THE SAN ROSARIO RANCH.

by Maud Howe.

CHAPTER I.

"Welcome her, all things youthful and sweet, Scatter the blossoms under her feet!"

The house was a large square building, simple and hospitable in appearance. A wide veranda ran about the four sides, heavily draped by climbing roses and clematis. There were indisputable evidences that visitors were expected. Old Tip, the dog, knew it as well as everybody else about the house. He had been routed out from his favorite spot on the sunny side of the piazza, by Ah Lam, who had given him a shower-bath of water and soap-suds, because he did not move away to make room for the scrubbing-brush which the white-clad Celestial plied vigorously.

From earliest morning the inhabitants of the simple house had been busied in making it ready. The very kittens which played about the steps of the piazza had licked an extra gloss upon their shining coats in honor of the expected guest. Only Tip, the old hunting-dog, the spoiled child of the household, showed no interest in what was going on, and with a cynical growl trotted off to the woods behind the house, where he might sleep safe from all fear of interruption.

From the wide doorway, which stood hospitably open, stepped a lady. At the first sight of Barbara Deering, strangers were always strongly impressed with the indisputable fact that she was above and before all else a lady. A second look,--and people were sure to take one,--and it appeared that she was a young lady and a beautiful one. She was tall, above the height of ordinary women, and her carriage was remarkably erect and commanding. She walked with a quick, light step to the edge of the piazza, and raising one hand to shade her eyes from the rays of the setting sun, stood looking out across the wide garden. Her figure was like that of a Greek Diana, muscular and graceful, indicating great strength and endurance. The limbs were rounded but not languidly, as one saw by the arm, from which the sleeve had slipped back: it was white, firm, and hard. Her hands were large and shapely, the tips of the fingers red, and the texture of the skin showed that they were used to other work than that of the broidery-frame. Her head, with its crown of pretty, curling flaxen hair, was habitually held rather high, and her face wore an expression in which a certain natural hauteur and imperiousness seemed at war with a gentleness which was more the result of education than a natural trait. The forehead was wide and unlined, the eyes brown and clear, the nose straight, and the mouth small and rosy. The soft, white woollen gown, with its breast-knot of red roses, suited the young woman perfectly; and as she stood in the sunset light, a spray of climbing rose hanging overhead from the roof of the piazza, she made an unconscious picture of grace and loveliness.

At the sound of a wagon on the driveway a warm flush mantled her cheek and throat, and stepping to the door of the house she called out in a sweet, high voice, "Mamma, mamma! they are coming!"

A moment later and a large open vehicle came into sight, drawn by two swift mules, which were urged forward by the driver, a young man in whose face the traits of the girl on the piazza were reproduced, but somewhat roughly. On the seat behind the driver was seen a female figure closely enveloped in heavy travelling wraps, her features concealed by a thick veil. As the mules stopped before the entrance, the young woman on the piazza came forward with both hands outstretched, saying cordially but half shyly,--

"Dear Millicent, welcome to San Rosario! Are you very, very tired? Let me help you out."

So saying, Barbara Deering almost lifted the new arrival from the wagon, and with her strong arm supported her to a chair.

"Thank you so much!" said the new-comer, speaking with a slightly foreign accent, and lifting her veil; "and you are Barbara? I know you from your picture, only you are much prettier."

"Poor child, you must be terribly tired; you shall come and speak to mamma, and then you must go directly to your room and lie down. Hal, you will go down for Millicent's luggage?"

The young man nodded an a.s.sent, touched up his steeds, and the wagon disappeared down the red dusty road. The two young girls entered the house, Barbara leading the stranger to a large room on the upper story.

In a low chair sat a small woman, with a face which must have once been beautiful, and which now shone with an expression of simple sincerity and kindliness. She held out her hand to Millicent, kissed her on both cheeks, and warmly bade her welcome to San Rosario. Millicent Almsford acknowledged the greeting with a courteous grace, and immediately after accepted Barbara's offer to show her to her room.

When the door was shut upon her, and she was for the first time in many days alone, she seated herself at the window, and leaning her head upon her hand, remained wrapped in thought. She had travelled from the coast of the Adriatic Sea to the sh.o.r.es of the Pacific Ocean, with no companion save her maid and her own painful thoughts. And now the long journeying was at an end, and she found herself in the far West, in California, amidst her kindred, all strangers to her save by tradition and some slight correspondence. She looked about the strange room. It was exquisitely neat and fresh, with its clean whitewashed walls and new blue Kidderminster carpet, its black-walnut "bedroom set," and comfortable lounge, which had been newly covered in her honor. On the bureau were blue and white mats and cushions, a toilet-set which Barbara's busy fingers had stolen time to make.

She marked all these little details, not one of which escaped her eyes, even to the embroidered towel-rack with her initials, and the worked motto, "Welcome home." Again she looked out from the window over a wide pleasant orchard, filled with heavily fruited peach and plum trees; over a garden gay with bright-hued flowers, and beyond to the everlasting hills which close about the happy valley wherein stands the house of the San Rosario Ranch. Numbers of oxen and cows were straying over the hills, with here and there groups of sheep cropping the sun-dried gra.s.s of the hills.

