Part 28

He looked back in wonder at the moment of wild regret and protest--the bitterer in its silence--when they had told him he must die; when in the last rally of the vital forces he had believed his will was still strong enough to command his ravaged body, to propel his brain, still teeming with a vast and complicated future, his heart, still warm and insistent with the image it cherished, on to the ultimates of ambition and love. How brief it had been, that last cry of mortality, with its accompaniment of furious wonder at his unseemly and senseless cutting off. In the adjustment and readjustment of political and natural forces the world ambled on philosophically, fulfilling its inevitable destiny.

If he had not been beyond humor, he would have smiled at the idea that in the face of all eternity it mattered what nation on one little planet eventually possessed a fragment called California. To him that fair land was empty and purposeless save for one figure, and even of her he thought with the terrible calm of dissolution. During these last months of illness and isolation he had been less lonely than at any time of his life save during those few weeks in California, for he had lived with her incessantly in spirit; and in that subtle imaginative communion had pressed close to a profound and complex soul, revealed before only in flashes to a vision astray in the confusion of the senses. He had felt that her response to his passion was far more vital and enduring than dwelt in the capacity of most women; he had appreciated her gifts of mind, her piquant variousness that scotched monotony, the admirable characteristics that would give a man repose and content in his leisure, and subtly advance his career. But in those long reveries, at the head of his forlorn caravan or in the desolate months of convalescence, he had arrived at an absolute understanding of what she herself had divined while half comprehending.

Theirs was one of the few immortal loves that reveal the rarely sounded deeps of the soul while in its frail tenement on earth; and he harbored not a doubt that their love was stronger than mortality and that their ultimate union was decreed. Meanwhile, she would suffer, no one but he could dream how completely, but her strong soul would conquer, and she would live the life she had visioned in moments of despair; not of cloistered selfishness, but of incomparable usefulness to her little world; and far happier, in her eternal youthfulness of heart, in that divine life of the imagination where he must always be with her as she had known him briefly at his best, than in the blunt commonplaceness of daily existence, the routine and disillusionment of the world. Perhaps--who knew?--he had, after all, given her the best that man can offer to a woman of exalted nature; instead of taking again with his left hand what his right had bestowed; completed the great gift of life with the priceless beacon of death.

How unlike was life to the old Greek tragedies! He recalled his prophetic sense of impending happiness, success, triumph, as he entered California, the rejuvenescence of his spirit in the renewal of his wasted forces even before he loved the woman. Every event of the past year, in spite of the obstacles that mortal must expect, had marched with his ambitions and desires, and straight toward a future that would have given him the most coveted of all destinies, a station in history. There had not been a hint that his brain, so meaningly and consummately equipped, would perish in the ruins of his body in less than a twelvemonth from that fragrant morning when he had entered the home of Concha Arguello tingling with a pagan joy in mere existence, a sudden rush of desire for the keen, wild happiness of youth--

His eyes wandered from the bright cross above the little cemetery where he was to lie, and contracted with an expression of wonder. Where had Jon found Castilian roses in this barren land? No man had ever been more blest in a servant, but could even he--here-- With the last triumph of will over matter he raised his head, his keen, searching gaze noting every detail of the room, bare and unlovely save for its altar and ikons, its kneeling priests and nuns. His eyes expanded, his nostrils quivered. As he sank down in the embrace of that final delusion, his unconquerably sanguine spirit flared high before a vision of eternal and unthinkable happiness.

So died Rezanov; and with him the hope of Russians and the hindrance of Americans in the west; and the mortal happiness and earthly dross of the saintliest of California's women.

Note: I have made the following changes to the text:

PAGE LINE ORIGINAL CHANGED TO

ii 13 unforgetable unforgettable ii 26 vizu- visu- vi 29 Krasnioarsk Krasnoiarsk 14 22 Arguella Arguello 15 28 Anna Ana 15 28 Gertrudes Gertrudis 16 6 Ignacia Ignacio 18 17 Dios de mi alma! Dios de mi alma!* 20 11 Madre de Dios!" Madre de Dios!"* 23 3 Ay yi! Ay yi!* 23 4 Dios, Dios,* 23 20 Propietario Proprietario 23 23 plebian plebeian 23 26 Madre de Dios! Madre de Dios!* 25 18 Dios mio! Dios mio! 25 19 mio!" mio!"* 33 17 embarassing embarrassing 33 24 Nadesha Nadeshda 40 10 commercal commercial 40 13 momentuous momentous 43 28 disintergrating disintegrating 51 5 He lover Her lover 55 4 Morga Moraga 71 22 Rafella Rafaella 72 3 straights straits 75 9 "You "Your 94 16 inexhautible inexhaustible 103 2 embarassed embarrassed 105 3 preciptate precipitate 106 28 Bueno Buena 111 8 Madre de Dios, Madre de Dios,* 117 30 prefer, prefer. 118 20 I "I 128 10 Arillaga Arrillaga 128 18 ride of rid of 133 8 Arillaga Arrillaga 133 22 Arillaga Arrillaga 135 10 Are "Are 137 28 Arrilaga Arrillaga 137 29 Nakasaki Nagasaki 146 21 refuse--' refuse--" 155 24 dumfounded dumbfounded 169 29 Moragas Moraga 171 7 twice--' twice--" 177 14 said said he said 178 16 phasis." phasis. 178 26 modoties modities 195 17 civilized that civilized than 200 27 gente de gente de* 201 1 razon razon* 201 21 silk silks 204 29 Duena duena 209 2 beneficient beneficent 211 13 Ay yi! Ay yi!* 211 14 yi! yi!* 212 22 Ay yi! Ay yi!* 213 3 ay yi! ay yi!*

I have also omitted the accents over proper names such as Rezanov, Baranhov, and Jose, and have omitted the umlaut over the u in Arguello.

* indicates that the italics were NOT used as emphasis, but merely as indicators of SOME of the non-English words, and were eventually stripped of their italicism for easier reading.

The first words of each chapter were also capitalized on paper, as least most of them. These have also been uncapitalized.