Pasquale. San Pasquale will be like Temecula,—it may be to-morrow.”
To the Father's suggestion that he should put the money in a bank in San Diego, Alessandro cried: “Sooner would I throw it in the sea yonder! I trust no man, henceforth; only the Church I will trust. Keep it for me, Father, I pray you,” and the Father could not refuse his imploring tone.
“What are your plans now?” he asked.
“Plans!” repeated Alessandro,—“plans, Father! Why should I make plans? I will stay in my house so long as the Americans will let me. You saw our little house, Father!” His voice broke as he said this. “I have large wheat-fields; if I can get one more crop off them, it will be something; but my land is of the richest in the valley, and as soon as the Americans see it, they will want it. Farewell, Father. I thank you for keeping my money, and for all you said to the thief Morong. Ysidro told me. Farewell.” And he was gone, and out of sight on the swift galloping Benito, before Father Gaspara bethought himself.
“And I remembered not to ask who his wife was. I will look back at the record,” said the Father. Taking down the old volume, he ran his eye back over the year. Marriages were not so many in Father Gaspara's parish, that the list took long to read. The entry of Alessandro's marriage was blotted. The Father had been in haste that night. “Alessandro Assis. Majella Fa—” No more could be read. The name meant nothing to Father Gaspara. “Clearly an Indian name,” he said to himself; “yet she seemed superior in every way. I wonder where she got it.”
The winter wore along quietly in San Pasquale. The delicious soft rains set in early, promising a good grain year. It seemed a pity not to get in as
