Novel 1974 - The Californios (v5.0) Read Free

We invited them to ride and told them we would take them back with the tar they used to seal the seams of their boats.
    “After that we were friends. Often they brought us fish, and just as often, Jaime gave them venison. It was on one of the trips to their camp on the shore with venison that we met Juan.”
    “Juan?” Michael frowned. “I don’t remember him.”
    “It was before you were born. We took the Indians meat and talked to them as they cooked it, but one man sat off by himself, staring at the sea. I asked who he was. ‘He is of another people,’ the Indians said.
    “His nose was thinner, his skin a bit lighter, his eyes larger, but he was old, very, very old.”
    “Another tribe?” Michael asked.
    “Another people. But he was their friend. We started to ride away, knowing no more about him. He was walking back from the beach. Jaime pulled up and spoke to him. ‘You seem alone. Come to visit us whenever you wish.’”
    “He replied, surprisingly, in English. ‘I will.’”
    “Jaime waved at the hills, the far, unknown hills. ‘Perhaps you know about them. I would like to know the trails, the people, the villages, especially the places where no men go. It is a beautiful land.’ The old man listened, then walked on without speaking. Two weeks later he was sitting on the beach one morning when we came by.”

 
     
    Chapter 2
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    C APTAIN SEAN MULKERIN, of the two-masted schooner
Lady Luck
stood on the afterdeck staring at the scattered lights of the sleepy village of Acapulco. It was a straggling town of some three thousand people against an exciting backdrop of mountains and forest.
    Tomorrow, at daylight, they would sail for home, and Sean Mulkerin was for once unhappy at the prospect. He had sailed south with too small a cargo and its sale had not gone well. Hides were a drug on the market and he had gotten rid of them for only a dollar and a half each instead of the expected two dollars.
    They had done better with their furs, especially the otter pelts, but they would be lucky even to show a profit after expenses were deducted. He had hoped to bring home enough to pay off the loan on the ranch.
    Owing to the depths of the harbor, a vessel could lie close in off the sandy beach, so the lights of the town were near. A few scattered houses and two cantinas still showed light, and there was another light at the Spanish fort that once guarded the harbor.
    Two more vessels lay at anchor, one a ship newly arrived from Manila, the other a schooner, three-masted and considerably larger than the
Lady Luck
.
    The night was hot and still with a feeling of impending change in the weather. Leaning on the rail he looked shoreward, an undefined longing inside him, a yearning for something that lay over there, something for him.
    He had always felt this way in seaport towns, always looked at the lights reflecting upon the dark water and wondered who awaited him there, what loves, what adventures, what dreams…or perhaps death and a bloody dagger. A man never knew, and that was the thing. A man never knew.
    Whichever way he turned there might be some haunting mystery, some enchantment. This way might lie love and fortune, and that way shame and death.
    He straightened up, stretched, and turned away. He was starting for his cabin when a movement caught his attention.
    Someone was running across the sand toward the water…it looked like…it was…a woman. As she reached the water’s edge she threw off her outer garment and plunged into the sea, swimming strongly.
    Startled, he turned back to the rail, but could see nothing on the dark water. Once he thought he saw the flash of a white arm, and then ashore a door slammed and someone called out.
    There was a shouted question, a reply, then a babble of excited yells, with men rushing back and forth.
    Suddenly there was a faint splash right under the taffrail and a low voice called up to him. “Unless you wish me to drown, throw me a rope.”
    It was a