The breath of Easter was in the air. It was hard, even in that last penitential week, to renounce the seductive wooings of those first April days. In the little Episcopal chapel, or in the venerable Mission, we acknowledged each evening our infirmities; but with all our abnegation, there was for some of us an heterodox satisfaction in hastening away from our prayers.

We wanted to exult, rather than to bemoan "our manifold sins and wickedness."

We were not sufficiently impressed with our depravity to smell brimstone, when the air was richly purified with the scent of orange blossoms and millions of newborn roses.

Doubtless our lenten orthodoxy would have developed more strongly in the cutting blast of a Manitoba blizzard. We would have felt more contrite, drawn by the persuasive chastisements of a sweet spring cyclone. But in such days as the ones which followed each other like glad birds in a flock, it was difficult to assume a despondency adequate to the penitential demand.

The Gold of Ophir rose and Mariposilla were now blooming together. The old house was bright, outside and in, with light and glory.

From the veranda and the crest of the roof, long sprays of dazzling bloom swept voluptuously to the sky. In the blushing hearts of myriads of buds and blossoms, the sun whispered each day his rapturous secrets.

Wonderful from its first hour of triumph until its last pale, dilapidated petals have fallen to the ground—a moral to its transient magnificence—this rose is tragic.

It seems always the glorious prototype of Mariposilla, who ever stole its fickle lights and shades. As I watched, through those eventful weeks, the marvelous unfolding of bud to flower and child to maiden, I was never able to separate them in my thoughts. Their analogy was captivating.

I have already said that I learned instinctively to watch for the girl's mood in the complexion of the rose. When the edges of its petals burned with fire, I knew that Mariposilla, too, glowed with hope and ecstasy. When the fog smote sullenly the golden heart of the Ophir, I felt without looking that the girl, too, was pale, tortured with jealousy, and indefinite forebodings. Thus for me there will always remain the fancy that between this rose and the Spanish child there existed a kinship—a subtile sympathy, that each unconsciously felt when the other was near.

Looking back over those happy days, they seem fraught with no ordinary conditions. Unconsciously all took part in the several acts of a realistic drama.

I see now, as I could not then see, the innumerable cues, the important by-play and scenic situations, which eventually led up to an inevitable climax.

As the weeks glided away, I no longer doubted Sidney Sanderson's love for Mariposilla. Had there been a sign of opposition on the part of his mother, I would have warned the DoÑa Maria. But, to the contrary, Mrs. Sanderson increased her affection daily for her pretty plaything; often alluding to the girl's beneficial influence upon her son.

"The scamp is head and ears in love!" she said one day. "Just look at him. I should die of rage and jealousy if I didn't adore his sweetheart myself," she confided.

Mariposilla and Sidney were at the far end of the veranda, oblivious to all but each other.

The woman then went as far as to intimate that a few years in a fashionable New York school would do all that was necessary for Mariposilla.

"Beauty such as hers would be ruined by rigorous education. Fortunately, Sid hates wise women. Imagine Mariposilla developing the occult transitions of theosophy. Come here, you pretty butterfly!" she cried. "Sid is a greedy boy to keep you away so long. Go fetch the guitar; I am just in the humor for music."

Thus the woman countenanced the wooing, petting, and enriching with gifts the happy child, while she silenced my own doubts and those of the DoÑa Maria.

That Mrs. Sanderson was selfish, worldly, and at times mercenary, I well knew. However, these very attributes led me to believe that she would gratify herself and her son. I knew how thoroughly she would enjoy the absolute control of Mariposilla, how extravagantly she would equip her with the elegancies of life, exulting that Sidney's wife eclipsed always the beauty of other women.

Beauty she worshipped.

It had never occurred to her that Sidney might possibly marry a plain woman.

"If Sid should marry a homely girl, I should hate her," she said, one day. "Is he not splendid?" she would ask, when her son chanced to dwarf physically his associates.

And Sidney's exterior was admirable. He dressed perfectly, and there was about him the freshness of perpetual bathing. To Mariposilla he was the ideal type of masculine American elegance.

She scorned each day in her secret soul the careless, unconventional dress of the remaining Spanish men of her acquaintance, feasting her eyes with childish delight upon every detail of her lover's faultless attire.

Yet, withal, Sidney was not a fop. He was too blasÉ, and at times too sullen, to represent the gibbering class to which his immaculate and ultra-fashionable clothes might have otherwise attached him. But his unbounded reticence was his greatest protection; while it gave him, with some, a reputation for depth. Many believed that, although not brilliant in conversation, he sympathized silently with culture, and was shrewd in business affairs. In truth, Sidney had never taken an active part in his mother's financial transactions; but that her son was a dummy she carefully concealed. There was a laudable spirit in the woman's attitude. Her affectionate subserviency to her boy in the eyes of their friends was admirable.

I had so often seen wealthy mothers humiliate and belittle their sons, that, although I believed Mrs. Sanderson to be the business brains of the family, I was glad that she abstained from flaunting the fact.

