As a child, a young girl with coltish legs and dusky skin, I
spent many anxious hours prowling the low desert and the
craggy foothills of southeastern Arizona's Huachuca
Mountains— anxious hours not just because I was trespassing
on the forbidden Cristo Rey land grant but also because I
was searching among the rocks and cactus-stubbled dunes for
the Ghost Lady, hoping and praying I could get a glimpse of
her and at the same time scared to death that I really would.
Some say she haunted that area of Cristo Rey because she
was a tormented wraith looking for the lover denied her in
life. And others say she rode the area, its barren deserts
and rock-clad mountains and lush, grassy valleys, because
her soul was condemned to wander Cristo Rey until the fifty
thousand acres—and the Stronghold—were at last returned to
her heirs.
Of course, I preferred to believe the latter . . .
perhaps because at that young age my childish mind could not
conceive of a love so great that it would transcend time and
space. I had yet to taste of love’s binding passion. But in
all likelihood I chose to believe that version of the tale
because even then I knew, like my Ghost Lady, my soul would
know no peace until I possessed what rightfully belonged to
me . . . Cristo Rey.
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