The landscape was a perfect symphony in brown. The round shiny hills were golden in color; the warm-hued earth in the ploughed fields and the meadows, whose crop of gra.s.s had long since been mowed, was of a deeper tint. The house stood in an oasis of green. A great hedge of rose-trees blushing with red blossoms marked the boundary of the flower-garden, irrigated with great care through the long summer months.

The sun, low-hanging over the hilltops, suddenly dropped from sight; and as the room grew dim, Millicent shivered slightly, and turning from the window threw herself on the couch and lay there quite still, too tired even to weep out the pain and homesickness in her heart. A tap on the door was followed by the entrance of one of her trunks, brought in by two strong Chinamen, at whose coppery faces Millicent stared curiously.

Six large boxes were placed in a row and unstrapped by the younger Chinaman, who, when he had completed his task, approached the stranger land said in a sympathetic voice, "Me solly you sick; Ah Lam bring tea-cup?" The white Celestial smiled benignantly and vanished, quickly reappearing with the promised cup of tea, which proved most grateful to the girl's tired nerves. The creature's sympathy and attention brought tears to her eyes; and when Barbara came in a few minutes later, to help her in unpacking, she found the traces of these tears on Millicent's cheeks.

"Do not try to dress for tea, dear; you are too tired. Where shall I find your dressing-case? You must let me take the place of your maid, now that she has left you so cruelly."

So talking pleasantly, Barbara unpacked the guest's dressing-bag, looked admiringly at the silver-topped bottles with "M. A." engraven upon them, the ivory brushes, and all the dainty _et ceteras_ which were necessities to the foreign girl, with the long white hands and finger-nails which shone like pale pink conch-pearls.

"Thank you, if you would help me a little to-night, I shall quickly learn to do for myself. If you will look in that largest trunk, you may give me whatever gown lies at the top."

Barbara unfolded as she was bid a sea-green cashmere dress, in which the stranger quickly clad her slender figure. Manifold strings of tiny seed-pearls she wound about her white throat and wrists, performing all the details of her dressing with a careful precision which seemed part of her nature. The pink nails received an extra polish, though the tea-bell had twice summoned the inmates of the house to the evening repast. With a peculiarly graceful motion, like the undulation of a swift but quiet stream, she moved about the room and finally down the stairway to the dining-room below.

"Millicent, will you sit here, on my right? Hal shall have the pleasure of occupying the place beside you."

The speaker was the lady whose gentle, firm hand swayed the small realm of the San Rosario Ranch during the long absence of its master, Mr.

Ralph Almsford.

Mr. Almsford had been a widower for the past ten years. On the death of his beloved wife, her mother Mrs. Deering had continued at his earnest request to make his house her home. Her two younger children, Barbara and Henry Deering, remembered no other home, and it seemed but natural to them that they should continue to live with their brother-in-law.

The family life was a particularly happy one, and the tie between Ralph Almsford and the Deerings was closer than that which exists between many blood relations.

The advent of the young heiress Millicent Almsford, the half-sister of Ralph, was an event of great importance in the household, and had been eagerly antic.i.p.ated by Mrs. Deering and her daughter for several weeks.

Henry Deering--or as he was always called Hal--displayed an absolute indifference concerning the "strange girl" who was coming to make her home among them for a year. What Ralph Almsford felt about his guest no one of the household could divine. He was a quiet, reticent man, entirely absorbed in his business, which of late had often taken him from home for months at a time. He had written to his half-sister, urging her to visit the ranch; and his letter, the first one of the kind she had ever received, had so moved the girl that she had telegraphed her departure, and forthwith started on her long journey.

Her brother met her in San Francisco, where they pa.s.sed one day together,--a business engagement calling him away on the morrow, as he hoped for a few days only.

Millicent took the place a.s.signed her by Mrs. Deering, and supper was enlivened by conversation about the journey she had just achieved, which she described as the most terrible ordeal that it was possible for a human being to undergo. The guest was entirely at her ease, though her position might have been to many people an embarra.s.sing one. Arriving alone in a household of near connections, who were as yet absolute strangers to her, and with whom it had been decided that the next year of her life should be pa.s.sed, most girls in her place would have experienced some sensation of awkwardness; but Millicent was entirely mistress of the situation. She spoke princ.i.p.ally to Hal Deering, a jolly-looking fellow of twenty-five, who puzzled her with the bits of dialect, perfectly unintelligible to her, which he introduced into his conversation.

After supper Mrs. Deering led the way into the drawing-room, saying to her guest,--

"Will you join us at prayers in the library, Millicent? Or would you prefer waiting here for us?"

"I see that you already know that I am an unorthodox person, Mrs.

Deering. Frankly, I would prefer not coming, if you will allow me.

Being an agnostic, I should hardly be in sympathy with your service. If you will kindly excuse me, I will await you here."

Millicent's refusal to join the family at their devotions was accompanied with a smile so exquisite and winning that the offence was forgiven, although forgiveness had not been asked. Hal, the great six-foot giant, more than forgave the graceful girl her ungraciousness, and would have a thousand times preferred remaining with her to joining his mother and sister.

