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-*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 52289 ***
-
-A VENDETTA OF THE HILLS
-
-By Willis George Emerson
-
-Author of “The Treasure of Hidden Valley,” “Buell Hampton,” “The
-Builders,” etc.
-
-Illustrated by A. Hutchins
-
-Boston: The Chappie Publishing Company, Ltd.
-
-1917
-
-
-
-TO MY WIFE BONNIE O’NEAL EMERSON
-
-
-Our enchanting years of pleasure, dear, are speeding all too fast,
-
-As our ever-fleeting joys become blest mem’ries of the past.
-
-Heaven’s blessings, glad and golden, strew with bliss the paths of life
-
-When a sweetheart, fond and cheery,
-
-Has her “hubby” for her dearie,
-
-And her “hubby” has a sweetheart for his wife.
-
-—The Author.
-
-January 18, 1917.
-
-
-
-
-
-CONTENTS
-
-CHAPTER I—Guadalupe
-
-CHAPTER II—Charmed Lives
-
-CHAPTER III—Feminine Attractions
-
-CHAPTER IV—Back to the Soil
-
-CHAPTER V—At La Siesta
-
-CHAPTER VI—The Quarrel
-
-CHAPTER VII—Old Bandit Days
-
-CHAPTER VIII—A Letter from San Quentin
-
-CHAPTER IX—Tia Teresa
-
-CHAPTER X—The Home of the Recluse
-
-CHAPTER XI—A Rejected Suitor
-
-CHAPTER XII—The Sped Bullet
-
-CHAPTER XIII—Accused
-
-CHAPTER XIV—Entanglements
-
-CHAPTER XV—Behind the Bars
-
-CHAPTER XVI—Pierre Luzon Returns
-
-CHAPTER XVII—The Bitter Bit
-
-CHAPTER XVIII—Elusive Riches
-
-CHAPTER XIX—The Jail Delivery
-
-CHAPTER XX—In the Cavern
-
-CHAPTER XXI—A Debt of Honor
-
-CHAPTER XXII—Underqround Wonders
-
-CHAPTER XXIII—The Unexpected Visitor
-
-CHAPTER XXIV—In a Tight Corner
-
-CHAPTER XXV—Love and Revenge
-
-CHAPTER XXVI—A Date is Fixed
-
-CHAPTER XXVII—Among the Old Oaks
-
-CHAPTER XXVIII—The Prize Winner
-
-CHAPTER XXIX—-The Rendezvous
-
-CHAPTER XXX—Don Manuel Appears
-
-CHAPTER XXXI—Shadows of the Past
-
-CHAPTER XXXII—Forebodings
-
-CHAPTER XXXIII—Old Friends
-
-CHAPTER XXXIV—Heart Searchings
-
-CHAPTER XXXV—At Comanche Point
-
-CHAPTER XXXVI—-Outwitted
-
-CHAPTER XXXVII—The Dawn of Comprehension
-
-CHAPTER XXXVIII—Exit Leach Sharkey
-
-CHAPTER XXXIX—The Fight on the Cliff
-
-CHAPTER XL—Revelation
-
-CHAPTER XLI—Beneath the Precipice
-
-CHAPTER XLII—Wedding Bells
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER I—Guadalupe
-
-IT was a June morning in mid-California. The sun was just rising over
-the rim of the horizon, dissipating the purple haze of dawn and bathing
-in golden sunshine a great valley spread out like a parchment scroll. It
-was a rural scene of magnificent grandeur—encircling mountains, rolling
-foothills, and then the vast expanse of plain dotted here and there with
-clumps of trees and clothed with luxuriant grasses.
-
-Thousands of cattle were bestirring themselves from their slumbers—some
-sniffing the air and bellowing lowly, others paving the earth in an
-indifferent way, and all moving slowly toward one or other of the
-mountain streams that wound serpent-like through the valley, as if they
-deemed it proper to begin the day with a morning libation.
-
-To the south, commanding a narrow pass that pierced the Tehachapi
-mountain range, stood old Fort Tejon, dismantled now and partly in
-ruins, picturesque if no longer formidable—a romantic relic of old
-frontier fighting days. In the foreground of the crumbling adobe walls,
-sheltered under giant oaks, was a trading store and postoffice combined.
-
-Within this building half a dozen men were in earnest conversation,
-swapping yarns even at that early hour. Perhaps they, too, like the
-cattle, had felt the call for their “morning’s morning.”
-
-A young army officer, Lieutenant Chester Munson, was telling of a rough
-experience he had had a few days before with a mountain lion in one of
-the near-by rugged canyons.
-
-The story was interrupted by a sound of galloping hoofs.
-
-“Here’s Dick Willoughby,” someone announced.
-
-The rider brought his mustang to a panting stop, threw the bridle rein
-over its head, and, leaping lightly from his saddle, entered the store.
-
-Dick Willoughby was a tall, athletic, square-jawed, grey-eyed young
-fellow who looked determinedly purposeful. He was originally an
-architect from New York City, but during the last five years had become
-an adopted son of the West—had made the sacrifice, or rather gone
-through the improving metamorphosis, of assimilation.
-
-“Good morning, Ches, old boy,” he shouted to the lieutenant.
-
-The latter returned the salutation with a friendly nod.
-
-“The camp was lonely without you last night, Dick,” he said. “Who is the
-fair senorita that keeps you away?”
-
-“That’s all right,” replied Willoughby, smiling. “I will tell you
-later.” Then after a genial allround greeting for the others present, he
-eagerly exclaimed: “Boys, she is coming.”
-
-“What! Guadalupe?” shouted everyone in chorus of surprise.
-
-“Yes, Guadalupe is headed this way. I spied her on the mountain trail
-an hour ago, and thanks to my field glasses, was able to determine the
-moving speck was none other than the old squaw herself. She is just
-beyond yon clump of trees and will be here shortly.”
-
-“I am wonderin’ if she’s got her apron filled again with them there gold
-nuggets,” remarked Tom Baker inquiringly, while a smile flitted over
-his grey-bearded countenance. “That squaw is a regular free-gold placer
-proposition.”
-
-“She would have been held up before now in the old days, eh, sheriff?”
-laughed one of the cowboys. Tom Baker had been sheriff for a long term
-of years in early times, and, although no longer in office, the title
-had still clung to him.
-
-“By gad!” exclaimed Jack Rover, another cowboy, and a gentlemanly young
-fellow in manner and appearance. “She’s not going to get back to her
-hiding-place this time, nor to that will-o’-the-wisp placer gold mine of
-hers unless she shows me.”
-
-“That will do for you,” said Dick Willoughby with an admonishing look.
-“Don’t you forget that Guadalupe, although an old Indian squaw, is also
-a human being. There is going to be no violence if I can prevent it.”
-
-“Well,” laughed Jack, pushing his hat back as if to acknowledge that he
-had been checkmated, “you’re my boss on the cattle ranch, and I’ll have
-to take your tip, I guess.”
-
-“I say, Dick,” asked the other cowboy, “did you see anything of the
-white wolf?”
-
-“Do you mean the real wolf?” interjected Jack Rover, “or the bandit, Don
-Manuel?”
-
-Willoughby was looking along the road and took no notice.
-
-“I guess both are real,” mused Tom Baker, grimly smiling, and a general
-laugh followed.
-
-“Well, I for one will subscribe to that,” exclaimed Buck Ashley,
-storekeeper, postmaster, bartender, and all-round generalissimo of the
-trading establishment. “If Don Manuel is not a wolf in human form, and
-a bigger outlaw than Joaquin Murietta ever thought of being, why you may
-take my head for a football.”
-
-“But he’s dead, ain’t he?” asked the cowboy who had introduced the
-subject of the white wolf.
-
-“Just one thing that I want to emphasize good and plenty to you
-fellers,” said Tom Baker, “and that is—”
-
-“Here she comes!” interrupted Dick Willoughby.
-
-A hush fell over the group as the bent, aged figure of an Indian woman
-was seen approaching the store. Her features were hidden by a shawl that
-closely muffled her head and shoulders.
-
-Buck Ashley saluted Guadalupe with a “How?” The squaw answered with the
-same abrupt salutation, shuffled up to the counter and said brokenly,
-“Coffee—sugar—tea—rice.” With her left hand she had gathered up the
-lower portion of her calico apron and held it pouch fashion. She thrust
-her right hand into the pocket so formed, and bringing forth a handful
-of gold nuggets, laid them on the counter. Some were the size of peas,
-and others as large as hulled hickory nuts. Not a word was spoken by the
-onlookers, who were wild-eyed in their astonishment. Soon interest rose
-to high tension.
-
-Buck Ashley tied up a large package of sugar and pushed it toward the
-bent form of his customer; then resting his hand on the counter, he
-looked fixedly at the squaw and said, “More gold.”
-
-Again she thrust her hand into the apron pocket and brought out another
-handful of nuggets, whereupon Ashley proceeded to tie up a large
-package of coffee. This done, he repeated the request for more gold.
-Old Guadalupe added another handful of nuggets to those already on the
-counter, and Ashley tied up a package of rice.
-
-The squaw looked up at the storekeeper for a moment and then said,
-“Tea.”
-
-Buck Ashley’s laconic response was “More gold,” and immediately another
-handful of nuggets was brought forth, whereupon a fourth package was
-deposited on the counter.
-
-Old Guadalupe stowed the parcels in her apron on top of any remaining
-gold nuggets she might have brought. Then she turned and walked
-limpingly away, through the low brushwood toward a little grove of
-gnarled and twisted sycamores close to the ruined fort.
-
-When she had gone Buck Ashley observed, “No use following her—not a
-damn bit of use in the world! She’ll make camp out there under the trees
-until some time tonight, and then vanish like a shadow into the dark.”
-
-While speaking, Ashley had been gathering up the gold.
-
-“I say, Buck,” observed Dick Willoughby, winking at his friend
-Lieutenant Munson, “it is my private opinion that that bandit, the White
-Wolf, has nothing on you.”
-
-Tom Baker laughingly chimed in: “If I am any judge, and I allow as how
-I am, Buck here would make that pound-of-flesh Shylock feller look like
-thirty cents Mex.”
-
-Ashley smiled greedily, but in a satisfied way, as he said with
-unruffled calm: “Guess I’d better weigh them nuggets and see how much
-the old squaw’s groceries cost her.”
-
-“The treacherous Indian and the honest paleface,” laughed Dick
-Willoughby in a half-rebuking tone.
-
-Buck Ashley bridled up. His voice rang with deep feeling.
-
-“Boys,” he said, “you think I’m a Shylock, a robber, a devil I expect,
-and everything that’s bad. I don’t talk much about myself, but just
-so you’ll not think too blamed hard of me, I’ll ask you a question.
-Supposen when you was only about fifteen years old, you stood by, tied
-hand and foot, and saw a lot of redskins scalp and kill your father and
-mother and two little sisters, and then rob your dead father of over
-ten thousand dollars in gold, run off the family stock, and take you to
-their camp to burn at the stake as a sort of incidental diversion at one
-of their pow-wow dances; and supposen you performed a miracle and got
-away and took an oath to kill and rob every derned Indian you might see
-throughout the remaining days of your life—what, then, if I reformed and
-gave up the kilin’ and stuck to robbin’, would you blame me?”
-
-During this tragic recital of his wrongs the old storekeeper had become
-noticeably excited.
-
-Dick Willoughby got up from the cracker-box where he had been resting,
-and advancing with hand extended, said: “Buck, what you have told us
-presents the whole matter in a new light. Shake!”
-
-“Thanks,” replied the storekeeper as he turned away to wipe a mist from
-his eyes.
-
-Then quickly facing about, he called out in his usual gruff, hale and
-hearty manner: “Say, boys, what’ll you all have? This round is on the
-house.” They drank in silence. A fragment of Buck Ashley’s history had
-cleared away a good deal of previous misunderstanding.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER II—Charmed Lives
-
-THE spell of restraint that resulted from Buck Ashley’s story was at
-last broken by the cowboy, Jack Rover.
-
-“Look here, Dick,” he exclaimed, “I’ll give a month’s salary if you will
-let me take a chance and follow old Guadalupe. I’ve simply got to find
-out and locate that sand-bar in some mountain stream from which she
-brings in all this gold. This is the third time I’ve seen our friend
-Buck Ashley collect a grocery bill from the old squaw, and the whole
-business, gold nuggets and all, is getting on my nerves. Why, I dreamed
-about it for a week last time I saw her forking out whole handfuls of
-gold.”
-
-“Very well,” replied Willoughby, “if you want to take the chance, Jack,
-go ahead. But it is a mad project which will end in my expressing your
-remains back East or else planting you in the cemetery on the hill. It’s
-up to you to make your choice before you tackle the job. You certainly
-know what happened to four or five others who attempted to follow the
-old squaw. Each mother’s son of them was buried the next day.”
-
-“Oh, that’s ancient history,” Jack retorted.
-
-“Not such very ancient hist’ry,” remarked Tom Baker. “I myself saw young
-Bill McNab drilled through the heart with a bullet that seemed to come
-from nowhere. After that I’ll allow I wasn’t filled up with too much
-curiosity as to where Guadalupe hiked over the mountains.”
-
-“There was a regular sharp-shootin’ outfit,” concurred Buck Ashley.
-
-“And there wasn’t a sheriff in the country would have led a posse into
-that damned ambush,” Tom went on. “There wasn’t a sportin’ chance along
-that narrow ledge round which Guadalupe always disappeared. And with all
-them outlaws in the mountains!”
-
-“But the outlaws have been wiped out years ago,” persisted Jack Rover.
-
-“Mebbe,” said Tom Baker, sententiously.
-
-“You forget the White Wolf,” added Buck Ashley.
-
-“Which white wolf?” asked Jack. “I put that question before but got no
-answer.”
-
-“Both,” replied Tom. “To begin with I don’t believe that Don Manuel is
-dead at all. That was only a newspaper story. You may take it from me
-that the bandit won’t pass in his checks till he gets old Ben Thurston.
-I’m allowin’ as how Ben Thurston would quick enough give a thousand head
-of his fattest beeves just to rest easy in his mind on that score. He’ll
-find out, sure enough, some day.”
-
-“Yes, when the White Wolf finds him,” interjected the storekeeper with a
-terse emphasis.
-
-“What’s that old feud anyway?” queried Lieutenant Munson. “Tell me,
-Tom.”
-
-“Oh, it is an old story,” the sheriff answered. “I thought everybody
-knew about it, but of course you’re a newcomer. Well, you see,”
-he continued, clearing his throat and expectorating a copious and
-accurately aimed pit-tew of tobacco juice toward a knot-hole in the
-floor, “the White Wolf’s father, Don Antonio de Valencia, a reg’lar
-high-toned grandee from Spain, had settled in these here parts away
-back longer than anyone could remember. He claimed this whole stretch of
-country from horizon to horizon. Then came the Americans, among them
-a government surveyor named Thurston. He had a pull at Washington and
-managed to get a legal grant to the San Antonio property. Of course the
-old Spaniard had no real title—his was just a sort of squatter’s claim.
-But they do say as how he had lived in this here valley more than half a
-century, so it was mighty hard luck to lose the land. And the boy Manuel
-never would admit the Thurstons had any right to call it theirs.”
-
-“Don Manuel had a younger sister,” interposed Buck Ashley. “Rosetta,
-a beautiful girl—looked like a morning-glory. Gad! but she sure had a
-purty face. You remember, Tom, don’t you?”
-
-“Oh, yes,” replied Tom Baker, “it’s not likely I should forget the poor
-girl. It was ‘cause of her the quarrel became a bitter blood feud—the
-Vendetta of the Hills, as we got to calling it. You see,” he went on,
-resuming the thread of his story, “old man Thurston’s son, Ben, the
-present owner of the rancho, was in his younger days a gay Lothario
-scamp, and he came from the East to his new home in California loaded
-down with a college education and a mighty intimate knowledge of
-the ways of the world that decent folks don’t talk about, much less
-practice. He had not been here a month until he commenced makin’ love
-to little Senorita Rosetta. Before the second sheep-shearin’ time came
-around, she was—well, in a delicate condition. To save himself and,
-as he thought, cover up the disgrace—you see he was engaged to a rich
-Eastern girl of prominent family—why, the young scoundrel conceived the
-hellish plot of lurin’ little Rosetta to Comanche Point one dark night.
-And when he got her there he threw her over the cliff—at least that’s
-the way the story goes. Guess Don Manuel was about twenty-five years old
-at that time, and Ben Thurston two or three years his junior. Well,
-the disgrace killed Rosetta’s father and mother. They died of grief
-and shame soon after the affair, almost on the same day, and Don Manuel
-buried them together in the old churchyard on the hill by the side of
-his murdered sister. And it was there and then, they say, that he took
-an oath to kill Ben Thurston. That was mor’n thirty years ago and the
-feud has been on ever since, and all us old-timers know hell will be
-poppin’ ‘round here one of these days.”
-
-“But nobody ever sees the White Wolf, Don Manuel,” added Buck Ashley.
-“That’s the ex-tr’ornery part of it.”
-
-“Oh, you yourself are likely to see him one of these dark nights, Buck,”
-laughed Jack Rover, as he winked at the other boys. “A storekeeper
-that’ll work night and day stacking up money year in and year out is
-liable to have a call sooner or later from the bandit and his friends.”
-
-“Oh, hell!” was the laconic response of Buck Ashley. “Guess I sure can
-take care of myself.”
-
-“But Don Manuel may not be alive,” suggested the young lieutenant.
-
-“He’s alive right enough, make no mistake,” said Tom Baker, “although
-I’ll allow I don’t know a single soul who has actually seen him
-personally for more’n twenty years. He is a kind o’ shadowy cuss.
-Everybody knows him by his old-time deeds of high-way robbin’ and
-all-round murderin’ for golden loot. I heard of a feller last year who
-claims to have seen the White Wolf when he was makin’ that last big
-stage delivery over by Tulare Lake. He was masked, and had all the
-passengers out on the roadside with their hands thrown up over their
-heads while he was takin’ their valuables away from them.”
-
-“It’s a dead cinch,” Buck Ashley observed, “that whenever there was a
-hold-up or a robbery, or a murder in cold blood for money, why everybody
-knew that the White Wolf was again in the hills and playin’ his
-cut-throat game for pelf and plunder, or mebbe just for revenge against
-the gringos, whom he hated like hell. Sometimes he was not heard of
-in these parts for two or three years, and then he showed up more
-blood-thirsty than ever. His hand was agin every man, and it looked like
-as every man’s hand was agin him.”
-
-“I’ve been told,” said Dick Willoughby, “that when the White Wolf was a
-boy he saved the life of the old highwayman, Joaquin Murietta.”
-
-“Yes, them are facts,” replied Tom Baker. “Leastways I’ve heard say so.
-They claim that he saved Murietta’s life from a posse of deputies one
-night, and altho’ the White Wolf was only a boy at that time, yet a heap
-of people think he’s the only livin’ soul who knows the whereabouts and
-location of the secret cavern where Joaquin Murietta planted his loot,
-amountin’, they say, to millions of dollars in gold and jewels and
-valuables of all kinds. The retreat always proved a safe one for the
-murderin’ gang, and now they’re gone no one even to this day can find
-the place. It’s somewhere on San Antonio Rancho, but where? The White
-Wolf kept his secret well.”
-
-“If old Pierre Luzon ever gets out of San Quentin,” remarked the
-storekeeper, “I guess he could tell, but he’s up for life. He was nabbed
-in that same Tulare Lake affair ‘bout which Tom had been talkin’.”
-
-“Yes,” said the sheriff, “two others were shot dead before they got back
-to the mountains. The White Wolf and Pierre were ridin’ alone when the
-Frenchie’s horse stumbled. They picked him up insensible, a broken leg
-and concussion of the brain, and he was the only one of the gang who
-ever went to jail.”
-
-“God ‘lmighty,” exclaimed Buck, “old Pierre used to sit around in this
-here store day after day, smokin’ an old foreign-lookin’ pipe, and
-hardly speakin’ a word. He used to pretend he knew no English. We never
-once suspected that he was one of Don Manuel’s bunch—always thought
-of him as an old sheepherder, a bit off his nut, who had saved a few
-dollars and was takin’ things easy. And hell, all the time he was the
-White Wolf’s look-out man, makin’ note of everything and passin’ the
-word o’ warnin’ when there was talk of the sheriff gettin’ busy.”
-
-“I’ll allow Pierre Luzon fooled me proper,” concurred Tom Baker.
-“However, he got what was cornin’ to him all right, a life sentence,
-though he ought to have been hanged. Well, perhaps it is only the White
-Wolf and Pierre Luzon who now know the cave where Joaquin Murietta
-cached his treasure.”
-
-“And Guadalupe perhaps as well,” remarked Buck Ashley.
-
-“Yes, perhaps Guadalupe also,” assented the sheriff. “But the White Wolf
-keeps guard over her.”
-
-“That’s the real White Wolf this time,” laughed
-
-Dick Willoughby, with a nod toward the young lieutenant, who had been
-listening intently to the tale of weird romance.
-
-“The real White Wolf?” replied Munson, enquiringly. “You’ve got me all
-tangled up. What do you mean?”
-
-“Don’t you know how Don Manuel came by his name of the White Wolf?”
-asked the sheriff.
-
-“No, all this folk lore is new to me.”
-
-“Why, gosh all hemlock! He is named because of a darn big white wolf
-that has been seen at different times in this here country for a hundred
-years.”
-
-“Wolves don’t live so long,” protested the lieutenant incredulously.
-
-“Well, this one does,” retorted Tom, curtly. “Leastwise he’s been seen
-from time to time since ever I can remember. In the old days they named
-the White Wolf Rancho after this monster animal. It has a charmed life.
-No one can kill this big fellow, altho’ lots of shots have been fired
-at him. And the same was true of Don Manuel de Valencia. He escaped so
-often that folks believed his life a charmed one. And so they called him
-the White Wolf.”
-
-“I saw the white wolf once myself,” said Buck Ashley, “the real white
-wolf that even now, as Tom says, guards old Guadalupe and makes it best
-for young fellows like you, Jack Rover, to leave the squaw alone when
-she makes back for her hidin’ place in the mountains. I’ll never forget
-that morning, although it’s more or less twenty years ago. The great
-shaggy brute was following Guadalupe along the trail like a Newfoundland
-dog. In those days I was out on the hills roundin’ up some mavericks.
-One of the calves broke from the herd and scampered along a trail that
-led directly in front of the old squaw. And say, boys, would you believe
-it? From less than half a mile away I saw with my own eyes that monster
-devil of a white wolf—white as the driven snow—make one terrific mad
-leap and grab that yearlin’ by the neck. Guadalupe spotted me and
-disappeared, and the white wolf trotted after her round the bend,
-carryin’ the dead calf in its jaws as a cat carries a mouse.”
-
-“Did you not shoot at the wolf?” excitedly asked Lieutenant Munson.
-
-“Shoot, hell! What would have been the use? Didn’t you hear what Tom
-Baker said? White wolves have charmed lives whether they go on two legs
-or four.”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER III—Feminine Attractions
-
-TOM BAKER, the sheriff, cleared his throat. “You fellers, I’m assoomin’,
-are all boys. I have been loafin’ ‘round in this man’s land for forty
-years. I was here the day Don Manuel had been buryin’ his old father
-and mother from the little Mission Church, less than a quarter of a mile
-from where we are settin’. He was standin’ right in front of this store
-when young Ben Thurston and two of his ranch hands rode up. If ever I
-saw real bravery it was that mornin’. Don’t take much bravery to do some
-things heroic when you have your artillery handy, but it requires the
-real stuff when you’re gunless.
-
-“Young Thurston spoke to his companions and they drew their guns and
-kept them leveled at Don Manuel as their boss dismounted.
-
-“Don Manuel was one of the handsomest young fellers I ever laid my two
-eyes on. He walked straight up to Thurston, and notwithstandin’ the two
-loaded pieces of artillery was pintin’ straight at him said:
-
-“‘Ben Thurston, you are the man who killed my sister.’
-
-“‘You are a damned liar!’ retorted Thurston.
-
-“‘Yes, you killed her,’ went on Don Manuel. I found this button in her
-dead hand, and right there, by God! is where it came from. Look at your
-coat. Your life shall pay for this dastardly murder. If I had my gun
-I would settle the matter now, notwithstandin’ that today I have been
-burying my beloved father and mother.’
-
-“When young Thurston heard about there bein’ no gun, he snatched the
-tell-tale button from his accuser’s hand, swung himself into his saddle,
-laughed mockingly, and with his quirt struck Don Manuel across the face;
-then he wheeled round his pony and rode away with his bodyguards in a
-cloud of dust.
-
-“God! I will never forget it. Don Manuel stood there, as white as a
-piece of paper, and never moved for a whole minute. The quirt had drawn
-the blood from his face in one long streak. At last he turned away with
-a resolve in his eyes—one of them there terrible resolves that change
-the life of a man, and went back to the little church to finish the
-last sad rites to his people. It’s my opinion Don Manuel, from that very
-hour, turned bandit in his heart and took oath to murder all the gringos
-in California.
-
-“As I said before, that was thirty years back, and mebbe a little
-more, and I have never seen him since. But we all heard of him good and
-plenty. He certainly left a red trail.”
-
-A silence followed. Presently Buck Ashley in the way of explanation,
-said:
-
-“That tombstone on his sister’s grave was put up one night. Nobody saw
-it done, but everyone knows, of course, it was the work of Don Manuel.
-It has just one word—’Hermana’—chiseled on the cross of white marble.
-That’s the Mexican for ‘sister,’ guess you all know. So the name Rosetta
-is only remembered by old-stagers here, like Tom Baker and me. And we
-ain’t forgotten her pretty face either. Poor little girl!”
-
-“A doggoned shame,” muttered the sheriff, meditatively, his eyes cast
-down.
-
-“How about the law?” asked Lieutenant Munson. “The law!” exclaimed
-Baker, raising his eyes and flashing a look of withering contempt.
-“What kind o’ law was there in those days and in these parts? A gun
-was usually both judge and jury. Besides, with the only bit of evidence
-gone, how could Don Manuel prove anything agin a rich young feller like
-Ben Thurston?”
-
-“But if he was laying for him all the time, how is it that the White
-Wolf never got his man all through those thirty years?”
-
-“Because Ben Thurston lit out—he was too demed scared to live on the
-rancho any longer. But that’s another story.”
-
-“Let’s have it, sheriff.”
-
-“Well, it’s a longish yarn, and p’raps you fellers are about tired of
-hearing me.”
-
-No one protested; there was rather a movement of settling down in
-pleased expectancy of something worth listening to. So Tom Baker
-continued:
-
-“Ben Thurston had one warnin’, good and plenty, and he didn’t wait
-around for a second one. After Don Manuel’s threat, he seldom left his
-home, and a little later went back East again. It wasn’t till more’n a
-year that he showed up agin at the rancho. This time he brought with him
-his Eastern bride, a fine slap-dash young woman who could ride a horse
-and handle a team in good shape. But we could all see that she wasn’t
-too happy, for Ben Thurston started in to drink heavily, and she was
-ashamed of him and showed it.”
-
-“Guess it was to drown his conscience and keep from thinkin’ about
-Rosetta,” interjected Buck Ashley.
-
-“Like as not,” assented Tom. “Well, anyhow, he hadn’t been here very
-long afore Don Manuel got him—yes, got him fair and square, although he
-managed to save his neck at the last moment. There was card-playin’ and
-drinkin’ one night at the rancho—Thurston had got a bunch o’ gay young
-dogs down from San Francisco. Mrs. Thurston had left the room, and was
-sittin’ out alone in the moonlight on the verandah. Suddenly she heard
-a sound that made her sit up and listen—the clatter o’ twenty pairs
-o’ gallopin’ hoofs a-comin’ straight for the house. She must ha’ known
-something about the vendetta, for she rushed in terror to her husband
-and gave him warnin’. He escaped by a back door, and a minute later the
-place was surrounded. The shootin’ came first from some of the ranch
-hands, who had tumbled out of the bunk house and were spyin’ around
-corners. They said later that the hold-up party numbered more’n twenty,
-some of them masked with handkerchiefs tied around their faces, but
-others bold as brass and not carin’ a dang who saw ‘em. Among these last
-was Don Manuel. But Pierre Luzon was a downy duck, for no one spotted
-him, although later on we came to know that he played the principal part
-that night, next to the leader of the gang.
-
-“Well, after the shootin’-scrap became general, there was a pretty scare
-in the ranch house—one of the card-players dropped, and the others
-were hiding under tables, when Don Manuel appeared and asked for Ben
-Thurston. His wife, mighty brave, denied that he was there—he had left
-that afternoon for Visalia to buy some cattle, she boldly declared. Don
-Manuel, always the true gentleman, mark ye, was for believin’ her when
-Pierre, his face masked, came in from the verandah and in a low voice
-passed some words to his chief. Mrs. Thurston knew in a moment that her
-bluff was goin’ to be called, and, while the outlaws were confabbin’,
-darted from the room.
-
-“But Pierre was just as quick out by the verandah, and before she got to
-the door o’ the woolshed beyond the horse corral, he was there to block
-her passage. It was Pierre who had caught a glimpse of the fugitive
-sneakin’ into this outbuilding, and now he knew for certain that
-Thurston was hiding among the bags o’ wool inside. But a cornered man is
-a dangerous animal, and it might mean a good few lives if the door was
-opened and any attempt made to rush the place.
-
-“The gang was soon buzzin’ all around; the woman, now almost in
-hysterics, was hustled aside, and a few bundles of loose hay was being
-dumped into the shed through an open window. A match did the rest.
-Within three minutes the door opened and Thurston came staggerin’ out
-through thick clouds of smoke. Pierre grabbed him and had a noose around
-his neck in doublequick time.
-
-“The shootin’ was over before this, and some of the ranch hands were
-lookin’ on from a little distance, for now everyone knew that it was
-only the boss that the night-riders were after. So more’n one was able
-afterwards to tell the story—how the young wife threw herself at Don
-Manuel’s feet, and with sobs and tears pleaded for mercy. And by the
-living God she won out even after the rope, with her husband at the end
-of it, had been swung over the limb of a near-by sycamore.
-
-“The White Wolf stood stock-still for perhaps a minute, weighin’ things
-like, his arms folded across his breast. Then he raised the weepin’
-woman, and, turnin’ to Thurston, now half-dead with fear, laid hold of
-him by the shoulder and shook him as a terrier shakes a rat. Then with
-his other hand he flung the noose from around his neck. ‘Take your
-miserable life, then, this time’—that’s what Don Manuel said. ‘Take
-it, but the day will come when we shall meet again, man to man, with no
-woman’s tears to save you.’ And he pushed Thurston away contemptuously,
-topplin’ him over like a ninepin, and a minute later rode off at the
-head of his men.”
-
-The narrator paused, and there was a general murmur of repressed
-excitement.
-
-“My word, that’s a peach of a story,” exclaimed Jack Rover.
-
-“He certainly was a chivalrous fellow, this oldtime Don Manuel,”
-remarked the lieutenant.
-
-“And don’t you see,” said the sheriff, “that, when a man acted like that
-and spoke like that, his words must come true? Don’t tell me that Don
-Manuel today is dead while Ben Thurston is still alive. But he has taken
-mighty good care of himself ever since that day. He an’ his wife skipped
-East the very next morning, and I’m told they never stopped till they
-got to Europe. Nobody knows where exactly they lived during the time
-that followed, but news came through years later that the wife had died,
-somewhere in the south of England, leaving a son behind. That’s young
-Marshall who has come West with his dad now—the young man’s first visit
-and his father’s last one, I reckon, if he sells the ranch, as I’m told
-he’s trying to do.”
-
-“But I say, boys,” observed Jack Rover, “what do you suppose the White
-Wolf did with all the gold he took away from the people? It’s said that
-in one stage robbery he got over fifty thousand dollars of the yellow
-stuff.”
-
-“Hid it,” replied Buck Ashley, “with Joaquin Murietta’s hoarded gold.
-For it’s sure as sure can be that Don Manuel came to know the secret o’
-the bandits’ cave where Murietta used to store his loot. The only thing
-anybody else knows is that it is around here somewheres.”
-
-“But they do say,” observed one of the cowboys, “whatever Sheriff Baker
-may think, and you, too, Buck, that Don Manuel is sure ‘nuff dead. Most
-folks herabouts believe that the White Wolf has gone to his long restin’
-place, sort a j’ined forces with old Joaquin Murietta. The Tulare Lake
-affair was, I guess, his last raid.”
-
-“He ain’t dead,” muttered Tom, determinedly, while Buck Ashley also
-shook his head in repudiation of the cowboy’s theory.
-
-“Well, I happen to know,” observed Dick Willoughby, “that Mr. Thurston
-has run down the story of the White Wolf’s death in that Seattle saloon
-brawl pretty thoroughly, and he is of the opinion that the big-featured
-articles in the San Francisco and Los Angeles papers were correct—that
-the dead man’s identity was absolutely established.”
-
-“That’s how he’d wish it to be, at all events,” said Buck Ashley. “But
-even now, when Ben Thurston ventures to come home to the rancho, he
-brings with him a great big hulking bodyguard—Leach Sharkey, I’m told is
-the fellow’s name. That don’t look much like believin’ the White Wolf
-to be dead and the vendetta played out, does it? You can see it in his
-hang-dog face that it isn’t any real pleasure for him to be around in
-these parts. He ain’t once paid me a visit at the store. Guess he thinks
-his hide’ll last longer by stickin’ close to home. You owe your job o’
-runnin’ his cattle, Dick Willoughby, to the fact that he’s still plumb
-scared.”
-
-“Oh, well, I am in his employ,” said Dick loyally, “and I’m inclined to
-give him the benefit of the doubt as regards these ugly rumors and idle
-stories. He has always been on the square with me. But perhaps he’ll
-stick to the rancho, now he believes the White Wolf to be dead.”
-
-“He may believe it, but, as Buck says, why then the bodyguard?”
-commented the sheriff as he relighted his pipe.
-
-“Yes.” replied Dick Willoughby, “but I believe he is thinking of letting
-Leach Sharkey go. Personally I would be willing to wager that Don
-Manuel, whom no one has seen since that last raid on the stage coach, is
-dead and sleeping with his sires.”
-
-“Well, dead or alive,” exclaimed Jack Rover, “I don’t care a hang for
-the White Wolf and his-buried treasure. But what I would like to know
-is the exact location of that rippling mountain stream, the identical
-sandbar where the old squaw Guadalupe gathers up her pocket change with
-which to buy groceries. That would be a heap better than any blooming
-cave. Them’s my sentiments.”
-
-As he said this he threw some silver on the bar and invited everybody to
-lubricate.
-
-“Just nominate your poison, boys, and let’s drink to my finding old
-Guadalupe’s gold mine.”
-
-They all laughed good-naturedly, and Lieutenant Munson declared that he
-thought he would put in the balance of his furlough days prospecting.
-“You know,” he explained in an aside to the storekeeper while the latter
-was preparing the drinks, “I am only here to visit my old college pal,
-Dick Willoughby, and incidentally see the place where my father was a
-soldier in the early California days. He was stationed several years in
-Fort Tejon.”
-
-“That was before my time,” said Buck Ashley.
-
-“The soldiers had abandoned the old fort when I came first into these
-parts.”
-
-Meanwhile Dick Willoughby was clinking glasses with Jack Hover.
-
-“There are some mighty pretty little senoritas hereabouts,” said Dick,
-“good American blood mixed with Spanish blood, you know, and all that.
-If a fellow could only find the right one—understand, I say the right
-one, Jack—he wouldn’t be losing any time in chasing after the old
-squaw’s secret gold mine or the White Wolf’s buried millions.”
-
-Jack Rover laughed outright.
-
-“I say, Dick, what are you reddening up about? Gee, if I had as fine a
-lead as you have staked out, I’d feel the same way. Ain’t that right,
-Buck?” Buck Ashley winked at Jack Rover and said: “If you mean who I
-think you mean, you sure are righter than right. I speak wide open and
-unrestrained when I give it as my opinion that Miss Merle Farnsworth is
-the finest specimen of young womanhood that I ever set eyes on, and I
-have seen some girls East as well as West. Take it from me, she is a
-jewel, she is a regular beauty rose. Yes,” he went on, “and too damned
-good for that young Thurston whelp, who hangs around tryin’ to act smart
-whenever she and that old duenna chaperon of hers comes here to trade.
-I’ll simply boot him out of the store one of these days.”
-
-Dick Willoughby smiled in a satisfied way as he moved toward the door.
-
-“Well, hold on, Dick,” called out Jack Rover, “don’t be in such a
-dangnation hurry. I’ll ride with you in a minute. I’ve just got this
-to say to you, Buck Ashley, that I like you better than ever for what
-you’ve said about Marshall Thurston. Even though I’m working for the
-Thurston outfit, I’m free to express my opinion that that young feller
-is about the meanest specimen of low-down humanity I’ve ever struck.”
-
-“It’s a case of the second decadency, I suppose,” remarked Munson. “The
-worthless profligate, spawn of the rich old roué, Ben Thurston.”
-
-“Such a drunken pup,” continued Rover, “aint’ good enough for a
-half-breed Indian, much less for the likes of the young ladies of La
-Siesta. Gee, if I thought there was one chance in a thousand for me with
-either of them, why goodbye to that placer gold mine ambition that’s
-eating my vitals, or to the planted millions of the White Wolf.”
-
-As he spoke the last words, he followed Dick Willoughby into the open.
-Dick was standing by his pony.
-
-“You’re superlatively in earnest, aren’t you?” he said as he laughed
-good-naturedly at the cowboy.
-
-“You bet your life I’m in earnest,” replied Jack. “And if you don’t
-get busy with that love affair of yours, well, take it from me, you had
-better look out, for somebody will be picking the peach right from under
-your very nose. Well, so long, Dick; I’ve changed my mind; I’ll not ride
-with you. I’ll see to that bit of fence repairing up on the range. And
-who knows but I may find a sand-bar and a riffle sparkling with yellow
-gold?” He laughed like a big overgrown boy as he touched the rowel to
-his pony and galloped away across the valley.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER IV—Back to the Soil
-
-JACK ROVER is a great boy,” said Dick Willoughby to Lieutenant Munson as
-the two rode off at a leisurely pace toward the group of ranch buildings
-peeping through a clump of trees at the edge of the foothills.
-
-“A type of Western character,” replied Munson, “that in a way is quite
-new to me. And yet, do you know, I rather like this Western atmosphere.”
-
-“Like it!” exclaimed Dick. “Why, man, it is the atmosphere in which to
-live, move and have one’s being.”
-
-They both laughed at his enthusiasm.
-
-“Really,” continued Dick, soberly, “I would not live another year in New
-York City for all the property fronting on the Circle, the coming centre
-of old Gotham. Out here a man is a man for what he is worth. You grow
-bigger, you think broader thoughts, you are not confined to following
-precedents or taking orders from the man higher up.”
-
-“Oh, I know,” replied Munson, “or at least I am beginning to understand
-something of what you mean. I have only been here ten days and I am
-already feeling loath to return to my post.”
-
-“Ches,” exclaimed Dick, turning abruptly and facing his companion,
-“give it all up, old fellow, and come and live in this glorious
-country—California! There’s music in the very name. It is the land of
-sunshine, of fruits and flowers, and of pretty girls into the bargain.”
-
-“You keep telling me of the pretty girls, but when am I to see them?”
-questioned Munson. “If you have any real senoritas who will cause a
-fellow to forsake his Eastern home and send in his resignation to army
-headquarters, let me get a peep at them.”
-
-Again they both laughed, this time at the challenge in Munson’s words.
-
-“All right,” said Dick, “you shall see them. And, by the way, don’t
-you remember that this is the very day we have arranged to call on Mrs.
-Darlington at the Rancho La Siesta? It is a beautiful place, this little
-rancho, and Mrs. Darlington you will find to be a most admirable woman.
-But just wait until you see Grace Darlington.”
-
-“How about Miss Farnsworth?”
-
-“Not for you, old man,” replied the other quickly, reddening at the
-temples. “Not as long as my name is Dick Willoughby—providing, you
-understand, always providing that I shall prove successful in my
-wooing.”
-
-“Is it as bad as that, Dick?”
-
-“Well,”—his laughing tone was only a mask to deeper feelings—“I cannot
-deny that I am pretty hard hit.”
-
-“My, but you do whet my impatience,” said the lieutenant. “And I am
-about as anxious to be paying that afternoon call as I am to have my
-breakfast. I don’t know how you feel, Dick, but I’m as hungry as a lean
-coyote.” He paused a moment, then asked in a musing tone: “How far away
-is this wonderful La Siesta Rancho?”
-
-“Oh, only about twenty miles.”
-
-“Twenty miles! You speak of miles out here in the same way as we speak
-of city blocks back in New York. Surely it must be quite a farm.”
-
-“Quite a farm? I should say! You musn’t confound our Californian ranchos
-with Eastern farms, old man. Why, this rancho of San Antonio covers over
-four hundred square miles of territory.”
-
-“You astonish me.”
-
-“La Siesta Rancho adjoins the great San Antonio possession and contains
-comparatively few acres, just under three thousand. But it surely is
-a beautiful little place, fixed up like a nobleman’s park in the old
-world. And then the ladies—”
-
-“Aha, the ladies,” repeated Munson, doffing his hat in courtly fashion
-and smiling audaciously.
-
-Dick touched the flank of his pony with his spur, and for a few
-miles they rode on at a quicker pace and in silence. Soon they were
-approaching the ranch buildings. On the outer edge was a little cottage,
-covered with vines and surrounded by fruit trees, the place which Dick
-Willoughby, the cattle foreman, had called “home” for the past five
-years.
-
-After turning their horses into a corral, they passed by way of a broad
-verandah into a big room, roughly but comfortably furnished. Some logs
-were smouldering in the fireplace, and quickly started into a bright
-blaze when Dick kicked them together. The warmth was grateful, for while
-out of doors everything was now bathed in genial sunshine, here the
-morning air was still keen.
-
-A Chinaman appeared from the back quarters, and smiled expectantly.
-
-“Breakfast, Sing Ling,” called out Dick, “and just as quick as you can
-serve it.”
-
-Sing Ling departed as noiselessly as he had come.
-
-“These are certainly great quarters,” observed Munson, settling himself
-in a big Old Mission rocker and glancing around.
-
-The walls, curiously enough, were pretty well covered with pen-and-ink
-sketches and designs of buildings that might have adorned an architect’s
-office, while there was a partly completed landscape painting in oils
-standing on a rudely fashioned easel.
-
-“And you’ve certainly stuck to the old line of work, Dick,” the
-lieutenant went on.
-
-“Of course one must have something to think about when he is all alone
-in a new country,” replied Willoughby. “But most of that stuff I did
-in my first year here,” he added, following the other’s survey of the
-walls.
-
-“You still paint, however,” remarked Munson, his eyes resting on the
-unfinished canvas.
-
-“Or try to,” was the laughing response.
-
-“Oh, that’s a modest way of putting it. Do you know, old man,” Munson
-went on, “since I came here I have often thought what a marvelous change
-has been wrought in you—what a transplanting has taken place? You were
-a chronic New Yorker, except for that one year you spent in the Latin
-Quarter of gay Paree. You thought then you were going to make a great
-painter. And, by gad, I almost believe so myself,” he added, bending
-forward to make a more critical scrutiny of the work on the easel. “By
-jove, that’s really fine, Dick.”
-
-“I’m afraid that’s flattery, Chester, my boy,” responded Willoughby.
-“However, it sounds good to hear you say so. A word of appreciation
-is what all hearts hunger for. Personally I even believe in a moderate
-amount of flattery. Its psychic influence is more potent in arousing and
-causing the heart to throb with ambition than all the stimulants, drugs
-or reasoning in the world. Indeed, without a certain amount of flattery
-one becomes ambitionless, languid, and perishes; whereas the unexpected
-caress or kindly words of praise from loved ones, just or unjust, adds
-more strength to the good right arm of the breadwinner than all the beef
-in Christendom, and makes the sunshine seem brighter and earth’s every
-breeze a south wind blowing across beds of violets.”
-
-“A bit of a poet, too, I see,” smiled Munson.
-
-Willoughby made no reply. He had crossed over to the open door and was
-looking out on the valley that stretched away for miles—great oak trees
-in the foreground, with cattle-dotted pasture lands beyond. Waving his
-hand toward the vast expanse, he said:
-
-“Just look at that for a picture, and see how tame a man-made gallery is
-as compared with this great art gallery of Nature. Do you know, Ches, I
-despise New York? There was a time, when I first came here, that I felt
-I should die of ennui, yearning for the Great White Way once again. But
-I have outgrown all that. I know now, thank God, there’s nothing to it.
-Here a man can fill his lungs with pure air, and at the same time feast
-his soul all day long with beautiful things.”
-
-There followed a brief interval of silence. Munson had risen and joined
-his comrade at the door. Both were gazing over the glorious sunlit sweep
-of territory rimmed by the distant, pine-clad hills. In the heart of
-Dick Willoughby was supreme contentment, in that of Chester Munson a
-vague longing to get away from red-tape army routine and breathe the
-exhilarating and inspiring freedom of life in the open.
-
-“Blakeflast,” bleated a soft voice behind them, and turning round they
-found the suave, smiling Chinaman with hand outstretched toward the
-smoking viands upon the table. Sentiment was instantly forgotten in
-favor of lamb chops grilled to a turn, a great fluffled omelette with
-fine herbs that would have done credit to a Parisian chef, and coffee
-that was veritable nectar.
-
-At last appetite was satisfied. The lieutenant had produced his cigar
-case, Dick was filling his briar-root pipe with tobacco from the
-humidor. The latter spoke:
-
-“Say, Ches, we were talking about New York. Do you want me to give you a
-toast on that modern Babylon?”
-
-“Sure, old man, go ahead! You know I haven’t lost my interest in old
-Gotham, by any manner of means. It may the a modern Babylon. But to me
-it is none the less the greatest of American cities.”
-
-“That’s just the trouble,” said Dick, seriously. “It is too great. There
-identities are swallowed up. Individualism cannot survive. It is all one
-great composite.”
-
-“Well, let us hear the toast.”
-
-Dick raised his cup of coffee and said: “Very well, here it is; here is
-my opinion of New York:
-
-
-‘Vulgar in manners; overfed,
-
-Over-dressed and under-bred;
-
-Heartless, godless, hell’s delight,
-
-Rude by day and lewd by night.
-
-Bedwarfed the man, enlarged the brute;
-
-Ruled by boss and prostitute.
-
-Purple robed and pauper clad;
-
-Raving, rotten, money mad;
-
-A squirming herd in Mammon’s mesh;
-
-A wilderness of human flesh;
-
-Crazed by avarice, lust and rum—
-
-New York! thy name’s delirium.’.rdquo;
-
-
-“Great Heavens, old man,” exclaimed Munson, when Dick had finished, “you
-are severe, to say the least.”
-
-Willoughby laughed good-naturedly as he passed the match box to his
-friend.
-
-“Not severe, only truthful,” he said. “You see, in New York no man
-dares think for himself. Everything is controlled by a machine-appointed
-chairman, secretary and committee, and you must hear the resolutions
-read before you know the doctrine you are perforce to advocate.”
-
-Then he lit his pipe and rose from the table.
-
-“Now, I have a lot of things to attend to, old fellow,” he resumed.
-“Make yourself comfortable. Here’s a bunch of Eastern newspapers—oh, I
-read them regularly, haven’t got rid of that bad habit yet. I’ll tell
-Sing Ling to have lunch ready on the stroke of noon. Then we’ll be in
-good time to start out for the Rancho La Siesta. So long!”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER V—At La Siesta
-
-SOON after one o’clock Dick Willoughby and Chester Munson were again in
-the saddle. They galloped along the foothills for some time in silence.
-But coming to the boulder-strewn wash of a mountain stream, they had
-perforce to rein their horses to a walk. Conversation was now possible.
-
-“Dick, will you give me a job as a cowboy if I quit the army?” asked
-Munson abruptly.
-
-“Surest thing you know,” replied Dick. “But why try to kid me like
-that?”
-
-“Oh,” laughed the other, “I am not jesting.”
-
-“Well, by gad, if you feel that way already, the chances are you will
-write out your resignation when you get back to the shack tonight.”
-
-“You mean by that—”
-
-“I mean,” said Dick, smiling benignly at his friend, “that when you have
-once seen Grace Darlington you will feel like browsing on the California
-range until you have learned to throw a riata.”
-
-“Oh, it is not the thought of any mere girl that will influence my
-decision. I feel like getting back to Nature—back to the soil—back to a
-life of untrammeled freedom.”
-
-“Back to unspoiled womanhood,” added Dick sententiously.
-
-“Well, you’ve certainly got my curiosity aroused over these young ladies
-at La Siesta. How much farther do we have to go?”
-
-“Within an hour, sir, within the hour, my lord, shall you see the lady
-fair. But remember,” Dick went on banteringly, “that you are not to
-practise any riata-throwing on Miss Merle Farnsworth.”
-
-“I understand. But we won’t fall out over her. You may have your
-beautiful brunette. I have always been partial to blondes.”
-
-“In the plural number,” grinned Dick. “But Grace Darlington will dim the
-light of all your previous flames. She is the most perfect blonde you
-have ever yet encountered.”
-
-“You are certainly enthusiastic—for a disinterested party.”
-
-“Well, you’ll say the same thing, Ches, my boy, when you see her.”
-
-It was not yet four o’clock when they approached the Rancho La Siesta.
-The house was of a style quite unusual in California—a miniature castle
-that might have been planned by some European architect of renown. It
-stood amid noble oak trees, old and gnarled and of gigantic size, but
-not too numerous to hide the architectural features of the building. To
-the rear the trees grew more thickly till they finally merged into one
-great forest that covered the lower ridge of the mountain beyond. Far
-up, just within the timber line, could be seen the red-tiled roof of a
-house which Dick told his friend was the home of a Mr. Ricardo Robles.
-Beneath the forest, the gently undulating lands sloped away to a
-considerable stream that dashed down from one of the mountain canyons
-and debouched into the great valley.
-
-“Whew!” exclaimed Munson admiringly, as they rode up and turned their
-horses over to an attendant. “Some swell architecture around here! Is
-this your work, Dick?”
-
-
-
-0055
-
-“Oh, no!” replied Willoughby. “I had nothing to do with it. But I do
-like the architectural lines of Mrs. Darlington’s home. She’s English
-and has English tastes, and transplanted ideas are not always successful
-in a new country. But in this case the building just seems to fit the
-scenery. It has always delighted me.”
-
-“It is certainly beautiful,” concurred Munson as they walked along a
-winding graveled pathway that climbed the gentle slope and led to the
-portico of the mansion.
-
-Around them were gay beds of flowers dotting the greensward. Almost
-hiding the columns of the portico were climbing roses, one bush of the
-purest white, the other of deep crimson.
-
-As they passed under the porch roof, a handsome and well-preserved lady
-of middle age appeared at the top of the steps with a welcoming smile.
-She descended to give them gracious greeting.
-
-“How glad I am to see you, Mr. Willoughby. No one could be more welcome
-at La Siesta.”
-
-“Thank you,” said Dick with marked chivalry.
-
-“Mrs. Darlington, permit me to present my friend, Lieutenant Munson.”
-
-The introduction over, they ascended the steps together, and passed
-into a spacious courtyard, with broad verandahs running all around and a
-fountain playing in the centre. The hostess conducted her visitors to
-a cosy corner, screened by glass panels from the open air and furnished
-with rich Persian rugs, divans, cushions, tapestries, carved ebony
-tabarets, all in oriental fashion. When they were comfortably settled,
-she opened the conversation.
-
-“Lieutenant, the young ladies of La Siesta are most impatient to meet
-you. Mr. Willoughby has told us so much about you and yet has been so
-very dilatory—yes, really you have, Mr. Willoughby—in bringing you over,
-that we have put down several black marks against his name.”
-
-“Oh, thank you,” stammered the young officer, reddening. “I quite agree
-with you about Willoughby, for I have been pleading with him to present
-me from the very first day of my arrival.” Turning to Mrs. Darlington,
-Dick laughingly protested: “My dear Mrs. Darlington, that is the first
-whopper you have heard from my esteemed friend. You have yet to learn
-that he always speaks in the superlative degree.”
-
-At this moment Grace Darlington stepped through one of the French
-windows. As she stood hesitating for a moment, Chester Munson there
-and then agreed with all the preliminary praise Dick Willoughby had
-bestowed. She was certainly a vision of loveliness, with a wealth of
-golden hair and eyes of sapphire blue; petite, her figure plump but
-beautifully molded, her cheeks aglow with the red roses of health and
-youth and happiness.
-
-“My daughter Grace,” announced Mrs. Darlington, rising and formally
-introducing the lieutenant to her as she joined the group.
-
-Again Munson blushed and stammered. Dick was chuckling; he saw that
-the gallant son of battle, with a penchant for blonde beauties, had
-succumbed to the first glance from Grace Darlington’s eyes.
-
-“Delighted to meet you, Lieutenant Munson,” she declared with frank
-friendliness as they shook hands.
-
-“Where’s Merle?” asked Dick almost before Grace had time to turn to him.
-
-“There now, Mr. Impatience,” she replied, shaking her finger teasingly
-at, him, “Merle will be here in her own good time. She’s busy with Bob
-just now.”
-
-“Who the dickens is Bob?” asked Dick, visibly disconcerted.
-
-“Oh, her new Irish terrier,” laughed Grace, her voice ringing with
-mischievous merriment. “And such a beauty!”
-
-Dick breathed again. The lieutenant had recovered his composure; it was
-his turn now to bestow a sardonic smile upon his comrade.
-
-“We’ll have afternoon tea,” suggested Mrs. Darlington. “And of course
-you two young men will stay for dinner.”
-
-Both uttered a simultaneous protest—they were only in riding clothes.
-But Mrs. Darlington made short work of the argument, and touched a
-pushbutton by her side. A maid responded, the extra covers for dinner
-were ordered, and meanwhile tea was to be sent on to the verandah.
-Pleasant small talk succeeded, the lieutenant being called upon for his
-first impressions of California.
-
-Of a sudden Grace exclaimed in a voice, half of joy, half of surprise:
-
-“Why, here comes Mr. Robles!”
-
-Advancing along the verandah, hat in hand, was a man of striking
-presence and dignity, perhaps fifty years of age. His jet black hair was
-streaked with gray, the full beard almost verging on whiteness. Olive
-complexion and brown eyes, together with the courtly manner of his
-salutation, indicated the thoroughbred Castilian.
-
-He bowed and raised to his lips the hand of his hostess. To Grace he
-paid the same deference. Next he turned to Dick Willoughby and extended
-his hand.
-
-“I have met Mr. Willoughby. I am pleased, sir, to see you again.”
-
-Then his eyes rested on Lieutenant Munson, and Mrs. Darlington presented
-the young army officer.
-
-“And where, I pray, is Miss Merle?” Mr. Robles finally asked, glancing
-around.
-
-“That’s what I want to know,” blurted out Dick. Then he reddened just a
-little.
-
-The older man looked kindly at Dick, and smilingly said: “The audacity
-of youth.”
-
-“Yes,” put in Grace, “the audacity and the impatience as well.”
-
-But just at that moment there floated from the recesses of the home the
-fragment of a song: “I dreamt I dwelt in marble halls, with vassals and
-serfs at my side.”
-
-“Ah, here comes the recreant now,” exclaimed Mrs. Darlington.
-
-The song stopped abruptly, and a moment later Merle Farnsworth appeared.
-She went first of all to Mr. Robles and greeted him warmly, giving him
-both her hands, which he kissed in his princely fashion. For Willoughby
-she had a pleasant smile, and for his friend, the lieutenant, a kindly
-welcome to California.
-
-The tea tray had meanwhile arrived, and soon both the young ladies
-were busy attending to their guests. While he sipped his tea, Munson
-completed his inspection of Merle Farnsworth—dispassionately, for the
-brunette type of beauty had never yet made his pulses beat faster. But
-he could none the less admire. She was a stately girl, taller than Grace
-Darlington, with fine, regular features and brown eyes that matched the
-dark heavy braids of her hair. Her manner was alert and vivacious, yet
-there was the quiet dignity of gentle breeding even in her smile.
-
-After half an hour of general conversation, Mr. Robles arose to take
-his leave, notwithstanding Mrs. Darlington’s pressing invitation that he
-should remain and join the dinner party.
-
-“My home is not far away,” he said when shaking hands with Munson, “up
-in the woods yonder. Perhaps you may have seen it as you came along the
-road.”
-
-“Yes,” observed Dick, “I pointed it out to the lieutenant.”
-
-“Well, both you gentlemen are cordially invited to pay me a visit any
-time you are riding through this part of the country. Although I live
-far away from the busy world, and am a recluse by choice, I have some
-things that may interest you—pictures, old manuscripts and books of the
-Spanish days.”
-
-“Pictures?” interposed Dick, inquiringly.
-
-“Yes, a few that I picked up during several visits to Europe.”
-
-“If people only knew it,” remarked Mrs. Darlington, “Mr. Robles has
-perhaps one of the finest private picture galleries in America.”
-
-“Then I’m certainly coming to see you,” said Dick, eagerly.
-
-“Me or my pictures?” asked Mr. Robles with a quizzical smile.
-
-“Both,” and the young fellow showed he meant it by a cordial hand grip.
