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Carlos, of the Mission

By May B. Chapman Starkey

W

HEN Aunt Pauline's letter came, inviting me to join her in Los Angeles and spend the winter with her in Southern California, I had settled down to the conviction that life was going to be a complete failure, and I might as well give up and marry "Jimmie Brown."

If you had spent all the nineteen years of your life in staid, stiff, cultured Boston, and possessed of a soul that craved "romance" as a drunkard craves strong drink, and had been forced to walk the conventional paths of life from the cradle, with never a spark of romance or adventure on the side, you would appreciate the delight with which I hailed this invitation.

Who could make that long trip over mountain and plain to the land of the "Setting Sun;" the land of "Gold and Adventure," and not encounter even a tiny bit of romance? Surely not I, who had watched so faithfully to catch a glimpse of this "will-o-the-wisp" for

years.

All my childhood and girlhood I had lived in dreams, but alas, none of them were ever realized. Even Jimmie Brown's wooing had not the tiniest bit of romance in it; just an every-day boy and girl affair which he, and all the relatives, took for granted must end in an every-day wedding.

As I said in the beginning, I had about convinced myself that I might as well marry Jimmie when Aunt Pauline's letter came. This, however, unsettled my convictions, and Jimmie's stock went away below par again, as, after a parental conference, I accepted the invitation; while visions of train

robbers and gallant rescues by dashing cavaliers ran through my head.

Deep in my heart I had a tender spot for "Jimmie," but there were a number of offenses to offset his good nature and fine young manhood; the worst was his name. Who would care to be labeled all through life as "Mrs. James Brown," when her heart was longing for "Percival St. Clair," or "Reginald de Montmorency," or some other such fanciful name, on her visiting cards?

Then there was nothing about his looks that even savored of romance. Well built and athletic looking, with gray eyes and straight brown hair; whereas, the hero of my dreams was always slender and pale, with waving locks of midnight color, and flashing eyes of darkest hue. No, Jimmie would have to be content with a bride of less romantic ambition than "Imogene Jones."

I've often wondered if my childhood dreams would have been tempered if my mother had given me the plain name of "Jane," instead of "Imogene." Surely the combination of "Jane" and "Jones" would have put an effectual damper upon romantic flights of fancy! "Jones" was bad enough, but "Imogene" partially redeemed it, and I always shuddered when I thought what it would have been to have been called Jane, Martha Ellen, or Susan Ann, in combination wih Jones!

I was rather an independent young lady in spite of my day-dreaming habits, so my parents trusted me to make the long journey alone, and one bleak November day, with a through ticket,

a whole compartment in a Pullman, many parting injunctions, and much advice, I started on my Western trip. Everything was familiar until we left Chicago, for I had gone over this much of the route a number of times, but from Chicago on all was new to me, and the passing view was a constant source of enjoyment, so much so that I forgot all about my hoped for "hold ups" and other adventures, thoroughly enjoying every minute of the present, without wasting time on day dreams.

I formed acquaintance with several pleasant people whose company helped to pass the time away, but most of the time my eyes were glued on the scenery.

Never can I forget our entrance into the Golden State of California. After a long run through snow covered heights, we descended into a valley, and were soon passing through groves of orange trees, immense vineyards, fields of green alfalfa, and rows of graceful, waving peppers and stately eucalyptus trees. So like fairyland it seemed to me, after the bleak, wintry scenes of the mountains that I could hardly stay on the train until Los Angeles was reached.

Aunt Pauline met me at the station and we started almost at once upon a continual round of sight-seeing and pleasure. We made little excursions here, there and everywhere. Aunt Pauline lived in apartments, and it was a very simple matter to pack our suit cases and take ourselves away for a few days' stay at this or that pleasure resort, famed spring or noted hotel.

During these swiftly passing weeks, the only thing that worried me was Jimmie's letters. Such mournful affairs they were! The more I wrote him of the happy days I was spending the more gloomily he answered, until I threatened to quit writing at all.

A particularly gloomy one came the day before we started on a visit to San Diego, the Southern city of Mission fame that I had heard so much about since coming to California. In this

letter Jimmie had said he would send another, in a few days, telling me of some plans of his that he thought would please me and between the lines I could read that he hoped would not please me.

from Long

We took a steamer Beach, and had a pleasant trip the hundred or more miles down the coast to San Diego. Aunt Pauline met an old school friend, a Mrs. Donner, on the steamer, and as this was her fourth or fifth visit to San Diego, she constituted herself our guardian, saw us comfortably located, and became our guide and companion on our numerous pleasure jaunts and excursions to all the surrounding points of interest.

I was particularly anxious to see the ruins of the Mission, the first one founded in California by the old Spanish fathers, but Aunt Pauline's friend had our program mapped out, and it was several days after our arrival, and after a number of other places of interest had been visited, before we finally made the trip.

