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"You can grumble, I take notice," he answered. "That's about all you women are good for, anyhow. There was a first-rate raw-hide bedstead in here. If Rothsaker hadn't been such a fool's to let those dogs of Indians carry off all their truck, we might have had that!" The woman looked at him reproachfully, but did not speak for a moment.
They all got together and brought a suit, they call it, up in San Francisco; and it was decided in the court that they owned all our land. That was all Mr. Rothsaker could tell about it. It was the law, he said, and nobody could go against the law." "Oh," said Ramona, "that's the way the Americans took so much of the Senora's land away from her.
I have been three days on the way; the horse, poor beast, is almost weaker than I. The Americans took my horse," Alessandro said. "Took your horse!" cried Ramona, aghast. "Is that the law, too?" "So Mr. Rothsaker told me. He said the judge had said he must take enough of our cattle and horses to pay all it had cost for the suit up in San Francisco.
It was Mr. Rothsaker, from San Diego. We had often worked for him on his ranch. He knew all about us. Don't you recollect, Senorita, I told you about him, how fair he always was, and kind too? He has the biggest wheat-ranch in Cajon; we've harvested miles and miles of wheat for him.
Rothsaker, I would have shot him dead, if I had hung for it; but I knew if he thought we must go, there was no help for us." "But, Alessandro," interrupted Ramona, "I can't understand. Who was it made Mr. Rothsaker do it? Who has the land now?" "I don't know who they are," Alessandro replied, his voice full of anger and scorn. "They're Americans eight or ten of them.
"In Temecula." exclaimed Alessandro, fiercely. "You don't seem to understand, Senorita. We have no right in Temecula, not even to our graveyard full of the dead. Mr. Rothsaker warned us all not to be hanging about there; for he said the men who were coming in were a rough set, and they would shoot any Indian at sight, if they saw him trespassing on their property."
So that is the way our new graveyard was begun, my father and the little baby; it is the very young and the very old that have the blessed fortune to die. I cannot die, it seems!" "Where did they bury Jose?" gasped Ramona. "In Temecula," said Alessandro. "Mr. Rothsaker made two of his men dig a grave in our old graveyard for Jose. But I think Carmena will go at night and bring his body away.
Rothsaker said nobody worked so well in the moving the first day as Jose did. Most of the men would not lift a hand. They sat on the ground with the women, and covered up their faces, and would not see. But Jose worked; and, Senorita, one of the first things he did, was to run with my father's violin to the store, to Mrs. Hartsel, and ask her to hide it for us; Jose knew it was worth money.
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