The Peraltas, father and son, answered my father's message. They came that night and we talked until late. The next morning Fernando Soto came. Then that afternoon a vaquero rode in from the Sanchez ranch, which was near Los Angeles, with the news that Señorita Rosa María Sanchez planned to marry a young man named John Harper, a gringo. The vaquero brought the regrets and good wishes of her father, Simón Sanchez.
Don Saturnino groaned at this news and struck his forehead and walked around in a fury, but a little later that afternoon two young men came from the Montoya ranch, leading fresh horses and carrying lances. Though we had never seen them before, we had heard their names. They brought news that Americans were camped in the Oriflame Mountains. One of their vaqueros had made a count; there were one hundred and ten of the enemy. They were camped in a meadow beside a spring and were feasting on roasted sheep.
"We have nine lancers altogether," Don Roberto said. During our talk the night before, Don César and Don Saturnino had placed him in command of our party.
"He is a fine horseman, though not so good in the saddle as you, Carlota," my father had said. "He is also brave. We will require both."
That afternoon another ranchero rode in from the coast, bringing with him two of his vaqueros. When we left the ranch at dusk there were twelve of us with lances.
My father said nothing to Doña Dolores about the gringos camped at the springs. Nor did I. She was in the sala and Rosario was kneeling in front of her when we went to say farewell. She did not look up. She was making one of her cigarillos. She took her time and folded the husk lengthwise and filled the crevice with tobacco. Then she spread the tobacco evenly and made a dimple in the center and used both her thumbs to tuck in the edge of the husk.
Only then did she glance up at my father, holding the half-rolled cigarillo in her hands. She gave Rosario a nudge with her toe and he ran to fetch her a coal. Only when she had licked the edges of the cornhusk and lit the cigarillo did she speak.
"Go," she said, "and get yourselves killed, you and your iron-headed daughter. I would not prevent it if I could."
"Señora Doña Dolores," my father said, "we accept your blessings with gratitude. In return we extend our blessings to you."
He started to back out of the room, but Rosario jumped up and shouted, "Take me with you. Por favor, I—"
"No," my grandmother cried. "Never! They go but you stay. I need you."
Don Saturnino said to Rosario, "It is your duty to take care of the eagle and Señora Doña, in that order."
He left the room quickly and I followed him. I don't think my grandmother was as angry as she appeared to be, for when we rode away she stood at her window and waved us goodbye. I think she was as confused as I was. It was my father who lit the flame and kept it burning, out of anger and Spanish pride.
The war was really over. And in California it had never been a real war. In other places, but not here among the Californians. We all hated the men who ruled us from Mexico City and we would have revolted against them if the gringos had just left us alone to go our way. But now, as we were to learn later, General Kearny and his soldiers did not know that the war in California was finished. It was a misfortune that they didn't know.
The twelve of us took to the trail at dusk. There was an early moon and we rode by its light until we came to Aguanga, which is a small Indian village about five leagues from the springs where the gringos were camped.
Here we ate our supper of jerky and yucca cakes. The night before, the chief of the Indians told us, gringos had come looking for horses and had driven off a dozen of his mesteños.
"They are getting ready to go somewhere," he said. "They have been resting at the springs, eating much, gathering horses. We have watched them. They will go soon, perhaps tomorrow."
Late that night, while we were sitting by the fire and talking, a party of rancheros rode in. They had gathered at San Juan Capistrano two days before. They had heard that we were on the trail and had followed us. Their leader was a lithe young man named Andrés Pico, the son of the Mexican governor of California, Pío Pico. There were twenty-one in his party and each man carried a lance.
It was agreed between Don Roberto and him that we would remain two parties, but that Pico would be in command when we met the gringos.
While we were sitting by the fire, off to ourselves and talking, my father said, "All of the men in our party know you. And the new ones, those who have come now with Pico, have heard of you. Do not worry, therefore, about this business, about anything."
I was wearing my deerskin trousers and jacket. My long hair, braided and held with iron pins, was bound in a black handkerchief and pushed up under my hat. I looked like a boy but I didn't feel like one.
"I do not worry," I said, to make him feel happy.
We had heavy ponchos and we slept with them over us, with our saddles for pillows. The earth was hard. Many times in the night I wished that I were in my bed at home.
Early in the morning Don Andrés Pico and Don Roberto sent three Indians on fast horses to Agua Caliente, where the gringos were camped. The Indians came back at noon and reported that the gringos were marching down the valley, westward toward the sea, with flags flying. Some of their horses were fresh but many were thin and stumbling. That all the soldiers carried long rifles and the officers carried pistols and swords. They were also dragging two small cannon.
"We could use a dozen rifles," Don Andrés, the captain, said.
"How about the swords?" someone asked.
"And the pistols?"
"How about a cannon?"
"You will catch flies in your big mouths," Don Andrés said, "as well as other things. We have no rifles or pistols or swords or cannon. We can have a flag. Make one, Señorita Carlota, out of this." He took off his green scarf and tossed it to me. "We will have a flag and for every man a lance and some to spare. Be content."
To the mutter of leather and the song of metal crickets many of the horses wore on their headstalls, carrying the green flag I had made, we rode down the valley in a direction close to the one the gringos had taken. Most of the rancheros had silver on their bridles and pommels and their hooded stirrups. Andrés Pico had silver everywhere, even on the broad band of his sombrero.
We rode at a quick trot through the mist, down the valley between the dripping trees, on our way to intercept—that was the word my father used—to cut off the gringo soldiers at San Pasqual. It was the first time since the day word had come about the gringos, since the hour that we had left Dos Hermanos, that I felt good. It was exciting to ride through the mist, with the sound of hoofs and the jingle of harness. Though no one was watching, it was like riding in a parade.