Chonita

“ Still, as long as she concealed the light of her mind under a bushel, her beauty and Lorleian fascination would draw men to her feet and keep them there. Every man but Estenega and Alvarado was as gay of color as the wild flowers had been, and the girls, as they cantered, looked like full-blown roses. Chonita wore a dark-blue gown and reboso of thin silk, which became her fairness marvelously well. ”

“ A caballero serenaded his lady at midnight in Monterey.
The tinkle of a guitar, the jingling of spurs, fell among the strong tones of a man's voice.
Chonita had been serenaded until she had fled to the mountains for sleep, but she crept to the foot of the bed and knelt there, her hand at her throat. A door opened, and, one by one, out of the black beyond, five white-robed forms flitted into the room. They looked like puffs of smoke from a burning moon. The heavy wooden shutters were open, and the room was filled with cold light. ”

“ The Americans hardly know that such a people once existed.
Chonita entered the sala at eleven o'clock, looking like a snow queen. Her gold hair, which always glittered like metal, was arranged to simulate a crown; she wore a gown of Spanish lace, and no jewels but the string of black pearls. I never had seen her look so cold and so regal.
Estenega stepped out upon the corridor. "Play El Son," he said, peremptorily. Then as the vivacious music began he walked over to Chonita and clapped his hands in front of her as authoritatively as he had bidden the musicians. ”

“ Go, Eustaquia!"
Of course I went. Chonita was not at the rodeo-ground, but, escorted by her father, had gone home. I followed immediately, and when I reached Casa Grande I found her sitting in her library. I never saw a statue look more like marble. Her face was locked: only the eyes betrayed the soul in torment. But she looked as immutable as a fate.
"Chonita," I exclaimed, hardly knowing where to begin, "be reasonable. Men of Estenega's brain and passionate affectionate nature are always weak with women, but it means nothing. He cares nothing for Valencia Menendez. ”

“ I followed, leaving Prudencia raking the trove her short arms would not hold.
"Ay, my Chonita!" she wailed, "I cannot carry that big piece of pink satin and that vase. And I have only two pairs of slippers and one fan. Ay, Cho-n-i-i-ta, look at those shawls! Mother of God, suppose Valencia Menendez comes—"
"Do not weep on the silk and spoil what thou hast," called down Chonita from the top step. "Thou shalt have all thou canst wear for a year."
She reached the deck and stood panting and imperious before her father. "All! All! I must have all!" she cried. ”

“ Chonita, alone, looked pale, but I knew that her pallor was not due to weariness. And I knew that she was beginning to fear Estenega; the time was almost come when she would fear herself more. Estenega had several talks apart with her. He managed it without any apparent maneuvering; but he always had the devil's methods. Valencia avenged herself by flirting desperately with Reinaldo, and Prudencia's honeymoon was seasoned with gall.
On Saturday night Chonita stole from her guests, donned a black gown and reboso, and, attended by two Indian servants, went up to the Mission to confession. ”

“ The music is so monotonous and sweet, the figures so melting and harmonious, that to both spectator and dancer comes a dreaming languid contentment, as were the senses swimming on the brink of sleep. Chonita and Valencia were famous rivals in its rendering, always the sala-stars to those not dancing. ”

“ Valencia laid her arm about Chonita's waist. "I wish to meet Don Diego
Estenega," she said. "Wilt thou not present him to me?"
"Thou art very forward," said Chonita, coldly. "Canst thou not wait until he comes thy way?"
"No, my Chonita; I wish to meet him now. My curiosity devours me."
"Very well; come with me and thou shalt know him.—Wilt thou come too,
Eustaquia? There are only men on the corridor."
We found Diego and Don Guillermo talking politics in a corner, both deeply interested. Estenega rose at once. ”

“ Only Estenega absented himself. Valencia stood her ground: she would not go while Estenega remained. Chonita moved proudly among her guests, and never had been more gracious. Valencia dared not meet her eyes nor mine, but, seeing that Prudencia was watching her, avenged her own disquiet by enhancing that of the bride. Never did she flirt so imperiously with Reinaldo as she did that fateful night; and Reinaldo, who was man's vanity collected and compounded, devoted himself to the dashing beauty. Her cheeks burned with excitement, her eyes were restless and flashing. ”

