there is Captain del Valle and the king's edict. It is very simple."
"That's a strange fix for a man to be in," said Miller. He walked on with head bent, plainly downcast and troubled by his peculiar peril. "And I've got to stay here, right here on this farm, till ages know when? is that it?"
"If you leave your sanctuary, it is very plain that Captain del Valle will carry you before the governor, who is a stern man, a man without mercy. He will apply the law without a doubt, my poor Juan Molinero; he will stand you against the first wall and shoot you through the heart."
"That's kind of a snap judgment to take on a stranger," Juan Molinero mused as he curbed his long stride to conform to the priest's leisurely gait. He appeared more interested in the peculiar phase of the situation than concerned over his own peril, turning the matter in his mind, viewing it for its unusual aspects as a student of jurisprudence might have done.
"It seems an inhospitable decree, indeed," the priest admitted, "but you can see that it is necessary to protect a land so isolated as California from the feet of adventurous men, such as Englishmen, who grasp and claim in their wicked greed all lands that their ships touch. The decree was designed for the protection of the missions, in the first place. The king wanted the great work of redeeming these gentiles to go forward without molestation or
