JUAN followed Padre Ignacio up the narrow stairs and through an unfinished part of the great building, where only the light of the priest's open chamber door guided them through a hot close darkness that one could feel on the face. There were finished chambers on only one side of the building in this part, used for lodging guests; the other side was a vast emptiness, the long rafters of round cedar trunks bare overhead. Juan was obliged to do obeisance to save his head a thump on the low lintel of the padre's door.
Padre Ignacio brought the chair from beside his bed and placed it for Juan at the table-end over against the north window. There they seated themselves, the thick tallow candle standing between them throwing off a smell of cracklings, such as the Indians feasted on after the fat had been pressed out of them in the vats.
"It is plain then, Juan, that this unfortunate engagement between you and Don Geronimo brings affairs to a crisis," Padre Ignacio said. "I tremble to think of the consequence of another meeting."
"Let him go about his own business and I'll attend to mine," Juan proposed, not disturbed by the padre's uneasiness for the future.
"Don Geronimo is not a man to accept a blow without retaliation. He is a hot, a vengeful man."
"I wouldn't expect him to let it pass."
"What can end this feud, then, but the death of one or both of you? Unless, certainly, you make peace with Don Geronimo as a Christian should."
"If he'll come and offer it, Padre Ignacio, I'll not turn my back."
"Don Geronimo is not the aggressor, my son. You were the first at fault, Juan, the morning you stood between Don Geronimo and Cristóbal at the wine press. You were ignorant of conditions here, certainly, and that mitigates your fault, in my eyes, but not so with Don Geronimo. It was a defiance of his authority before the eyes of the meanest; it threw Don Geronimo in contempt."
"He was about to do a contemptible thing."
"After the insubordination you have witnessed tonight, you should know better than to condemn Don Geronimo for his inflexible hand, my son. You have seen how license springs from the striking down of authority, how the spirit of anarchy sweeps like a fire among the unrestrained."
"I have seen a coward lashing harmless women and children with a whip! and that is all I have seen tonight that was wrong, Padre Ignacio."
"We are spending words for nothing, Juan. There are two courses open to you for insuring the placidity of San Fernando: the first is to go humbly and contritely to Don Geronimo this night, and crave his pardon for the passionate weakness that drove you to strike him with your unlucky flail."
Juan shook his head, his lips set firmly, his countenance severe.
"The other course is that you leave San Fernando within three days. I pronounce this sentence with a heavy heart. Grateful as I am, dearly as I have come to love you for your candor, your honor, your truth, I must set your face to the perils of the long journey back to your own country, unless your wisdom prompts you to accept the simpler, the truly Christian way."
Padre Ignacio looked at Juan appealingly, his brown hand put out as if to invite to the simplicity of this course. Juan did not see the inviting hand, nor the pathetic, tender appeal of Padre Ignacio's eyes. He was staring at the window, his eyes fixed as if he saw the long road stretching through many dangers, that led to his home and kind. He shook his head again, unmoved.
"I can't go and bend my neck to Don Geronimo," he said.
Padre Ignacio regarded him in silence, the eager appeal dying out of his face. He saw that Juan would accept any penance rather than the single one that would bend down his pride. He was a man who confessed no superior.
"You can understand the justness of my decision, Juan?" he seemed to beseech.
"Don Geronimo struck the first blow; let him come to me," Juan replied.
"It cannot be," Padre Ignacio sighed, despairing of making him understand.
"Then there's nothing for me but to leave."
Padre Ignacio did not speak. He sat with head bent, overwhelmed by a cataract of thought. One sandalled foot was set beyond the shadow of the table, a sturdy, dusty foot that seemed as if it had come to rest but then from tramping the long white trails of that summer-land.
"Will you permit me to take the horse that fell into my hands from Alvitre?" Juan inquired.
"But I will be happier to know that you are alive, filling the useful destiny that God has planned for you, than dead here by Don Geronimo's hand," Padre Ignacio said, his head still bent, his voice low. "The horse?" looking up suddenly, as if the words had only penetrated his ear that moment. "Take him, Juan. I wish I could give you riches to load his back. But you will prosper without that. Only tell me, Juan, that you will hang a bell in a little church some day in your own country in memory of your old friend who wished you well, but could do so little for your happiness."
"You have saved my life, Padre Ignacio." Juan touched the brown hand that lay on the table near him with firm pressure, assurance of his sincere gratefulness.
"By my cruel edict I save it again, for you will pass through the dangers of the journey and come to your home at last."
"And I will hang three bells in a church, each one of them not less than a hundred pounds weight. I shall name them in my heart for the three that I love best in San Fernando; when I hear them, I shall think it is your voices, calling to me from California, from San Fernando by the hills."
Padre Ignacio's fingers clasped his young friend's hand, pressing it tenderly. His face was bright with a smile, but tears stood in his eyes, to tremble a moment in the candle light and course down upon his worn brown gown.
"Duty calls for many sacrifices along our way," he said. "If I could send Don Geronimo away I would keep you here, but that is impossible, there is no other man who could stand in Don Geronimo's place. He knows our fields and herds as no other man; his loss would be a calamity."