I received a letter from Jimmie the afternoon before, and it worried me quite a little, for he told me his proposed plan, which was nothing more nor less than that he was going to join a party on a hunting trip to Africa within a month from the time his letter was dated; and he said he hoped the lions that didn't catch "Teddy" would get him, if I let him go. If I didn't want him to go, I could just write him a line to join me in California, and we would spend our honeymoon there. A postscript informed me that he had my parents' consent to the latter plan.

As I said, his letter worried me. I didn't want to marry Jimmie-so I thought-neither did I want him to go away off to Africa and risk getting eaten by lions or crocodiles.

I had a rather bad night over his letter, but I couldn't make up my mind to send for him and resign my dreams of real heroes who might any day materialize; so I tried to forget his letter for the present, and when the carriage with Mrs. Donner and the driver

CARLOS, OF THE MISSION.

called for us, I was in good spirits and ready to enjoy the trip with all my usual overflow of enthusiasm.

On the way down the winding canyon road and up through the peaceful valley to the Mission, Mrs. Donner

told me quite a little of the history of its founding. It was the first of a chain of Missions reaching up the coast and founded by the Franciscan priest, Father Junipero Serra, and a faithful band of zealous workers for the church, together with a protecting company of soldiers and helpers. She told me of the hardships endured, and of the moving of the Mission to its present location from the first emporary structure at a point near the shore of the bay, and also told of the treachery of the Indian converts who once came near massacring the entire band.

By the time we reached the old adobe ruins with their surrounding olive groves, the Mission had become of as much interest to me as one of my own "Castles in Spain," whose portals, alas, I had never been ble to pass.

We spent the rest of the morning exploring the ruins and then ate our lunch out under the olive trees. After lunch, Aunt Pauline and Mrs. Donner accepted an invitation given us by the good sisters to visit the Mission school for the Indians, which is taught in a modern structure adjoining the tumbling walls of the original buildings.

I was not interested in this, and wanted to make a sketch of the old ruins, so I found a point of vantage in the shade of the olives and was soon absorbed in my task.

I had just completed my sketch and leaned back against the trunk of a tree under which I was sitting when I heard a rustling sound and turned to investigate. I really thought I was dreaming, at first, so uncanny did the sight I beheld seem, for, coming almost noiselessly toward me was the figure of a man who seemed so out of place in the bright light of a twentieth century day. He was dressed as a Spaniard of the higher classes might

55

have dressed ages before, and his black eyes gleamed from a face of refinement and great beauty, but of a deathly paleness.

I scarcely breathed, and was struggling between a desire to escape and

an equally strong desire to remain and learn what manner of man was this, who looked as though he had just stepped from the wings of a medieval play, when my decision was made for me, for catching sight of me he reeled until I thought he would fall, then springing forward with outstretched arms, he cried out: "Isabella! Isabella!" with such a look of happiness and longing as I never expect to see again on a mortal's face. "At last you have come to me," and he would have clasped me in his arms, but I shrank back in affright, while I protested that I was not his Isabella, but only poor, frightened little Imogene Jones.

"Oh, but you are! You are my Isabella!" he insisted. "Surely you have not forgotten Carlos: your poor Carlos whom you sent to the new country to prove himself a hero worthy of your love? Oh, Isabella, many and long are the years that have gone by since that sad day in far off Spain, when I bade you good-bye to go to the new country and join the dear old Father Serra and his noble band, and your heart would bleed for us all if you knew the suffering, hardships and cruel deprivations that we have endured for the love of the Mother Church and the honor of Spain. Surely your hard little heart would melt with tenderness, and you would not have kept me waiting all these longing, lonesome, cruel years."

Say what I would, I could not convince him; he threw himself at my feet and in the softest and must musical voice he continued:

"All the long journey across the seas my heart was filled with longing for you, and with my last vision of you as you stood waving me a last farewell, but with laughter instead of the love I longed to see in your eyes, and my heart was heavy, and the days dragged

cruelly by during all the months when we were getting a foothold in this almost desolate land. But after we had built this refuge, one night, while sleeping in my grass hammock in the moonlight, you came to me, and, with all the love-light that I had prayed for in your eyes, you leaned over me and whispered: 'Carlos, Love, I was not so hard-hearted as I seemed, and my heart almost broke when I realized that you had gone from me, and I might never see you again. I wept and refused to be comforted, and grew pale and weak from grieving, but listen, Carlos, I've a secret for you! I'm coming to you, Carlos, dear! Coming, coming soon. Watch and wait for me!'

"After that my heart was filled with joy all the days, and no one worked harder or with more earnest effort than I. No task was too hard for me to undertake, and no one took more pride in planting and caring for the beautiful flowers and the young fruit trees, for was not my Isabella coming to me? Some day we should have a vine-covered cottage within sound of the Mission bells, and the dear old Father should bless our union and be our guardian.

"A rumor that one of our supply ships was to bring the wives and families of some of the soldiers had reached us, and I felt that my little Isabella would be with them, and my heart overflowed with joy.

