Chapter 8

Juana gazed long on the inanimate form of her husband, then, with a last parting kiss, turned toward the house. She thought now of Pepito, for the first time since she had left him, and she quickened her steps, going faster as she neared the house, and her fear of the hidden savage came over her. The time she had been absent was short, though it seemed hours to her, and she found the baby playing in the sunlight that streamed in the window. Snatching him up convulsively, she dashed out of the house, and ran at her utmost speed along the road that led to the mission, nearly three miles away. Her horse was tethered in the field, not one hundred yards from her, but she was too frightened to think of that. Her one thought was to get away from the Indian, and to reach the mission, forgetting in her unceasing fear that she was completely at the mercy of her foe, and that, were he bent on still further mischief, by hurrying unduly, she was only hastening the bitter moment.

And so it proved. The road to the mission lay at an acute angle with the course of the stream, and the place where Juana supposed the Indian to be hid was, for some distance, almost in front of her. She hurried on, looking neither to right nor left, but with gaze bent tensely on the mission church, the cross on the roof alone being visible above the tree tops. She had gone only a few yards when she heard a sudden, sharp whistling in the air near her. Startled, she glanced quickly to one side, and clutched the baby more closely to her--too late; she saw not the arrow, such was its velocity, but felt the baby give one spasmodic bound. She flew along the road, the child screaming as she ran. As she neared the mission, and the houses clustered around it, the inmates started from their various occupations and gazed in astonishment at Juana as she sped by, wild-eyed, her hair streaming in the wind.

Father Zalvidea had passed the morning in reading the letters Diego had brought to him the night before, and meditating gloomily on the prospect confronting the missions. He did not fear any particular trouble at San Gabriel, but the news he had had from some of the northern establishments was not reassuring; and the missions were so closely united in one common bond, that what was an injury to one was an injury to all. After reading and re-reading the letters, he put them away, and betook himself to his garden for a little pasear before his midday meal. He had paced the length of the garden only two or three times, when he was aroused from his revery by the abrupt appearance of a woman whom, from the agony distorting her face, and her long fluttering hair, he did not at once recognize. As soon as she saw him Juana cried out, “Father, Father!” and staggering forward a step, fell, unconscious, at his feet. Calling loudly for help, the priest bent over, and caught the baby from her arms. At sight of the arrow he exclaimed: “Now may God help us!” for he understood, on the instant, its import.

By this time he was surrounded by a number of women and servants, and, not heeding their ejaculations, he bade them carry Juana into the house. The baby was past help--the arrow had pierced its neck, and the child was even then in the stupor that would give way only to death, the poison working rapidly in the small body. But the Father could not linger. Leaving Juana and the child in care of the household, he quickly alarmed the Mexican contingent of the mission, and put them on guard. A small number of armed men were sent to reconnoitre the mountains near Diego’s home. The hunt was kept up for two days; but nothing was found except the tracks of the Indian in the soft mud of the river, and a circle of ashes, the remains of a small fire. From all indications there had been only one Indian in the neighborhood, and he, apparently, had disappeared to return no more, for nothing was seen of him, though a watch was maintained there for several weeks.

Such a state of extreme uncertainty as the mission was in could not have lasted long, and the Father knew that unless something were done to end it, the neophytes would most certainly rise in rebellion, and slay their masters. Fortunately all danger was removed, a few days after Diego’s tragic end, by the arrival of a messenger with letters from Santa Barbara. The news they contained was most grave. The vague, intangible anxiety, so long experienced, had culminated at last in the uprising of the Indians at Mission Purezima. On the Sabbath morning previous, they had made a sudden assault on the mission, and had burned many of the buildings, almost ruined the church, and, after much fighting, had driven the Mexicans with the fathers to Mission Santa Inez, twenty-five miles distant. Word had been sent at once to Monterey, and a detachment of soldiers from the presidio there had hastened to the spot. This required two days, during which the insurgents held the mission; but on the arrival of the troops, they were soon ousted and forced to retire.

The same thing was attempted at Santa Inez, but not much difficulty was found in quelling the disturbance. Some signs of insubordination were shown at the neighboring missions, San Luis Obispo in the north, and Santa Barbara, San Buenaventura and San Fernando south of the scene of the trouble; but there was no disturbance after the Indians had learned that the attempt at Purezima was unsuccessful; and they hastened to pledge obedience to the fathers. There were four hundred Indians in active insurrection, and although many were wounded, only sixteen were killed.