On being left to herself, Millicent moved to the piano which stood open near the window, and seating herself let her white fingers stray gently over the keys. Strange hands were Millicent's, of a whiteness that made her pale cheek look brown by comparison. The fingers were long and taper, at the tip of each a drop as of water ready to fall from the pink digits. The wrists were round and very slender. On the fifth finger of the left hand she wore a strange, small old ring of an Etruscan pattern, which had been stripped from the fleshless hand of a princess, whose sanctuary had been rifled by some nineteenth-century robber of graves.

The setting enclosed a small green intaglio exquisitely carved, representing a Psyche with new-found wings.

She had a strange, white luminous face whose beauty shone from within and lit the dark gray eyes with a rare and tender loveliness. The large mouth was more exquisitely refined than the mere rosebud tininess of Barbara Deering's. The teeth were very white and perfect, and the veil of soft, golden bronze hair, in which she could have clothed herself like Mary in the desert, was deftly ma.s.sed into a great dusky knot at the nape of her white neck. Her arms and bosom, veiled by half transparent draperies, were white as marble from Carrara, and as finely yet generously chiselled as those of a G.o.ddess of Phidias. She was very tall, though her grace of movement concealed her height; her small feet in their velvet sandals were not disproportionate to her size. Her features were beautiful, and her hair and eyes the delight of every artist who looked upon her. And yet that which made her so remarkable among women had nothing to do with delicate contours or harmonious tints. Her body seemed like a screen through which shone a flame, at times white and gentle, again rosy and pa.s.sionate. She was like the twin opals which clasped her girdle, and was as sensitive as they to every pa.s.sing influence.

As the words of the ritual, grown to be meaningless to him by their frequent repet.i.tion, fell upon the ears of Henry Deering he heeded them not, and failed to make the proper responses: other sounds had struck his ear, and soft, solemn strains of music made an under prayer to the evening service. To these strange chords his heart made answer, and his thoughts were raised by them far higher than was usual at that hour, when it was their wont to run riot over the business in hand for the next day.

As the family re-entered the drawing-room, Millicent remained seated at the piano, now striking louder chords, and finally ending the long rhapsody with a brilliant waltz of Chopin.

"Thank you, dear," said Barbara, as Millicent left the piano; "I am so glad that you are musical. I find very little sympathy for my music in the family; we will have great pleasure in practising together. I have some very good four-hand music."

Soon after, the newly arrived guest bade good-night to the family, and went to her room accompanied by Barbara.

"She is a little like Ralph," said Mrs. Deering, "only infinitely handsomer. How did she please you, my son?"

"Is she handsome? I hardly noticed. It was her voice that struck me; it has the sound of laughing waters. And can't she play, though! I never heard such music in my life."

"I am very glad for Barbara's sake that she is musical," answered his mother.

"Yes; I hope that Barbara and Miss Almsford _will_ get on together. But I have my doubts," said Hal, dubiously pulling his straw-colored mustache.

This is San Rosario to-day. Shall we go back a hundred years? It has a history worth a word or two. To one who is familiar with the beautiful country which lies about the old Mission of San Rosario, it is not a little strange that the place has as yet no prominence either in history or literature. Santa Barbara and the Mission Dolores have been celebrated in prose and verse. San Miguel and San Fernando Rey are not forgotten; while San Rafael and San Francisco, now grown to be important cities, will be remembered as long as Plymouth or Manhattan.

The venerable President of the missions of Upper California, Father Junipero Serra, founded the San Rosario Mission in 1784, the last year of his life. It is possible that the judgment of the enthusiastic priest was already failing when he chose this site, for the Mission was never prosperous, and was abandoned early in the present century. While standing among the ruins of the old church, it is not difficult to see in fancy a picturesque scene enacted on the spot a century ago, on the morning of the consecration of the Mission.

The little band of priests and soldiers have come to the end of their journey; the pleasant valley set in sheltering green hills has been chosen for the site of the new Mission. The tall thin figure of Father Junipero first strikes the eye. In spite of his great age, and the mortal disease with which he is afflicted, it is his hand that tugs l.u.s.tily at the rope which swings the great bronze bell, hung in the arms of a gigantic redwood. It is he who shouts aloud the summons, "Hear, hear! all ye Gentiles! come to the holy Church!" Close to the President stand two priests,--one, a middle-aged man with a head which indicates great power and a dogged persistence; the other, a delicate looking youth with the face of an enthusiast, beautiful and dreamy. The handful of soldiers who serve the Fathers as an escort are making fast the slight church tent which they have just set up. From the neighboring thicket the cries of the startled birds mingle with the earnest tones of Father Junipero and the deep notes of the bronze bell. Hardly less timorous than the wood creatures are the Indians, who peer cautiously from behind the great trees at the strange spectacle before them. They are invited to draw near, and the bolder ones come close to the black-robed figures, and stare curiously at the simple ceremonials with which the ground is consecrated to the service of the heavenly kingdom.

Through the indefatigable energy of the President and the two priests, the few buildings of the Mission were completed within a year. The adobe church was unusually large and well built, as one can see to-day.