SAN DIEGO DE ALCALA—PADRE URBANO'S UMBRELLA
Padre Urbano, priest in charge of the Mission of San Diego, was in a bad humor. If he had been asked what was the most necessary article in the cargo of the supply ship Santiago on the first of her half-yearly visits in the year 1830, he would almost certainly have said, the umbrella. The candles were important, no doubt; so was the new altar-cloth, for the present one had become shockingly worn under the unskillful treatment of the Indian lavanderas; so were the seeds, all the more so because he had included in the list seeds for an onion-bed, and onions were a delicacy to which his soul had long been a stranger. And many others of the articles he had named in his requisition had passed from a state of shortage into one of absolute vacancy on the storeroom shelves. But foremost in his thoughts was the umbrella. He had specified it with care,—such an umbrella as he had used in Spain, before ever he came to this destitute and heathen land; the size, a vara and a half across; the material, silk; the color, yellow; and as the warm spring sun smote ever more fervently upon his tonsured head, his thoughts had daily turned with yearning towards the good, ample quitasol that was to shield him from the fiery persecutions of his enemy, the prince of the power of the air.
Well, the vessel had come that day, and with it the umbrella; and now, most cruelly dashing his long-cherished hopes, one of his Indians had stolen it! Moreover, to-morrow he was to start on his annual visitation of the outlying stations, and he had especially relied for comfort, on that long, hot, dusty round, upon the umbrella,—the fiend fly away with the miscreant who had taken it! thought the Father in his wrath.
This is how it happened: The ship had sailed into the bay at early morning, and the lieutenant at the fort had straightway sent a runner up to the Mission with the cheering news, adding that the articles for the Father's personal use had been thoughtfully packed separately from the heavier goods, and the captain had obligingly kept the special package in his own cabin, so that it could be delivered to the expectant consignee at once on arrival. The Father had immediately dispatched two of his most trusted Indians, Pio and Jose, to receive the goods, which the captain had promised to have brought ashore in the first boat-load.
The sergeant who delivered the goods to the Indians, in order to make the unwieldy package easy of transportation by the two men over the two leagues of road that lay between the bay and the Mission, had unwisely opened it in the presence of the Indians, so as to arrange the contents in two loads. The men had each taken one of the bundles and started for the Mission. In due course, Jose had arrived with his load, but alone, and in explanation had reported that at a mile or two from the bay his companion had fallen behind—to rest, as he supposed—while he continued on his way. After a time he had waited for Pio to come up, but the latter had not rejoined him. Jose had left his own load by the roadside and gone back to see what had become of him, but no trace was to be found of either Pio or his burden. There was nothing for him, Jose, to do but to continue on his way with his own part of the Padre's property, and here he was. Pio would doubtless come soon with the remainder.
But Pio had not come, and the Father's fears, born as he listened to Jose's story, grew into angry certainty as hours passed and no Pio appeared. Examination of Jose's bundle had revealed the altar-cloth, the ink, the sugar, the onionseed, some books, and a few of the articles of clothing he expected, but the umbrella and part of the clothes were numbered with the missing; and though the clothes were not only valuable but much needed, somehow it was the umbrella that made the head and front of the crime in the Father's mind. Calling the Indians together after vespers, he announced the theft, denounced the thief, and pronounced his severest displeasure, with punishments proportionate, against any who should fail to do all in his or her power toward the apprehension of that ungrateful sinner, Pio.
Let us see what had become of the rascal from the time when he disappeared. He had really dropped behind to rest, as Jose had supposed; but while resting, the desire had come to him to look again at that strange thing in his package. What could it be? He had seen the sergeant take it out of the box, along, thin object; then he put his hand somewhere on it, and pushed, and, wonderful! it had changed in an instant into a huge flower! Such a flower! Yellow like a sunflower, nay, like a thousand sunflowers, or the sun itself. Then he had done something again, and all at once it was as it had been at first. Talk about magic! All the things his father, old Kla-quitch, the medicine-man, used to do were nothing to this. He simply must have another look at it, and now was his chance, while Jose, who might tell the Padre, could not see. He slipped the cords from the bundle and took out the thing of mystery. A long stick, with some yellow cloth rolled round one end: but how to turn it into the other wonderful thing? He could not resist trying, and he felt about the stick, pushing this way and that, as he had seen the soldier do, and it began to open. He pushed again—it was done; behold the magic sunflower, beautiful, wonderful! And turning it round and round he feasted his eyes on it, the most astonishing thing he had ever seen; yes, and done, for he, Pio, knew how to make the Big Flower open.
That is where the tempter caught him. What power that would give him over the other Indians! What was Kla-quitch, with his painted sticks and bones, compared with him, if only he were the possessor of this marvel! He should need no other stock in trade as medicine-man. The people would pay well to have it opened—that would be good medicine:—and simply keeping it shut would be bad medicine:—delightfully easy! How did it shut, by the by? He fumbled at the stick, but it did not close: he pushed and pulled, it made no difference. He pressed on the cloth; an ominous creaking warned him that Big Flower objected to being shut by force, and threatened to break.