eyes. Diego stopped short, but Bernardo dismounted and embraced him, easily lifting him off his feet, and they were once again the inseparable twins of before. Diego felt as if he had gained back half his soul. He didn’t care a whit that Bernardo didn’t speak, because neither of them had ever needed words to know what the other was thinking.
Bernardo was amazed that the burned-out property had been completely restored in the months he was gone. Alejandro de la Vega had determined to erase every sign of the pirates’ passing, and he seized the excuse of the damage to improve his house. When he had returned to Alta California six weeks after the assault, with his load of luxury goods to surprise his wife, there hadn’t been so much as a barking dog to welcome him. The home was completely abandoned, its contents turned to ash, and his family gone. The one person who came to greet him was Padre Mendoza, who brought him up to date on what had happened and took him to the mission, where Regina was taking her first steps as a convalescent, still heavily bandaged and with her arm in a sling. The experience of having peered into the far side of death had erased her freshness with a single stroke. Alejandro had left a young wife, but upon his return he found a woman with streaks of gray in her hair, a woman who was only thirty-three, but past her youth, and who showed no interest in Turkish carpets or engraved table silver. The news was bad, but as Padre Mendoza told him, it could have been much worse.
Alejandro de la Vega vowed to put it all behind him since there was no possibility of punishing renegades, who by now must be halfway to the China seas, and turned his energies toward restoring the hacienda. In Mexico, he had seen how people of means lived, and he had determined to imitate them not to be ostentatious, he would say as an excuse for his extravagance, but because in the future Diego would inherit the mansion and fill it with grandchildren. He ordered building materials and sent to Baja California for craftsmen smiths, ceramists, woodcarvers, painters who in no time at all added a second floor, long arched corridors, tile floors, a balcony in the dining room, a bandstand in the patio, the better to enjoy the musicians, small Moorish fountains, wrought-iron railings, carved wood doors, and windows with painted panes. In the main garden he installed statues, stone benches, bird cages pots of flowers, and a marble fountain topped with a Neptune and three sirens that the Indian craftsmen copied directly from an Italian painting. When Bernardo came back, the mansion’s red tile roofs had been restored, the second coat of peach-colored paint had been applied to the walls, and bales and bundles from Mexico City were being opened to decorate the house. “As soon as Regina gets well, we will have a housewarming this town will remember for a hundred years,” Alejandro de la Vega announced. But that day would be long in coming, because his wife found excuse after excuse for putting off the fiesta.
Bernardo taught Diego the Indians’ sign language, which they then enriched with their own additions and used for communicating when telepathy and the flute failed. Sometimes, when dealing with more complicated matters, they took recourse to slate and chalk, but they did it secretly because they did not want to be thought conceited. With the help of his whip, the schoolmaster had drilled the alphabet into the heads of a few privileged boys, but between there and reading freely lay an abyss, and in any case, no Indian went to school. Diego, despite himself, ended up becoming a good student, at which point he understood for the first time his father’s mania for education. He began to read everything he could get his hands on. Maestro Manuel Escalante’s Treatise on Fencing and Dueling was revealed to him as a collection of ideas very similar to the Indians’ okahue‘; it, too, spoke of honor, justice, respect, dignity, and
Bernardo was amazed that the burned-out property had been completely restored in the months he was gone. Alejandro de la Vega had determined to erase every sign of the pirates’ passing, and he seized the excuse of the damage to improve his house. When he had returned to Alta California six weeks after the assault, with his load of luxury goods to surprise his wife, there hadn’t been so much as a barking dog to welcome him. The home was completely abandoned, its contents turned to ash, and his family gone. The one person who came to greet him was Padre Mendoza, who brought him up to date on what had happened and took him to the mission, where Regina was taking her first steps as a convalescent, still heavily bandaged and with her arm in a sling. The experience of having peered into the far side of death had erased her freshness with a single stroke. Alejandro had left a young wife, but upon his return he found a woman with streaks of gray in her hair, a woman who was only thirty-three, but past her youth, and who showed no interest in Turkish carpets or engraved table silver. The news was bad, but as Padre Mendoza told him, it could have been much worse.
Alejandro de la Vega vowed to put it all behind him since there was no possibility of punishing renegades, who by now must be halfway to the China seas, and turned his energies toward restoring the hacienda. In Mexico, he had seen how people of means lived, and he had determined to imitate them not to be ostentatious, he would say as an excuse for his extravagance, but because in the future Diego would inherit the mansion and fill it with grandchildren. He ordered building materials and sent to Baja California for craftsmen smiths, ceramists, woodcarvers, painters who in no time at all added a second floor, long arched corridors, tile floors, a balcony in the dining room, a bandstand in the patio, the better to enjoy the musicians, small Moorish fountains, wrought-iron railings, carved wood doors, and windows with painted panes. In the main garden he installed statues, stone benches, bird cages pots of flowers, and a marble fountain topped with a Neptune and three sirens that the Indian craftsmen copied directly from an Italian painting. When Bernardo came back, the mansion’s red tile roofs had been restored, the second coat of peach-colored paint had been applied to the walls, and bales and bundles from Mexico City were being opened to decorate the house. “As soon as Regina gets well, we will have a housewarming this town will remember for a hundred years,” Alejandro de la Vega announced. But that day would be long in coming, because his wife found excuse after excuse for putting off the fiesta.
Bernardo taught Diego the Indians’ sign language, which they then enriched with their own additions and used for communicating when telepathy and the flute failed. Sometimes, when dealing with more complicated matters, they took recourse to slate and chalk, but they did it secretly because they did not want to be thought conceited. With the help of his whip, the schoolmaster had drilled the alphabet into the heads of a few privileged boys, but between there and reading freely lay an abyss, and in any case, no Indian went to school. Diego, despite himself, ended up becoming a good student, at which point he understood for the first time his father’s mania for education. He began to read everything he could get his hands on. Maestro Manuel Escalante’s Treatise on Fencing and Dueling was revealed to him as a collection of ideas very similar to the Indians’ okahue‘; it, too, spoke of honor, justice, respect, dignity, and
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