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Show " Mistress of Monterey VIRGINIA STIVERS BARTLETT Virginia Stivers Bartleh - " WNU Service CHAPTER XV Continued 12 "Then wnat happened?" vWell, in the meantime I had quietly qui-etly moved to the table, picked up this letter, and slipped it into the sleeve ol my habit. But the father did not notice. He seemed quite distressed, and dismissed me, saying say-ing he would call for me again. And here is the letter." "Read it" "There is the usual preamble. Then it goes on thus: 'Upon reaching reach-ing here these padres withdrew themselves. They passed the day in sleep and Idleness and the night in outrages, disturbing the repose ol those who, having spent the day in .. work, must needs sleep at night. They behaved, indeed, like sons of darkness; breaking the jars where the chocolate of the community is kept, stealing the chocolate-pots to beat them for drums, and appropriating appropri-ating the balls which were kept by the community for the recreation of the religious, bowled them through the dormitories at unseasonable hours of the night, with result to the religious of terror and confusion. confu-sion. And they scaled the walls of the mission establishment by night, scarcely on deeds of virtue bent . . .' " "Scarcely!" crowed Fray Mariano, Mari-ano, sitting up on the edge of his cot and rocking back and forth. "Scarcely! Ai, por Dios, that is fine! Brother, you did a noble deed to get that letter!" The other rose and walked over to the table, and poured wine for both of them. "Now I want to speak of something else seriously to you. The other day when the Governor and his party were here at the mission for the confirmation of his spoiled little Excellency, Ex-cellency, young Pedro, I overheard many things. One of them was that, because you and I had not turned out to be the shining lights Junipero Serra had hoped us to be, the founding found-ing of the Mission Santa Barbara could not take place." He gazed sternly at the other. "Oh, tut, tut, tut Aren't you ashamed, Brother?" "Stop it, hypocritical wretch! So I have been thinking that if we mended our ways, things might turn out so that we could be, if not actually the founders of that mission, mis-sion, at least those in charge of it. Is that not worth thinking about?" Fray Rubi gazed open-mouthed in admiration. "Splendid! Oh, what a brother have I! What a mind, what a soul! Yes, let us do that. I shall be Father Fa-ther Superior, and you shall be my subordinate." "Oh, no! I shall be Father Superior, Supe-rior, and you the subordinate ... I am . . ." "No, I shall be superior, you misbegotten mis-begotten dog!" Fray Rubi dashed his wine-cup at Gili's face. The other screamed, and reached blindly before him, but Rubi had retreated to a corner, for in the doorway stood the Father President, looking in at them, shielding with a protective gesture, the Indian youth, Pio. -For a moment the padre stared at the two, then covering his eyes with his hands, stumbled away, limping painfully to his own cell. As though his legs could not support him, he sank on his knees beside his bed, and resting his head on the rough uncovered planks, wept. Pio stood awkwardly beside him, watching compassionately the thin heaving shoulders. "Padre mio," he said at last very softly. "Padre mio, come, Pio is here beside you. Do not grieve, Father." He laid a timid brown hand on the priest Junipero Serra raised his ravaged face to the Indian. "Yes, Pio, you are beside me. Thank God for that Thank God for you, my own, my true little son." He allowed Pio to lift him to the cot. "Pio," he groaned, "I have been a sinner. I have failed, somewhere, somehow, or else I would not be now forsaken. I had gone to those two with love and forgiveness in my heart, to beg them to help me, to be my eyes, since my spectacles are gone. And you saw them, Pio. Your innocent eyes saw them. Ah, why have they been sent to me, for I do not remember any sin I have committed black enough to deserve them as a punishment." "No, Father! Say it not! You are no sinner." "Dear son." The father smiled faintly. "Little loyal one. You are all I have, Pio, it seems. Everything Every-thing else is falling away from me; my right of confirmation, my beloved be-loved mission to Santa Barbara, my friendship with Don Pedro and now these messages that have come today, to-day, denying me even hope for the future. Pio," he said suddenly, "you can read?" "A little. Father." "Good. You shall read to me the Jr-dispatches that arrived on the San Antonio. You who have been my legs, must now be my eyes. I have looked at these letters once, but I can scarcely see ... so read, my son, and carefully. I may have been mistaken when I read them." The