Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1931-06-08
INSTALLMENT 1.

!
folk of means and leisure that they
were, in the year of our Lord eighteen
. hundred and forty-nine, and had sailed
elegantly for Ric, for Buenos Aires
and around the Horn. They had
| loitered in Valparaiso and In Lima for
| some weeks, taking things easily, IN
/ leisurely way, and had in due time
! come up the stormy coast Of California
and had dropped anchor IN the opaies-
| Fer San Francisco had been still
| Familiarity known as Yerba Buena then
| and the blue waters of the bay had
! Tapped the strand at Montgomery
street. The globe-trotters, magnificent
! Philip Lawrence and his frail Indian
! shaWled pretty wife, had remained on
the ship for few days, for the settle
ment on shore promised small COM
fort fer tourists. Thus they had en-
joyed a safe view not only Of the glor-
| ious harbor strewn with green islands
aud ringed with eternal hills. but of
| the busy traffic between the Mexicans,
Spanish, Chinese and Janpanese fish,
| ing smackS and trading boats that
had put off from the shore.
! Early in their second week, however,
they had been obliged to seek lodging
ashore. This was for two reasons, one
| important, one ridiculous. The i'm
portant reason was that an heir to
| the Lawrences was about to be born.
| The absurd reason was that some pre-
| posterous person had discovered gold,
| or had pretended to, at a place called
Suffer Greek and that every one IN
Yerba Buena had promptly lost his
senses.
Philip and Abigail Lawrence natu-
rally did not lose their senses. They
were rich anyway; they were above
this undignified scramble for lucre.
Philip had an income of $4,000 year
and Abigails father owned five sailing
vessels, including this very Abby Bald
win, in which they had spent their
honeymoon.
But the sailors, and indeed the off,
GERS of the Abby Baldwin, were not
above acquiring fortunes, and they mad
instantly deserted the ship and made
| for the gold region. So Philip and
Abigail had signaled Chinese crab
catcher and in his little Shallop he
had rowed them and their carpet bags
ashore.
They had felt affronted and be-
wildered, and Abigail very faint. But.
pale and heroic and smiling. she had
said to Philip that within three days
the men would be back and that then
| they-Philip and she-would be able
to make pretty stiff terms with them.
They had gone to "the French
! wcman's," quaint-looking adobe
house on hill. with an upper balcony
and shutters. There were no WINDOW
sashes but there were tents of
mosquito-netting over the bed and the
bare floors were clean. Downstairs
was merely a level Of dim arcades.
earthen- hoored and smelling of spilled
wine, where men lounged on benches
and whe the Frenchwoman herself
tended the bar. But the upstairs room
had been comfortable enough and
Abigail had put the daguerreotype OF
her mother-a hook-nosed ringleted
woman in flowing striped silks-on the
table, and had eaten shore meal OF
fish stew, dumplings, fresh soft black
some appetite.
This would do for the present, she
had said. But one could not live quite
like a savage. after all, and immediate
" after breakfast tomorrow Philip must
find really nice place, even If he
had to buy it, and good plain serv-
ant and a nurse. If not, then they
would have to go back to the ship.
So much for Philips benefit. But
when he had gene out after supper
to walk about little on the uneven
billy streets and listen to the shouting
and singing of the strangely mixed
population. and watch the card games.
the drinking and the fights. Abigail
had felt very low-spirited indeed, and
had cried little secretly into the big
hard French pillow. They had been
II months getting so far and the baby
was due in few weeks time. Per-
hans il would be weeks before they
could get a crew on the Abby Baldwin.
Philip had returned flushed, dis
tressed and annoyed from his search
the next morning; he had returned
flushed, distressed and increasingly an
noyed from the searches Of the fol.
lowing days. Desperate, he had rented
spanking team and loose-wheeled
buggy, and had begun to drive about
the adjoining country Looking LOT
shelter.
For it had become obvious now that
the crew was not going to return to the
Abbv Baldwin The ship had swung
rotting at her anchor in dismal COM
pany Of other deserted vessels week In
and week out.
Meanwhile so miles southeast Of
foggy Yerba Buena they had found
refuge on rancho. 1t was managed
by a widow, one Sonora Castellazo, who
lived farther south IN another hacienda
and was willing to rent this one to the
strangers. A four-square adobe build
ing of four empty rooms shaded mag
nificently by natural oaks and by a
plantation of beecheS, gums, cotton
woods, figs and peppers, 1t had con-
tanned no furnishings whatsoever when
the Lawrences had moved in.
But many trips up to the. Abby
Baldwin had pretty well transformed
the dismal place. Philip. breathiessly
grateful that somehow, with the aid OF
a Norman doctor frcm Benicia ana the
care of two stolid wall-eyed Mexican
women, Abigail had actually brought
forth a first-born daughter, had made
no complaints.
Poor Abigail had laughed forlornly
en- the first anniversary OF her wed
ding day. It had found her weak and
weary, stretched on mattress on the
floor CT one of the cool rooms, while
a burning August day had hammered
away at the spread level acres OF the
rancho outside. Beside her had been
Annie Sarah.
Somehow Abigail's ordeal had been
got over and she had been free then
to cry little, thinking of her room
at home in an orderly shaded Massa-
chusetts village, with Mas lavender
scented linen on the smooth bed and
roses in a green glass vase on the
bureau, and the lace curtains blowing
softly in and cut of the opened up
stairs windows. Lilacs. trembling grass
and grandpa'S grave IN the graveyard,
and doughnuts and currant jelly-oh,
deari
AS soon as the baby and the mother
were well upon the road to normal
living Philip and Abigail had seriously
discussed going home. They had kept
a sharp eye on all the vessels that
came in the Gate, and Philip had gone
I'D to the city at least once a week to
see what the chances were.
Then old Sonora Castellazo had died
land her sons had wished to dispose of
the Santa Clara hacienda. Four hun
~s,zaI - o-o. for NO0n DliliYI had aOn-