For the Soul of Rafael

by Marah Ellis Ryan

"I wasted the holy water on the doorway of the sala and the bedroom," grumbled old Polonia, ensconced among the serapes on the carreta; "I should have kept it for the road to the sea. She rides away from him alone; but it is a witchcraft, all the same."

Secretly the old woman gave sympathy to the handsome Rafael, who loved women of gaiety and fine clothes. The town was a very good place to stay, and the band played, and there was a good circus; and to choose instead a nasty old Mission where a cross priest scolded, and smoked, and drank himself stupid each dinner-time! What kind of a girl would go back there?

Still, the old Indian knew that she was not of wood, like the statues in the old church, let the husband think as he might! Last night had proven she could be her mother's own child in a storm of passion. It was perhaps for the best that she did not love her husband so madly; for if he should ever prove untrue,—and men of course were so—what might not happen?

She thought of the witchcraft of the mother, and crossed herself.

The moon, the beautiful moon of the month of Mary! shone round and silvered in the blue above the mountains, as the blaze of the sun sank into the western sea. South lay the ranch of San Joaquin, and Raquel, for all her thirty-mile ride, was sorry. She would have no excuse to ride past; it was the one slight of the country to pass the house of an acquaintance, and this family was one deserving of honor. The soft dusk of warm lands had stretched over the level. The sweet clover along the road had a deeper note of perfume, and the patches of mustard bloom added its own spicy fragrance. Gladly she would have ridden on alone in the perfect night, but it would not do. She cared little for the herd of people, but she always tried to keep in mind what the Doña Luisa would have done in the little duties toward the opinion of the valley, and she had no idea of making a scandal, or of appearing to ride in secret from the town where her husband was still detained.

So, when the dogs barked, she galloped forward to the ranch-house, and was met with excited welcome from the mistress and her two vivacious daughters and their cousin Ana Mendez. All the news of the town they asked for. They had heard wonderful things of the courtesy shown her by the new bishop, who was not given to showing much pronounced attention to even the devout of the faith. They had rejoiced each day to hear of the honors showered on her by the families of the city. It was as if a queen had arrived in their valley—and to leave it all and ride alone in the night!

Ana cut their queries short and bade them see to old Polonia, that she might be fed and rested well, and the driver also, and then carried her guest to her own room, where she put her hands on Raquel's shoulders and looked into her eyes, and then without a word led her to the shrine in the corner, where they both knelt.

When the prayer was over and she had seen her guest supplied with bread, and red wine, and olives, and sliced beef, she regarded her sadly a moment, noting that only the wine was swallowed, and that the girl looked pale in the candle-light.

"Poor little dear," she said, softly, and patted her shoulder and spoke with the tenderness of intimacy. "I think now thou wert only a child that morning in the wedding-veil, when she gave thee that vow and died. Thou hast such strength in looks, my Raquelita, no one remembers how young in life thou art. But I see now how it is. Rafael is the son of my mother's cousin, and I know that blood! You but give the word, and my uncle shall ride to Los Angeles in the morning and say what is right to be said to Rafael. We know those boys—Miguel too," and she crossed herself. "My uncle always look himself to the door-key when that Miguel Arteaga come with a serenade. Oh, we know those boys in this valley better than their mother, who thought to guard Rafael from the heretics. Holy Mary! No heretic in the land lived worse than the life on Miguel Arteaga's ranches!"