"We all worked as never before, and I was always singing-singing of the blue skies of sunny Spain and of my love who was coming, coming swift to me. Then one morning, when no evil, it seemed, could have been in the world, so beautiful and full of joy was it, as I leaned over the spring to fill my earthen bottle, a cruel arrow from one of the savages, who had hung around us for months and occasionally picked off one of our little band, struck me here!"

Rising to his feet, he threw back his cape, and the silken vest beneath it was covered with a red stain. I covered my eyes in horror and almost

screamed-and then I heard his voice in fainter tones, saying:

"They killed my body, little Isabella, but they could not kill my soul, and I'm waiting for you, little onewaiting and watching always for you."

I uncovered my eyes just in time to see him fade into the dark shadows of the olives, and as my eyes looked into his for the last time, a most curious thing happened-I seemed to be looking-not into the dark eyes of the "Carlos" of a minute before-but the deep gray eyes of "Jimmie Brown!" They smiled at me with the same sad, sweet smile that Jimmie had smiled as I waved him a careless good-bye from my Pullman window.

"Jimmie! Jimmie!" I cried, springing to my feet; but only the sea breeze rustling the leaves of the grim old olives answered me.

Just then around the corner of the old Mission came Aunt Pauline and Mrs. Donner, so I hastily gathered myself together and joined them.

I did not tell Aunt Pauline of my experience. I knew she would say in her practical way that I had dreamed it; though I knew better. On the way home she and her friend were too interested in each other to notice my abstracted mood.

This was only yesterday, and this morning I could hardly wait to dress to start this message on its way:

"Jimmie-I'll wait for you in San Diego. Come at once. Imogene."

I may have been "Isabella" in another lifetime, and I may not have been, but whether I was or whether I wasn't, I'm not going to run the risk of savages and wild beasts killing Jimmie in Africa and having his ghost forever wailing for me down there.

And suppose I was the Isabella for whom poor Carlos is still watching? Think what a lot I'd have to answer for with two disembodied spirits roaming around calling for me!

I can scarcely wait for Jimmie to come, and I've thought of a splendid calling card. Jimmie's second name is "Mortimer," and I'll have my plate read: "Mrs. J. Mortimer Brown."

The Maverick

By Guy Oliver

T

HE tall, raw-boned COWpuncher swung over and stood, open-mouthed, staring at my trunks. There were two of them on the depot platform, just arrived-as had I-stage-wise from Coyote Gap. On each was plastered a flaring red label, advertising my line. "Wear MacGregor Hats" was the message of the labels.

The cowpuncher looked hard at the stickers, walked round the trunks several times, and eyed me as though he had something to say. Twice he started towards me and hesitated. At the third trial, I hailed him:

"Well, old man, is there anything I can do for you?"

He gave his belt a hitch and approached me, grinning gratefully.

"Wa-all, now, sonny, you're jest shoutin'!" He shifted the swelling over to the other cheek. "I take it you got hats in them trunks."

"Correct."

"I feel kind o' ornery an' low-down to be askin' for such a thing, but—” he scraped his feet in the cinder covering of the platform and looked sheepish "but you don't happen to have a plug hat along with you that you want to sell, do you?"

I laughed. "Now, never mind poking no fun at me, son!" he rasped. "I'm jest as ashamed of it as anybody ever dared to be. An' lemme tell you this: I wouldn't go up an' brace nobody about such a thing for myself. But this is for a friend o' mine, my pardner, Squint."

I looked him over with a speculative eye. My insatiable curiosity was clamoring for satisfaction. A loud

voice from somewhere within me kept asking: "What does a cowpuncher want with a silk hat?"

“Well, Mr.——————” "Pete," he supplied promptly. "Jest call me Pete."

"Well, then, Pete, I have what you call a 'plug' hat in one of my trunks; and as it's a sample I won't need on this trip, I'll go to the trouble of getting it out, and sell it to you on one condition-that you'll tell me what under the sun you want with it."

His eyes brightened wonderfully for an instant; then his face clouded. He shifted the swelling several times from one cheek to the other.

"I ain't much on layin' bare sacred private affairs to the vulgar gaze o' the public, but I want that there hat mighty bad for my pardner, Squint."

"Your confidence shall be inviolate." My solemnity was owl-like.

"Don't mention it." He bowed awkwardly. "Wa-all, you see, she's a little, half-wild thing, part white an' part Injun, an' she don't know no better." "Who is? Who don't?" I blinked in bewilderment.

He looked at me, uncertainly. “I guess I better back up an' start over," he decided. "You see, it's like this: My pardner, Squint, got stuck on a little half-breed Injun gal. She lives ten or twelve miles out on the trail near the edge o' the reservation. Now, Injuns don't love like white folks, an' between you an' me, I don't think she's so crazy about Squint. But that don't make no difference to him. She's promised to marry him, an' he's jest wild to git his brand on her."

My "kidding" propensities came to

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