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In the now deserted plaza were many low stone rectangles partly covered with adobe and ready to be converted into booths. The plaza was surrounded by long, thatched buildings of adobe and stone, mostly of rough ashlars. A few ashlars showed signs of having been carefully dressed by ancient stonemasons. Some loose ashlars weighed half a ton and had baffled the attempts of modern builders.
No one who had not seen such a walk would realize how well whales' vertebrae will answer for paving. Some of the old vertebrae had now sunk below the original level of the walk, so that the path by which a person went to the old adobe house beyond the red hollyhocks was somewhat uneven as to surface.
Not even in that capacity would Major Murphy deliver to her the will and insurance policy when they were demanded, and it is claimed that he destroyed the will. Certainly it was never probated. Murphy was accustomed to keep this will in a tin can, hid in a hole in the adobe wall of his store building. There were no safes at that time and place.
Limasito's principal street was well-nigh deserted in the lethargy of the noon-day siesta, but the flower-market was a riotous blaze of color in the glistening white plaza, from which radiated broad vistas of fantastically painted adobe and soberer concrete, ending in a soft green blur.
The interior of the Mission, a great oblong of white-washed adobe with a flat ceiling, was lighted dimly by the sanctuary lamp that hung from three long chains just over the chancel rail at the far end of the church, and by two or three cheap kerosene lamps in brackets of imitation bronze. All around the walls was the inevitable series of pictures representing the Stations of the Cross.
The old adobe Palace is in itself a volume whose pages are filled with pathos and stirring events. It has been the scene and witness of incidents the recital of which would to us to-day seem incredible. An old friend, once governor of New Mexico and now dead, thus graphically spoke of the venerable building:
The next instant the rifles began their cracking on both sides, and the bullets with furious spat drove deep into the adobe or whizzed through the gunny-sacks into the barley. The unseen foe was once more investing them on every side and not a shot could be wasted in return.
His mind rushed back to that terrible evening so long ago when Lopez had ridden up to the adobe, and changed the world for them all in almost the twinkling of an eye. He got up from the table now, and "Red" followed him. Dusk was just descending, but Gilbert's sharp eyes recognized the first horseman even in the dimming light. "It's Pancho Lopez!" he cried.
After they had eaten cake and ice cream, Kate showed Gordon over the house. It was built of adobe, and the window seats in the thick walls were made comfortable with cushions or filled with potted plants. Navajo rugs and Indian baskets lent the rooms the homey appearance such furnishings always give in the old Southwest.
The rock nuthatch is as expert a mixer of mortar as the well-known cliff swallows of our own country, and his adobe dwellings bear a close resemblance to theirs.
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