We sat in the sala the next evening, awaiting the return of the
prodigal and his deliverer. The night was cool, and the doors were
closed; coals burned in a roof-tile. The room, unlike most Californian
salas, boasted a carpet, and the furniture was covered with green rep,
instead of the usual black horse-hair.
Don Guillermo patted the table gently with his open palm, accompanying
the tinkle of Prudencia's guitar and her light monotonous voice. She
sat on the edge of a chair, her solemn eyes fixed on a painting of
Reinaldo which hung on the wall. Doña Trinidad was sewing as usual,
and dressed as simply as if she looked to her daughter to maintain the
state of the Iturbi y Moncadas. Above a black silk skirt she wore a
black shawl, one end thrown over her shoulder. About her head was a
close black silk turban, concealing, with the exception of two soft
gray locks on either side of her face, what little hair she may still
have possessed. Her white face was delicately cut: the lines of time
indicated spiritual sweetness rather than strength.
Chonita roved between the sala and an adjoining room where four Indian
girls embroidered the yellow poppies on the white satin. I was reading
one of her books,--the "Vicar of Wakefield."
"Wilt thou be glad to see Reinaldo, my Prudencia?" asked Don
Guillermo, as the song finished.
"Ay!" and the girl blushed.
"Thou wouldst make a good wife for Reinaldo, and it is well that he
marry. It is true that he has a gay spirit and loves company, but you
shall live here in this house, and if he is not a devoted husband he
shall have no money to spend. It is time he became a married man and
learned that life was not made for dancing and flirting; then, too,
would his restless spirit get him into fewer broils. I have heard
him speak twice of no other woman, excepting Valencia Menendez, and I
would not have her for a daughter; and I think he loves thee."
"Sure!" said Doña Trinidad.
"That is love, I suppose," said Chonita, leaning back in her chair and
forgetting the poppies. "With her a placid contented hope, with him a
calm preference for a malleable woman. If he left her for another she
would cry for a week, then serenely marry whom my father bade her, and
forget Reinaldo in the _donas_ of the bridegroom. The birds do almost
as well."
Don Guillermo smiled indulgently. Prudencia did not know whether
to cry or not. Doña Trinidad, who never thought of replying to her
daughter, said,--
"Chonita mia, Liseta and Tomaso wish to marry, and thy father will
give them the little house by the creek."
"Yes, mamacita?" said Chonita, absently: she felt no interest in the
loves of the Indians.
"We have a new Father in the Mission," continued her mother,
remembering that she had not acquainted her daughter with all the
important events of her absence. "And Don Rafael Guzman's son was
drafted. That was a judgment for not marrying when his father bade
him. For that I shall be glad to have Reinaldo marry. I would not have
him go to the war to be killed."
"No," said Don Guillermo. "He must be a diputado to Mexico. I would
not lose my only son in battle. I am ambitious for him; and so art
thou, Chonita, for thy brother? Is it not so?"
"Yes. I have it in me to stab the heart of any man who rolls a stone
in his way."
"My daughter," said Don Guillermo, with the accent of duty rather than
of reproof, "thou must love without vengeance. Sustain thy brother,
but harm not his enemy. I would not have thee hate even an Estenega,
although I cannot love them myself. But we will not talk of the
Estenegas. Dost thou realize that our Reinaldo will be with us this
night? We must all go to confession to-morrow,--thy mother and myself,
Eustaquia, Reinaldo, Prudencia, and thyself."
Chonita's face became rigid. "I cannot go to confession," she said.
"It may be months before I can: perhaps never."
"What?"
"Can one go to confession with a hating and an unforgiving heart? Ay!
that I never had gone to Monterey! At least I had the consolation of
my religion before. Now I fight the darkness by myself. Do not ask
me questions, for I shall not answer them. But taunt me no more with
confession."
Even Don Guillermo was dumb. In all the twenty-four years of her life
she never had betrayed violence of spirit before: even her hatred of
the Estenegas had been a religion rather than a personal feeling. It
was the first glimpse of her soul that she had accorded them, and they
were aghast. What--what had happened to this proud, reserved, careless
daughter of the Iturbi y Moncadas?
Doña Trinidad drew down her mouth. Prudencia began to cry. Then,
for the moment, Chonita was forgotten. Two horses galloped into the
court-yard.
"Reinaldo!"
The door had but an inside knob: Don Guillermo threw it open as a
young man sprang up the three steps of the corridor, followed by a
little man who carefully picked his way.
"Yes, I am here, my father, my mother, my sister, my Prudencia! Ay,
Eustaquia, thou too." And the pride of the house kissed each in turn,
his dark eyes wandering absently about the room. He was a dashing
caballero, and as handsome as any ever born in the Californias. The
dust of travel had been removed--at a saloon--from his blue velvet
gold-embroidered serape, which he immediately flung on the floor. His
short jacket and trousers were also of dark-blue velvet, the former
decorated with buttons of silver filigree, the latter laced with
silver cord over spotless linen. The front of his shirt was covered
with costly lace. His long botas were of soft yellow leather stamped
with designs in silver and gartered with blue ribbon. The clanking
spurs were of silver inlaid with gold. The sash, knotted gracefully
over his hip, was of white silk. His curled black hair was tied with a
blue ribbon, and clung, clustering and damp, about a low brow. He bore
a strange resemblance to Chonita, in spite of the difference of color,
but his eyes were merely large and brilliant: they had no stars in
their shallows. His mouth was covered by a heavy silken mustache, and
his profile was bold. At first glance he impressed one as a perfect
type of manly strength, aggressively decided of character. It was only
when he cast aside the wide sombrero--which, when worn a little
back, most becomingly framed his face--that one saw the narrow,
insignificant head.