As for San Gabriel, the shooting of Diego and his child was the only incident that occurred at this mission which showed the condition of things prevailing everywhere; and Father Zalvidea was thankful to have it no worse--yet long he mourned for his faithful servant. When Diego and Pepito were buried, the Father made a solemn and impressive address to the neophytes, painting in vivid colors the pains of hell, which those engaged in the insurrection were in danger of experiencing after death, contrasting it with the joys of those blessed ones who did God’s will on earth, and received their own great reward hereafter.

Juana was delirious and raving for many days. The shock itself was sufficient to cause her illness, but it was surmised that the arrow, which had slain Pepito, had entered an inch or so into her arm. In the excitement of her sudden appearance and fainting, when the Father took the child from her, this was not noticed; but a few hours later her arm became much swollen and very painful; and as a slight wound was discovered, the Father concluded some of the poison had entered her system. This was the only plausible theory to account for her swollen arm, and also, perhaps, for her subsequent condition; for Juana, alas! never recovered her mental faculties after the fever left her. Regaining her physical health, the memory of her former life was an almost complete blank. All she seemed to have retained were the refrains of two or three songs she had been accustomed to sing to Diego, in the first months of their married life.

Juana lived for many years, and until she became an old, old woman. She was always treated with the greatest consideration by every one at the mission, for her story was known, at first, as an event in their mission life, then, as the years went by, as history and tradition. Meek and gentle she was. It was only when thwarted in her desires that she became aroused to a pitch of angry insanity which made her dangerous. This chanced very seldom, for she was allowed to do as she pleased in all things. And so she lived, unnoting the many and great changes that took place from year to year in Nueva California--San Gabriel losing its greatness and power, ceasing, even, together with all the others, its life as a mission, and the province itself torn from the grasp of Mexico, to become a member of the greatest republic in the world--her unheeding mind knew nothing of all this. Her favorite pastime, after the railroad was built through the little town of San Gabriel, was to wander down to the station, when time for the trains, which she quickly learned, and to greet them with the snatches of song that remained with her--sole vestige of her former life.

But death came at last to this poor wayfarer on life’s journey, and she was buried in the cemetery near the church, by the side of her husband and her child, the place which had been, by common consent, reserved for her in the sadly overcrowded little campo santo. Here lies all of her that was mortal. We know she is well once more, with her mind and memory, touched by divine healing, restored to her, and, we may be sure, happy in the companionship of her loved ones.

Father Uria’s Saints

“Therefore I went to Father Uria and told him your story. He was very kind, and bade me write to you that you might trust him to find you something to do if you should decide to come here. Have no fear; there are not enough men at San Buenaventura to prevent a single man from having all the work he may wish. Make haste and come. Do not delay. Diego.” The reader finished the letter, and there was a silence of some minutes between the two, reader and listener. The former, a young man, not much more than twenty-five years of age, had a moody expression on his dark face. After reading the letter he waited for his companion to speak. But Maria, his wife, appeared not to notice this and remained silent. The two were sitting on the porch of a little adobe house on the outskirts of the presidio town of Tubac, Mexico, a few, miles from the coast of the Gulf of California. This had been the home of Benito’s parents, and since their death three years before, that of himself and his wife. For a time they had been happy in their hard-working life, for love lightened their toil; but toward the close of the second year in their home they had suffered a series of reverses that sadly crippled Benito’s resources. First there had been a season of such heat and drought that all their labor in the dozen acres which Benito cultivated came to naught, and they gathered hardly more than enough to keep them from starving before the next year’s harvest. Then one of Benito’s horses, of which he had three, and fine ones they were, had been taken sick and died just at the time when it was most needed, during the early summer plowing--both Benito’s and his neighbors’; for after the work on his own land was done, Benito worked for others, thus adding something toward their income. The death of his horse was a severe blow to him, not only because he loved his horses, but because his income was greatly curtailed in consequence. With three horses Benito could use a pair every day, and yet allow each horse to rest one day out of three; but with two, it could be done only by losing a day’s work out of every three; and this was the plan Benito had followed, for he could not bring himself to use his good steeds every day. This had occurred in the spring following the poor harvest.

Some weeks later, about six months before our story opens, another disaster befell these two unfortunate ones. One night, Benito and Maria had been awakened by a terrible uproar in their chicken house. Benito rushed out to find it in flames. Some traveler passing, after smoking a cigarette, had, most likely, carelessly thrown the burning stub among the inflammable boards and loose stuff of the enclosure. Benito did what he could to rescue the hens and chickens, but of all of his flock, he saved a mere score. This last calamity was almost more than Maria could bear. The hens had been her especial care. She had, under her skillful tending, seen the flock increase from the small nucleus of a dozen, which Benito had bought and given her on her coming to his home, a few days after they were married, to over one hundred. These hens had been the source of no small profit, and by their means Benito was able to put aside a little nest egg each year. And now they must begin again! It was hard, and both felt there was no relief for them. The little they had saved during the first few years had to be used for the summer sowing, and for food until they could gather a harvest. Here, again, Benito found there would not be more than sufficient for their wants, and that, when the next sowing time came, they would be in a worse condition than at present for continuing the struggle for existence. Altogether Benito and Maria were on the edge of despair.