boy read, slowly, painfully, stumbling over the stilted official phraseology of the letters from the Viceroy, and the Father Guardian in Mexico. There was no hope for the Mission Mis-sion Santa Barbara. The Governor, Don Pedro Fages, had not recommended recom-mended the idea. It was regrettable regretta-ble the two Franciscans, Fray Mariano Rubi and Fray Bartolome Gili, were unsuitable, but it was hard to get decent men to leave Mexico, and go to the distant province of California. There was a friendly personal letter let-ter from the Father Guardian, but that gave Junipero Serra no comfort. com-fort. Serra was warned against using us-ing his temporal influence, as there were rumors abroad that the missions mis-sions in California were to be turned over to the Order of Donimicans, and the Franciscans returned to Mexico. "No, no," faltered the Fanciscan. "No, Pio, you do not read that truly! tru-ly! California to be delivered to the Dominicans? But California is San Francisco's own country . . . chosen cho-sen by his own wish . . . never should it be in other hands than fM k ' ) "Slipped It Into the Sleeve of My Habit." those of the Brothers of San Francisco! Fran-cisco! Ah, it is just a rumor ... it could be nothing else, God forbid that it should!" Serra clasped his hands and was still. "Are there no more letters?" he asked calmly. "Here is one, but it is not from Mexico, Padre. It is from his Excellency." Ex-cellency." "Don Pedro! Read it." The note was curt, brief. The Governor had received dispatches from Mexico, regarding the founding found-ing of the Mission Santa Barbara, and he presumed the holy father had received the same intelligence. It was unfortunate the holy father had not seen fit to communicate with him, or shown any disposition to enter en-ter again upon friendlier relations. He himself and La Gobernadora, with an escort, were leaving on the San Antonio when she sailed for the Presidio and Mission of San Francisco, where La Gobernadora would be confined by the eminent doctor who was stationed there. And that was all. The father rose painfully from his cot, and stood in the center of the little cell, his hands outflung to Heaven. "Deserted! Betrayed! The face of all mankind is turned against me, but Thou, O Father, art with me! Thy rod and thy staff they comfort me! Thou art with me always . . ." "And I, Padre," whispered Pio, kneeling at the father's feet. "I am with you, always." The Missionary put one hand on the Indian's bowed head, and with the other still upraised, stood, with rapt face, his lips murmuring prayers. pray-ers. Pio could feel the heat of the trembling hand even through the thick thatch of his hair, and close to the father as he was, could feel his limbs trembling. At last Serra spoke to him. "It is finished, Pio. And if all the years that I have toiled have brought me nothing else, it is enough that you are here, simple, loving, righteous. Pio mio." He smiled at the boy, and turned again to his cot He knelt beside it "But Padre, will you not lie down?" questioned the anxious boy. "This attitude is more comfortable, com-fortable, son, for it is one to which my body is more familiar than any other. Pio, will you try to find Estevanico, and bring back my spectacles to me? For now I have many, many letters to write, and the time is getting short, ay, short" Pio tightened the red sash around his waist and straightened proudly. "Father, it shall be done. At once." He dashed out of the cell, through the mission grounds, and in the direction of the village of the gentile Indians. Junipero Serra did not feel the hard floor beneath his knees, nor the hard boards in which his head rested. rest-ed. He was pondering deeply, sadly, sad-ly, praying to keep the bitterness from his thoughts. He began dreaming of the past of his earlier days in California. Episodes which he had forgotten long since came into his mind. His first baptism of an Indian child, the sweetness of a hedge of wild roses along a newly broken trail, a sunset glow on the white peaks of the lofty sierras. With each of these impressions impres-sions came the figure of Pedro Fages, whose eyes saw the same beauty, and whose heart loved it as be did. "Ai, mi companero," he sighed, "you have deserted me. Friend, brother." The room grew dark, A swallow darted In the low doorway, circled the cell and flew out with a silky rustle rus-tle of swift wings. Junipero Serra smiled. "Father Francis . . ." he whispered, whis-pered, "Father Francis ... I recognize rec-ognize thy messenger . . ." Then he lay very still. Into the room, after a long while, darted Pio, as swiftly and noiselessly noise-lessly as the swallow. "Padre mio!" he crowed, "Padre mio! Look, your spectacles!" There was