For a time there was no conversation, only a series of exclamations.
Chonita alone was calm, smiling a loving welcome. In the excitement of
the first moments little notice was taken of the devoted bailer, who
ardently regarded Chonita.
Don Juan de la Borrasca was flouting his sixties, fighting for his
youth as a parent fights for its young. His withered little face wore
the complacent smile of vanity; his arched brows furnished him with a
supercilious expression which atoned for his lack of inches,--he was
barely five feet two. His large curved nose was also a compensating
gift from the godmother of dignity, and he carried himself so erectly
that he looked like a toy general. His small black eyes were bright
as glass beads, and his hair was ribboned as bravely as Reinaldo's. He
was clad in silk attire,--red silk embroidered with butterflies. His
little hands were laden with rings; carbuncles glowed in the lace of
his shirt. He was moderately wealthy, but a stanch retainer of the
house of Iturbi y Moncada, the devoted slave of Chonita.
She was the first to remember him, and held out her hand for him to
kiss. "Thou hast the gratitude of my heart, dear friend," she said,
as the little dandy curved over it. "I thank thee a thousand times for
bringing my brother back to me."
"Ay, Doña Chonita, thanks be to God and Mary that I was enabled so to
do. Had my mission proved unsuccessful I should have committed a crime
and gone to prison with him. Never would I have returned here. Dueño
adorado, ever at thy feet."
Chonita smiled kindly, but she was listening to her brother, who was
now expatiating upon his wrongs to a sympathetic audience.
"Holy heaven!" he exclaimed, striding up and down the room, "that an
Iturbi y Moncada, the descendant of twenty generations, should be put
to shame, to disgrace and humiliation, by being cast into a common
prison! That an ardent patriot, a loyal subject of Mexico, should be
accused of conspiring against the judgment of an Alvarado! Carillo was
my friend, and had his cause been a just one I had gone with him to
the gates of death or the chair of state. But could I, _I_, conspire
against a wise and great man like Juan Bautista Alvarado? No! not even
if Carillo had asked me so to do. But, by the stars of heaven, he
did not. I had been but the guest of his bounty for a month; and the
suspicious rascals who spied upon us, the poor brains who compose the
Departmental Junta, took it for granted that an Iturbi y Moncada could
not be blind to Carillo's plots and plans and intrigues, that, having
been the intimate of his house and table, I must perforce aid and abet
whatever schemes engrossed him. Ay, more often than frequently did
a dark surmise cross my mind, but I brushed it aside as one does the
prompting of evil desires. I would not believe that a Carillo would
plot, conspire, and rise again, after the terrible lesson he had
received in 1838. Alvarado holds California to his heart; Castro, the
Mars of the nineteenth century, hovers menacingly on the horizon. Who,
who, in sober reason, would defy that brace of frowning gods?"
His eloquence was cut short by respiratory interference, but he
continued to stride from one end of the room to the other, his
face flushed with excitement. Prudencia's large eyes followed him,
admiration paralyzing her tongue. Doña Trinidad smiled upward with
the self-approval of the modest barn-yard lady who has raised a
magnificent bantam. Don Guillermo applauded loudly. Only Chonita
turned away, the truth smiting her for the first time.
"Words! words!" she thought, bitterly. "_He_ would have said all that
in two sentences. Is it true--_ay, triste de mi!_--what he said of my
brother? I hate him, yet his brain has cut mine and wedged there. My
head bows to him, even while all the Iturbi y Moncada in me arises to
curse him. But my brother! my brother! he is so much younger. And if
he had had the same advantages--those years in Mexico and America and
Europe--would he not know as much as Diego Estenega? Oh, sure! sure!"
"My son," Don Guillermo was saying, "God be thanked that thou didst
not merit thy imprisonment. I should have beaten thee with my cane and
locked thee in thy room for a month hadst thou disgraced my name.
But, as it happily is, thou must have compensation for unjust
treatment.--Prudencia, give me thy hand."
The girl rose, trembling and blushing, but crossed the room with
stately step and stood beside her uncle. Don Guillermo took her hand
and placed it in Reinaldo's. "Thou shalt have her, my son," he said.
"I have divined thy wishes."
Reinaldo kissed the small fingers fluttering in his, making a great
flourish. He was quite ready to marry, and his pliant little cousin
suited him better than any one he knew. "Day-star of my eyes!" he
exclaimed, "consolation of my soul! Memories of injustice, discomfort,
and sadness fall into the waters of oblivion rolling at thy feet. I
see neither past nor future. The rose-hued curtain of youth and hope
falls behind and before us."
"Yes, yes," assented Prudencia, delightedly. "My Reinaldo! my
Reinaldo!"
We congratulated them severally and collectively, and, when the
ceremony was over, Reinaldo cried, with even more enthusiasm than he
had yet shown, "My mother, for the love of Mary give me something to
eat,--tamales, salad, chicken, dulces. Don Juan and I are as empty as
hides."
Doña Trinidad smiled with the pride of the Californian housewife. "It
is ready, my son. Come to the dining-room, no?"
She led the way, followed by the family, Reinaldo and Prudencia
lingering. As the others crossed the threshold he drew her back.
"A lump of tallow, dost thou hear, my Prudencia?" he whispered,
hurriedly. "Put it under the green bench. I must have it to-night."
"Ay! Reinaldo--"
"Do not refuse, my Prudencia, if thou lovest me. Wilt thou do it?"
"Sure, my Reinaldo."