I wondered
that I had ever complained about anything there, or wished to
leave that blissful spot.
The poorest person in that place by the sea had more to be
thankful for, in my opinion, than the richest people in Arizona.
I felt as if I must cry it out from the house-tops. My heart was
thankful every minute of the day and night, for every breath of
soft air that I breathed, for every bit of fresh fish that I ate,
for fresh vegetables, and for butter - for gardens, for trees, for
flowers, for the good firm earth beneath my feet. I wrote the man
on detached service that I should never return to Ehrenberg.
After eight months, in which my health was wholly restored, I
heard the good news that Captain Corliss had applied for his
first lieutenant, and I decided to join him at once at Camp
MacDowell.
Although I had not wholly forgotten that Camp MacDowell had been
called by very bad names during our stay at Fort Whipple, at the
time that Jack decided on the Ehrenberg detail, I determined to
brave it, in all its unattractiveness, isolation and heat, for I
knew there was a garrison and a Doctor there, and a few officers'
families, I knew supplies were to be obtained and the ordinary
comforts of a far-off post. Then too, in my summer in the East I
had discovered that I was really a soldier's wife and I must go
back to it all. To the army with its glitter and its misery, to
the post with its discomforts, to the soldiers, to the drills, to
the bugle-calls, to the monotony, to the heat of Southern
Arizona, to the uniform and the stalwart Captains and gay
Lieutenants who wore it, I felt the call and I must go.
CHAPTER XXIII
BACK TO ARIZONA
The last nails were driven in the precious boxes, and I started
overland in November with my little son, now nearly two years
old.
"Overland" in those days meant nine days from New York to San
Francisco. Arriving in Chicago, I found it impossible to secure a
section on the Pullman car so was obliged to content myself with
a lower berth. I did not allow myself to be disappointed.
On entering the section, I saw an enormous pair of queer cow hide
shoes, the very queerest shoes I had ever seen, lying on the
floor, with a much used travelling bag. I speculated a good deal
on the shoes, but did not see the owner of them until several
hours later, when a short thick-set German with sandy close-cut
beard entered and saluted me politely. "You are noticing my shoes
perhaps Madame?"
"Yes" I said, involuntarily answering him in German.
His face shone with pleasure and he explained to me that they
were made in Russia and he always wore them when travelling.
"What have we," I thought, "an anarchist?"
But with the inexperience and fearlessness of youth, I entered
into a most delightful conversation in German with him. I found
him rather an extraordinarily well educated gentleman and he said
he lived in Nevada, but had been over to Vienna to place his
little boy at a military school, "as," he said, "there is nothing
like a uniform to give a boy self-respect." He said his wife had
died several months before. I congratulated myself that the
occupant of the upper berth was at least a gentleman.
The next day, as we sat opposite each other chatting, always in
German, he paused, and fixing his eyes rather steadily upon me he
remarked: "Do you think I put on mourning when my wife died? no
indeed, I put on white kid gloves and had a fiddler and danced at
the grave. All this mourning that people have is utter nonsense."
I was amazed at the turn his conversation had taken and sat quite
still, not knowing just what to say or to do.
After awhile, he looked at me steadily, and said, very
deferentially, "Madame, the spirit of my dead wife is looking at
me from out your eyes."
By this time I realized that the man was a maniac, and I had
always heard that one must agree with crazy people, so I nodded,
and that seemed to satisfy him, and bye and bye after some
minutes which seemed like hours to me, he went off to the smoking
room.
The tension was broken and I appealed to a very nice looking
woman who happened to be going to some place in Nevada near which
this Doctor lived, and she said, when I told her his name, "Why,
yes, I heard of him before I left home, he lives in Silver City,
and at the death of his wife, he went hopelessly insane, but,"
she added, "he is harmless, I believe."
This was a nice fix, to be sure, and I staid over in her section
all day, and late that night the Doctor arrived at the junction
where he was to take another train. So I slept in peace, after a
considerable agitation.
There is nothing like experience to teach a young woman how to
travel alone.
In San Francisco I learned that I could now go as far as Los
Angeles by rail, thence by steamer to San Diego, and so on by
stage to Fort Yuma, where my husband was to meet me with an
ambulance and a wagon.
I was enchanted with the idea of avoiding the long sea-trip down
the Pacific coast, but sent my boxes down by the Steamer
"Montana," sister ship of the old "Newbern," and after a few
days' rest in San Francisco, set forth by rail for Los Angeles.
At San Pedro, the port of Los Angeles, we embarked for San Diego.
It was a heavenly night.
