For the Soul of Rafael

by Marah Ellis Ryan

"Not any pleasure has any of it been to me from first to last," he retorted, "nor any pleasure will it be to whoever holds it! You think you are strong, your saints will help you! But no saint ever put on an altar—not even that of the Virgin herself—can take off the curse from San Juan till the altar is bathed in human blood, as the tiles of the floor have been bathed—that is the curse of Sahirit."

She stared at him with wide eyes and blanching face.

"Until the altar is bathed in human blood, as the tiles of the floor have been," she whispered. "Rafael! That—that is of a religion older than the life of Christianity in Mexico. God of Gods! Does it follow me here?"

"Follow you!" and he laughed contemptuously; "it is a story older than our grandfathers. Only the old Indians whisper it now each time ill luck comes to any of us—and I've had enough! When they picked up Miguel tramped into the earth by the cattle, only the white men would help—no Indian; they knew it was the curse coming true."

"Tell me," she said, briefly. Her lips were white, and she shuddered with cold, and drew the serape close.

"You'd rather hear some old Indian tell it," he answered; "they make one chill when they count on their fingers and toes the things the curse has brought. We had a curse of our own in the Arteaga family: my mother was always in prayer because of that; she never knew that Miguel had bought an interest in another."

"Go on—tell me! How comes the rule of the Aztec altar to this Christian temple?"

"Aztec? I did not say Aztec. I know nothing of their mummeries. But it can't be that—there have been no Aztecs since the time of Cortez and the priests."

"I—I have heard there is one hill tribe still refusing the saints, and giving the sun worship," she said, slowly. "But go on; tell me!"

"Sun-worship! yes, that's the thing!" he cried. "A man, who was a heretic of Mexico and a great builder of stone, killed a priest and a woman down there. Some say the woman was his wife. He was to have his head cut off for it, but word went down from here that such a man was needed by the priests of San Juan; they wished to build a stone church instead of adobe brick, as all the others were, if only a master mason could be sent to them. They had soldiers to guard him, even if the man chanced to be a convict, as many of the guards had been, and they got the viceroy to help; and in the end the heretic who had killed a priest was sent to San Juan. The old Indios say he looked as big as two men, and he worked as he pleased. When the padres interfered he sat down and looked at the piles of stone and did nothing, and nothing could move him. They could have shot and buried him, but that would not build their church, which was to be the finest in the Californias. So they had to let him alone, and he built it as pleased himself. Their ground plan only he accepted. It was like a cross, as you see it now, but on no other part of the church was any symbol of Christianity—only stars and other things which some say are flowers and some say are suns and moons, and on the corner-stone and key-stone of the high altar is carved a thing no Christian can read, not even the padres—and somewhere in those symbols is held the curse."