-
-“You will pass our door, Mr. Willoughby?” exclaimed Merle in
-half-laughing reproachfulness. “You will dare to give the go-by to La
-Siesta?”
-
-“Well, art is art,” replied Dick sturdily, although he did not trust
-himself to look at Merle while he answered.
-
-“But perhaps the young ladies will show you the way through the oak
-forest,” suggested Mr. Robles.
-
-“That would be great,” said Lieutenant Munson, with his eyes fixed on
-Grace Darlington.
-
-“Delightful,” she blushingly assented.
-
-“Well, arrange it among yourselves. For the present, adios.” And with a
-sweeping bow the senor took his departure.
-
-A stroll through the gardens and orchards, dinner and sprightly
-conversation, an hour of piano-playing and singing to follow—altogether
-a delightful evening was spent. The nearly full moon had risen before
-the young men found themselves on the homeward trail.
-
-As side by side they rode down into the valley, Munson said:
-
-“Dick, boy, there’s no use talking. You have introduced me to some
-perfectly charming people today—they’re wonderful.”
-
-“What did I tell you?” asked Dick.
-
-“You surely did not tell me the half,” replied the other. “I think Grace
-Darlington is the prettiest girl I have ever seen.”
-
-“Guess you’ll be writing out your resignation and sending it to army
-headquarters,” laughed Dick. “Quien sabe?”
-
-The lieutenant made no reply, and quickening their pace, they pushed on
-in silence.
-
-At last they were nearing home—passing round the last spur of the
-mountain. The moon was now riding high overhead, bathing the whole
-landscape in bright effulgence. Willoughby brought his pony to a walk,
-and Munson, coming up behind, soon joined him.
-
-“How do you like riding by the light of the California moon?” asked
-Willoughby.
-
-“Really, Dick, you call even the moon a California moon, as if the same
-moon didn’t shine in New York City or in Paris.”
-
-“Not in the same way,” said Dick soberly. “The truth is, the moon really
-looks larger and brighter here, and the stars, too, are more brilliant.
-Haven’t you noticed it?”
-
-“I have noticed that the atmosphere is exceedingly clear,” replied
-Munson, and, as if to verify his observation, he cast a glance up to the
-rock-ribbed flank of the mountain above the belt of timber.
-
-“Good God, what’s that?” he added breathlessly grasping the arm of his
-friend.
-
-Instinctively both halted their horses as they continued to gaze.
-
-
-
-0105
-
-The bent form of the old Indian squaw Guadalupe was unmistakable as she
-toiled slowly along a narrow ledge on the face of the precipice. But
-following close behind her was a vague, shadowy figure—the figure of
-some four-footed beast, bigger than a big dog.
-
-“The white wolf!” gasped Dick.
-
-“Is it real, or is it a spectre?” whispered Munson.
-
-Just then a scudding cloud momentarily obscured the moon, and when the
-full light again shone forth, both woman and wolf had vanished.
-
-The young men looked into each other’s eyes in awe and wonderment.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VI—The Quarrel
-
-THE following days were busy ones on San Antonio Rancho. Dick Willoughby
-was constantly in the saddle, looking after his subordinates, watching
-the line fences, and generally keeping track of the vast herds.
-Lieutenant Munson was becoming acclimated. He not only accompanied
-Willoughby on many of his rides, but had also paid several visits to
-La Siesta, and one afternoon in particular had enjoyed immensely a
-successful trout fishing expedition with the young ladies along the
-mountain stream that flowed through the property.
-
-One morning there was great excitement at San Antonio headquarters. Ben
-Thurston returned from a visit he had been paying to Los Angeles, and
-with him floated in a circumstantial story that the rancho had been
-really sold. As usual, he was attended by the plain-clothes detective
-whom he retained as bodyguard. Leach Sharkey was a big, hulking fellow,
-more than six feet in height, with a tousled shock of reddish hair, a
-stubby red mustache, and teeth that showed even when his face was in
-repose. Bulging hip pockets indicated the brace of heavy revolvers which
-he invariably carried.
-
-Within an hour of Mr. Thurston’s coming, Dick Willoughby, as foreman,
-was summoned to an interview at the ranch house. The owner received him
-alone in his office.
-
-Ben Thurston was a squat, solidly built man, and despite his life
-of idle luxury, carried his fifty odd years well. He was sullen and
-taciturn in manner, but brusque and imperious when he did choose to
-speak. Two features were markedly characteristic—the chin was weak and
-the eyes had the restless, alert look of one who constantly lived in an
-atmosphere of fear and suspicion.
-
-Thurston opened the conversation without any preliminaries.
-
-“Willoughby, I want an accurate count of all the cattle and horses on
-the ranch; and especially I require a fair idea as to the number of
-fatted beeves—those ready for the market, you understand.”
-
-“Very well,” replied Dick, “your orders shall be carried out as
-expeditiously as possible, but it will require a few days to complete
-the work.”
-
-“How many days?”
-
-“If I make use of all the force it may take a week—perhaps a little
-longer.”
-
-“All right, use all the help you can get. I must have these figures
-promptly. There is a Los Angeles syndicate who are after an option on
-the rancho. They are counting on buying me out—lock, stock and barrel.”
-Ben Thurston smiled, squinted his shifty eyes and blew his nose
-vigorously.
-
-“It always makes me laugh,” he added pompously, “to have these fellows
-come around this great principality of mine and try to buy me out.”
-
-Just then someone outside flitted past the window, and, quick as
-lightning, Thurston turned and exclaimed in a startled tone: “Who was
-that?”
-
-“That was Jack Rover,” replied Dick, “one of our cowboys.”
-
-“Oh,” and the frightened look in the eyes subsided.
-
-“Tomorrow then,” Dick went on, returning to their former topic of
-conversation, “we’ll begin a round-up of the stock at this end of the
-range. I’ll put the boys on the job right now.”
-
-“I’ll join you tomorrow myself.”
-
-“All right, Mr. Thurston.”
-
-“What time?”
-
-“At any time agreeable to you.”
-
-“Well, say eight o’clock in the morning. You see,” he continued, “I want
-to get through with this damned business in a hurry and start back East.
-I have friends who are waiting for me. Of course I will have to stay
-here until the representatives of this syndicate come up from Los
-Angeles, but I will make short work of them, believe me.”
-
-This time Ben Thurston laughed outright and rubbed his hands together in
-a satisfied way. For once he seemed inclined to be communicative, and,
-turning to Willoughby, resumed:
-
-“Do you know, I have collected over three hundred thousand dollars,
-first and last, selling options on this San Antonio Rancho? It is quite
-a joke. They all fall down. They make a first payment of twenty-five
-or fifty thousand dollars, and then,” throwing up both his hands and
-shrugging his shoulders, “their payments cease and I am just that much
-ahead of the game.” Willoughby listened in frigid silence; there was not
-even the flicker of a responsive smile on his face.
-
-Thurston, eyeing him for a moment, looked disconcerted. He drew himself
-up stiffly in his chair. His voice assumed its usual gruff tone.
-
-“That’s all; get to work then,” he said curtly as he lifted some papers
-to show that the interview was at an end.
-
-The first round-up was held some twenty miles southwest of the ranch
-house, at the base of the foothills across the valley from La Siesta.
-Ben Thurston, attended closely by his bodyguard, was there, his shifting
-eyes scanning each new face. Not fewer than ten thousand head of cattle
-were milling about, pawing the earth and bellowing in low tones of
-irritation at being herded together and held away from their accustomed
-haunts of juicy grasses.
-
-From a knoll at a little distance Lieutenant Munson, seated on a fine
-riding pony, watched the great performance, which to him was more
-wonderful than any hippodrome show or military parade. He was so
-engrossed with the spectacle that he did not hear the patter of
-approaching hoofs.
-
-“Good morning, Senor Lieutenant,” came a lady’s voice in cheery
-greeting.
-
-Turning quickly in his saddle he saw Grace Darlington and Merle
-Farnsworth on their ponies, which had been brought to a sudden halt
-close behind him.
-
-“Really, Mr. Munson,” said Grace Darlington, “one would think you were
-so completely lost in contemplation of a mob of cattle that you had no
-eyes for your friends.”
-
-Chester bowed and raised his hat as he replied with a bright smile:
-
-“It is certainly a great scene, isn’t it? But you are none the less
-welcome. Indeed when one is witnessing something unusual, it always adds
-to the interest to have the companionship of friends.”
-
-“Very prettily put,” observed Merle Farnsworth. “Fortunately the place
-selected for the round-up this year isn’t very far from La Siesta, so we
-rode across the valley.”
-
-“Have you anything in New York,” asked Grace, “to compare with this?”
-
-“Indeed we have not,” replied the lieutenant with conviction. “I am
-beginning to think that the West is a pretty good place in which to
-live. By the way,” he went on, taking a newspaper clipping from his
-pocket, “here is something that our mutual friend, Dick, gave me, and
-said I should read once a day for a month, and then—well, then, he says
-I will never go East again, but remain in this great picture country.
-Shall I read it?”
-
-“Oh, do, by all means,” said the girls in unison. “Well, here goes!
-‘Every idea we have in the East is run with a convention. We cannot
-think without a chairman. Our whims have secretaries; our fads have
-by-laws. Literature is a club. Philosophy is a society. Our reforms
-are mass meetings. We cannot mourn our mighty dead without some great
-chairman and a half hundred vice-presidents. We remember our novelists
-and poets with trustees, while the immortality of a dead genius is
-looked after by a standing committee. Charity is an association, and
-theology at best only a set of resolutions.’.rdquo;
-
-“What do you think of that?” he asked, laughing. “Isn’t that an awful
-slam on the East?”
-
-“It is rather severe,” smiled Merle. “But you know, Mr. Willoughby has
-become a thorough Westerner. The lure of the hills and the valleys has
-taken complete possession of him.”
-
-“And yet he remains unspoiled.” exclaimed the lieutenant. “But are you
-aware he is trying to tamper with my old allegiance to the East?”
-
-“Indeed,” asked Grace, “in what way?”
-
-“He wants me to resign my commission and take pot luck with him, as he
-terms it.”
-
-“You couldn’t do better,” exclaimed Grace enthusiastically.
-
-While this conversation was going on, an exciting incident was taking
-place only a short distance away. Young Marshall Thurston had come
-with his father to the round-up, and was riding about watching the
-operations. Chancing to pass near, Dick Willoughby overheard him use
-an insulting epithet in regard to Miss Farnsworth—the young man was
-evidently peeved that the ladies had not sought him out instead of
-Munson, and it was obvious, too, that he had been drinking even at that
-early hour in the morning.
-
-Swiftly wheeling, Dick rode up to him with a look of anger so intense
-that even the cowboys who knew him were taken aback.
-
-“You foul-mouthed beast!” he hissed, as he pushed his quirt into the
-slanderer’s face. “Just let me overhear you make a rude remark again
-about Miss Farnsworth and I will hammer the life out of you. You are
-nothing better than a drunken hobo, not fit to associate with ladies.”
-
-The outburst was so sudden that young Thurston was cowed and attempted
-no reply. But as Willoughby rode off he sent after him a look of sullen
-and resentful hatred. Two or three of the cowboys, who really were good
-friends of Dick Willoughby, but were nevertheless not above fawning for
-the favor of the heir to the great rancho, indicated that they were on
-Marshall’s side.
-
-“Guess two can play at the hammering game,” remarked one.
-
-“He don’t come any of his rough-house business over you, Marshall, while
-I’m around,” affirmed another, pugnaciously.
-
-But the young man, still without uttering a word, turned gloomily away
-and started his pony in the direction of home.
-
-“Guess he feels like another drink,” grinned an irreverent youth.
-
-“Hell,” exclaimed an elderly man, the blacksmith at the rancho, “if the
-Thurston family don’t beat the band for quarrels and bloody feuds!”
-
-But just then a bunch of cattle broke from the main herd and the group
-of cowboys dispersed in a galloping scamper.
-
-Munson and the young ladies, engrossed in their light conversation, knew
-nothing of this unpleasant episode. They were now discussing the date
-of the projected visit to the home of Mr. Ricardo Robles among the oaks
-above La Siesta. It was decided to fix it for the first Sunday after the
-cattle muster was completed, when Dick Willoughby would be free to make
-one of the party.
-
-“But hold a moment,” exclaimed the lieutenant suddenly, “unless I’m to
-be court-martialled for absence without leave, I must take the train
-East next Saturday, or—or—”
-
-His eyes fixed on Grace, he hesitated to complete the alternative.
-
-“Or what?” she inquired.
-
-“Follow Dick’s advice and send in my resignation.” As he spoke he thrust
-a hand into his breast pocket and drew forth a letter, sealed, addressed
-and stamped, all ready for the mail. “I really can’t quite make up my
-mind,” he added, dubiously.
-
-
-
-0155
-
-“Let me help you,” said Grace with a gay smile as she extended her hand
-for the letter.
-
-“How?” he asked.
-
-“I’ll mail your resignation for you. We shall be riding home by La
-Siesta postoffice.”
-
-“Oh, Grace!” murmured Merle in timid protest. “Think of the
-responsibility you are taking.”
-
-“A woman’s mission in life is to encourage men to do the proper thing,”
-replied Grace with roguish defiance. “Our friend here is enamored of
-the West, and the West is the very best place for him. I’ll post your
-letter, lieutenant.”
-
-He placed it between her fingers, doffed his hat, and bowed gallantly.
-
-“Be it so. Let the gods—or should I say, a fair goddess?—decide.”
-
-“Thanks for the compliment,” cried Grace, with a pretty flush on her
-face. “Good-bye, then, for the present. Get ready for Sunday’s picnic
-among the oaks. Come along, Merle, my dear.”
-
-And with a touch of the quirt she started her pony into a canter.
-
-“Great guns, but she’s worth while,” exclaimed Munson as he gazed after
-the retreating figures.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VII—Old Bandit Days
-
-ON the evening of the day that followed the big round-up of cattle, Dick
-Willoughby and Chester Munson rode over to the store. As they cantered
-along, both men were pre-occupied with their thoughts.
-
-Dick was not worrying over his sharp passage of words with his
-employer’s son, for he knew that his services at the present time were
-quite indispensable, more especially if the rancho was to be sold to the
-best advantage. The owner had spoken lightly of the negotiations, and
-had chuckled in a sinister way about the money he had frequently made
-over unexercised options. But this time it was a Los Angeles syndicate
-that was seeking the property, composed of men whose financial
-reputation and keen business ability Willoughby knew well. For he had
-learned their names after his interview with Ben Thurston, and he felt
-certain that this particular group of capitalists would have entered
-into no serious negotiations without having both the cash and the
-intention to put the deal through. Therefore he scented a change of
-ownership in the rancho, and consequently, perhaps, the necessity for
-his looking around to find employment elsewhere. He hated to think of
-leaving a place that he had come to look on as home and parting from
-all the friends he had made throughout the countryside. Unconsciously to
-himself, the greatest tie of all was proximity to La Siesta and to Merle
-Farnsworth. But Dick was not thinking of Merle just then—he was merely
-turning things over generally in his mind as he rode across the valley.
-
-Munson also was cogitating the change in his own outlook that had
-been brought about by the mailing of the letter of resignation to army
-headquarters. He was recalling the many years he had striven to reach
-the lieutenancy now voluntarily surrendered—of his youthful zeal and
-ambition for an army career which had been powerless to withstand
-the witching call of the West. And although Grace Darlington’s act of
-putting the letter in the post had been only the last feather to tip an
-evenly balanced scale, he could not but feel that thereby this beautiful
-girl of the West had entered into his life and into all his future
-plans, hopes, and aspirations. The thought gave him joy; he was more
-pleased than ever that the decisive step had at last been taken.
-
-Arriving at the store, they found old Tom Baker seated on a dry goods
-box, while Buck Ashley leaned against the counter, waiting for the
-stage coach and the mails. Already two or three others were beginning to
-congregate under the trees, in readiness for the distribution of letters
-and newspapers.
-
-“Hello, Dick,” called out the sheriff, “I heard of your scrap yesterday
-morning with that young ne’er-do-well, Marshall Thurston. My God, I’m
-glad you gave him hell.”
-
-“Please don’t speak about it,” replied Willoughby quietly. “That was my
-affair and mine alone. I guess we can find some more agreeable topic.”
-
-“Wal,” drawled Buck Ashley, “Tom here was just a-tellin’ me a yarn
-that’ll interest both you boys a heap, or the lieutenant at all events,
-for he’s new to these parts and don’t know the local hist’ry yet. Of
-course I’ve heard the story before, but not all the pertic’lars the way
-Tom can tell ‘em. And its a dangnation good story. So start from the
-beginnin’ again, Tom.”
-
-Thus addressed, the sheriff, after taking a bite from his tobacco plug,
-began:
-
-“The yarn has to do with the old-time bandit Joaquin Murietta, about
-whom we were speakin’ the other morn in’. Well, the way it all happened
-was this: On a neighboring ranch, over Ventura way, beyond the Lagunita
-Rancho, owned at that time by Senor Olivas, a rich cattle dealer comes
-down from ‘Frisco to buy a bunch of beeves. The stock had all been
-driven up on a mesa near the Olivas ranch house, and for several days
-the herders had been cuttin’ out the cows and the young calves from the
-steers, ‘cause this feller was only goin’ to buy the steers.
-
-“The great herd was bellerin’ and pawin’ in a big cloud of dust, through
-which the vaqueros—cowboys, you know, lieutenant—could be seen ridin’
-round and round. Of course roundin’ up cattle is always more or less
-excitin’ work, but this rich chap had come down from ‘Frisco with his
-saddle bags bulgin’ out with gold, and this sorta added a mighty sight
-to the interest of the doin’s. Part of the bargain was that the deal
-was to be for spot cash, all in gold, too, mind you, and it was arranged
-that the buyer and Senor Olivas were to take their stations at one side
-of the narrow gate, and every time a steer was driven through that gate
-a twenty-dollar gold piece was to be tossed into a big bag which Senor
-Olivas was holdin’.
-
-“They do say as how the work continued all day, from early mornin’ until
-dark, afore the last blamed steer passed that ‘ere gate, and they claim
-that there was eighty thousand dollars in the Senor’s bag as pay for the
-day’s drive. They say, too, that Joaquin Murietta, disguised, was one
-of the vaqueros doin’ the drivin’. Anyway that very night old Olivas was
-waked up mighty abruptly by feelin’ the cold nose of a revolver shoved
-against his own nose.
-
-“Well, the long and short of it all was that Senor Olivas and his wife
-were both gagged and bound hand and foot, while Murietta ransacked the
-house, found the strong box and carried away every blamed gold coin that
-Olivas had received for the sale of his steers. The outlaw succeeded in
-makin’ his escape into the Tehachapi mountains with his cut-throat gang,
-and they found a hidin’ place in the robbers’ cave that is somewhere
-hereabouts on the San Antonio Rancho. It sure was as slick a piece of
-rascality as was ever pulled off in the old lawless days.”
-
-“Well,” observed Buck Ashley, as he shook his head reflectively, “I’m
-assoomin’ some of the cowboy fellers around here will find that cave one
-of these days. I’ve put in a good many Sundays huntin’ for it myself.”
-
-Just then there was the sound of horses’ hoofs outside, and a moment
-later Jack Rover strolled into the store. Over his shoulder was slung
-the big leather bag for the rancho mails.
-
-“Hallo, everybody,” was his greeting. “I’m ahead of time Buck, but the
-stage will be here in five minutes. I saw its dust above the ridge. I
-hear, lieutenant,” he went on, “you’re going to stick to the West and be
-one of us.”
-
-“Quit the army?” exclaimed Tom Baker in surprise.
-
-“That is so,” replied Munson. “California has fairly got hold of me, and
-I intend to make my home in the West.”
-
-“Then you just stick here, young man,” said the sheriff, rising to his
-feet and extending his hand. “California is the pick of the States, and
-our valley the pick of California. Don’t you forget it. We’re proud to
-welcome you as a new resident.”
-
-“That’s what I say, too,” concurred Buck Ashley, cordially.
-
-Munson smiled. “Well, I don’t know if you can put me in the resident
-class all at once,” he observed, diffidently. “Guess I’ve got to join
-the cowboy brigade first, if Dick and Jack here will break me in.”
-
-“Sure thing,” assented Jack Hover. “You’re a good rider now—for an army
-man.”
-
-“An ex-army man,” corrected Willoughby, laughing.
-
-“It strikes me we should put you in as postmaster, Munson,” suggested
-the sheriff, a sly gleam of mischief in his eye. “Buck Ashley here is
-growin’ old.”
-
-“Yes, but not too old to hold down his job till your tombstone’s in the
-cemetery, Tom Baker,” retorted the storekeeper, with a grin. “No man
-takes the Tejon postmastership while I’m alive,” he added defiantly.
-
-“I’m forewarned and won’t apply for your job, Buck,” laughed Munson.
-“But here comes the stage, so show your spryness, old fellow, by getting
-us our mail.”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VIII—A Letter from San Quentin
-
-BUCK ASHLEY had retired into the partitioned-off section of the store
-that formed the postoffice, and was busy stamping and sorting out
-the mail. The scattered loiterers outside crowded into the building
-expectantly, and the local parliament was in session. Amid the buzz
-of conversation Willoughby could not but hear his own name mentioned,
-coupled with that of Marshall Thurston. He understood quite well that
-all manner of gossip was flying around in regard to the quarrel at the
-round-up. But he remained stoically indifferent, shut his ears, and
-leaning against the counter busied himself with an old Saturday Evening
-Post that had been lying there.
-
-At last the wicket was shoved up with a bang, and those present began to
-move toward the little aperture through which Buck Ashley proceeded to
-hand out correspondence and newspapers. One by one the throng melted
-away. Jack Rover was examining the big bunch of mail for San Antonio
-Rancho as he stowed it into the letter bag. Munson was opening and
-gleaning the contents of two or three letters that had come to him from
-New York. Dick Willoughby continued his reading, unconcerned; Jack would
-pass over any correspondence for him. Old Tom Baker had not risen from
-his accustomed seat on an empty box; he had few correspondents, and
-the mail did not worry him, although he invariably assisted with his
-presence at its distribution.
-
-These four were now the only ones in the store besides Buck Ashley, who
-still remained behind the partition. At last the postmaster appeared,
-holding in his hand an open letter. His face showed great agitation as
-he glanced around to take stock of those who might be present.
-
-“Say, boys,” he whispered in a mysterious manner, as he held up the
-letter, “this is the most dangnation extr’ornery thing that has ever
-happened to me. You’re just the bunch of fellers I’d like to consult.
-Close the door, Tom.”
-
-“What’s up, Buck?” asked the sheriff as he rose to comply. “You look as
-if you had the ague shakes.”
-
-“No ague in this here land of California,” laughed Jack Rover. “Is it a
-proposal of marriage you’ve been getting, Buck?”
-
-“A derned heap better’n that. God ‘lmighty, boys, this may mean millions
-for all of us. Shoot the bolt, Tom; I’ll hand out no more groceries
-tonight. Come close together, all of you. You read the letter aloud,
-Dick. My hand’s a-tremb-lin’, and I can’t get the Frenchie’s lingo just
-right.”
-
-“The Frenchie?” echoed Tom Baker in puzzled surprise.
-
-“It’s a letter from Pierre Luzon,” explained Buck.
-
-“Good God!” The sheriff was now as deeply stirred as his old crony.
-
-“The bandit scout you were telling us about the other morning?”
-exclaimed Jack Rover, also fired with excitement.
-
-“I thought that fellow was in San Quentin for life.” remarked Munson,
-composedly.
-
-“Wal, and ain’t this letter from San Quentin?” retorted Buck. “See the
-headin’. But Dick’ll read it aloud. I feel clean knocked out.” And the
-old man sank back on his chair behind the counter.
-
-The four others were now clustered around Dick Willoughby. The latter,
-deputized to do the reading, had nonchalantly taken the epistle from
-Buck Ashley’s trembling hand. While the others were speaking he had
-bestowed a preliminary glance, and from his lips there escaped a murmur
-of surprise.
-
-“Great Caesar!” As he uttered the ejaculation Dick sat up, keenly alert.
-
-“Well, what’s it all about?” inquired Munson, by this time the only cool
-man in the bunch.
-
-“Read, read!” cried the storekeeper hoarsely.
-
-Dick Willoughby began:
-
-“Mr. Buck Ashley, Storekeeper, Tejon, California.
-
-“If God in His goodness permits this letter to come to your hands,
-remember it is from old Pierre, the Frenchman, who used to be about your
-store sometimes a half a day at a time, smoking his pipe. You never knew
-much about me or where I lived. But I will tell you.
-
-“I am an old man now—very old. I was born in the South of France, came
-to this country in the ‘40’. and entered into the service of Joaquin
-Murietta, who was one great man, but a big bandit. Peace to his soul!
-Well, he was good to me, and I was faithful to him, taking care of the
-cave, the big grotto, the cavern among the Tehachapi mountains where he
-many times hid from the sheriff’s posse, and also, where he brought all
-his gold to stack up and keep from everybody.
-
-“You also know Don Manuel, him whom the people call White Wolf. Well,
-once when a boy, Don Manuel he save Marietta’s life from the sheriff by
-helping him to escape from one close place. Murietta was very grateful,
-and one day he bring the boy to the grotto cave, and there I see him and
-like him very much. That was while Murietta still lived.
-
-“Afterward when the little boy grow up and was one man, and turned
-bitter against the gringos because they wrong his sister, Senorita
-Rosetta, and his old father and mother die of grief, he say to me, ‘I
-will become a bandit like Joaquin Murietta.’ He came to the cavern one
-night and tell me and say, ‘You be my servant.’ So I say, ‘All right,’
-because Don Manuel one brave man.
-
-“So that night of the great stage robbery over near Lake of Tulare,
-I hold horses. That’s all I do, but all the same they put me in this
-horrid prison, and here I am. The other two men, Felix Vasquez and Fox
-Cassidy, were shot by the posse and I have been told by a Portugee in
-the jail here about the White Wolf being killed away north in Seattle,
-and he is no more.
-
-“Don Manuel de Valencia, he was one great man. Peace to his soul!
-
-“I am alone. I want to get away from this terrible prison. I have
-promised one of my guards—a good Frenchman who comes from my town in
-France—$5,000 in gold if he can secretly get this letter into postoffice
-to you and get me away from this living hell. You do this and I show you
-the cavern. Nobody knows where it is but me.
-
-“Come and get me, please, my good Mr. Ashley, come, and may the spirit
-of the Virgin Mary reward you. All I say here is truth. You come get me
-and I show you the secret grotto. I show you the great stacks of gold
-hidden by Joaquin Murietta and Don Manuel. Also the sand-bar in the
-hidden stream where Guadalupe gathered up much gold.
-
-“I beg and pray you to keep what I say in this letter secret. I am old
-and weak and sick. Come and get me.
-
-“Obedient servant,
-
-“Pierre Luzon.”
-
-“Ain’t that just one hell of a letter, boys?” exclaimed Buck Ashley.
-
-“Gospel truth, every word,” cried Tom Baker, emphatically.
-
-“It certainly reads like the truth,” concurred Munson.
-
-“Then what are we going to do about it?” asked Jack Rover.
-
-Dick Willoughby spoke now with the quiet and quick decision that marks
-the leader of men:
-
-“What we will do is this. We five are partners in this secret, and, if
-Buck is willing, we’ll play the game together for all it is worth. To
-begin with, we’ll put up one hundred dollars apiece to send Tom Baker to
-Sacramento. He will try to get a pardon or a parole for Pierre Luzon.”
-
-“That can be managed,” assented the sheriff. “I’ve got a political pull,
-you know, boys.”
-
-“Well,” continued Dick, “we’ll bring old Pierre here and we’ll get from
-him the information he promises about the secret grotto.”
-
-“Not forgetting Guadalupe’s placer mine,” interjected Jack Rover.
-
-“Everything will be attended to in its turn,” replied Dick. “One thing
-at a time, and the first thing to be done is to get the Frenchman out of
-San Quentin. When can you start, Tom?”
-
-“The day after tomorrow.”
-
-“Well, we’ll have the cash ready for you by tomorrow night. You must
-bring Pierre Luzon here without anyone else besides ourselves knowing
-his name or getting next to him.”
-
-“I’ll fix up a cot for him in my own room behind the store,” suggested
-Buck Ashley.
-
-“That’s a good plan,” assented Dick. “When the Frenchman’s here, it
-will be time then to discuss our next move. Meanwhile, it’s an honorable
-promise of secrecy all round, and to begin with I give my word.”
-
-While speaking the last words, Dick solemnly raised his hand, and each
-man in turn followed his example as he gave the pledge required.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER IX—Tia Teresa
-
-TEN days had passed and the count of the stock on San Antonio Rancho had
-been completed, every canyon searched, the last wandering maverick
-roped and branded, the number of fat beeves accurately estimated. Three
-members of the Los Angeles syndicate had arrived in a big automobile and
-remained over night at the ranch house. Most of the time they had been
-closeted with Ben Thurston in his office, and had finally taken their
-departure without exchanging a word with anyone else on the rancho.
-Nobody knew whether the deal had gone through or not, but rumor said
-that, after some disagreement on the first day, terms had been arranged
-next morning.
-
-Dick Willoughby, although he discussed the question with no one, made
-his own inferences. The very fact that the visitors had not made any
-inspection of the property proved that they already knew it thoroughly
-well. The counting of the cattle and horses had been the final factor
-in the negotiations, and the figures had enabled the deal to advance a
-further stage toward completion. Ben Thurston might fool himself about
-easy option money put up only to be forfeited, but Dick Willoughby was
-not fooled. The days of closer settlement in California had come, and
-these Los Angeles men were the most enterprising and skilful subdividers
-in the West. They dealt only in big propositions, and after mopping
-up all the available tracts in the southern end of the State, were
-extending their operations northward. This vast so-called “Spanish
-grant,” an empire in itself, had no doubt for several years been in
-their eye, and now they were prepared to handle the San Antonio Rancho
-with the lavish expenditure it deserved and required to transform the
-great sweep of cattle range—rich agricultural land, as the luxuriant
-native grasses showed—into smiling orchards and alfalfa farms, each
-provided with the irrigation water which intelligent conservation would
-ensure in abundance.
-
-Dick knew in his heart that the era of transformation had at last come,
-that the roaming herds were to be pushed back into regions more remote,
-that homes and schoolhouses and garden cities would soon be dotting the
-landscape, that the passing of Ben Thurston, the cattle king, and of his
-hard-riding, devil-may-care vaqueros was at hand.
-
-Yet Thurston spoke no word—in fact, he seemed to be more grouchy and
-taciturn than ever. Not even his son Marshall was in his confidence, for
-the young man was seldom with his father, preferring to spend his
-time in the drinking saloons and dance halls of Bakersfield, where the
-activity of oil-developing operations attracted all sorts and conditions
-of men, among whom the dissipated decadent had readily found friends to
-his liking.
-
-Ben Thurston who had gone the pace himself in his early days, did not
-seek to interfere with his son’s pursuit of pleasures, but he had very
-promptly squelched any interference from Marshall with his own business
-operations. On the evening of the quarrel with Dick Willoughby at the
-round-up, Marshall had attempted to tell his father about the affair and
-suggest Dick’s dismissal. But the old man had at once silenced him
-by saying: “Why, damn you! I brought you out to this country to enjoy
-yourself and not to get into trouble. So far as Willoughby is concerned,
-I can’t afford to quarrel with him. He is my foreman, and I am right
-in the midst of a big business transaction. So just you mind your own
-business, my boy, and leave him alone.”
-
-Accordingly, Marshall Thurston, a coward at heart, had not sought to
-pursue the feud singlehanded, and Dick had seen but little of him during
-the rest of the mustering work. When they did happen to meet, it was a
-case of a black scowl of hate from the one and a contemptuous smile of
-indifference from the other. And so the days had passed until the task
-was finished.
-
-It was the Sunday morning that had been fixed for the visit to the
-home of Mr. Ricardo Robles, when the cattle foreman could at last
-conscientiously take a day of recreation. With the first break of dawn
-he and Munson were in the saddle, for they had been invited to breakfast
-at La Siesta before starting with the young ladies on the ride through
-the oak forest.
-
-The visitors arrived early, but not too early for their hostesses. Grace
-and Merle were waiting to welcome them in the portico, looking more
-charming than ever in their neat riding suits of khaki.
-
-“We saw you cross the bridge,” declared Grace, “and mother has gone in
-to order breakfast to be served. You must be hungry after your early
-start.”
-
-“Oh, Sing Ling didn’t let us go without a cup of coffee,” laughed Dick.
-“But I fancy we’ll do full justice, all right, to the bountiful fare of
-La Siesta.”
-
-It proved to be a delightful meal in every way, the viands seasoned with
-gay repartee and laughter. A full hour had sped before Dick recalled the
-real object of the day’s excursion.
-
-“We usually walk to Mr. Robles’ place,” remarked Merle. “It is only a
-mile or so by the short cuts up the hill, but by the winding road it is
-very much longer. So we ordered our ponies.”
-
-“I see,” smiled Munson, “to prolong the pleasure of our foursome among
-the oaks.”
-
-“Not at all, sir,” retorted Grace. “The climb on foot is a stiff one,
-and we knew that you must be out of condition from the lazy life you are
-living.”
-
-“I am only waiting for Willoughby to give me a cowboy’s job,” replied
-the ex-lieutenant.
-
-“I don’t know if there will be any cowboy jobs going,” observed
-Willoughby. “It’s my belief that San Antonio Rancho is sold and is going
-to be broken up into small holdings.”
-
-“Oh, what a pity!” exclaimed Merle.
-
-“From one point of view, perhaps,” answered Dick. “But from a hundred
-other points of view, what a blessing! There will be a dozen happy homes
-for every steer the range now feeds!”
-
-“But La Siesta will remain just as it is,” cried Grace.
-
-“That will be all right,” replied Dick, gallantly, “It’s already a happy
-home.”
-
-The ladies smiled pleasantly.
-
-“Then this will mean the elimination of Mr. Ben Thurston,” observed Mrs.
-Darlington.
-
-“The greatest blessing of all,” declared Merle, clapping her hands. “You
-see, I am already converted to the change, Mr. Willoughby,” she added
-merrily.
-
-“But what about my job?” asked Munson in mock dolefulness.
-
-“Consult Mr. Robles,” laughed Grace. “He may take pity on you, and find
-you a place as handy man on his estate.”
-
-In merry mood they all sallied forth. The saddle horses were waiting,
-and standing beside them was an elderly Spanish woman.
-
-“Tia Teresa, Mr. Munson,” said Mrs. Darlington by way of introduction.
-
-Munson had often enough heard the name, and in answer to an inquiry,
-Willoughby had told him that the old dame had been the personal
-attendant of the two young ladies ever since they could remember. Tia
-or Aunt Teresa was now more a friend of the family than a servant of the
-house, and, taking her hand in salutation, Munson treated her with the
-affable courtesy that was her due.
-
-“I am glad to make your acquaintance,” he said, raising his hat.
-
-Tia Teresa looked pleased. Despite her seventy years, she was a buxom
-and splendidly preserved woman, and there was still the flash of
-youthfulness in her big dark eyes.
-
-“You will look after my little girls,” she said, as she gathered
-together the folds of her black lace mantilla. “By rights I should
-be coming with you, too,” she added, in the manner of a true Spanish
-duenna.
-
-“You forget that we are home again—in free America,” laughed Merle as
-she settled herself in the saddle.
-
-“Too free, I sometimes think,” rejoined Tia Teresa. “But there is safety
-in four,” she added, turning with a smile to Mrs. Darlington.
-
-And as the young folks rode away she waved them a pleasant adios.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER X—The Home of the Recluse
-
-AT a gentle pace they wound their way through the forest of magnificent
-old oaks.
-
-As for Munson, riding by Grace Darlington’s side, the miles were the
-shortest he had ever before traversed. It seemed only a few minutes
-before the red tiled roof and towers of a house built in the California
-Mission style were gleaming through the trees only a short distance
-ahead.
-
-Great oaken doors closed the arched gateway, but at the clatter of hoofs
-and the sound of voices, a little peep-hole wicket was withdrawn. The
-inspection by unseen eyes apparently was satisfactory, for a moment
-later a postern was opened, and two men, Mexicans obviously by their
-garb and deferential manner, emerged to take and lead away the horses.
-Within the patio stood Senor Robles, his usually grave face lighted by a
-smile of cordial welcome.
-
-“Let me tell you, young men,” he said while shaking hands, “that while
-Grace and Merle are quite at home here, you are the very first strangers
-who have passed through my portals.”
-
-“Strangers no longer then,” said Dick, good-naturedly.
-
-“Precisely,” replied Mr. Robles, “or you would not be here. But I
-foresee that all of us are going to be very close friends. Isn’t that
-so, Grace, my dear?”
-
-“I’m sure I cannot say,” replied Grace, with a smile of demure innocence
-toward Mr. Munson. Then she turned to Mr. Robles with a roguish twinkle
-in her eye. “But I’ve news for you. Mr. Munson has resigned from the
-army and is looking for a job.”
-
-“Both facts are already known to me,” answered Robles, smiling.
-
-“Oh,” exclaimed Grace, “one can never surprise you, Mr. Robles. Although
-you live the life of a hermit, you seem to be always the first to learn
-everything that is going on.”
-
-“A hermit, my dear, need not necessarily be out of touch with the
-world,” replied Robles, playfully pinching her ear. “And now, Mr.
-Willoughby, you came specially to see my pictures. Lead the way, Merle.
-Gentlemen, I say again—welcome to my mountain home.”
-
-They lingered awhile in the patio to admire the marble columns of the
-cloister that ran all around, the playing fountains at each of the four
-comers, with groups of symbolical statuary, the wealth of beautiful
-shrubs and flowers. On the side opposite to the gateway rose a tall
-tower, fashioned like the campanile of an Old Mission and crowned with
-bright red tiles.
-
-“We shall ascend there later on,” remarked Mr. Robles, following Dick’s
-upward glance.
-
-Then they passed through the wide-opened French window into the living
-rooms.
-
-The first was a great apartment that occupied one entire side of the
-building. In the centre was a large globe of the world. Here and there
-were glass cases displaying manuscripts and illuminated missals. Along
-the walls were finely-carved bookcases filled with several thousands of
-volumes.
-
-“When you have the leisure you can come and browse here,” said the
-host, addressing both young men. “Meanwhile you may care to look at the
-bronzes and statuary”—this with a sweep of the hand that indicated the
-art treasures distributed about the apartment.
-
-On the side of the house beneath the tower were the dining room and the
-billiard and smoking room. Passing through these, the visitors came to
-the picture gallery, a room corresponding in size to the library. Here
-were hung treasures of the painter’s art, masterpieces signed by names
-that are immortal. These, as their owner again explained, had been
-acquired by him during several prolonged visits to Europe.
-
-“Count this just as a preliminary survey, Mr. Willoughby,” he said
-finally. “Then come again. There are guest chambers on either side of
-the gateway, and one of these will always be at your disposal when I am
-at home. I extend the same invitation to you, Mr. Munson.”
-
-“My word, but you may feel honored,” exclaimed Grace, in unconcealed
-amazement.
-
-“When I open my gates, I open my heart as well,” said Mr. Robles, with a
-courtly little bow to his new friends.
-
-Next they ascended the tower. Its first floor, above the living rooms,
-was a delightful den filled with curios of all kinds. From this sprang a
-winding iron staircase, up which Mr. Robles led the way.
-
-The upper chamber, extending on all sides some distance beyond the
-supporting tower, proved larger than might have been expected. Its one
-conspicuous article of furniture was a great terrestrial telescope. The
-sliding panels of glass which formed a complete window all around the
-room showed that the instrument could be used without obstruction in any
-direction.
-
-Here a Mexican boy was on duty. When the visitors entered, his hand was
-resting on the telescope. A bright red sash around his waist imparted a
-touch of picturesqueness to his costume. He was perhaps only twelve or
-thirteen years of age, but wonderfully keen and alert-looking for his
-years. At a glance from his master, the youngster took his departure,
-closing the door behind him.
-
-“Gentlemen,” remarked Mr. Robles, when they were again alone, “perhaps
-before I brought you here I should have exacted the promise I am now
-going to ask you to make. Grace and Merle know that I am a recluse and
-wish to live undisturbed by curiosity-mongers or tittle-tattlers. I want
-nobody but the friends I deliberately choose to know about my habits
-of living or the contents of my home. Only in this way can I hope to
-be left alone. Therefore, please give me your word, Mr. Willoughby and
-Lieutenant Munson, that you will not speak with any outsider about the
-things I am showing you today.”
-
-The promise was instantly given and sealed by a hearty hand clasp.
-
-“Now,” resumed the host in lighter tone, “perhaps you would like to view
-the landscape. I may explain that I had this observatory, as I call it,
-specially built and equipped so that I could sweep the valley from end
-to end. For example, I saw you two young men riding along the road this
-morning,” he went on, with a smile. “I saw one of you alight, about
-twelve miles from here—it was you, lieutenant—and tighten the girths of
-your saddle.”
-
-“Great Scott!” murmured Munson, in half-incredulous surprise.
-
-“Test the glass for yourself,” continued Robles, as, placing one eye
-at the lens, he adjusted the instrument. “Look”—and he stepped back,
-motioning Munson to approach.
-
-Munson peeped through the long tube and there came from his lips a cry
-of mingled delight and amazement.
-
-“Dick, Dick, there’s the store as large as life—Buck Ashley standing
-at the door and lighting a cigar. Geewhizz, and it must be twenty miles
-away.”
-
-He rose erect and made room for Dick. The latter gazed in silence for a
-few moments. When he turned to Mr. Robles he said:
-
-“It’s really wonderful—it is the most wonderful glass I ever looked
-through.”
-
-There was the glimmer of an exultant smile on the face of Ricardo
-Robles.
-
-“I saw you at the round-up across the valley the other day,” he
-remarked. “You were much nearer to me than is the store. And while I do
-not invite any confidence, Mr. Willoughby, you certainly engaged in
-a very spirited conversation, to say the least, with young Marshall
-Thurston. Indeed, I half expected to see you come to blows.”
-
-“What was that?” asked Merle in some trepidation.
-
-Willoughby had reddened.
-
-“Nothing of consequence,” he responded, almost curtly. “I had to tell
-the young cub to mind his own business. That was all.”
-
-“You certainly have the whole valley under observation,” remarked
-Munson, considerately diverting the conversation.
-
-“Yes,” assented Mr. Robles, with an almost grim smile of satisfaction.
-“The telescope teaches one not merely to observe, but to reason from the
-facts observed. Tia Teresa evidently thought that she should have come
-along today to play duenna, eh, Merle?”
-
-“You don’t say you guessed that?” exclaimed Merle in great astonishment.
-
-“Guessed it! I knew it when she raised her protesting finger.”
-
-“You are a magician, Mr. Robles,” cried Grace.
-
-“No, only a logician,” was the sententious rejoinder.
-
-“Please let me peep at our garden,” asked Merle. “I wonder if mother is
-among her roses.”
-
-Without a word Robles swung round the instrument on its pivot and
-changed the focus.
-
-“That’s about right,” he said, stepping back. “There is no one out
-of doors at present. Move the glass slightly and you can see over the
-entire garden.”
-
-Each girl in turn made a prolonged scrutiny; they were enchanted with
-the clearness and marvellous detail of the picture.
-
-“Henceforth we’ll have to be on our best behavior, Dick,” laughed
-Munson, as they turned toward the winding stairway. “We’ve got to
-remember Mr. Robles has a constant eye on us.”
-
-“Perhaps I’ve had you under observation quite a while,” laughed the
-senor, tapping the young fellow on the shoulder.
-
-Then he threw open the door, and, with a slight bow and extended hand,
-motioned to his visitors to descend. At the foot of the narrow, winding
-staircase they found the Mexican youth standing on guard. He bowed low
-as the ladies passed, and when Mr. Robles followed last of all, saluted,
-and then immediately returned to the chamber above, again without
-a single word of instruction from his master. Munson and Willoughby
-exchanged meaning looks; obviously a well-disciplined outlook was kept
-from the observatory all the time, as if from the conning-tower of a
-battleship.
-
-Again the party was in the patio. Mr. Robles turned to Willoughby.
-
-“I hope Grace and Merle have explained to you that at present I do not
-entertain. My own fare is of the simplest.”
-
-“Mother is to have luncheon ready at one,” interposed Grace. “I caught
-the broiled trout myself this morning.”
-
-“You caught them ready broiled, eh?” laughed Munson.
-
-“Oh, you know what I mean,” rejoined Grace, with a pretty little moue.
-
-“Broiled trout!” exclaimed Dick, appreciatively. “Then I think we’ll
-be hurrying down the hill, senor.” He had recognized with intuitive
-courtesy that the interview was at an end.
-
-“Is he not delightful?” asked Merle, as their horses started off at a
-walk. “And you would never guess how sweet and kind he can be.”
-
-“I don’t doubt it,” assented Willoughby. “A polished gentleman, but a
-man of mystery, isn’t he?”
-
-“Not when you come to know him. A recluse always has his little
-idiosyncrasies.” As she spoke, she set her pony at a canter down the
-gentle incline.
-
-After luncheon, Dick found himself tête-à -tête with Mrs. Darlington
-in the music room. The mystery attaching to the personality of the
-recluse was still uppermost in his mind. But for the present the music
-claimed his attention.
-
-Merle had seated herself at the grand piano and was softly fingering the
-keys, striking a chord here and there, until finally she drifted into
-Chopin’s Fifth Nocturne. There was something almost divine in her
-interpretation. The music fairly rippled from her deft fingers, as they
-glided on from one beautiful cadence to another until at last, note by
-note, as if sobbing a reluctant adieu, the melody died away.
-
-Both the visitors were generous in their tributes of congratulation.
-
-“Thank you,” said Merle, as she arose from the piano and proceeded to
-unfasten the clasps of a violin case.
-
-“What now?” exclaimed Munson.
-
-“Oh, I am not the performer; I am merely the accompanist,” and she
-held out a beautiful old violin to Grace. As Merle sounded a key on the
-piano, Grace touched the strings of the Stradivarius. When all was ready
-she tenderly caressed the violin with her chin, and, her bow sweeping
-across the instrument, Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata trembled from the
-strings, in soft and plaintive melody, filling the room with echoing
-and re-echoing notes of sweetness, while Merle’s accompanying notes lent
-support, in blending harmony, to the rich cadences.
-
-“Splendid! magnificent!” exclaimed the young men in unison.
-
-Munson was now called upon to sing, and Dick felt himself at full
-liberty to converse with Mrs. Darlington. He broached the subject that
-had been occupying his thoughts.
-
-“What is known of Senor Ricardo Robles?” he enquired. “Have you been
-long acquainted?”
-
-“Oh, I have known him for many, many years,” replied Mrs. Darlington.
-“We used to be next door neighbors in Los Angeles. That was twenty years
-ago. Then we returned to England—Mr. Darlington had fallen heir to the
-family estates. Mr. Robles used to visit us off and on. He is, as you
-have seen, very fond of Grace”—she paused a moment, then went on—“and of
-my adopted daughter Merle as well. Merle, you know, was the child of my
-dearest girl friend who died a year after her baby was born.”
-
-“Yes, Merle has told me this.”
-
-“Well, six years ago my dear husband died, and it was Mr. Robles who
-persuaded me to return to California. He selected this beautiful ranch
-for us, near to his own home. And we have all been so happy here at La
-Siesta.”
-
-“Mr. Robles is certainly a wonderful man, with all those art treasures
-around him.”
-
-“He has princely tastes and princely wealth as well—this you will have
-seen for yourself today. He travels a great deal abroad, sometimes for a
-whole year at a time, and then returns quietly to his hermitage. He has
-taken a great fancy to you, Mr. Willoughby. You are lucky in gaining the
-friendship of such a man.”
-
-“I think I’ll like him, too—when I know him better,” replied Willoughby,
-with cautious reserve.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XI—A Rejected Suitor
-
-IN Dick Willoughby’s presence Marshall Thurston contented himself with
-sullen looks. But beyond his sight and hearing he spoke truculently of
-what he was going to do some day to get level with “the hired hand who
-had had the infernal insolence to call him down in public.” So all the
-little world on the rancho knew, or at least believed, that a bitter
-feud was in progress.
-
-Two or three of the cowboys fostered young Marshall’s feelings of
-animosity, partly out of sheer devilment, partly because they deemed
-it good policy to keep in the good graces of the heir to the rancho.
-Moreover, so long as old Ben Thurston knew nothing about it, they were
-always willing to break a bottle with the dissipated spendthrift, not
-only because good liquor was not to be despised at any time, but also
-for the sake of the amusement afforded by Marshall, in his cups, with
-his stories of fast life in New York and his apparently inexhaustible
-fund of highly spiced anecdotes. Even his braggart threats against
-Willoughby had an element of fun.
-
-“Why don’t you cut him out with the girl?” one of his boon companions
-had suggested on an occasion of this kind.
-
-“By gad, I will,” Marshall had responded with vehemence. “You just watch
-me.”
-
-Thenceforward this thought was uppermost in his alcohol-sodden brain.
-
-Marshall Thurston had met Mrs. Darlington and her daughter on several
-occasions, but, although he had been formally introduced, he had never
-been invited to call at La Siesta. Nor up to the present had he felt any
-inducement to take the initiative. Like clings to like, and these people
-were not of his kind—in the presence of pure and refined womanhood the
-human toad becomes uncomfortably conscious of his own loathsomeness.
-
-But now there was a valid reason to egg him on. He would show Dick
-Willoughby who was who on the San Antonio Rancho. If the heir to all
-those broad acres chose to pay court to Merle Farnsworth, the girl would
-only be too glad to jump at him and his millions. He would tell her,
-too, that Willoughby was going to be fired and that the fellow was not
-worth a moment’s consideration.
-
-Such was his mood one afternoon when, his motor car being in the repair
-shop, he had not made his usual trip to Bakersfield. “Yes, he would
-ride over that very day to La Siesta;” and he proceeded to fortify the
-resolve by opening a bottle of champagne in the solitary seclusion of
-his den. After gulping down the wine he felt brave enough to face
-the devil himself. Yet, when mounted on his horse, he still evinced
-sufficient discretion to make a wide detour lest Willoughby should catch
-sight of him and divine his intentions.
-
-As he rode along young Thurston nursed his wrath to keep it warm. At
-the same time the desire to possess the girl for her own sake began to
-inflame his imagination. Unscrupulous passion had been bred in the very
-bone of this worthless degenerate. Just as his father, Ben Thurston, had
-thirty years before trampled on the virtue of the young Spanish beauty,
-Senorita Rosetta, the sister of Don Manuel, so now was the son hatching
-in his brain a foul plot of spoliation.
-
-“I’ll get even with Willoughby, by God, in the very way that will
-hurt his pride the most. Women!—pshaw, they’re all alike. And she’s a
-peacherino all right—those flashing dark eyes—she sure looks good to
-me.” This was now the tenor of his musing as his pony cantered up the
-slope to La Siesta.
-
-He advanced on foot to the portico with a swagger and a smile, and
-there, as luck would have it, he found Merle seated in a rocker,
-reading, and alone. She rose with quiet courtesy and returned his
-greeting.
-
-“I am sorry,” she said, “mother is not at home. She and my sister Grace
-have driven over to the dairy. We have a model dairy, you know, on La
-Siesta,” she went on, anxious to make conversation that would not prove
-embarrassing. For already she divined some particular object in the
-young man’s visit, knowing as she did that he and Willoughby had
-recently exchanged angry words.
-
-“Won’t you show me your famous rose gardens?” asked Thurston, boldly.
-
-“With pleasure,” she replied, assenting with a sweet smile of
-politeness, although there was sore reluctance in her heart, as she
-stepped from under the portico.
-
-But, unknown to herself, she did not go unattended, for as Merle and her
-visitor passed round the house and through the shrubberies there glided
-after them the figure of a woman, clothed in black, wearing over her
-head and shoulders a Spanish mantilla. It was Tia Teresa, the ever
-watchful duenna.
-
-The roses of La Siesta, as Marshall Thurston had said, were indeed
-famous. Here were all the finest varieties, growing in the perfection
-to which only care and scientific skill applied under ideal climatic
-conditions can attain. Merle was glad to point out the different blooms
-and give them their names—the topic was certainly an innocuous one,
-and she smiled at the thought as they strolled along. She was vaguely
-wondering, too, whether Dick Willoughby would approve even this slight
-measure of courtesy toward the visitor to her home. Although she had
-as yet not the remotest conception that the quarrel at the round-up had
-been in any way connected with her name, she knew that the two young men
-were at daggers drawn, and toward Dick there was the instinctive loyalty
-in her heart that prompted her to count his enemies as her enemies, his
-friends as her friends.
-
-The young girl was too unversed in the ways of the world to notice
-that Marshall Thurston was under the influence of wine. He was too
-experienced a toper to show any signs of unsteadiness on his feet, but
-all the same there was undoubted tipsiness in his leering side-glances
-and occasional slurring of his words. Of this Merle in her maidenly
-innocence was supremely unconscious, nor did she dream that the very
-sparkle of her eyes was completing the intoxication of wine fumes.
-
-Once she cast a look up the hill and asked herself whether the wizard
-of the red-tiled tower had his spy-glass on La Siesta and was even
-then quietly surveying the scene in the gardens. The thought made her
-uncomfortable; she felt sure that her kind friend, Mr. Robles, would
-not look with favor on her condescending to show even the slightest
-attention to one whose evil ways of living were notorious.
-
-Suddenly she came to a halt, close beside a little clump of oleander
-trees laden with rich blossoms.
-
-“I am sorry I must leave you now,” she said, quite abruptly.
-
-“Leave me?” stammered Thurston. “What for?”
-
-“I have other things to attend to,” she replied.
-
-“Oh, I say, Miss Farnsworth”—the inebriate as he spoke made a gesture of
-appeal—“I hope you are not angry with me. If that scalawag of a fellow
-Willoughby told you I said anything disrespectful of you the other
-day, he is a demed liar—that’s what he is, a derned liar, and a poor
-penniless beggar as well, whom my father’s going to fire off the ranch.”
-
-Merle stood speechless. She stepped back when Thurston advanced with
-outstretched hands.
-
-“The truth of the whole matter is,” he rambled on, with growing
-incoherence, “I am madly in love with you myself. That’s what I am, and
-I’m going to have you, too.” And he grabbed her fiercely and attempted
-to draw her to him.
-
-Merle screamed both in fear and in repulsion as she tried to push him
-away.
-
-Just then, from among the oleanders, rushed Tia Teresa. The old duenna
-came like a cyclone. Her eyes blazed with anger. Grasping the young
-libertine by the collar of his coat, she pulled him madly from the now
-half-fainting girl. Then, whirling him around, she rushed him, with
-the strength and ferocity of a tigress defending her whelps, down the
-gravelled path and flung him bodily over the low retaining wall along
-the embankment that separated the rose gardens from the public road. She
-spat upon his prostrate figure below and rained down on him a torrent of
-imprecations in the Spanish tongue.
-
-It was all over in one brief minute. When young Thurston picked himself
-up, it was to see the aged fury half-leading, half-carrying Merle away
-in the direction of the house.
-
-“The hell cat,” he murmured.
-
-Then he brushed the dirt from his coat and straightened out his tumbled
-appearance as best he could. His horse was tied to the gate post a
-hundred yards along the road. He slunk toward it, climbed into the
-saddle, and rode slowly away in the falling twilight. He had been
-thoroughly sobered by the incident, yet continued somewhat dazed, for
-his horse was headed toward the woods and hills and not in the direction
-of home.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XII—The Sped Bullet
-
-MEANWHILE events had been happening in the conning tower high up
-among the hills. The Mexican boy on duty had observed the lone rider
-approaching the gateway at La Siesta, and for a brief few moments had
-put the figure under observation by the telescope. He had then sprung
-alertly erect and pressed a button on the wall. Mr. Robles had quickly
-responded to the summons, and it was he who had had his eye to the
-lens during the scene in the rose garden which had terminated in the
-ignominious expulsion of young Thurston at the hands of the infuriated
-duenna.
-
-When the recluse at last withdrew his gaze, his hands were clenched and
-he stood absolutely rigid in the tenseness of his indignation. He had
-seen Merle’s insultor ride toward the hills and Merle herself taken
-indoors under Tia Teresa’s protecting care. For almost a minute the
-storm of rage held him, then he relaxed and his look changed to one of
-terrible determination. He seized a rifle that was hanging on one of the
-walls and swiftly departed.
-
-At the arched gateway he spoke a few words to the two retainers on
-guard, and when he passed through the postern one of them, also equipped
-with a rifle, followed. Taking a cross-cut from the high road, together
-they descended the wooded hillside.
-
-In a little canyon just below the forest Dick Willoughby was rounding
-up a bunch of vagrant steers. He was alone, riding at a walking pace,
-driving a dozen or more beasts in front of him, and keeping an eye among
-the brushwood searching for more.
-
-On the roadway through the woods Marshall Thurston ambled along. He was
-a poor and awkward rider at all times, the discreetly-veiled jest of
-the nimble cowboys, to whom reins, saddle, and spurs were all as second
-nature. Now, when he imagined himself free from observation, he did not
-take pains to display even a semblance of horsemanship and, with bridle
-dropped, steadied himself by a grip on the saddle horn.
-
-In her bedroom Merle had soon recovered from her distress of mind.