"I believe he is a zealous and conscientious man, although I question his methods. No, I am not one, at least, who could fill his place."
"He understands cattle, the breeding, the increase, and agriculture. Only vines and olives he does not understand, but they are safe with me. If I could keep you, Juan, and teach you the care of a vineyard, until the exemption I have asked for you arrives—but that is indefinite; it will be months, perhaps years. It may not be granted at all. Perils encompass you wherever you are in California; there is no refuge for you here. More than that, you must be disciplined before our neophytes, they must be shown that no man can strike down authority and continue on his way. His deed must overwhelm him, as they must see this assault upon Don Geronimo banish you from friends, and dearer than friends. So, make ready, Juan. The third day from this must not see you in San Fernando."
"I am ready. When everything is quiet tonight I'll leave you, Padre Ignacio. You can direct me to the pass that leads to the mission road across the sands?"
"It is by way of San Gabriel. No, not tonight, Juan—there is no pressure to force you away tonight. Tomorrow I will give you a map, and letters to those at San Gabriel, who will assist you on your way. Now I go to Don Geronimo, to tell him of your banishment. He shall have no cause to say you have gone unpunished, and seek adjustment with his own hand. Tomorrow, Juan; tomorrow."
Juan accompanied Padre Ignacio to the court, where they stood a moment in silence before the broad door, now shut and barred, through which the Indians were carrying grapes to the wine press on Juan's first morning in San Fernando. Padre Ignacio laid his hand on the young man's shoulder, in a touch of gentle absolution for whatever fault was his.
"I will set a truce between you and Don Geronimo, I will require it of him on the cross," Padre Ignacio said. "If you want to remain until the day after tomorrow, or to the last hour, Juan?"
"I think it will be better to go soon, since I must go."
"Until tomorrow, then. It is pleasant on a moonlight night beside the fountain, Juan."
Juan was not a stranger to the delights of the fountain on a moonlit night, or even a night without moon. He had sat on the bench near the trellis where the roses clambered in perpetual bloom many an evening with Padre Mateo, smoking their pipes in perfect understanding. Borromeo, the blacksmith, often had joined them; frequently Juan and Borromeo had occupied the bench alone, when there were guests who had news of interest to the padres of San Fernando. Tonight the bench was empty. Padre Mateo was taking his pipe on the arched portico before the public door, with guests from the south who were passing the night; Borromeo was singing in his little house, where his shadow crossed the window when he moved about, busy at some congenial service for himself.
It was a sad thing for Juan, this banishment from San Fernando, where he had come an uncouth stranger but a little while ago. Its quaintness had become as familiar as his own face, its medieval atmosphere, its baronial government, had come to be accepted as truly fitting to the old-world somnolence of that sunny land. The charm of it had won him from his recollections, the peace of it had quelled his yearnings for home, until the past had become very dim and far away, its renewal not any more desired.
He had hoped that the stern law of that land otherwise so genial and inviting would be set aside in his case, an answer to Padre Ignacio's generous appeal. With such immunity he could have taken land on the river, somewhere in the broad and fecund valley between San Fernando and the Pueblo de Los Angeles, and established a prosperous ranch, free alike from the harassments of winter and the hazards of drouth. But, as Padre Ignacio had said, such exception might not be granted, the paper might never come. In such event, the mission soon would grow a small place for one whose feet never before had acknowledged bounds. So he had thought. But tonight, with the sentence of banishment upon him, he would have been glad to accept the restrictions which had bound him during his stay for the balance of his days. For there was that to be left behind at San Fernando which all the world beyond could not supply.
That was not Borromeo's footstep on the tiled garden path, nor Padre Mateo's step. It might be Doña Magdalena, coming to her kitchen to see that all was well. But she had passed the kitchen door; she was coming toward the fountain, perhaps cooling her brow after Don Geronimo's foray into the plaza. It would be a trying experience to meet Doña Magdalena, and hear her reproaches, yet there was no way to escape. For Doña Magdalena's sake he was sorry for the blow he had given Don Geronimo with the flail. He bowed his head in his hand, waiting for her to speak.
"Will you assist me, Don Juan? Padre Ignacio sent me for roses to refresh the breakfast table."
Then if Doña Magdalena's voice was so gentle, so friendly and so sweet, she might speak on by the hour, even to chide and condemn. Tula, white as a white rose she had come to gather, stood beside the fountain, a basket in her hand.
"How many do you require?" Juan asked, taking the little bright shears out of her hand, the same, indeed, that she had worn that morning hung about her neck like a crucifix.
"Wait, Don Juan—the braid!"
She took it from round her neck and tossed it playfully over his head.
"I have caught you now, Don Juan!" she laughed. "You are my apprentice to the shears."
"Bind me to the trade," he supplicated; "make it a long apprenticeship."
"They should be sheep shears then," said she. "But why would you have the apprenticeship long, Don Juan?"
"How many roses do you require?" he asked, his hand on the bramble that grew thicker than a strong man's arm.
"As many as the basket will hold, Don Juan."
