Sleep was fitful that night for all three of the siblings. Where normally the soft patter of rain on the roof would lull them to sleep, this rain was not the welcome moisture they looked forward to every spring, making everything green and forcing the long-dormant flowers to bloom. This rain was disturbing, filling the San Gabriel River and threatening all the homes that were nestled in the valley, including their own.
About four a.m., when the horses started nickering from the corral, Enrique got up to see what was bothering them.
It was pitch black out when he opened the kitchen door. He could hear the rain on the porch roof but he couldn’t see it. He put on his hat and ducked he head, as he made his way across the water-soaked earth. The house was on a small rise, so it wasn’t until he got closer to the corral that the ground transitioned from mud to water. Now he knew why the horses were worked up. The closer he got to the corral, the deeper the water became. When he reached the corral fence, he was standing in ankle-high water, and he could hear the horses splashing nervously on the other side. He knew what he had to do.
Instead of going into the corral, he headed for the barn, where he found the horses’ halters and lead ropes he and his siblings would need to bring them back to the barn to get them saddled up. It was time to leave Rancho Arroyo.
As he made his way back up to the house, the rain washed away the tears that fell from his eyes.
“Pilar! Santiago! Come quick!” he yelled up the stairs.
Pilar was already dressed, having given up on getting any more sleep an hour ago. She was braiding her hair in one thick plat as she stepped out of her room. Santiago came out of his bedroom still in his nightclothes.
They both ran to the top of the steps.
“What’s the matter?” Pilar asked.
“We’ve got to go. The river has already reached the ranch. The barns and corral are filled with water.”
Pilar and Santiago looked at each other. It took them a moment but they both turned and went back to their rooms and started to pack. Enrique followed suit.
Pilar threw open her clothes closet and stared. Then she fell on her knees and began to cry.
“I’m not ready for this,” she said to herself. “This is my home. This is my family’s home.” She hit the floor with her fist. “This is not fair!” she yelled. “This is not fair!”
Santiago ran into the room. When he saw his sister on the floor, tears streaming down her cheeks, he ran to her and pulled her into his arms. Enrique was next into the room. He went to their side and put his arms around them both. It took a moment for them to let go of each other.
Santiago was the first to speak. “You’re right, Pilar, it’s not fair. Our family has been forced off land that we have been working for generations. But we are not alone. We have family who are all waiting for us. That is what’s important – family, the people we love and who love us.”
Pilar wiped the tears from her cheeks and nodded her head.
“It’s just hard,” she said, tearing up again.
Enrique grabbed her arm. “It is, sis, but you’re strong. You can handle this. Santiago is right, our families are the thing that is important here. As long as we are all safe, we will manage. As long as we stick together. But we need to move, quickly.”
Pilar nodded again. Santiago pulled a case from on top of Pilar’s clothes closet and set it on the bed.
“You okay, sis?” Enrique asked.
“Yes, go, go,” she said looking at both of them. “I’ll be fine, as long as we’re together,” she said with a smile.
Her brother’s nodded and ran from the room.
Pilar pulled a few choice clothes from the closet, then opened dresser draws and pulled out as much as she could fit in her case. She pulled a carpet bag from under her bed and filled that too. The last thing she took was the picture that sat by her bedside. It was the picture of her parents on their wedding day – a studio picture with her mother sitting in a simple wedding dress and veil, a bouquet of flowers in her hand and Roberto standing right behind her in a fine suit, his hand resting on her shoulder. The picture was black and white, but Pilar knew her father’s suit was velvet and a deep burgundy color. Elizabeth had told her the story of their meeting a hundred times. He had worn that same suit to a barn raising dance outside of San Antonio where he was visiting, looking to buy horses, and had swept Elizabeth off her feet. The thought made Pilar smile, before she wrapped the precious memory in a scarf and buried it safely inside the carpet bag before she closed it.
She picked up her cases and ran down the stairs.