-Dashing the tears from her eyes, she had enjoined Tia Teresa to say
-nothing to anyone about the unpleasant incident. Mrs. Darlington would
-be angered and would certainly tell Mr. Robles, while if the story ever
-reached Dick’s ears there could be no saying what further trouble might
-not ensue—a horse-whipping at least, with jeopardy to Dick’s position
-at the rancho and embitterment of an already dangerous quarrel. So Tia
-Teresa, to complete the comforting process, had assented to secrecy.
-
-On the pathway down through the forest the Mexican, now in advance,
-uttered a low “hist,” halted, and held out a warning hand toward his
-master. The gaze of both was now fixed in the same direction. Below them
-could be seen the figure of the horseman coming around a bend in the
-roadway. The Mexican raised his rifle to the shoulder, but the hand of
-Robles detained him. The time was not yet—the distance was too great in
-view of the obstructing timber.
-
-Robles turned away and rested an arm against a tree trunk. His eyes were
-downcast; for the moment his mind was far away. He saw once again the
-little cemetery on the hill, with the marble cross inscribed “Hermana,”
-and the other gravestone at the head of the twin mounds that marked the
-resting place of his parents whose hearts had been broken by Rosetta’s
-tragic end. The fingers of the man who had long years ago sworn the
-vendetta worked nervously, closing and unclosing themselves.
-
-The rider was nearer now, in a higher loop of the road where the trees
-were more scattered than below. Merle, drowsy from the reaction of her
-emotions, had dropped off asleep on her sofa. Tia Teresa had returned to
-the portico, to make sure that the interloper had taken himself off
-for good and would not return. In the little canyon Dick Willoughby was
-quietly riding behind his accumulating drove of cattle.
-
-Suddenly a shot from among the woods rang through the air. Tia Teresa
-heard it, and after the start of first surprise, into her eyes came the
-light of swift comprehension and her whole face was illumed by fierce
-vindictive joy. “At last, at last,” she murmured, “vengeance begins.”
-And in the fervor of her triumph she threw up her extended arms, as if
-to give benediction to a righteous deed.
-
-Dick also heard the sharp detonation which his experienced ear knew at
-once to be from a rifle, not from the shot-gun that some sportsman
-after quail or rabbits might have been using. He betrayed no great
-surprise—just the unspoken word “curious” hovered on his lips as,
-halting his horse, he turned in his saddle to glance upward in the
-direction whence the sound had come. Then after a moment he wheeled the
-pony round, and, abandoning his drove for the present, ascended at a
-leisurely pace the narrow pathway which he knew communicated with the
-winding highroad above.
-
-When the bullet had reached its fated billet, Marshall Thurston’s
-fingers were still gripping the saddle horn. And right there the missile
-of death struck, glancing upward from the metal crown and piercing
-the victim right through the heart. Not a cry—just an outflung arm, a
-swaying figure slipping down onto the roadway, and a terrified riderless
-horse pivoting quickly round on its haunches, then galloping madly for
-home.
-
-Dick, glancing upward through the timber, caught a glimpse of the
-fleeing steed, and he touched his own pony with the spur so that it,
-too, darted forward.
-
-Farther along the road Tia Teresa heard the clatter of the hoofs and saw
-the animal in its swift stride disappear in the direction of the rancho.
-She knew now for certain that her surmise was correct, and the first
-flush of triumph on her fact settled down into an expression of grim
-satisfaction. “It served him right in any case.” she muttered. “It was
-just what the young villain deserved.” Then she re-entered the house and
-passed upstairs. Her young mistress was placidly asleep, smiling in her
-dreams. The duenna nodded her head in a satisfied sort of way; Merle
-would learn the news at the proper time, and would not meanwhile be
-agitated by wild conjectures. So she tiptoed from the room, and was soon
-busied with domestic duties as if nothing had happened.
-
-Dick, emerging on foot from the last steep ascent of the canyon,
-promptly swung himself again into the saddle and started at a loping
-canter up the winding roadway through the woods. After rounding the
-first comer he spied the huddled figure on the ground. Before he turned
-the body over he knew that the man was dead. But when the dead face
-looked up at his, it was with a terrible shock of surprise that he
-recognized Marshall Thurston.
-
-Dick stood for a few moments, gazing around in utter bewilderment. One
-hand of the dead man was shattered and bloody, while a big splurge
-of red on the shirt showed where the bullet had completed its work.
-Murder—palpable murder! But who could have done this deed? Who had any
-valid motive to rid the world of this stray piece of humanity—and in
-such coldblooded manner, not in the heat of some angry quarrel, but by a
-deliberate act of assassination in a place so lonely as these pine-clad
-hills? Dick sat him down by the roadside and pondered these questions.
-
-There was no real pity in his heart. Young Thurston had been utterly
-bad—not big-brained enough to belong to the social dregs, but just
-equally worthless scum, the more repellent because it made itself
-visible all the time. He would pass almost without a tear except from
-the father whose own record had been so foully besmeared that there
-could be scant sympathy even for him in the hour of his bereavement.
-
-Dick just wondered and wondered. For the time being he had quite
-forgotten that old legend—the Vendetta of the Hills.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XIII—Accused
-
-AROUND the horse corral at the San Antonio Rancho some half-dozen
-cowboys were squatted on their heels, cowboy-fashion, swapping the news
-of the day. They had ridden in from various points of the compass, and
-two or three of their horses, those of the latest comers, still stood
-saddled outside the enclosure, the reins dropped loosely over their
-heads, which for the trained cow-pony is just as effective an anchorage
-as any stake and rope.
-
-Two or three cigarettes were a-light, and the “makings” were passing
-from hand to hand among those not yet engaged in the leisurely blowing
-of smoke rings. The topic of conversation was the rumored sale of the
-ranch, which some declared to be assuredly impending, while others
-dismissed the possibility of such a big deal going through as the merest
-moonshine.
-
-Jack Rover was among those who had no illusions as to the future.
-
-“Believe me, fellers,” he was remarking, “it’s no false alarm this time.
-The old rancho is as good as sold, the stock is a-going to be shipped
-out, the farmers is a-coming in, and in a few months’ time we’ll all be
-hunting jobs if there’s any more cow-punching jobs left in this blamed
-new topsy-turvy world. And that’s the straight goods—hell!”
-
-Just as this terse and vigorous summation of the whole dispute found
-utterance, all eyes were turned in a particular direction. It was young
-Thurston’s riderless steed that had attracted attention as it swept
-toward its accustomed quarters in the corral.
-
-“It’s Marshall’s horse,” observed one of the boys.
-
-“Off again, on again, gone again, Flannigan,” laughed another—an
-adaptation of a popular story that evoked a general grin.
-
-But one youth had sprung to his feet, and skilfully caught the bridle of
-the panting animal as it passed him.
-
-“Whoa, beauty!”
-
-The others had not stirred. The involuntary dismounting of the young
-boss was too familiar an episode to provoke anything more than a laugh
-tinctured with mild satisfaction—
-
-“No Easterner can ride a Western broncho, anyhow.”
-
-“Pass your baccy, Bob,” came a voice from the ring. But the cowboy
-holding the riderless horse now brought them all to instant attention.
-
-“By God, he’s been shot! There’s blood on the horn, and here’s the rip
-of the bullet.”
-
-Everyone was on their feet now, and the situation was being eagerly
-discussed while the saddle was undergoing confirmatory inspection.
-
-“Something’s happened, boys,” exclaimed the big husky fellow addressed
-as Bob, conclusively, if somewhat obviously. “And I guess we’d better
-investigate.”
-
-As he spoke he swung himself into his saddle—he had been one of the late
-arrivals and his horse was all ready for the road or the range.
-
-“Up toward the hills then,” remarked another, indicating the direction
-whence the riderless horse had come. And a moment later he, too, was
-astride his broncho.
-
-“I’ll borrow your pony, Ted,” cried out Jack Rover as he jumped astride
-a third mustang.
-
-And a moment later all three riders were pelting along the road leading
-to La Siesta. There was no difficulty whatever in picking up the long
-galloping strides on the dusty highway, and the speed of the trackers
-depended only on the swiftness and endurance of their mounts.
-
-Meanwhile the boy who had caught Marshall’s horse had disencumbered it
-of saddle and bridle, and turned it into the corral with a kindly pat on
-its heaving flank.
-
-“Guess I’ll report to the boss,” he called out, as he picked up the
-saddle and moved away toward the ranch home.
-
-“Look out for yourself,” shouted one of the group. “Old Thurston will be
-madder than hell.”
-
-But it was terror, selfish terror, not anger nor grief, that came into
-Ben Thurston’s eyes when he saw the saddle horn smeared with fresh blood
-and scarred by a bullet.
-
-“My God, and I believed Don Manuel was dead,” he whispered in a hoarse
-voice to Leach Sharkey.
-
-The two had been, as usual, in close companionship; Sharkey reading a
-weekly newspaper, while the employer he was paid to protect, restlessly,
-as was his wont, paced the room.
-
-“Disappeared and dead ain’t exactly the same thing,” replied the
-sleuth as he critically examined the saddle. “And there may be another
-explanation to this. What about Dick Willoughby?”
-
-“Yes, yes, Dick Willoughby,” eagerly assented the trembling man.
-
-“You saw them quarreling the other day—they hate each other like
-poison,” continued Sharkey. “Where’s Dick Willoughby now?” he enquired,
-with a swift glance at the cowboy.
-
-“Good Lord, that’s just where he is—searching the canyons below the
-forest for mavericks,” was the reply.
-
-Sharkey smiled blandly; the informant looked disappointed, yet
-confident.
-
-“I couldn’t have believed that of Dick,” he added, regretfully.
-
-“Well, clear out now,” said Sharkey. “Mr. Thurston and I will want to be
-alone. You say Jack Rover and two others have gone out to search? Well,
-we can’t do more till they bring us in some news. Let us know at once
-when they return.”
-
-Ben Thurston had collapsed onto a chair, then raised himself, and was
-leaning eagerly forward now. He met Sharkey’s glance of hardly concealed
-contempt.
-
-“That’s right,” he murmured, “It has been Dick Willoughby’s work. I knew
-Don Manuel was dead.”
-
-“And what about your boy?” asked the sleuth curtly.
-
-“Oh, yes, poor Marshall! I forgot about him. But perhaps he’s only
-wounded. We’ll send to Bakersfield for a doctor.” And he half rose from
-his seat.
-
-“You’ll just wait patiently here,” replied Sharkey, as he pushed
-Thurston back into his chair. “All that is possible for the present is
-being done.”
-
-And the rôles were now reversed—it was the bodyguard who slowly and
-meditatively paced the room.
-
-Meanwhile Dick Willoughby had ceased from his ruminations, and was
-beginning to take practical steps for getting Marshall’s body home. He
-had no thought of coroner’s regulations that a corpse should be left
-undisturbed till the proper official investigation had been made. He
-had got his riata ready, and was just going to sling the body across
-his saddle and tie it there, when the rhythmic thud of clattering hoofs
-smote upon his ear. Thank God! Help was coming. There would be others
-to assist him in his gruesome task. So Dick patiently waited while the
-sound grew nearer and nearer, until at last the three cowboys dashed
-round the bend.
-
-“I heard the rifle shot,” Dick explained, “and rode up from the canyon
-below to have a look. I found him here, huddled up just as you see him
-by the side of the road.”
-
-“Who the devil did this?” asked Jack Rover, contemplating the corpse.
-
-“God only knows,” replied Dick. “You take him on your saddle, Bob,” he
-added, addressing the big cowboy, whose horse was a full hand taller
-than the other ponies and more stalwart in proportion.
-
-And so the cortege was formed, Jack Rover leading the way, with Bob and
-the body following and Dick Willoughby bringing up the rear.
-
-The sun was low when at last they gained the rancho. They made their way
-quietly round to the bunk house and quite tenderly swathed the mortal
-remains of the young boss in a blanket, before carrying it to his
-father’s home.
-
-At the sound of approaching footsteps old Ben Thurston, with Leach
-Sharkey close on his heels, emerged onto the verandah. There was no need
-to announce the death of his son—the ominous bundle told its own sad
-tale. The ranch owner stared at it, horrified, inarticulate from a
-conflict of emotions, the hunted look of terror again in his eyes. Leach
-Sharkey took up the work of interrogation.
-
-“How did it happen?” He was addressing Jack Rover, who chanced to stand
-next to him after helping to deposit the body on a bench that stood
-conveniently against the wall.
-
-“Dick Willoughby heard the shot up among the woods, and found him lying
-dead on the road.”
-
-Sharkey advanced a pace or two and confronted Dick.
-
-“Who fired the shot?”
-
-“How should I know?” retorted Dick, reddening slightly from the
-brusqueness of the enquiry.
-
-“I reckon I can tell,” cried Sharkey. And with a swift, experienced
-movement he grabbed Dick by both arms and clicked a pair of handcuffs on
-his wrists before anyone, Dick least of all, had fathomed his intention.
-
-Dick Willoughby was a square-shouldered, powerful fellow, but the great
-husky bodyguard, Leach Sharkey, towered above him. In the first flush of
-anger and surprise Dick struggled to break the shackles of ignominy. But
-the sleuth grabbed him by both shoulders with a grip that rendered its
-recipient absolutely powerless.
-
-“Go easy, young man.”
-
-Dick’s muscles relaxed, and Sharkey was content to release his hold.
-
-“Go easy. If you have any answer to make to the charge of murdering that
-boy, you’ll have the chance all in good time.”
-
-“What right have you to arrest me?” demanded Dick, somewhat recovering
-his poise.
-
-“Oh, I’ve a special constable’s star all right,” replied Sharkey,
-throwing open his coat and displaying, close to his armpit, the badge of
-the office he had claimed.
-
-“Guess that’s good enough for you and all others here. And now take my
-advice, Willoughby. You’ll come quietly with me to Bakersfield. I’ve
-no special grudge against you, but have my obvious duty to perform. You
-threatened young Marshall more than once in all our hearing, and it will
-be up to you to prove yourself guiltless of his death. You bring round
-Mr. Thurston’s automobile, Rover. We start right now.”
-
-Everything had happened so rapidly that none of the cowboys, had they
-so desired, could have protested or interfered. Meanwhile the news had
-spread, for others among the ranch hands were coming up and crowding
-toward the verandah rails. General sympathy was obviously with Dick
-Several of the onlookers advanced and shook his manacled hands. “All
-right, Mr. Willoughby.” “You’ll be home again tomorrow,” “Buck up,
-it’s a ridiculous charge”—these were among their expressions of
-encouragement. Dick just smiled his thanks—a wan, wistful smile. He now
-had himself under perfect control—even his resentment toward Sharkey had
-been allowed to evaporate.
-
-“Very well,” he said quietly, addressing the sleuth. “I’ll give you no
-trouble, Sharkey. Let us get away from here as quickly as possible.”
-
-Just then Lieutenant Munson came hurriedly onto the scene. For a moment
-he looked thunderstruck when he saw the handcuffs around Dick’s wrists.
-
-“Great Scott, Dick! What’s the meaning of this?” Then without waiting
-for a reply he turned to the sleuth.
-
-“I’ve just heard about young Thurston’s death, but you’re surely not
-going to mix up Dick Willoughby’s name with it, Mr. Sharkey? You must
-know that he would have nothing to do with such a cowardly crime.”
-
-“He can prove all that at the proper time and place,” was the cool,
-determined rejoinder.
-
-“Don’t interfere, Munson,” interposed Dick. “Mr. Sharkey considers
-that he is doing his duty. That’s an end to all argument. I’ll have no
-difficulty in obtaining my release once we get to Bakersfield.”
-
-“And the lieutenant can come along with us if he likes,” observed the
-sleuth, conciliated by his prisoner’s sensible view of things. “As Mr.
-Willoughby’s best friend, you can see that everything’s done right, Mr.
-Munson.”
-
-“But why these handcuffs?”
-
-“I know my own business,” replied the sleuth, with returning severity,
-as he touched the constable’s star on his breast. “And as a soldier you
-should know the wisdom of letting it go at that, sir.”
-
-Munson turned to Mr. Thurston. All through the colloquy the ranch-owner
-had spoken not a word. He had dropped onto the bench beside the still
-swathed body of his son, and was sitting there with bowed head and
-stolidly fixed eyes.
-
-“You are no party to this accusation, Mr. Thurston?” the lieutenant
-enquired. “I am sorry for the blow that has fallen on you. But you can’t
-seriously believe that Dick Willoughby’s the man who fired that shot.”
-As he spoke he pointed at the dead rigid form.
-
-Thurston raised his eyes. There was a dull glare of fury in them, a
-savage snarl on his parted lips.
-
-“Mind your own business, young man. He killed my boy, and by God he’ll
-hang for it.” While speaking he rose to his feet, holding forth a
-denouncing arm toward Willoughby, “Yes, he’ll hang for it,” he growled
-again with savage determination, turning round to the open door.
-
-With a gesture to the cowboys standing nearest, he bade them carry the
-body within. He stood aside to let them pass with their burden, then
-followed and slammed the door behind him with an angry bang.
-
-Despite the tragedy of it all, a little smile went round the group
-of onlookers. It meant to say that that was just Ben Thurston all
-over—irascible and vindictive. But some faces looked grave.
-
-“May go mighty hard with Willoughby,” murmured one voice, that of the
-old grey-headed man, the blacksmith at the rancho for twenty years or
-more. “I wouldn’t like to feel the weight of the old devil’s hand.”
-
-But just then the automobile came round the house, piloted by Jack
-Rover. Sharkey began to make his dispositions for the journey.
-
-“Do you want to take anything with you, Willoughby?” he asked in a
-considerate manner.
-
-“Nothing,” was the prompt reply.
-
-“Well then, you’ll ride with me on the front seat. Lieutenant, you can
-share the tonneau with Mr. Thurston.” There was a slight grin on the
-sleuth’s face as he signified the arrangement.
-
-“Mr. Thurston?” queried Munson, taken somewhat aback. “Does he come,
-too?”
-
-“Sure,” replied Sharkey. “Who’s going to make the charge, I’d like to
-know? Willoughby, I just need your promise that you won’t move from this
-verandah till I return.”
-
-Dick nodded assent. “You have my word,” he said with quiet dignity.
-
-“Then I’ll be back in a minute,” added the sleuth, his hand on the door
-knob.
-
-Ben Thurston was standing alone in the centre of the living room, the
-body with its bearers having passed to an inner apartment. His arms were
-folded across his breast in an attitude of deep dejection. But it was
-with the scared look of a hunted beast that he started away at the touch
-of Leach Sharkey’s hand upon his shoulder.
-
-The sleuth smiled understandingly.
-
-“You don’t want to be left here all alone, do you?”
-
-“No, no. For God’s sake, no. I had forgotten that.”
-
-“Then you’ve got to come with me to Bakersfield. In any case you will be
-wanted to swear the information. And you can also make arrangements for
-the funeral. So get your hat and overcoat. We are all ready outside.”
-
-“Yes, yes, I’m coming,” faltered Thurston. “Wait for me, Sharkey,” he
-added, as with nervous fingers he detached his overcoat from a rack on
-the wall.
-
-And a few minutes later the automobile, with Sharkey at the wheel, the
-handcuffed prisoner by his side, and Thurston and the lieutenant seated
-frigidly apart in opposite comers of the tonneau, was spinning
-through the gathering dusk of evening on its way to the county town of
-Bakersfield.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XIV—Entanglements
-
-FROM the observatory high up among the hills, Mr. Robles had witnessed
-the arrest and the departure of the prisoner. He had understood every
-move just as if he had been present on the verandah down below and had
-heard each spoken word.
-
-As he stood erect, his hand still rested on the telescope. For a few
-moments he pondered, then murmured to himself as he turned to leave the
-room: “A bad complication! I must break the news tonight to Merle. Poor
-little girl!”
-
-But it was two hours later before he wended his way down through the
-moonlit forest in the direction of La Siesta.
-
-There dinner was over. No word of untoward happenings had as yet
-come from the outside world to disturb the tranquillity of the little
-household. In the drawing room Merle was at the piano, while Grace,
-close by, was curled on a sofa reading the latest novel. At
-some distance from the young girls was Mrs. Darlington, occupied
-intermittently over a piece of embroidery.
-
-She was seated in semi-darkness, only her hands and her work illumed by
-the soft pink radiance of a shaded lamp resting on a little table by
-her side. In the evening costume of the chatelaine of La Siesta was the
-suggestion of old lace and old-time lavender—the old lace at her bosom
-and around her neck, the subtle fragrance of lavender exhaled from her
-garments that gave to her a sort of personal atmosphere. And as she sat
-musingly, with the skeins of silk passing through her fingers, she might
-have formed a picture of some Penelope seated at the loom of pensive
-memory.
-
-The music from the piano was in harmony with both her mood and her
-attitude—the soft dreamy melodies of Mendelssohn’s “Songs without Words”
-to which she was vaguely listening while busy with her thoughts and her
-stitches.
-
-Downstairs amid the oriental luxuriousness of the cosy corner sat Tia
-Teresa, waiting in the dark to intercept the visitor of whose coming
-she had been apprized by a secret messenger. And at last Ricardo Robles
-came, with the noiseless footfall that was characteristic of the man and
-imparted to him an air of mystery. He was standing by the old duenna’s
-side before she had realized his presence.
-
-“I wanted a few words with you first of all, Tia Teresa,” he murmured,
-as she grasped his hand in both her own and affectionately kissed it.
-“Something has happened.”
-
-“I know what has happened, Don Manuel,” she whispered. “The young man
-deserved his fate, for I am sure you saw what occurred in the rose
-garden during the afternoon. For one of his breed to have dared even to
-touch my little girl!” She hissed the words venomously, then added in
-calmer tone: “So all is well. He brought down his doom upon his own
-head, and vengeance for Rosetta begins.”
-
-Robles pressed her hand as he disengaged his own from her almost
-fiercely caressing touch.
-
-“I nursed you both,” continued the duenna in a low impassioned voice.
-“Your people were my people, you children were my very life, and your
-revenge has come to be my own. So I rejoice that the young ruffian
-died.”
-
-He had seated himself by her side on the divan. “We shall say no more
-then about that,” he responded. “In some ways I am sorry over the day’s
-work. At times I find it difficult to reconcile my firmness with my
-softness.”
-
-“But you cannot forget that you are no longer the owner of your father’s
-lands and flocks, and are virtually childless besides.” She breathed the
-words with intense repressed fury, intensified as she added: “And all
-through the accursed gringo who wrecked our happy lives—Rosetta’s,
-yours, your beloved parents’ as well. While that abominable wretch
-lives, the vendetta can never end.”
-
-For a moment Robles remained silent. Then he spoke resolutely:
-
-“I know it, Tia Teresa. Today my work only begins. Rest assured that it
-will be carried to the bitter finish. For this I have waited all through
-those long years. But I wanted to tell you of another matter—to warn you
-of a very serious complication. Dick Willoughby has been arrested
-for the slaying of Marshall Thurston.” The duenna sat bolt upright in
-shocked surprise. “Oh, my! What will this mean?” she murmured.
-
-“Terrible grief for my little girl—possibly much suffering for him until
-I choose to take the responsibility upon myself.”
-
-“You must not do that.”
-
-“No. Not yet, at all events. Or the victory will be his—my enemy’s.”
-
-He mused again. She, too, remained silent. At last he broke the spell.
-
-“But I have already devised measures for his safety. Now I must go
-upstairs. They have heard nothing yet?”
-
-“Not a word.”
-
-“Then I must tell them of the mysterious shooting in the woods, and at
-the same time reassure Merle that her lover is in no real danger.”
-
-“And Mrs. Darlington?” asked Tia Teresa. “How much is she to know?”
-
-“Nothing! The vendetta is for us Spaniards. It is ours and ours alone.
-No one knows of my vow but you and I. Let it remain so. Adios, my dear
-friend.”
-
-In the darkness he stooped and kissed her on both cheeks. For a moment
-she clung to him, but he gently liberated himself from her embrace. He
-moved toward the stairway, and Tia Teresa followed him cautiously up to
-the drawing room door, outside of which she remained. Knowing that she
-was there, he left the door ajar. The soft music was still playing, but
-suddenly ceased when Robles advanced into the apartment.
-
-“My word, but this is an unexpected pleasure,” exclaimed Merle, as she
-came from the piano with outstretched hands.
-
-He took them both in his own, and bestowed on her a grave but kindly
-smile. He also nodded to Grace, who had dropped her book and risen in
-courteous greeting.
-
-“But you look sad and serious,” Merle went on, with quick intuition that
-his coming at this late hour meant something more than a mere neighborly
-visit.
-
-“Something sad and serious has happened,” he replied.
-
-Mrs. Darlington had advanced from her lamp-lit table.
-
-“What?” she enquired eagerly. “Somehow I had a sense of impending
-trouble all day long.”
-
-“Young Thurston of the rancho has met with an accident.”
-
-“Dead?” gasped Merle, her hands clasped against her bosom.
-
-“Yes, dead, I am afraid. He was mysteriously shot this afternoon when
-riding through the pine woods.”
-
-Merle was stricken dumb. Grace glided to her side and listened in silent
-expectancy.
-
-“Shot! By whom?” asked Mrs. Darlington.
-
-“That I cannot tell,” gravely replied Robles. Then he smiled faintly.
-“But an amazingly stupid blunder has been made. By some combination
-of circumstances suspicion is being fastened on our dear friend Dick
-Willoughby.”
-
-“Dick!” exclaimed Merle. “Who dares to suggest such a thing?” she added
-indignantly.
-
-“I infer that Mr. Thurston is his accuser,” replied Robles.
-
-“The two young men quarreled,” murmured Mrs. Darlington, in a voice of
-deep agitation.
-
-“Mother!” cried Merle reprovingly. “Even to think for one moment that
-Dick, whatever the provocation, could have done such a thing! He is
-absolutely innocent, Mr. Robles,” she went on decisively, again turning
-to their visitor.
-
-“Of course he is innocent—absolutely innocent. No one knows that better
-than myself.” And he gave an enigmatic smile as he spoke the words of
-reassuring confidence.
-
-“Where is Mr. Willoughby now?” queried Grace.
-
-“He has been compelled to go to Bakersfield.”
-
-“To Bakersfield?” exclaimed Merle, half wonderingly.
-
-“There to prove his innocence,” replied Robles.
-
-But Mrs. Darlington had probed the real significance of his words.
-
-“You don’t mean to say that they have—arrested him?”
-
-Robles nodded gravely. “That’s how the law acts. A man under suspicion
-must be taken into custody—he must be charged so that he can refute the
-shameful calumny.”
-
-Merle had dropped into a settee—white and speechless. Her lips trembled.
-Then she burst into a passion of weeping, burying her face against an
-arm flung across the upholstery.
-
-Mrs. Darlington moved forward quickly to comfort the sobbing girl.
-
-“Oh, don’t take on like this, my dear child. The arrest was a mere
-formality. He will be immediately set at liberty.”
-
-Merle raised her tear-stained face. She spoke in gulping sobs.
-
-“But, mother, I never told you—I shrank from telling any of you. While
-you and Grace were away this afternoon, Marshall Thurston called and
-wanted to make love to me—he even dared to try to kiss me. Tia Teresa
-flung him out of the rose garden. It was I who made Tia Teresa promise
-to say nothing about it to anyone. I feared trouble. And, oh, trouble,
-terrible trouble, has already come.” Again she bowed her head and
-continued weeping, but quietly weeping now. Grace was bending over her,
-patting her shoulder in soothing sympathy.
-
-Mrs. Darlington’s eyes met those of Robles.
-
-“This may prove serious,” she said softly, that Merle might not
-overhear.
-
-“It is decidedly unfortunate,” replied Robles; “an unfortunate
-complication that may, of course, strengthen the suspicion against
-Willoughby and so render it more difficult for us to help him.”
-
-Merle sprang to her feet, and with a hand dashed away her tears.
-
-“Suspicion!” she exclaimed. “There can be not one moment’s suspicion.”
-And she gazed up into Robles’ face in ardent appeal.
-
-“Of course not, my dear, among us—among all those who know Dick
-Willoughby. But there is the harshly judging world to reckon with
-besides. They may say that this discloses a motive for the crime.”
-
-“However, Merle has just told us,” commented Mrs. Darlington, “that only
-she and Tia Teresa know anything about this unhappy episode in the rose
-garden. Mr. Willoughby has not been here at all today.”
-
-“But I happen to know that he was not far away this afternoon—that he
-was rounding up some cattle in the near-by canyons. Malice may suggest
-that he was a witness of Thurston’s insolent behavior.”
-
-“Then we should all keep silent on the subject.”
-
-“Which might be compromising in the long run, my dear Mrs. Darlington.
-Altogether it is a difficult situation.”
-
-Merle had been hardly listening to this conversation. She had been
-thinking, and with thinking had regained her composure. Her mind was
-quickly made up as to the line of prompt action that must be taken. She
-spoke quite calmly now.
-
-“He is in prison. You have not spoken the word, Mr. Robles, but I know
-the truth all the same. We shall go to him tonight.”
-
-“Not tonight, my dear,” replied Robles, with gentle firmness. “But
-tomorrow morning, certainly, I would suggest that you drive over to
-Bakersfield. He will appreciate your kindness in paying him this prompt
-visit, and you can at the same time convey to him my message of absolute
-belief in his innocence.”
-
-“You will not come, too?”
-
-“I can do more for him, Merle, by not going to Bakersfield for the
-present. Do not forget that for reasons of my own I live in seclusion.
-My name must be mentioned to no one but Mr. Willoughby. Trust me, all
-three of you, and leave me to work quietly alone and by my own methods.
-There, I give my promise. The captive will be set free within a short
-time. My hand on that, and you know that I never break my word.”
-
-There was a joyous smile of confidence on his face as he spoke the
-words. Merle took the extended hand gratefully, trustfully, and pressed
-it to her lips. Robles went on:
-
-“My advice is—try to sleep tonight. Tomorrow, or within a few brief
-tomorrows, all will be well. Good night.”
-
-Tia Teresa followed him from the open door down into the outer hall.
-
-“You heard everything,” he said as he paused to speak a final word of
-parting. “Comfort her, but at the same time guard our secret closer than
-ever. Not one hair of Willoughby’s head will be touched—make her know
-that for certain. And everything will come right in a very little time.”
-
-“My poor little girl,” he murmured to himself as he strode down the
-silent tree-shadowed avenue.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XV—Behind the Bars
-
-Dick Willoughby had been lodged in the county jail at Bakersfield, duly
-charged by Ben Thurston as the murderer of his son. To his surprise, and
-indeed to his dismay, the prisoner was informed that, the crime alleged
-being a capital one, no bail could be accepted. This was first of all
-a blow to Willoughby’s pride. Here he was under the stigma of
-imprisonment, but with no possibility of redress. It was not the loss of
-comforts, the deprivation of personal liberty, the hardships to body and
-to soul, inseparable from such restraint, that he resented, so much as
-the semiconviction of guilt implied by the durance vile to which he was
-to be subjected, although absolutely innocent of the deed of which he
-was accused.
-
-However, after first chagrin came manly philosophy. The law might be
-right or wrong, wise or unwise, necessary or superfluous. But all the
-same it was the law of the state and had therefore to be obeyed. So,
-when the situation was finally reviewed, it was Lieutenant Munson who,
-when bidding his friend good-night, had been the angry man, fretting
-and fuming over such an abominable act of injustice, while the prisoner
-himself was tranquilly resigned to the ordeal through which he must
-pass and to which unkind fate was subjecting him for reasons that he was
-powerless to fathom.
-
-“Good night, Ches, old man. You’ll see me again in the morning. It’s
-mighty kind of you to stay in town all night. But we can decide on the
-best lawyer to employ, and then you must hasten back to break the bad
-news at La Siesta.”
-
-Such had been Dick’s quiet words when their colloquy had been broken up,
-and he had been ordered to the retirement of his prison cell. To enter
-that place was for Dick a horrible experience. But he accepted the
-experience calmly, bade the turnkey a cheerful good-night, and laid him
-down to sleep on the narrow mattress resting upon the hard bench, at
-peace with himself and the world, even with the bitter enemy who had all
-so unexpectedly appeared on his path.
-
-Although Munson was back in the jail betimes next morning, he found Dick
-already conferring with a lawyer—the best and most honored in the town,
-as Munson knew the moment his name was mentioned.
-
-“Let me introduce you to Mr. Bradley,” said Dick, presenting him. “Some
-kind friend whose name he declines to reveal for the present, sent him a
-special message last night retaining his services for my defence.”
-
-“Mrs. Darlington, I bet,” interjected the lieutenant.
-
-“No, not Mrs. Darlington, let me assure you,” rejoined the lawyer,
-“although undoubtedly she would be willing to do the same thing. But I
-am not permitted to say any more.”
-
-“And he has carte blanche for all expenses,” smiled Dick. “Although I
-should not think there will be much money required to clear an innocent
-man,” he added.
-
-“Wait till you see,” said the lawyer crisply. “We have to reckon with a
-malignant persecutor, I am already informed.”
-
-“Well, I’ve got a bit to my bank credit,” Dick replied. “And we’ll draw
-on that first before I accept the generosity of an unknown friend. It
-will be quite a saving here,” he went on with a humorous twinkle in his
-eye as he glanced around. “Free board and lodging at the state’s expense
-for a week at all events.”
-
-“Much longer than that, I am afraid,” gravely remarked the lawyer.
-“You see, Mr. Munson, just before you arrived we were discussing
-the decidedly unfortunate coincidence that at the time the shooting
-occurred, Mr. Willoughby, by his own admission, was in the little canyon
-below the scene of the tragedy.”
-
-“Rounding up some cattle,” observed Dick. “Of course. But all the same,
-open to suspicion as being on the ground, and indeed being the first to
-reach the dead man’s side.”
-
-“That should be proof of innocence,” observed Munson.
-
-“Or may be taken as evidence of well-reasoned audacity to throw accusers
-off the trail,” retorted the attorney. “You see we have to look at
-everything, not from our own point of view, but from the other side. Now
-I want to learn something more about that quarrel between you and young
-Thurston at the cattle muster.”
-
-“He made an insulting remark about one of the young ladies from La
-Siesta,” replied Dick. “I told him I would tan his hide if he ever did
-it again. That’s all. But the last thing I want is that these ladies’
-names should be dragged into the case.”
-
-“But his remark and your reproof were overheard by others,” commented
-the attorney.
-
-“Oh, yes, by a bunch of ranch hands.”
-
-“Whose evidence will undoubtedly be called for the prosecution,
-necessitating, perhaps, the evidence of the young ladies on our side.”
-
-“By God, I won’t stand for that,” exclaimed Dick hotly. “I can defend
-myself without their being called to the witness stand. Think, Munson,
-of subjecting Merle or Grace to any such thing”—and his indignant face
-appealed to the lieutenant’s.
-
-“I saw nothing of the quarrel,” observed Munson, addressing the lawyer,
-“although, of course, I heard something about it later on—not from
-Willoughby, however, for he has never once referred to the matter in
-conversation with me. But I say, Dick, old fellow, you know that Merle
-Farnsworth and Grace Darlington, too, will be only too proud and happy
-to stand up for you in a law court or anywhere else.”
-
-“That may be,” replied Dick gloomily, “but I don’t propose that they
-shall be made the objects of vulgar curiosity in a crowded court-room,
-or that their ears should ever hear the vile words that fell from that
-miserable degenerate who has at last met the fate he properly deserved.”
-
-“Well, it is a point that we shall have to consider carefully,” spoke
-the lawyer as he rose to take his departure. “I have all the main facts
-of the case now, Mr. Willoughby. Of course I shall apply formally to
-the court for bail, but I know it is bound to be refused. I’ll make all
-arrangements outside for your comfort here—meals, etc., and no
-doubt your friend, Mr. Munson, will bring you over clothing, toilet
-requisites, and the other little things you will require. I’ll see you
-again later on today.”
-
-The lawyer was gone, and the two comrades were alone in the little room,
-stone-walled and bare of furniture except for a few chairs, where the
-consultation had been held. Beyond the open door stood a constable, just
-out of earshot. But he now took his stand within the room.
-
-“Well, Munson, old chap,” said Dick with cheerful alacrity, “you get
-back to the rancho in double-quick time. Then go on to La Siesta and
-tell Merle not to worry on my account. Tell her that I’m bright and
-happy, and just enjoying a good rest, and will be set at liberty within
-a week or so. But remember, she is not to come here. Good Lord, I
-never want her to see me in a place like this.” And he glanced around
-forlornly, and in a measure ashamed.
-
-But at the very moment there was a flutter along the corridor—the sound
-of voices, and women’s voices, too. A moment later the superintendent of
-the jail appeared, bringing with him Mrs. Darlington and Merle. At the
-doorway he spoke to the officer on guard; the man withdrew.
-
-“Mr. Willoughby, here are some more friends,” said the superintendent
-as he ushered in the ladies. “I am going to interpret the regulations as
-leniently as possible—that’s a matter which can rest between ourselves.
-I’ll come back for you, Mrs. Darlington, in half an hour.”
-
-Merle advanced toward Dick with outstretched hand. In her other hand was
-a fine bouquet of roses.
-
-“What a shame that you should be here,” she exclaimed. “But I realize
-that the only thing to do is to submit as cheerfully as possible to the
-inevitable. Mother and I came over to give you our sympathy and proffer
-our help in every possible way. Grace also sends her very kindest
-regards, and I was bidden by Mr. Robles, whom we saw last night, to
-assure you of his complete belief in your innocence.”
-
-“Oh, I’m not afraid of any real friend thinking me capable of a cowardly
-deed like that,” replied Willoughby. “But it is nice to have these kind
-messages, although I could have wished, Miss Farnsworth, that you had
-not seen me amid such surroundings.”
-
-“Do you think that we would desert you in such a time of trouble as
-this?” replied Merle, as she sat down. “But seeing that our visit is
-to be restricted to half an hour, it is well that we should get to
-the important points without delay. I have been talking over a certain
-matter both with mother and Mr. Robles, and although I shrink from
-telling it, they have decided that you must know about the affair.”
-
-She then proceeded, in a low voice and with lips that trembled, to tell
-how young Thurston had forced his attentions on her just a little time
-before the shooting occurred and how Tia Teresa had rescued her from his
-clutches.
-
-This was the first that Dick had heard of the incident and his face
-flushed with anger. But Merle quieted him at once. “You need not be
-angry now, Mr. Willoughby. It is all over. But your lawyer will want to
-consider what bearing this may possibly have upon the case.”
-
-“It can have no bearing at all,” maintained Dick. “In the first place I
-didn’t even know till now that Marshall had been visiting at La Siesta.
-And in the second place, just as I was saying to Munson a few minutes
-ago, I am determined that the names of you ladies shall not be dragged
-into this miserable affair. Isn’t that right, Mrs. Darlington?”
-
-“In a measure. But all the same we are ready to stand by you so as to
-establish your innocence with the least possible delay. I heard this
-morning that Mr. Thurston is very bitter against you, keeps vowing
-vengeance, and announces that no money will be spared to bring the
-slayer of his son to retribution.”
-
-“Well, I hope he’ll find him without loss of time,” smiled Dick. “That
-will be the quickest and easiest way to get me out of confinement.
-But at this moment I have not the faintest idea on whom to fasten the
-charge. Lots of the cowboys despised young Thurston, but none were
-really his enemies, and I don’t know any one among the bunch who would
-have shot him in that dastardly, cold-blooded manner.”
-
-“Which makes the situation for you all the more disagreeable,” commented
-Munson. “You had been known to threaten him, and if there is no one else
-to whom suspicion can point, you may be kept here, Dick, for quite a
-time—for months, perhaps, until the case goes to trial.”
-
-Dick’s face fell. “For months!” he exclaimed. “Surely that would be an
-outrage.”
-
-“Oh, I wouldn’t be too despondent,” protested Merle. “Besides, Mr.
-Robles has pledged his word to me that you will be free in a very brief
-time.”
-
-“Then he may know who the culprit is,” remarked Dick eagerly.
-
-“No,” interposed Mrs. Darlington. “He is like ourselves—quite in the
-dark. But you may rest assured that Mr. Robles will leave no stone
-unturned to solve the mystery and restore you to liberty, Mr.
-Willoughby, for I happen to know that he holds you in highest esteem.”
-
-“I’m glad of that,” replied Dick. “Well, I want you to tell him from me
-how keen I am that you ladies shall be spared from all association
-with this case. You know that I am exercising great self-denial, Miss
-Farnsworth, when I say that you are never to come here again. This is no
-place for you.”
-
-“Pardon me,” laughed Merle, “but we are interested in you and will
-excuse the hotel you have chosen to patronize. We brought these
-roses for you from La Siesta”—as she spoke she presented him with the
-beautiful blooms—“and if Lieutenant Munson will be kind enough to come
-out to our automobile he will find there some books, also a box of fruit
-and a few delicacies which we hope will help to make your stay here just
-a little more tolerable.”
-
-“You’re kind indeed,” murmured Dick gratefully. “Don’t worry about me,”
-he added cheerfully, “I’ll have a fine rest here, and will be able to
-catch up with my arrears of reading.”
-
-And in this philosophic frame of mind the prisoner was left to begin his
-holiday.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XVI—Pierre Luzon Returns
-
-IN the outside world the question on everybody’s lips was—who had
-fired the fatal shot among the pine woods? The young reprobate had been
-thoroughly despised, but he had no known enemies except Willoughby. So
-while Willoughby’s staunch friends could only reiterate the question
-in vain perplexity, most people were inclined to answer it with Dick’s
-name. The angry quarrel between the two young men was universally
-known and had been subjected to sundry embellishments—for example, the
-threatened horse-whipping had become an actual recorded event, and so
-on. And even there were whispers about rivalry in some love affair—that
-Marshall had had his eye on one of the young ladies at La Siesta where
-Dick for some time had been a constant caller.
-
-So among the cowboys on the ranch, the oil drillers who frequented
-the Bakersfield saloons and had often enough stood around while young
-Thurston had set up the drinks, the newspaper reading public generally
-for whom all the facts had been set forth in elaborate detail—the
-universal concensus of opinion seemed to be that Dick Willoughby was the
-man. Not that this verdict of popular opinion carried with it any real
-reprobation. Everyone agreed that the worthless degenerate had met even
-a kindlier fate than he merited. Had he lived, not all his father’s
-millions could have long saved him either from the penitentiary or an
-asylum for the insane.
-
-A week passed. Thurston brooded in solitude, but at his bidding Leach
-Sharkey kept up active investigations with a view to nose out every bit
-of evidence that could tell against the accused man. Sharkey worked,
-not from any special animosity against Willoughby, but from keen
-professional pride.
-
-Dick accepted his confinement with manly fortitude. It. was one of those
-untoward happenings that come into some people’s lives for no obvious
-reason, but he was calm in the confidence that everything would be made
-clear in a very short time.
-
-Moreover he was clear to his own conscience, which was the main thing.
-Next in importance was that Merle, Grace and Mrs. Darlington, Robles and
-Munson, all the friends whom he held in highest esteem, had never for
-one moment doubted him. In their unshaken friendship was sufficient
-reward for all the tribulations through which he was passing.
-
-Meanwhile word had reached Buck Ashley that old Tom Baker was on his way
-home in company with Pierre Luzon, to whom the Governor of the State
-had at last granted parole. In view of Dick’s imprisonment Munson had
-well-nigh lost all interest in the romance of the buried treasure. But
-it had been Dick himself who had insisted that his friend must attend to
-their joint interests during his period of enforced sequestration.
-
-Thus it had come about that Munson found himself one evening at the
-store, awaiting with Jack Rover and Buck Ashley the arrival of the
-automobile in which the sheriff was bringing the liberated convict
-from San Quentin. In a brief letter Tom Baker had explained that he had
-decided on this manner of transportation both because of its ensuring
-privacy and also because Pierre Luzon was so enfeebled by age, sickness
-and prolonged confinement that he could not travel by train. “I’ve
-rigged up a stretcher,” wrote Tom, “but the poor old Frenchie is as weak
-as a kitten, and we’ll have to run slow.”
-
-Nine o’clock that night was the scheduled hour around which the
-automobile might be expected. Buck Ashley had the extra cot for the
-invalid all ready in his own bedroom at the rear of the store.
-
-It was close on ten o’clock, however, before the headlight of the
-automobile showed across the valley on the high-road. Buck piled another
-big log on the fire in the sitting room. He saw that the doors were all
-carefully closed and the shades pulled down. Then he brought in from the
-bar a tray with glasses and a bottle of whisky.
-
-“Kentucky bourbon—that was old Pierre Luzon’s favorite lotion,” he said
-as he set down the tray. “And I guess he’ll be glad of a good stiff
-drink on a cold night like this.”
-
-At last the automobile entered the yard, and the invalid was carried in
-on the stretcher and propped up comfortably in a rocking chair near the
-cheerful blaze. His teeth were chattering from cold, and he gratefully
-gulped down the stiff glass of bourbon which Buck lost no time in
-proffering him.
-
-“You see,” explained Tom Baker, as he bustled around, “the Governor just
-grants paroles; he can’t grant pardons. Some sort of a board has to pass
-on the pardons. But I got him out all right, and that’s the main thing.
-Eh, Pierre, old man?”
-
-The sheriff nodded with great friendliness to his protégé. Luzon
-responded with a wan smile that silently spoke his thankfulness. His
-face was deathly pale, but there was wonderful snap and vitality in
-the black bead-like eyes that roamed around the room and searched each
-countenance.
-
-Buck was now standing by the rocker. He laid a hand familiarly on the
-Frenchman’s shoulder.
-
-“You see, Pierre, old scout, I don’t forget you”—he pointed to the
-bottle on the table. “Kentucky bourbon, the best I’ve got in the house,
-and the very label you used to call for. Now we’ve got to drink to your
-speedy recovery. Fill up all round, boys. The drinks are on me tonight.”
-
-“Hip, hip, hooray!” shouted Tom, as the glasses tinkled.
-
-“Hush!” exclaimed Buck, warningly. “We don’t want to bring any booze
-fighters prowlin’ around here tonight. You see, Pierre, we four are in
-cahoots and understand each other. You know Tom and myself—we ain’t in
-need of any guarantee. And you can trust Mr. Chester Munson and Jack
-Rover here to the limit.”
-
-Luzon bowed acknowledgment of the informal introduction.
-
-“It was we who put up the cash to get you out of San Quentin,” continued
-Buck, as he dropped into a chair close beside Tom Baker.
-
-“Together with Dick Willoughby,” interjected Munson.
-
-“Oh, yes, not forgettin’ Dick,” resumed the storekeeper, “as fine a
-young feller as ever walked on shoe leather. But, by God, he’s in jail
-just now.”
-
-“Eh?” ejaculated the ex-convict, with a look of awakening, almost
-fraternal, interest.
-
-Buck turned to the sheriff.
-
-“Of course, Tom, you’ll have read all about that terrible affair in the
-newspapers?”
-
-The sheriff surreptitiously grabbed Buck’s arm. He spoke in a
-confidential whisper.
-
-“Drop that subject for the present. I’ve said nothin’ about it to old
-Pierre in case it might upset him. I ain’t dared to mention the name
-Thurston to him, for he shared the White Wolf’s hatred of the breed.”
-Then Tom gave a little cough and glanced across the fireplace at the
-Frenchman. “Just a little cowboy shootin’ scrap, Pierre, in which our
-chum Dick Willoughby has got himself temporarily involved. But say,
-boys,” he went on, casting his eyes toward Munson and Rover, “I just
-thanked the Lord it wasn’t me as had to arrest Dick. Of course if I had
-still been sheriff I’d a done it—when I was a sworn-in officer, duty was
-duty all the time with me, as every damned horse-thief within a hundred
-miles knows. But to take an honest man into custody for shootin’ a
-miserable human coyote like that young—”
-
-“Well, we’re not a-goin’ to speak about him just now,” interrupted Buck,
-bestowing a cautioning kick on the sheriff’s shins.
-
-Tom took the timely reminder.
-
-“That would have gone sore against the grain,” he said emphatically, as
-he reached for the whisky bottle and replenished his tumbler.
-
-“Glad to be back?” asked Buck, beaming pleasantly on old Pierre.
-
-The Frenchman lifted one thin hand and smiled.
-
-“Here I will become once more strong,” he murmured. “No place in ze
-world like ze dear old Tehachapi mountains.”
-
-“Wal, I see you’ve begun to let your beard grow again,” continued Buck,
-pointing to the gray stubbled chin. “And when your hair comes along,
-too, you’ll just be lookin’ fine and dandy. The same old Pierre that
-used to sit for hours at a time in the store.”
-
-He paused a moment, surveying the visitor.
-
-“A leetle more whisky, please,” murmured Pierre, as he watched the
-sheriff lay down his glass.
-
-“All the whisky you want, old fellow,” exclaimed Buck, with effusive
-hospitality. “By gunnies, you’re entitled to a good few nips after all
-the long years you’ve been locked up. Ain’t that so, boys?”
-
-“I should say,” declared Tom, fervently, wiping his lips with the back
-of his hand.
-
-The Frenchman drank gratefully, and as he felt the warm alcoholic glow
-in his vitals, uttered a deep-drawn “Ah!” of appreciation.
-
-“Tastes good, don’t it?” observed Buck. “You never turned down a drink
-of good whisky in the old days, did you, Pierre? Great times then! And
-gosh almighty, don’t it beat hell, I never suspected who you were all
-those years you used to sit around the store smokin’ that big-bowled
-pipe of yourn? And you knew about the cave then?”
-
-“Oh, Pierre Luzon, he know how to keep one secret,” responded the
-Frenchman, smiling.
-
-“Yes, and good for us all you kept it, old man,” exclaimed the sheriff.
-“He’s a-goin’ to show us the cave tomorrow, Buck. There will be six in
-the divvy-up now, boys, for of course Pierre Luzon stands in. That’s
-agreeable all round, fellers?”
-
-“Sure, sure,” responded the others in unison. Tom turned to the
-Frenchman.
-
-“I told you, Pierre, we’d play the game fair and square with you. Ain’t
-that right?”
-
-“I trust you all,” replied Luzon. “I show ze cave tomorrow to my friend,
-Tom Baker, and you gentlemen who have been so kind to make up one purse
-to bring me back here from zat horrid prison.”
-
-“Guess you’re about the only feller that knows where it is?” enquired
-Buck, cautiously.
-
-Luzon looked at his questioner and spoke just one word: “Guadalupe.”
-
-“Does Gaudalupe know?” exclaimed Jack Rover. “I thought her long suit
-was the riffle where she gets her placer gold.”
-
-“Guadalupe,” answered Pierre, speaking slowly, “she know ze cave, but
-she not know where ze treasure is buried. Ze cave her home. She live
-zere. Lots and lots of times she come out, and nobody ever track her
-when she go back. Ze outlaws they sharp-shoot from places in ze hills
-nobody could see. But I show you,” he continued, nodding his head at
-Jack Rover, “I, Pierre, show you where zat riffle is. I know both where
-Guadalupe wash out placer gold and ze secret chamber in ze big cave
-where Joaquin Murietta bury him money and where ze White Wolf, Don
-Manuel—peace to his soul!”—Pierre Luzon crossed himself—“hide sacks and
-sacks of ze yellow gold. Oh, yes!”
-
-This long speech had exhausted the old man. He dropped his head wearily.
-
-“What you need now is a good long sleep,” exclaimed Tom Baker. “Another
-jolt of bourbon Pierre, and then you get in between the blankets, old
-fellow.”
-
-“I’ve got your bed all ready in the next room,” observed Buck.
-
-“I guess I go to bed zen,” assented Luzon.
-
-He gulped down with relish a nightcap of the old whisky. Then Buck and
-Tom helped him from his chair.
-
-“It is good to be here,” murmured the Frenchman. “I grow strong again
-among ze mountains. I never go back—never go back to San Quentin, that
-one horrid prison.”
-
-“We’ll nurse you like a baby,” said Buck assuringly, as he led the
-feeble old man into the adjoining room.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XVII—The Bitter Bit
-
-ON the very night of Pierre Luzon’s return, Ben Thurston was in close
-colloquy with his attorney, summoned specially from New York. It was not
-only the murder of his son that had brought about this consultation.
-The owner of San Antonio Rancho, while filled with fury against Dick
-Willoughby, was also gravely perturbed over other things. Immediately
-after dinner the two men shut themselves up in Thurston’s office.
-
-Thurston opened the safe and produced a little bundle of neatly-folded,
-legal-looking documents.
-
-“These are the option papers,” he said gruffly, as he tossed them across
-the table to the lawyer. “Look them over, Mr. Hawkins.”
-
-The attorney glanced through the documents in a preliminary way.
-
-“I see the first big payment falls due on April 1st,” he remarked.
-
-“Yes, April 1st,” responded Thurston, “and I was a damned fool, too,
-to let that Trust Company fellow inveigle me into making the date April
-1st, instead of March 1st. You see,” he went on, “the taxes come due
-on March 1st, and on this principality they amount to quite a pretty
-figure, I can tell you.”
-
-“How much?”
-
-“Oh, about $18,000.”
-
-The lawyer again read the papers through, this time more carefully.
-
-“Well, Mr. Thurston,” he said, as he lighted a cigar and sat back in his
-chair, “I left some very important matters to come to you in answer to
-your imperative message. What’s the work in hand?”
-
-“Why, this option for one thing; and then, too, I want you to help me
-put the noose around the neck of that scoundrel who killed my son.”
-
-“We’ll take one thing at a time, please,” replied the attorney, speaking
-slowly and quietly. “So far as this option on the rancho is concerned,
-it seems to be quite regular. Nevertheless, five million dollars is a
-whole lot of money. Is there any danger of their forfeiting their option
-payment of $100,000?”
-
-“Danger? Forfeiting?” ejaculated Ben Thurston. “Well, I’m not at all
-afraid of that. My fear now is that they may take up the option.”
-
-“Why, didn’t you wish to make the sale?”
-
-“Yes, but I am not getting money enough. The ranch is really worth
-ten million dollars today, in cold cash. I have recently had some San
-Francisco capitalists down here appraising it for me, but I had already
-given the option.”
-
-“I see that the agreement provides for your cattle and horses going in
-at the stipulated price.”
-
-“Yes, I don’t know why I should have been so infernally stupid. But you
-see those Los Angeles fellows came over here one day in an automobile
-and stayed all night. We had a sort of a tiff—didn’t agree very well—and
-I let them start away the next morning without their breakfast—rather
-uncivil, I’ll admit. After they had gone I got to thinking matters over,
-and I sent a telephone message along the road to stop them and ask them
-to come back. They returned all right. There was one of their number,
-this fellow from some Title and Trust Company, who was pretty warm under
-the collar, and, if I do say it myself, was as peeved as hell at me.
-Well, he was the one who drew up the agreement, sitting here at this
-table. The paper looked all right to me, and so I just went ahead and
-signed. I know now they caught me for the $18,000 of taxes because I
-didn’t just insist on having the option expire March 1st, instead of
-April 1st. But, to be frank with you, I really didn’t much mind, for at
-that time I was only keen to get their $100,000 for the option,
-never believing for a moment that they would come across with the
-million-dollar first payment due April 1st. You see the cattle and
-horses and all the stock on the ranch was a sort of sheaf of oats that I
-hung out in order to get them to put up their option money—just so much
-bait.”
-
-Mr. Hawkins shrugged his shoulders and said: “Well, Mr. Thurston,
-judging from this inventory before me, you certainly hung up a most
-generous bait.”
-
-“I didn’t stop to think—that’s all there is to be said. All these
-details hadn’t been worked out into cold figures at the time I gave the
-option. When these men were here I just wanted to wheedle them into a
-bargain which would leave a cool $100,000 in my hands. I never for one
-moment believed they could make the million-dollar payment, although, by
-God, I begin to realize the danger of their doing so now.”
-
-The lawyer looked up in silent surprise. Thurston continued:
-
-“Of course I should have had this detailed valuation made before I went
-into the deal. Up to the time I read that inventory I had no real idea
-of the increased value of the property and what was on it. Oh, you may
-shake your head; I’m not a good business man—never cared a damn for
-business—and I know quite well I haven’t given enough attention to the
-ranch. You see I have been living mostly in the East, for good reasons.
-I don’t like it here at all—I’ve never felt safe in California,” and
-he glanced nervously at the window of the room, as if some enemy were
-lurking there.
-
-Mr. Hawkins once more reached for the inventory, and carefully examined
-the figures. Finally he said: “Pardon me, Mr. Thurston, for the
-observation. But you should have sent for me before the option was
-signed, if you did not really intend to carry out its terms. I find that
-you have twenty-six thousand head of cattle, and you say that the price
-of cattle is very high just now—that the whole herd ought to average
-forty dollars a head. This item alone makes one million and forty
-thousand dollars, or, in other words, if they exercise the option and
-pay you the first million dollars, they will have forty thousand
-dollars more than the payment which they make at that time.” The lawyer
-pencilled down the figures while he spoke.
-
-Ben Thurston had been listening with a gloomy look on his brow. But when
-he saw the figures translated into dollars he fairly bounced from his
-chair, walked rapidly up and down the room, and then, coming to a sudden
-halt, shouted: “By God, that’s where they got me again. I see it all
-now; these fellows were a damned sight too smart for me. Well, Hawkins,
-you are my attorney. I don’t want to go on with this deal, even if they
-are able to dig up the money.”
-
-The lawyer puffed at his cigar, wholly undisturbed, and then replied:
-“Mr. Thurston, you have already made a sale.”
