And to the west of the Mission—­past the river with its fringe of cotton-woods and willows, beyond a long dusty road which led through fields and canon and over more than one hill—­was the old adobe house of the Rancho de los Olivos.

Talbot was a practical man of business to-day.  The olive orchard was his, the toy hotel at the end of the plateau, the land upon which had grown the rough village, with its one store, its prosperous saloon, its post-office, and several shanties of citizens not altogether estimable.  He was also a man of affairs, for he had represented the district for two years at the State Legislature, and was spoken of as a future Senator.  It cannot be said that the people among whom he had spent so many years of his life loved him, for he was reserved and had never been known to slap a man on the back.  Moreover, it was believed that he subscribed to a San Francisco daily paper, which he did not place on file in the saloon, and that he had a large library of books in one of his rooms at the Mission.  As far as the neighbors could see, the priest was the only man in the district in whom he found companionship.  Nevertheless he was respected and trusted as a man must be who has never broken his word nor taken advantage of another for twenty-three years; and even those who resented the manifest antagonism of his back to the national familiarity felt that the dignity and interest of the State would be safe in his hands.  Even those most in favor of rotation had concluded that it would not be a bad idea to put him in Congress for life, after the tacit fashion of the New England States.  At all events they would try him in the House of Representatives for two or three terms, and then, if he satisfied their expectations and demonstrated his usefulness, they would “work” the State and send him to the United States Senate.  Santa Ursula had but one street, but its saloon was the heart of a hundred-mile radius.  And it was as proud as an old don.  When its leading citizen became known far and wide as “Talbot of Ursula,” a title conferred by the members of his Legislature to distinguish him from two colleagues of the same name, its pride in him knew no bounds.  The local papers found it an effective head-line, and the title clung to him for the rest of his life.

It was only when a newspaper interviewed Talbot after his election to the State Senate that his district learned that he was by birth an Englishman.  He had emigrated with his parents at the age of fourteen, however, and as the population of his district included Germans, Irish, Swedes, Mexicans, and Italians, his nationality mattered little.  Moreover, he had made his own fortune, barring the start his uncle had given him, and he was an American every inch of him.  England was but a peaceful dream, a vale of the hereafter’s rest set at the wrong end of life.  He recalled but one incident of that time, but on that incident his whole life had hinged.