“You know not what you say, father,” said the young girl, angrily, exasperated by a slight twinkle in the American’s eye.

“Not so,” said Cranch.  “Perhaps one of the American nation may take him at his word.”

“Then, caballeros, you will, for the moment at least, possess yourselves of the house and its poor hospitality,” said Don Juan, with time-honored courtesy, producing the rustic key of the gate of the patio.  “It is at your disposition, caballeros,” he repeated, leading the way as his guests passed into the corridor.

Two hours passed.  The hills were darkening on their eastern slopes; the shadows of the few poplars that sparsedly dotted the dusty highway were falling in long black lines that looked like ditches on the dead level of the tawny fields; the shadows of slowly moving cattle were mingling with their own silhouettes, and becoming more and more grotesque.  A keen wind rising in the hills was already creeping from the canada as from the mouth of a funnel, and sweeping the plains.  Antonio had forgathered with the servants, had pinched the ears of the maids, had partaken of aguardiente, had saddled the mules,—­Antonio was becoming impatient.

And then a singular commotion disturbed the peaceful monotony of the patriarchal household of Don Juan Briones.  The stagnant courtyard was suddenly alive with peons and servants, running hither and thither.  The alleys and gardens were filled with retainers.  A confusion of questions, orders, and outcrys rent the air, the plains shook with the galloping of a dozen horsemen.  For the acolyte Francisco, of the Mission San Carmel, had disappeared and vanished, and from that day the hacienda of Don Juan Briones knew him no more.

CHAPTER III

When Father Pedro saw the yellow mules vanish under the low branches of the oaks beside the little graveyard, caught the last glitter of the morning sun on Pinto’s shining headstall, and heard the last tinkle of Antonio’s spurs, something very like a mundane sigh escaped him.  To the simple wonder of the majority of early worshipers—­the half-breed converts who rigorously attended the spiritual ministrations of the Mission, and ate the temporal provisions of the reverend fathers—­he deputed the functions of the first mass to a coadjutor, and, breviary in hand, sought the orchard of venerable pear trees.  Whether there was any occult sympathy in his reflections with the contemplation of their gnarled, twisted, gouty, and knotty limbs, still bearing gracious and goodly fruit, I know not, but it was his private retreat, and under one of the most rheumatic and misshapen trunks there was a rude seat.  Here Father Pedro sank, his face towards the mountain wall between him and the invisible sea.  The relentless, dry, practical Californian sunlight falling on his face grimly pointed out a night of vigil and suffering.  The snuffy yellow of his eyes was injected yet burning, his temples were ridged and veined like a tobacco leaf; the odor of desiccation which his garments always exhaled was hot and feverish, as if the fire had suddenly awakened among the ashes.