burning world that the sea had rushed upon and extinguished in some long-distant age. Even with their austerity chastened in the moonlight, there was no invitation to man in the face they presented.
Yet Roberto knew that their sides were covered with low-growing shrubs, with sweet-scented plants, with sage and holly and honey-bearing flowers, which left a man's clothing perfumed by their touch when he threaded the tangle of their barring limbs. Green things grew there which sheep and cattle fattened on; the sage-bloom called the bees to gather such honey as never gladdened man's tongue in any other land. There was a great beneficence, a gentle kindness, even in the forbidding hills.
To the east Roberto could not see far, the vision hemmed by trees, but there he knew the valley came down to a point, like a river flowing between the hills. To the west it broadened for miles, closing again before coming quite to the sea. In that direction the road turned from San Fernando Mission, threading to Santa Barbara and, in its weary course, to Monterey.
It was clear in the valley this night, not a curl of mist drifted along the hills, a sweet languor in its placidity that embraced a man and made him glad. He could dissemble, he could put pride aside, stoop to soft words to beguile a foolish girl's ear, for the blessings of that place. This knowledge that he had teeth to bite made a man wiser, fortified his courage like a pistol in the belt.