I think I understood the elements of Mrs. Sanderson's character at that time quite well, with one exception. Unfortunately, I stopped too soon in my analysis. I innocently took it for granted that she possessed a moral side to her worldly and perhaps frivolous nature. Here was my fatal mistake. I did not understand that the woman would unflinchingly sacrifice any one for selfish, momentary enjoyment.

In all cases her own pleasure was suggested by the inclinations of her son. To keep him contented and passably respectable, she would have ruined her dearest friend.

Ethel Walton was arranging an entertainment to take place shortly after Easter. The girl was an enthusiast. Everything that she did called for her heart's best efforts.

Her present schemes were charitable. The Episcopal church needed an organ, and Ethel had determined that the necessary money should be raised. Her artistic and really poetic nature had found an outlet in the existing emergencies of her church, and she boldly originated a grand rose pageant. Each day she grew more enthusiastic over her prospects of success.

All the youth and beauty of Pasadena had been pressed into the carnival. The opera-house had been generously donated by the owner; while the papers each day keyed to the highest pitch the expectations of the public, by promising the most ravishing display of beauty and flowers ever gathered upon the celebrated Pacific Coast.

Even the DoÑa Maria had been beguiled into loaning treasures from the sacred green chest. But, best of all, she had generously consented to allow Mariposilla to dance, when Ethel explained, in her pretty way, that everyone was taking part, for the glory of Pasadena, if not for the church.

"Will you believe it?" she said; "I have had scarcely any opposition. My dances are all full, and I have two magnificent marches composed of beauties, whose scrupulous parents can't quite go the tripping, but are delighted to allow their consciences a constitutional walk."

The rehearsals were, of course, an interesting excuse to go to Pasadena; and each week we drove over with Mariposilla. At home she was continually practicing her steps, and the clicking of castanets soon grew familiar. She was alive with enthusiasm and expectation; while her costume to be worn upon the eventful night became a matter for our united thoughts, before it was at last satisfactorily designed.

It was all that the DoÑa Maria could do to restrain her restless child through the long, religious hours of Good Friday. When they knelt together in the old church, Mariposilla listened not to the solemn prayers. Sternly her mother rebuked her inattention; but the girl's eyes were flooded with happy dreams, and she forgot over and over again the crape-draped cross. The pictures of the stern, gloomy saints failed to frighten her into a state of contrition. Only to the Virgin did she sometimes lift her wandering eyes to implore protection for the lover now absent from her side.

When the sun rose gloriously upon the last day of the penitential season, Mariposilla's spirits rose too. Nothing could restrain her.

"I am most tired of prayers!" she cried, innocently joyous in her emancipation, as we went together, at the request of the DoÑa Maria, for lilies.

Like a field of snow in the sunshine the tall, pure flowers bloomed in symbolic beauty, for the world's glad festival. Our offering to the sweet Mother and the holy Child was a thousand—and on Easter day they would make glorious the old church.

For years the DoÑa Maria had dressed the ancient Mission for Easter, and for several seasons her daughter had also assisted. Now for the first time the girl plead excuses.

She wanted to go to Pasadena with Sidney and Mrs. Sanderson, as there was to be a rehearsal of her dance in the afternoon and Ethel had urged them to drive over early and lunch at Crown Hill.

Sadly the DoÑa Maria turned from the basket of white roses she had just gathered.

"What!" she exclaimed, "does my child refuse to honor the sweet Mother and the holy Child? Never before has she thought it other than joy to arrange the holy altar."

"Forgive Mariposilla, dear DoÑa Maria," I said. "Let me assist this year, and later, when the work is completed, I will drive the child myself to the rehearsal."

To this arrangement the mother agreed, and in consequence we had gone for the lilies early, reaching the old church in advance of other workers.

As we drove through the long, shaded roads of San Gabriel, the waysides seemed lined with devotees. Everyone was going to some church with flowers. Wagon-loads of lilies and roses were soon a common, though not less beautiful spectacle. Loveliest of all were the little children, hastening eagerly upon their sweet errand, with arms almost hidden beneath fragrant burdens.

We met one small child carrying in proud distinction a cross of violets. Another bore a crown of golden poppies, smiling with the light of the foothills.

When we approached the Mission, groups of Mexican children, many of them in their bare feet, thronged about us with funny little offerings, composed of flowers whose astonishing tones were often a mad blending of orange and deep pink.

The near advent of the happy festival had awakened in these humble breasts and uncultivated natures a God-given love for the beautiful. Each arrangement of flowers told a touching story. In every bunch was hidden the angel of the child who gathered it.

When we halted with our fresh burden, Father Ramirez, who was standing in the doorway of the ancient church, hastened with courtly consideration to assist us. The old priest commanded the staring children (in Spanish) to carry the flowers into the church, as he gallantly hitched our horse.

Once free from the wagon, I found it impossible to resist the picturesque old stone stairway, which leads from the ground to the choir above. Stealing a moment from my duties, I ran up the rough, time-worn steps, and from a little overhanging balcony caught the morning vision of the valley, stretching peacefully beyond.

"Some time I must come here in the moonlight," I said, as I descended and entered the chilly old church. "Surely I would learn sweet secrets which the sun each day effaces."