In the kitchen her brothers had both put one case just inside the kitchen door. She assumed they were outside already. She put the remaining biscuits from last night’s dinner in a dishtowel and put that into her carpet bag, then put on a wool poncho and a large-brimmed hat before she stepped out the door.
The rain had not stopped but it wasn’t coming down in sheets as it had the night before. But the wind had picked up so was now coming at her sideways, so she had to drop the brim of her hat and squint as she made her way to the corral. The sun was up but it was hidden behind storm clouds so everything was a dull gray, except the dark clouds overhead. The horses’ whinnying made he pick up her speed as she waded in water that now came up to just above her ankles.
“Dear God, help us,” she said to herself, sloshing through the muddy water.
Enrique and Santiago had the halters around three of the four horses, so she grabbed the halter and rope hanging on the corral gate and headed for King, her favorite riding horse, who was running rings around her brothers as they made their way to the gate.
Enrique gave his lead rope to Santiago and helped Pilar corner King in the three-sided shed. He reared up, pawing at the air before he dropped down to let Pilar take hold of his mane.
“It’s okay, boy. I’m here. I’m here,” she said soothingly into his ear. “I’ve got you.”
Enrique threw the halter on his head and tied it in place.
“I’ve got to help Santiago,” he yelled over the pelting rain as it drummed on the roof of the shed.
“I’ve got him,” Pilar said, attaching the lead to the halter.
Enrique ran and got hold of his own horse, and they all made their way slowly out of the corral and over to the barn, the horses dancing nervously in the raising water, their coats and manes slick with rain.
The horses settled a bit once inside the barn, but the barn floor was also covered in water. They all tied up the horses and Pilar and Enrique worked quickly to saddle up King and Enrique’s horse, Mesa.
The horses Santiago was leading would be hooked up to the wagon, so he tied them to a barn post and slogged over to where the wagon was resting.
“I’ll saddle up Mesa,” Pilar said the Enrique. “You help Santiago with the wagon.”
The two men pulled the wagon into the center of the barn with some difficulty since the floor of the barn was now mud. They threw in bales of hay and bags of oats for the horses for the long journey north. Then they covered it all in a canvas tarp and strapped it down to keep it from flying off in the wind.
Pilar brought the two remaining horses and started hitching them to the wagon. It wasn’t easy because the water made it harder for the horse to concentrate on her commands. Pilar kept talking to them, trying to sooth them with her voice.
“Good girl. That’s right, back up. We’ll be out of here soon, I promise. Good girl, just a little more.”
Her brothers were finally at her side, latching the final straps in place.
Santiago jumped up on the wagon’s seat, as Enrique lead the pair out of the barn door.
Pilar took hold of King’s reins, then Mesa’s and followed them out. She led them to the house, where the water was now lapping against the porch floorboards. Enrique held the wagon horses while Santiago threw their cases into the back of the wagon and covered it all back up with the tarp.
He jumped back into the wagon and Enrique came back to Pilar and took Mesa’s reins from her.
Pilar and Enrique mounted their horses and rode up in front of the wagon, slowly leading the horses that pulled the wagon down into the now mid-calf-deep water, their heads bend down against the rain that pelted their faces. The horse too, had their heads down against the wind and rain. They had to travel a good five slow miles before they pulled out of the standing water. They had ridden another four miles when the last of the rain drops fell and they could get off their horses and have something to eat.
They were now on perched on the edge of the valley. They could not see their ranch but they could see the large El Alto Grande dam in the distance and the water that now covered where cornfields and pastureland once stood. Close to the dam, trees that had once lined the San Gabriel could only be seen by their crowns, just poking up out of the deepening water. In a few days’ time they would be completely submerged.
The siblings stood side by side surveying the surreal scene, all three lost in their own thoughts.
Pilar eventually walked back to the wagon and took the biscuits out of her carpet bag. She brought them back to her brothers, and they all ate in silence, looking over the valley that had once been their home, trying to memorize the hills, rocks, and trees that they all knew so well, before it would forever be erased from sight, but never from their hearts.