-
-“No, by God, I haven’t; nothing of the kind,” replied Thurston. “The
-truth is that I should get ten million dollars for this ranch, and keep
-all my horses and cattle, too. I don’t propose to be fleeced by that
-Los Angeles outfit either,” he continued, running his hands through his
-hair. “I have it; we’ll break the contract. I’ll bet that option is so
-faulty that you can drive a load of hay right through it. Hunt up a
-flaw and we will send them back their option money. I don’t want their
-$100,000 now.”
-
-“I have already carefully studied the paper,” replied Hawkins, “and can
-find no flaw in it. It was evidently drawn by a master hand.”
-
-“Master hand be damned,” thundered Thurston. “Why, the stiff wasn’t even
-a lawyer. He was just one of the syndicate—the one I told you about a
-while back. He knows so cussed much about titles that the other fellows
-let him write the option.”
-
-“I see,” replied the attorney, as a half-smile flitted over his face;
-“about all you seemingly had to do was to sign the option papers and
-count the option money. The sole hope you have now, Mr. Thurston, in my
-opinion, is for those Los Angeles gentlemen to let this valuable option
-lapse. You have only a few days to wait.”
-
-“But I haven’t told you the worst yet,” said Thurston sullenly, dropping
-again into his chair.
-
-“What do you mean?”
-
-“I had a long-distance telephone this morning from the First National
-Bank at Los Angeles saying that the million dollars due April 1st has
-been already paid in to my credit. But I won’t touch the money—I’ll be
-damned if I do.”
-
-“You have no choice but to accept it,” said the lawyer. “It would be
-foolish to deceive yourself; San Antonio Rancho is sold, and with the
-payment just made, you, by the terms of your contract, are compelled to
-give immediate possession. I can only advise you to take your medicine
-like a man, but don’t let those Los Angeles gentlemen know that you
-are swallowing a bitter dose.” He refolded the papers, and pushed them
-across the table. “Now, Mr. Thurston, if there is anything I can do to
-assist you in the prosecution of your son’s murderer, I stand ready to
-do so.” Ben Thurston arose.
-
-“We’ll talk about that tomorrow. I’ll hang Dick Willoughby right enough
-in good time. Meanwhile you tell me the rancho is sold—that I have lost
-my great estate for less than half its value? Hell! Isn’t that enough
-for one night?” And he stalked wrathfully out of the room, slamming the
-door behind him.
-
-“He sold at the wrong price,” mused the lawyer with a quiet smile.
-“Perhaps he’ll be trying next to hang the wrong man.”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XVIII—Elusive Riches
-
-IN the meantime the quartet at the store were making a night of it. With
-old Pierre Luzon peacefully asleep in the adjoining room, there were
-many things to speak about. Tom Baker recounted in elaborate detail his
-story of interviews with the governor and state officials at Sacramento,
-the weary and harassing delays before parole was finally granted, his
-own dogged determination, together with the artful pulling of political
-strings that had finally brought about the results desired. Then there
-was the trip to San Quentin, the breaking of the joyful news to Pierre
-Luzon in his cell, the delivery of the paroled convict into Tom’s
-hands, and the clever solution of all further difficulties by hiring
-an automobile for the journey south. The narrative was all very
-interesting, each listener eagerly followed every word, and at the close
-Tom Baker’s chest had expanded several inches.
-
-“I tell you boys, there’s no man alive could have done what I did. The
-business was in the right hands. If it hadn’t been for me, you wouldn’t
-have Pierre Luzon here tonight.”
-
-“But if Pierre Luzon hadn’t written that letter,” growled Buck Ashley,
-“you would never have started for Sacramento and San Quentin.”
-
-“Well, all’s well that ends well,” discreetly interposed Munson, as he
-raked the smouldering wood ashes together. “Gee, but its cold tonight.”
-Jack Rover rose and tossed another log onto the fire. In a moment a
-bright flame sprang up.
-
-“The bottle’s empty,” observed the sheriff. “The next one’s on me,
-Buck.”
-
-“Guess we’ll charge it to syndicate account,” grinned the storekeeper,
-whose momentary grouch seemed to have been dissipated by the cheerful
-blaze. “We’ll have to open books, boys, and go about things in a reg’lar
-way,” he added, as he drew the bolt of the door that communicated with
-the store and groped his way into the darkness beyond.
-
-Buck needed no candle, and was soon back with another bottle of the
-Kentucky bourbon. Glasses were filled and clinked and pledges of
-brotherhood renewed.
-
-“It’s champagne we’ll be drinkin’ tomorrow night, Buck, old sport,”
-exclaimed Tom, slapping his old crony on the shoulder.
-
-“I’ll long-distance Bakersfield for a case in the morning,” responded
-Buck, genially. “By gosh, we’ll be swimmin’ in wine afore long, boys.
-First thing I’ve got to do is to sell out this ‘ere store.”
-
-“Sell it!” cried the sheriff, contemptuously. “You can afford to give it
-away, Buck. We ain’t a-goin’ to be pikers in our old age, are we now?”
-
-“I ain’t old by a danged sight,” snapped back the storekeeper, for Tom
-had touched a sore spot once again. “Besides, when I’ve got a barrel of
-Joaquin Murietta’s gold safe in the bank, you’ll see me friskin’ around
-like a two-year-old colt,” he added, his momentary surliness changing to
-a smile.
-
-“And it ain’t only gold, boys,” said Tom Baker. “That ‘ere story old
-Pierre told me about the grotto cavern havin’ a lake of oil in it as big
-as a city block, sure ‘nuff got me goin’. Why, we’ll be able to blossom
-out into oil kings.”
-
-“What’s that?” asked Munson.
-
-“Why, the Frenchie told me, you know, confidential like, comin’ along on
-our motor car that since fifty years back those bandit fellers skimmed
-oil from the surface of that lake and burned it in lamps down in that
-cavern.”
-
-“By Jove, that’s interesting,” replied Munson.
-
-“We know there is oil to the west, oil to the north, and oil to the
-south, and it stands to reason there must be oil here as well.”
-
-“Yes,” interposed Buck, “but old Ben Thurston would never allow any
-drillin’ on his place.”
-
-“Who the hell wants oil anyhow?” exclaimed Jack Rover. “We’ll have all
-the money we need with the buried gold and Guadalupe’s placer mine.”
-
-“Yes, but oil is oil,” replied the storekeeper, with a shrewd nod of his
-head. “They say Rockefeller has only to raise the price a quarter of a
-cent a gallon whenever he wants to give away another million or so to a
-university or a hospital.”
-
-“Well, we ain’t interested in universities or hospitals,” said Tom
-Baker. “But I agree with Buck that oil’s oil, and I, for one, intend to
-take everything that’s comin’ to me. My God, we can afford to buy Ben
-Thurston out and do some drillin’ for ourselves on San Antonio Rancho.
-It’ll help to pass the time anyways.” As he finished, he began to pour
-out another round of drinks.
-
-“Help to keep you from the booze,” muttered Buck, in an inaudible aside.
-But he drained his own glass and smacked his lips with satisfaction.
-“Guess I’ll be gettin’ another bottle, boys,” he said aloud, genially.
-
-“Oh, we’ve had enough,” mildly protested Munson.
-
-“Not by a jugful,” replied Buck. “You and Jack ain’t goin’ to ride home
-till mornin’, and there’s lots of things to be talked over yet.”
-
-“Great Scott, it’s already two o’clock,” remarked Munson, consulting his
-watch.
-
-“Then the night’s still young, boys,” exclaimed Tom Baker, hilariously.
-“Get the brew, Buck. The empty bottles will keep the tally. Come on,
-lieutenant, drain your glass. No heel taps in this crowd.”
-
-They had started their conversation in low tones so as not to disturb
-the slumbers of Pierre Luzon. But this precaution, or act of delicate
-consideration, had been long since forgotten. They were talking loud
-now, and often all together, and when Buck Ashley had returned from yet
-another pilgrimage to the store, none heard or noticed the door of the
-bedroom being cautiously pushed open by just the fraction of an inch.
-
-All four chairs had been again drawn around the cheerful log fire.
-
-“You were talking, Tom, of buying out Ben Thurston,” remarked Jack
-Rover. “Then you haven’t heard there’s an option been given to a Los
-Angeles syndicate? Guess mebbe Ben Thurston won’t be the owner of the
-big rancho very much longer.”
-
-“And a good job, too,” replied the sheriff, as he helped himself to yet
-another drink.
-
-Buck Ashley shook his head incredulously. “Oh, lots of fellers have paid
-down money for an option, as they call it, on the Thurston property, and
-finally when the rub came they didn’t come across and live up to their
-bargain, and so they just naturally lost their option money.”
-
-“I was talking to a geologist,” intervened Munson, in whose mind the
-oil question seemed to be still uppermost, “and he says there is every
-indication that the Midway Oil fields, a few miles north, are not one
-whit better than wells that can be opened up right here.”
-
-“But what’s the use,” said Tom Baker, “of all the oil fields in
-California to us fellers if we are about to be let into the secret
-door of a big cavern where they’ve got twelve or fifteen millions of
-twenty-dollar gold pieces stacked up, jest awaitin’ for us to take ‘em.”
-The whisky was beginning to do its work; he had already forgotten his
-aspirations of being an oil king.
-
-“That’s right,” said Jack Rover, “and don’t forget, while you’re
-counting them twenty-dollar gold pieces, that Pierre Luzon has promised
-to show us the shallow riffle in the mountain stream where Guadalupe
-gets all that placer gold.” In the cowboy’s case the alcohol was making
-only still more fixed the one fixed idea in his brain.
-
-“Damn this store business anyway,” said Buck Ashley, inconsequentially
-returning to the theme that appealed to him most directly. “Do you
-‘spose I’m goin’ to work my fingers off tying up groceries after we find
-old Murietta’s money and the White Wolf’s treasure? Not by one hell of
-a sight, if I know myself, and I ‘low as how I do.” And at the slightly
-opened bedroom door old Pierre, Luzon whom they all thought to be fast
-asleep, was listening to every word!
-
-“But there is one thing,” cried Tom Baker, striking the table fiercely
-as he set down his glass, “I want you fellers to get next to yourselves
-now and make up your mind to.”
-
-“Wa’al, don’t stop, Tom,” said Rover. “Go on and tell us what you’re
-thinking about. Get it off your chest, old man.”
-
-“It’s just this way. By God, you fellers are not entitled to as much of
-this ‘ere twelve or fifteen million dollars as I am, for I’m the feller
-that went to the governor and got his parole and brought Pierre back
-here to Tejon. Do you get me?” Buck Ashley had straightened up and
-looked at Tom Baker with an ugly scowl on his face. “It was me,” he
-said, “got that letter from Pierre Luzon and we all throwed in, share
-and share alike, all five of us. And we’ll cut what we find, too,
-whether it’s one million or fifteen million, into five equal parts, or
-there’ll be blood flowin good and plenty.”
-
-Baker staggered to his feet, steadied himself for a moment and began to
-roll up his sleeves.
-
-“There be some things,” he ejaculated, “that you jest can’t let wait and
-settle up when the deal is all closed. I know what my rights are and you
-fellers can’t bluff me, not by a derned sight.”
-
-“Hold on, hold on, gentlemen,” interposed Munson. “Let’s not commence
-quarreling about something we are not even sure we shall ever see. Of
-course we hope to be escorted into the cavern by old Pierre Luzon, and
-we likewise hope that he’ll find a hidden treasure. And by the way,
-Buck, this reminds me—the cut has to be into six equal parts, not five,
-for we owe Luzon the squarest of square deals.”
-
-“Oh, I’m not agin’ that,” muttered Buck. “I just didn’t remember him.”
-
-“Well,” resumed Munson, “why quarrel about something that is as yet
-nothing but a myth? It occurs to me that we should rather, individually
-and collectively, be exceedingly thankful that Pierre Luzon is alive,
-and that the White Wolf is dead, and that the one man who holds the
-secret has promised to show us this treasure.”
-
-“I’ve never believed one cussed word about the White Wolf being dead,”
-growled Buck Ashley.
-
-“Well, it sure was in the newspapers,” said Tom Baker, turning down his
-sleeves and resuming his seat.
-
-“Yes, it sure was in the newspapers,” replied Buck, “and they jest
-seemed to settle the fact, leastways to their own satisfaction. But I’ve
-been a-thinkin’ about Dick Willoughby. I don’t believe he ever killed
-Marshall Thurston, I don’t.”
-
-“Whoever did kill him,” put in Jack Rover, “did it good and plenty. Put
-the shot right square through his heart.”
-
-“Well,” said Tom Baker, reaching for more whisky, “I ain’t got much to
-say, but what I says I stands to on this ‘ere subject, and that is—”
-Almost with one accord all turned at the creaking of the bedroom door,
-and there was Pierre Luzon, looking as if he had seen a ghost. His short
-prison-cropped hair seemed to be standing on end like bristles, and his
-eyes stared wildly at the four men. At last he cried out in a shrill
-voice that was almost a scream:
-
-“Ze son of Ben Thurston killed! Ah, ha!” he laughed, hysterically. “Shot
-through ze heart!—vengeance at last begins! Ze White Wolf is not dead!
-He is one live man!”
-
-
-
-0205
-
-The door was hastily closed with a loud bang, and the weird figure
-vanished like an apparition.
-
-For a few moments the revellers sat in stupefied silence. Finally Buck
-Ashley said in a low voice: “Damn that whisky anyhow. It has made us
-talk too loud.”
-
-“Yes,” remarked Tom Baker, “and also too dangnation much, I’m
-a-thinkin’.”
-
-Both were sober men now.
-
-“Believe I’ll have a snooze,” said Jack rover, seating himself on an old
-lounge in a corner of the room. But he did not lie down.
-
-Nothing more was said for perhaps a full half hour; all were nodding or
-busy with their brooding thoughts.
-
-At last Buck Ashley rose and tiptoed toward the bedroom.
-
-“Guess I’ll see if poor Pierre has gone to sleep again,” he murmured.
-
-A moment later he shouted out from the inner chamber:
-
-“Hell, boys!—he’s gone! He’s given us the slip—the damned old
-jail-bird!”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XIX—The Jail Delivery
-
-AROUND Dick Willoughby there had been woven a web of circumstantial
-evidence that even before his trial had convinced most people of his
-guilt. Only a few tried friends who absolutely refused to believe him
-capable of shooting down an unarmed man from ambush clung to their
-faith that he had had nothing to do with the slaying of young Marshall
-Thurston. Among the general public the only question in discussion was
-whether the jury were likely to find extenuating circumstances and,
-should the life of the prisoner come to be spared, how long would be his
-sentence.
-
-Ben Thurston had lavished money with a free hand toward securing every
-possible piece of testimony in support of the prosecution, and before
-his return home even the cautious New York lawyer, Mr. Hawkins, had
-admitted that the case against Willoughby appeared to be conclusive. It
-was only a matter of a few weeks now when Thurston would be leaving the
-district.
-
-Already San Antonio Rancho was in possession of the syndicate; their
-foreman was in charge, the stock under their control, and it was only
-out of consideration that the former owner was being permitted to linger
-a little longer in residence. But for the gloomy and morose man there
-seemed to be gloating satisfaction in the grim thought that before
-shaking off forever the dust of his old home he would first of all
-ensure the hanging of his son’s murderer.
-
-Among the most regular visitors at the jail were the ladies of La
-Siesta, and rumor now began to run around that Miss Merle Farnsworth,
-despite Willoughby’s pleading that she should not mix her name up in
-the case, would offer some surprising evidence in favor of the accused
-man—evidence that might not exonerate Willoughby from responsibility for
-the deed, but perhaps would fully justify his act to the minds of the
-jurymen.
-
-It was now only three days from the trial, and the whole county was agog
-with expectation.
-
-That night in the small hours five masked men rode very quietly through
-the streets to the vicinity of the jail. All were heavily armed, and one
-of them was leading an extra saddle horse. The party dismounted under
-the shadow of some trees. One man held the horses, while his four
-companions, with drawn revolvers, advanced to the gateway. Whether it
-was a simple case of cowardly yielding to threats, or whether there had
-been preliminary financial greasing of locks and bolts, aided perhaps
-by sympathy for the prisoner, the fact remains that within a very few
-minutes Dick Willoughby had been brought from his cell.
-
-“You are a free man, Mr. Willoughby,” said the leader of the masked band
-in a low voice. “You will come with us.”
-
-“Who are you?” asked Dick.
-
-“We are friends—that is enough.”
-
-“I have no wish to go,” protested Dick in the hearing of the jailers.
-“The jury must acquit me—I am ready to remain here until they do acquit
-me.”
-
-“Take care. The man with the money can put the rope round your neck.”
-
-“I am not afraid.”
-
-“There is another reason. The name of a certain young lady must not be
-introduced into this case.”
-
-“I have begged her not to testify.”
-
-“But she will testify if this trial goes on—that you know well. Now you
-will come with us, for her sake if not for your own.”
-
-“Be it so then,” replied Dick. “Lead the way.” Just as quietly as they
-had come the little band of riders rode through the silent and deserted
-streets. They took the southern road, and for the first few miles kept
-to the thoroughfare. Then, reaching a stretch of unreclaimed land, they
-started across country. The night was moonless and dark, but Dick knew
-instinctively that they were making for the mountainous country to the
-north of the Tejon Pass.
-
-The leader rode a short distance ahead. Not a word was spoken. In about
-two hours they were among the foothills. The pace slackened, and then,
-as they reached a clump of oaks, a halt was called. From under the
-shadow of the trees a man appeared, leading two sturdy little mountain
-ponies. The newcomer wore no mask.
-
-“This man will be your guide from now on,” announced the leader, whose
-features were still concealed by the strip of black cloth tied around
-the lower part of his face. “I am sorry we must ask you to wear a
-blindfold, Mr. Willoughby. But you are among friends, and I feel sure
-you will help us all by your ready assent.”
-
-“I am in your hands,” replied Dick, quietly. A few minutes later he was
-seated on one of the ponies, his eyes securely bandaged. The saddle was
-a big comfortable Mexican one, and he rested his hands on the horn; for
-there was no bridle, only a leading rein held by the man mounted on the
-other pony.
-
-“Adios!”
-
-It was the leader’s voice again, and now once more Dick was on the move,
-the nimble little pony cantering gently over the turf. 0006
-
-Hour succeeded hour. The sun had risen, as the blindfolded rider could
-tell from the warmth of the atmosphere. The canter had long since
-changed to a walk, and Dick knew that they had been climbing steadily,
-with many a turn and sometimes up precipitous slopes.
-
-At last a strange chilliness came into the air. Dick imagined that he
-heard a growl, as of some savage animal. Then there came a stop, and
-he caught some whispered words—a woman’s voice he could have sworn,
-speaking in some strange tongue. After a few minutes his pony started
-again.
-
-But they had not gone more than a hundred yards further when his guide
-called out.
-
-“Here we are, sir. I will help you to descend. Zen I take ze bandage
-away. You see again.”
-
-The voice had a quaint foreign accent. For a little time Willoughby
-remained blind. Then he began to see things, and involuntarily rubbed
-his eyes in amazement.
-
-He was in a vast vaulted cavern with no visible entrance revealed by
-the dim light of several lanterns suspended from the roof. In the far
-distance a log fire was burning, and silhouetted against its ruddy
-glow was the figure of the aged Indian squaw, Guadalupe, with a great
-dog-like creature standing by her side.
-
-“Guadalupe!” exclaimed Dick in profound surprise, turning to his guide.
-
-This man he now saw was old, with short gray hair and a short gray
-beard. His face was pale, but there was a pleasant gleam in his eyes.
-
-“Yes, Guadalupe,” the guide replied. “Guadalupe, she guard ze entrance
-to our cave—she and ze white wolf. No one can get past ze white wolf
-unless Guadalupe speaks ze word.”
-
-“And who are you?”
-
-“Oh, call me Pierre. I am Mr. Willoughby’s servant. Here are fine
-beefsteaks ready for breakfast. Come.”
-
-“Pierre!” murmured Dick. “Pierre Luzon?”
-
-“Zat is my name. I am Pierre Luzon.”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XX—In the Cavern
-
-WHEN Dick proceeded to follow Pierre Luzon he found that the ponies had
-already trotted away through the semidarkness, evidently quite capable
-on their own account of finding their accustomed stable. Leading the
-way across the cavern, Pierre entered a corridor at the far end of which
-bright lights were burning. Soon, Dick, to his great wonderment, found
-himself in a comfortably, almost luxuriously furnished apartment.
-
-There were big thick rugs on the floor, and the rock walls were
-completely hidden by tapestries. The dining table in the centre was set
-with napery, china, glass, cutlery and silverware that would have done
-credit to a first-class hotel. Above swung a bronze lamp of antique
-pattern. Another table was laden with books, newspapers and magazines.
-In one corner gleamed the snow-white counterpane of a massive bedstead
-built of oak in Old Mission style. Here and there portable oil stoves
-were burning, diffusing a genial warmth throughout the grotto.
-
-Pierre watched the guest’s look of bewilderment as he gazed around him.
-
-“You will be very comfortable here,” said the Frenchman. “I have orders
-to attend to all your wants.”
-
-“Orders, from whom?” asked Dick abruptly. “After breakfast you will
-know. I have one letter for you in my pocket.”
-
-With characteristic philosophy Dick accepted the situation. The very
-mention of breakfast gave a keener edge to an already sharply whetted
-appetite. Pierre departed and presently returned with a superb sirloin
-steak sizzling on a hot platter. Under his arm was tucked a bottle
-of wine. As he set down the latter, Dick noted that it was dusty and
-cobwebby, as if it had emerged from some ancient cellar.
-
-“Zis is not ze vintage of California,” remarked Pierre, as he drew the
-cork. “It is rare old Burgundy—all ze way from my beloved France.”
-
-“La belle France,” murmured Dick. “I spent a year there, Pierre, most of
-the time in Paris.”
-
-“Ah, monsieur knows France and Paris,” exclaimed the old man in great
-delight. “Zen you speak French, too?”
-
-“Un peu,” laughed Dick. “Mais je fais beaucoup de fautes, mon ami.”
-
-“Non, non, monsieur,” cried Pierre, breaking into voluble French. “Your
-accent is perfect—it is delightful to hear my native language again.
-We shall be great friends, Mr. Willoughby. Already I am your devoted
-servant.” He bowed deferentially, as he held Dick’s chair ready for him
-to be seated.
-
-“You will breakfast with me, Pierre?” asked Dick, still in his best
-French.
-
-“No, no. I wait on monsieur. I shall breakfast in good time.”
-
-Pierre was not to be persuaded to take a place at the table, so Dick sat
-down in solitary state and was served in lordly fashion.
-
-With the demi-tasse of black coffee at the close of the meal came a box
-of cigars—cigars fit for a prince, as Dick knew from the first fragrant
-whiff.
-
-The table was now cleared and Pierre ready to withdraw. He had taken a
-letter from his pocket and was holding it in his hand. But Dick, warmed
-and fed and supremely contented, was watching the ascending rings of
-tobacco smoke.
-
-“Do you know, Pierre,” he said between complacent puffs, “that I was one
-of the bunch that helped to get you out of San Quentin?” He had lapsed
-into English.
-
-“Oh, yes, I know,” replied Pierre, also dropping his French. “Ze five
-men who made up ze purse—I am very grateful to you all.”
-
-“Then what about the hidden treasure?”
-
-“Ah, I was to show ze hidden treasure. But one great change come about.
-I made one big mistake.”
-
-“Then the story of all this gold was a frame-up, was it?” laughed
-Willoughby.
-
-“No, no,” protested Pierre earnestly. “Ze cave—you are here in ze cave,
-although you do not know ze secret hiding place. Ze treasure, it is
-here, too. But I can no longer show ze gold, for ze man to whom it all
-belong he is not dead—he is alive.”
-
-“Whom do you mean?”
-
-“Don Manuel de Valencia—him you call ze White Wolf.”
-
-“Great guns! So he has appeared again. The newspaper stories were all
-wrong?”
-
-“Zat is how I made my mistake. But I did not know until I came back to
-Tehachapi. Ze White Wolf is alive. It is he who has brought you here
-as his guest. Now you will read zis letter, and zen all things you will
-comprehend.”
-
-Pierre laid the missive on the damask table cloth in front of Dick.
-The latter fastened his eyes on it in speechless surprise. Before
-he recovered himself Pierre, lifting the tray of empty dishes, had
-noiselessly disappeared.
-
-“Mystery upon mystery,” murmured Dick as he broke the seal. The letter
-was a brief one, and began without any of the usual forms of personal
-address:
-
-“You are in safe and honorable keeping. Have no care. Nor need you worry
-about your friends—they will be informed of your safety.
-
-“Just as soon as possible the real slayer of Marshall Thurston will be
-revealed. You will be completely exonerated and can then return to the
-world, a free man. By this means a certain young lady will be spared
-from the gossip and the publicity which, although she has been brave
-enough to say it does not matter, would bring for her annoyance and
-pain.
-
-“If she is dear to you, as the writer of this letter believes, you will
-help to shield her from vulgar curiosity by remaining quietly where
-you are until the proper hour for your deliverance comes. It is only
-necessary for you to give your word of honor to Pierre Luzon that
-you will make no attempt to escape or reveal your whereabouts. Your
-trustfulness will be rewarded—this is the solemn promise of
-
-“Don Manuel de Valencia,
-
-“Your friend.”
-
-Dick read and re-read the strange message. All at once he became
-conscious that Pierre Luzon was again standing by his chair. Their eyes
-met.
-
-“Does Mr. Willoughby give ze promise required?” asked Pierre.
-
-Dick rose to his feet and extended his hand.
-
-“I promise, Pierre. You have my word of honor. The letter says that is
-enough.”
-
-“I have read ze letter before it was sealed. We all know Mr.
-Willoughby’s word is enough—it is as good as one gold bond.”
-
-“I’d do anything for Merle Farnsworth,” continued Dick, carried away by
-his fervid emotion. “I would die for her, if need be, to save her from
-one moment’s pain.”
-
-“Don Manuel he know that,” replied Pierre. Dick paused and his look
-changed.
-
-“How the devil does he know I love the girl?”
-
-“Ah!” The Frenchman shrugged his shoulders and smiled. “Ah! Don Manuel
-he know everything. But now, I am under orders not to speak. Over there
-you will find ze latest newspapers, sir,” he went on, pointing to the
-table laden with literature, “and every few days more will be brought
-for you—not only ze newspapers of Los Angeles and San Francisco, but
-also, ze newspapers of New York and London and Paris, all of which
-monsieur is accustomed to read.”
-
-“Great Scott, you seem to know,” exclaimed Dick in a low voice.
-
-Pierre continued placidly:
-
-“And you play chess. There is a box of chess—échecs we call it in
-France, you will remember. I too play ze game. Don Manuel and I used to
-spend many hours over ze board. After I have had my breakfast, I, Pierre
-Luzon, challenge you to one game of chess.”
-
-“Be it so,” laughed Dick. “But you must be hungry, man. For heaven’s
-sake go and eat. We’ll yarn later on. Meanwhile, I’ll have a glance
-through the newspapers.”
-
-Dick handled the newspapers with renewed surprise—the very New York
-papers he was accustomed to receive regularly, also the old familiar.
-Times Weekly from London and the Paris Figaro to which he had subscribed
-ever since the old Quartier Latin days! The same with the magazines—all
-his favorites were on the table.
-
-“Well, I’ll be blowed! Is it the guileless Sing Ling whom Don Manuel has
-been tapping for information? This certainly looks like home,” and again
-he glanced over the table. He looked at the titles of the books—several
-of the latest novels, a volume on socialism, another on the history of
-architecture.
-
-“Seems to know my book tastes, too. I won’t be lonesome, that’s certain.
-Well, I can’t do better than make a start with the newspapers. I’ve
-fallen quite behind the times.”
-
-He stretched himself out on a long rattan chair, and started with a Los
-Angeles daily. He had read lazily on for nearly an hour, when there came
-from his lips a little cry of surprise.
-
-Starting up into a sitting posture, Dick again perused the paragraph
-that had excited his special interest.
-
-It was an announcement stating that an ideal city was about to be built
-in the Tehachapi valley, and that a prize of ten thousand dollars was to
-be awarded to the designer of the best plans for laying out such a
-town. Reference was made to an advertisement on another page giving the
-details and the rules of the competition. To this Dick eagerly turned.
-
-The advertisement set forth that the model city was to be located
-somewhere near the centre of San Antonio Rancho, that the land was
-traversed by the state highway, by two railroads, by two electric power
-lines and two oil-carrying pipe lines, also the great Owen’s River
-aqueduct that supplied Los Angeles, some two hundred miles away, with
-water from the high Sierras. It was further stated that the entire ranch
-was to be subdivided into small tracts, and that already hundreds of
-applicants were waiting to make choice of home sites just so soon as the
-survey work was completed and the land thrown open to selection.
-
-The plans required, and for which the prize of ten thousand dollars was
-offered, were to show the finest landscape effects, the most impressive
-and convenient location of public buildings, the most attractive ideas
-for bringing into being a veritable ideal city provided with all the
-most modern conveniences and sanitary equipment.
-
-“By gad, I’d like to have a shot at that,” murmured Willoughby as he lay
-back in his chair and meditated.
-
-After a time he picked up the London journal, and the very first thing
-that met his eye was the identical advertisement on the back of the
-cover. He rose and began to search through the week’s file of the
-Figaro, and there again he found the announcement of the contest. He was
-too keenly excited now for more reading. He began to pace the chamber.
-What a clever head had planned all this world-wide publicity!
-
-“That Los Angeles bunch of fellows are certainly great. They are
-evidently going into this thing right. Doubtless they are determined to
-build the ideal—the model—city of California. They want the best brains
-of all lands to help beautify the place. Gee! but I’d like to be in this
-contest game. But perhaps it would be presumption on my part. Yet, who
-knows the country better than I do? When it comes to landscape effects,
-I’m Johnny-on-the-spot all right. And they’re in a hurry—only sixty days
-for the drawings. Unusual, such a short time. But I guess they’re
-going to make the dust fly without a week’s unnecessary delay. They are
-certainly live wires—they began by getting old Ben Thurston on the run.”
-
-He was chuckling to himself at the thought when Pierre reappeared.
-
-“Pierre, old fellow,” cried Dick, “would you be able to get me a drawing
-board, a box of instruments, india ink, water-colors, drawing paper, and
-so on?”
-
-“What are you going to do?” asked the old man with a smile. “Do you
-think you are again in ze Quartier Latin, Mr. Willoughby?”
-
-“No. But while I’m here I’m going back to the old Quartier Latin life,
-that’s a cinch. Can you buy me that stuff?” he added, diving into his
-hip pocket.
-
-But he had forgotten—he had come out of jail, and his personal
-possessions had been left behind.
-
-Pierre Luzon, however, had interpreted both the gesture and the thought
-that had prompted it.
-
-“You need no money here, Mr. Willoughby,” he said. “My orders are to get
-you everything you call for. Write all you need on a piece of paper. I
-send a trusty messenger, and we have ze drawing paper, ze instruments,
-ze ink and ze paints here very soon—yes, very soon.”
-
-“Then, by thunder, I’m going to win that ten-thousand-dollar prize.”
-
-“But she is worth millions of dollars.”
-
-“What do you mean?”
-
-“Ze young lady—she very rich young lady, Miss Merle.”
-
-Dick laughed.
-
-“Oh, that’s quite another prize, Pierre,” he replied. “And if she is so
-very rich, as you say, why that puts her further out of my reach than
-ever.”
-
-Pierre nodded his head determinedly.
-
-“If I was you, Mr. Willoughby, ze prize I would try to win is ze
-beautiful young lady.”
-
-When Pierre had gone, Dick again lay back in the long chair. But he was
-day-dreaming and love-dreaming now, wondering whether Merle Farnsworth
-really cared for him, whether he might dare whisper to her the story of
-his passionate love.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXI—A Debt of Honor
-
-PUBLIC excitement had been running high over the approaching trial of
-Dick Willoughby, but his delivery from jail by the masked night-riders
-came as the culminating climax. Mystery and romance were piling up.
-Despite the strength of the circumstantial evidence, the sudden fate
-that had overtaken the young heir to San Antonio rancho had been
-shrouded with uncertainty; no witness had seen the actual doing of
-the murderous deed. The sensational arrest of Dick Willoughby had been
-followed by his still more sensational disappearance; for he seemed to
-have vanished from the face of the earth—he had been spirited to some
-place of concealment to which there was not the slightest clue, while
-also the identity of his rescuers remained a profound enigma.
-
-All sorts of speculations were rife, and it was small wonder that the
-name of the famous bandit, Don Manuel, came to be revived. This was just
-the sort of audacious work the White Wolf would have gloried in—breaking
-into a prison, defying the authorities, leaving behind him a trail of
-mystery and vague terror. But shrewd old-timers pointed out that Don
-Manuel had never in his whole career helped a gringo—that his hand had
-been against every American, and that in his earlier days at all events
-he had killed ruthlessly, out of sheer lust for vengeance against the
-race of newcomers who had despoiled him of his ancestral acres. What
-reason, therefore, could he have had to help Dick Willoughby to liberty?
-Even if it had been the outlaw’s hand that had pulled the trigger
-against the son of his hated enemy, Ben Thurston, little would he have
-cared if a score of gringos had come to their end, justly or unjustly,
-as an aftermath of the tragedy.
-
-Old Ben Thurston had discussed this very question with himself. The
-slaying of his only son, the clever business deal that had called his
-own tricky and dishonest bluff and lost him his principality, the
-sight of his herds being driven away, the approaching eviction from his
-home—all these events crowding one upon the other had exasperated
-him beyond measure and completed the change of the already grouchy,
-disgruntled man into a veritable wild beast snapping and snarling at
-everyone. Yet his mind was completely obsessed by the idea that it was
-Dick Willoughby, and Dick Willoughby alone, who had shot his son, so
-there was no room in his small and obfuscated brain for any seriously
-renewed apprehension that his old enemy, the White Wolf, had come to
-life again.
-
-Dick’s escape from jail almost gave Ben Thurston a fit of apoplexy. It
-was the sleuth, Leach Sharkey, who alone of those around him ventured
-to break the news. After his first paroxysm of wrath, Thurston paced the
-room like a caged animal. He had begun to make a confidant of this man,
-his constant attendant, the protector with the handy guns in his hip
-pockets on whom he had come to rely night and day, the one associate who
-phlegmatically endured his irritable moods and abusive language.
-
-So, in Leach Sharkey’s presence, Thurston, as he walked to and fro,
-spoke his thoughts aloud.
-
-“Damn all pretty faces, anyhow. First and last they have cost me a fine
-sum. And now it is a pretty face that has cost me my boy’s life. It’s
-hell, that’s what it is. But I will have my revenge. I’ll hang Dick
-Willoughby with my own hands if necessary—even if it is the last act of
-my life I’ll have his neck stretched for him.”
-
-He was glaring down at the sleuth, and the pause seemed to call for some
-reply.
-
-“Well, he’s given us the slip for the present,” Sharkey ventured. Then
-he caught the gathering fury in the other’s eyes, and hurriedly went on:
-“But there is no question in the world we’ll run the scoundrel down. I
-myself will shoot him like the dog he is the moment I lay my two eyes on
-him.”
-
-“Well, don’t waste your breath telling me you are going to do it,”
-growled Thurston. “Hunt him down. Take all the money you need. Get all
-the men you can. Search every canyon. Guard every road out of the hill
-country. And don’t be misled by that damn fool talk about the White Wolf
-of which you’ve been telling me. That cursed outlaw is dead—dead as a
-herring. I ran the story of his death to earth—stood on his very grave
-in the potters’ field at Seattle. Dick Willoughby’s the outlaw now. Get
-him at any cost. Get him, or, by God, lose your own job, Leach Sharkey.
-Do you follow me?”
-
-“Oh, I follow you,” replied the sleuth, a sardonic smile still further
-exposing the teeth that were the most prominent feature of his face and
-at all times gave him a hyena-like appearance. “I’ll get him, make no
-mistake, Mr. Thurston. Just draw me that check, and I’ll have twenty
-more men out on the range before morning.”
-
-At the store, Dick Willoughby’s disappearance was for days the sole
-topic of conversation. One morning Tom Baker and Buck Ashley were
-gossiping together.
-
-“What beats me,” remarked the storekeeper, “is that Chester Munson wears
-such a spry look. He was Dick’s closest chum, yet he don’t seem to be
-one bit anxious.”
-
-“Oh, he’s got the word, make no mistake,” replied Tom. “Although the
-lieutenant is as close as wax, he knows Dick’s all right, for sure.
-And I’m told that up at La Siesta, where Dick has his girl, you know,
-they’re still a-playin’ the pianner and the fiddle all the time. Mark my
-words—there’s been some wireless telephone at work. Munson don’t worry,
-his lady friends don’t worry, so I begin to think we’re a couple of
-derned old fools to fret ourselves on Dick’s account.”
-
-“It’s about Pierre Luzon I’m frettin’ most,” Buck Ashley rejoined. “To
-think that that damned Frenchman should have done us in the eye, got
-clean away and robbed us of our share of the buried treasure—that’s what
-worries me, Tom Baker. And you’ll allow now you made a mess of things by
-not havin’ the old convict shackled to the bedpost.”
-
-“A mess of things!” cried the sheriff, rising anger in his voice and
-eyes. “You won’t keep your mouth shut till I teach you—”
-
-But just then there was the clatter of hoofs outside, and Tom stopped in
-the middle of his sentence. A moment later Munson and Jack Rover entered
-in a state of visible excitement. Munson carried in his arms a rotund
-canvas sack tied at the neck. The package was not very big, but clearly
-of considerable weight.
-
-“Great Caesar,” exclaimed the lieutenant, without pausing to give any
-greeting. “A most surprising thing has happened. When I awoke this
-morning I found this bag lying on my table. And what do you think it
-contains?” As he asked the question he dumped the sack on the counter
-with a heavy thud.
-
-“You’ve got us guessin’,” drawled Tom.
-
-“Ten thousand, five hundred dollars in gold!” announced Munson.
-
-“Good Lord!” ejaculated the sheriff in great surprise.
-
-Munson went on:
-
-“Five thousand dollars are for the French warder at San Quentin who
-smuggled Pierre Luzon’s letter out of the prison, and the balance is for
-the syndicate.”
-
-“What syndicate?” gasped Buck, for the moment quite bewildered.
-
-“The Hidden Treasure Syndicate, of course,” exclaimed Jack Rover.
-“Pierre Luzon has sent each man back the hundred dollars he put up to
-get him out of the pen, and five thousand dollars extra to divide among
-us.”
-
-Buck and Tom sprang simultaneously to their feet.
-
-“Hooroosh!” shouted the sheriff. “I always knew there was no yellow
-streak in old Pierre Luzon.”
-
-“And I always said I liked him, too,” observed Buck. “But come into the
-parlor, boys,” he went on, with a cautious look around. “Let’s count the
-money.”
-
-“And divvy it up,” added Tom eagerly. “Gosh ‘lmighty, boys! I’ve never
-yet seen a thousand dollars in gold at one time outside a bank cashier’s
-window. And to think there’s that amount cornin’ to me right now!”
-
-“One thousand, one hundred, pal, to be exact,” laughed Jack Rover,
-lifting the package and following the storekeeper into the sanctum
-beyond the counter.
-
-The gold was in United States twenty-dollar pieces, bearing dates which
-showed they had been minted more than twenty years ago.
-
-“Some of Joaquin Murietta’s loot,” remarked Jack Rover, when attention
-had been drawn to this detail.
-
-“No,” observed Tom Baker, holding up the coin he had been examining,
-“Murietta wasn’t alive when this ‘ere gold piece came from the mint.
-This is some of Don Manuel’s stuff.”
-
-“The White Wolf!” exclaimed Munson.
-
-“Yes, the White Wolf,” continued the sheriff. “So if the White Wolf
-ain’t dead, as Pierre declared that night—” Tom gazed at the bedroom
-door as if the spectral figure might reappear—“he’s honorin’ the
-Frenchie’s sight draft, that’s sure.”
-
-“I see,” said Munson. “He is paying the five thousand dollars old Pierre
-promised in his letter if he was helped to freedom and five thousand
-dollars besides.”
-
-“Precisely,” Tom Baker replied. “But if the White Wolf is dead, as most
-folks say, then the Frenchie’s got the key to the treasure vault, all
-right.”
-
-“So we’ve got to get him back here again, boys,” murmured Buck, rubbing
-his hands while his eyes feasted upon the heap of gold. “I don’t mind
-boardin’ Pierre Luzon for a spell, and he can have all the bourbon he
-wants.”
-
-“Till he tells us where Guadalupe gets her nuggets,” grinned Jack. “But
-you’ve forgotten to show ‘em, Munson, the card that came with the coin.”
-
-“Oh, yes,” rejoined Munson, drawing a small piece of pasteboard from his
-pocket. “It is brief enough. Luzon gives his countryman’s family address
-in Marseilles where the first five thousand dollars is to be mailed.
-Then he writes down our five names, Dick Willoughby’s first, and says
-the five of us are to share equally.” He passed the card to Tom Baker
-for inspection, and went on: “Jack and I are going to ride over to
-Bakersfield, get the French bank draft and put Dick’s money in the bank
-along with our own.”
-
-“Where’s Dick?” asked Buck, with a quick uplift of his eyes into
-Munson’s face.
-
-But the latter was not to be betrayed into divulging any information
-that might be in his possession.
-
-“I have not the slightest idea,” he replied airily. “But I feel sure
-Dick’s all right. He is the sort of fellow well able to look after
-himself. Meanwhile, Jack and I will attend to his financial interests,”
-he added with a laugh, as he began to count the gold.
-
-In silence the task proceeded, five thousand dollars first being set
-aside, and then the balance divided into five separate heaps. When all
-were satisfied as to the correctness of the distribution, Munson swept
-the gold back into the sack, except for the two little piles allotted to
-Ashley and Baker. Then he securely tied the package, ready for the ride
-to Bakersfield.
-
-“Buck will lock mine in his safe, boys,” exclaimed Tom Baker. “Gosh me,
-but I’ll want to look at it two or three times a day.”
-
-“Oh, I’m drivin’ over to the bank myself tomorrer,” declared Buck. “I’ve
-got a bit more to add to this pile.”
-
-“A few handfuls of nuggets, I suppose,” laughed Rover.
-
-“Well, I’ll allow Guadalupe always pays her grocery bills. But this ‘ere
-store ain’t goin’ to be a safe deposit vault, not on your demed life,
-with bandits around again. So you’d better arrange to come with me to
-town tomorrer, Tom.”
-
-“You’ll need me to help you home, perhaps,” grinned the sheriff. “But, I
-say, Munson, you ain’t told us yet how this sack came to be delivered at
-your place.”
-
-“There’s a proper mystery for you!” cried Munson. “As I said before, I
-found the bag this morning, lying on my dressing table. Sing Ling was
-the only one besides myself in the shack, and he never heard a sound all
-night.”
-
-“You’re still in Dick’s old home?” asked Buck. “Yes, but I leave
-tomorrow—have notice to quit, for some surveyor chaps are coming in. I’m
-moving up to Mr. Robles’ place. He wants me to catalog the books in his
-library.”
-
-“And Sing Ling?” queried Tom.
-
-“He goes, too. You see, Mr. Robles needs a crackerjack cook, now I’ll be
-boarding with him,” Munson laughed, gaily. “You don’t happen to have a
-porterhouse steak about the place, Buck?”
-
-“I can heat you up a can of pork and beans.”
-
-“Nothing doing! Jack and I wouldn’t spoil our appetites with such truck
-as that. We’re going to set up a chicken dinner in Bakersfield.”
-
-“Chicken and champagne,” chimed in Jack, as he swung the sack over his
-shoulder.
-
-“You’re beginning to get big bugs these days,” called out the
-storekeeper as the young men left the room. “Guess, Tom,” he went on,
-turning to the sheriff, “we could do with a jolt of Kentucky.”
-
-“Make it a bottle of bourbon,” gurgled Tom, “to remind us of our absent
-friend.”
-
-“Dear old Pierre,” murmured Buck, as he fumbled in his pocket for the
-key of the safe, his eyes glued all the time on the two little heaps of
-gold.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXII—Underqround Wonders
-
-Dick Willoughby was in a way happy in his retreat. At first he had been
-inclined to regret the jail delivery—it might have been the manlier part
-to have faced the music and cleared his name before the whole world. But
-then he reflected on the uncertainties of a trial, the cases of innocent
-men having suffered because of damning circumstantial evidence piled up
-against them, the vindictiveness of Ben Thurston and the undoubted power
-of his money to press the criminal charge by every unscrupulous means.
-So Dick soon came round to the belief that he might be safer for the
-time being in the guardianship of the White Wolf than at the mercy of a
-fallible jury.
-
-Then there was Merle Farnsworth to consider. Yes; to have brought her
-into a public court, to have allowed her to plead for him by telling the
-story of Marshall Thurston’s loathsome advances—that was a thing that
-could never have been tolerated. The leader of the jail-breaking gang
-had been right; Dick owed it to Merle to save her from such a cruel
-ordeal.
-
-Finally Dick’s contentment over his change of quarters was completed
-when Pierre Luzon appeared with a superb equipment of drawing
-instruments and materials. There was no time to worry now over surmises
-as to the wisdom of this course or the other course. Work lay to his
-hand—work of the most absorbing and delightful kind; and with all the
-ambitious enthusiasm of his temperament he tackled it whole-heartedly
-there and then. Hour after hour, day after day, Pierre watched in
-contemplative silence the methodical advancement of the task to which
-the young architect had applied himself.
-
-But there were frequent intervals for conversation, sometimes in French,
-sometimes in English, as the mood prompted. Occasionally Pierre drifted
-into semi-confidential reminiscences, and Willoughby soon came to know
-in close detail the story of Don Manuel’s life—the tragedy of his sister
-Rosetta’s death, the vow of vengeance against Ben Thurston, the early
-bandit days when the White Wolf counted every gringo in the land his
-natural enemy, the often hairbreadth escapes of the outlaw, his sublime
-courage and nerve in the direst emergencies.
-
-“Don Manuel was one great man,” remarked Pierre at the close of one of
-these confidences—the phrase was a favorite one with the old Frenchman.
-“Many and many a time he could have shot his enemy from a distance
-and got away. But Don Manuel had vowed zat he would kill him hand to
-hand—zat ze villain must die with a last malediction in his ear, and
-knowing zat it was he, ze White Wolf, who in ze end had revenged his
-sister’s shame.”
-
-“He felt, too, didn’t he, that his father had been wronged in being
-driven from San Antonio Rancho?”
-
-“Sure—zat was another great wrong—zat was why Don Manuel was so bitter
-against all ze Americans. But he made zem pay for ze land many and many
-times over.” Then Pierre, as was now his custom in Dick’s presence when
-speaking at any length, lapsed into French as he continued: “But the
-White Wolf was a man of high honor. He never used any of the proceeds of
-his robberies for himself. True, he spent the money to pay his band, to
-pay the numerous scouts and spies whose services he secretly retained,
-to plan and accomplish further hold-ups, to defy and outwit the
-authorities. But on his own needs—never—not one dollar!”
-
-Pierre went on to explain that after Ben Thurston had fled from
-California and kept away in hiding, Don Manuel had visited Spain, to
-claim the family estates in Valencia to which his father’s death had
-left him the sole heir. These he had sold for many millions of dollars,
-and most of that money he kept in banks in London and Paris. So he was
-a very rich man, and had no need to rob anyone except to gratify his
-vengeance. Even the hoarded gold of Joaquin Murietta he had never
-touched. It remained intact today in the treasure vault of the cave,
-boxes and sacks of gold and jewels.
-
-“Won’t I be allowed to see this wonderful treasure?” asked Dick, half
-jesting.
-
-“Perhaps, some day, if the White Wolf chooses to show you. But it is not
-for me to do that—I swore an oath of secrecy when the White Wolf trusted
-me—me and Felix Vasquez, who was also his confidant. But Vasquez was
-killed at Tulare Lake. So now only we two know the secret, and until the
-White Wolf himself dies my lips are sealed by the solemn oath I swore to
-the Virgin Mary.” The old man crossed himself devoutly.
-
-“Then where does the White Wolf live now?”
-
-“Ah, that is another secret. Again I would break my oath if I spoke one
-word.”
-
-“And Guadalupe—does she know these things?” asked Dick in English.
-
-“Guadalupe? Oh, no,” responded Pierre, politely adopting the change of
-language, “she is just one servant, our cook—one very excellent cook, as
-monsieur knows—and ze guardian of ze cave. For ze real white wolf guards
-Guadalupe—ze big animal is just like one tame dog to ze old squaw, but
-with his fierce jaws he would kill anyone who dared to approach her or
-come near ze hidden entrance to zis cavern. No man can ever find zat
-while ze white wolf is alive. In ze old days he killed several men when
-zey dared to follow Guadalupe.”
-
-“Then the white wolf must be very old?”
-
-“As old as Guadalupe—as old as the Tehachapi mountains,” exclaimed
-Pierre, again crossing himself and thereby revealing the superstitious
-dread in which he held the savage animal.
-
-“But you can pass the white wolf, can’t you?’ asked Dick.
-
-“Never—except when Guadalupe give permission. Then ze wolf lies down and
-I can come out of ze cave or enter. Ah! ze white wolf is one terrible
-beast. But he never shows his teeth to Don Manuel. Only Don Manuel can
-pass when Guadalupe is not there.”
-
-“Then where is Guadalupe’s riffle of gold—where is the lake of oil about
-which you told Tom Baker?”
-
-“Come, I will show you zese,” replied Pierre. As he rose he picked up
-the lantern he usually carried.
-
-Dick jumped to his feet with alacrity and followed his guide.
-
-They crossed the main cavern, then entered another side gallery. This
-had many windings and from it ran several diverging rock corridors. But
-Pierre led the way unfalteringly.
-
-Fully half a mile must have been traversed when at last the Frenchman
-halted and swung his lantern aloft.
-
-“Zere!” was all he said.
-
-Dick followed the flash of the lantern, and there before him was a dark
-pool stretching away indefinitely into the blackness beyond. He bent
-down and scooped up a little of the fluid in his palm. It was a brown
-oil, as thin as water, and therefore capable of use without any refining
-process.
-
-“Great Scott, this is wonderful!” exclaimed Dick in profound amazement.
-
-“Very wonderful,” concurred Pierre. “In zis cavern are oil and water,
-also gold—Guadalupe’s gold. Ze gold is close to here. Come.”
-
-Pierre turned and again led the way through dark and winding corridors.
-At a little distance Dick became conscious of the purling of a running
-stream. Pierre stopped once more, but this time held the lantern close
-to the ground.
-
-“Here Guadalupe come to wash out ze nuggets of gold, and since I have
-been in prison she buy with zem, so Mr. Baker say to me, groceries at
-ze store. Don Manuel, when I tell him, he very angry—she never do zat
-again.”
-
-“Poor old Buck Ashley!” laughed Dick. “He lost you, Pierre, and now
-he’ll be losing his best paying customer, too.”
-
-While speaking, he knelt and dipped his hands into the stream, bringing
-up some gravel into the lantern rays. But Pierre shook his head.
-
-“You no find ze gold. Guadalupe wash many hours to get, perhaps, just
-one nugget. But there is heaps and heaps, if ze miners came with spades
-and cradles.”
-
-“Great guns, there must be the reef, too, from which the nuggets have
-come!” exclaimed Dick, rising erect and dropping the handful of pebbles.
-
-“Now, we must go back,” said Pierre, “for zis evening you are to be
-allowed to come for a ride with me down ze mountains.”
-
-“You don’t say?” Dick cried, surprised and delighted.
-
-“Yes; Don manuel he send word today that he give permission. But you
-must wear ze bandage round your eyes, and you must promise to return
-when I give ze word.”
-
-“Don’t for one moment think, old fellow, that I would leave my drawings.
-But where are we going tonight?”
-
-“To La Siesta,” replied Pierre.
-
-“Hurrah!” shouted Dick. “Hurry up, Pierre! I’m mighty glad you got
-me those ties and things from Los Angeles. You say you can give me a
-hair-cut?”
-
-“Ze old-time bandit learned to trim ze hair of his friends as well as ze
-pocket-books of his enemies,” was the laughing answer.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXIII—The Unexpected Visitor
-
-MOST of the cattle had been driven off the land. The vaqueros had
-dispersed to the four points of the compass. Chester Munson had vacated
-his room in Dick Willoughby’s old home, and had taken up his residence
-and library duties at Mr. Robles’ mansion on the hill. Sing Ling had
-folded his tent like the Arab and silently stolen away in the same
-direction. A small army of surveyors had appeared on the scene and were
-quartered in the rancho buildings.
-
-The only one of the old-timers who still lingered on was Ben Thurston,
-more gloomy and morose than ever, seldom stirring out of doors now, but
-conducting all his business by telephone or through the agency of the
-sleuth, Leach Sharkey, his only companion.
-
-Jack Rover had pitched his camp temporarily at the store. Buck Ashley
-had assigned him Pierre’s cot, but the cowboy had fixed it under a
-wide-spreading sycamore, preferring to sleep in the open rather than
-share the grocery-perfumed atmosphere of the store building.
-
-Tom Baker was around most of the time. The three men clung together with
-a vague sense that they had a common interest in the vast treasure which
-had so far eluded them, but which might any day come again within reach
-of their eager claws. It afforded an endless theme of conversation,
-varied by talk about the passing of the rancho and all the train of
-changes which were bound to follow the close settlement of the valley.
-
-One morning Jack Rover found Buck at the door of the store, with a pair
-of antiquated-looking field glasses at his eyes.
-
-“Where did you get the goggles, Buck?” asked Jack.
-
-“Oh, I rummaged ‘em out of a trunk—had almost forgot I had the blamed
-things. But we used to keep a sharp lookout in the old bandit days—got
-kinda ready for any suspicious lookin’ riders on the road.” He had
-spoken while still peering through the binoculars, but now he turned to
-Jack and proffered him the glasses. “I do wonder what ‘n hell we’re all
-cornin’ to anyway. This here ranch that we’ve bragged up as bein’
-the biggest in all California! Ugh!” The grunt was one of unspeakable
-disgust. “Take a look for yourself.”
-
-Jack turned the glasses in the direction Buck had been gazing, and began
-to adjust the focus.
-
-“What’s the matter now?” he asked.
-
-“Matter ‘nough,” growled the storekeeper. “San Antonio Rancho is goin’
-to the dogs. Do you see them specks away out yonder in the valley?
-That’s another band of surveyors. One feller’s peekin’ through a
-spy-glass set on a tripod; another feller goes ahead and puts up tall
-stakes with big figgers on ‘em, and the other fellers are chainin’ off
-the distances. This ‘ere ranch ‘ll surely look like a checker-board
-blamed soon.”
-
-“Progress,” said Jack, laconically.
-
-“Progress, hell!” snapped Ashley. “These new fellers that bought the
-ranch have sure ‘nuff driv’ off all the cattle and now they’re dividin’
-up the land. I bet they’ll take the postoffice away from me—not that
-it pays much, for the Lord knows it don’t—but it brings customers to my
-store.”
-
-“Well, Buck,” said the cowboy, consolingly, “there are lots worse things
-than moving a postoffice. What’s to prevent your setting up the finest
-grocery store in the new model city the advertisements speak about?”
-
-“That would suit me fine, wouldn’t it?” cried the old storekeeper,
-with scathing contempt. “Goin’ around in a biled shirt, and handin’ out
-pencils and chewin’ gum to the little school gals that’ll be swarmin’
-all over the place. Not on your life, Jack! I’ll be losin’ both my
-postoffice and my store in these new-fangled times.” He paused a moment,
-then his tone changed to one of aggressiveness. “However, they ain’t
-built their doggoned new town yet, and it’s my belief all this boom talk
-is just so much hot air.”
-
-“In any case you won’t need to worry, Buck, after we get on the tracks
-of Pierre Luzon again. I intend to find the old squaw’s sand-bar, or my
-name isn’t Jack Rover.”
-
-“And I betche I’m a-goin’ to find Joaquin Murietta’s cache,” concurred
-the old man with equal determination.
-
-Just then Tom Baker slouched out of the store, where he had overheard
-the conversation.
-
-“Oh, things are a-goin’ to turn out all right in the end, boys, don’t
-fret over that. And there’s one thing gol-dern certain, there’ll be some
-great things doin’ in this ‘ere valley once they get started on buildin’
-the town. The new place will just spring up like Oklahomy City, or
-Liberal, Kansas, or some of them big towns that had twenty thousand
-people livin’ in ‘em inside o’ thirty days from the time they were
-surveyed and laid out.”
-
-“That seems quite impossible,” commented Jack.
-
-“Not impossible by a derned sight. My brother was at Liberal, Kansas,
-down there on the Rock Island, near No Man’s Land, you know. The new
-town had been talked of and talked of for mebbe three or four months,
-just as this new town is bein’ talked about today. Then finally the
-mornin’ came when the new town of Liberal was to be opened up. There
-was to be a regular town openin’, so to speak, and a sale of lots.
-Why, great guns, when the management of that town company rode into the
-station, on the early train, they found more’n ten thousand people right
-there campin’ in covered wagons, tents and all that sorta business, just
-awaitin’ for the auctioneerin’ to start.”
