Flaming Irons by Max Brand

Author:Max Brand [Brand, Max]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Western
Publisher: Roy Glashan's Library
Published: 2017-01-22T23:00:00+00:00

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XXIII. — WHERE LIES LA PAZ?

“What brings you through this part of the world, child?” asked the old man as they sat in the cool shadow of the pine tree before the house.

“I’m on the heels of an old yarn,” said Tarron.

“Following a story?” The Mexican smiled genially. “I have followed them, too. I have had gold in every valley of these mountains!”

“You lie!” cried the woman from within. “Let me see some of it, then!”

“I’ve had the hope of gold,” said the old man, after making a little pause so that the harsh echo of the woman’s voice might die away. “Following the gold is better than having the gold, some say. If that’s true, I haven’t wasted my life.”

“It’s not true, though!” barked the woman.

The ancient sighed. But he did not look toward the door from which these ringing accents poured. He merely moved off a little farther. And Tarron replaced his stool for him on the farther side of the pine tree.

“But you’re starting for the same thing?” asked the Mexican. “You’re following gold, too? Ah, boy, boy, you’ll have years of happiness—and very little money, I suppose!”

“You’ve been here a long time?” asked Tarron.

“In one more year I shall be ninety.”

Tarron breathed deep. He had never before seen a man so old. And never had he seen one who so perfectly filled the picture of what age should be—mellow, quiet, dignified, and wise, with all the bitterness of ignorant prejudices rubbed away.

Not all of these thoughts were formulated definitely in the mind of Tarron, but he felt them all, and he could not look at the old man without smiling, half-affectionately. Old men and children have little pride; therefore we may show that we love them. But most strong men had rather be feared than loved.

“Ninety years,” said Tarron quietly. “Well, it’s a grand thing to be that old!”

“Do you think so?” said the seer. “And why?”

“Why,” said Tarron, “ain’t it better to be a filled bucket than an empty one?”

This speech the other considered for a moment, stroking his beard placidly. And then he laughed, and his eyes shone blue and bright beneath the white brush of his brows.

“The pleasure’s in the filling of the bucket,” said he, “not in being where only a few more drops can be added!”

“Ninety years!” murmured Tarron. “And most of them spent on the mountains, here?”

“I’ve lived in a small way,” said the other. “Small as people around here count distances. I’ve prospected over ten thousand square miles—a thousand square leagues, if you want to put it in another way. But I’ve never gone outside of the country that I was born to.”

“You were born in the mountains, then?”

“Lad, my father built this house with his own hands. When I was eighteen, I chipped out that bowl in the rock beneath the spring.”

“Ninety years in this place!” murmured Tarron. “That’s a fine long time!”

“Fine and long or dreadful and long. There’s two ways of looking at every day—or every thousand days.

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