Excerpt from Cuentos De CaliforniaAnuela gonzalez stood in her doorway, and looked out over the water. All she could see was the empty bay and the hills beyond, but it was where the ships came in from the sea, and Manuela Gonzales looked over the water with silent eyes. The sea had sung her son from her, and had never given him back. She had watched and waited, but he never came. Every evening at sunset she stood in her doorway and looked over the water, her eyes staring with changing hope and fear. With the last light of the sun, a day of waiting for Manuela was done, with the first gray of dawn, another began. 'weeks and months went by. Moons came and melted, and years went with them, but no ship came in from the sea with the son of Man uela. New stars shone over Monterey, and new roses clung to the adobe walls, leaves dropped from the pear trees, and came back again, but the house of Manuela was empty. Manuela Gonzales stood in her doorway and looked out over the water. The sun was below the pine trees on the Sierra. A red light spread upon thebay and upon the hills beyond. The air blew in from the sea, into the face of Manuela, and past her into the house. There was no sound in the earth nor in the sky but of the falling of the sea upon the sand. The mystery of the dying day filled the air. The oak trees stood silent upon the mesa. The red-tiled roofs gave back to the sky its fainting glow. Shadows limned themselves in the canyons in the hills. The things of the day faded before the coming dark. But there was no sight for the eyes of Manuela but the water upon which a ship might sail in from the sea.The days of her waiting with their aching and their loneliness cried out in her heart. They were with herc always, and at sunset a new day with them. Her life and her hope had been for her children. She had given her prayers and her watchings for them, through the days and the nights of their young lives. She had walked after them in death, till all were gone but Mateo, and he was out in the sea, in a world she knew nothing of. Her home was empty. There was no one to come to her in the morning, no one to be with her through the long day.About the PublisherForgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.comThis book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully, any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.