my position and my influential friends, yet hourly I am expecting the tap on the arm that will tell me to go."
The case of most extreme fear which I observed was that of a wealthy and beautiful woman, wife of an official of the Rio Blanco mills, with whom De Lara and I took dinner one day. The official drank deeply of wine, and as the meal was near an end his tongue loosened and he spoke of matters which, for the sake of his own safety, he should have guarded. The wife sat opposite him, and as he spoke of government murders of which he knew her face blanched and with her eyes she tried to warn him to be more careful. Finally I turned my face away, and, glancing sidewise, saw her take the opportunity to bend forward over the table and shake a trembling, jeweled finger in his face. Again and again she tried skilfully to turn the conversation, but without success, until finally, unable to control herself longer, she sprang forward, and, clapping a hand over her husband's lips, tried to dam back the fearsome words he was saying. The animal terror on that woman's face I can never forget.
Fear so widespread and so extreme as I met with cannot be the result of imagined dangers. There must be something behind it, and there is. Secret killing is constantly going on in Mexico, but to what extent no one will ever know. It is asserted in some quarters that there are more political executions going on right now than ever before, but that they are more cleverly and secretly done than ever before. Whether that is true or not I do not know. Certainly the press is better controlled than ever before. The apparent quiescence of Mexico is entirely forced by means of club, pistol and knife.
Mexico has never really enjoyed political freedom.
