I formed a syndicate; and the present enterprise is the result.
I became leader, as the Jew always becomes leader, by his brains and imagination. But with all my pride of race I would give everything I possess to be an Englishman.
I am like a boy: I cut her name on the trees and her initials on the sod.
When I am alone I lie down and tear my wretched hair and cry Louisa—
STRAKER. [startled] Louisa!
MENDOZA.
It is her name—Louisa—Louisa Straker—
TANNER.
Straker!
STRAKER. [scrambling up on his knees most indignantly] Look here: Louisa Straker is my sister, see?
Wot do you mean by gassin about her like this? Wot she got to do with you?
MENDOZA.
A dramatic coincidence!
You are Enry, her favorite brother!
STRAKER.
Oo are you callin Enry?
What call have you to take a liberty with my name or with hers?
For two pins I'd punch your fat ed, so I would.
MENDOZA. [with grandiose calm] If I let you do it, will you promise to brag of it afterwards to her?
She will be reminded of her Mendoza: that is all I desire.
TANNER.
This is genuine devotion, Henry.
You should respect it.
STRAKER. [fiercely] Funk, more likely.
MENDOZA. [springing to his feet] Funk!
Young man: I come of a famous family of fighters; and as your sister well knows, you would have as much chance against me as a perambulator against your motor car.
STRAKER. [secretly daunted, but rising from his knees with an air of reckless pugnacity] I ain't afraid of you.
With your Louisa!
Louisa!
Miss Straker is good enough for you, I should think.
MENDOZA.
I wish you could persuade her to think so.
STRAKER. [exasperated] Here—
TANNER. [rising quickly and interposing] Oh come, Henry: even if you could fight the President you can't fight the whole League of the Sierra.
Sit down again and be friendly.
A cat may look at a king; and even a President of brigands may look at your sister.
All this family pride is really very old fashioned.
STRAKER. [subdued, but grumbling] Let him look at her.
But wot does he mean by makin out that she ever looked at im? [Reluctantly resuming his couch on the turf] Ear him talk, one ud think she was keepin company with him. [He turns his back on them and composes himself to sleep].
MENDOZA. [to Tanner, becoming more confidential as he finds himself virtually alone with a sympathetic listener in the still starlight of the mountains; for all the rest are asleep by this time] It was just so with her, sir.
Her intellect reached forward into the twentieth century: her social prejudices and family affections reached back into the dark ages.
Ah, sir, how the words of Shakespear seem to fit every crisis in our emotions! I loved Louisa: 40,000 brothers Could not with all their quantity of love Make up my sum.
And so on. I forget the rest.
Call it madness if you will—infatuation.
I am an able man, a strong man: in ten years I should have owned a first-class hotel.
I met her; and you see! I am a brigand, an outcast.
Even Shakespear cannot do justice to what I feel for Louisa.
Let me read you some lines that I have written about her myself.
However slight their literary merit may be, they express what I feel better than any casual words can. [He produces a packet of hotel bills scrawled with manuscript, and kneels at the fire to decipher them, poking it with a stick to make it glow].
TANNER. [clapping him rudely on the shoulder] Put them in the fire, President.