But their legs were young and their brains eager; in
little over an hour they were in sight of the Mission.
It looked very white and ghostly in the pale blaze of the moon, a huge
mass, full of prayer and discontent. Close beside it, but without the
walls, the Indians slept in the rancheria, quiescent enough, for they
had no Anastacio. At midnight the great bells in the tower had rung out,
filling the valley with their sweet silver clamour; but as the boys
approached and skirted the wall, some distance to the right, the Mission
might have been as lifeless as it is this year, in its desertion and
decay.
The hills were a mile behind. The Mission, like all of its kind, stood
on a broad open, that no hostile tribe might approach unseen. Cows and
horses lay in their first heavy sleep, their breathing hardly ruffling
the profound stillness. So great an air of repose did the silent walls
and sleeping beasts give to the landscape that the boys felt the quiet
of the night as they had not done in the other valley, and drew closer
together, almost holding their breath lest the priests might hear it. A
quarter of an hour later they were among the hills and standing before
the aperture whose secrets were known only to Padre Osuna.
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