Rex Stout - Target Practice

The next morning but one found the paymaster, mounted on a short-haired native pony, proceeding leisurely along the white, level road that leads from San Juan to the foothills of the Sierra de Luquillo. Feeling sure of his quarry, he had taken his time. He had not questioned the carrier for fear of a possible communication and warning to Señor Martin; but the courteous Hernandez had furnished information of the exact whereabouts of Martin’s plantation.

The paymaster’s intentions were extremely hazy. Strapped about his waist under his coat were two ugly Navy revolvers; yet he was no Corsican. He told himself that they were meant purely as a defense; he certainly did not premeditate murder. In the meantime there they were.

He did not intend to expose Martin or arrest him; that would have been to expose and betray himself. Nor had he an idea of forcing a material restitution. The loss of the money had been but a slight and temporary annoyance; furthermore, it was to be doubted if Martin had it in his power to repay even a small part of it. Apparently, then, his journey was purposeless.

But still his heart was hot with anger; indefinable, and therefore reasonless. He was not a lover of justice, an avenger of the law, a crusader for the right. He was simply a man with a grudge.

The pony, unlike its rider, was little inconvenienced by the glare of the road and the heat of the tropical sun. For four long hours he trotted on unwearyingly, stopping now and then to rest in the shade of a grove of palms, or to drink from one of the bubbling streams dashing toward the foothills below.

At eleven o’clock he turned from the road into a path at the foot of a ridge of limestone cliffs, and three hundred yards farther on came within sight of a low rambling house set at the edge of a small clearing.

This was the home of Señor Martin.

Paymaster Garway Ross stopped his pony and for some minutes sat gazing at the house in silence. Afterward when the scene rose in his memory, he wondered at the rare loveliness of the setting — the charm, even, of the house itself.

In the immediate background was a grove of tillandsia, fragrant and cool. On either side appeared long rows of coffee trees, brilliantly white with their innumerable blossoms; and beyond, at the foot of a sloping valley, could be seen a somber purple patch, relieved here and there by a gorgeous scarlet of nature’s most beautiful parasite.

Over all was the heavy fragrance, the droopy languor, of the land of the lotus.

But for the present the paymaster was conscious only of his immediate emotions. For the first time he realized that the enterprise contained an element of real danger.

Martin might even now be observing him from one of those shaded windows; possibly have recognized him. Thinking thus, the paymaster wheeled his pony about and retreated out of sight round a bend in the path.

Here he removed one of the revolvers from the hidden belt and placed it in his side coat pocket; after which precaution he returned to the clearing and rode boldly up to the door of the house.

He had scarcely halted his pony when the door opened and a woman appeared on the threshold.

The paymaster dismounted, lifted his hat, and bowed.

“I want to see James Martin,” he said.

The woman looked up quickly and for a moment was silent.

Then she spoke in a low, rather harsh voice:

“What about?”

The paymaster bowed again.

“I had rather tell that to Mr. Martin himself,” he said. “Is he here?”

“No.” A faint gleam of interest flickered across the woman’s face as she added, “Were you a friend of his?”

“Yes,” said the paymaster inwardly thanking her for the tense, while he wondered at it. “When will he be at home?”

The woman did not answer. Instead after a moment of silence, she turned and called sharply, “Miguel!”

Another moment, and a slouching blinking hombre appeared in the doorway.

“Take the pony,” the woman said shortly.

Then, motioning to the paymaster to follow, she started round the path encircling the house toward the grove of tillandsias in the rear.

The paymaster guessed intuitively what they were to find.

It was in the air, in the woman’s tone, in her very silence; and he as silently followed her through the shady grove across a quivering log bridge, and into a second grove more deeply shaded than the first. She halted abruptly by a giant tillandsia, and the paymaster approached and stood at her side.

He had guessed correctly. At their feet was a slender mound of earth covered with coarse grass; and at its farther end was a rude block of limestone bearing this inscription:

The woman sat on the trunk of a fallen tree and gazed at the stone impassively, in silence. Finally the paymaster turned to her.

“So,” he said, “six months ago.”

The woman nodded.

“I am Paymaster Ross, of the navy,” he continued presently. “Perhaps you have heard him speak of me. I knew your — him—”

“My son,” said the woman dully.

At this the paymaster felt a slight surprise; somehow he had never thought of Martin as having a mother. He knew that he ought to speak, to say something; but he felt that there was nothing he could possibly say, nothing worth saying.

Finally, “He was a good boy,” he observed awkwardly.

Again the woman nodded.

“I suppose he was. He spoke a lot about you. He always said you was kind to him. I suppose I ought to thank you.”

“Won’t you tell me more about it?” said the paymaster. “I mean about him, and how he came down here, and how he — about the end.”

Then he seated himself beside her and waited.

She began with a grim smile.

“There was a time then I could have talked all about it,” she observed. “Somehow I don’t feel like it anymore. And it’s all Jimmie’s fault. Maybe you’re right. Maybe he was a good boy and all that; but somehow he never seemed to get anywhere.”

She paused and sighed heavily, and the paymaster rose to his feet and stood looking down at the grave.

“He was just like his father.”

As the woman continued, her voice held a new note of bitterness, and the paymaster shuddered.

“He died when Jimmie was twelve years old and the others was babies. He always was a fool, and Jimmie was just like him. Then, after I’d starved and slaved to death nearly, Jimmie got that money from the navy.

“He called it a bonus. I never understood about it. I never wanted him to go in the navy anyway; but then that was all right. And then, when he got all that money, he made us all come down here, where it’s only fit for niggers.

“And Annie and Tom are always sick, too. I used to wonder about it and I wouldn’t be surprised if he stole it. Annie and Tom are the others. You didn’t see ’em as you came in from the road?”

With an effort the paymaster turned to face her and shook his head.

“No. But he... he was a good worker.”

His own words sounded in his ear hollow, inane. Here all was dust and ashes. Words were useless.

“Perhaps,” the woman continued. “But when a woman like me has had her whole life spoiled by a man and his son, she can’t think very well of either of ’em. He should have given me that money; I’d earned it. But he talked about Annie and Tom, and what he’d do for ’em, and brought us all off down here where it’s only fit for niggers.

“And now he’s gone and I can’t get anybody to stay here, and the niggers won’t work, and we’re worse off than ever. He ought to stayed in the navy. At least, we got forty dollars a month from him then.”

The paymaster forced himself to speak.