THE LADY IN BLACK

Don Ramos was a handsome young Spanish rancher. He was also rich, owning great hers of cattle which roamed over the flat coastal plains northwest of where the city of Corpus Christi now stands. When he built a fine hacienda, the eligible girls from nearby ranches had hopes that he was ready to marry and settle down. One in particular had yearned after Don Ramos for sometime. She now waited expectantly for him to call on her father and ask for her hand.

She waited in vain. When Don Ramos returned from a trip to Mexico, he brought with him a beautiful bride named Leonora. They settled into the lovely ranch house and were happy.

They had been married for only a few months when business matters called Don Ramos away to Spain. In the 1700s, that was a long and dangerous trip. Sadly, he took leave of his young wife, knowing she would be safe in the care of her devoted duena.

Don Ramos was gone for many months. When he returned, Leonora told him joyfully that they were going to have a child. He was delighted, and for a few days, the reunion with his wife was a time of great joy. His happiness soon turned to dismay and then to dark fury when rumors reached his ears that Leonora had been unfaithful while he was away. The child was not his, they said. The rumors were supposedly started by the disappointed girl who had wanted to be his wife.

Leonora wept and begged him to believe that she loved only him and would never be untrue. Her pleas fell on deaf ears. Don Ramos' pride was devastated.

"Dress her in black," he ordered the sobbing duena. Then he stormed out to the quarters of his vaqueros. "You will escort Dona Leonora one day northward," he told them. "At dusk, find a tall tree and hang her!"

Perhaps the cowboys were horrified and perhaps not. In those days, a man was the king of his household, and his orders were obeyed without question. Further, they had never seen their padron so angry.

Once Leonora realized she was doomed, it was as though she turned to ice. "I am innocent," she told the riders. "I will never let any of you forget this thing you do."

She has kept her vow. On the lonely roads around Alice, Ben Bolt, and Falfurrias, persons have told of seeing a tall, slender figure in black by the side of the road. Those who stop to see if the lady needs help find no one there. Since there are no trees or underbrush in many spots where the lady has been seen, the claim is made that she simply disappears.

Old-timers from this area have been told Leonora's sad story since they were children. They know who the Lady in Black beside the road is. It is the spirit of a broken-hearted young wife keeping her promise: "I will never let you forget."