Shortly after the death of Benito’s parents, his elder brother had made one of a band of artisans, laborers and soldiers, in company with two Franciscan priests, to the province of Nueva California. Diego, who was of a roving disposition, had wandered off to the south, working at his trade of carpentry as the mood seized him, or the state of his pocket forced him, now here, now there, until finally he found himself in the coast town of San Blas. This was the point from which many of the expeditions to the northern province set sail; and the busy preparations for departure, which Diego witnessed, fired his desire to join a company about to leave for the remote, half-mythical region in the north. This he did, and, some weeks later, landed at Monterey, whence, in the course of the next year, he worked his way south until he reached Mission San Buenaventura. Here he settled down permanently, having grown tired of his aimless life, and became an active and useful man to the Father. Communication between the two countries in those days was infrequent, and Benito had heard his brother was settled at San Buenaventura only after he had been there nearly a year. Diego described, in glowing terms, the advantages of the province--the fine climate, exceeding fertility of the soil, land to be had for the asking, where everything necessary and desired could be grown, and his own content, far away, though he was, from his old home. This letter had reached Benito when he was at the lowest ebb of his fortunes. The glowing language of his brother’s description of Nueva California awakened an intense longing in his heart to go there and make a new beginning, under more favorable influences. He said nothing to Maria, but wrote a letter to Diego, telling of his troubles, and asking if there were room for himself and wife in that new land. This he sent off by a friend to San Blas, where it was given over to a priest who, in turn, was to deliver it into the charge of the next expedition to be sent out. Benito had written nearly six months before, and had about given up looking for an answer, when a neighbor, returning home from the town, handed him a letter as he passed by. His brother gave him encouraging news and advised him to come, ending with the words quoted above. After reading it, Benito hastened to find Maria, and with her by his side on the little porch he read it again to her.

At last Maria broke the silence:

“Benito, I am glad you wrote to Diego, and I feel sure the best thing for us to do is to go. How can we keep on in the way we have been doing the last two years? I am tired and disheartened, and I know you are too; but there, in the new land, we could make another start with better courage. Let us go.” Maria looked up at Benito, smiling brightly, but with tears in her eyes.

Benito lost no time in carrying out his plan, and at the end of a few weeks he had sold his house and land, and all his furniture and farming tools, reserving only his horses. These, with a few clothes, and two hundred dollars in gold in his pocket, made up the entire wealth of this poor couple. As Benito wished to keep his horses, he decided to go to the new country overland by way of the Colorado River, and across the desert to Mission San Gabriel. This had been the regular route of the land expeditions of the early days of mission history, and was still used, although less frequently. Benito and Maria had not long to wait when a company was formed to start out on the long journey of seven hundred miles to Mission San Buenaventura.

At the time of the setting out of our friends in the year 1830, traveling overland from Mexico to California was an easy thing, compared to the hardship and dangers of fifty years earlier. Then, the way, through the desert around the mouth of the Colorado River, was beset by the fierce and powerful Yuma Indians, and unless the band of travelers were large and well armed, it would suffer severely at their hands. But the Yumas had become subdued with time, and traveling made safe. The company with which Benito and Maria journeyed had no mishap, and after four weeks passed on the way, they arrived, one evening late in October, at Mission San Buenaventura, just as the bells of the mission church were pealing out their evening burden.

What a charming place Mission San Buenaventura was in those days! Situated on the coast, it stood not a half-mile from the water, which it faced, while behind, and close to it, was a line of hills running off into the distance until they disappeared on the horizon. At the time of year our pilgrims first saw it, there was little remaining of the verdant freshness of spring and early summer. But if Nature refuses to permit southern California to wear her mantle of green later than May or June, she has bestowed on her a wealth of warm yellow, red and brown, which, to some, is even more pleasing. The bare ground takes on a vividness of glowing color that is almost incredible, while the hills in the distance run through another gamut of color--from yellow through all the shades of orange to an almost pure pink, with pale blue shadows, changing at sunset to intensest purple. Color is rife in California.