no answer from the priest. Pio leaned over him breathlessly. "Look," he said, "I have them, your spectacles, Father." At last Serra stirred. "Ah, bless you, my child?" he said in a faint voice. "Now light the candles for there is work to be done." Pio lighted the candles. If the father had not been so engrossed in his own thoughts he would have seen the youth's face was bleeding, that one eye was closed, and that his hair was standing wildly on his usually sleek head. The father fitted his spectacles over his ears, took them off, and adjusted the steel bows a bit, wiped the square lenses with the corner of his brown robe and picked up his quill. He must summon his brethren to him. First there were those staunch countrymen of his, Fermin Lasuen, Francisco Palou, islanders like himself. him-self. Ah, but Crespi . . . but lately he had been laid to rest beneath the altar of the church here at Carmel. And Jose Antonio Murguia, the Builder . . . but he too now slept in the beautiful church at Santa San-ta Clara, which he had builded, and whose dedication he had not lived to see. So many of the pioneer Franciscans Francis-cans were dead, Garces, El Pedes-triano, Pedes-triano, killed by the very Indians whose souls he was bent on saving; and that other martyr of the early days of the Mission San Diego, Fray Luis Jaime, whose body, stripped, bruised, bloody, and pieroed with arrows, had been found after an Indian In-dian raid, with only the consecrated hands left unscathed. Junipero Serra sighed deeply, and breathed a prayer for those sainted souls. California had exacted her toll from the Franciscans . . . but there were many left, praise God. And to them he must write; to Mission Mis-sion San Buenaventura, San Gabriel Gabri-el Arcangel, San Juan Capistrano, San Diego de Alcala, Santa Clara, San Luis Obispo de Tolosa, San Antonio An-tonio de Padua, and San Francisco de Asis. As he leaned over the table his head was light with fever, and the quill in his hand shook. For a moment mo-ment he needs must lay his head down on the clean page before him, and close his eyes. Yet he must write . . . though well he knew those brothers of the farther missions mis-sions would never reach him in time. But Palou, his closest brother, broth-er, his Mallorcan countryman . . . he must come. He roused himselfi and started writing, ending the letter, let-ter, "Good Brother Palou, come and assist me to die!" For hours into the night, the little cell was quiet except for the scratching of the pen, and the gentle clicking of his rosary when he rested rest-ed from his writing. Once Pio slipped in, and put fresh candles in the candle-sockets. He curled up at the father's feet, and was soon asleep. As he wrote a white fog moved silently in from the sea, traveling inland to the great valleys of the Salinas, the San Joaquin, the Sacramento, Sacra-mento, drowning all things in thick white vapor. Along the far-flung coast, golden beaches, shingly strands, jutting promontories and forbidding rocks the tides of morning morn-ing raced. The letters were finished, all but one. Junipero Serra walked to a wooden shutter, opened it to the cold dawn. A breath of fog drifted into the cell like a wraith, and warmed itself at the candles. He seated himself again. With a prayer he pulled a clean page toward to-ward him, and wrote slowly: "To Be Delivered After My Death. "To His Esteemed Excellency, Don Pedro Fages, Gobernador-Gen-eral of the Californias, Baja and Alta." Lifting his spectacles, he wiped away some tears that had gathered beneath the thick lenses, then wrote, "My beloved son ..." Just as he finished, Pio awoke, and the swallows were aware that it was dawn. Junipero Serra read the letter, sighed, and signed it with his rubric: "Fr. Junipero Serra." CHAPTER XVI Don Pedro Fages agreed with An-gustias An-gustias that it was indelicate for La Gobernadora to be confined by a physician, a man. But the lady herself, her-self, when she learned that a very learned man of medicine was stationed sta-tioned at the Presidio of San Francisco, Fran-cisco, made up her mind that she would not remain in Monterey, to be delivered by the midwife from the Mission Carmelo, who also delivered de-livered the Indian women. The Governor himself, greatly worried by the news he had received re-ceived from Mexico concerning the possibility of the missions of California Cali-fornia being put under the guardianship guardian-ship of the Dominican Order, felt the need of discussing the situation with Junipero Serra' s countryman, Francisco Palou, the Mallorcan, at San Francisco. Fray Palou was wise, liberal, friendly, and with him Don Pedro felt he could discuss his impasse with Serra, and other matters. mat-ters. (TO BE CONTINUED) |