"A romance that may well take a place with such world-famed love stories as those of Abèlard and Hèloïse; and Alexandre and Thäis. I should like to make a pilgrimage to her grave," he added as we left the old adobe house.
"You can," I replied. "It's tucked away in a corner of the Benicia Cemetery, marked by a marble slab carved with her name and a simple cross."
We entered a grove of eucalyptus trees, which now and again divided, giving marvelous views of the bay and the Marin shore.
But my companion's mind still dwelt on the story he had heard. "So Concepcion suffered in the uncertainty of hope and despair for ten years," he said, "but ten months of it brought me to the limit of endurance. Do you think if Rezánov had returned and Concepcion had married him and gone to Petrograd she would have been happy?"
"Still Petrograd is a cold, dreary place compared to California."
"But what difference would that make? A woman would give up everything and count it no sacrifice for the man she loved."
"Oh, but that was different," I assured him, my cheeks burning under his gaze. "Rezánov loved California. He thought it so wonderful that he wanted it for a Russian province, and he would have brought Concepcion back to visit--"
"Boston is nearer than Petrograd and not so cold. Don't you think you could teach me to love California, too?"
"Perhaps," I acknowledged. Then anxious to turn the conversation, I asked: "Would you like to see the location of the old Spanish fort?" He nodded and we took the road leading to the present Fort Point. "I can't show you the exact location," I confessed, "because the United States cut down the bold promontory, Cantil Blanco, in order to place the present fortification close to the water's edge, but if you will use your imagination and picture a white cliff towering a hundred feet above the water at the point where Fort Winfield Scott now stands, you will see the entrance to the bay as it was in Spanish days. Here was located the old fort, called Castilla San Joaquin, which guarded the harbor for many years. Made of adobe in the shape of a horseshoe, so perishable that the walls crumbled every time a shot was fired, still it answered its purpose, as it was never needed for anything but friendly salutes, and even these were at times, perforce, omitted. The Russian, Kotzebue, states that when he entered the harbor he was impressed by the old fort and the soldiers drawn up in military array, but wondered that no return was made to his salute. A little later, however, the omission of the courtesy was explained when a Spanish officer boarded the vessel and asked to borrow sufficient powder for this purpose. Moreover, Robinson tells us that frequently during the afternoon's siesta a foreign ship would pass the fort, drop anchor in Yerba Buena Cove, and spend several days in the bay before the Presidio officers would know of its presence. But this was after the time of Luis Argüello."
