Argosy All-Story Weekly, Vol. 123, No. 3 — page 111: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Pa PRIDE OF TYSON. “You were good to come,” said the padre. “ Are you tired?” “You stole the distance away with your talk,”’ smiled Tyson. | “‘ Ah,” he nodded. ‘“ The time was when Y could have walked with you, but time has put heavy boots upon me. Well—” His brown hand waved slowly, a gesture of profound resignation. ‘‘ ‘You must come out to the garden with me,” he said, “ and we will sit in the cool while you recover your breath. This way, if you please.” And he led Tyson through a massive arch on the farther side of the room, down a brief passage, and into the open. “At least, this was once: the burial- ground, and some little care of the graves is all my strength permits; so here is all my garden. Do you mind so gloomy a . place to sit?” He spoke slowly, in careful English, but the soft Spanish ran, somehow, behind his English words. A throng of old tombstones filled the space, which was bounded on the three other sides by sagging heaps of ruins, and close to the wall of the cloister were two stone chairs; they had stood there moldering for centuries, perhaps; six inches of the stout legs were sunk into the ground. Here they sat down. “Ts there only you to take care of all this?” asked Tyson. ‘““T am the last,” nodded Padre Miguel. “Our flock is wasted away; there is little to do except with hoe and spade and rake. And even for that I am a little old.” And he smiled deprecatingly on Tyson. The latter removed his hat, for they sat in the steep shadow of the wall, and so doing he felt the eyes of the padre shift quickly up to his golden hair and rest there. Not long or boldly; it was only a lingering glance of. curiosity. “And yet,” argued Tyson, “are not those new graves—there—and there—and there?”’ “Oh, yes. They are the bodies of men who died at the dam. Many of them come here; the Mexican loves the old, you know. It is a long walk, but some of them ‘come here for confession when they are deeply troubled. And when these poer fellows died . igitiz » Go ogle $93 their last request was that they be buried here in the shadow of dear San Vicente. I was sorry, but their last prayers must be heeded.” ‘“‘ Sorry?” queried Tyson. “‘ For all these stones and all these graves will be lost soon enough, senor. When the dam is finished and the waters rise—that will be soon now—all the mission will be quickly covered. And that -will be the last of San Vicente.”’ His quiet eyes grew misty; he sighed. “It is not a brave place, sevor; but even a prisoner will come fo love his chains. One of your own poets has said it. Well, there will be many a sad heart among those workers at the dam when the waters rise over the bell-tower. I could wish that just that could be spar . “It is sure to be covered?” asked Tyson, and he peered at the old padre, “You are excited, my son,” replied the other, smiling. ‘“ But yes, San Vicente has softened many a heart. He has worked great works here within these walls of mud. But there is a period that all things reach, and every sentence has its end. And so— His will be done.” The head of the padre bowed, and Tyson knew that he prayed silently. “‘There will be excitement at the dam when the mission is covered with the - water,” he mused. “For you see,” explained the padre, “they look on it, in a way, as a sacrilege, and it is all that I can do to keep them to their work, a great many of them. They are like children, you see, and the whisper goes to and fro among them, and they shake their heads and say that no good thing will come from drowning San Vicente.” “It would not take much to rouse them to action, I suppose,” brooded Henry Tyson. “Only a leader. But I have brought you here for a purpose, sévor, and you will weary when an old man talks so much to so little purpose.” “ Padre,’ answered Tyson, with strange feeling, ‘“‘ I would have walked thrice as far to learn -what you have told me.” He looked on down the valley, and frowned at the blunt, looming top of the dam. “ Aye, WE Sra CON CU O@ CO© mm