“ Chonita rose to her full height, and although he rose too, and was taller, she seemed to look down upon him.
"Thou wouldst have me marry him? Is that thy meaning?"
"Ay." His voice trembled. Under his swagger he was always a little afraid of the Doomswoman.
"Thou askest perjury and disloyalty and dishonor of an Iturbi y
Moncada?"
"An Iturbi y Moncada asks it of an Iturbi y Moncada. If the man is ready to bend his neck in sacrifice to the glory of his house, is it for the woman to think?" ”

“ And she tossed her spirited head.
"He shall not!" cried Chonita, then checked herself abruptly, the blood rushing to her hair. "I hate him so," she continued hurriedly to the astonished Valencia, "that I would see no woman show him favor. Thou wilt not like him, Valencia. He is not handsome at all,—no color in his skin, not even white, and eyes in the back of his head. No mustache, no curls, and a mouth that looks,—oh, that mouth, so grim, so hard!—no, it is not to be described. No one could; it makes you hate him. And he has no respect for women ”

“ Ay, no, my Chonita; thou art wrong. He is not beautiful at all. He is rather haggard, and wears no mustache, and he has the profile of the great man, fine and aquiline and severe, excepting when he smiles, and then sometimes he looks kind and sometimes he looks like a devil. ”

“ Chonita listened to this conversation with mingled amazement and anger. She did not doubt Estenega's sincerity to herself; neither did Valencia appear to doubt him. But his present levity was manifest to her. Why should he care to talk so to another woman? How strange were men! She gave up the problem.
After the long banquet concluded, the cavalcade formed once more, and we returned to the town. Prudencia rode her white horse alone this time, her husband beside her. Leading the cavalcade was the Presidio band. ”

“ She crossed the room and looked down upon Diego Estenega. His night garment, low about the throat, made his head, with its sharply-cut profile, look like the heads on old Roman medallions. The pallor of night, the extreme refinement of his face, the deep repose, gave him an unmortal appearance. Chonita bent over him fearfully. Was he dead? His breathing was regular, but very quiet. She stood gazing down upon him, the instinct of seeking vanished. What did it mean? Was this her soul! A man? ”

“ When they ascended the steps, not a woman was to be seen; all had followed Prudencia to her chamber to see the donas of the groom, which had arrived that day from Mexico. Chonita tarried long enough to see that her father had forgotten the family grievance in his revived susceptibility to Estenega, then went to Prudencia's room. ”

“ If he left her for another she would cry for a week, then serenely marry whom my father bade her, and forget Reinaldo in the donas of the bridegroom. The birds do almost as well."
Don Guillermo smiled indulgently. Prudencia did not know whether to cry or not. Doña Trinidad, who never thought of replying to her daughter, said,—
"Chonita mia, Liseta and Tomaso wish to marry, and thy father will give them the little house by the creek."
"Yes, mamacita?" said Chonita, absently: she felt no interest in the loves of the Indians. ”

“ Thorpe dressed for dinner, pocketed a roll of the gold with a wry face, and went to the sala, a long room opening on the middle corridor. Prudencia, in a red-satin gown, so thick that it stood out about her as if hooped, and flashing jewels on a great deal of white skin, her hair piled high and surmounted with a diamond comb, sat in the middle of the room talking volubly to her sister-in-law, who stood by the mantel looking sadly about her. Chonita had lost little of her beauty. ”

“ Chonita recalled, and angry with herself for having been beguiled by her enemy, took the infant from the nurse's arms and carried it fearfully up the aisle. Estenega, walking beside her, regarded her meditatively.
"What is she?" he thought, "this Californian woman with her hair of gold and her unmistakable intellect, her marble face crossed now and again by the animation of the clever American woman? What an anomaly to find on the shores of the Pacific! All I had heard of The Doomswoman, The Golden Señorita, gave me no idea of this. What a pity that our houses are at war! ”

“ Such men cause infinite suffering, but they can give a happiness that makes the suffering worth while. You never will meet another man like Diego Estenega. Do not cast him lightly aside."
"Do I understand," said Chonita, in a perfectly unmoved voice, "that you are counseling me to marry an Estenega and the man who would send me to Hell hereafter? ”