The mission consisted of a large white adobe church, a long line of buildings adjoining in which lived the padre and the Mexicans, and a number of little houses and cabins, some of adobe, but the greater number of straw and rushes, which sheltered the Indians. These little huts were scattered around irregularly on all sides; and to them the inmates were wending their way from their daily toil in the fields and among the horses and cattle, and from all the occupations of a pastoral life. Nothing more beautiful could well be imagined than the picture the mission made in the rosy light of sunset--crowds of savages, children of nature gathered together to receive the rich blessings bestowed on them by the fathers, deriving their authority from the Church whose symbol, the great white building, towering above all else of man’s work, stood like a sentinel guarding the religious life of the mission.

Father Uria had been pacing to and fro in front of the mission for more than an hour, waiting impatiently for the expedition from Mexico, which had been expected two days before, its regular time of arrival. It was not at all unusual for these bands to be delayed three or four days, and that without meeting with any accident on the way; but news from home was infrequent to a degree that made an expedition to the province awaited with almost unreasonable impatience. Mail, as well as everything else, came usually by sea; but to send letters by the desert route was by no means rare.

Father Uria was known to all his fraternity in the country for his eccentricity. He was a small, rather stout man, about sixty years of age, every one of which had left its mark upon him; for his had been a life of toil surpassed by but few, even among those self-denying workers in the Lord’s vineyard. But the hardships of his life had not quenched his jovial spirits, which were, indeed, irrepressible. A laughing greeting for every one he met, Mexican or Indian, was his habit, one that might have begotten a measure of contempt in the beholder, had the Father not possessed a sternness, latent for the most part, it is true, but which could, on occasion, be evoked to prop up the apparently tottering respect due him. Father Uria was fond, too, of company, not only for its own sake, but because it gave him an excuse for the pleasures of the table, and, in especial, for enjoying the delights of the wine made at Mission San Gabriel, and which was in demand by all the missions. This was a weakness seldom indulged in, for the Father cared not for imbibing this delectable liquid unless assisted by pleasant company; and occasions when this could be had were rare. Let not the reader infer from this that our respected fraile was guilty of drinking more than was good or seemly for him. There had been a whisper one time, going the rounds of the missions, that he had been uproariously drunk on some occasion in the past; one slanderous tongue said the priest had been reprimanded by President Sanchez, but we do not believe a word of this. And who would grudge him all the pleasure he might get from the good San Gabriel wine? Think of the poor padre, expatriated for the rest of his days, and in a land that wanted much to make life seem worth the living! Our hearts go out to the Father, as to all the other good men who had done likewise, in deepest sympathy.

It is not our intention to enumerate all the peculiarities of Father Uria. But there was one, before which all the rest sank into insignificance, and that was his excessive fondness for cats. The love of cats is more particularly a feminine trait; and this, together with his strength of mind, marked though it was usually by his geniality, makes it the more surprising in Father Uria’s case. Yet such was the fact, and as such was it recognized by all with whom he came in contact; for in this instance it was “love me love my”--cats! This hobby of the friar was one he had had from childhood; but gaining man’s estate, he had kept it in subjection (fearing it was not in accord with the strictest propriety, especially after taking orders) until he came to California. Here he had found a life of such loneliness, that, as a refuge from almost unbearable ennui, he had gone back to his youthful feline love with more than youthful ardor. When he came to take charge of the Mission, San Buenaventura, three years before, he had brought with him, carefully watched over, four immense cats, which had long been his pets. These he still had, and in their companionship he found his greatest solace for a life of solitude.

Father Uria continued his walking to and fro, gazing off to the east along the road which the expedition from Mexico must traverse on its way to Monterey. Behind him, almost at his heels, trotted one of his pets, seeming to be perfectly content to follow the footsteps of her master, and showing unbounded joy, when he stopped for a moment to pet and speak to her.

“Well! gatita mia, you are the only one to stay with your old master. Where are the others? Off hunting for gophers, I suppose. But here are the travelers at last,” and he hurried down the road toward the approaching train, the cat bounding along at his side, or running off every few feet, now this way, now that, to chase a butterfly or mosquito hawk. Once, in her haste to overtake her master, she encountered a horned toad. With a spring to one side, and a loud “spst!” she passed it, for this pet of Father Uria was acquainted with these hated objects, but could never overcome her intense horror of them. We are much afraid this puss is a sad coward.

The Father reached the band of travelers, and he received from the commander the packet of letters destined for the mission. Then, with a few words of welcome to all, he bade them follow him to the mission, where they would find refreshment and shelter for the night. On the way, singling out Benito and Maria (the former from his resemblance to Diego) Father Uria questioned them as to their journey, and plans for their future home at his mission. Benito related his story, and hopes of finding some occupation.