have told why cholla fascinated him, and, though Genie admitted she liked to look at the frosty silver-lighted cones and always had an impulse to prick her fingers on the cruel thorns, she could not explain why.
“Genie, the Yaqui Indians in Sonora love this cholla,” said Adam. “Love it as they hate Mexicans. They will strip a Mexican naked, tear the skin off the soles of his feet, and drive him through the cholla until he’s dead. It wouldn’t take long!... All prospectors hate cholla. I hate it, yet I—I guess I’m a little like the Yaquis. I often prick my finger on cholla just to feel the sting, the burn, the throb. The only pain I could ever compare to that made by cholla is the sting of the sharp horn of a little catfish back in Ohio. Oh! I’ll never forget that! A poison, burning sting!... But cholla is terrible because the thorns stick in your flesh. When you jerk to free yourself the thorns leave the cones. Each thorn has an invisible barb and it works deeper and deeper into flesh.”
“Don’t I know!” exclaimed Genie, emphatically. “I’ve spent whole hours digging them out of my feet and legs. But how pretty the cholla shines! Only it doesn’t tell the truth, does it, Wanny?”
“Child, please don’t call me Wanny. It’s so—so silly,” protested Adam.
“It’s not. No sillier than your calling me child! I’m nearly fifteen. I’m growing right out of my clothes.”
“Call me Adam.”
“No, I don’t like that name. And I can’t call you mister or father or brother.”
“But what’s wrong with Adam?”
“I read in mother’s bible about Adam and Eve. I hated her when the devil got into her. And I didn’t like Adam. And I don’t like the name Adam. You’d never have been driven from heaven.”
“I’m not so sure about that,” said Adam, ruefully. “Genie, I was wicked when I was a—a young man.”