The good man leaned forward as if to see each face there, sweeping in everything at one glance.  Then he looked down at the ground.

“These are troublesome days.  War is only a temporary evil, but it makes for hate, and hate kills as it dies.  Love lives and gives life.”  A smile lighted his eyes, though his lips were firm.  “I wish you well.  Among friends or enemies the one haven of safety always is the holy sanctuary.”

Uncle Esmond bowed his head reverently.

“You will find it beside the trail near the river.  The walls are very old and strong, but not so old as hate, nor so strong as love.  A little street runs from it, crooked—­six houses away.  Peace be to all of you.”  He broke off suddenly and his last sentence was spoken in a clear, strong tone unlike the gentler voice.

“I thank you, Father!” Jondo said, as the priest passed his wagon.

The holy man gave him one swift, searching glance.  Then lifting his right hand as if in blessing, and slowly dropping it until the forefinger pointed toward the west, he passed on his way.

Jondo’s brown cheek flushed and the lines about his mouth grew hard.

“Take my place, Bev,” he said, as he left his wagon and joined Esmond Clarenden.

The two spoke earnestly together.  Then Jondo mounted Beverly’s pony.

“If you need me—­” I heard him say, and he turned away and rode in the direction the priest had taken.

Uncle Esmond offered no explanation for this sudden action, and his sunny face was stern.

Usually wagon-trains were spied out long before they reached the city, and a rabble attended their entry.  To-day we moved along quietly until the trail became a mere walled lane.  On either side one-story adobe huts sat with their backs to the street.  No windows opened to the front, and only a wooden door or a closed gateway stared in blank unfriendliness at the passer-by.  Little straggling lanes led off aimlessly on either side, as narrow and silent as the strange terminal of the long trail itself.

I was only a boy, with the heart of a boy and the eyes of a boy.  I could only feel; I could not understand the spell of that hour.  But to me everything was alluring, wrapt as it was in the mystery of a civilization old here when Plymouth Rock felt the first Pilgrim’s foot, or Pawnee Rock stared at the first bold plainsman of the pale face and the conquering soul.

I was riding beside Beverly’s wagon as we neared the quaint, centuries-old, adobe church of San Miguel, rising tall and silent above the low huts about it, its rough walls suggesting a fortress of strength, while its triple towers might be an outlook for a guardsman.

“Look at that church.  Bev, I wonder how old it is,” I exclaimed.

“I should say about a thousand years and a day,” Beverly declared.  “See that flopsy steeple thing!  It looks like building-blocks stacked up there.”