Carmen Navarro Chapter Two: Love and a Proposal of Marriage

"What does he have to offer you?" Don Carlos de Vargas demanded of his sister, one month later. Manolito's attentions had been persistent and in advance of his visit this day, he had asked to speak to Don Carlos alone. Knowing her brother's tendency to bombast, Carmen had prepared him for the topic she knew would be broached. "He did not inherit his father's vast rancho, did he?" Don Carlos stormed.

"A good thing for you he did not," Carmen snapped in reply. She knew of her brother's gambling debts, forgiven by Don Domingo. She had loaned her brother money on more than one occasion herself.

"As your guardian…"

"Let me make this perfectly plain, my brother. You are not my guardian. I am a woman of property and I am of age. I may marry whomever I choose. I do not need your permission, either in the eyes of the law or of the Church. And for your information, hermano mío, Manolo owns champion stallions and will one day in all likelihood inherit the Rancho Montoya. Not that this matters to me."

"But Carmenita, his reputation…"

"Is what you wish yours had been, Carlos."

Don Carlos growled. "You love this man?"

"Yes, my brother. And I desire a life with him." It will be a life of adventure, Carmen mused. Perhaps unsettled but never boring and never lacking passion, even if I grow as plump and as plain as my sister-in-law.

Don Carlos, purpled-faced, breathing hard, grunted his assent.

Good, thought Carmen. Now it will be much easier for Manolo to say what must be said. She smiled.

And so it was.


The wedding was at first to be a small affair, in the chapel of the Hacienda Montoya...but this plan appeared quickly to change. The Vargas family was too well known and the Montoya name bespoke grandeur and style. Besides, Victoria would allow no small affair, not now that her brother was finally settling down.

"Manolito, I am so happy," Victoria had gushed when she had first seen him and then again when she met his future wife. She adored Carmen from the start. How lovely it would be to have a sister-in-law whose visits to the High Chaparral rancho would alleviate the loneliness she sometimes felt. How good it would be to have another woman to talk to. And how fine it was that Manolito would no longer carouse but would become the gentleman she knew he could be. Or so she hoped.

Their meeting had occurred as soon as possible. Victoria had flown to the Rancho Montoya in haste, just after her brother had written them from Sonora of the engagement.

"Mano, gettin' married?" Buck Cannon's eyebrows lifted in disbelief when Victoria told him during dinner at the High Chaparral the day Manolito's letter had arrived. She knew the news would come as a surprise to her husband's brother.

"Yes, she is of an old family and he met her in Mexico City with Tío Domingo," Victoria explained.

"Well, I'll be."

"Yup," John Cannon grinned. "'Bout time one of you settled down."

"I'll jes be. Where you think they gonna live?"

"Well, they will have homes everywhere," Victoria exclaimed. "Here, at the High Chaparral!" John frowned. "And at your rancho, Buck." She paused. The C-Bar-M was much too small and crude...she did not say this, but continued, rapid-fire, "And at the Rancho Montoya. Carmen Navarro even possesses a ranch of her own, from her first marriage."

"You mean?"

"Yes, John, she is a widow."

"A wealthy widow, I figger," Buck laughed. Victoria's eyes flashed.

"Buck, you know Manolito has never cared about money. This is why my uncle, not my brother, controls our father's ranch!"

"Jes calm down, Victoria. I know'd it. But it's jes like Mano to get hisself a lady with money an' looks. I'm shore she ain't ugly. Does she have any chillun?"

"No, she was married quite young and her husband died young as well. He was in the army. She has lived with her brother's family. I have heard of her, and only good things. Besides, Buck, you know what Tío Domingo has informed Manolito. He will inherit Rancho Montoya one day!" As he should, Victoria thought but did not say.

"Yup. As he should," John added, voicing what Victoria had only thought. She smiled at her husband with grateful eyes.

"John, it may be that they will want to stay with us for extended periods."

Of course they will, John thought, knowing his life was about to change as well. "And they will always be welcome, Victoria," he assured her. "Besides, I can't afford to lose Mano. If nothing else, I need him to deal with your uncle!"

"Boy, that's for dang shore," Buck added between large bites of roast beef.

They all laughed at this, but they knew that Manolito had become a de facto diplomatic liaison between the two ranches. He seemed to be able to persuade Don Domingo to comply with John Cannon's ideas most of the time...and to smooth the waters with John when this was not possible. And John had learned, over the years, to listen to his brother-in-law more often than not.

The wedding was to be within two months, the date yet to be confirmed. Victoria had begun packing for Sonora that afternoon. Buck and she would go to the Rancho Montoya until the marriage. John would send the hands Reno, Pedro, and Joe along, with instructions to return to Arizona once Victoria had arrived safely at her uncle's. John, as usual, was too busy to leave the ranch.

"Victoria, I will be down for the wedding. I cannot leave twice in one season."

"But John!"

"I am sorry, dear. I will see you next month or whenever they set the date. Let me know the plans."

John begrudged losing Buck for that length of time, but this was family, after all. He, his foreman Sam Butler, and a few of the boys would come down for the wedding. He had no desire to be anywhere near the prenuptial festivities. And so he kissed his wife goodbye the following morning and watched the buckboard and horsemen till they were out of sight. Then he turned to a month or more of work and eating with the fellas in the bunkhouse. He was going to miss his wife.

None can copyright the characters of "The High Chaparral," for that has been done, but the authors do claim the creation of others, especially Carmen Navarro (whose first name comes from a David Dortort script proposal), Rancho Navarro, the entire Vargas and Santos clans, Valencio Ruiz, Teresa Lauder, and Delgado, whose appearance, we trust, may remind our readers of an older Henry Darrow.