-
-Tom paused to take a fresh chew of tobacco and then rambled on:
-
-“I tell you, boys, that within thirty days there was twenty thousand
-people livin’ in that ‘ere town. Two banks were established, and one of
-them had one hundred and eighty-five thousand dollars in deposits, too.
-Oh, there’s lots of people who remember the rush to Liberal, and the
-boomin’ of Oklahomy City also. And history’s fixin’ to repeat itself
-right here on this ‘ere ranch. Things will be sizzlin’ when the town
-site is finally located and the rush starts pourin’ in from Portland,
-Oregon, on the north, to San Diego on the south, with a few thousands
-from Texas and other states this side o’ the Rocky Mountains. They’ll
-sure be great doin’s when the Los Angeles syndicate announce they’ve
-awarded to some feller that ten-thousand-dollar prize for the best plans
-for their ideal city, as they keep on callin’ it.”
-
-“Munson and I were speaking about the contest and the prize,” remarked
-Jack, “and were saying that if Dick Willoughby were only here, he’d
-about win, hands down. You know he was an architect once, before he came
-West.”
-
-“Dick Willoughby,” snorted Ashley, “How can he compete when he don’t
-know anything about the blamed business? He’s hid away, right enough.”
-
-“Munson knows a thing or two,” remarked Tom Baker. “If he’d only apeak,
-he could tell us where Dick is. That’s my opinion.”
-
-“And there once again you’re dead wrong,” retorted Jack, warmly. “If
-Munson only knew where Dick is hiding, he would have got that very prize
-competition advertisement into his hands long before now. He’s sore
-because he can’t send Dick the word. Where is Dick Willoughby? By gad,
-it’s a mystery.”
-
-“I guess you’re right,” said the sheriff. “That sort o’ exonerates
-Munson from keepin’ things from his partners. I think I owe it to
-Chester Munson to drink his health—just for ever doubtin’ him. What
-shall it be, boys?”
-
-And the open-air meeting adjourned.
-
-It was the very evening of the day on which this conversation had been
-held in Buck Ashley’s store that Dick Willoughby rode forth from the
-cavern blindfolded and under the guidance of Pierre Luzon. For the first
-hour progress was slow—round many turnings, down steep declivities, with
-just here and there a few miles of easier trail. But then there had been
-a swift canter for another hour over grass land, and now at last the
-riders were upon a well-made road. Dick divined that this must be the
-highway leading to La Siesta, but from what point of the compass they
-had come he had not the remotest conception.
-
-Very soon Pierre Luzon, still riding ahead with the leading rein, came
-to a halt.
-
-“Here we are. Dismount, please,” he said. “You are free to remove ze
-bandage.”
-
-Dick looked; they were right below the knoll on which the Darlington
-home stood. Lights were gleaming from the windows. Dick could even hear
-the faint tinkle of the piano.
-
-“I hide ze ponies here in zis little grove of trees,” Pierre continued,
-pointing to a coppice not fifty yards from the main road. “In two
-hours’ time, at eleven o’clock”—Pierre looked at his watch in the bright
-moonlight—“monsieur will return. I have your word?”
-
-“My word as a gentleman, Pierre,” exclaimed Dick, extending his hand.
-“So long then, old fellow. I’ve got to make the best use of my time.”
-
-The piano playing stopped abruptly when Willoughby, unannounced,
-appeared at the door of the music room.
-
-“Dick!” exclaimed Merle delightedly, leaving the instrument and rushing
-toward him. If they had been alone Dick felt that right then she would
-have jumped into his arms. But at the distance of a few paces she halted
-and clasped her hands.
-
-“How ever did you get here, Mr. Willoughby?” she asked intensely.
-
-“I rode here,” he answered, as they shook hands. “But it is only a brief
-visit. Hallo, Miss Grace! I’m delighted to see you again. And you, Ches,
-old sport—why this is great luck to find you here! Mrs. Darlington, I’m
-mighty glad to see you all once more.”
-
-The whole bevy were crowding around him, shaking hands and expressing
-their joyful surprise.
-
-“We knew you were safe, that was all,” explained Munson.
-
-“So you were having just the same jolly good times,” laughed Dick,
-glancing at the piano. “I’m simply dying for some music.”
-
-“But wait a minute,” exclaimed Munson, drawing a fat wad of newspaper
-cuttings from his pocket. “I’ve got to tell you about a competition you
-must get into—new plans for an ideal city here—”
-
-“In the heart of the old rancho,” smiled Dick, as he completed the
-sentence. While he spoke, he placed his arm affectionately across his
-chum’s shoulders. “I know all about it, old man. I’m working hard on my
-plans—they are already more than half done.”
-
-“Bravo!” shouted Munson. “That’s great news.”
-
-“But here, too, is Mr. Robles,” exclaimed Dick, breaking from the group
-and stepping across the room. “Excuse me, senor, but I did not notice
-you were here till this moment.”
-
-“No excuse needed, my friend. You were better engaged”—this with a
-humorous side-glance at the young ladies. “But I am glad to see you
-looking so well.”
-
-“Where have you been, Mr. Willoughby?” asked Grace.
-
-“That I cannot tell you,” replied Dick gravely. “I have pledged my
-solemn word. I must leave you at eleven o’clock, returning whence I
-came. And meanwhile nobody must ask me a single question about my place
-of hiding. There now—that’s all. What shall it be first, Miss Merle, a
-piano solo or a duet with the violin?”
-
-“Supper, I should say,” exclaimed Mrs. Darlington, as she left the room.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXIV—In a Tight Corner
-
-DICK’S after-dark visit to La Siesta was only the first of several that
-followed at intervals of a few days. He came and departed mysteriously,
-and during his brief stay every precaution was taken that no one except
-his few trusted friends should know of his presence. But by some means
-or other a whisper had reached the ear of the sleuth, Leach Sharkey,
-that the fugitive had been seen at the home of Mrs. Darlington.
-
-When the news was imparted to Ben Thurston, the old man quivered from
-excitement.
-
-“At La Siesta, do you tell me? Let us ride over there at once, and
-search the place from basement to attic.”
-
-“No, no,” replied Sharkey. “I’ve got my scouts out. Don’t you worry. We
-must wait till the night bird comes back. Then we’ll trap him like a fat
-quail.”
-
-“All right. Have my automobile ready, and a bunch of well-armed fellows
-right here, so that we can make a rush over at a moment’s notice. By
-God, I’ve been disappointed in everything else—lost my son, lost my
-ranch, lost my home. But I’m not going to lose that man. I’m going to
-get him, even if we shoot him down on sight as an outlawed fugitive from
-justice with a price on his head.”
-
-“We’ll get him,” answered Sharkey, with a grim smile. “You may count him
-a dead bird. I guessed he wouldn’t keep away from his girl very long.”
-
-“His girl! Curse her—it was she who lured my son to his death. But I’ll
-be avenged. If she has been harboring an outlaw, she, too, has broken
-the law and shall go to jail.”
-
-“Well, she no doubt thinks him innocent,” suggested the sleuth.
-
-“Innocent! All women are alike—treacherous devils at heart. I would give
-them the vote—yes, but the rope at the same time,” he went on, growling
-in savage incoherence.
-
-And Sharkey, knowing that discussion or contradiction only added fresh
-fuel to his vile temper, left him alone.
-
-At last, a few nights later, a rider dashed up to Ben Thurston’s house
-with the news that Dick Willoughby had been seen entering La Siesta, and
-that, following Sharkey’s instructions, every avenue of escape was now
-guarded.
-
-“Hurry, hurry! I’ve got to be in at the death,” fairly screamed the old
-man.
-
-Five minutes later the big seven-passenger automobile, carrying three or
-four armed men besides its owner and his personal guard, Leach Sharkey,
-was devouring the twenty miles of road that lay between the two ranch
-homes.
-
-That evening the four young people were quietly chatting in the cosy
-corner on the interior verandah—the comfortable little nook fixed up
-with rugs and tapestries and oriental divans. It was summer now, and
-after a sultry day the night air was sweet and balmy. Willoughby was
-smoking a cigar in languid contentment with his surroundings, when all
-at once he sprang to his feet.
-
-Tia Teresa had rushed in, frantic with excitement.
-
-“A great big automobile is coming along the road,” she cried, “and
-there are men watching outside the portico. Come with me,” she went on,
-addressing Dick. “I know where your horses are hid. I can take you by a
-secret path through the oleanders.”
-
-Dick vaguely wondered why the duenna should know anything about his mode
-of coming. But there was no time to question, for just then there came
-the sound of voices outside.
-
-Mrs. Darlington, pale and agitated, emerged from the drawing room.
-
-“What has happened?” she asked breathlessly.
-
-“I guess I’m trapped,” replied Dick quietly. “No doubt it’s old
-Thurston. There will be shooting if I resist. So there is nothing for it
-but to surrender.”
-
-“No, no,” exclaimed Merle. “I dread that vindictive man. He must never
-get you in his power again. We must gain time to smuggle you out of
-the house. I have it. Tia Teresa—give me your mantilla and your cloak.
-Quick, quick!”
-
-A first loud knocking had come on the door at the head of the portico
-steps. The duenna in a moment had divested herself of her loose black
-robe and heavy lace veil.
-
-“Get something else to wear and meet us at the oleanders,” continued
-Merle, taking the garments from Tia Teresa. “Put these on, Dick, and
-sit right there in that corner. Mr. Munson, turn off two or three of the
-lights. Mother, dear, control yourself. Take this book and be reading.
-Now, that will do. They will be here in a moment.”
-
-A second knock had been heard, and now they knew that the door was being
-opened without further ceremony, for at placid La Siesta there were no
-bolts or bars against unwelcome visitors.
-
-In that brief minute a wonderful transformation scene had taken place in
-the cosy corner. Tia Teresa had disappeared. Munson was stretched on
-a sofa, puffing his cigar. Merle and Grace had been playing patience
-during the afternoon and had left the cards in scattered confusion. Mrs.
-Darlington, beneath the single incandescent aglow, was quietly reading.
-From the darksome corner the pretended duenna surveyed this peaceful
-scene of domesticity.
-
-It was Ben Thurston himself who led the way for his swarm of myrmidons.
-
-He began without formality; his tone was coarse and rude.
-
-“We want the outlaw, Dick Willoughby. We know he is here. So make no
-fuss. Deliver him over.”
-
-Mrs. Darlington had risen to her feet, and Munson, too, had sprung
-erect.
-
-“What do you mean?” asked the lady with quiet dignity.
-
-“You know darned well what I mean.”
-
-Munson stepped forward, but he played the game best by keeping himself
-under perfect control.
-
-“You will speak civilly, Mr. Thurston, or leave this house. What is
-wanted?” he added, turning to Leach Sharkey.
-
-“We want Dick Willoughby, of course,” the sleuth replied, politely
-enough. “We have reason to believe he is here.”
-
-“Well, you can see for yourself whether he is here or not,” said Munson,
-glancing around. “But if you wish to look through the house, I don’t
-suppose Mrs. Darlington will refuse you permission.”
-
-The lady bowed her acquiescence.
-
-“With your consent, Mrs. Darlington,” Munson went on, “I’ll show these
-gentlemen round and save you the annoyance. Come along then.”
-
-Ben Thurston had been fairly silenced by the army man’s suave courtesy.
-He was glowering at him, dully conscious of having been suppressed.
-
-Munson turned from the sleuth.
-
-“Perhaps Mr. Thurston would prefer to remain with the ladies?” he asked,
-with a touch of smiling irony.
-
-“I don’t leave my man Sharkey,” replied Thurston gruffly. “Sharkey, keep
-close watch on me. We’ll search the place, but you stay near me all
-the time.” Once again there was the old hunted look in his eyes as he
-glanced apprehensively into the courtyard.
-
-“Then follow me,” said Munson quietly.
-
-“You have left a guard at the door of course?” asked Thurston of
-Sharkey.
-
-“Oh, you just allow me to know my business,” replied the detective
-sharply. He bowed to Mrs. Darlington and her daughters. “I am really
-sorry to disturb you, ladies.”
-
-“Then get the business over as soon as possible,” said Munson. “Come
-along.”
-
-The moment the coast was clear, Merle jumped up.
-
-“Quick! Mr. Willoughby. Follow me downstairs. I’ll take you through the
-kitchen to the rose gardens.”
-
-It was a strange looking duenna that stalked after Merle, with a robe
-reaching only to the knees. But at the head of the kitchen stairway Dick
-discarded the now useless garments, flinging them across the balustrade.
-
-“We must trust to our good luck now, Merle,” he said.
-
-“Never fear. It won’t desert us. Hurry on.”
-
-At the clump of oleanders they found Tia Teresa, provided with another
-shawl. Not a moment was to be wasted in words. Merle just pressed Dick’s
-hand by way of farewell. As he hastened away down the dark path, she,
-too, sped from the spot.
-
-Perhaps fifteen minutes later Ben Thurston, going the round of the
-house, came to the head of the kitchen stairs. He saw the black cloak
-and mantilla on the balustrade.
-
-“By God!” he cried with swift inspiration of what had happened. “We’ve
-been properly fooled! Where is that old hag of a duenna?”
-
-Gathering the vestments in his hands he rushed through the house to the
-verandah. Merle was quietly seated with her mother and Grace. But there
-was no sign now of Tia Teresa.
-
-Sharkey had followed close on his employer’s heels. Munson came a few
-paces behind.
-
-Ben Thurston glared for a moment at the vacant place where the
-black-robed figure had been seated. Then he turned round and, addressing
-Mrs. Darlington, fairly shouted:
-
-“Where is Dick Willoughby? It was he who was wearing these damned
-clothes.” And he flung the garments on the rug before her.
-
-“No swearing, please,” said Munson, tapping him on the shoulder.
-
-“To hell! Who wouldn’t swear? Where is the man I’m after?”
-
-“An innocent man,” exclaimed Merle, rising to her feet and proudly
-folding her arms.
-
-“Looks like it—breaking jail and hiding in the hills,” sneered Thurston.
-“He is nothing but a murderer and an outlaw. And I’m going to get him,
-dead or alive.”
-
-“Then catch him if you can,” cried Merle, pointing toward the door that
-opened on the portico.
-
-Under the girl’s fearless gaze Ben Thurston wilted. Baffled, humiliated,
-speechless in his impotent rage, he allowed the sleuth to take him by
-the arm and hustle him from the scene.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXV—Love and Revenge
-
-BEYOND the oleanders a tall thick hedge of cypress favored the flight
-of the fugitive. At the end of the gardens Tia Teresa took a little path
-that dipped into the river bed, and when they ascended again out of the
-hollow, Dick found himself quite close to the grove where Pierre was in
-hiding with the ponies.
-
-By this time the young fellow was angry with himself for having fled
-so precipitately. He was full of solicitude for Merle. Why had not he
-remained to defend her from the brutality of that ruffian, Ben Thurston?
-This was the question that was now making him both ashamed and anxious.
-
-“Hush!”
-
-The caution came from Pierre, and showed that the Frenchman was alive to
-what had happened.
-
-“I saw ze automobile rush by,” he whispered. “We will ride across
-country, so zat it cannot follow us.” He pointed in the direction he
-would go.
-
-“Not yet,” replied Dick, determinedly. “I’m off back to the house to see
-that they are all safe there.”
-
-“No, no, Mr. Willoughby,” protested the duenna earnestly. “You heard
-what Miss Merle said—she is afraid of that raging old man. Besides I
-know. He has vowed that he and his hired gunmen will shoot you on sight.
-For my little girl’s sake you must not go back,” she implored.
-
-“Besides your word of honor is pledged to me,” added Luzon. “You must
-return wiz me. I have your parole.”
-
-“Parole be hanged,” muttered Dick between his teeth.
-
-The old Frenchman laid a kindly hand on the young man’s shoulder.
-
-“No, no. Monsieur is a man of honor. And honor comes before
-love—always.”
-
-“If you love her,” insisted Tia Teresa, “you will save yourself tonight.
-We will look after her. You need not worry on her account.”
-
-Dick for the moment was silenced, but unconvinced.
-
-“Well, at all events we’ll wait a bit. I don’t leave this spot till I’m
-sure that Ben Thurston himself has cleared.”
-
-“All right,” assented Pierre. “Stay where you are, Tia Teresa. You must
-not be seen. Zey may be searching in ze gardens.”
-
-Even as he spoke there was the flash of a lantern among the rose bushes.
-
-In tense silence they waited and watched. The leaden-winged minutes
-stole on. For a time lights flitted about, then vanished. At last came
-the “honk-honk” of the automobile, and a minute later the great machine
-with its flaring headlights swept down the roadway. They could just see
-that it was crowded with men. Then in a few seconds it had disappeared
-around the bend.
-
-“Now we go,” said Pierre.
-
-“Just a minute longer, please,” replied Dick in a firm tone. “Tia
-Teresa, you slip back to the house. I will stay here till you bring me
-word from Merle that she is safe and that all is well.”
-
-“I will soon return,” said the duenna as she hurried away on her
-mission.
-
-Again an interval of high-tensioned waiting. Neither Dick nor Pierre
-spoke a word. At last there came a rustle of the bushes from the
-direction of the river bed, and a moment later Tia Teresa was again by
-their side.
-
-“Mr. Willoughby,” she said, breathless from the speed she had made,
-“Miss Merle begs you to make good your escape. She is well, and happy
-because you are safe. She sends this rose and”—the old lady hesitated a
-moment—“her love.”
-
-“She said that?” murmured Dick, tremblingly, as he took the white
-blossom and breathed its fragrance.
-
-“Well, does not the flower speak her love?” replied the duenna. “Now go,
-go.”
-
-“Come,” said Pierre, as he raised himself into the saddle. “We shall fix
-the blindfold later on.” Dick furtively kissed the rose before he placed
-it in the breast pocket of his coat. Then he mounted, and, bringing his
-pony alongside of Pierre’s, started off at a canter across the starlit
-plain.
-
-Ben Thurston did not feel inclined to sleep that night. He paced his
-sitting room like an angry bear, and kept Leach Sharkey out of bed to
-listen to his growls and threatenings.
-
-“By God, I’ll have that girl shoved into jail. Harboring an outlaw! It’s
-a criminal offence.”
-
-“You can’t do it,” objected the sleuth.
-
-“Can’t do it?” shouted Thurston, halting and glowering down upon the man
-who had dared to contradict him. “You’ll see damned quick if I can’t.”
-
-“Not one of us could swear that Willoughby was there. Neither you nor I
-could. We never saw him.”
-
-“He wore that disguise,” thundered Thurston. “So you think. But thinking
-ain’t proof—not by a long chalk.”
-
-Thurston was now almost speechless from rage. Half articulate words of
-blasphemy were upon his stuttering lips. But Sharkey went coolly on.
-
-“Besides the sympathy of everyone would be with the girl. You can’t
-succeed that way. You yourself would be covered with ridicule.”
-
-At last the torrent of curses broke forth. “Damn you, Leach Sharkey!
-That’s what I pay you for, is it? To let that scoundrel slip through our
-very fingers? And you had the nerve to ask me for another big check this
-evening. It’s all a confounded plot. You’re bleeding me. Leach is your
-name, and leech is your nature.” Leach Sharkey rose to his feet. His
-white teeth gleamed as his short upper lip curled in a contemptuous
-smile. He raised a threatening finger. It was his turn now to give free
-vent to profanity.
-
-“Stop right there, you doggoned old fool. I bleed you, do I? Well, take
-my resignation. All your pay ain’t worth another five minutes of your
-infernal temper. No man ever dared to browbeat me and insult me as you
-have done. And now you may go to hell—where you belong.”
-
-The sleuth turned on his heel, and strode to the doorway. But Thurston
-was after him in an instant, penitent, trembling, ashen pale. He grabbed
-Sharkey by the coat sleeve.
-
-“No, no, don’t go, I beg of you,” he whined, “I was wrong. I spoke in
-anger. I apologize. Good God, some one or other will get me within an
-hour if you leave me unprotected. I haven’t a single friend—no one to
-stand by me.” There was craven fear in his eyes as he looked timidly
-around. “I hear the prowling footsteps of my enemies in the night. You
-alone can save me, Mr. Sharkey.”
-
-“Your damned civility comes too late,” replied the sleuth, as he shook
-the clutching hands from his shoulder.
-
-“No, no. Don’t say that. Sit down again. See, here is my check book.
-I’ll pay you that money now—I’ll double the amount—I’ll never haggle
-with you again. Stay with me till we go East together.”
-
-Sharkey showed himself somewhat mollified. He had played his game well,
-for after all, cash with him was the main consideration. So smiling over
-the success of his bluff, he watched the unnerved coward as he tottered
-to his desk, dropped into a chair and drew the check with slow and
-painful effort, and then returned with it between his still trembling
-fingers.
-
-“You’ll stand by me, Mr. Sharkey, won’t you?”
-
-“Well, no more of that nonsense,” was the curt reply, as the sleuth
-glanced at the slip of paper, then thrust it in his waistcoat pocket.
-
-To Thurston the reconciliation brought instant relief. He drew himself
-up; he rubbed his hands; he even attempted a smile.
-
-“That’s a good fellow, Sharkey. You know I’ve always held you in high
-esteem. And we’ll get that man yet”—the glare of vindictiveness was
-again in his eyes, the rasp of accustomed irritability was returning to
-his voice. “We’ll get him, I say, even if it costs double the money I’ve
-already spent. And that devil of a girl, too—I hate her more than ever
-now. She’ll pay for her insults tonight with her lover’s life. Remember,
-Sharkey, no more chances. When you get the scoundrel within gunshot,
-it’s up to you to shoot. That will be best in any case. It will save the
-cost of a judge and jury. You understand me?”
-
-“I understand,” nodded Sharkey. “Then, as you’re speaking about
-doubling. Mr. Thurston, I suppose that ten-thousand-dollar reward coming
-to me goes up to twenty thousand.”
-
-“Yes; twenty thousand if you shoot him like a dog, and let me get away
-from this damned place. I have come to loathe the very name of it. Well,
-spread your cot now across my door. I’ll try to get an hour’s sleep.
-Good night.”
-
-And Ben Thurston disappeared into the inner room.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXVI—A Date is Fixed
-
-ON the morning after the exciting episode at La Siesta, Chester Munson
-was in the library of Mr. Robles’ home ready for his day’s duties. But
-he was in no mood for the routine work of cataloging and classifying the
-volumes on the bookshelves. Up to now the task had been one of absorbing
-interest, for Munson, although not a scholar, had always been fond of
-reading, and it was a treat to dip at times into the contents of the
-rare and curious works which wealth and the educated taste of a true
-bibliophile had accumulated.
-
-But today the amateur librarian was thinking of other things. He was
-feverishly awaiting the usual morning visit of his employer, so that he
-might tell him the story of the previous night’s happenings. At last Mr.
-Robles made his appearance, and gave his usual quiet greetings.
-
-“I see you are making great progress with your work,” he remarked,
-glancing at the pile of classified volumes resting temporarily on the
-library table.
-
-“Oh, I’m getting along,” replied Munson. “But I have most surprising
-news for you, Mr. Robles.”
-
-“Indeed?” The recluse arched his eyebrows in expectant curiosity as he
-took a chair beside the desk at which Munson had been seated. “Sit down,
-please. Let me hear the story.”
-
-“You know that I was at La Siesta yesterday evening?”
-
-“I know that you are very often there,” replied Mr. Robles, smiling.
-“I understand the attraction and congratulate you on your good fortune.
-Grace Darlington is certainly a charming young lady.”
-
-Munson flushed and bowed his acquiescence in the compliment as he said:
-
-“It was not of her, however, that I was going to speak. I want to say
-to you, Mr. Robles, that Miss Farnsworth did one of the bravest and
-cleverest things imaginable last evening.”
-
-“Tell me about it. I am all attention.” Munson then proceeded to relate
-in full detail the events of the preceding evening—the surprise visit
-of Ben Thurston, the brutality of the man, the quick wit of Merle, the
-escape of Dick Willoughby, and his final message by Tia Teresa that he
-was safe and, in obedience to Merle’s injunction, was returning to his
-place of hiding. During the narrative only once did the listener betray
-emotion; when Thurston’s rude insults were repeated there came a
-flash into Robles’ eyes, and he clenched his hands to restrain his
-indignation. But he interrupted with no word, and at the end spoke no
-comment.
-
-Munson was a little taken aback at this silence and impassivity.
-
-“My story does not seem to surprise you?” he remarked, with a note of
-interrogation.
-
-“No,” was the quiet reply, “I already knew it.”
-
-“How?” exclaimed Munson, wonderingly.
-
-“You have forgotten, young man, that there is a private telephone
-between my home here and La Siesta. Mrs. Darlington has already told me
-about the matter. But I am pleased to have your version, and
-delighted more than I can tell to know that Merle proved equal to the
-emergency—that it was she who may be truly said to have saved Dick
-Willoughby.” There was a ring of pride and admiration in his voice as he
-spoke the words.
-
-“She’s the real stuff,” cried Munson, enthusiastically.
-
-“It was well done,” continued Mr. Robles, his tone taking a graver note.
-“For I want to warn you, Munson, as Willoughby’s closest friend, that
-Ben Thurston or one of his hired assassins will certainly shoot on sight
-the instant they get the chance to do so. But by the Lord, if anything
-like that happens, I will hang that villain Thurston to the highest tree
-in Tejon for the buzzards to pick his bones.” And the upraised hand,
-the voice vibrating with passionate determination, showed that Ricardo
-Robles meant just what he said.
-
-Mr. Robles had risen to his feet. For a moment he turned his face away.
-Then he again spoke, but now in his customary, sedate manner.
-
-“This morning, Mr. Munson, I leave home for a few days. Go on with your
-work, of course, but remember that it is quite a minor consideration.
-During my absence I shall rely on you to see that Ben Thurston, on any
-pretence of searching for Willoughby, does not cross my door.”
-
-“He shall never do that, so long as I’m here,” declared the young army
-man, with quiet confidence.
-
-“I don’t think he will, either,” replied Robles. “I have given orders
-for him to be shot down,” he added grimly, “if he should dare to
-approach my gates. But I’ll count on you all the same as a second guard
-to the sanctity of my home.”
-
-“You may count on me to the death,” responded Munson, extending his
-hand.
-
-“I know it, and therefore I go away on a necessary duty with an easy
-mind. But I have good news for you, Munson. I have instructed Sing Ling
-to prepare luncheon for the ladies of La Siesta every day they choose
-to come. So, while I prefer you to remain here on guard while I am
-gone, you need not be lonely. Perhaps you’ll hardly wish me to come back
-again,” he added with a smile.
-
-“Oh, don’t say that. But you’re mighty kind thinking of such things at
-all.”
-
-“Well, you may expect our friends today about one o’clock. Now,
-goodbye—but not for long.”
-
-The library work proceeded but slowly during the hours that followed.
-Munson was all impatience now for Grace and Merle to arrive. Books were
-of little account, for there was none ever printed that could rival
-for him the charm of a certain pair of laughing blue eyes. And it was a
-self-confessed pseudo man-of-letters who at last rushed to the gateway
-to greet the fair visitors.
-
-“Mother couldn’t come,” cried Grace, as she jumped from her horse and
-flung the bridle to a Mexican groom. “She’s putting up fruit with Tia
-Teresa, and I think she really believes everything would go wrong if she
-didn’t superintend.”
-
-Munson, as he led the girls through the arched gateway, was inclined to
-bless both the fruit and the fallacy.
-
-Sing Ling came across the patio with a welcoming smile.
-
-“Dinnel all leady,” he announced in tinkling syllables.
-
-“And we’re all ready, too, Sing Ling,” laughed Merle, as she went up and
-shook the Chinaman’s hand.
-
-“Me vely glad to see you again, missie.”
-
-“I didn’t know you were old friends,” exclaimed Munson, in some
-surprise.
-
-“Oh, didn’t you? Sing Ling has been Mr. Robles’ cook off and on for
-nearly twenty years. When Mr. Robles is abroad of course he works
-elsewhere. That’s why you found him at San Antonio Rancho.”
-
-“But Dick told me he was his cook—had been for several years.”
-
-“With Mr. Robles’ tacit consent, then,” replied Merle.
-
-The Chinaman was grinning in a vacuous sort of way, as if all the
-conversation was so much Greek to him.
-
-“Sing Ling, you scamp,” cried Munson, “I begin to understand now how Mr.
-Robles comes to know so much about Dick and myself. You’ve been telling
-tales out of school.”
-
-“Oh, no; me cookee allee time; me no go school,” replied the Celestial,
-in guileless incomprehension.
-
-After the dainty luncheon, Merle proposed that they should visit the
-watch tower. There they found the Mexican lad on duty. He had been
-strumming a guitar to pass the time, but at the sound of voices
-had sprung erect and alert. Munson noticed at a glance that the big
-telescope was ready trained on San Antonio Rancho.
-
-“Como estas, Francisco?” asked Merle, addressing the boy in Spanish.
-
-“Bien, gracias, senorita,” he replied, with a deferential bow. But he
-averted his glance instantly, and gazed out on the landscape.
-
-Merle turned to Munson: “We are not allowed to converse with the
-servants here,” she explained. “Just a word of greeting—that is all.”
-
-“I’m under similar orders,” replied Munson. “Not that it much matters
-in my case, for I haven’t your accomplishment of knowing the Spanish
-language.”
-
-“Oh, Grace and I speak Spanish almost as well as English. You see, Mr.
-Robles, who has always been interested in us two girls, insisted that we
-should be taught his native tongue.”
-
-“And we’ve been all over Spain, too,” interposed Grace. “Lived there
-a whole year. That’s where I fell in love with the violin and took my
-first lessons.”
-
-“An inspiring country obviously,” remarked Munson with a flattering
-gesture.
-
-“Thank you for the subtle compliment,” laughed Grace, tossing the
-vagrant, wind-blown curls from her face.
-
-“I never come here but I love to gaze at the view,” observed Merle. “Is
-it not glorious—this valley of Tehachapi?”
-
-It was indeed a glorious scene—that noble sweep of verdured plain,
-stretching north far as the eye could reach, on the south guarded by the
-rugged pass, east and west embosoming hills twenty miles apart etching
-the sky with peaks and domes and lines of beauty. For a few moments all
-three visitors to the tower remained silent and enraptured.
-
-Grace was the one to break the spell.
-
-“I’m going down now to the library to inspect your work, lieutenant,”
-she announced with a roguish smile.
-
-“Spare me,” protested Munson. “But perhaps you would help me with some
-of those Spanish books,” he added as an afterthought.
-
-“Delighted! Come along.” And she led the way down the winding iron
-staircase.
-
-In the library the three were for the first time during the visit quite
-alone. Munson carefully closed the door.
-
-“Now I’ve got the chance, Miss Merle,” he began, “I want to compliment
-you on your splendid bravery last night.”
-
-“Bravery!” she laughed. “Why I was so scared I could hardly stand.”
-
-“Well, you deceived us all finely, then.”
-
-“And that Ben Thurston—what an old ruffian!” cried Grace. “But I agree
-with you, Mr. Munson; Merle was a hero.”
-
-“A heroine,” suggested the lieutenant.
-
-“Oh, in these days we don’t make such fine sex distinctions,” laughed
-Grace. “A real hero, that’s what I call her.”
-
-“Rubbish,” protested Merle. “I just did what anyone else would have done
-in the circumstances.”
-
-“I’m afraid men are not so ready of wit in an emergency as are women,”
-remarked Munson.
-
-“Just listen to that, Merle,” exclaimed Grace. “I verily believe the
-lieutenant is a suffragette.”
-
-“A suffragist,” corrected Munson, emphatically this time. “I’m hanged
-if I’m going to wear a petticoat even if the women are determined to
-don—the other things.”
-
-They all laughed merrily.
-
-Grace turned and began examining the carefully written library cards.
-
-“Any more news from Mr. Willoughby?” asked Merle, with a look of
-solicitude in her eyes.
-
-“Nothing,” replied Munson. “But I’m beginning to put two and two
-together,” he continued. “Early every morning a horseman comes down here
-from the mountains and evidently brings a report of some kind to Mr.
-Robles. And when he rides off again Sing Ling has always ready a basket
-of grub, all sorts of nice things, fried chicken, spiced beef—”
-
-“Sounds quite epicurean,” interrupted Grace, tossing away the card she
-had been pretending to examine.
-
-“Yes, hang it all—just the little delicacies Dick used to like.”
-
-“I never knew you fared so bountifully at San Antonio Rancho,” remarked
-Merle with a smile.
-
-“Oh, Dick’s no candy kid, as you know well,” replied Munson. “It was
-mostly rough and ready fare all right, but Sing Ling had a knack of
-adding a few dainty trifles to our meals, and it strikes me that for the
-purposes of this mysterious and capacious lunch basket he is trying to
-excel himself.”
-
-“No doubt it goes to Mr. Willoughby,” said Merle. “Well, I’m real glad
-to know that they are making him comfortable.”
-
-“I guess, though, he’ll miss his occasional visits to La Siesta. Mr.
-Robles says you were quite right, Miss Merle. Dick is in real danger.
-Those gunmen of old Thurston have orders to shoot him on sight.”
-
-“I knew it,” exclaimed Merle. “Oh, I’m so thankful he got away. Even
-though we miss seeing him, he must never run such a risk again.”
-
-“It is all very mysterious,” said Munson, in a musing tone. “And I had
-no idea, too, that this was such a lovely place. Mr. Robles has taken
-me around several times. He has the choicest dairy cattle, the finest
-blooded horses, rare trees and plants from every corner of the world.”
-
-“These are his hobbies,” commented Merle.
-
-“He says he wants to give me some practical lessons in estate
-management.”
-
-“Why?” asked Grace.
-
-“Well,” laughed Munson, “he thinks I may some day own a rancho of my
-own. But that will be a mighty long time.”
-
-“Who can tell?” said Merle, glancing mischievously from the lieutenant
-to Grace. “Even in these humdrum days soldiers have been known to come
-in and conquer.”
-
-Grace blushed crimson.
-
-“Merle, how dare you?” she exclaimed, half angry, half laughing. “Next
-time we visit you, Mr. Munson, I’ll have to bring along Tia Teresa.”
-
-“Oh, dear Aunt Teresa has a soft side for the lieutenant,” retorted
-Merle, with merry audacity.
-
-But Grace had recovered from her momentary confusion.
-
-“Then I’ll help you all I can, Mr. Munson, with dear Aunt Teresa,”
-she laughingly said. “We’ll send her along tomorrow instead of coming
-ourselves.”
-
-“Heaven forbid!” murmured the lieutenant, with pious fervor. He, too,
-had been looking and feeling awkward.
-
-“So we’ll say goodbye for the present,” continued Grace, frankly
-extending her hand.
-
-“I hope I haven’t said anything to offend you,” stammered Munson.
-
-“It is perhaps what you haven’t said that is the cause of trouble,”
-laughed the irrepressible Merle.
-
-But Grace had fled from the room, and as the others followed, Merle went
-on:
-
-“I said when we left home that two would be company but three—a
-complication. Wasn’t I right, lieutenant?”
-
-“You are always right,” murmured Munson, too bewildered to think of
-anything else but the obvious gallant reply.
-
-He stood at the gateway watching the two young ladies as they cantered
-away. At the bend of the road Merle turned round in the saddle and waved
-her hand. But Grace rode steadily on.
-
-“By jove, that’s as good as telling me that I can sail in and win,” he
-said to himself. “Thank you, Merle, little girl. Next time Grace and I
-are alone, my fate will be sealed.”
-
-But no one called again during Mr. Robles’ absence—not even Tia Teresa.
-
-It was toward evening a few days later when the recluse strolled into
-the library. Munson did not know that he had returned, and rose from his
-seat in some surprise.
-
-“Still hard at work?” said Mr. Robles, as he nodded and shook hands.
-
-“When did you get back, sir?”
-
-“Last night. And today I have been busy with some important letters.”
-
-“Any word of Dick?”
-
-“There is nothing new so far as I am aware.”
-
-“Mr. Robles, excuse me,” said Munson earnestly. “But I’m anxious on
-Dick’s account. You know of his whereabouts, of course?”
-
-“I have indicated as much, although for the present I prefer to say
-nothing.”
-
-“Well, when is he to be restored to liberty?”
-
-“In due time. At latest he will be free on the eleventh of October.”
-
-“Oh, that’s months ahead yet. But why the eleventh of October? You
-excite my curiosity.”
-
-“The date is not of my choosing—it was fixed many years ago, by another
-than myself.”
-
-The enigmatic reply puzzled Chester Munson—not only the words
-themselves, but the tremor of deep emotion in the voice of Ricardo
-Robles as he gave them utterance.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXVII—Among the Old Oaks
-
-PIERRE, now my sketches and plans are finished, how am I going to pass
-the time?” It was some ten days after the affair at La Siesta, and
-Dick had spent the interval in close and absorbed work over his drawing
-board. Happy in his occupation, he had not felt the restraints of
-confinement.
-
-But now that the task was completed, and the big cardboard cylinder
-containing the set of drawings rested on the ledge of the easel all
-ready to be sent away on its mission, a feeling of chafing restlessness
-had ensued.
-
-“Good Lord, a fellow can’t read all day,” Dick went on, half in
-soliloquy, half addressing his companion.
-
-“Monsieur is comfortable here?” asked the latter solicitously.
-
-“I should say, old fellow. I was never in better quarters in all my
-life.”
-
-“And zere is nothing more I could get for ze table?”
-
-“For goodness sake, don’t talk like that, Pierre! In any ease I don’t
-worry about what I eat. But this is a regular Delmonico’s. Guadalupe
-is certainly a crackerjack cook. She is even better than Sing Ling.
-Wherever did she learn to turn out all these little delicacies? And just
-my favorite dishes, too.”
-
-Pierre smiled enigmatically.
-
-“Guadalupe very clever old squaw,” he remarked.
-
-“I would like to know her better. But she keeps out of my sight all the
-time.”
-
-“Guadalupe is very old. She has her fixed ideas.”
-
-“I suppose that means she does not love the Americans.”
-
-“No doubt. She prefer to be alone—alone with ze white wolf all ze time.
-And where the white wolf is, monsieur dare not go.”
-
-“I understand that all right,” laughed Willoughby. “I strolled only
-once toward the log fire, and the brute showed me a set of teeth which I
-never wish to see again.”
-
-“Ze white wolf guard ze cave well,” remarked Pierre, sententiously.
-
-“Oh, I’m not thinking of trying to run away. You know I would never
-break my word. But what the dickens am I to do all day long?”
-
-“What do you say? Suppose we go to ze riffle and wash out some gold.”
-
-“Great Scott!” exclaimed Dick eagerly. “That’s not a bad suggestion. But
-Don Manuel won’t mind?”
-
-“He will be very pleased—he has no use for ze gold.”
-
-“And Guadalupe?”
-
-“Long ago she would have killed you if you had gone zere. But not now.
-She very old, and all her people are dead.”
-
-“And the white wolf? That confounded beast won’t interfere?”
-
-“No, no. Ze white wolf stay near Guadalupe all ze time.”
-
-“Then, by jove, it’s a bully idea,” cried Dick. “It gets me all right.
-We’ll turn miners, Pierre, and we’ll have a rare old sack of nuggets to
-divide when the time comes for me to go free. I’ll be better off in the
-end than if I were holding down my old job at the rancho,” he laughed
-gaily.
-
-“I will find ze spades and ze pans to wash ze gravel. When shall we
-begin?”
-
-“Well, wait now,” replied Dick, glancing reflectively at the roll of
-drawings. “I’ve got to send these plans away. I want you to get them
-at once into the hands of my friend, Lieutenant Chester Munson. He will
-know how to forward them to their proper destination.”
-
-“May I suggest one zing?”
-
-“Go ahead, Pierre. What’s in your mind?”
-
-“I venture to make one little suggestion. Why not ask ze young lady to
-take ze plans to your friend?”
-
-“Miss Merle Farnsworth?” asked Dick in surprise. “But how am I to do
-that?”
-
-“I will promise to arrange a meeting—zat is, if you are not afraid of
-Mr. Thurston and his men.”
-
-“Afraid!” shouted Dick. “You give me the chance to see Merle again, and
-old Ben Thurston and all his sleuths may go to blazes.”
-
-“Zen I will arrange, and I zink it will please ze young lady very much
-to have ze honor of taking care of ze plans.”
-
-“You mean it will be a mighty honor for the plans to be in her care,
-Pierre. But I know she will gladly do me this service. How and when can
-I see her?”
-
-“Be ready tomorrow morning by ten o’clock. I will take you to a quiet
-place among ze old oak trees.”
-
-“Pierre, you’re a regular brick,” cried Dick, as he slapped the old
-Frenchman on the shoulder in the exuberance of his delight.
-
-The following morning they started out for the trysting place. Dick
-without demur submitted to the usual precautions. He was blindfolded
-before mounting his pony in the great central domed cavern and it was
-not until a couple of hours later, after a veritable switchback ride up
-and down and round about in a bewildering maze, that he was permitted
-to remove the bandage. Dismounting, he found himself in the heart of a
-great oak forest, in what precise locality he could not tell, for there
-was nothing in sight but endless vistas of tree trunks under their thick
-canopy of green leaves.
-
-Pierre touched him on the shoulder, and he followed the direction of
-the Frenchman’s eyes. There, advancing through the sylvan twilight, was
-Merle Farnsworth, her hands eagerly extended, her face lighted with joy.
-Following at a little distance came Tia Teresa.
-
-Dick, hastening to meet Merle, took both her hands into his, and gazed
-deep into her eyes.
-
-“Oh, it’s great to meet you again,” he exclaimed. “And this is my first
-chance to thank you for having saved me the other night. My word, but
-you were quick to think and to act. You cannot know how I admired your
-courage and coolness.”
-
-“Nonsense, nonsense,” protested Merle, in sweet blushing confusion. “You
-make far too much of the little I did.”
-
-“You saved my life,” said Dick, determinedly. “You can call that a
-little thing if you choose.”
-
-“No, no,” she replied, earnestly. “If I really did that, then it was
-truly a big thing.”
-
-“For me.”
-
-“And for all of us,” she added, with face half-averted.
-
-“And you, too?” pressed Dick.
-
-“Yes, for me, too,” answered Merle, turning round and frankly meeting
-his gaze. “I should never have been happy again had any harm come to you
-there—that night—in my very home—without a proper effort to get you away
-to a place of safety.”
-
-“God bless you, Merle, dear,” exclaimed Dick, as again he pressed her
-hands. He had been carried away by his fervent emotions, but she did not
-resent the familiar and endearing manner of his address.
-
-He would have taken her in his arms there and then, but Merle drew back
-and gave a little glance aside. Then Dick remembered Tia Teresa. To his
-astonishment he found her chatting with Pierre Luzon as if they were old
-friends.
-
-Dick left Merle for the moment to greet the duenna.
-
-“And I have to thank you, too, for helping me,” he said. Then he added
-with a laugh: “When am I to be privileged to wear that mantilla again?”
-
-“You are not to be allowed to endanger yourself again,” replied Tia
-Teresa. “And I warn you now. We remain here only half an hour—these are
-our orders.”
-
-“Whose orders?”
-
-“Never mind. Just one half hour, that is all.”
-
-“Then I’ll make the best of my time,” exclaimed Dick, turning toward
-Merle. “I see you won’t be lonely with my gallant friend, Pierre Luzon,”
-he added with a smile.
-
-“Oh, I knew Pierre when he was just as handsome a young fellow as
-yourself,” retorted Tia Teresa. “But we’ll excuse you, and Pierre will
-keep the time.”
-
-Dick led Merle down a glade of the forest, but before doing so he had
-unstrapped the roll of drawings from the horn of his saddle.
-
-“What are you carrying so very carefully?” asked Merle.
-
-“My plans for the ideal city. I told you I was going to have a try in
-that competition.”
-
-“I hope you’ll have good luck.”
-
-“Well, I want you to help me. Will you take this package, please, to
-Chester Munson and ask him to send it to the proper address?”
-
-“With the greatest of pleasure, Mr. Willoughby,”—and she put forth her
-hands for the roll.
-
-“No—we’ll lay it down here for the present. This log will serve as a
-seat. See, this twisted, limb makes quite a comfortable nook for you.”
-He had halted at a fallen tree, had dropped the drawing on the turf, and
-was now dusting away the twigs and leaves from the seat he had chosen.
-
-“Cannot I look at the drawings?” she asked, after settling herself
-cosily.
-
-“Before handing them to Munson, if you like. But there are other things
-to talk about now.” As he spoke he tossed his hat on the ground at her
-feet.
-
-“Are you growing impatient over your confinement?” she asked.
-
-“Impatient—it is hardly the word. I long to be out in the world again.
-I could never have endured the long seclusion but for my work over these
-drawings and my thoughts of you.”
-
-“Why me?”
-
-“I have felt that I am doing the best for your sake as well as my own.
-I would not have had you subjected to the vulgar gaze of a crowded court
-room—not for worlds. The very thought that I have saved you from that
-has made me contented with my enforced idleness.”
-
-“Not idleness,” she said, tapping the roll of drawings with the toe of
-her shoe.
-
-“Well, no, not idleness exactly.”
-
-“And I do hope you’ll win the prize,” she added, looking up into his
-eyes.
-
-“So do I. But perhaps you don’t know what I count to be the real prize.”
-
-
-
-0255
-
-“Pray, what is that?”
-
-Dick thrust a hand into the breast of his coat and brought forth a
-pocket book. From this he produced a little package, and opening the
-folds of paper disclosed the white rose which she had sent him on the
-night of his escape from La Siesta.
-
-“Where did you get that?” she asked demurely.
-
-“It is your rose—the rose you sent me.”
-
-“I did not know you were so partial to roses as to keep them after they
-are withered.” Her voice trembled; she bravely tried to keep up the
-pretence of not understanding.
-
-“It is not the gift I treasure—it is the thought of who was the giver.”
-
-A blush stole over her beautiful face, while the long drooping eyelashes
-half concealed her brown eyes. Dick’s arms slipped around the girl’s
-slender waist.
-
-“Merle, my dear, I love you. For months past I have known that there is
-no woman on earth for me but you. I would have spoken before, but I have
-always been afraid that you could not love me, and that talk of such a
-thing might terminate a friendship that had become my greatest pleasure
-in life.”
-
-For reply, placing one hand on his shoulder, she just buried her face in
-his breast and gave way to tears—tears of joy, he knew, as he kissed her
-hair again and again, and then at last her lips when she allowed him to
-raise her face toward his.
-
-“My darling,” he murmured, and the kiss she gave him back accepted and
-returned the words of fond endearment.
-
-A moment of restful bliss followed; then Merle gently disengaged herself
-and rose to her feet.
-
-“What will Tia Teresa say?” she asked, laughingly, as she glanced over
-her shoulder.
-
-“I think Tia Teresa knew all about my love long ago,” replied Dick.
-“Yes, both she and Pierre Luzon, too.”
-
-“Then you have been wearing your heart on your sleeve.”
-
-“Or we have been surrounded by very observant people. But, I say, Merle,
-this reminds me of a thing I had quite forgotten for the moment.” His
-face fell. “There is one great barrier that stands between us.”
-
-“What do you mean? You are surely too strong and purposeful a man to
-care for barriers.”
-
-“I never knew until the other day that you are so very rich.”
-
-“Rich!” laughed Merle. “Who ever told you such a foolish thing? While
-of course I have never felt poverty, don’t you know that I am absolutely
-dependent upon Mrs. Darlington’s kindness and generosity to me, her
-adopted daughter?”
-
-A smile of understanding broke over Dick’s face.
-
-“You tell me that? I am so delighted,” he exclaimed.
-
-“You surely know my story well enough,” continued Merle, “not to have
-mistaken me for an heiress. I lost both father and mother when I was
-a baby. Mrs. Darlington took me to her heart, and no mother could have
-been dearer and sweeter than she, no sister kinder and more loving than
-Grace. But I am proud to think they have loved me for my own sake, not
-for any wealth I might have owned.”
-
-“Then there is no barrier,” cried Dick, as once again he drew her to
-him. “Unless my poverty is a barrier,” he added. “But won’t I work hard
-all my life to give you every comfort you can desire!”
-
-“Well, we’ll have a good start at all events,” said Merle, with a merry
-little upglance.
-
-“How’s that?”
-
-“The ten-thousand-dollar prize for the best plans. Have you forgotten
-about that already?”
-
-“But it is not won yet.”
-
-“Oh, I have the firm presentiment that you are going to win, Dick, dear.
-I am sure of it—sure!” she repeated in a tone of conviction.
-
-Her face was aglow and Dick caught the spirit of her enthusiasm.
-
-“Then I’m sure, too. And, by jove, won’t we have one grand honeymoon
-trip, dearest?”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXVIII—The Prize Winner
-
-DICK WILLOUGHBY’S sensational escape from La Siesta had added another
-thrill to the mystery surrounding the murder of Marshall Thurston. But
-as week succeeded week without further incident, the affair gradually
-faded away as a topic of conversation. All the talk now was about the
-coming of the new town. The fever of speculation was in the air.
-
-“Say, boys,” remarked Jack Rover one evening to his two cronies at the
-store, “I’m sure getting crazy about the new town. I’ve got a thousand
-bones of my own savings besides the money from old Pierre Luzon, and I’m
-going to invest every dangnation cent of it in town lots on opening day.
-You bet I’ll be there mighty early in the morning when the sale starts.”
-
-“I’m sorta locoed myself,” said Baker, “about them lots in the new
-town. Guess I’ll grab off a few good corners. I look for an early
-rise—prices’ll go up like blazes,’ I’m ‘lowin’.”
-
-Buck Ashley snorted contemptuously. “Say, you fellers are two dippy
-ones. That new town talk is a lot o’ hot air, d’you hear? Jest the
-agitatin’ work of them pesky town boomers. Won’t ‘mount to nothin’.”
-
-Jack Rover started a defence, but was quickly motioned to silence by
-old Tom Baker, who, after clearing his throat, pushed his hat back and
-glared at Buck Ashley.
-
-“Buck,” said he, “you’re a thick-headed fool. The openin’ of that town
-will amount to one hell of a sight, don’t you fergit it. Why, that Los
-Angeles syndicate cuss who’s a-runnin’ the machine is sharper than a
-razor blade. Just think for one little puny moment,” Tom Baker went
-on, enthusiastically, “of that printed notice being in every blamed
-newspaper in the whole country—yes, and on the other side of the
-Atlantic pond—offerin’ ten thousand dollars for the best plans for an
-ideal city. Gosh all hemlock, they do say as how the mails were just
-chuck full of answers—architect fellers as well as them as ain’t
-architects, a-tryin’ to get their hooks on that ten-thousand-dollar
-prize. It was a mighty smart business notion, I’m a-tellin’ you, and has
-boomed the town to beat the band.”
-
-“But,” inquired Buck Ashley, in a sarcastic way, “who is confounded fool
-enough to buy lots in such a wild-cat scheme, no matter how much they
-advertise it? That’s what I’m askin’.”
-
-“I will, for one,” said Jack Rover. “As I said before, I’m going to put
-in my last dollar.”
-
-“As for me,” chimed in Tom Baker, “I will lay my money on this ‘ere
-proposed new town bein’ the biggest town in the whole dangnation State
-of California outside of sea-board towns.”
-
-Just then through the gathering darkness a lone horseman rode up to the
-store, dismounted and came hurriedly in. It was none other than Chester
-Munson, flushed and excited, as he sang out a good-natured salute:
-“Hallo, boys. I have news for you.”
-
-As he spoke he pulled a Bakersfield daily paper from his pocket. “The
-new town!” he fairly shouted. “All about it, right on the front
-page, pictures and all. And it is Dick Willoughby who wins the
-ten-thousand-dollar prize!”
-
-“That’s great news, sure,” cried Jack.
-
-“It’s a mighty pity Dick ain’t here to celebrate,” growled the sheriff.
-
-“What’s to be the name of the town?” asked Buck Ashley, in a
-disbelieving tone.
-
-“Tejon, after the old fort here,” replied Munson, as he pointed to the
-featured article with its big-type headlines and started to cull a few
-sentences.
-
-“It says that the new city of Tejon, right here in the heart of a rich
-horticultural valley, is bound to be one of the top-notch towns of
-California. And the opening day is going to be immense. Next Tuesday
-is the date fixed. Maps and plans of the new town will be ready for
-distribution from the land company’s office, corner Main Street and
-Broadway, at nine o’clock Monday morning. Let me see,” he went on,
-looking up from the paper, “this is Wednesday. Mighty few days to wait,
-boys. You just ought to see the excitement in Bakersfield.”
-
-“Well, I say there ain’t no such town,” snapped Buck Ashley, “nor no
-such a company’s office buildin’, ‘cause I was down there day before
-yesterday myself, right where them surveyin’ fellers have been foolin’
-‘round for weeks, peekin’ through spy-glasses at each other and
-measurin’ off so many feet this way and so many feet that way, like a
-bunch o’ kids playin’ some game. No, siree, there’s nothin’ but long
-rows of white stakes driv in the ground. Looks to me as if they was
-a-gettin’ ready to build a lot of henhouses. Of course the railroad’s
-there, and the only thing changed that I could see was a lot of
-side-tracks they’ve put in.”
-
-“Well, things have been humming the last two days,” laughed Munson.
-“This afternoon I found all the side-tracks filled with trains of
-lumber, carload after carload, and not less than two or three hundred
-workmen, all as busy as nailers. Looked to me as if a three-ring circus
-were getting ready for a big show. They are already running up electric
-light poles and stringing the wires. Some of the men are unloading cars,
-some stacking up lumber, others are putting up tents, and the entire
-business reminded me of a hive of extremely busy bees. Go down and look
-for yourself, Buck, and you’ll be convinced at last that the new town
-has arrived.”
-
-The old storekeeper had come from behind the counter, and stood leaning
-against a stack of boxes.
-
-“I’ve been here for more’n a quarter of a century, boys,” he said, in
-a tone of seriousness that approached to sadness, “and this old store
-seems like home to me. I’m some fighter and I’m some stayer. But, hell,
-I reckon I know when I’m licked. I guess this new town puts a crimp in
-me and my business, and—”
-
-“Honk-honk; honk-honk”—it was the distant warning of an automobile that
-interrupted Buck’s speech, and drew all four present to the doorway.
-There was the glare of twin headlights on the southern road.
-
-“Some of the Los Angeles buyers, most likely,” suggested the sheriff.
-
-And so the travellers proved to be. The automobile halted at the
-store, but only one of the party of four or five descended.. He was a
-bright-faced, clean-shaven man, of dapper build and faultlessly attired.
-In his hand was a bunch of papers.
-
-“Mr. Buck Ashley?” he inquired.
-
-“I’m your man,” replied Buck, stepping from the doorway.
-
-“Well, we can’t stop tonight. But we wanted to say ‘how-do.’ I represent
-the Los Angeles Trust Syndicate, and these documents just arrived
-yesterday from Washington, D. C.”
-
-“Can’t be for me, then,” replied Buck, hesitating to take the proffered
-papers.
-
-“But they are,” replied the stranger with a laugh. “Oh, we haven’t
-forgotten the interests of the old identities. We’ve had your name in
-mind all the time, and this is a removal order from the Government to
-change your postoffice over to the new town of Tejon.”
-
-Buck was speechless as his fingers closed on the documents.
-
-“We’ll hope to see you over on Tuesday morning, Mr. Ashley, so that you
-can secure a good site for your new store. Now I must be going. We have
-got to be in Bakersfield by eleven o’clock.”
-
-“Honk-honk,” and the automobile was gone.
-
-“Hell, Buck, have you lost your tongue?” cried Tom Baker, slipping the
-storekeeper on the shoulder. “Don’t you see what it all means? You’re
-goin’ to shift camp, old man; you’re goin’ into the new town.”
-
-“Gosh ‘lmighty!” murmured Buck, at last recovering the power of
-articulation. “I think the first thing to do is to lubricate.”
-
-“A taste from the mystery keg,” suggested the sheriff, as they all
-crowded back into the store.
-
-“The mystery keg? What’s that?” asked Munson.
-
-Buck laid his hand on a small barrel at the end of the counter.
-
-“We call it the mystery keg,” he replied, “because we just found it
-yesterday mornin’ settin’ at my back door. It has come to us sorta like
-manna from heaven.”
-
-“And tastes like manna, too,” interjected Baker.
-
-“It means free drinks for all this pertic’lar bunch,” continued Buck,
-“for there is no question as to where the keg came from. Look at the
-date on the top—1853. This ‘ere barrel came out of Joaquin Murietta’s
-wine cellar.”
-
-“You don’t say?” exclaimed Munson, pressing forward eagerly to examine
-the little brass-hooped keg, looking bright and sound despite its
-antiquity.
-
-“This whisky is sixty years old at least,” Buck went on, turning the tap
-and filling a small pitcher.
-
-“Tastes like it might be a hundred years older,” remarked the sheriff.
-“Mellow as fresh drawn milk.”
-
-Buck handed Munson a pony glass of the rare old beverage.
-
-“By jove, it is fine,” said the lieutenant, judicially smacking his
-lips.
-
-“Just makes my internals feel as soft and roly-poly as a ripe
-pomegranate,” murmured Tom, as he set down his empty glass and rubbed
-his belt-line in a complacent way.
-
-“Well, we’ll fill up again, boys,” cried Buck. “Here’s to dear old
-Pierre Luzon, for it was sure him who sent us the mystery keg.”
-
-“And to Dick Willoughby who won the prize,” cried Jack Rover.
-
-“And to our host,” added Munson in a courtly way. “To Buck Ashley, boys,
-the postmaster of the new city of Tejon.”
