Prelude
He was feeling... restless. California spring. All the new beginnings. As his palomino gelding, Apache, cantered towards the pueblo of Los Angeles, Diego de la Vega breathed in the sweet, soft air and wondered what lay ahead. Oh, he knew what immediately lay ahead: finding his father in town, alerting him that Diego would have to leave for a few days, returning to Rancho de la Vega to disappear into the back passages of the house, and emerging as darkness fell for a mission as El Zorro. Yes, he knew that.
The horse’s gait rocked beneath him. He tried to sort out the day, and why he felt so strange.
He felt... rested. He had gotten a rare full night’s sleep the night before. Perhaps that was the source of the restlessness -- for once he was not tired. The morning had been uncharacteristically quiet. Nearly everyone involved in the household life was gone on various errands, thus Diego had spent his morning hours alone, first in the hacienda courtyard with his coffee and later in the stable checking his horses.
It was then that his mute manservant, Bernardo, arrived with news from the pueblo: three innocent men were jailed in the presidio in Santa Barbara, accused of a theft almost certainly engineered by a new outlaw in Southern California, known locally as "Diablo."
Bernardo had made the sign of the "Z" questioningly after his gestured tale to his master, and as he had a hundred times before, Diego nodded, adding, "tonight." They agreed to ride together after nightfall.
Now, as he rode to the east from their rancho to find his father, Diego was at ease and at the same time feeling agitated. Going to Santa Barbara would be a welcome change, even if it were for a relatively easy purpose. He did not expect major resistance there. Zorro’s appearances in Santa Barbara were so rare that when he did show up there was a tendency for the waters to part. Even the lancers there practically removed their hats and saluted when El Zorro bounded into view. It helped that the commandante of the presidio was a particular fan of Zorro’s, thanks to a good deed the Fox had performed the year prior when he saved the commandante’s wife from a wildcat. Thus the commandante discouraged his men from taking the 2,000 peso price on El Zorro’s head too seriously.
Diego shook his head and laughed to himself. It was starting to get ridiculous. Was it time to give it up? Was that where this restlessness he couldn’t shake was coming from? Life was becoming laced with predictability, despite his frequent escapades and good deeds as El Zorro. The secret of his dual identity was intact. Only Bernardo and his father knew. It seemed miraculous that the secret had held for four years despite numerous close calls, a few right guesses that had been laughed away, more danger than he could catalogue, and one reckless liaison that easily might have cost him not only his secret identity, but also his dignity and his bachelorhood. Was this the moment to stop? To quit while he was ahead?
He did not allow himself much reflection on this sort of thing. The truth was that most of the time such contemplation didn’t much interest him. He preferred to be in motion with something. Zorro’s work was not finished, he knew. This outlaw Diablo smelled like trouble. The hold of the Spanish empire on California was increasingly feeble, even as the Mexicans increased their pressure to make California a territory of their own. The dons with land grants in Alta California were deeply wary. Many were behaving badly out of panic to protect their holdings. It was not a safe or an easy time. If things were becoming oddly predictable in his double life, Diego knew none-the-less that a great deal of fear and uncertainty characterized the society.
He shook his head and laughed again, this time rather ruefully, to himself. When he created Zorro four years earlier, he hardly foresaw the day when his alter ego would represent, of all things, a symbol of justice and stability in a fragile world. But then, he thought to himself, who could have foreseen any of this? Every day might offer up a new world.
He took another deep breath of the spring air, and looked about as he approached the pueblo walls. It was Eden, this place where the mountains and desert and sea all met, where the sunshine ravished the landscape in a daily sweet embrace...
And then he laughed yet again, finding his inner poetics replaced by the sight of the rotund Sergeant Garcia, Los Angeles’s acting commandante, strolling into the town square. Time enough for wondering.
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