Of course-the apse in a church.
I'd probably stumbled onto the ruins of the church mentioned in John Quincannon's report-San Anselmo de las Lomas. It would have been similar in style to the Franciscan missions: plain adobe and wood beam, without the elaborate stained glass windows and statuary of the typical Catholic church. The walls would have been whitewashed, the pews simple wooden benches, and any artworks would have been small paintings or statues of the saints. All those things were gone now, of course, destroyed in the fire or stolen. I was surprised that the great roof beam remained-it would make good firewood-but it was massive enough that it would have to be sawed up before it could be moved.
I looked around, feeling the way an archaeologist must after stumbling onto a lost city. I was certain now that this was the site of Rancho Rinconada de los Robles's pueblo-that center of the day-to-day activities of those who worked and lived on the sprawling self-sufficient spread-and as I searched for it, I began to see more evidence. To the right of the church was what appeared to be a graveyard; the tips of a couple of headstones peeked through the tall grass. About thirty feet away, under a big olive tree, was a three-foot-high round structure that looked like a well; probably it had been a lavanderia, the rancho's equivalent of the town pump, where the laundry was done. When I came to explore the surrounding area-perhaps crossed that dry creek bed to that gnarled apple orchard, or climbed the rocky, oak-crowned knoll off on the right-I might see where the foundations of the stables, outbuildings, vaqueros' quarters, or even the hacienda were.
Had John Quincannon come here and seen these ruins? Had the place been as desolate then as it was now? No, the rancho was still being worked in those days; there would have been some buildings still standing, the hacienda for one. But the church would have been much the same, since it had been destroyed some forty-odd years before Felipe Velasquez had engaged the detective's services.
I narrowed my eyes, squinting at the ruins of the church through my lashes. For a moment I could almost picture it as it had been in the days before the Bear Flag Revolt. It would have been an immaculate white with a red tile roof; a carved wooden or iron cross would have crowned the peak over the heavy double doors. The square structure to the right was undoubtedly the bell tower; it would have risen high above the rooftop, its heavy bell silhouetted against the sky.
It was strange, I thought, that no one had tried to restore this place, or at least make a historical attraction of the ruins. Of course, the revolutionaries had destroyed a great deal of it. And then, it was also well off the beaten tourist track, in a rocky and inhospitable place. Perhaps whoever owned the land now preferred to let the ruins of the rancho lie in peace, visited only by teenagers seeking privacy, and occasional curious people like myself.
A sudden breeze came up, rushing through the nearby orchard and rattling the trees' leaves. The wildflowers that surrounded me rippled with its passage. I looked up at the sky and saw that the streaky clouds were now tinged with gray. The temperature had dropped sharply, as it often does in the hills on uncertain spring days. I shivered, wishing I'd brought a sweater.
The landscape had a bleak aura now, in spite of the still-bright sun; the remaining wall of the church seemed a lonely reminder of an age that was gone and would never come again; the bright colors of the spray-painted rainbow were a mockery of the grandeur these ruins represented.
I crossed my arms, hugging my elbows and feeling my spirits sink. I thought of Dave, the loss of him. And I thought of Mama, her illness that was only a prelude to old age and death. My life had taken a turn in the last two days, a turn that I was powerless to stop.
Always before I'd been the sort of person who fought against changes she didn't like. If there was a problem, I could think it through and fix it. If a situation displeased me, I could twist it around and make it right. But now I felt caught up in a great wave of inevitability, a force as strong as the one that had destroyed the great ranchos and the way of life that the dons had assumed would go on and on forever. Standing in this lonely place among the ruins made me realize for the first time how truly powerless we human beings are.
I stood there for a long time, arms wrapped tightly across my breasts, feeling sorry for myself. But after a while-as it had the night before-my self-pity began to seem ludicrous.
“Pobrecita Elena,” I said aloud. “You thought you were all grown-up, and now you find there's yet another lesson to be learned.”
Then I wiped a couple of tears from my cheeks and made my way back to the car to get my picnic lunch.
TWO
Before I could carry my picnic lunch back to the ruins of the church, it began to rain, so I gave up on that idea and ate in the car. By the time I had finished and started down the road toward Las Lomas, the sun was out again and a rainbow-delicate translucence that in no way resembled the gaudy imitation on the church wall-arched over the landscape. The tender spring leaves and blossoms were studded with droplets that broke the light into miniature prisms, as if pieces of the rainbow had flaked off and fallen to earth.
The little village of Las Lomas shared none of the beauty of the country around it. lit nestled in a valley on the edge of Los Padres National Forest, where the foothills became mountainous and rugged. A ragtag collection of shabby frame and cinder-block buildings sprawled around a town square. Half weeds and half packed earth, the square contained a flagpole without either flag or rigging, a basketball hoop minus a net, and a broken-down green picnic table. A couple of small boys were tossing a baseball around on the dirt section that apparently served as a playground, and an old brown dog lay under the table watching them.
The main road into the town deadended at the square. I turned left and parked in front of one of the few buildings that wasn't in poor repair-a freshly painted white Victorian house with a picket fence and well-tended garden. When I got out of the car and took a closer look, I saw that what grew there was not flowers but vegetables-big spiky-leaved artichoke plants, seedling beans that had already begun to climb a trellis, tomato plants with yellow blossoms. White-flowered strawberry plants were everywhere, like a ground cover. It seemed an efficient and economical use of space, and for a moment I thought of all the room I had in my backyard and how attractive it would look filled with vegetables. Then I remembered last summer's zucchini disaster-zucchini grows like weeds for everybody but me-and dismissed my visions of living off the land.
Back on the corner where the road had entered the town, I'd passed a grocery store with a gas pump out front, and now I started walking back to it. The sign on the cinder-block facade said MARSHALL'S, and there was a bin full of potatoes and onions and some sacks of feed sitting under the overhang of the rusty corrugated iron roof. When I got closer I could see, through the front window, wire racks containing potato chips, other snacks, and packaged baked goods. I opened the screen door and stepped inside.
It was a country store but without the usual charm of such establishments. The wooden floor looked grimy; the light was a peculiar jaundiced yellow; the walls a dirty beige. Rows of shelves stretched from the door to the rear where the refrigerated cases were, but they were half-empty and what canned and boxed goods stood there were in total disorder. To my left was a counter with produce in crates; most of it looked wilted or half-rotten. To my right was a checkout counter, backed by high shelves that held liquor, candy, and cigarettes. An old man with wispy gray hair and a sallow complexion stood behind it, putting a fifth of Old Crow into a paper sack. His customer had his back to me and was slipping a wallet into the hip pocket of his faded jeans. When the screen door flapped shut, the customer glanced over his shoulder; he was about forty, with a suntanned, weathered face and a full head of faded sandy hair. I smiled self-consciously and began turning the rack of snacks to give myself something to do until they'd finished their business.