-
-“Hip, hip, hurrah!”—all four voices shouted the triple toast as the
-upraised glasses clinked merrily.
-
-Buck resumed his former position, with his back against the cracker
-boxes.
-
-“As I was sayin’, boys, when that automobile interrupted us, I know when
-I’m licked. But I know, too, that the fightin’ blood is still left in
-me, and I was a-goin’ to remark that this new town sure ‘nuff looks a
-winner. I’ve got plenty of lumber right in my back yard, and tomorrer
-mornin’ I begin to have the scantlin’s cut, for, by jingoes, I’ll be the
-chap who will build the first buildin’ in the new town.”
-
-“Bully for you,” cried Munson.
-
-“I say what I mean,” continued Buck, his face aglow with enthusiasm,
-“and on Tuesday mornin’ I’ll buy the first town lot if I have to stand
-in line for forty-eight hours to get it.”
-
-“Life in the old dog yet,” laughed Jack Rover. “It’s wonderful the
-effect of Pierre Luzon’s brew,” smiled the sheriff. “I think we’ll just
-have four more spoonfuls, Buck, of that distilled nectar of sunshine.
-Success to the new store, old man!”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXIX—-The Rendezvous
-
-SUMMER had come and gone and it was now the early days of October. The
-mystery of Dick Willoughby’s disappearance had remained unsolved, yet it
-was on his plans that the new city of Tejon had been laid out, and, like
-the fabled palace in the Arabian Nights’ tale, had sprung into being
-with such rapidity that men rubbed their eyes to satisfy themselves
-whether the transformation scene were an actuality or the baseless
-fabric of a dream. Within three months of the opening day auction of
-lots Tejon was a thriving, hustling centre of population, with whole
-avenues of beautiful homes, several blocks of stores on the main street,
-schoolhouse and other public buildings well on the way to completion.
-
-Electricity had helped to the accomplishment of the miracle, for it had
-been only necessary to tap the great power cables running across the old
-rancho from the Kern River canyon to secure the supplies of “juice” both
-for lighting and traction purposes. So there was already an interurban
-tramway service connecting with the county seat, Bakersfield, while at
-night the new town was a blaze of electricity. All around country homes
-were going up, and ten and twenty acre holdings were being planted to
-fruit trees or ploughed for alfalfa.
-
-Ben Thurston still clung to the ranch house, although it was definitely
-understood now between him and the new owners that Thanksgiving Day was
-to be the extreme limit of his occupancy. The hue and cry after Dick
-Willoughby had in a measure subsided, but, if the authorities
-had relaxed their efforts, Thurston still sought relentlessly and
-indefatigably for the man accused of the slaying of his son.
-
-One night at a lonely road-house on the outskirts of Bakersfield, the
-sleuth, Leach Sharkey, was in close and secret conference with a bent
-and bowed old man. This was none other than Pierre Luzon, although his
-physical condition seemed to have greatly changed and he answered now to
-the name of José.
-
-The two men had met a few days before on the range; Pierre had spoken of
-the scant living he was making from a herd of goats he pastured on the
-mountains, and in the course of conversation had thrown out a hint for
-information as to the amount of the reward that Mr. Thurston would be
-willing to pay if Dick Willoughby were handed over to him. Sharkey had
-eagerly followed the lead thus given. Hence this midnight meeting in the
-road-house parlor for the discussion of terms and conditions over the
-bottle of whisky that helps so efficaciously to dispel distrust and
-unloosen tongues.
-
-More than an hour had been spent in skirmishing preliminaries, but now
-Leach Sharkey was congratulating himself that he had got his man fixed
-just right. He was running over the final arrangements so as to make
-sure that everything was clearly understood.
-
-“Then Mr. Thurston and myself are to come to Comanche Point. You will
-take us from there to the place where we’ll find Willoughby. That’s the
-understanding, José?”
-
-Pierre nodded in acquiescence.
-
-“And you will bring wiz you ze reward of five tousand dollars—not gold
-or silver, remember, but treasury bills, for I am not strong enough now
-to carry a very heavy weight. Zen when you have paid me ze money, I will
-lead you to Mr. Willoughby.”
-
-“All right. I’m going to trust you and take my chances. But bear in
-mind that you don’t get away with the cash until I have actually put the
-handcuffs on the man I’m after.”
-
-“Oh, I will not run away, Mr. Sharkey.”
-
-“By God, if you try any monkey tricks on me, I’ll shoot you in your
-tracks. Make no mistake about that, José. And it will be hands up first
-to prove to me you have no gun.”
-
-“As I have promised,” replied Pierre with some dignity, “I shall come
-unarmed. But remember, Mr. Thurston and you must be alone. If zere are
-any ozers I will not show myself—I will give no sign.”
-
-“Don’t worry about that. We’ll be alone. I need no other protection than
-the two guns I always carry.” As he spoke, the sleuth slipped a hand to
-one of his hip pockets, and with a grim smile, laid a vicious-looking
-revolver on the table.
-
-Luzon evinced no disquietude; he merely smiled.
-
-“Mr. Sharkey he is ze famous man wiz ze two guns. I would take no risk
-wiz him. But I wish to win ze reward.”
-
-“Well, then, the reward is yours if you play the game straight. Thurston
-and I will be there, and you will be there unarmed. The hour?”
-
-“Four o’clock. I will watch you come to Comanche Point all alone along
-ze road.”
-
-“You’re certainly a cautious old duck,” laughed Sharkey. “However,
-that’s all right. Four o’clock, then. And you said Tuesday next week,
-didn’t you?”
-
-“Yes, Tuesday.”
-
-Sharkey glanced at a big advertisement calendar on the wall.
-
-“That will be the eleventh of the month. Then I think everything is
-understood. Now I want to be off. I can just catch the last car to
-Tejon. Shake. You can finish that drop of whisky by yourself, old man.”
-
-They shook hands and Sharkey was gone.
-
-The other waited for a few moments, cautiously and cunningly listening
-to the retreating footsteps. Then he sprang erect, transformed in an
-instant into a hale and vigorous man. Into his eyes there leapt a flash
-of joy, in his heart was a song of triumph.
-
-“So the villain Ben Thurston will be there at Comanche Point on the very
-anniversary of the night, just thirty years ago, when he committed that
-foul crime—at the very spot where the poor little Senorita Rosetta and
-her unborn babe perished at his hands. Glory be to God! At last the hour
-of vengeance comes!”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXX—Don Manuel Appears
-
-A GOODLY little sack of water-worn nuggets of gold had been washed out
-of the subterranean stream by Pierre Luzon and Dick Willoughby. The
-captive had found in the work both an exciting pastime and the ease
-of mind that comes from the thought that his time was being spent to
-profitable account. So week after week he had toiled on cheerfully,
-setting for himself each day a full day’s task. In this way also,
-although the want of sunshine had paled his cheeks, he had maintained
-his health by the regular physical exercise.
-
-But as the appointed date of his release drew near, Dick’s mining
-enthusiasm suffered an eclipse. The gold no longer tempted him,
-the eight-hour day became a burden to his soul, his whole being was
-possessed with feverish restlessness. He was not only filled with eager
-excitement at the thought of again folding Merle in his arms, but he was
-fired with curiosity to know what events were happening outside
-which would enable him to step forth a free man, exculpated from all
-connection with the crime of which he had been suspected, restored to an
-honorable place among his fellow men.
-
-But Pierre remained obstinately deaf to all hints for information.
-
-“I can say nozing,” was his invariable reply. Then, to divert Dick’s
-mind, he would challenge him at chess, a game in which they had proved
-to be pretty equally matched, or he would produce the latest batch of
-newspapers.
-
-The young fellow had read with great delight the announcement that his
-plans for the ideal city had been awarded the prize of ten thousand
-dollars. Still more welcome had been the warmly congratulatory note
-received from Merle at the hands of Pierre; for this letter, while it
-made no reference to the point, virtually sealed the pact between the
-two lovers that the money would provide for a glorious honeymoon trip to
-Europe. Dick had sent instructions to Munson to notify the Los Angeles
-syndicate in his name that the reward was to remain to the credit of
-the winner until he would come personally to Tejon to claim it, probably
-about the middle of October.
-
-It wanted now only two days of the fateful date, the eleventh of that
-month. Dick had already gathered together his personal belongings ready
-for removal. He was pacing the grotto, when his eye chanced to fall upon
-the sack of gold.
-
-“I forgot about that, Pierre, old fellow,” he remarked. “We have to
-divide this spoil.”
-
-“No,” replied Pierre, with quiet determination, “it is all yours, Mr.
-Willoughby, honestly earned, too. I have no need for any of ze gold. I
-have all ze money I can ever spend during ze rest of my life.”
-
-No amount of argument could shake the old Frenchman’s resolution.
-
-“Then what is to be done with the sack? By jove, I’ll share it with our
-Hidden Treasure Syndicate. By the way, where is Jack Rover now, Pierre?”
-
-“He is living in Buck Ashley’s old store. Buck, you know, is ze
-postmaster at Tejon, and has a splendid store in ze new city. But Jack
-Rover, he just hang about ze old place.”
-
-“Well, Pierre, I’ve got a plan. You say it will not be until Tuesday
-afternoon that I leave these quarters?”
-
-“Zat is so, and I am sorry you must still wear ze blindfold, but it will
-be for ze last time now.”
-
-“Oh, I’m not kicking about that. I know the conditions under which I
-came here. But it will be evening when we get clear of the hills, and I
-won’t have any particular place to go to. Next morning it will be best
-for me to ride right over to Bakersfield, to surrender myself and
-secure my formal discharge. When, did you say, am I to get the necessary
-documents for all this?”
-
-“Before you depart from ze cave.”
-
-“Well, everything will fit in fine. Tomorrow you have kindly promised
-to take out my things. Just carry the nuggets along with you also, and
-leave everything in Jack’s charge. But tell him that nothing must be
-opened or disturbed until I arrive. I’m going to give Jack Rover the
-surprise of his life when he sees that gold. The sack is too heavy
-to handle, but I guess we can make it into several packages. Jack was
-always crazy to find Guadalupe’s sand-bar.”
-
-“So were lots of ozers,” grinned Pierre. “But they have never found it
-yet. Even you will not be able to find it again when you are led out of
-zese hills wearing ze blindfold.”
-
-“I am fully aware of that, old man,” laughed Dick in reply. “I suppose
-I couldn’t discover the place again in a hundred years. But Jack’s eyes
-will fairly pop when he sees that bunch of gold marbles. He will be
-mighty pleased to show the nuggets around to some of the boys who have
-laughed over his enthusiasm, always declaring that Guadalupe’s gold
-simply came from some old-timer’s sack of dust that had been part of
-Joaquin Murietta’s plunder.”
-
-“Oh, no. All ze bandits get out much gold from ze riffle in zose
-days—Don Manuel himself had plenty.”
-
-“Well, Pierre, you just pack all my belongings to Buck Ashley’s old
-store. And you tell Jack Rover to expect me about six o’clock the night
-after tomorrow—that’s Tuesday. And I wish Munson to be there, too—I’ll
-want him to accompany me to Bakersfield.”
-
-“If you write a leetle note to ze lieutenant,” suggested Pierre, “I will
-see zat it reaches his hands. But you must say very leetle—just a few
-words. For nozing must be told to anyone outside until you are free.”
-
-“All right, Pierre. Here goes.” And Dick seated himself at the writing
-table. In a very few moments he had completed his task.
-
-“See,” he said, returning to Pierre’s side. “I wish you to know exactly
-what I have written—just a hurried scrawl.” And he read aloud while the
-old Frenchman’s eyes rested on the paper:
-
-“On Tuesday night next, about six o’clock, meet me at Buck Ashley’s
-old store. I shall want you to ride over to Bakersfield with me next
-morning, where my acquittal is assured. Give Merle the glad news. Yours,
-Dick.”
-
-“Guess that’s all right?” he added, as he folded the note and placed it
-in an envelope on which he had already inscribed the name of Lieutenant
-Munson.
-
-Pierre had signified his approval with a nod, and now he carefully
-bestowed the letter in the pocket of his shirt.
-
-“He will get ze letter—he will surely be zere.”
-
-“Then you say I cannot write to Merle—Miss Farnsworth, I mean?”
-
-“I have ze strictest orders,” replied Pierre. “Nozing must be told just
-yet. Bah! It is only two days more.”
-
-“Two mighty long days for me, old sport,” said Dick, half in jest and
-half in sober earnest, as he sat down and began cutting at a plug of
-tobacco.
-
-Most of next day Willoughby was alone. But at the regular dinner hour
-Pierre appeared, and announced that he had safely packed the valise and
-the gold in four bags to the old store, and Jack Rover had been apprised
-of Dick’s coming on the following night.
-
-“He knew what was in ze sacks,” laughed Pierre. “Zey were so very heavy,
-oh my! But I told him I would come back and shoot him like a jack-rabbit
-if he opened zem before you came.”
-
-“Guess it needed an old bandit like you to scare Jack Rover,” replied
-Dick, jocularly. But he was very happy—everything was going along
-well—only another four-and-twenty hours now and his captivity would be
-at an end.
-
-That night Dick could hardly sleep a wink, and next morning he was too
-restless and impatient for his approaching liberation to keep within the
-confines of the little grotto. In the darkness of the big central cavern
-he walked up and down, casting occasional glances at the distant glow of
-the log fire where, as he could see, both the aged squaw and the white
-wolf were on vigilant and ceaseless guard.
-
-Suddenly his steps were arrested. With great surprise he gazed toward
-the log fire. There, with Guadalupe and the white wolf, stood the figure
-of a strange man, cloaked and wearing a big sombrero. All their shapes
-were outlined against the ruddy glow, and the monstrous beast was
-actually fawning at the newcomer’s feet. A moment later the stranger,
-with a parting wave of his hand to Guadalupe, advanced toward the spot
-where Dick was standing. Close by was an oil lantern set in a socket of
-the rock wall to mark the entrance to the inner grotto.
-
-For a minute the approaching figure had been swallowed up in the
-darkness, but now came the sound of his footsteps crunching on the sandy
-floor, and a few seconds later he appeared in the flickering radiance.
-Dick Willoughby had already made his inference as to the identity of
-the newcomer—he had been so often told that no living man but the bandit
-chief, Don Manuel, could pass the white wolf with impunity.
-
-But the name Dick pronounced was quite a different one.
-
-“Senor Ricardo Robles—it is you—you?”
-
-“It is I,” replied the Spaniard, quietly, as he extended his hand.
-
-“Then you are—Don Manuel—the—”
-
-Dick faltered and paused.
-
-“Yes, I am Don Manuel de Valencia, the outlaw, the bandit of Tehachapi,
-the White Wolf, as he is commonly called. Come within, my friend. I have
-matters of importance to communicate.” And the visitor led the way
-with an ease that showed his perfect familiarity with every opening and
-turning in the great subterranean series of chambers.
-
-“I cannot remain with you very long,” said Mr. Robles, when they were
-seated in the inner grotto, “for I have a number of things to attend to
-during the few hours that still remain at my disposal.”
-
-“I must not ask questions,” remarked Dick, although his words belied the
-questioning look in his eyes.
-
-“Oh, although I speak in confidence,” Mr. Robles replied, “having
-learned to trust you, I shall make no secret of my contemplated
-movements. Tonight I hope to settle my last score”—he paused, then
-corrected himself—“my last piece of business in California. If all goes
-well, within twenty-four hours I shall be on the high seas. Never
-mind my exact route, but my final destination is Spain, the land of my
-fathers. There, perhaps, you and I may meet again.”
-
-“I hope so. I have come to be deeply interested in you, Mr. Robles.”
-
-“And I in you, young man, all the more because you are now engaged
-to one I hold very dear. Since her birth, Merle Farnsworth has been
-a—little protégée of mine.” Again he had hesitated, and his voice had
-vibrated from emotion. But he was smiling now as he went on: “I have
-watched with sympathetic interest and approval the progress of your love
-affair.”
-
-“Through your spy-glass on the tower?” laughed Dick.
-
-“Well, partly in that way, perhaps,” replied Mr. Robles, with eyebrows
-humorously upraised. “You have had my quiet support from beginning to
-end, and now that you have won the young lady’s heart, you have my most
-sincere congratulations. May you have long years together, and every
-happiness.”
-
-He had clasped Dick’s hand, and placed his disengaged hand
-affectionately on the young man’s shoulder.
-
-“You are really very kind,” said Dick, cordially responding to the hand
-clasp.
-
-“Because I have counted you worthy of your great good fortune in winning
-such a girl as Merle. And I have taken much the same liking to your
-friend, Chester Munson. Have you heard the news:
-
-“No, but I can guess it.”
-
-“Yes, he and Grace Darlington are engaged. And to them I give my
-heartiest blessing just as I have given it to you and Merle. For Grace,
-like her adopted sister, has been always very dear to me. I have loved
-them both very dearly indeed all through their young lives.”
-
-“And both are devoted to you, as I happen to know,” affirmed Dick with
-warm conviction.
-
-“I believe it,” replied Mr. Robles. His hand sought an inner pocket and
-drew forth a legal-looking document. “I came here not only to bid you
-good-bye, but more important still to place this in your possession.”
-
-“My release?” exclaimed Dick eagerly, as his fingers closed on the
-paper.
-
-“Well, not exactly—but it will lead to that, never fear. It is an
-affidavit which has been properly sworn to before a San Francisco notary
-public. It briefly sets out my confession. It was I, Don Manuel de
-Valencia, who killed Marshall Thurston, or at least was responsible for
-his killing.”
-
-As he spoke the words, the outlaw drew himself proudly erect. Dick was
-too overwhelmed with amazement to reply.
-
-“The young ruffian was shot partly because he deserved his fate for
-insulting Merle, partly because, as you cannot but know, Don Manuel, the
-White Wolf, had sworn a vendetta against the whole Thurston brood.”
-
-“Then Ben Thurston—is he dead, too?” gasped the listener.
-
-“Not yet,” was the grim reply. Then he paused and changed his tone.
-
-“But I want to speak not another word about this. What happens to Ben
-Thurston is nothing of your concern—must be nothing of your concern. For
-this document here frees you from all legal entanglements, and I have no
-wish that you should by any chance become enmeshed again. So we dismiss
-Ben Thurston from our talk and from our minds. When you lodge this paper
-with the authorities at Bakersfield, it will be a matter only of a few
-formalities to secure dismissal of the charge against you. For I even
-put it on sworn record that your jail delivery that night was against
-your will.”
-
-“I have forgotten to thank you for that same delivery. I never dreamed
-you were my liberator, Mr. Robles.”
-
-“Because that night I was Don Manuel de Valencia. But at present I
-am Ricardo Robles, and in that capacity it is for me to thank you for
-having so chivalrously protected our dear Merle from the necessity of
-associating her name in any way with the death of that worthless young
-scoundrel. I appreciate the cheerful manner in which you have, for her
-sake, and let me add, for my sake, too, borne your long imprisonment
-here.”
-
-“I’ve been mighty comfortable,” laughed Dick, with a glance around his
-luxurious quarters. “And Pierre Luzon has been a treasure—a good comrade
-all the time.”
-
-“Ah, yes, Pierre,” exclaimed the outlaw, musingly. “Pierre is a very
-good fellow. He has been faithful to me for thirty long years.”
-
-“And where does he go after tonight?” asked Dick. “He cannot stay here,
-all alone except for Guadalupe.”
-
-“Everything is arranged. Guadalupe is accustomed to live alone. But
-tonight Pierre accompanies me on my long journey.”
-
-“So we may all meet again?”
-
-“Yes, we may all meet again,” responded Robles, slowly and gravely,
-“far, far away from the Tehachapi mountains. But now I must go,” he went
-on in a brisk tone, “for I have to make some final preparations. You
-have the affidavit; see that you do not lose it on your ride down the
-mountains.”
-
-“You just bet I won’t,” replied Dick, as he held tightly to the precious
-document with both hands.
-
-“Pierre will come for you here early in the afternoon. Be prepared to go
-with him then. As for myself, Willoughby, there is for the present only
-one word more to be spoken. Adios!” Again they clasped hands, and a
-moment later Don Manuel was gone.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXI—Shadows of the Past
-
-IN a little summer-house at the edge of the rose garden of La Siesta,
-Tia Teresa was seated all alone. She was awaiting the coming of Mr.
-Robles to a rendezvous which he had arranged by a confidential message
-sent on the previous evening. It wanted some time yet of the appointed
-hour, but in her state of deep emotion and repressed excitement she had
-gladly sought the solitude of this secluded corner. Deep in thought, her
-mind was divided between the faraway past and the near-impending future.
-
-Each recurring year this day to her had always been a sad and tragic
-anniversary. In the early hours of the morning she had been to the old
-Mexican cemetery on the hillside, and had bedecked with flowers the
-grave marked by the marble cross bearing the single word “Hermana,”
-also the graves close by of the parents of Don Manuel and Rosetta, the
-children she had nursed and tended and fondled from infancy to early
-manhood and womanhood, through twenty years of unalloyed happiness until
-the gringo had come, the ancestral acres had been filched away, and
-dishonor and death been brought to the slumbrously peaceful home.
-
-And from that slumbrous peace what a sudden and terrible change! On this
-day thirty years ago poor little Rosetta had been found done to death
-beneath the precipice at Comanche Point. No less done to death by the
-shock and shame of the pitiful story thus revealed, the aged parents of
-the beautiful young girl were, within a few days, sleeping their long
-last sleep by her side in the churchyard on the hill. A whole family
-blighted and withered as by the blast of some death-laden sirocco.
-
-Then had followed the years of terror during which Don Manuel, the White
-Wolf, the dreaded outlaw, had wreaked his vengeance on the whole race
-of gringos. She had never seen him all through that time, although at
-intervals money had reached her by Pierre Luzon’s trusted hand, enabling
-her to maintain herself in the little Mexican village near the old fort
-of Tejon. At last had come the fight when the band of outlaws had been
-finally dispersed, Pierre Luzon wounded and dragged away to serve the
-rest of his days in prison, Don Manuel vanished like a wraith in the
-mist, gone where no man could tell.
-
-But through the years that succeeded, Tia Teresa had known that he
-lived—had known in her heart of hearts that he would live until the
-vendetta he had sworn against Ben Thurston would be accomplished. The
-remittances that arrived from time to time, first from Spain, then
-from England, needed no signature to show that they were from her young
-master of former years and that he still held his faithful old nurse in
-affectionate remembrance. And at last had come the crowning surprise of
-all.
-
-Tia Teresa had been bidden to come to Los Angeles by a letter which bore
-a strange signature, but the handwriting of which she had immediately
-recognized. And there, in a fine home beneath the foothills that skirt
-the city to the north, she had found Don Manuel again, much older in
-manner than by lapse of years—quiet, reserved, tinged with a sadness
-of which she knew the cause, but happy withal, for he was married to a
-beautiful English girl and had a little baby daughter. And as nurse to
-this child Tia Teresa, to her great joy, was promptly installed.
-
-Thus again she had become the trusted servant in Don Manuel’s home,
-the only one around him possessing his full confidence and knowing the
-secret story of his past. For, amid these changed surroundings, his
-name was Ricardo Robles, his standing that of a Spaniard or Mexican of
-wealth, of scholarly tastes, and devoted to the seclusion of his home
-with its spacious surrounding gardens.
-
-Their next door neighbors were an English family named Darlington, Mrs.
-Darlington and Mrs. Robles having been life-long friends. And here, too,
-was another tiny child in the home, likewise a daughter.
-
-Seated in the summer-house, Tia Teresa was going over in her mind the
-whole chain of happenings—the new era that had dawned and had brought
-the hope of restored and abiding happiness for Don Manuel. But it had
-been fated not so to be. Within a year his young wife had died, his
-child was motherless, he himself, if not alone in the world, was
-broken-hearted. For a spell he had fits of brooding, then all of a
-sudden he had sold the home that could only henceforth be for him a
-place of saddening memories.
-
-His daughter Merle, taking her English mother’s maiden name of
-Farnsworth, was transferred to the loving care of Mrs. Darlington. Thus
-had it come about that Grace Darlington and Merle Farnsworth had been
-brought up as sisters, with Tia Teresa their nurse, and in later years
-their devoted attendant.
-
-Ricardo Robles had resolved to travel, but Tia Teresa had quickly
-divined that the vendetta was again in his heart. For no other reason
-could he have decided on masking the paternity of his infant daughter
-by giving her the maternal name. And from Tia Teresa Don Manuel had
-no secret to conceal. “Yes.” He had sworn he would hunt Ben Thurston
-through Europe, and it was to protect the future life of his child from
-any association with future consequences of the blood feud that he had
-handed her over to his friends under their solemn promise that, as Merle
-grew up, she should never know anything more than that both her parents
-had died.
-
-So once again Don Manuel had gone his way and disappeared. Some years
-later the Darlington home had been transferred to England, where Mr.
-Darlington had fallen heir to some ancestral estates. Again, after a
-lapse of years, another change had occurred—Mr. Darlington dying, and
-Mrs. Darlington being left a widow in the big, now gloomy, English
-country-house, with Grace and Merle approaching young womanhood, and
-all of them, Tia Teresa included, longing again for the sunshine of
-California.
-
-Intermittently during those years in England, Ricardo Robles had visited
-his friends, but the secret about his real relationship to Merle had
-always been preserved. Both daughters in the home had been brought up
-alike to regard him simply as a dear and valued friend, whose comings
-brought much happiness to their lives in the shape of gifts which
-preserved fond memories during his prolonged spells of absence.
-
-And while the little family was still plunged in deep sorrow for the
-death of Mr. Darlington, Mr. Robles had reappeared as the messenger
-of great joy. For he brought the news that the beautiful rancho of
-La Siesta, lying in mid-California, among the foothills of the Tejon
-Valley, had been purchased for the express purpose that the widow and
-children should make it their future place of abode. In this way had
-come about the return to the land which each and all already loved best
-and regarded as truly “home.”
-
-“Five years ago!” murmured Tia Teresa pensively. And they had been all
-so happy here, the young girls growing up with every accomplishment
-money and the best governesses could bestow, Don Manuel not far away
-watching the progress and developing beauty of his daughter, always
-hovering near for acts of helpful kindness.
-
-Five years of placid enjoyment, of unbroken tranquility, till all of a
-sudden the old enemy had returned and all the rankling wounds of the old
-vendetta had been reopened!
-
-In the Spanish soul of Tia Teresa there was bitter hate still, and
-fierce joy even now that the hour of retribution was approaching—that at
-last after all those years her little Rosetta would be avenged. Yet
-time had had some mellowing influences, for in her musings now she
-experienced a vague sense of uneasiness for possible consequences that
-in former times had never for a moment been tolerated. The true spirit
-of the vendetta had always been in her very blood—strike when you can,
-without thought of what may happen next.
-
-But now she was thinking of coming happenings—of sorrow perhaps for
-Merle, of the undoubted danger for Don Manuel himself.
-
-And while thus she conned the chances, her head bent in deep meditation,
-her eyes half closed, Ricardo Robles, approaching with noiseless step,
-stood by her side and laid an affectionate hand upon her shoulder.
-
-“I have come, Tia Teresa,” he said simply, as he sat down at the edge of
-the little rustic table.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXII—Forebodings
-
-FOR this last hour, Don Manuel,” she said, placing a hand on his, “I
-have been going over all the long story of the past, from the days when
-you were a little boy and Rosetta was suckled at my bosom. Why should I
-not have loved her?” asked the old duenna almost fiercely. “Why should
-I not love her still?” she added, in a lower tone, as she bowed her head
-and covered her eyes with her disengaged hand. “There is love that can
-never die, Don Manuel.”
-
-“Nor should we wish it otherwise,” he said gently, caressing the hand
-extended toward him. “And this very night our undying love for dear
-little Rosetta will be proved—tonight at last she will be avenged.”
-
-With a start Tia Teresa sat erect.
-
-“Then it is all arranged?” she asked breathlessly.
-
-“Yes, all finally arranged,” was his quiet rejoinder. “We meet this
-evening on Comanche Point—the place where I have always vowed he should
-answer for his crime. And you remember what day this is?”
-
-“I remember—can I ever forget?—the very day we found her dead beneath
-the cliff.”
-
-“The very day, Tia Teresa. So my vengeance will be complete. Before now
-I could have shot him a dozen times. But he would never have known that
-his death was by my hand. Tonight, however, he will know. And he will
-realize that the vendetta is the law of God—an eye for an eye, a tooth
-for a tooth; his life, so precious to himself, for hers so dear to us in
-the happy old-time days.”
-
-“But you, Don Manuel?” she asked fearfully.
-
-“It does not matter much about me,” he answered. “But all the same I
-have come to speak a little in regard to myself. Tonight Ben Thurston
-assuredly will die, and should I perish with him, the story of the
-vendetta cannot fail to be revived and the identity of the recluse,
-Ricardo Robles, with Don Manuel, the outlaw, will be established. This
-will come as a great shock to all my dear friends at La Siesta—to Mrs.
-Darlington as well as to Grace and Merle. But this counts for little—the
-name of Don Manuel is just as honorable a name as that of Robles. And
-you can tell them further that all the loot I ever took from the gringos
-lies today untouched in Joaquin Murietta’s cave. I sullied my hands
-with none of it. I was made rich by the sale of, my ancestral estates in
-Spain. And that wealth the law cannot confiscate, for I have been only
-its trustee during all those years. Everything I possess has been vested
-from the first in the names of Merle Farnsworth and Grace Darlington.”
-
-“Grace as well?” murmured Tia Teresa, enquiringly.
-
-“Certainly, for I love both the girls dearly; there is ample to divide
-between them, and by ranking them together I guard Merle from the
-thought that I was anything more to her than to Grace. To both alike I
-was just a deeply attached friend.” He paused a moment, then regarded
-Tia Teresa fixedly. “For my little girl must never know that her father
-was an outlaw, with a price on his head; yes, with blood on his hands,
-if it is only the blood of the worthless Thurston breed.”
-
-“That is no stain—it is an honor—it is a duty that you owed,” exclaimed
-the duenna with fervency, her hands clenched against her bosom as she
-spoke.
-
-“You understand—we understand the vendetta, you and I, Tia Teresa. But
-the Americanos do not understand. And I have brought up my little girl
-as an American, for her own happiness I long ago realized. So she would
-never understand. When she comes to know that her old friend Ricardo
-Robles was Don Manuel de Valencia as well, she will breathe a gentle
-prayer of rest for his soul. But she will not be distressed by the
-knowledge that her father was the bandit and outlaw—she will not have to
-face the cruel world with that stigma attached to her name. For that I
-have contrived, for that I have suffered the dumb agony of childlessness
-all these years.”
-
-“And that, in God’s name,” exclaimed Tia Teresa, “is part of the price
-Ben Thurston, thrice accursed, has to pay.”
-
-“And tonight will pay,” responded Don Manuel, determinedly. “But I speak
-of all this just to put you on your guard. It will be necessary for me
-to say something to Mrs. Darlington as well. I have brought for her the
-papers that will establish the rights of Merle and Grace to all I leave
-behind.” As he spoke he touched his coat where the shape of a packet in
-an inner pocket showed.
-
-“Your will?”
-
-“No. As I have explained, I require no will. The property is theirs
-already. And I do not need to tell you, my dear Tia Teresa, my beloved
-friend, that you, too, have not been forgotten.” As he spoke he raised
-her hand and pressed it reverently to his lips.
-
-“Don’t speak like that, Don Manuel,” she protested.
-
-“I know that all I owe to you can never be repaid,” he continued,
-humbly, gratefully—“the devoted life-service for me and for Rosetta and
-our beloved parents as well.”
-
-Again he kissed her hand, and this time she accepted the seal of his
-high-souled and chivalrous regard. There were tears in her eyes now.
-
-“But, Don Manuel, you need not die tonight. Death for him—that is right.
-But why for you?”
-
-“Perhaps not for me—most certainly,” he replied with a little,
-reassuring smile. “Oh, do not imagine that I deliberately court death
-for tonight. On the contrary, I have all my plans carefully laid. An
-automobile is ready for the road, and I have a yacht waiting for me at
-a quiet spot on the coast, and if all is well, by tomorrow’s dawn Pierre
-and I will be on the ocean. No one around here except at La Siesta will
-miss Ricardo Robles, and if the name of Don Manuel is associated with
-the death of Ben Thurston, only once more will the White Wolf have
-strangely disappeared just as he used to do in the old times.”
-
-He was laughing, not loudly, but just with carefree, almost joyous
-triumph, as he rose to say good-bye.
-
-“Then, Tia Teresa, if events work out just as I have planned, we may all
-meet again, somewhere, somehow—I cannot say more at present. For I shall
-be happy to see my little girl happy in her married love, and later on
-I shall close my eyes contentedly when I can feel assured that nothing
-from the past will ever emerge to spoil her life or bring to her
-distress of mind.”
-
-Tia Teresa, too, had arisen.
-
-“God grant it may be so,” she fervently exclaimed. “But somehow my mind
-misgives me. Today I am softened as I have never been before. Even for
-the sake of our dear Rosetta in Heaven I feel inclined to plead with you
-to let Thurston go his way and the vendetta be forgotten.” And she clung
-to his arm imploringly.
-
-“Never!” cried Don Manuel, putting her gently but resolutely aside.
-“That can never be, Tia Teresa. You know it. A vow sworn over my wronged
-and murdered sister’s grave, over the graves of my parents as well, must
-be fulfilled. To break it at the very moment when it is in my power to
-give it fulfillment would be the act of a coward—a sacrilege that could
-never be atoned. No more words like that. I must not even listen.”
-
-She was sobbing as she dropped back into her chair. Her silence was the
-confession that she was powerless to argue against the unwritten law of
-the vendetta.
-
-“So I kiss you good-bye for the present, Tia Teresa.” He suited the
-action to the word, and, stooping, saluted her first on one cheek, then
-on the other. “Be your old brave and resolute self again. Where shall I
-find Mrs. Darlington?”
-
-“Alone in her boudoir. This is her day for correspondence,” replied the
-duenna, resolutely striving to repress her tears.
-
-“Then I’ll leave you here. Let your best wishes go with me.”
-
-Almost lightly he touched her hand and was gone, disappearing among the
-roses.
-
-Tia Teresa bowed her head across her folded arms. She was thinking not
-of the past now, but solely of the future.
-
-“How would it all end?”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXIII—Old Friends
-
-AM glad to find you alone,” spoke Mr. Robles, as he advanced into the
-subdued light of Mrs. Darlington’s boudoir.
-
-She was seated at her escritoire. Around her were letters lying open
-for answer, others sealed and ready for the mail, also sundry books of
-account which indicated that the chatelaine of La Siesta was a business
-woman who paid attention to the running of her household and the
-management of her estate.
-
-“Always so pleased to see you,” she replied, as she rose to give her
-visitor welcome.
-
-“Pray, keep your seat, Mrs. Darlington. You form an attractive
-picture—the lady who is not too much of a lady to neglect her
-correspondence and her business affairs. And it is about some business
-matters that I have come to talk with you this evening.”
-
-She smiled pleasedly over the compliment paid in the old-fashioned
-courtly style of the true Spanish grandee. She herself always suggested
-the old-time, old-world lady of fashion—one belonging to the old lace
-and sweet lavender era that has so nearly passed away.
-
-“Business matters?” echoed Mrs. Darlington. “That sounds quite serious.
-We have had no cause to talk business for years and years. La Siesta has
-certainly justified its name.”
-
-“But even the most pleasant siesta must in time come to an end,” he
-replied with a grave smile. “There are things in this world that must be
-accomplished—calls of duty that interfere sadly with continuous repose.
-I am leaving tonight on a journey—perhaps a long journey,” he added
-slowly and thoughtfully.
-
-“Oh, going abroad? The wanderlust again? That’s too bad. We shall all
-miss you so much.” She spoke the words with real concern in her tone and
-in her eyes.
-
-“Not exactly the wanderlust,” he responded. “But there is a certain task
-I must perform. And it takes me away—far away from your delightful La
-Siesta.”
-
-“And for a long time?”
-
-“That will be decided by events. I shall write you a long letter when
-once I am on the ocean. Meanwhile there are certain documents I wish to
-leave in your charge, my good kind friend.”
-
-He drew the packet from the breast pocket of his coat. “They are
-important papers, and I wish them to be locked in your safe.”
-
-“Under seal, I see,” she remarked, indicating the big circle of wax that
-closed the cover.
-
-“Yes, sealed with my signet,” he answered, touching the ring on his
-finger. “But all the same I wish you to know the nature of their
-contents. That is why I have sought this little private talk.”
-
-Silently she settled herself to listen, and he went on:
-
-“You are aware that many years ago I sold out all my interests in
-Spain—lands and flocks and mines. Well, except for the money I used in
-building and furnishing my home, I invested the whole amount so realized
-in British Government bonds. But not in my own name. They stand in the
-names of Merle Farnsworth and Grace Darlington.”
-
-Mrs. Darlington showed some surprise.
-
-“Merle, of course. But why Grace, Mr. Robles? I need not tell you that
-she is already well provided for.”
-
-“That I fully understand. But I preferred it so. To me both children
-were very dear, and have always continued to be very dear. There was
-more than a sufficiency to divide. I wished them to share my patrimony,
-even though the one might have a greater claim on me than the other. But
-it was precisely, to guard against such a thought occurring to the mind
-of any outsider that I have treated Merle and Grace exactly alike. The
-secret that Merle is my daughter is known only to you and Tia Teresa and
-me, and, as I have always wished, it must be kept from Merle herself and
-from all others—now, more than ever,” he added after a little pause.
-
-“I have never sought to pry into this mystery,” replied Mrs. Darlington.
-“You had valid reasons for it, I well understood. But I was glad for the
-wee baby’s sake to take her to my heart—the child of the dearest friend
-of my girlhood days. And it was nice, too, for her to have her mother’s
-maiden name—Merle Farnsworth. So, from the very first, I loved her just
-as much as my own baby, Grace.”
-
-“That I know,” said Robles, gratefully touching her hand. “I can never
-adequately thank you for the mother love you have so generously bestowed
-on my child. And I have always been grateful, too, for the chivalrous
-manner in which you have never sought to have me explain my actions in
-this matter—my virtual separation from the daughter whom, while
-hiding our relationship, I have loved all through her young life with
-passionate devotion.”
-
-Mr. Robles was deeply moved. He bowed his head and covered his eyes with
-his hand. In sympathy, Mrs. Darlington also was greatly affected.
-
-“You have been the best of fathers to Merle,” she said in a trembling
-voice, “even though Merle little dreams of what she really means to your
-life. But oh, Mr. Robles, how often have I not pitied you when I have
-seen you restraining in her presence the natural impulses of your
-heart!”
-
-“It was my duty,” he replied, regaining his composure by stern
-self-command and sitting erect again. “My bounden duty to her,” he
-added, resolutely. “So, as you have so kindly done before, we shall
-leave that subject alone. You call it a mystery. Be it so. Just let
-it abide a mystery to the end. Now, Mrs. Darlington,” he went on in a
-changed tone, “please lock up these papers. If I ever want them again I
-shall come to you. But if anything should happen to me, the seal is to
-be broken. You are my trustee. But there is no troublesome will to
-prove and execute. As I have already indicated, all the property I die
-possessed of, all the property that is inalienably and rightfully mine,
-including my home on the hill—everything is already apportioned between
-Merle and Grace, and stands in their names by a deed that dates back
-almost to their days of infancy.”
-
-“It is unheard-of generosity,” protested Mrs. Darlington. “I mean so far
-as Grace is concerned.”
-
-“Not another word, I beg of you. I have already given valid reasons
-besides those of affection and gratitude. Now, Mrs. Darlington, let me
-see you lock up these documents, and my mind will be at rest.”
-
-Without further speech she took the packet of papers from his hand,
-crossed the room, and, standing before a safe inset into the wall and
-already open, deposited the papers in a little drawer. Then she swung
-back the safe door, and the click of the combination as she turned the
-knob told that her visitor’s wishes had been fully complied with. Slowly
-she returned to her seat at the desk.
-
-“Thank you,” said Mr. Robles, pressing her hand.
-
-“Then I am not to ask why you are leaving us tonight?” enquired Mrs.
-Darlington.
-
-“Please not. I just came to you, as I have many times done before, to
-speak the little word—Adios. And it has always been spoken brightly
-between us, my dear friend. For have I not returned again and again like
-the proverbial bad penny?” he continued with a smile.
-
-“And so it will be yet again, I hope,” she replied. “Bad pennies of your
-kind, Mr. Robles, are better than minted gold. And you must think of the
-young people. Engagements should not be too long. Everything is settled
-so far as Dick and Merle are concerned—with your full approval?”
-
-“With my fullest approval, and to my great joy and peace of mind.”
-
-“Well, and you know, too, that it is just the same old story as regards
-Chester Munson and my little girl.”
-
-“Munson has so informed me. He wanted my congratulations on his good
-fortune. Chester Munson is certainly a fine fellow, and Grace could have
-made no better choice for the bestowal of her love. Again I am filled
-with happiness at the turn events have taken.”
-
-“But if there are to be wedding bells for four, their peal will not be
-so joyous if you are absent, my dear Mr. Robles.”
-
-“I shall try to be present,” he replied, with a little wistful smile.
-“Who knows? Wouldn’t it be fine if the wedding bells were to ring in
-Spain?”
-
-“No, no, my friend. You forget that all four are young Americans.
-The honeymoons in Spain, if you like. But the weddings in California,
-please.”
-
-“So be it,” he answered. “Then if I cannot get back for the wedding
-bells, we may have a family reunion during the honeymoons.” He laughed
-almost gaily as he rose. “Now, where are our young Americans? I wish to
-say good-bye to them, too.”
-
-“Where Dick Willoughby is, I cannot say. But he is safe—you still assure
-me of his safety, Mr. Robles?”
-
-“Assuredly. And I have good news for our dear Merle. Tomorrow Willoughby
-will be free, with every suspicion removed from his name.”
-
-“Oh, that will be glad tidings indeed for Merle—for both the girls.”
-
-“Then let us take the news to them. Where shall we find them?”
-
-“As usual, I fancy, in their favorite cosy corner. And Mr. Munson is
-here, too. He is to have luncheon with us. He said you had given him a
-day off from his onerous library duties.”
-
-“Quite correct. I told him I would meet him here, for I have a message
-for him as well. Come then, let us join the young people.”
-
-Again, like the courtly hidalgo, he presented a hand to his hostess and
-led her from the room.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXIV—Heart Searchings
-
-AS Mrs. Darlington had anticipated, the trio of young Americans were
-discovered in the cosy corner. Grace and Munson were engaged in a
-tête-à -tête that was obviously very delightful to themselves, while
-Merle at a discreet distance was busily engaged in watering the pot
-plants and flowers. She was the first to sound a note of warning.
-
-“Here comes mother, and Mr. Robles, also, I do declare.”
-
-The young lovers started a little apart, and Grace in a moment was
-demurely busy over a bit of sewing that had been resting undisturbed in
-her lap during the previous half hour.
-
-Merle advanced toward Mr. Robles.
-
-“This is delightful,” she exclaimed, as she warmly shook hands. “You
-will stay to luncheon, of course.”
-
-“No, my dear. This is to be only a brief visit, I am sorry to say.”
-
-Grace had also come forward, and he saluted her in his usual quiet,
-kindly manner. But for Munson he had a word of sly banter.
-
-“Better than drilling a squad or cataloguing musty old books,” he
-remarked, bestowing a significant side glance in Grace’s direction.
-
-“Infinitely better,” replied the ex-soldier and amateur librarian, with
-frank and unabashed satisfaction.
-
-Mr. Robles took a seat close to Merle.
-
-“I came to bring you two pieces of news,” he said, taking her hand,
-yet addressing his words to all the company. “First and foremost, by
-tomorrow the charge against Dick Willoughby will be withdrawn, and he
-will be a free man.”
-
-“Oh, that is good news indeed,” cried Merle, fairly hugging its bearer.
-
-“Then they have at last discovered the murderer of young Thurston?”
-enquired Munson in a tone of eager satisfaction.
-
-“Yes, or rather he has discovered himself, I believe. Oh, you need
-not ask me for the name. It will only be made public when Willoughby
-formally claims his liberty.”
-
-“I am so thankful,” murmured Grace. “But of course Dick’s complete
-exoneration was bound to come.”
-
-“And I am the bearer of a special message to you, Mr. Munson. I have
-not read it. But it was given to me as the one most likely to get it
-promptly into your hands.”
-
-Speaking thus, he passed over to Munson the hasty scrawl that Dick had
-written in the cavern and entrusted to Pierre Luzon for delivery.
-
-Munson ripped open the envelope, first scanned the contents, then read
-aloud:
-
-“On Tuesday night next, about six o’clock, meet me at Buck Ashley’s
-old store. I shall want you to ride over to Bakersfield with me next
-morning, where my acquittal is assured. Give Merle the glad news. Yours,
-Dick.”
-
-“That I have already been privileged to do,” said Mr. Robles, as he
-smiled down on the young girl by his side. Their eyes met, and a look of
-grave earnestness came into Merle’s.
-
-“And the second item of news, Mr. Robles?” she asked, in a low tone. “I
-hope it is also gladsome tidings.”
-
-“Oh, it is of comparative unimportance,” he answered. “Simply that I am
-going away on a long journey, and may not see all you happy young people
-again for quite awhile.”
-
-Merle’s face fell. “I am so sorry,” she murmured, a note of real feeling
-in the softly-spoken words.
-
-“As you grow older you will realize that the world is full of partings,
-Merle,” he answered.
-
-“But why should there be partings among us?” she protested. “Now that
-Dick is free, there is not a shadow on all our happiness. And we do so
-wish you to share it, Mr. Robles. It will not be just the same if you
-are gone.”
-
-“It is very kind of you to think like that.”
-
-“That’s just how we all think,” interjected Grace. “But when duty calls,
-one must needs answer,” replied Robles. “Right there is an end to all
-argument.”
-
-“And where are you going this time, Mr. Robles?” enquired Merle.
-
-“On a long journey—as far as Europe, I hope. But my plans are not
-quite certain, except that I start tonight. However, I shall be in
-correspondence with Mrs. Darlington, and I trust that when you young
-people come to make that contemplated foreign tour, your footsteps
-will be turned in my direction. Meanwhile you have, all of you, as you
-already know, my warmest congratulations and heartiest good wishes.”
-
-As he spoke, Mr. Robles rose. His manner indicated that he wished no
-further questioning. After a comprehensive glance around, he advanced,
-first of all, to Munson and extended his hand.
-
-“Mr. Munson, you will receive a letter tomorrow that contains an offer
-for you to continue your work in my library, which I hope will prove
-acceptable, at least for the present. Grace, my dear, I take the liberty
-of an old friend.” And he kissed her brow. “With your mother I
-already have had a good long talk,” he continued, as he pressed Mrs.
-Darlington’s hand and looked into her eyes. “And now, Merle, dear, I am
-going to ask you to gather me some roses in your garden. I want them for
-a particular purpose, and, as you know, there are no roses like those of
-La Siesta.”
-
-Merle was standing eager and happy to do his bidding—privileged to have
-the chance of conferring such a little service on her dear old friend,
-her friend from the earliest childhood days of her remembrance. With
-impulsive good-nature, Grace was ready to help as well. But a quiet look
-from her mother restrained her, and Merle and Mr. Robles passed from the
-verandah, hand in hand.
-
-For nearly an hour they wandered among the rose bushes, picking the
-choicest blooms, talking a little on many things, silent at times, but
-both happy in each other’s companionship. At last Mr. Robles looked at
-his watch. The hour of parting had come.
-
-Merle had deftly tied the roses in a bunch, and now she placed them in
-his hands.
-
-“A bouquet from me—from your little friend Merle,” she murmured, with a
-wistful attempt at a smile.
-
-“From my dear little friend, Merle,” he replied, gravely repeating her
-words as he looked down into her upraised face. It was a beautiful
-face, in its fresh youthfulness, its eager joy of living, the sublime
-unconsciousness of self that reveals the spotless soul. For an instant
-their eyes met.
-
-During that brief spell Robles’ whole being trembled. His arms moved as
-if to enfold the sweet girl to his breast. But with a mighty effort he
-controlled himself, and he simply kissed her on the brow, just as he had
-done to Grace in the cosy corner.
-
-“God bless you, Merle, my dear,” he murmured as he turned away with a
-final wave of his hand.
-
-In a moment he was gone from her view. But the girl’s gaze remained
-fixed—still directed down the avenue of trees along which the figure
-of her life-long friend had disappeared. There was a look of dazed
-wonderment in her eyes.
-
-“Oh, can it be so—could it be so?” she faltered, as she raised a hand to
-hold back the tears.
-
-An hour later Robles was in the little Mexican churchyard, scattering
-the rose blooms gathered by his daughter Merle on the graves of the dead
-relatives whose names she would never know as such. Already there were
-the flowers that Tia Teresa had that morning brought—a garland of white
-arum lilies around the cross that marked the sleeping place of Rosetta,
-wreaths of rich red carnations on the tombstone inscribed with the
-father’s and the mother’s names.
-
-And now on the turf beneath the memorials Don Manuel, with lingering
-fingers, dropped the roses here and there, as if to rest with their
-beauty and their fragrance on the forms of his beloved dead. The last
-bloom fluttered to the ground. Then, standing erect, hands upraised, no
-words uttered, but with the unspoken words none the less reverberating
-through his very soul, he vowed once again the vendetta which he had
-sworn on the identical spot thirty long years before.
-
-When he turned to leave the tiny hamlet of the dead, a wonderful
-transformation had come over his countenance. The placid calm was gone;
-the fierce fire of implacable hatred and unswervable resolve burned in
-his eyes. He had bidden adieu to all the softer things in this life. His
-sole concern now was with the enemy whom he had marked down for death
-that night.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXV—At Comanche Point
-
-BEN THURSTON, during the afternoon, seated in his big armchair, had
-first nodded over a newspaper and then dropped off to sleep. He was
-awakened by a touch on the shoulder—rudely awakened, for he jumped to
-his feet, and in a dazed way glared at the disturber.
-
-“Excuse me,” apologized Leach Sharkey, “but I want to remind you that
-this is the afternoon when we are to meet that old Portugee I told you
-about.”
-
-“I need no reminder,” was the gruff reply. “I am ready to start when you
-are. By the way, what’s the fellow’s name?”
-
-“José, he said. He claims to know every nook and corner in the range.
-Has lived in the mountains for many years; keeps goats and bees, and
-shoots a mountain lion occasionally, earning the bounty as well as
-getting the skin.”
-
-“Shoots,” echoed Thurston, somewhat nervously.
-
-“Oh, that was in his younger days mostly, I fancy. Today he is a
-tottering old man who couldn’t hold a rifle straight if he tried. But
-he’s well acquainted with the mountains, that’s the main thing. He tells
-me he has known where Dick Willoughby is hiding since the very day after
-he broke jail.”
-
-“Then why didn’t he come to me?”
-
-“Because he knew nothing about the reward. But at our very first chance
-meeting among the hills I very soon made five thousand dollars look
-mighty good to him. By gad, you should have seen his eyes pop and his
-hands tremble.”
-
-“It is a fortune for such a man.”
-
-“That’s what got him. He has been supplying Willoughby with goats’
-milk, but is paid only two bits a quart. So he grabbed at my bait like
-a hungry coyote. You have the money ready, I suppose? Treasury
-bills—that’s what he stipulated for, because he’s too frail to hump a
-sack of gold around.”
-
-“The money is in that wallet on my desk. You had better carry it.”
-
-Sharkey stepped across the room and shoved a fat leather wallet into the
-breast pocket of his coat.
-
-“So frail, is he?” Thurston went on, musingly. “Well, I needn’t take a
-gun.”
-
-Sharkey smiled. He knew Ben Thurston’s timidity in even handling a
-revolver, and the man’s abject reliance on his armed bodyguard.
-
-“Not the slightest necessity,” assented the sleuth. “I’ve always got
-my brace of bulldogs ready;” and the professional gunman, touching
-the broad leather belt to which his holsters were attached, grinned
-complacently.
-
-“And no danger to be feared from Willoughby himself, you said?”
-
-“None whatever. In fact, he don’t have a gun, José declares. So he only
-sneaks out after dark for a constitutional. The old fellow will take us
-to the spot where we can grab him by the neck.”
-
-“That sounds like business,” replied Thurston, rubbing his hands. “And
-shoot him down, Sharkey, if he runs.”
-
-“He won’t give us the slip this time—you can bet dollars to doughnuts
-on that. But of course he’s got to have the chance of hands-up before
-I fire. Killing is killing, and I prefer the handcuffs. There is really
-less trouble in the long run.”
-
-“Well, perhaps I, too, would prefer to see him hanged,” murmured
-Thurston, with gloating satisfaction. “But don’t forget that we must get
-him this afternoon, dead or alive. I’m sick of this life of watching and
-waiting.”
-
-“The end’s in sight at last.”
-
-“Then we’ll go back East—after I have had my revenge. It will be sweeter
-to me after all the trouble we’ve encountered. And by God, we’ll drag
-that Farnsworth girl, too, through the mire. Hell to all of them! I’ve
-never had anyone but enemies around me here.”
-
-While speaking, Thurston reached for his overcoat thrown across the back
-of a chair.
-
-“All right, we’ll start,” said Sharkey. “I’ll go and get the horses
-ready.”
-
-It was about half past three o’clock when the riders reached the base of
-the mountain barrier not far from the entrance to Tejon Pass.
-
-“We’ve got to make it on foot now,” remarked Sharkey, as he swung
-himself from the saddle. “I’ll tether the horses to this manzanita.”
-Thurston dismounted, and while his companion led the animals under the
-trees, he gazed aloft at the precipice beetling in front of them.
-
-“Damn it, I wish you had chosen any other place than Comanche Point,” he
-exclaimed irritably.
-
-“We had to come to the spot where we can find our man,” replied Sharkey
-complacently. “It is on the ridge above that Willoughby has his place of
-hiding. Come along, we have a good stiff climb before us.”
-
-He led the way up the first slope of the winding trail and Ben Thurston
-followed, reluctantly now, half doubting the wisdom of his having left
-his home for such an adventure.
-
-Meanwhile there had been two other riders on the range that afternoon,
-mounted on little hill ponies. The one man was blindfolded; the other
-rode in advance and guided the second pony by a leading rein. It had
-been the usual experience to which Dick Willoughby had now become
-accustomed—hour after hour along winding, maze-like trails. At last the
-call had come to dismount, and the bandage had been removed from Dick’s
-eyes. He saw that he was in a little box-like nook in the mountains.
-
-“You will remain here,” said Pierre Luzon, “until I whistle for you—you
-know my signal. Zen you will lead ze ponies along zis path. When
-you come to me, I will put you on ze road for home, and we will say
-good-bye.”
-
-“I suppose I may smoke,” laughed Dick, philosophically. The day of
-surprises had left him dulled to any further wonderment.
-
-“Sure, smoke,” replied Pierre. “But remember ze forest regulations,” he
-added with a chuckle, “and do not set ze brush on fire.”
-
-“Oh, I’m no green tenderfoot,” laughed
-
-Willoughby, as he drew his briar-root from his pocket. “And it’s quite a
-balmy afternoon for October.”
-
-He sat down and propped his back against a moss-grown rock.
-
-“You must not stir from here,” continued Pierre. “Remember I have to
-find you again.”
-
-“Guess I’ve learned to obey orders. I’m quite comfortable where I am.”
-And Dick started contentedly smoking.
-
-Pierre, following the little path to which he had drawn Dick’s
-attention, pushed through the brushwood and disappeared.
-
-Just ten minutes later Pierre Luzon stood on Comanche Point and gazed
-down the trail leading up from the pass below.
-
-“Zey are coming, zey are coming!” he exclaimed eagerly to himself, with
-finger outpointed in the direction of the two climbers on foot half
-way up the ascent. Then he slipped back into the shadow of a clump of
-stunted pines that grew close to the cliff.
-
-Fifteen minutes or so passed. Then the heads of Ben Thurston and Leach
-Sharkey showed above the final steep ascent that led directly on to the
-projecting spur known as Comanche Point. Thurston was breathing hard
-after the difficult climb.
-
-“Here we are at last,” remarked Sharkey cheerfully, as he glanced
-around.
-
-Even as he spoke, a tottering figure came forth from among the pines. A
-few minutes before, Pierre Luzon had been erect and vigorous and nimble
-on his feet, but now he seemed to be indeed a frail and bowed old man.
-
-“I have come,” he said, as he approached the figures on the cliff.
-
-“Hands up, then,” cried the sleuth, half laughing. “You remember, I said
-I would search you for a gun.”
-
-“I have no gun,” Pierre answered, as he halted and elevated his arms.
-
-Sharkey advanced and, without taking the trouble to draw either of his
-own weapons, ran his fingers with the quick touch of experience over the
-old man’s clothes.
-
-“I knew you were on the square, José,” said the bodyguard, quickly
-satisfied. “Well, I’ve brought the mazuma.”
-
-He drew from his pocket the fat wallet, opening it for a moment to
-display the wads of greenbacks. Then he put it back again.
-
-“Now where is our man?”
-
-“He is down here, just a little distance,” replied Pierre, in a cautious
-whisper. “I am not strong enough to hold him. But you come. Ze boss, he
-can remain here for ze present.”
-
-Ben Thurston had turned away and was looking down into the valley.
-
-“We’ll be back in a short time,” called out Sharkey.
