Page:Stewart Edward White--The Rose Dawn.djvu/220

208 tion Company—whose business by its nature needed no advertisement!

In order successfully to carry on this enterprise and his contemplated scheme of improving Arguello, Boyd had to have a Council on which he could depend. The opposition to doing anything that cost either time or money was partly climatic, partly habitual, partly from parsimony, partly conservative. It was very real, and very strong; but it was not organized. Boyd knew how to organize and he did so. His chief source of strength was the lower wards where the most of the Mexicans lived. There dwelt an obese, polite, suave old scoundrel who belonged to one of the oldest Californian families and was connected by marriage with several of the others. Don Caesar Azevedo held a great prestige among the members of his race, because of his personality and his Falstaffian capacity for vino. On election days he was given disposal of a number of surries and a sum of "expense money." By evening he was portentously drunk, still dignified and respectable, apparently close to apoplexy, but his two wards had voted safe. It amused Boyd to watch the other four wards closely and to determine his action by the conditions of the moment. Sometimes it was quite sufficient to handle his man after election. At any rate he always had his Council.

This, it must be understood, was the development of a number of years, and carries us somewhat ahead of our story; but an appreciation of Patrick Boyd's place and power in the community is desirable to an understanding of the history of those who may interest us more. We should add that through his purchase of Colonel Peyton's bank stock, and some other blocks he picked up from time to time, he attained a position on the directorate where soon he carried a controlling advice. He gained thus a birds-eye-view of the affairs of the county. He knew who borrowed and how much; who was delinquent; who paid promptly; and he was enabled to shape policies that would influence the future of the country he had adopted. For, though Patrick Boyd made money in the ventures he undertook, the making of money was not the primary incentive of his activities. He had all the money, per se, he wanted. His basic desire was