“ I exclaimed, with that virtue born of discomfort, as they came in sight.
"My dearest Eustaquia," said Diego, kissing my hand gallantly, "thou hast given me pleasure so often, most charming and clever of women, thou hast but added one new art to thy overflowing store."
We mounted almost immediately upon returning, and I was alone with
Chonita for a moment. "Do you realize that you are playing with fire?"
I said, warningly. "Estenega is a dangerous man; the most successful
man with women I have ever known." ”

“ I have it in me to stab the heart of any man who rolls a stone in his way."
"My daughter," said Don Guillermo, with the accent of duty rather than of reproof, "thou must love without vengeance. Sustain thy brother, but harm not his enemy. I would not have thee hate even an Estenega, although I cannot love them myself. But we will not talk of the Estenegas. Dost thou realize that our Reinaldo will be with us this night? We must all go to confession to-morrow,—thy mother and myself, Eustaquia, Reinaldo, Prudencia, and thyself."
Chonita's face became rigid. "I cannot go to confession," she said. ”

“ STEPHEN FRANKLIN THE DOOMSWOMAN. I. It was at Governor Alvarado's house in Monterey that Chonita first knew of Diego Estenega. I had told him much of her, but had never cared to mention the name of Estenega in the presence of an Iturbi y Moncada.
Chonita came to Monterey to stand godmother to the child of Alvarado and of her friend Doña Martina, his wife. She arrived the morning before the christening, and no one thought to tell her that Estenega was to be godfather. The house was full of girls, relatives of the young mother, gathered for the ceremony and subsequent week of festivities. ”

“ As they reached the square they drew rein swiftly, the horses standing upright at the sudden halt. Then strange sounds came to them through the open doors of the church: ribald shouts and loud laughter, curses and noise of smashing glass, such songs as never were sung in Carmelo before; an infernal clash of sound which mingled incongruously with the solemn mass of the surf. Chonita's eyes flashed. Even Estenega's face darkened: the traditions planted in plastic youth arose and rebelled at the desecration.
"Some drunken sailors," he said. "There—do you see that?" A craft rounded Point Lobos. ”

“ She was surrounded at one time by caballeros, but she whirled and doubled so swiftly that every cascaron flew afield.
The pelting grew faster and more furious; every room was invaded; we chased each other up and down the corridors. The people in the court had their cascarones also, and the noise must have been heard at the Mission. Don Guillermo hobbled about delightedly, covered with tinsel and flour. Estenega had tried a dozen times to hit Chonita, but as if by instinct she faced him each time before the egg could leave his hand. ”

“ They forgot the men, and the men forgot them. Even Chonita was oblivious to all else for the hour. She was a famous horsewoman, and keenly alive to the enchantment of the race-field. The men bet their ranchos, whole caponeras of their finest horses, herds of cattle, their saddles and their jewels. Estenega won largely, and, as it happened, from Reinaldo particularly. Don Guillermo was rather pleased than otherwise, holding his son to be in need of further punishment ”

“ There are no cavalcades in the cold depths of those redwood forests, and the ocean beats against ragged cliffs. Only at Fort Ross, in her log palace, does the beautiful Russian, Princess Hélène Rotscheff, strive occasionally to make herself and others forget that the forest is not the Bois of her beloved Paris, that in it the grizzly and the panther hunger for her, and that an Indian Prince, mad with love for the only fair-haired woman he has ever seen, is determined to carry her off——"
"Tell me! tell me!" cried Chonita, eagerly, forgetting her rôle and her enemy. ”

“ My husband is very glad to think that he shall meet you again.”
[Pg 160]
“I am glad you come to cheer her up, Señor Torp,” said Prudencia. “She feel blue because coming to the old house once more.”
Thorpe looked at Chonita with the quick sympathy of the Englishman for terra ego, and Chonita flashed her acknowledgment. “Yes, I am a little sad,” she said; “not only because it is the first time in so many years, but because it is probably for the last time in my life. My husband does not care for California. Here he is.” ”