-
-But Thurston, if he had heard, made no reply.
-
-“Now show the way, old fellow,” continued the sleuth, addressing his
-guide.
-
-A moment later Ben Thurston was alone.
-
-Alone on Comanche Point—gazing over the broad sweep of lands that had
-been his princely heritage, but which he had now lost forever! The
-valley lay beneath him, bathed in the mellow evening sunshine. But his
-eyes were riveted on a single spot. And what a transformation scene for
-the erstwhile cattle king—this new city with its checkerboard of streets
-and all around it new homes amid plots of young fruit trees and meadows
-of alfalfa!
-
-The whole picture was one of fascinating beauty—the city itself the
-finishing touch that gave it human interest. But in Ben Thurston’s soul
-there was nothing but bitterness and disgust. He had kept on complaining
-that he had been unscrupulously plundered by the Los Angeles syndicate,
-and with the realization now of what enterprise and enlightened progress
-could achieve, he began to feel that he had been mercilessly stripped
-of what was rightfully his. Greed and envy and vain regrets were all
-commingled in his surge of envenomed thoughts. But avarice predominated.
-
-“Good God, to think I parted with the rancho at a beggarly acreage
-price, when I might have been selling town lots today. There will be a
-dozen other towns springing up to follow this one.”
-
-In his agony he groaned aloud and covered his eyes with his hands to
-shut out the hateful sight.
-
-Just at that moment the sound of a twig crackling underfoot smote his
-ear. He turned round; into his face stole an ashen look of terror as he
-watched an approaching figure wrapped in a Spanish cloak and crowned by
-a broad-brimmed sombrero. His haggard eyes asked: “Is it man or ghost?”
-He would have screamed aloud, but found himself voiceless from fear.
-
-At last the figure stood before him with proudly folded arms.
-
-“The White Wolf!” gasped Thurston, in a faint whisper.
-
-“Yes, Don Manuel de Valencia—the White Wolf, as you choose to call him.
-And now at last, Ben Thurston, we meet face to face, and alone—after
-thirty long years, and without a woman’s tears this time to save you!”
-
-Ben Thurston sank to the ground, a huddled heap, trembling in every
-limb.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXVI—-Outwitted
-
-PIERRE LUZON led Leach Sharkey along the trail. Beyond Comanche Point it
-dipped again owing to the contour of the mountain, then at a distance of
-about fifty yards, took a sharp turn round an abrupt face of rock.
-
-“Where the hell are you taking me?” asked the sleuth, as they approached
-this bend.
-
-“Only a little further,” replied the guide, in a feeble quavering voice
-as he glanced over his shoulder.
-
-The men were only a few paces apart. In the shadow cast by the cliff,
-Pierre’s pallid face with its stubbly white beard looked like that of a
-veritable ancient, and his bent form and tottering steps completed the
-picture. The sleuth smiled at his momentary discomposure.
-
-Around the turn, however, Pierre grabbed at a revolver lying ready to
-his hand on a ledge of rock, and when Sharkey followed, it was to find
-a hale and stalwart man, erect, alert, with the flash of conscious power
-in his eyes.
-
-“Hands up!” cried Pierre, in a voice of stern command. Leach Sharkey was
-standing three short steps away and was looking now into the muzzle of
-a big automatic pistol. Over his countenance there stole a sickly smile.
-But he knew the rules of the game too well to attempt any resistance.
-His hands went slowly above his head until both arms were fully
-extended.
-
-“You’ve got the drop on me all right, José,” he murmured, in
-self-apology.
-
-“Face the rock,” came the next curt order—the very tone was reminiscent
-of old bandit days.
-
-Sharkey obeyed in silence, and in a trice both his guns were withdrawn
-from their holsters and flung among the brushwood.
-
-“You go ahead now,” said Pierre, stepping aside to let the other pass.
-“You can drop your hands, but if you cry out or attempt to run, zen you
-are one dead man.”
-
-The discomfited sleuth meekly complied, although there was now a black
-scowl on his face as he stepped on ahead. In all his professional
-career, Leach Sharkey had never before fallen so ignominiously into a
-trap like this.
-
-Not a word was spoken while a distance of some two hundred yards was
-being traversed. Then Pierre called out the one word: “Halt!”
-
-Sharkey did not dare even to look round. He stood still as a piece of
-statuary.
-
-“You sit on zat stone over zere,” continued Pierre, “and do not rise
-until I give you permission. Now we will proceed to business.”
-
-Sharkey sat down as ordered.
-
-“Hell, you can have your five thousand dollars right enough,” he said,
-pulling the wallet from his pocket.
-
-“No, my friend. I did not bring you here to rob you. I am out on parole,
-and I never break my word. I am Pierre Luzon!” He spoke the name with
-triumphant pride.
-
-“Good God!” exclaimed Sharkey, in dumfounded surprise. “You belonged to
-the White Wolf’s gang?”
-
-“I belong now to ze gang. Ze White Wolf is alive!”
-
-Leach Sharkey had looked sick before, but a ghastly grey pallor came
-into his face now.
-
-“Then he has got hold of Ben Thurston—at last?” he faltered.
-
-“Yes, at last,” replied Pierre, with a grim smile of joy. “Don Manuel
-and Ben Thurston are alone on Comanche Point just now. Zey will settle
-old scores—zat is zeir affair. Now, I attend to my affair.”
-
-Sharkey looked up enquiringly, but said no more.
-
-“Leach Sharkey,” continued the old Frenchman, “you are one strong man.
-You will now take ze handcuffs from your pocket—I know you carry zem—and
-drop zem over your shoulder. Zere, zat is right. I am glad you obey
-wizout giving me any further trouble. Now, you will hold out your hands,
-behind your back—you know exactly how.”
-
-Yes, Leach Sharkey knew exactly how. And he also knew what the business
-end of a big revolver meant, with the forefinger of a daring bandit like
-Pierre Luzon on the trigger. He was handcuffed and helpless right enough
-in very short order. For the first time in his life the man who had so
-often slipped the bracelets on others, found the bracelets around his
-own wrists.
-
-“Next I want ze key of ze handcuffs,” Pierre resumed. “Which pocket,
-please?”
-
-Sharkey, with a downward thrust of his chin, indicated the waistcoat
-pocket.
-
-“Zank you,” said Pierre, as he thrust in his fingers and produced the
-key. “Now, we will throw zis zing away”—as he spoke it went whizzing
-through the air—“and when you get home to ze rancho, ze blacksmith zere
-will set you free.”
-
-“Oh, I’m going home, am I?” said the sleuth, considerably reassured.
-
-“Yes, Pierre Luzon no longer rob or kill or break ze law. He keep his
-word of honor always. And I promised to bring Dick Willoughby to you
-tonight. Now I shall be true to zat promise, too.”
-
-And through his teeth he blew a shrill whistle.
-
-At the sound Dick Willoughby started up, and shook the ashes from his
-pipe. Following Pierre’s instructions, he led the two ponies along the
-little trail through the chaparral. Within five minutes he emerged on a
-broader trail, right at the spot where the Frenchman was standing.
-
-“Hello, Pierre!” Then Dick’s eyes fell on Leach Sharkey, and at the very
-first glance he saw the shackled hands. “But what’s the meaning of all
-this?” he asked in bewildered surprise.
-
-“It means zat you will take zis man down ze mountains. He came to arrest
-you, but you can tell him now zat you are one free man. You can show him
-ze paper which proves it was not you, but Don Manuel, who is responsible
-for ze death of young Thurston.”
-
-“Great Caesar!” muttered the sleuth, “I thought that from the first, but
-the old fool would not listen to me.”
-
-“Mr. Sharkey,” said Dick, “you and I have no quarrel. What Pierre says
-is true—I have a sworn affidavit in my pocket, fixing the responsibility
-for that unhappy affair where it belongs.”
-
-“I believe you, Mr. Willoughby,” replied the sleuth. “I’m glad you
-are innocent, but I was only doing my duty in trying to arrest the man
-charged with the crime.”
-
-“I understand all that. I bear you no ill will.”
-
-“And I’d shake hands if it were not for these damned bracelets,”
-continued Sharkey.
-
-“Pierre, there is no need of handcuffs,” said Dick, turning to the
-Frenchman. “Set him free. We will go peaceably home together.”
-
-“No, no,” replied Pierre, determinedly. “Leach Sharkey, he is one giant
-in strength. He will go home as he is. Besides, I have trown ze key
-away.” And he laughed aloud.
-
-Sharkey nodded in helpless admission of his sorry plight.
-
-“Too bad,” murmured Dick.
-
-“And now,” continued Pierre, “zere is no time to be lost. We will help
-zis man onto your pony, and you will ride my pony and hold ze leading
-rein.”
-
-“But he can’t ride with his hands behind his back like that,” objected
-Dick.
-
-“Oh, yes, he can,” grinned Pierre. “Ze good horseman ride wid his knees,
-and most of ze road you can be by his side and hold him on. And it is ze
-only way, for ze key, as I have said, is gone.”
-
-“I suppose we’ve got to accept the situation,” said Dick, with a glance
-at Sharkey’s lugubrious countenance. The man of strength was obviously
-crestfallen at his almost ridiculous plight of powerlessness.
-
-Pierre resumed his instructions. “You will not go back to Comanche
-Point, but will take ze mule trail down into ze valley. You know it, Mr.
-Willoughby—it is about one mile furzer on.”
-
-“I know it,” replied Dick.
-
-“You will leave Mr. Sharkey at the rancho and zen ride to ze place where
-your friends are waiting for you. Now, zat is all. I must go. We
-have already said our adios, my dear young friend.” Dick grasped the
-proffered hand and warmly pressed it.
-
-“Good-bye, Pierre. I can never thank you enough for all you have done
-for me. Good-bye.” Leach Sharkey was assisted into the saddle, and the
-horsemen started on their way.
-
-“Good-bye,” shouted back Dick Willoughby, yet once again.
-
-“Adios!”
-
-And as the two figures disappeared around a bend, the Frenchman uttered
-a deep sigh. “A splendid young fellow! I wonder shall we ever meet
-again!”—this was the thought in his mind as for just a moment he stood
-in an attitude of deep dejection.
-
-Then swinging around, he started back at a run for Comanche Point.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXVII—The Dawn of Comprehension
-
-ALL through the afternoon at La Siesta, Merle was in a meditative mood.
-After luncheon Mrs. Darlington had returned to her letter-writing and
-her book-keeping. Munson and Grace had departed for a walk through the
-pine woods, after vain but not too strenuous endeavors to get Merle to
-accompany them. Left to her own resources she had retired to the drawing
-room, had tried to interest herself at the piano, but after a little
-while had given up the attempt; and, coiled in a big chair, had
-surrendered herself to a “big think,” as she mentally termed it.
-
-In that momentary searching of the eyes between her and Mr. Robles
-just before their parting in the rose garden, there had come a flash of
-revelation to her soul. She had divined a yearning in his gaze that was
-surely more than the affection of an old and devoted friend. There was
-passionate tenderness that belied the gentle yet almost perfunctory kiss
-on the brow that he had finally bestowed at parting. Nor had she failed
-to notice the restraint which the strong man had imposed upon himself.
-And strangely enough, her own momentary impulse had been to throw her
-arms around his neck and kiss him, just as a fond daughter might
-have kissed a father at such an emotional moment—on the eve of a long
-journey, the whither unrevealed, the return all so uncertain.
-
-She recalled, too, their previous conversation while she was gathering
-the roses—his words of kindly wisdom, his little bits of advice that now
-seemed to be weighted by more than mere friendly interest in her future
-happiness. Then her mind traveled back slowly, step by step, all the way
-to childhood days—a long vista marked by his comings and his goings, his
-prolonged absences, his unexpected but always welcome reappearances, his
-numberless acts of thoughtful kindness. Once she had been seriously ill,
-when a little girl, and the memory of that illness had ever been the
-memory of his face hovering over her cot, night and day, till the crisis
-had been passed and she had been on the way to assured convalescence.
-
-There had always been an air of mystery about Mr. Robles, but she had
-never sought to penetrate it, instinctively recognizing that there had
-been some great sorrow in his life, and almost unconsciously accepting
-the affectionate regard he had lavished on Grace and herself as some
-sort of consolation for him in his loneliness. She knew that Grace
-was only her sister in name, but none the less Grace was to her a real
-sister, just as Mrs. Darlington was a real mother—the only mother she
-had ever known. Weaving together now the threads of memory, she became
-conscious of the mystery in her own life. There was assuredly some
-fuller story than the story she had been told in the past and had always
-tacitly accepted—that her parents had been neighbors and dear friends of
-Mrs. Darlington in the long ago, and when they had died, the baby girl
-left behind had been bequeathed to her motherly care.
-
-At this stage in her ruminations Merle sat bolt upright in her chair.
-The shadows of evening were beginning to close around her, but the dawn
-of revelation was in her heart.
-
-Would Mrs. Darlington still be alone in her boudoir? Merle answered the
-unspoken thought by stealing from the room.
-
-Yes, Mrs. Darlington was at her writing table, lighted now by candles
-on each side which, covered by little red shades, only dimly illuminated
-the apartment. Merle flitted in without her coming being observed.
-
-Mrs. Darlington was no longer writing—her elbows were resting on the
-table and both hands were covering her eyes in an attitude of deep
-thought, perhaps of sleep, as Merle for a moment imagined when she had
-noiselessly gained her side.
-
-“Mother dear,” she said softly, laying a hand on her shoulder.
-
-“You here, my child?” exclaimed Mrs. Darlington. There was no trace of
-slumber in her eyes.
-
-“Yes, and I want to have a little talk with you—all alone,” said
-Merle, as she dropped into a chair, the very chair which Mr. Robles had
-previously occupied.
-
-The look of vague sadness and anxiety in Mrs. Darlington’s face
-deepened.
-
-“What about, dear?” she asked.
-
-Merle’s mind had been made up, and she came to the issue with
-point-blank abruptness.
-
-“Is Mr. Robles my father?”
-
-The startled look on the other’s face was almost in itself an admission
-of the truth—Mrs. Darlington had been caught off her guard. But she made
-a desperate attempt to parry the question.
-
-“What makes you fancy such a thing?” she faltered.
-
-“Because there is certainty in my heart,” replied
-
-Merle bravely. “It came to me first when he bade me good-bye in the
-garden. And now I see it in your face.”
-
-The young girl dropped on her knees, and, an arm around her mother’s
-waist, gazed up imploringly.
-
-Eyes met eyes. Falsehood was impossible in either case. Mrs. Darlington
-stooped and folded the kneeling girl in a fond embrace. Both were
-weeping now. No word had been spoken, but Merle knew that she had
-correctly divined.
-
-It was a few minutes before there was sufficient self-control for the
-conversation to be resumed. But then, Merle still kneeling by her side,
-Mrs. Darlington spoke:
-
-“I had promised to keep this secret, dear,” she began, fondling the
-girl’s tresses. “But you have gained your knowledge apart from me, so
-I cannot be held to have betrayed my trust. Yes, Mr. Robles is your
-father—your loving and devoted father. Your real name is his—Merle
-Robles you should always have been called.”
-
-“And why not?” asked Merle. “Oh, I am proud and overjoyed to think of
-him as my father.”
-
-“Because he has some important reason to have the world think otherwise.
-I know you will believe me, dear Merle, when I say I do not know that
-reason. He is too grand and honorable a man for me to have ever pressed
-for an explanation. I just accepted you as a gift from his hands—his
-child and the child of my girlhood chum, named Merle, as you know, like
-yourself.”
-
-“So, if I have solved one mystery, there is still another mystery
-beyond,” murmured Merle.
-
-She rose, seated herself, and remained silent for a moment, her hands
-locked across her knees, her brows knit in thought.
-
-“But why distress your heart over unknown things?” said Mrs. Darlington.
-“As you have learned by your today’s experience, mysteries solve
-themselves in due time.”
-
-“Yes,” replied Merle, “but somehow I feel that this is the due time that
-I should know everything—for my dear father’s sake,” she added, “not for
-my own. Oh, mother, you should have seen his face of anguish just before
-he parted from me this afternoon. It was revealed to me only for
-an instant. But now I feel sure that something terrible is going to
-happen—to him.”
-
-She was sobbing again, as she flung her arms impulsively around Mrs.
-Darlington’s neck and sat in her lap, just as if once again she had
-become a little child.
-
-“Oh, mother mine—I shall always call you mother mine, for you have been
-a dear, sweet, kind mother to me ever since I can remember. But don’t
-you see that today I have also found a father whom I deeply love?
-Nothing must happen to him.”
-
-“Why should anything happen to him?”
-
-“I do not know. Where is Tia Teresa?”
-
-The question came with startling suddenness as Merle started up with
-another ray of illumination in her mind.
-
-“I haven’t seen her since morning,” replied Mrs. Darlington.
-
-“Nor have I,” said Merle, standing erect, wiping away the traces of her
-tears, and with a few pats adjusting her rumpled hair. “That is very
-strange.”
-
-“No. I happen to know that this day, the eleventh of October, is always
-a sad anniversary for Tia Teresa—the death of some dear friend who
-lies buried in the little Mexican cemetery on the hill. She has always
-refused to tell me the story. But early this morning she went, as usual,
-to place flowers upon the grave.”
-
-“Flowers—for a grave!” exclaimed Merle. She was thinking of the roses
-she had gathered that afternoon for Mr. Robles—for her father—because
-he specially wanted the most beautiful blooms. But she did not give her
-thought to Mrs. Darlington.
-
-“It is all so strange,” continued Merle. Then her air of decisiveness
-returned. “I’ll go and see if Tia Teresa is in her room.”
-
-Mrs. Darlington was gravely perturbed at this persistency. Oh, if only
-the mysteries of the past could be left alone, the joys of the present
-accepted for themselves! Probing into trouble cannot but lead to further
-trouble—that, for her, had been the secret of contentment. But she was
-powerless to intervene. Merle had already departed on her mission of
-enquiry.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXVIII—Exit Leach Sharkey
-
-THE ponies were jogging down the trail, Leach Sharkey uncomfortably
-lurching in his saddle when some sudden bend or dip was encountered,
-Dick Willoughby good-humoredly holding him on when such emergencies
-rendered the service advisable if an ignominious fall were to be
-avoided. There was a song of joy in Dick’s heart—liberty was at hand;
-he was riding down from the hills to join his loved one again. But there
-was sullen brooding in the soul of the outwitted sleuth—growing more
-sullen with every mile traversed, with every kindness rendered, with the
-very realization of his own ridiculous predicament and the contrast of
-his companion’s light-hearted happiness.
-
-At last they reached the foot of the trail, leading on to the road that
-crossed the plain. At the distance of a few miles the Rancho San Antonio
-showed amid its clustering shade and orchard trees.
-
-“Let us dismount for a bit,” suggested Sharkey. “I feel all in—dead beat
-and tired.”
-
-“But how will I get you on to your horse again?” replied Dick, a trifle
-dubiously.
-
-“Oh, we’ll manage that. Please help me down.” Dick sprang to the ground,
-dropped the reins over his pony’s head, and soon had Leach Sharkey on
-terra firma.
-
-“You’re no light weight to handle,” he laughed. “By the way, Sharkey, I
-forgot to ask: Where’s your boss this afternoon?”
-
-Sharkey eyed Dick curiously.
-
-“You don’t know?”
-
-“Why should I know? It’s quite a time since I met the gentleman.”
-
-“You are aware who Pierre Luzon is?”
-
-“Certainly. Pierre has come to be quite a friend of mine. He’s a good
-fellow all right.” There was a moment’s pause. Dick was rolling a
-cigarette, Sharkey furtively watching every expression on his face.
-
-“Well, the Frenchie played me a dirty trick when he threw that key
-away,” remarked the sleuth, rattling, the handcuffs behind his back.
-
-“I guess Pierre was resolved to take no chances,” replied Dick, grinning
-through the tobacco smoke as he surveyed the helpless bodyguard. “He
-only needed a pair of hobbles to complete the job.”
-
-A muttered curse came from Sharkey’s lips—but this was an aside. For
-Dick he had an insinuating smile.
-
-“You might get these blamed handcuffs off all right, Willoughby. Look
-at that big boulder there. If I set my hands across it, you might hammer
-through the chain. Or if you have a pistol, that might do the trick.”
-
-“No, I’ve got no pistol,” Dick replied.
-
-He did not notice the gleam of satisfaction in Sharkey’s eyes—the
-wolfish smile at the corners of his wolf-like teeth. At the moment he
-was looking around for a convenient stone that might serve as a hammer.
-
-“But I think I might break that chain all right with this,” he went on,
-as he stooped and picked up a heavy, sharp-edged fragment of granite
-from the rock-strewn ground. “Come along, then. Set your wrists just
-here. At least, we can try.”
-
-The trial succeeded—the slender steel strain stretched across the
-boulder soon yielded to the succession of battering blows.
-
-Sharkey flung his great big brawny arms aloft. He was still wearing the
-bracelets, but his hands were free.
-
-“Feels better, don’t it?” said Dick, with a sympathetic smile.
-
-“A damned sight better,” roared the sleuth, as he turned quickly round.
-“Now, young man, you are my prisoner. I arrest you for jail-breaking.
-There’s my star. I don’t say hands up, for I know you haven’t a gun.”
-
-As he spoke, Sharkey opened his coat so that the official badge might be
-displayed.
-
-Dick in his amazement stepped back, just one pace. Sharkey advanced, his
-high hands outstretched.
-
-“Make no trouble, now. You know I am only doing my duty.”
-
-“Duty be hanged,” cried Dick, as with a swift uppercut he caught
-his would-be captor on the jaw. Sharkey staggered, and Dick, with a
-right-arm swing, banged him on the temple, bowling him over like a
-ninepin.
-
-Sharkey was soon on his hands and knees; then dazed and tottering, he
-got onto his feet again. But Dick was watchfully waiting, and with sharp
-jabs, right and left, sent him down once more. The sleuth lay motionless
-now.
-
-Like a flash Dick grabbed the riata hanging from the saddle-horn of his
-pony, and without a moment’s loss of time had its coils around the arms
-and chest of the prostrate man, roping him like a thrown steer with all
-the skill of the trained cowboy. In a brief minute the knots were tied,
-and with the final clove-hitch the fallen Samson was turned over on his
-back. Sharkey’s eyes opened, glaring dully at his conqueror.
-
-“You contemptible hound!” exclaimed Dick, as he tossed the loose end of
-the lariat from him. “By God, I’ve seen a few low-down things done in
-my lifetime, but this is certainly the limit. I suppose you would have
-betrayed me for the sake of the reward, even though you know now for
-certain that I was wrongfully arrested at the start. You damned Judas!
-You deserve to be hanged like a horse-thief, Leach Sharkey—that’s about
-your proper finish.”
-
-And Dick in his righteous indignation glanced around as if in search of
-a convenient tree for the operation.
-
-“I’ll give no further trouble,” mumbled Sharkey.
-
-“It will be my particular care that you don’t,” replied Dick. “Get
-up, you hulking brute.” And grabbing the coils of the riata, he fairly
-lifted Sharkey to his feet.
-
-“Now, I wouldn’t shame the pony by putting you on his back again. Follow
-me.”
-
-Picking up the free end of the rope, and gathering the leading rein of
-Sharkey’s horse into the same hand, Willoughby vaulted into his saddle.
-
-“Come along,” he called out, turning round as the riata came taut. And
-thus, a dozen paces behind, the sleuth, discomfited again a second
-time that day, and humiliated worse than ever, followed perforce in his
-victor’s trail.
-
-Perhaps half a mile of the open road was thus traversed, Dick speaking
-not another word, but looking round occasionally and giving an energetic
-yank at the rope whenever there was evidence of laggard steps. Sharkey
-stumbled along, his chin buried in his breast, his eyes half-closed to
-conceal their dumb, vicious glare of concentrated but impotent fury.
-
-They had now reached a gate; Dick dismounted and threw it open, pointing
-the way for Sharkey to take.
-
-“It’s about five miles to the rancho,” he said. “I don’t know how you’ll
-get through the other gates, but I reckon you can crawl under them, like
-the snake you’ve proved yourself to be. Now, off you go,” and with
-the words he looped the loose end of the riata around the victim’s
-shoulders. “That’s a better necktie than you deserve, Leach Sharkey.
-If it was any one but myself, you would be helped to a start by a few
-vigorous kicks behind.”
-
-The sleuth shambled through the gateway, with shamed, averted face. With
-a click the gate was closed. For just a few minutes Dick watched the
-figure moving away through the now gathering dusk. Then he laid a hand
-on his saddle-horn.
-
-“I hope it’s the last I’ll see of that animal,” he murmured to himself,
-as he sprang lightly into the saddle. And at a canter he started along
-the road, the led pony, after a few heel-kicks as if in joy at being
-relieved of its burden, soon dropping into the swinging stride.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXIX—The Fight on the Cliff
-
-FOR a few moments Don Manuel contemplated the cowering figure of Ben
-Thurston in contemptuous silence. His end was accomplished; his enemy
-was in his power; like the cat with the mouse just a few inches from its
-paw, he could strike at any moment. He spoke now with measured calm.
-
-“Do you remember what day this is? The eleventh of October.”
-
-He paused for a reply. Thurston’s lips were parted but remained dumb.
-Don Manuel resumed:
-
-“Thirty years ago this very night—here at this very spot, you brutally
-killed my poor little sister, Rosetta.”
-
-Thurston shrank back. His lips moved, but no sound came.
-
-“Oh, attempt no denial,” continued Don Manuel, for the moment clenching
-a menacing fist over him. “You cannot forget the tell-tale button which
-you snatched from my hand to hide the proof. Nor have I forgotten the
-lash of your quirt that drew blood from my cheek”—and he wiped his face
-with the tips of his fingers as if to rub away the memory of the deadly
-insult—“the very day on which I buried my dear father and mother,” he
-added, in a voice vibrant with emotion.
-
-He bowed his head; there was another brief period of silence. Then he
-recovered himself and went on:
-
-“The deaths of my beloved parents are just as much on your head, Ben
-Thurston, as the death of the guileless, innocent, young girl whom you
-betrayed, and then with coward hands pushed over this cliff, mangling
-her body on the rocks below. My vengeance has been slow in coming, but
-after all, I am glad of the delay. For all through these years you have
-not only suffered the agony of constant fear, but I have lived to see
-you landless, bereft of the broad rich acres which belonged to my father
-and were never rightfully yours.”
-
-“That’s not so—my claim was established in the law courts.” Thurston
-managed to articulate the words. The sound of his voice seemed to
-restore some little measure of courage, for he sat up, and leaning an
-elbow on a rock, adjusted himself in a more comfortable position. But
-he did not seek to gain his feet—the bandit’s figure still towered over
-him.
-
-“Law courts—your American law courts!” exclaimed Don Manuel, with
-ineffable scorn. “You know you bribed the judge who gave the decision.
-Dare you deny it?”
-
-Thurston ventured no denial—his dropped jaw proclaimed his consciousness
-of guilt.
-
-“Nothing was too base for you,” Don Manuel proceeded. “You robbed,
-despoiled, destroyed my home. But now at last your hour has come. I have
-waited patiently for this hour. On many an occasion, Ben Thurston,
-I could have shot you dead from a distance. But I have
-waited—waited—waited for the time when you would know that it was I, the
-White Wolf, who was sending you to your doom just as I have already sent
-your ruffian son to his.”
-
-“So it was really you—who murdered my boy?” stammered Thurston.
-
-“Don’t call it murder—it was righteous retribution for both him and you.
-Oh, I can tell you something tonight, for a secret does not pass from a
-dead man’s lips.”
-
-The victim so confidently doomed, shuddered. Don Manuel continued:
-
-“Merle Farnsworth is my daughter; your vile and debauched son dared to
-insult her, and so he died—rightly died. Yes, at my hands—I take full
-responsibility. And I am glad to tell you this before you follow him out
-of the world. Tonight, Ben Thurston, you go over this cliff—you die the
-death you gave to my sister.”
-
-As he spoke, Don Manuel cast loose his Spanish cloak, and dropped both
-it and his sombrero to the ground.
-
-Thurston at last staggered to his feet.
-
-“So get ready now to fight for your life,” Don Manuel resumed, folding
-his arms across his breast as he surveyed his victim.
-
-“But I am unarmed,” cried Thurston, pointing to the revolver at the
-other’s belt. His outstretched hand trembled, his voice was a terrified
-shriek.
-
-“Then I, too, shall be unarmed,” replied Don Manuel, as he unbuckled his
-belt and tossed it lightly from him. “Come along, then—it is man to
-man with naked hands.” His tone now was one of concentrated passion and
-hate, and he advanced with arms extended for an enfolding embrace.
-
-Now did Ben Thurston realize that his only chance for life lay in his
-superior weight, possibly his superior strength. At the thought, craven
-fear changed of a sudden to the courage of desperation, and like a wild
-cat he leaped at the throat of his adversary.
-
-Then began a terrible struggle—two strong men writhing in each other’s
-grip like savage beasts. Soon their clothes were torn, their bodies
-begrimed with sweat and mud, their faces and naked arms bespattered
-with blood, for Ben Thurston’s nose had been broken in one of the first
-falls. Thurston, besides his extra pounds, had also the advantage of
-being younger by a few years. But Don Manuel was in better physical
-condition and his muscles were like bands of steel. So it was pretty
-much of a level match in this grim fight to the death.
-
-
-
-0305
-
-As they tugged at each other, as each attempted to bear the other down
-or trip and throw him, as at times, each tried in their locked embrace
-to crush in his adversary’s ribs and squeeze the last breath out of his
-body, as they milled round and round, swayed and fell and rolled over
-and then for a moment regained a kneeling or an upright position—both
-men realized that it was the one who could last the longest with whom
-the mastery would rest.
-
-Pierre Luzon, running up the trail, came to the edge of the open space
-where the desperate contest was in progress. But the onlooker did not
-attempt to interfere—he had had his orders; he just crouched and watched
-the swaying, writhing figures.
-
-For an hour or more the fight proceeded, at times fast and furious,
-with breathing spells to follow, during which grips were tenaciously
-maintained. Points of advantage alternated now to the one side, now
-to the other, but after each succeeding tussle both combatants were
-exhausted without victory being pronounced for either. Every vestige
-of clothing above the belt line had long since been torn away, and they
-were sweating like lathered horses.
-
-The milling and wrestling had gradually grown weaker, and it was clear
-now that the final test of endurance could not be much longer delayed.
-Yet again Don Manuel renewed the attack, and had forced Thurston to his
-knees, when the latter by a supreme effort raised himself again, and
-then by sheer weight pressed his opponent back a pace or two. But just
-at this moment Thurston’s strength seemed to give out, for he dropped
-down sideways, dragging his enemy after him.
-
-Then Pierre Luzon saw the object of the manoeuvre. Thurston had gained
-the spot where Don Manuel’s discarded pistol belt was lying, and now he
-was reaching out with a disengaged hand to grab the gun.
-
-The Frenchman darted forward.
-
-“Keep out of this,” cried Don Manuel, peremptorily, although he was
-breathing hard.
-
-“Look out! Your gun!” screamed Pierre, as he seized Thurston’s wrist in
-a vice-like grip.
-
-Just an instant too late, however, for Thurston’s fingers had already
-closed round the weapon and it went off with a bang.
-
-Pierre dropped to his knees. It was he who had received the
-bullet—through one of his lungs. But he had wrested the pistol from
-the treacherous villain’s grasp and now it fell, still smoking, to the
-ground.
-
-The wounded man coughed a great mouthful of crimson blood on to the slab
-of rock. Then he recovered himself and raised his head. Thurston and
-Don Manuel, even in their weakened state, were fighting more desperately
-than ever, blinded by hate to every sense of danger, and Pierre was just
-in time to see them slip on some loosened stones and then, still locked
-in the death clench, go rolling over the edge of the precipice.
-
-“Mon Dieu! Mon Dieu!” murmured the Frenchman. He staggered to his feet
-and without waiting turned and started down the steep trail, stumbling
-like a drunken man.
-
-At the foot of the zig-zag pathway he gazed helplessly around. He would
-have pushed his way through the brushwood to seek his beloved chief.
-Dead! He must be dead. No one could have dropped that sheer three
-hundred feet onto the cruel jagged rocks below and live. Yet, who knows?
-A tree might have broken the fall—Don Manuel might still be alive.
-
-Pierre, however, was incapable of further effort. His limbs trembled
-beneath him, and again he was spitting blood.
-
-All of a sudden he spied the two horses tethered under the manzanita
-tree. He tottered toward them, untied the first one he reached, and with
-difficulty pulled himself up into the saddle.
-
-To reach Dick Willoughby and get help—that was the thought in the
-reeling brain of Pierre Luzon as with a final effort, leaning forward
-over the saddle, he turned his steed in the direction of Buck Ashley’s
-old store, and urged it to a canter.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XL—Revelation
-
-MERLE paused at the foot of the stairway leading up to one of the towers
-where Tia Teresa had her room. She deliberated for a moment, consulted
-the tiny watch on her wrist, then turned to retrace her footsteps.
-
-“There will be plenty of time,” she murmured to herself. “I shall be
-best able to manage Tia Teresa when I know still more than I do now.”
-She repaired to her own room and put on her automobile cloak, cap, and
-veil. Without telling anyone of her plan, she left the house, went to
-the garage, selected a runabout that was specially her own, and was soon
-speeding along the highway in the direction of the cluster of hills amid
-which the little Mexican cemetery was nestled.
-
-She had been there just once before, several years ago, and she knew
-that her machine would have no difficulty in ascending the trail. Within
-less than an hour, indeed, she was at her destination.
-
-In the grey evening twilight the place looked very dismal and desolate.
-The tiny adobe chapel in one corner was falling into ruins because of
-disuse and neglect. A tall rank growth of weeds overran most of the
-graves. But there were two that showed marks of loving attention, and
-toward these Merle advanced. Here she found the fresh wreaths around the
-headstones, and her own roses scattered on the turf.
-
-“Hermana”—she read the single word on the white marble cross adorned
-with spotless arum lilies. “Sister,” Merle murmured, translating the
-word.
-
-Then she turned to the big gravestone close at hand, and moved the
-wreaths of red carnations so that she might read the words inscribed.
-From these she soon knew that this was the family burial place of the de
-Valencias—that here rested the former owners of the San Antonio Rancho,
-the beloved parents of two children, Manuel and Rosetta.
-
-“Manuel,”
-
-“Rosetta”—she repeated the names. The latter awakened no memory,
-but when she filled out the former to “Don Manuel de Valencia,” she
-instantly recalled the old-time bandit of whom she had heard many a
-tale.
-
-“The White Wolf,” she murmured eagerly.
-
-“Yes, yes. His father once owned the rancho, and that was the cause of
-the deadly feud—the Vendetta of the Hills. But I thought all that was
-forgotten. Yet here are the beautiful fresh flowers.”
-
-Seating herself on a flat monument near by, Merle pondered, piecing
-things together. “Sister”—the cross must mark the grave of the girl
-Rosetta, and have been erected by her brother, Don Manuel. Then whose
-hand had strewn the roses? Mr. Robles! In a flash she knew that Mr.
-Robles was Don Manuel.
-
-And her father, too! The further thought came with such suddenness,
-with such absolute conviction of certainty, that for a moment she felt
-appalled. Her father the notorious robber chief, the desperado on whose
-head a price had been set, the outlaw who had defied the whole state
-of California to arrest him. Somehow she felt no shame—Don Manuel de
-Valencia had been a sort of heroic knight-errant in all the stories she
-had heard—his hand only against the rich, his heart always for the poor
-and oppressed, his attitude toward the intrusive gringos quite justified
-by the sharp practice whereby he had been robbed of his patrimonial
-acres. It was this very story of wrong which had been one of the reasons
-that had from the first predisposed the household at La Siesta to
-despise the Thurston family at the Rancho San Antonio.
-
-Then from thinking of Don Manuel, Merle’s mind passed to Ricardo
-Robles—the courteous, dignified, generous, lovable man she had known all
-her life, the very man whom she had rejoiced that day to call her own
-father. Don Manuel could be judged only by this standard, and her heart
-went out again to Mr. Robles, whatever the name which he had formerly
-worn.
-
-The shadows were closing around her, the night air bit sharply, and
-Merle arose. Two or three of the rose blooms had fallen beyond the lines
-of white stones that marked the graves. Merle advanced, and picking
-these up gently, placed them on the breasts of the sleeping dead. Her
-own kith and kin! Now she realized how she came to have brown eyes and
-raven tresses—the blood of Spain was in her veins. With this thought
-throbbing in her heart, she left the cemetery and hurried away for home.
-
-Tia Teresa was the only Roman Catholic at La Siesta, a devout member
-of the faith of her fathers and of her childhood days with which no
-one around her had ever sought to interfere. Her room was her private
-chapel, a curtained recess at one end being fitted up with a crucifix, a
-small altar, and a prie-dieu.
-
-Here Tia Teresa was kneeling and praying, the only light in the
-apartment coming from the altar candles, when Merle softly tiptoed
-in, still wearing her automobile cloak. She hesitated to advance, and
-momentarily turned to withdraw. But Tia Teresa had seen her, and by a
-gesture had bidden her to remain. For a few moments the old duenna’s
-lips continued to move, then she told another bead on her rosary, arose
-from her knees, crossed herself devoutly, and with a final prostration
-before the crucifix, terminated her devotional exercises.
-
-“What brought you here, my child?” she asked, approaching Merle.
-
-“Why are you engaged in prayer tonight?” asked Merle, answering question
-with question.
-
-“You know I often pray,” replied Tia Teresa. “You have seen me many,
-many times.”
-
-“Yes, but not at this hour, when you are always with my mother.”
-
-“She will be wondering where I am. I had better go to her now.”
-
-“No,” rejoined Merle. “I wish to speak to you. Come here, Tia Teresa;
-sit down by my side, and treat me once again as the little girl of the
-long ago whom you used to pet and fondle.”
-
-“That’s very easily done,” responded Tia Teresa, with a pleased smile,
-seating herself on the low sofa close to Merle. “Come to my heart, my
-darling, as in the long ago.”
-
-And the duenna drew the girl to her loving, protecting bosom. She
-noticed now that Merle was trembling under the influence of some deep
-emotion.
-
-“What is wrong with you, my dear?” she asked anxiously.
-
-“I have learned many things today, Tia Teresa,” replied Merle, taking
-her old nurse’s hands and softly stroking them. “First, that Mr. Robles
-is my father”—the duenna started, but Merle went quietly on—“and that he
-is really Don Manuel de Valencia, the famous outlaw.”
-
-“Whoever told you that?” fairly gasped Tia Teresa.
-
-“No one. I found everything out for myself. After I had looked into Mr.
-Robles’ eyes at our parting this afternoon, I knew the truth. It was
-impossible for mother to deny it, but it is not she who has told me
-anything. I have just returned from the little Mexican cemetery on the
-hillside where Mr. Robles, my father, had taken the flowers for which he
-asked me.”
-
-“And you saw his flowers—and my flowers, too?” faltered the duenna,
-realizing now how Merle had gleaned her knowledge.
-
-“Yes; I inferred that the wreaths were yours, and of course I knew that
-the scattered roses were from my father. He is Don Manuel. But I want
-you to tell me a little about Rosetta.” It was Merle now who put her
-arms around Tia Teresa and drew her affectionately to her.
-
-“You have always loved me, you know, my dear,” the girl went on
-coaxingly. “Now I understand why you were so deeply attached to Mr.
-Robles, for you told me once that you had nursed Don Manuel. And that
-is why I have been, perhaps, just a little closer to you than
-Grace”—the pressure of Tia Teresa’s arms told that Merle had correctly
-divined—“because I was of the blood of your old master. But why has
-there been all this secrecy toward me?”
-
-“Don Manuel’s name could not be revealed—he had been outlawed.”
-
-“And Rosetta—tell me about Rosetta?”
-
-“She was the real cause of the feud between Mr. Thurston and Don
-Manuel.”
-
-The duenna had spoken the words before she had realized how much they
-told. With unfaltering intuition Merle guessed their meaning.
-
-“You mean to tell me that Thurston wronged Rosetta—betrayed her?”
-
-Tia Teresa nodded assent—she was too deeply agitated to speak another
-word.
-
-“And this day—the eleventh of October—the day when you decorate her
-grave?” enquired Merle, in a tone and with a look that compelled an
-answer.
-
-“Is the day she was found dead on the rocks below Comanche Point,”
-replied Tia Teresa.
-
-At the same moment the duenna started to her feet. A wonderful and
-terrible transition came over her usually placid countenance. Her eyes
-fairly blazed with mingled fury and hatred. Her fists were clenched by
-her side. Her whole frame trembled.
-
-“Murdered by Ben Thurston!” she added, the words hissing like hot lava
-from her lips.
-
-“Murdered?” cried Merle, incredulously. She too, had risen.
-
-“Yes, pushed over the cliff by his coward hands. His torn coat, one of
-the buttons between her dead fingers, proclaimed his guilt before God
-and man. But there was no justice in the land in those days—the
-days when the gringos broke up our Spanish homes. Now you know
-everything—that was the real reason of the Vendetta of the Hills.”
-
-Tia Teresa was calm again—it was Merle who was deeply agitated, too
-deeply agitated for a moment to speak.
-
-The duenna went on triumphantly. “But the vendetta once sworn will
-always be fulfilled. Tonight at Comanche Point—”
-
-Then she stopped short, as she saw the look of terror and horror on
-Merle’s pale face.
-
-“Tonight?” queried the young girl tremulously. “They meet tonight? Then
-that is where Mr. Robles is going—that is why he bade us all that sad
-good-bye? My father, oh, my dear father!” And dropping down again on the
-sofa, she burst into a passion of weeping.
-
-Tia Teresa sought to soothe her. But Merle was not to be comforted.
-Yet while she sobbed she was thinking, for suddenly she rose again and
-dashed away her tears.
-
-“At what hour tonight?” she asked.
-
-“I do not know,” answered the duenna.
-
-“Then he is in danger—perhaps at this very moment he is in danger. Don
-Manuel’s life—my father’s life is worth a hundred lives of such a man
-as Ben Thurston. Quick, quick, Teresa. Get your mantilla and cloak. My
-runabout is in readiness. There, let me help you.”
-
-Merle was speaking with swift insistence.
-
-“Where are you going?” whispered Tia Teresa, as the girl’s fingers were
-buttoning her cloak.
-
-“To Comanche Point. We may not be too late to save him.”
-
-A minute later the two women had stolen down the narrow stairway of the
-tower and were speeding through the gathering darkness of the night.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XLI—Beneath the Precipice
-
-WILLOUGHBY had found his friends Munson and Jack Rover at Buck Ashley’s
-old store, eagerly awaiting his coming, with a fine supper sizzling on
-the cook stove, prepared in Jack’s finest professional cowboy style.
-
-“We’ve got to feed you up a bit, I reckon,” grinned Jack, as he slipped
-the Gargantuan slab of beef-steak from the griller on to the big hot
-dish waiting for its reception.
-
-“And some potatoes, too,” he went on, “not forgetting the fried onions
-that beat all your newfangled sauces to a frazzle.”
-
-Dick was nothing loth to fall to. He had been too excited to do more
-than taste the midday meal that Pierre Luzon had prepared for him in the
-cavern. It had been a long hard day, and now he was hungry as a wolf.
-In ordinary circumstances he had no objection to fried onions, but,
-with delicate regard for possible contingencies, he left to the others a
-monopoly over this item in the bill-of-fare.
-
-There were so many things to talk about that it was a difficult matter
-to know where to begin. But at the close of the meal Jack Rover solved
-the question by sweeping the supper things from the table, and emptying
-thereon the contents of one of the bags of gold.
-
-“Good old Guadalupe!” exclaimed the delighted cowboy, as he patted the
-nuggets with a loving hand. “I always told you that the ancient squaw
-had a real gold mine. I guess we’ll be able to stake out our claims
-tomorrow, eh, Dick, my boy?”
-
-“I’m afraid not,” smiled Willoughby. “The fact is that, although I
-helped to wash out that gold, I have not the faintest idea where the
-riffle is up among the hills.”
-
-Jack’s face fell. There was a moment of disappointed silence, and just
-then there came the sound of a faint tapping at the outer door.
-
-“What’s that?” asked Munson. The faces of all three showed that they had
-heard simultaneously.
-
-Dick rose, crossed over, and threw the door wide open.
-
-“My God, who’s this?” he asked, as he stooped over the figure lying
-prone across the steps. “Pierre, Pierre!” he added, as he turned over
-the face. “It’s Pierre Luzon, boys, and desperately wounded!”
-
-The others were pressed together in the doorway.
-
-“Looks as if he had crawled here on his hands and knees,” remarked
-Munson.
-
-“There’s his horse out among the chaparral,” exclaimed Jack, pointing to
-the shadowy form of the animal from which the wounded man had obviously
-tumbled.
-
-“Stand clear,” cried Dick, gathering up Pierre in his arms. “He has
-fainted, but is still alive.”
-
-And Dick, carrying the senseless form, passed into the bedroom beyond
-the living room, and there laid poor old Pierre on the very cot which
-he had occupied once before—on the eventful night when Tom Baker had
-brought the paroled convict from San Quentin.
-
-A few drops of whisky brought the wounded man back to consciousness.
-Dick leaned over him and caught the faintly whispered words. Piérre was
-speaking in the French of his childhood days.
-
-“He is dead—he is dead! At last Rosetta is avenged!”
-
-Dick motioned his companions to silence. He bent down close to the dying
-bandit.
-
-“Who is dead, Pierre? Ben Thurston?”
-
-“Yes, yes. Ben Thurston. Glory be to God! Don Manuel is avenged!”
-
-“And how did you come to be shot, Pierre? Where is Don Manuel?”
-
-“Dead—dead, too!” The wounded man this time cried out the words and
-struggled to sit up. His eyes opened wide, and fastened themselves on
-Dick. His voice again dropped to a whisper; he was speaking lucidly now.
-“But perhaps he lives. Who knows? Go and save him, Dick—Don Manuel—go,
-go.”
-
-Exhausted, Pierre sank back on the pillow. His eyes closed. The death
-rattle was in his throat. “Where is he—where shall I find Don Manuel?”
-Dick uttered the words close to Pierre’s ear. He alone caught the faint
-answer. Pierre Luzon was dead.
-
-“He’s gone, Chester,” said Dick, standing erect. Munson stooped, put his
-ear to Pierre’s breast, then pressed apart one pair of the eyelids.
-
-“Yes, it’s all over,” he said solemnly, as he folded the coverlet over
-the already marble-like face.
-
-In stricken silence the three men passed to the outer room, shutting the
-door softly behind them.
-
-“What’s happened?” asked Jack Rover, “I couldn’t catch his bloomin’
-lingo.”
-
-“Something terrible. There has evidently been a fight to the death on
-Comanche Point between Ben Thurston and Don Manuel. Looks as if both of
-them had gone over the cliff in the struggle.”
-
-“Gee!” muttered the cowboy.
-
-Dick remained just a moment in deep thought. His plan of action was
-promptly decided on.
-
-“Munson, old man, you saddle my pony, and ride to Tejon for help. Jack,
-you remain here with the body.”
-
-“And with the nuggets,” remarked the cowboy drily.
-
-Dick paid no heed to the interruption. He continued:
-
-“I’ll take the horse outside, and ride back to Comanche Point. That’s
-the best we can do, and the main thing is to do it quickly. Pass me that
-flask of whisky—it may come in handy. I’m off now, boys. You’ll find me
-at the cliff. Bring a doctor, Ches. So long!”
-
-The moon had now risen, and while Dick was galloping toward Comanche
-Point from the one direction, the runabout, with Merle at the wheel and
-Tia Teresa by her side, was speeding from the other end of the valley
-toward the same destination. The horseman was the first to arrive.
-
-Willoughby had no need to search long beneath the precipice. A loud,
-continuous cry of lamentation guided him to the spot. There, wailing
-over the corpse of Don Manuel, was the old Indian squaw, Guadalupe. Even
-in death the two bodies were locked in each other’s embrace, and Dick
-noted with horror that Ben Thurston’s teeth were buried in the flesh of
-his enemy’s shoulder. Guadalupe was in the act of trying to separate the
-dead men when Dick intervened.
-
-Great heavens, what a withered, aged face was raised toward his own!
-It was the first time he had ever seen Guadalupe unveiled and at close
-quarters. Her cheeks were wrinkled into a hundred folds; her eyes were
-sunken in deep cavernous hollows. When he touched her, she rose and,
-jabbering furiously for all the world like an angry ape, reviled him
-with curses, her meaning unmistakable, although she spoke in some
-strange Indian tongue.
-
-Just then Dick caught the distant chug-chug of the automobile. He looked
-up the valley, wondering who might be passing at that hour of night.
-This was not the main highway; nobody ever came to Comanche Point after
-dark. Some intervening spur of the foothills dulled the sound; all was
-still and silent.
-
-He became conscious that Guadalupe’s fury had spent itself, and turned
-round. The squaw was gone. His eyes searched the scrub; at one place he
-saw the twigs bending, and he even fancied he could detect the outline
-of the white wolf gliding away through the brushwood. But that was all.
-
-Again the sound of the automobile smote his ears; louder now, and only a
-few hundred yards away he beheld the headlights sweeping toward the spot
-where he stood. He resolved to intercept the vehicle and stepped across
-the belt of chaparral that intervened between him and the roadway.
-Gaining the thoroughfare, he called aloud and the machine slowed down.
-
-But what was his utter amazement when Merle jumped’ from the runabout.
-To her there could be no more surprises on this night of surprises.
-
-“Dick,” she exclaimed, as she accepted his embrace almost as a matter of
-course.
-
-“How do you come to be here, Merle, my darling?” he asked, holding her
-in his arms.
-
-“Something terrible is going to happen. I have come to try to prevent
-it. Have you seen Don Manuel?”
-
-“Don Manuel!” He repeated the name in great surprise.
-
-“Mr. Robles is Don Manuel,” she gasped by way of explanation.
-
-“I am aware. He told me so today.”
-
-“Well, where is he now? And his enemy, Mr. Thurston?”
-
-Dick still had an arm on her shoulder. She was gazing up into his face,
-her voice trembling with emotion as she breathlessly plied him with her
-questions.
-
-“You have come too late, dearest,” Willoughby gently replied.
-
-“Dead!” she exclaimed.
-
-“Both are dead. They fought and rolled over the precipice. I have just
-found their bodies lying in the chaparral back there.”
-
-Merle leaned forward, sobbing on his breast.
-
-“Take me to him, take me to him,” she cried.
-
-“No, Merle, my dear. It is better not. You must go home. Tia Teresa,”
-he added, addressing the duenna who had drawn near, “she must go home.
-Munson has gone to Tejon for help. There will be people arriving here
-very soon now.”
-
-“He is really dead—Don Manuel?” asked Tia Teresa in a voice of awed
-sadness.
-
-“There can be nothing but the one answer,” replied Dick. “Don Manuel has
-passed on.”
-
-“Take me to him,” moaned Merle.
-
-“No, no, Merle. This is no sight for you.”
-
-“But, Dick, Dick, don’t you know one other thing?” she pleaded, raising
-her tearful eyes.
-
-“What other thing?”
-
-“Don Manuel—was my father—my dear, dear father.”
-
-Again Willoughby was overwhelmed with amazement.
-
-“Your father?” he murmured.
-
-“Yes, I only came to know it today. So, Dick, dear, even though he is
-dead, let me kiss him now, let me kneel by his side and tell him that I
-loved him, and will always love and revere his memory. Let me watch by
-him until the others come.”
-
-Dick drew the sobbing girl close to him. His eyes sought those of Tia
-Teresa. He shook his head, telling the duenna in an unmistakable way
-that Merle must be taken home—that she must not be shocked by the
-gruesome spectacle hidden in the chaparral.
-
-Even as their eyes met, the faint throb of an automobile was heard, and
-glancing across the plain Dick saw the far-away headlights twinkling
-like twin stars. With a gesture he directed Tia Teresa’s attention to
-the coming help.
-
-“I shall watch by our beloved dead one,” said the duenna. “My place is
-by his side. Come, dearie,” she went on, placing an arm around Merle’s
-waist. “Mr. Willoughby will drive you back to La Siesta, and I shall
-see that your father’s body is taken to his home. There we shall pay all
-honor to the dead.”
-
-Together they led Merle, unresisting now, to the runabout. Dick got in
-beside her, and took the wheel.
-
-“They will be here very soon now,” he said to Tia Teresa. “Mr. Munson
-will give you all the help you require. I’ll look after Merle.” He
-backed the machine, turned, and the little red light swept up the
-roadway into the distance. From across the valley the headlights of
-a big automobile were now glaring like flashing suns in the soft
-moonlight.
-
-It was the hands of Tia Teresa that separated the bodies. That of Ben
-Thurston she flung from her as if it had been carrion for the buzzards
-and coyotes. Then she knelt down and stroked with loving hand the brow
-of Don Manuel. On the dead face was a look of ineffable calm.
-
-“Manuel, my Manuel, the little child I nursed! My beautiful, brave
-Manuel!”
-
-Thus lamenting, she awaited the coming of Munson and his friends.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XLII—Wedding Bells
-
-A FULL year had passed, and the good people of Tejon had at last
-ceased to speak daily about Dick Willoughby’s exciting adventures, Ben
-Thurston’s inglorious death, and the romantic and now indubitable ending
-of the famous outlaw, Don Manuel.
-
-Both the victims of the desperate fight on Comanche Point had been laid
-to rest—Don Manuel, in the little Mission churchyard above the hill,
-side by side with the beloved sister of his youthful days, whose
-betrayal and death he had at last avenged, although at the cost of his
-own life; Ben Thurston, in the modern cemetery beside his son, the poor
-weak youth in whom the once sturdy family of pioneers had sunk to final
-decadency. Pierre Luzon, the brave and chivalrous old Frenchman, slept
-near the grave of the chief he had served so loyally, and, according to
-the old-time bandit code of ethics, so nobly and so well. In the God’s
-acres where all feuds pass to oblivion there was perfect peace.
-
-Sing Ling had unobtrusively departed for China, a wealthy man, as the
-bank manager at Bakersfield could have told, no doubt destined to become
-a leading magnate in the Flowery Land. Guadalupe was never seen again;
-the aged squaw had probably died in her secret cave. The white wolf,
-too, had perished; a cowboy riding the range had been attracted by some
-buzzards flying and circling round and round far up on the mountain
-side, and on making his way to the indicated spot, had found the
-animal’s carcass picked almost to the bones. The old days were forever
-gone.
-
-But in the beautiful city of Tejon a glorious era of happiness was in
-progress. Christmas-tide had come round again, and had been made gay
-with a tournament of roses, and then with the dawning of the New Year
-had followed a round of festivities in honor of the double wedding
-of Dick Willoughby and Merle Farnsworth, Chester Munson and Grace
-Darlington.
-
-In no place was there more sincere and hilarious rejoicing than in the
-back parlor of Buck Ashley’s fine new store, where the mystery keg,
-sacredly reserved for this great occasion, was once more on tap and the
-postmaster, assisted by Tom Baker and Jack Rover, dispensed hospitality
-to a few chosen friends. But all good things come to an end, and it was
-with a regretful sigh that the sheriff squeezed out the last few drops
-from the tilted keg and sipped for the last time “the blessed nectar”
-that had served to keep green the memory of “dear old Pierre.”
-
-The marriage ceremonies had been performed in a fine little church that
-sheltered all denominations in the new town, and amidst a shower of rice
-and old shoes the happy couples had departed for the wedding breakfast
-at La Siesta.
-
-To Merle the day was one of blissful joy, but of tender regrets as well.
-During the quiet afternoon hours she and Dick had conversed about their
-dear old friend, Mr. Robles—the gallant and chivalrous Don Manuel—the
-beloved father whose identity as such was known only to their own two
-selves besides Mrs. Darlington and Tia Teresa.
-
-And now the hour of departure on the honeymoon trail had come. The
-idea of a trip to Europe had been abandoned for the present. The young
-couples were going up among the Canadian Rockies, by divergent routes
-which would meet a little later on, and all were full of enthusiasm at
-the thought of seeing the mighty mountains in their wintry grandeur.
-
-Mrs. Darlington accompanied the young people to the railway station,
-but Tia Teresa was too deeply affected to trust herself away from home.
-Merle had kissed her a tender good-bye in the apartment in the tower,
-and, despite the joyful promise that they would soon meet again, had
-left the old duenna in prayerful tears before her little altar.
-
-At last they were pulling out from the depot, where the church crowd
-of the morning had reassembled in full force, with fresh supplies of
-good-luck munitions.
-
-
-
-0371
-
-Thus, like a disbanding company of players, the actors in this tale of
-California, pass into history. The olden days of bandits are no more,
-while the hatred of the gringo is only a tradition. The broad acres of
-the San Antonio Rancho no longer lie comparatively fallow in Nature’s
-pasture, but are tilled by the thrifty plowman as he labors afield with
-fullest confidence of a bountiful reward. Meanwhile, the mountains
-that look down upon the beauteous valley guard their secret well. But
-searching eyes will yet, undoubtedly, sometime, somewhere, rediscover
-the mysterious cavern with its hoarded millions of loot, stored by the
-rapacious hands of Joaquin Murietta, the White Wolf, and their brigand
-bands, its lake of oil from which outlaws fed their lamps, and its
-subterranean river from whose shallow riffles Guadalupe, and Dick
-Willoughby also, gathered a wealth of golden spoil.