Juan stood on the bench to reach the choice blossoms high on the trellis, Gertrudis holding the basket, the moonlight on her lifted face. The shadow in her cheek was deeper here than by the light of day; it seemed as if many hopes had departed out of her life, and few had come to abide. Yet there was no sense of oppression in her manner, only a gentle patience as of one chastened and made sweet by pain. Her hair was fairer for the moonlight, fair as northern tresses, her heritage from some Gothic adventurer who set foot upon the Iberian plains so long ago.
"We have enough now, Don Juan, the basket will not hold another one."
"Here is one too many, then, and the best of them all. I was reserving it; you can put it in your hair."
"In the morning it will open," she said, holding it against her cheek. "When I see a rosebud burst, I think it is like a soul that goes to God."
Juan took the basket from her and placed it on the bench, while she wove the rose stem in her hair above her ear, where the jasmine blossom had held the place of honor as she sat that morning with her class, when Juan Molinero found it as difficult to pass her door as if his own feet had been enmeshed in that soft entanglement.
"Now, I will run with the roses, Don Juan," she said, reaching out her hand.
He gave the basket to her, keeping hold of it still as if it stood, with its white burden, a covenant between them.
"Roses seem sweeter at night," she said, her head bent over them, her hand passive on the basket, no pressure in it to relieve him, nor any hurry in her feet to run away.
"Has Padre Ignacio told you of my banishment, Gertrudis?"
"Banishment?" She lifted her face quickly, in a panic of surprise.
"For the peace of San Fernando. You know what has happened?"
"May you always strike hard for those you love, Don Juan." She laid her free hand on his where it clasped the slender handle of the little basket, her seal of approval of the deed for which he stood under sentence of banishment. "But I did not know that you must go; I thought Padre Ignacio had arranged a truce. I heard him speak of a truce to Don Geronimo."
"Only covering the time I make my preparations to depart. Tomorrow Padre Ignacio will give me letters to certain people on the way, and a map of the road I am to go."
"But the soldiers, Don Juan?"
"There will be no soldiers the way I am going, Tula; not even men of any kind for a long and weary way across the southern desert. Very likely I'll leave in the night, besides. They'd find it hard to follow me."
"It will seem that so much will go with you away from San Fernando, Don Juan," she said pathetically, "so much of the life and energy of the place, so much that is needed here for the happiness of all."
"I wish I could think it so," he said, his voice low and grave.
"It will seem that hope will leave with you on your long, long journey to your homeland, Don Juan."
"I wish I might hope that it would be so, Gertrudis."
"You will go to those whom you love better, but to none that can wish you better than those you leave behind."
"I shall leave more behind me than I shall ever find again. If I had the freedom of this country outside the mission, Tula, Tula, I would not go, Tula. If the dispensation asked for me by Padre Ignacio were certain to be granted, I would hide in the mountains until it came."
"But it might be granted," she spoke eagerly, her handclasp tightening. "Then I could send you word, I could send Cristóbal. Or I would go, Don Juan; I would go to the world's end to carry such good news to you."
He covered her hand with his broad palm, and so they stood, their four hands on the little basket, their fealty pledged in roses, their understanding blessed in bloom.
"And I would wait till the world's end for you to come," he told her, as earnestly as if he vowed. "But it is too uncertain, Tula; Padre Ignacio says it may take months, even years. I believe he has no hope that it ever will come at all."
"Then you will go away, Dan Juan, into the desert, as one goes away into the night, never to be seen again."
"Paper or no paper, I will come back, Gertrudis, if you will wait for me at San Fernando. Give me a year, and we will fill a basket of roses for our wedding day."
"A year, or ten years, Juan. I will be waiting here, if San Fernando stands."
"I am not a poor man in my own country, Gertrudis, and more than I own I can command. It will be a simple thing for me, if I ever reach the Mississippi, to go to Boston and sail with a ship for California. There is trade waiting anybody that will brave the barbarous laws of this country and sail a ship here freighted with the things that are needed, to be exchanged for the hides there is no market for in Mexico."
"It might be a hazardous undertaking, but you, but you, my brave, strong Juan, you do not know peril where another falls."
"The coast is unguarded, Tula; there isn't a ship in these waters that could turn back a Boston brig. We could lie off San Pedro—I looked it over the day we went for you—and run to sea if anything threatened from land. But I believe the authorities would wink at the law to get a cargo of yankee goods. Give me a year, then, Tula, and I will return."
"As long as San Fernando stands."
"Your trust will carry me through. It may be for the best, after all, that I must go."
"There was a forecast in your heart of this going when you stood here this morning in the sun. You will remember, Juan?"
"But you were wrong when you said that home was dearer than friends in San Fernando. Poor Padre Ignacio! For the peace of the mission he banishes me, but he weeps to see me go."
"I have been a long time after the roses, Juan," she said, gently freeing her hands. "Padre Ignacio will wonder why I am so slow."
"There is no mystery," Juan answered, smiling; "he has been sitting on the bench by the wine press for the past ten minutes, waiting for us to come."
"Ah, what a heart!" said she.