Royal Beaudry Hears a Call

A bow-legged little man with the spurs still jingling on his heels
sauntered down one side of the old plaza. He passed a train of
fagot-laden burros in charge of two Mexican boys from Tesuque, the
sides and back of each diminished mule so packed with firewood that it
was a comical caricature of a beruffed Elizabethan dame. Into the
plaza narrow, twisted streets of adobe rambled carelessly. One of
these led to the San Miguel Mission, said to be the oldest church in
the United States.

An entire side of the square was occupied by a long, one-story adobe
structure. This was the Governor's Palace. For three hundred years it
had been the seat of turbulent and tragic history. Its solid walls had
withstood many a siege and had stifled the cries of dozens of tortured
prisoners. The mail-clad Spanish explorers Penelosa and De Salivar had
from here set out across the desert on their search for gold and glory.
In one of its rooms the last Mexican governor had dictated his defiance
to General Kearny just before the Stars and Stripes fluttered from its
flagpole. The Spaniard, the Indian, the Mexican, and the American in
turn had written here in action the romance of the Southwest.

The little man was of the outdoors. His soft gray creased hat, the
sun-tan on his face and neck, the direct steadiness of the blue eyes
with the fine lines at the corners, were evidence enough even if he had
not carried in the wrinkles of his corduroy suit about seven pounds of
white powdered New Mexico.

He strolled down the sidewalk in front of the Palace, the while he
chewed tobacco absent-mindedly. There was something very much on his