It was ten o'clock when Rezanov, who had supped on the Juno, met
Santiago in a sandy valley half a mile from the Presidio and mounted
the horse his young friend himself had saddled and brought. The long
ride was a silent one. The youth was not talkative at any time, and
Rezanov was conscious of little else save an overwhelming desire to see
Concha again. One secret of his success in life was his gift of
yielding to one energy at a time, oblivious at the moment to aught that
might distract or enfeeble the will. To-night, as he rode toward the
Mission on as romantic a quest as ever came the way of a lover, the
diplomat, the anxious director of a great Company, the representative
of one of the mighty potentates of earth, were submerged, forgotten, in
the thrilling anticipation of his hour with the woman for whom every
fiber of his being yearned.
Nor ever was there more appropriate a setting for one of those
inaugural chapters in mating, half appreciated at the time, that
glimmer as a sort of morning twilight on mountain tops over the mild
undulations of matrimony. The moon rode without a masking cloud across
the ambiguous night blue of the California sky, a blue that looks like
the fire of strange elements, where the stars glow like silver coals,
and out of whose depths intense shadows of blue and black fall; shadows
in which all the terrestrial world seems to float and recombine, where
houses are ghosts of ancient selves and men but the eidola of forgotten
dust. To-night the little estate of Juan Moraga, the most isolated and
eastern of the settlement, surrounded by its high white wall, looked as
unreal and formless as the blue oval of water and black trees behind
it, but Rezanov knew that it enfolded warm and palpitating womanhood
and was steeped in the sweetness of Castilian roses.
The riders, who had taken a path far to the east of the Mission
dismounted and tied their horses among the willows, then, in their dark
cloaks but a part of the shadows, stole toward the wall designed to
impress hostile tribes rather than to resist onslaught; at the first
warning the settlement invariably fled to the church, where walls were
massive and windows high.
In three of Moraga's four walls was a grille, or wicket of slender iron
bars, whence the open could be swept with glass, or gun at a pinch; and
toward the grille looking eastward went Rezanov as swiftly as the
uneven ground would permit. As Concha watched him gather form in the
moonlight and saw him jerk his cloak off impatiently, she flung her
soft body against the wall and shook the bars with her strong little
hands. But when he faced her she was erect and smiling; in a sudden
uprush of spirits, almost indifferent. She wore a white gown and a
rose in her hair. A rosebush as dense as an arbor spread its prickly
arms between herself and the windows of the house.
"Good-evening," she whispered.
Rezanov gave the grill an angry shake. (Santiago had considerately
retired.) "Come out," he said peremptorily, "or let me in."
"There is but one gate, senor, and that is directly in front of the
house door, that stands open--"
"Then I shall get over the wall--"
"Madre de Dios! You would leave your fine clothes and more on the
thorns. My cousin planted those roses not for ornament, but to let the
blood of defiant lovers. Not one has come twice--"
"Do you think I came here to talk to you through a grating? I am no
serenading Spaniard."
His eyes were blazing. Adobe is not stone. Rezanov took the light bars
in both hands and wrenched them out; then, as Concha, divided between
laughter and a sudden timidity, would have retreated, he dexterously
clasped her neck and drew her head through the embrasure. As Santiago,
who had watched Rezanov from a distance with some curiosity, saw his
sister's beautiful face emerge from the wall to disappear at once
behind another rampart, he turned abruptly on his heel and could have
wept as he thought of Pilar Ortego of Santa Barbara. But there was a
hope that he would be a cadet of the Southern Company before the year
was out, and his parents and hers were indulgent. Even as he sighed,
his own impending happiness infused him with an almost patronizing
sympathy for the twain with the wall between, and he concealed himself
among the willows that they might feel to the full the blessed
isolation of lovers. His Pilar presented him with twenty-two hostages,
and he lived to enjoy an honorable and prosperous career, but he never
forgot that night and the part he had played in one of the poignant and
happy hours of his sister's life.
Day and night a great silence reigned in the Mission valley, broken
only by the hoot of the owl, the singing of birds, the flight of horses
across the plain. Even the low huddle of Mission buildings and the few
homes beyond looked an anomaly in that vast quiet valley asleep and
unknown for so many centuries in the wide embrace of the hills. Its
jewel oasis alone made it acceptable to the Spaniard, but to Rezanov
the sandy desert, with its close companionable silences, its cool night
air sweet with the light chaste fragrance of the roses, the simple,
almost primitive, conditions environing the girl, possessed a power to
stir the depths of his emotions as no artful reinforcement to passion
had ever done. He forgot the wall. His ego melted in a sense of
complete union and happiness. Even when they returned to earth and
discussed the dubious future, he was conscious of an odd resignation,
very alien in his nature, not only to the barrier but to all the
strange conditions of his wooing. He had felt something of this
before, although less definitely, and to-night he concluded that she
had the gift of clothing the inevitable with the semblance and the
sweetness of choice; and wondered how long it would be able to skirt
the arid steppes of philosophy.
She told him that she had talked daily with Father Abella. "He will
say nothing to admit he is weakening, but I feel sure he has realized
not only that our marriage will be for the best interests of
California, but that to forbid it would wreck my life; and from this
responsibility he shrinks. I can see it in his kind, shrewd, perplexed
eyes, in the hesitating inflections of his voice, to say nothing of the
poor arguments he advances to mine. What of my father and mother?"
"They look troubled, almost ill, but nothing could exceed their
kindness to me, although they have pointedly given me no opportunity to
introduce the subject of our marriage again. The Governor makes no
sign that he knows of any aspiration of mine above corn, but he
informed me to-day that California is doomed to abandonment, that the
Indians are hopeless, that Spain will withdraw troops before she will
send others, and that the country will either revert to savagery or
fall a prey to the first enterprising outsider. As he was in
comparison cheerful before, I fancy he apprehends the irresistible
appeal of your father's surrender."
Concha nodded. "If my father yields he will see that you have
everything else that you wish. He may have advocated meeting your
wishes in other respects in order to leave you without excuse to
linger, but that argument is not strong enough for the Governor,
whereas if he made up his mind to accept you as a son he would throw
the whole force of his character and will into the scale; and when he
reaches that pitch he wins--with men. I must, must bring you good
fortune," she added anxiously. "Marriage with a little California
girl--are you sure it will not ruin your career?"
"I can think of nothing that would advantage it more. What are you
going to call me?"
"I cannot say Petrovich or Nicolai--my Spanish tongue rebels. I shall
call you Pedro. That is a very pretty name with us."
"My own harsh names suit my battered self rather better, but the more
Californian you are and remain the happier I shall be. When am I to
see your ears? Are they deformed, pointed and furry like a fawn's? Do
they stand out? Were all the women of California tattooed in some
Indian raid--"
Concha glanced about apprehensively, but not even Santiago was there to
see the dreadful deed. With a defiant sweep of her hands she lifted
both loops of hair, and two little ears, rosy even in the moonlight,
commanded amends and more from penitent lips.
"No man has ever seen them before--since I was a baby; not even my
father and brothers," said Concha, trembling between horror and rapture
at the tremendous surrender. "You will never remind me of it. Ay yi!
promise--Pedro mio!"
"On condition that you promise not to confess it. I should like to be
sure that your mind belonged as much to me and as little to others as
possible. I do not object to confession--we have it in our church; but
remember that there are other things as sacred as your religion."
She nodded. "I understand--better than you understand Romanism. I
must confess that I met you to-night, but Father Abella is too discreet
to ask for more. It is such blessed memories that feed the soul, and
they would fly away on a whisper."