The Splendid Idle Forties: Stories of Old California

Delfina de Capalleja, after months of deferred hope, stood with the crowd at the dock, awaiting the return of the troop which had gone to defend the Mission of San Gabriel in its building.  There was no flutter of colour beneath her white skin, and the heavy lids almost concealed the impatient depths of her eyes; the proud repose of her head indicated a profound reserve and self-control.  Over her white gown and black dense hair she wore a black lace mantilla, fastened below the throat with a large yellow rose.

The ship swung to anchor and answered the salute from the fort.  Boats were lowered, but neither officers nor soldiers descended.  The murmur of disappointment on shore rose to a shout of execration.  Then, as the ship’s captain and passengers landed, a whisper ran through the crowd, a wail, and wild sobbing.  They flung themselves to the earth, beating their heads and breasts,—­all but Delfina de Capalleja, who drew her mantilla about her face and walked away.

The authorities of the city of Mexico yielded to public clamour and determined to cast a silver bell in honour of the slaughtered captain and his men.  The casting was to take place in the great plaza before the cathedral, that all might attend:  it was long since any episode of war had caused such excitement and sorrow.  The wild character and remoteness of the scene of the tragedy, the meagreness of detail which stung every imagination into action, the brilliancy and popularity of De la Torre, above all, the passionate sympathy felt for Delfina de Capalleja, served to shake society from peak to base, and no event had ever been anticipated with more enthusiasm than the casting of that silver bell.

No one had seen Delfina since the arrival of the news had broken so many hearts, and great was the curiosity regarding her possible presence at the ceremony.  Universal belief was against her ever again appearing in public; some said that she was dead, others that she had gone into a convent, but a few maintained that she would be high priestess at the making of the bell which was to be the symbol and monument of her lover’s gallantry and death.

The hot sun beat upon the white adobe houses of the stately city.  At the upper end of the plaza, bending and swaying, coquetting and languishing, were women clad in rich and vivid satins, their graceful heads and shoulders draped with the black or white mantilla; caballeros, gay in velvet trousers laced with gold, and serape embroidered with silver.  Eyes green and black and blue sparkled above the edge of large black fans; fiery eyes responded from beneath silver-laden sombreros.  The populace, in gala attire, crowded the rest of the plaza and adjacent streets, chattering and gesticulating.  But all looked in vain for Delfina de Capalleja.

Much ceremony attended the melting of the bell.  Priests in white robes stiff with gold chanted prayers above the silver bubbling in the caldron.  A full-robed choir sang the Te Deum; the regiment to which De la Torre had belonged fired salutes at intervals; the crowd sobbed and shouted.

Thunder of cannon, passionate swell of voices:  the molten silver was about to be poured into the mould.  The crowd hushed and parted.  Down the way made for her came Delfina de Capalleja.  Her black hair hung over her long white gown.  Her body bent under the weight of jewels—­the jewels of generations and the jewels of troth.  Her arms hung at her sides.  In her eyes was the peace of the dead.

She walked to the caldron, and taking a heavy gold chain from her neck flung it into the silver.  It swirled like a snake, then disappeared.  One by one, amidst quivering silence, the magnificent jewels followed the chain.  Then, as she took the last bracelet from her arm, madness possessed the breathless crowd.  The indifferent self-conscious men, the lanquid coquetting women, the fat drowsy old dowagers, all rushed, scrambling and screaming, to the caldron, tore from their heads and bodies the superb jewels and ropes of gold with which they were bedecked, and flung them into the molten mass, which rose like a tide.  The electric current sprang to the people; their baubles sped like hail through the air.  So great was the excitement that a sudden convulsing of the earth was unfelt.  When not a jewel was left to sacrifice, the caldron held enough element for five bells—­the five sweet-voiced bells which rang in the Mission of San Gabriel for more than a century.

Exhausted with shouting, the multitude was silent.  Delfina de Capalleja, who had stood with panting chest and dilating nostrils, turned from the sacrificial caldron, the crowd parting for her again, the Laudate Dominum swelling.  As she reached the cathedral, a man who loved her, noting a change in her face, sprang to her side.  She raised her bewildered eyes to his and thrust out her hands blankly, then fell dead across the threshold.