-
-THE END
-
-*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 52289 ***
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-    <title>
-      A Vendetta of the Hills, by Willis George Emerson
-    </title>
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-  <body>
-<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 52289 ***</div>
-
-    <h1>
-      A VENDETTA OF THE HILLS
-    </h1>
-    <h2>
-      By Willis George Emerson
-    </h2>
-    <h4>
-      Author of &ldquo;The Treasure of Hidden Valley,&rdquo; &ldquo;Buell Hampton,&rdquo; &ldquo;The
-      Builders,&rdquo; etc.
-    </h4>
-    <h3>
-      Illustrated by A. Hutchins
-    </h3>
-    <h5>
-      Boston: The Chappie Publishing Company, Ltd.
-    </h5>
-    <h3>
-      1917
-    </h3>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0001" id="linkimage-0001"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
-      <img src="images/0001.jpg" alt="0001 " width="100%" /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h5>
-      <a href="images/0001.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
-    </h5>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0002" id="linkimage-0002"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
-      <img src="images/0006.jpg" alt="0006 " width="100%" /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h5>
-      <a href="images/0006.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
-    </h5>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0003" id="linkimage-0003"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
-      <img src="images/0007.jpg" alt="0007 " width="100%" /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h5>
-      <a href="images/0007.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
-    </h5>
-    <h3>
-      TO MY WIFE
-    </h3>
-    <h3>
-      BONNIE O&rsquo;NEAL EMERSON
-    </h3>
-    <p>
-      Our enchanting years of pleasure, dear, are speeding all too fast,
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      As our ever-fleeting joys become blest mem&rsquo;ries of the past.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Heaven&rsquo;s blessings, glad and golden, strew with bliss the paths of life
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      When a sweetheart, fond and cheery,
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Has her &ldquo;hubby&rdquo; for her dearie,
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And her &ldquo;hubby&rdquo; has a sweetheart for his wife.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &mdash;The Author.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      January 18, 1917.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <b>CONTENTS</b>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0001"> CHAPTER I&mdash;Guadalupe </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0002"> CHAPTER II&mdash;Charmed Lives </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0003"> CHAPTER III&mdash;Feminine Attractions </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0004"> CHAPTER IV&mdash;Back to the Soil </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0005"> CHAPTER V&mdash;At La Siesta </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0006"> CHAPTER VI&mdash;The Quarrel </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0007"> CHAPTER VII&mdash;Old Bandit Days </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0008"> CHAPTER VIII&mdash;A Letter from San Quentin </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0009"> CHAPTER IX&mdash;Tia Teresa </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0010"> CHAPTER X&mdash;The Home of the Recluse </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0011"> CHAPTER XI&mdash;A Rejected Suitor </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0012"> CHAPTER XII&mdash;The Sped Bullet </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0013"> CHAPTER XIII&mdash;Accused </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0014"> CHAPTER XIV&mdash;Entanglements </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0015"> CHAPTER XV&mdash;Behind the Bars </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0016"> CHAPTER XVI&mdash;Pierre Luzon Returns </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0017"> CHAPTER XVII&mdash;The Bitter Bit </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0018"> CHAPTER XVIII&mdash;Elusive Riches </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0019"> CHAPTER XIX&mdash;The Jail Delivery </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0020"> CHAPTER XX&mdash;In the Cavern </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0021"> CHAPTER XXI&mdash;A Debt of Honor </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0022"> CHAPTER XXII&mdash;Underqround Wonders </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0023"> CHAPTER XXIII&mdash;The Unexpected Visitor </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0024"> CHAPTER XXIV&mdash;In a Tight Corner </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0025"> CHAPTER XXV&mdash;Love and Revenge </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0026"> CHAPTER XXVI&mdash;A Date is Fixed </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0027"> CHAPTER XXVII&mdash;Among the Old Oaks </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0028"> CHAPTER XXVIII&mdash;The Prize Winner </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0029"> CHAPTER XXIX&mdash;-The Rendezvous </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0030"> CHAPTER XXX&mdash;Don Manuel Appears </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0031"> CHAPTER XXXI&mdash;Shadows of the Past </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0032"> CHAPTER XXXII&mdash;Forebodings </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0033"> CHAPTER XXXIII&mdash;Old Friends </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0034"> CHAPTER XXXIV&mdash;Heart Searchings </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0035"> CHAPTER XXXV&mdash;At Comanche Point </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0036"> CHAPTER XXXVI&mdash;-Outwitted </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0037"> CHAPTER XXXVII&mdash;The Dawn of Comprehension
-      </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0038"> CHAPTER XXXVIII&mdash;Exit Leach Sharkey </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0039"> CHAPTER XXXIX&mdash;The Fight on the Cliff </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0040"> CHAPTER XL&mdash;Revelation </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0041"> CHAPTER XLI&mdash;Beneath the Precipice </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0042"> CHAPTER XLII&mdash;Wedding Bells </a>
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0001" id="link2HCH0001"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER I&mdash;Guadalupe
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>T was a June
-      morning in mid-California. The sun was just rising over the rim of the
-      horizon, dissipating the purple haze of dawn and bathing in golden
-      sunshine a great valley spread out like a parchment scroll. It was a rural
-      scene of magnificent grandeur&mdash;encircling mountains, rolling
-      foothills, and then the vast expanse of plain dotted here and there with
-      clumps of trees and clothed with luxuriant grasses.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Thousands of cattle were bestirring themselves from their slumbers&mdash;some
-      sniffing the air and bellowing lowly, others paving the earth in an
-      indifferent way, and all moving slowly toward one or other of the mountain
-      streams that wound serpent-like through the valley, as if they deemed it
-      proper to begin the day with a morning libation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      To the south, commanding a narrow pass that pierced the Tehachapi mountain
-      range, stood old Fort Tejon, dismantled now and partly in ruins,
-      picturesque if no longer formidable&mdash;a romantic relic of old frontier
-      fighting days. In the foreground of the crumbling adobe walls, sheltered
-      under giant oaks, was a trading store and postoffice combined.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Within this building half a dozen men were in earnest conversation,
-      swapping yarns even at that early hour. Perhaps they, too, like the
-      cattle, had felt the call for their &ldquo;morning&rsquo;s morning.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      A young army officer, Lieutenant Chester Munson, was telling of a rough
-      experience he had had a few days before with a mountain lion in one of the
-      near-by rugged canyons.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The story was interrupted by a sound of galloping hoofs.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Here&rsquo;s Dick Willoughby,&rdquo; someone announced.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The rider brought his mustang to a panting stop, threw the bridle rein
-      over its head, and, leaping lightly from his saddle, entered the store.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick Willoughby was a tall, athletic, square-jawed, grey-eyed young fellow
-      who looked determinedly purposeful. He was originally an architect from
-      New York City, but during the last five years had become an adopted son of
-      the West&mdash;had made the sacrifice, or rather gone through the
-      improving metamorphosis, of assimilation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good morning, Ches, old boy,&rdquo; he shouted to the lieutenant.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The latter returned the salutation with a friendly nod.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The camp was lonely without you last night, Dick,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Who is the
-      fair senorita that keeps you away?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s all right,&rdquo; replied Willoughby, smiling. &ldquo;I will tell you later.&rdquo;
-       Then after a genial allround greeting for the others present, he eagerly
-      exclaimed: &ldquo;Boys, she is coming.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What! Guadalupe?&rdquo; shouted everyone in chorus of surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, Guadalupe is headed this way. I spied her on the mountain trail an
-      hour ago, and thanks to my field glasses, was able to determine the moving
-      speck was none other than the old squaw herself. She is just beyond yon
-      clump of trees and will be here shortly.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I am wonderin&rsquo; if she&rsquo;s got her apron filled again with them there gold
-      nuggets,&rdquo; remarked Tom Baker inquiringly, while a smile flitted over his
-      grey-bearded countenance. &ldquo;That squaw is a regular free-gold placer
-      proposition.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;She would have been held up before now in the old days, eh, sheriff?&rdquo;
-       laughed one of the cowboys. Tom Baker had been sheriff for a long term of
-      years in early times, and, although no longer in office, the title had
-      still clung to him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;By gad!&rdquo; exclaimed Jack Rover, another cowboy, and a gentlemanly young
-      fellow in manner and appearance. &ldquo;She&rsquo;s not going to get back to her
-      hiding-place this time, nor to that will-o&rsquo;-the-wisp placer gold mine of
-      hers unless she shows me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That will do for you,&rdquo; said Dick Willoughby with an admonishing look.
-      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t you forget that Guadalupe, although an old Indian squaw, is also a
-      human being. There is going to be no violence if I can prevent it.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; laughed Jack, pushing his hat back as if to acknowledge that he
-      had been checkmated, &ldquo;you&rsquo;re my boss on the cattle ranch, and I&rsquo;ll have to
-      take your tip, I guess.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I say, Dick,&rdquo; asked the other cowboy, &ldquo;did you see anything of the white
-      wolf?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Do you mean the real wolf?&rdquo; interjected Jack Rover, &ldquo;or the bandit, Don
-      Manuel?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Willoughby was looking along the road and took no notice.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I guess both are real,&rdquo; mused Tom Baker, grimly smiling, and a general
-      laugh followed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, I for one will subscribe to that,&rdquo; exclaimed Buck Ashley,
-      storekeeper, postmaster, bartender, and all-round <i>generalissimo</i> of
-      the trading establishment. &ldquo;If Don Manuel is not a wolf in human form, and
-      a bigger outlaw than Joaquin Murietta ever thought of being, why you may
-      take my head for a football.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But he&rsquo;s dead, ain&rsquo;t he?&rdquo; asked the cowboy who had introduced the subject
-      of the white wolf.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Just one thing that I want to emphasize good and plenty to you fellers,&rdquo;
-       said Tom Baker, &ldquo;and that is&mdash;&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Here she comes!&rdquo; interrupted Dick Willoughby.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      A hush fell over the group as the bent, aged figure of an Indian woman was
-      seen approaching the store. Her features were hidden by a shawl that
-      closely muffled her head and shoulders.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck Ashley saluted Guadalupe with a &ldquo;How?&rdquo; The squaw answered with the
-      same abrupt salutation, shuffled up to the counter and said brokenly,
-      &ldquo;Coffee&mdash;sugar&mdash;tea&mdash;rice.&rdquo; With her left hand she had
-      gathered up the lower portion of her calico apron and held it pouch
-      fashion. She thrust her right hand into the pocket so formed, and bringing
-      forth a handful of gold nuggets, laid them on the counter. Some were the
-      size of peas, and others as large as hulled hickory nuts. Not a word was
-      spoken by the onlookers, who were wild-eyed in their astonishment. Soon
-      interest rose to high tension.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck Ashley tied up a large package of sugar and pushed it toward the bent
-      form of his customer; then resting his hand on the counter, he looked
-      fixedly at the squaw and said, &ldquo;More gold.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Again she thrust her hand into the apron pocket and brought out another
-      handful of nuggets, whereupon Ashley proceeded to tie up a large package
-      of coffee. This done, he repeated the request for more gold. Old Guadalupe
-      added another handful of nuggets to those already on the counter, and
-      Ashley tied up a package of rice.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The squaw looked up at the storekeeper for a moment and then said, &ldquo;Tea.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck Ashley&rsquo;s laconic response was &ldquo;More gold,&rdquo; and immediately another
-      handful of nuggets was brought forth, whereupon a fourth package was
-      deposited on the counter.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Old Guadalupe stowed the parcels in her apron on top of any remaining gold
-      nuggets she might have brought. Then she turned and walked limpingly away,
-      through the low brushwood toward a little grove of gnarled and twisted
-      sycamores close to the ruined fort.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      When she had gone Buck Ashley observed, &ldquo;No use following her&mdash;not a
-      damn bit of use in the world! She&rsquo;ll make camp out there under the trees
-      until some time tonight, and then vanish like a shadow into the dark.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      While speaking, Ashley had been gathering up the gold.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I say, Buck,&rdquo; observed Dick Willoughby, winking at his friend Lieutenant
-      Munson, &ldquo;it is my private opinion that that bandit, the White Wolf, has
-      nothing on you.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Tom Baker laughingly chimed in: &ldquo;If I am any judge, and I allow as how I
-      am, Buck here would make that pound-of-flesh Shylock feller look like
-      thirty cents Mex.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Ashley smiled greedily, but in a satisfied way, as he said with unruffled
-      calm: &ldquo;Guess I&rsquo;d better weigh them nuggets and see how much the old
-      squaw&rsquo;s groceries cost her.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The treacherous Indian and the honest paleface,&rdquo; laughed Dick Willoughby
-      in a half-rebuking tone.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck Ashley bridled up. His voice rang with deep feeling.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Boys,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;you think I&rsquo;m a Shylock, a robber, a devil I expect, and
-      everything that&rsquo;s bad. I don&rsquo;t talk much about myself, but just so you&rsquo;ll
-      not think too blamed hard of me, I&rsquo;ll ask you a question. Supposen when
-      you was only about fifteen years old, you stood by, tied hand and foot,
-      and saw a lot of redskins scalp and kill your father and mother and two
-      little sisters, and then rob your dead father of over ten thousand dollars
-      in gold, run off the family stock, and take you to their camp to burn at
-      the stake as a sort of incidental diversion at one of their pow-wow
-      dances; and supposen you performed a miracle and got away and took an oath
-      to kill and rob every derned Indian you might see throughout the remaining
-      days of your life&mdash;what, then, if I reformed and gave up the kilin&rsquo;
-      and stuck to robbin&rsquo;, would you blame me?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      During this tragic recital of his wrongs the old storekeeper had become
-      noticeably excited.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick Willoughby got up from the cracker-box where he had been resting, and
-      advancing with hand extended, said: &ldquo;Buck, what you have told us presents
-      the whole matter in a new light. Shake!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Thanks,&rdquo; replied the storekeeper as he turned away to wipe a mist from
-      his eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Then quickly facing about, he called out in his usual gruff, hale and
-      hearty manner: &ldquo;Say, boys, what&rsquo;ll you all have? This round is on the
-      house.&rdquo; They drank in silence. A fragment of Buck Ashley&rsquo;s history had
-      cleared away a good deal of previous misunderstanding.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0002" id="link2HCH0002"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER II&mdash;Charmed Lives
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>HE spell of
-      restraint that resulted from Buck Ashley&rsquo;s story was at last broken by the
-      cowboy, Jack Rover.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Look here, Dick,&rdquo; he exclaimed, &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll give a month&rsquo;s salary if you will
-      let me take a chance and follow old Guadalupe. I&rsquo;ve simply got to find out
-      and locate that sand-bar in some mountain stream from which she brings in
-      all this gold. This is the third time I&rsquo;ve seen our friend Buck Ashley
-      collect a grocery bill from the old squaw, and the whole business, gold
-      nuggets and all, is getting on my nerves. Why, I dreamed about it for a
-      week last time I saw her forking out whole handfuls of gold.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Very well,&rdquo; replied Willoughby, &ldquo;if you want to take the chance, Jack, go
-      ahead. But it is a mad project which will end in my expressing your
-      remains back East or else planting you in the cemetery on the hill. It&rsquo;s
-      up to you to make your choice before you tackle the job. You certainly
-      know what happened to four or five others who attempted to follow the old
-      squaw. Each mother&rsquo;s son of them was buried the next day.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, that&rsquo;s ancient history,&rdquo; Jack retorted.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not such very ancient hist&rsquo;ry,&rdquo; remarked Tom Baker. &ldquo;I myself saw young
-      Bill McNab drilled through the heart with a bullet that seemed to come
-      from nowhere. After that I&rsquo;ll allow I wasn&rsquo;t filled up with too much
-      curiosity as to where Guadalupe hiked over the mountains.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;There was a regular sharp-shootin&rsquo; outfit,&rdquo; concurred Buck Ashley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And there wasn&rsquo;t a sheriff in the country would have led a posse into
-      that damned ambush,&rdquo; Tom went on. &ldquo;There wasn&rsquo;t a sportin&rsquo; chance along
-      that narrow ledge round which Guadalupe always disappeared. And with all
-      them outlaws in the mountains!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But the outlaws have been wiped out years ago,&rdquo; persisted Jack Rover.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mebbe,&rdquo; said Tom Baker, sententiously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You forget the White Wolf,&rdquo; added Buck Ashley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Which white wolf?&rdquo; asked Jack. &ldquo;I put that question before but got no
-      answer.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Both,&rdquo; replied Tom. &ldquo;To begin with I don&rsquo;t believe that Don Manuel is
-      dead at all. That was only a newspaper story. You may take it from me that
-      the bandit won&rsquo;t pass in his checks till he gets old Ben Thurston. I&rsquo;m
-      allowin&rsquo; as how Ben Thurston would quick enough give a thousand head of
-      his fattest beeves just to rest easy in his mind on that score. He&rsquo;ll find
-      out, sure enough, some day.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, when the White Wolf finds him,&rdquo; interjected the storekeeper with a
-      terse emphasis.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What&rsquo;s that old feud anyway?&rdquo; queried Lieutenant Munson. &ldquo;Tell me, Tom.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, it is an old story,&rdquo; the sheriff answered. &ldquo;I thought everybody knew
-      about it, but of course you&rsquo;re a newcomer. Well, you see,&rdquo; he continued,
-      clearing his throat and expectorating a copious and accurately aimed
-      pit-tew of tobacco juice toward a knot-hole in the floor, &ldquo;the White
-      Wolf&rsquo;s father, Don Antonio de Valencia, a reg&rsquo;lar high-toned grandee from
-      Spain, had settled in these here parts away back longer than anyone could
-      remember. He claimed this whole stretch of country from horizon to
-      horizon. Then came the Americans, among them a government surveyor named
-      Thurston. He had a pull at Washington and managed to get a legal grant to
-      the San Antonio property. Of course the old Spaniard had no real title&mdash;his
-      was just a sort of squatter&rsquo;s claim. But they do say as how he had lived
-      in this here valley more than half a century, so it was mighty hard luck
-      to lose the land. And the boy Manuel never would admit the Thurstons had
-      any right to call it theirs.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don Manuel had a younger sister,&rdquo; interposed Buck Ashley. &ldquo;Rosetta, a
-      beautiful girl&mdash;looked like a morning-glory. Gad! but she sure had a
-      purty face. You remember, Tom, don&rsquo;t you?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, yes,&rdquo; replied Tom Baker, &ldquo;it&rsquo;s not likely I should forget the poor
-      girl. It was &lsquo;cause of her the quarrel became a bitter blood feud&mdash;the
-      Vendetta of the Hills, as we got to calling it. You see,&rdquo; he went on,
-      resuming the thread of his story, &ldquo;old man Thurston&rsquo;s son, Ben, the
-      present owner of the rancho, was in his younger days a gay Lothario scamp,
-      and he came from the East to his new home in California loaded down with a
-      college education and a mighty intimate knowledge of the ways of the world
-      that decent folks don&rsquo;t talk about, much less practice. He had not been
-      here a month until he commenced makin&rsquo; love to little Senorita Rosetta.
-      Before the second sheep-shearin&rsquo; time came around, she was&mdash;well, in
-      a delicate condition. To save himself and, as he thought, cover up the
-      disgrace&mdash;you see he was engaged to a rich Eastern girl of prominent
-      family&mdash;why, the young scoundrel conceived the hellish plot of lurin&rsquo;
-      little Rosetta to Comanche Point one dark night. And when he got her there
-      he threw her over the cliff&mdash;at least that&rsquo;s the way the story goes.
-      Guess Don Manuel was about twenty-five years old at that time, and Ben
-      Thurston two or three years his junior. Well, the disgrace killed
-      Rosetta&rsquo;s father and mother. They died of grief and shame soon after the
-      affair, almost on the same day, and Don Manuel buried them together in the
-      old churchyard on the hill by the side of his murdered sister. And it was
-      there and then, they say, that he took an oath to kill Ben Thurston. That
-      was mor&rsquo;n thirty years ago and the feud has been on ever since, and all us
-      old-timers know hell will be poppin&rsquo; &lsquo;round here one of these days.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But nobody ever sees the White Wolf, Don Manuel,&rdquo; added Buck Ashley.
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s the ex-tr&rsquo;ornery part of it.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, you yourself are likely to see him one of these dark nights, Buck,&rdquo;
-       laughed Jack Rover, as he winked at the other boys. &ldquo;A storekeeper that&rsquo;ll
-      work night and day stacking up money year in and year out is liable to
-      have a call sooner or later from the bandit and his friends.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, hell!&rdquo; was the laconic response of Buck Ashley. &ldquo;Guess I sure can
-      take care of myself.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But Don Manuel may not be alive,&rdquo; suggested the young lieutenant.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He&rsquo;s alive right enough, make no mistake,&rdquo; said Tom Baker, &ldquo;although I&rsquo;ll
-      allow I don&rsquo;t know a single soul who has actually seen him personally for
-      more&rsquo;n twenty years. He is a kind o&rsquo; shadowy cuss. Everybody knows him by
-      his old-time deeds of high-way robbin&rsquo; and all-round murderin&rsquo; for golden
-      loot. I heard of a feller last year who claims to have seen the White Wolf
-      when he was makin&rsquo; that last big stage delivery over by Tulare Lake. He
-      was masked, and had all the passengers out on the roadside with their
-      hands thrown up over their heads while he was takin&rsquo; their valuables away
-      from them.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s a dead cinch,&rdquo; Buck Ashley observed, &ldquo;that whenever there was a
-      hold-up or a robbery, or a murder in cold blood for money, why everybody
-      knew that the White Wolf was again in the hills and playin&rsquo; his cut-throat
-      game for pelf and plunder, or mebbe just for revenge against the gringos,
-      whom he hated like hell. Sometimes he was not heard of in these parts for
-      two or three years, and then he showed up more blood-thirsty than ever.
-      His hand was agin every man, and it looked like as every man&rsquo;s hand was
-      agin him.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve been told,&rdquo; said Dick Willoughby, &ldquo;that when the White Wolf was a
-      boy he saved the life of the old highwayman, Joaquin Murietta.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, them are facts,&rdquo; replied Tom Baker. &ldquo;Leastways I&rsquo;ve heard say so.
-      They claim that he saved Murietta&rsquo;s life from a posse of deputies one
-      night, and altho&rsquo; the White Wolf was only a boy at that time, yet a heap
-      of people think he&rsquo;s the only livin&rsquo; soul who knows the whereabouts and
-      location of the secret cavern where Joaquin Murietta planted his loot,
-      amountin&rsquo;, they say, to millions of dollars in gold and jewels and
-      valuables of all kinds. The retreat always proved a safe one for the
-      murderin&rsquo; gang, and now they&rsquo;re gone no one even to this day can find the
-      place. It&rsquo;s somewhere on San Antonio Rancho, but where? The White Wolf
-      kept his secret well.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;If old Pierre Luzon ever gets out of San Quentin,&rdquo; remarked the
-      storekeeper, &ldquo;I guess he could tell, but he&rsquo;s up for life. He was nabbed
-      in that same Tulare Lake affair &lsquo;bout which Tom had been talkin&rsquo;.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said the sheriff, &ldquo;two others were shot dead before they got back
-      to the mountains. The White Wolf and Pierre were ridin&rsquo; alone when the
-      Frenchie&rsquo;s horse stumbled. They picked him up insensible, a broken leg and
-      concussion of the brain, and he was the only one of the gang who ever went
-      to jail.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;God &lsquo;lmighty,&rdquo; exclaimed Buck, &ldquo;old Pierre used to sit around in this
-      here store day after day, smokin&rsquo; an old foreign-lookin&rsquo; pipe, and hardly
-      speakin&rsquo; a word. He used to pretend he knew no English. We never once
-      suspected that he was one of Don Manuel&rsquo;s bunch&mdash;always thought of
-      him as an old sheepherder, a bit off his nut, who had saved a few dollars
-      and was takin&rsquo; things easy. And hell, all the time he was the White Wolf&rsquo;s
-      look-out man, makin&rsquo; note of everything and passin&rsquo; the word o&rsquo; warnin&rsquo;
-      when there was talk of the sheriff gettin&rsquo; busy.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll allow Pierre Luzon fooled me proper,&rdquo; concurred Tom Baker. &ldquo;However,
-      he got what was cornin&rsquo; to him all right, a life sentence, though he ought
-      to have been hanged. Well, perhaps it is only the White Wolf and Pierre
-      Luzon who now know the cave where Joaquin Murietta cached his treasure.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And Guadalupe perhaps as well,&rdquo; remarked Buck Ashley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, perhaps Guadalupe also,&rdquo; assented the sheriff. &ldquo;But the White Wolf
-      keeps guard over her.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s the real White Wolf this time,&rdquo; laughed
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick Willoughby, with a nod toward the young lieutenant, who had been
-      listening intently to the tale of weird romance.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The real White Wolf?&rdquo; replied Munson, enquiringly. &ldquo;You&rsquo;ve got me all
-      tangled up. What do you mean?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t you know how Don Manuel came by his name of the White Wolf?&rdquo; asked
-      the sheriff.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, all this folk lore is new to me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Why, gosh all hemlock! He is named because of a darn big white wolf that
-      has been seen at different times in this here country for a hundred
-      years.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Wolves don&rsquo;t live so long,&rdquo; protested the lieutenant incredulously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, this one does,&rdquo; retorted Tom, curtly. &ldquo;Leastwise he&rsquo;s been seen
-      from time to time since ever I can remember. In the old days they named
-      the White Wolf Rancho after this monster animal. It has a charmed life. No
-      one can kill this big fellow, altho&rsquo; lots of shots have been fired at him.
-      And the same was true of Don Manuel de Valencia. He escaped so often that
-      folks believed his life a charmed one. And so they called him the White
-      Wolf.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I saw the white wolf once myself,&rdquo; said Buck Ashley, &ldquo;the real white wolf
-      that even now, as Tom says, guards old Guadalupe and makes it best for
-      young fellows like you, Jack Rover, to leave the squaw alone when she
-      makes back for her hidin&rsquo; place in the mountains. I&rsquo;ll never forget that
-      morning, although it&rsquo;s more or less twenty years ago. The great shaggy
-      brute was following Guadalupe along the trail like a Newfoundland dog. In
-      those days I was out on the hills roundin&rsquo; up some mavericks. One of the
-      calves broke from the herd and scampered along a trail that led directly
-      in front of the old squaw. And say, boys, would you believe it? From less
-      than half a mile away I saw with my own eyes that monster devil of a white
-      wolf&mdash;white as the driven snow&mdash;make one terrific mad leap and
-      grab that yearlin&rsquo; by the neck. Guadalupe spotted me and disappeared, and
-      the white wolf trotted after her round the bend, carryin&rsquo; the dead calf in
-      its jaws as a cat carries a mouse.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Did you not shoot at the wolf?&rdquo; excitedly asked Lieutenant Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Shoot, hell! What would have been the use? Didn&rsquo;t you hear what Tom Baker
-      said? White wolves have charmed lives whether they go on two legs or
-      four.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0003" id="link2HCH0003"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER III&mdash;Feminine Attractions
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>OM BAKER, the
-      sheriff, cleared his throat. &ldquo;You fellers, I&rsquo;m assoomin&rsquo;, are all boys. I
-      have been loafin&rsquo; &lsquo;round in this man&rsquo;s land for forty years. I was here
-      the day Don Manuel had been buryin&rsquo; his old father and mother from the
-      little Mission Church, less than a quarter of a mile from where we are
-      settin&rsquo;. He was standin&rsquo; right in front of this store when young Ben
-      Thurston and two of his ranch hands rode up. If ever I saw real bravery it
-      was that mornin&rsquo;. Don&rsquo;t take much bravery to do some things heroic when
-      you have your artillery handy, but it requires the real stuff when you&rsquo;re
-      gunless.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Young Thurston spoke to his companions and they drew their guns and kept
-      them leveled at Don Manuel as their boss dismounted.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don Manuel was one of the handsomest young fellers I ever laid my two
-      eyes on. He walked straight up to Thurston, and notwithstandin&rsquo; the two
-      loaded pieces of artillery was pintin&rsquo; straight at him said:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;&lsquo;Ben Thurston, you are the man who killed my sister.&rsquo;
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;&lsquo;You are a damned liar!&rsquo; retorted Thurston.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;&lsquo;Yes, you killed her,&rsquo; went on Don Manuel. I found this button in her
-      dead hand, and right there, by God! is where it came from. Look at your
-      coat. Your life shall pay for this dastardly murder. If I had my gun I
-      would settle the matter now, notwithstandin&rsquo; that today I have been
-      burying my beloved father and mother.&rsquo;
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;When young Thurston heard about there bein&rsquo; no gun, he snatched the
-      tell-tale button from his accuser&rsquo;s hand, swung himself into his saddle,
-      laughed mockingly, and with his quirt struck Don Manuel across the face;
-      then he wheeled round his pony and rode away with his bodyguards in a
-      cloud of dust.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;God! I will never forget it. Don Manuel stood there, as white as a piece
-      of paper, and never moved for a whole minute. The quirt had drawn the
-      blood from his face in one long streak. At last he turned away with a
-      resolve in his eyes&mdash;one of them there terrible resolves that change
-      the life of a man, and went back to the little church to finish the last
-      sad rites to his people. It&rsquo;s my opinion Don Manuel, from that very hour,
-      turned bandit in his heart and took oath to murder all the gringos in
-      California.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;As I said before, that was thirty years back, and mebbe a little more,
-      and I have never seen him since. But we all heard of him good and plenty.
-      He certainly left a red trail.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      A silence followed. Presently Buck Ashley in the way of explanation, said:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That tombstone on his sister&rsquo;s grave was put up one night. Nobody saw it
-      done, but everyone knows, of course, it was the work of Don Manuel. It has
-      just one word&mdash;&rsquo;Hermana&rsquo;&mdash;chiseled on the cross of white marble.
-      That&rsquo;s the Mexican for &lsquo;sister,&rsquo; guess you all know. So the name Rosetta
-      is only remembered by old-stagers here, like Tom Baker and me. And we
-      ain&rsquo;t forgotten her pretty face either. Poor little girl!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A doggoned shame,&rdquo; muttered the sheriff, meditatively, his eyes cast
-      down.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How about the law?&rdquo; asked Lieutenant Munson. &ldquo;The law!&rdquo; exclaimed Baker,
-      raising his eyes and flashing a look of withering contempt. &ldquo;What kind o&rsquo;
-      law was there in those days and in these parts? A gun was usually both
-      judge and jury. Besides, with the only bit of evidence gone, how could Don
-      Manuel prove anything agin a rich young feller like Ben Thurston?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But if he was laying for him all the time, how is it that the White Wolf
-      never got his man all through those thirty years?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Because Ben Thurston lit out&mdash;he was too demed scared to live on the
-      rancho any longer. But that&rsquo;s another story.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Let&rsquo;s have it, sheriff.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, it&rsquo;s a longish yarn, and p&rsquo;raps you fellers are about tired of
-      hearing me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      No one protested; there was rather a movement of settling down in pleased
-      expectancy of something worth listening to. So Tom Baker continued:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ben Thurston had one warnin&rsquo;, good and plenty, and he didn&rsquo;t wait around
-      for a second one. After Don Manuel&rsquo;s threat, he seldom left his home, and
-      a little later went back East again. It wasn&rsquo;t till more&rsquo;n a year that he
-      showed up agin at the rancho. This time he brought with him his Eastern
-      bride, a fine slap-dash young woman who could ride a horse and handle a
-      team in good shape. But we could all see that she wasn&rsquo;t too happy, for
-      Ben Thurston started in to drink heavily, and she was ashamed of him and
-      showed it.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guess it was to drown his conscience and keep from thinkin&rsquo; about
-      Rosetta,&rdquo; interjected Buck Ashley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Like as not,&rdquo; assented Tom. &ldquo;Well, anyhow, he hadn&rsquo;t been here very long
-      afore Don Manuel got him&mdash;yes, got him fair and square, although he
-      managed to save his neck at the last moment. There was card-playin&rsquo; and
-      drinkin&rsquo; one night at the rancho&mdash;Thurston had got a bunch o&rsquo; gay
-      young dogs down from San Francisco. Mrs. Thurston had left the room, and
-      was sittin&rsquo; out alone in the moonlight on the verandah. Suddenly she heard
-      a sound that made her sit up and listen&mdash;the clatter o&rsquo; twenty pairs
-      o&rsquo; gallopin&rsquo; hoofs a-comin&rsquo; straight for the house. She must ha&rsquo; known
-      something about the vendetta, for she rushed in terror to her husband and
-      gave him warnin&rsquo;. He escaped by a back door, and a minute later the place
-      was surrounded. The shootin&rsquo; came first from some of the ranch hands, who
-      had tumbled out of the bunk house and were spyin&rsquo; around corners. They
-      said later that the hold-up party numbered more&rsquo;n twenty, some of them
-      masked with handkerchiefs tied around their faces, but others bold as
-      brass and not carin&rsquo; a dang who saw &lsquo;em. Among these last was Don Manuel.
-      But Pierre Luzon was a downy duck, for no one spotted him, although later
-      on we came to know that he played the principal part that night, next to
-      the leader of the gang.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, after the shootin&rsquo;-scrap became general, there was a pretty scare
-      in the ranch house&mdash;one of the card-players dropped, and the others
-      were hiding under tables, when Don Manuel appeared and asked for Ben
-      Thurston. His wife, mighty brave, denied that he was there&mdash;he had
-      left that afternoon for Visalia to buy some cattle, she boldly declared.
-      Don Manuel, always the true gentleman, mark ye, was for believin&rsquo; her when
-      Pierre, his face masked, came in from the verandah and in a low voice
-      passed some words to his chief. Mrs. Thurston knew in a moment that her
-      bluff was goin&rsquo; to be called, and, while the outlaws were confabbin&rsquo;,
-      darted from the room.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But Pierre was just as quick out by the verandah, and before she got to
-      the door o&rsquo; the woolshed beyond the horse corral, he was there to block
-      her passage. It was Pierre who had caught a glimpse of the fugitive
-      sneakin&rsquo; into this outbuilding, and now he knew for certain that Thurston
-      was hiding among the bags o&rsquo; wool inside. But a cornered man is a
-      dangerous animal, and it might mean a good few lives if the door was
-      opened and any attempt made to rush the place.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The gang was soon buzzin&rsquo; all around; the woman, now almost in hysterics,
-      was hustled aside, and a few bundles of loose hay was being dumped into
-      the shed through an open window. A match did the rest. Within three
-      minutes the door opened and Thurston came staggerin&rsquo; out through thick
-      clouds of smoke. Pierre grabbed him and had a noose around his neck in
-      doublequick time.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The shootin&rsquo; was over before this, and some of the ranch hands were
-      lookin&rsquo; on from a little distance, for now everyone knew that it was only
-      the boss that the night-riders were after. So more&rsquo;n one was able
-      afterwards to tell the story&mdash;how the young wife threw herself at Don
-      Manuel&rsquo;s feet, and with sobs and tears pleaded for mercy. And by the
-      living God she won out even after the rope, with her husband at the end of
-      it, had been swung over the limb of a near-by sycamore.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The White Wolf stood stock-still for perhaps a minute, weighin&rsquo; things
-      like, his arms folded across his breast. Then he raised the weepin&rsquo; woman,
-      and, turnin&rsquo; to Thurston, now half-dead with fear, laid hold of him by the
-      shoulder and shook him as a terrier shakes a rat. Then with his other hand
-      he flung the noose from around his neck. &lsquo;Take your miserable life, then,
-      this time&rsquo;&mdash;that&rsquo;s what Don Manuel said. &lsquo;Take it, but the day will
-      come when we shall meet again, man to man, with no woman&rsquo;s tears to save
-      you.&rsquo; And he pushed Thurston away contemptuously, topplin&rsquo; him over like a
-      ninepin, and a minute later rode off at the head of his men.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The narrator paused, and there was a general murmur of repressed
-      excitement.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My word, that&rsquo;s a peach of a story,&rdquo; exclaimed Jack Rover.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He certainly was a chivalrous fellow, this oldtime Don Manuel,&rdquo; remarked
-      the lieutenant.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And don&rsquo;t you see,&rdquo; said the sheriff, &ldquo;that, when a man acted like that
-      and spoke like that, his words must come true? Don&rsquo;t tell me that Don
-      Manuel today is dead while Ben Thurston is still alive. But he has taken
-      mighty good care of himself ever since that day. He an&rsquo; his wife skipped
-      East the very next morning, and I&rsquo;m told they never stopped till they got
-      to Europe. Nobody knows where exactly they lived during the time that
-      followed, but news came through years later that the wife had died,
-      somewhere in the south of England, leaving a son behind. That&rsquo;s young
-      Marshall who has come West with his dad now&mdash;the young man&rsquo;s first
-      visit and his father&rsquo;s last one, I reckon, if he sells the ranch, as I&rsquo;m
-      told he&rsquo;s trying to do.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But I say, boys,&rdquo; observed Jack Rover, &ldquo;what do you suppose the White
-      Wolf did with all the gold he took away from the people? It&rsquo;s said that in
-      one stage robbery he got over fifty thousand dollars of the yellow stuff.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hid it,&rdquo; replied Buck Ashley, &ldquo;with Joaquin Murietta&rsquo;s hoarded gold. For
-      it&rsquo;s sure as sure can be that Don Manuel came to know the secret o&rsquo; the
-      bandits&rsquo; cave where Murietta used to store his loot. The only thing
-      anybody else knows is that it is around here somewheres.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But they do say,&rdquo; observed one of the cowboys, &ldquo;whatever Sheriff Baker
-      may think, and you, too, Buck, that Don Manuel is sure &lsquo;nuff dead. Most
-      folks herabouts believe that the White Wolf has gone to his long restin&rsquo;
-      place, sort a j&rsquo;ined forces with old Joaquin Murietta. The Tulare Lake
-      affair was, I guess, his last raid.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He ain&rsquo;t dead,&rdquo; muttered Tom, determinedly, while Buck Ashley also shook
-      his head in repudiation of the cowboy&rsquo;s theory.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, I happen to know,&rdquo; observed Dick Willoughby, &ldquo;that Mr. Thurston has
-      run down the story of the White Wolf&rsquo;s death in that Seattle saloon brawl
-      pretty thoroughly, and he is of the opinion that the big-featured articles
-      in the San Francisco and Los Angeles papers were correct&mdash;that the
-      dead man&rsquo;s identity was absolutely established.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s how he&rsquo;d wish it to be, at all events,&rdquo; said Buck Ashley. &ldquo;But
-      even now, when Ben Thurston ventures to come home to the rancho, he brings
-      with him a great big hulking bodyguard&mdash;Leach Sharkey, I&rsquo;m told is
-      the fellow&rsquo;s name. That don&rsquo;t look much like believin&rsquo; the White Wolf to
-      be dead and the vendetta played out, does it? You can see it in his
-      hang-dog face that it isn&rsquo;t any real pleasure for him to be around in
-      these parts. He ain&rsquo;t once paid me a visit at the store. Guess he thinks
-      his hide&rsquo;ll last longer by stickin&rsquo; close to home. You owe your job o&rsquo;
-      runnin&rsquo; his cattle, Dick Willoughby, to the fact that he&rsquo;s still plumb
-      scared.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, well, I am in his employ,&rdquo; said Dick loyally, &ldquo;and I&rsquo;m inclined to
-      give him the benefit of the doubt as regards these ugly rumors and idle
-      stories. He has always been on the square with me. But perhaps he&rsquo;ll stick
-      to the rancho, now he believes the White Wolf to be dead.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He may believe it, but, as Buck says, why then the bodyguard?&rdquo; commented
-      the sheriff as he relighted his pipe.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes.&rdquo; replied Dick Willoughby, &ldquo;but I believe he is thinking of letting
-      Leach Sharkey go. Personally I would be willing to wager that Don Manuel,
-      whom no one has seen since that last raid on the stage coach, is dead and
-      sleeping with his sires.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, dead or alive,&rdquo; exclaimed Jack Rover, &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t care a hang for the
-      White Wolf and his-buried treasure. But what I would like to know is the
-      exact location of that rippling mountain stream, the identical sandbar
-      where the old squaw Guadalupe gathers up her pocket change with which to
-      buy groceries. That would be a heap better than any blooming cave. Them&rsquo;s
-      my sentiments.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      As he said this he threw some silver on the bar and invited everybody to
-      lubricate.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Just nominate your poison, boys, and let&rsquo;s drink to my finding old
-      Guadalupe&rsquo;s gold mine.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      They all laughed good-naturedly, and Lieutenant Munson declared that he
-      thought he would put in the balance of his furlough days prospecting. &ldquo;You
-      know,&rdquo; he explained in an aside to the storekeeper while the latter was
-      preparing the drinks, &ldquo;I am only here to visit my old college pal, Dick
-      Willoughby, and incidentally see the place where my father was a soldier
-      in the early California days. He was stationed several years in Fort
-      Tejon.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That was before my time,&rdquo; said Buck Ashley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The soldiers had abandoned the old fort when I came first into these
-      parts.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Meanwhile Dick Willoughby was clinking glasses with Jack Hover.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;There are some mighty pretty little senoritas hereabouts,&rdquo; said Dick,
-      &ldquo;good American blood mixed with Spanish blood, you know, and all that. If
-      a fellow could only find the right one&mdash;understand, I say the right
-      one, Jack&mdash;he wouldn&rsquo;t be losing any time in chasing after the old
-      squaw&rsquo;s secret gold mine or the White Wolf&rsquo;s buried millions.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Jack Rover laughed outright.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I say, Dick, what are you reddening up about? Gee, if I had as fine a
-      lead as you have staked out, I&rsquo;d feel the same way. Ain&rsquo;t that right,
-      Buck?&rdquo; Buck Ashley winked at Jack Rover and said: &ldquo;If you mean who I think
-      you mean, you sure are righter than right. I speak wide open and
-      unrestrained when I give it as my opinion that Miss Merle Farnsworth is
-      the finest specimen of young womanhood that I ever set eyes on, and I have
-      seen some girls East as well as West. Take it from me, she is a jewel, she
-      is a regular beauty rose. Yes,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;and too damned good for that
-      young Thurston whelp, who hangs around tryin&rsquo; to act smart whenever she
-      and that old duenna chaperon of hers comes here to trade. I&rsquo;ll simply boot
-      him out of the store one of these days.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick Willoughby smiled in a satisfied way as he moved toward the door.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, hold on, Dick,&rdquo; called out Jack Rover, &ldquo;don&rsquo;t be in such a
-      dangnation hurry. I&rsquo;ll ride with you in a minute. I&rsquo;ve just got this to
-      say to you, Buck Ashley, that I like you better than ever for what you&rsquo;ve
-      said about Marshall Thurston. Even though I&rsquo;m working for the Thurston
-      outfit, I&rsquo;m free to express my opinion that that young feller is about the
-      meanest specimen of low-down humanity I&rsquo;ve ever struck.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s a case of the second decadency, I suppose,&rdquo; remarked Munson. &ldquo;The
-      worthless profligate, spawn of the rich old roué, Ben Thurston.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Such a drunken pup,&rdquo; continued Rover, &ldquo;aint&rsquo; good enough for a half-breed
-      Indian, much less for the likes of the young ladies of La Siesta. Gee, if
-      I thought there was one chance in a thousand for me with either of them,
-      why goodbye to that placer gold mine ambition that&rsquo;s eating my vitals, or
-      to the planted millions of the White Wolf.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      As he spoke the last words, he followed Dick Willoughby into the open.
-      Dick was standing by his pony.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;re superlatively in earnest, aren&rsquo;t you?&rdquo; he said as he laughed
-      good-naturedly at the cowboy.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You bet your life I&rsquo;m in earnest,&rdquo; replied Jack. &ldquo;And if you don&rsquo;t get
-      busy with that love affair of yours, well, take it from me, you had better
-      look out, for somebody will be picking the peach right from under your
-      very nose. Well, so long, Dick; I&rsquo;ve changed my mind; I&rsquo;ll not ride with
-      you. I&rsquo;ll see to that bit of fence repairing up on the range. And who
-      knows but I may find a sand-bar and a riffle sparkling with yellow gold?&rdquo;
-       He laughed like a big overgrown boy as he touched the rowel to his pony
-      and galloped away across the valley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0004" id="link2HCH0004"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER IV&mdash;Back to the Soil
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">J</span>ACK ROVER is a
-      great boy,&rdquo; said Dick Willoughby to Lieutenant Munson as the two rode off
-      at a leisurely pace toward the group of ranch buildings peeping through a
-      clump of trees at the edge of the foothills.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A type of Western character,&rdquo; replied Munson, &ldquo;that in a way is quite new
-      to me. And yet, do you know, I rather like this Western atmosphere.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Like it!&rdquo; exclaimed Dick. &ldquo;Why, man, it is <i>the</i> atmosphere in which
-      to live, move and have one&rsquo;s being.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      They both laughed at his enthusiasm.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Really,&rdquo; continued Dick, soberly, &ldquo;I would not live another year in New
-      York City for all the property fronting on the Circle, the coming centre
-      of old Gotham. Out here a man is a man for what he is worth. You grow
-      bigger, you think broader thoughts, you are not confined to following
-      precedents or taking orders from the man higher up.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I know,&rdquo; replied Munson, &ldquo;or at least I am beginning to understand
-      something of what you mean. I have only been here ten days and I am
-      already feeling loath to return to my post.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ches,&rdquo; exclaimed Dick, turning abruptly and facing his companion, &ldquo;give
-      it all up, old fellow, and come and live in this glorious country&mdash;California!
-      There&rsquo;s music in the very name. It is the land of sunshine, of fruits and
-      flowers, and of pretty girls into the bargain.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You keep telling me of the pretty girls, but when am I to see them?&rdquo;
-       questioned Munson. &ldquo;If you have any real senoritas who will cause a fellow
-      to forsake his Eastern home and send in his resignation to army
-      headquarters, let me get a peep at them.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Again they both laughed, this time at the challenge in Munson&rsquo;s words.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;All right,&rdquo; said Dick, &ldquo;you shall see them. And, by the way, don&rsquo;t you
-      remember that this is the very day we have arranged to call on Mrs.
-      Darlington at the Rancho La Siesta? It is a beautiful place, this little
-      rancho, and Mrs. Darlington you will find to be a most admirable woman.
-      But just wait until you see Grace Darlington.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How about Miss Farnsworth?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not for you, old man,&rdquo; replied the other quickly, reddening at the
-      temples. &ldquo;Not as long as my name is Dick Willoughby&mdash;providing, you
-      understand, always providing that I shall prove successful in my wooing.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Is it as bad as that, Dick?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo;&mdash;his laughing tone was only a mask to deeper feelings&mdash;&ldquo;I
-      cannot deny that I am pretty hard hit.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My, but you do whet my impatience,&rdquo; said the lieutenant. &ldquo;And I am about
-      as anxious to be paying that afternoon call as I am to have my breakfast.
-      I don&rsquo;t know how you feel, Dick, but I&rsquo;m as hungry as a lean coyote.&rdquo; He
-      paused a moment, then asked in a musing tone: &ldquo;How far away is this
-      wonderful La Siesta Rancho?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, only about twenty miles.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Twenty miles! You speak of miles out here in the same way as we speak of
-      city blocks back in New York. Surely it must be quite a farm.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Quite a farm? I should say! You musn&rsquo;t confound our Californian ranchos
-      with Eastern farms, old man. Why, this rancho of San Antonio covers over
-      four hundred square miles of territory.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You astonish me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;La Siesta Rancho adjoins the great San Antonio possession and contains
-      comparatively few acres, just under three thousand. But it surely is a
-      beautiful little place, fixed up like a nobleman&rsquo;s park in the old world.
-      And then the ladies&mdash;&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Aha, the ladies,&rdquo; repeated Munson, doffing his hat in courtly fashion and
-      smiling audaciously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick touched the flank of his pony with his spur, and for a few miles they
-      rode on at a quicker pace and in silence. Soon they were approaching the
-      ranch buildings. On the outer edge was a little cottage, covered with
-      vines and surrounded by fruit trees, the place which Dick Willoughby, the
-      cattle foreman, had called &ldquo;home&rdquo; for the past five years.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      After turning their horses into a corral, they passed by way of a broad
-      verandah into a big room, roughly but comfortably furnished. Some logs
-      were smouldering in the fireplace, and quickly started into a bright blaze
-      when Dick kicked them together. The warmth was grateful, for while out of
-      doors everything was now bathed in genial sunshine, here the morning air
-      was still keen.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      A Chinaman appeared from the back quarters, and smiled expectantly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Breakfast, Sing Ling,&rdquo; called out Dick, &ldquo;and just as quick as you can
-      serve it.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Sing Ling departed as noiselessly as he had come.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;These are certainly great quarters,&rdquo; observed Munson, settling himself in
-      a big Old Mission rocker and glancing around.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The walls, curiously enough, were pretty well covered with pen-and-ink
-      sketches and designs of buildings that might have adorned an architect&rsquo;s
-      office, while there was a partly completed landscape painting in oils
-      standing on a rudely fashioned easel.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And you&rsquo;ve certainly stuck to the old line of work, Dick,&rdquo; the lieutenant
-      went on.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Of course one must have something to think about when he is all alone in
-      a new country,&rdquo; replied Willoughby. &ldquo;But most of that stuff I did in my
-      first year here,&rdquo; he added, following the other&rsquo;s survey of the walls.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You still paint, however,&rdquo; remarked Munson, his eyes resting on the
-      unfinished canvas.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Or try to,&rdquo; was the laughing response.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, that&rsquo;s a modest way of putting it. Do you know, old man,&rdquo; Munson went
-      on, &ldquo;since I came here I have often thought what a marvelous change has
-      been wrought in you&mdash;what a transplanting has taken place? You were a
-      chronic New Yorker, except for that one year you spent in the Latin
-      Quarter of gay Paree. You thought then you were going to make a great
-      painter. And, by gad, I almost believe so myself,&rdquo; he added, bending
-      forward to make a more critical scrutiny of the work on the easel. &ldquo;By
-      jove, that&rsquo;s really fine, Dick.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m afraid that&rsquo;s flattery, Chester, my boy,&rdquo; responded Willoughby.
-      &ldquo;However, it sounds good to hear you say so. A word of appreciation is
-      what all hearts hunger for. Personally I even believe in a moderate amount
-      of flattery. Its psychic influence is more potent in arousing and causing
-      the heart to throb with ambition than all the stimulants, drugs or
-      reasoning in the world. Indeed, without a certain amount of flattery one
-      becomes ambitionless, languid, and perishes; whereas the unexpected caress
-      or kindly words of praise from loved ones, just or unjust, adds more
-      strength to the good right arm of the breadwinner than all the beef in
-      Christendom, and makes the sunshine seem brighter and earth&rsquo;s every breeze
-      a south wind blowing across beds of violets.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A bit of a poet, too, I see,&rdquo; smiled Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Willoughby made no reply. He had crossed over to the open door and was
-      looking out on the valley that stretched away for miles&mdash;great oak
-      trees in the foreground, with cattle-dotted pasture lands beyond. Waving
-      his hand toward the vast expanse, he said:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Just look at that for a picture, and see how tame a man-made gallery is
-      as compared with this great art gallery of Nature. Do you know, Ches, I
-      despise New York? There was a time, when I first came here, that I felt I
-      should die of ennui, yearning for the Great White Way once again. But I
-      have outgrown all that. I know now, thank God, there&rsquo;s nothing to it. Here
-      a man can fill his lungs with pure air, and at the same time feast his
-      soul all day long with beautiful things.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      There followed a brief interval of silence. Munson had risen and joined
-      his comrade at the door. Both were gazing over the glorious sunlit sweep
-      of territory rimmed by the distant, pine-clad hills. In the heart of Dick
-      Willoughby was supreme contentment, in that of Chester Munson a vague
-      longing to get away from red-tape army routine and breathe the
-      exhilarating and inspiring freedom of life in the open.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Blakeflast,&rdquo; bleated a soft voice behind them, and turning round they
-      found the suave, smiling Chinaman with hand outstretched toward the
-      smoking viands upon the table. Sentiment was instantly forgotten in favor
-      of lamb chops grilled to a turn, a great fluffled omelette with fine herbs
-      that would have done credit to a Parisian chef, and coffee that was
-      veritable nectar.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At last appetite was satisfied. The lieutenant had produced his cigar
-      case, Dick was filling his briar-root pipe with tobacco from the humidor.
-      The latter spoke:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Say, Ches, we were talking about New York. Do you want me to give you a
-      toast on that modern Babylon?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Sure, old man, go ahead! You know I haven&rsquo;t lost my interest in old
-      Gotham, by any manner of means. It may the a modern Babylon. But to me it
-      is none the less the greatest of American cities.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s just the trouble,&rdquo; said Dick, seriously. &ldquo;It is too great. There
-      identities are swallowed up. Individualism cannot survive. It is all one
-      great composite.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, let us hear the toast.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick raised his cup of coffee and said: &ldquo;Very well, here it is; here is my
-      opinion of New York:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br />
-    </p>
-    <p class="indent15">
-      &lsquo;Vulgar in manners; overfed,
-    </p>
-    <p class="indent15">
-      Over-dressed and under-bred;
-    </p>
-    <p class="indent15">
-      Heartless, godless, hell&rsquo;s delight,
-    </p>
-    <p class="indent15">
-      Rude by day and lewd by night.
-    </p>
-    <p class="indent15">
-      Bedwarfed the man, enlarged the brute;
-    </p>
-    <p class="indent15">
-      Ruled by boss and prostitute.
-    </p>
-    <p class="indent15">
-      Purple robed and pauper clad;
-    </p>
-    <p class="indent15">
-      Raving, rotten, money mad;
-    </p>
-    <p class="indent15">
-      A squirming herd in Mammon&rsquo;s mesh;
-    </p>
-    <p class="indent15">
-      A wilderness of human flesh;
-    </p>
-    <p class="indent15">
-      Crazed by avarice, lust and rum&mdash;
-    </p>
-    <p class="indent15">
-      New York! thy name&rsquo;s delirium.&rsquo;.rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br />
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great Heavens, old man,&rdquo; exclaimed Munson, when Dick had finished, &ldquo;you
-      are severe, to say the least.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Willoughby laughed good-naturedly as he passed the match box to his
-      friend.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not severe, only truthful,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;You see, in New York no man dares
-      think for himself. Everything is controlled by a machine-appointed
-      chairman, secretary and committee, and you must hear the resolutions read
-      before you know the doctrine you are perforce to advocate.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Then he lit his pipe and rose from the table.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Now, I have a lot of things to attend to, old fellow,&rdquo; he resumed. &ldquo;Make
-      yourself comfortable. Here&rsquo;s a bunch of Eastern newspapers&mdash;oh, I
-      read them regularly, haven&rsquo;t got rid of that bad habit yet. I&rsquo;ll tell Sing
-      Ling to have lunch ready on the stroke of noon. Then we&rsquo;ll be in good time
-      to start out for the Rancho La Siesta. So long!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0005" id="link2HCH0005"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER V&mdash;At La Siesta
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">S</span>OON after one
-      o&rsquo;clock Dick Willoughby and Chester Munson were again in the saddle. They
-      galloped along the foothills for some time in silence. But coming to the
-      boulder-strewn wash of a mountain stream, they had perforce to rein their
-      horses to a walk. Conversation was now possible.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dick, will you give me a job as a cowboy if I quit the army?&rdquo; asked
-      Munson abruptly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Surest thing you know,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;But why try to kid me like that?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh,&rdquo; laughed the other, &ldquo;I am not jesting.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, by gad, if you feel that way already, the chances are you will
-      write out your resignation when you get back to the shack tonight.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You mean by that&mdash;&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I mean,&rdquo; said Dick, smiling benignly at his friend, &ldquo;that when you have
-      once seen Grace Darlington you will feel like browsing on the California
-      range until you have learned to throw a riata.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, it is not the thought of any mere girl that will influence my
-      decision. I feel like getting back to Nature&mdash;back to the soil&mdash;back
-      to a life of untrammeled freedom.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Back to unspoiled womanhood,&rdquo; added Dick sententiously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, you&rsquo;ve certainly got my curiosity aroused over these young ladies
-      at La Siesta. How much farther do we have to go?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Within an hour, sir, within the hour, my lord, shall you see the lady
-      fair. But remember,&rdquo; Dick went on banteringly, &ldquo;that you are not to
-      practise any riata-throwing on Miss Merle Farnsworth.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I understand. But we won&rsquo;t fall out over her. You may have your beautiful
-      brunette. I have always been partial to blondes.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;In the plural number,&rdquo; grinned Dick. &ldquo;But Grace Darlington will dim the
-      light of all your previous flames. She is the most perfect blonde you have
-      ever yet encountered.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You are certainly enthusiastic&mdash;for a disinterested party.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, you&rsquo;ll say the same thing, Ches, my boy, when you see her.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      It was not yet four o&rsquo;clock when they approached the Rancho La Siesta. The
-      house was of a style quite unusual in California&mdash;a miniature castle
-      that might have been planned by some European architect of renown. It
-      stood amid noble oak trees, old and gnarled and of gigantic size, but not
-      too numerous to hide the architectural features of the building. To the
-      rear the trees grew more thickly till they finally merged into one great
-      forest that covered the lower ridge of the mountain beyond. Far up, just
-      within the timber line, could be seen the red-tiled roof of a house which
-      Dick told his friend was the home of a Mr. Ricardo Robles. Beneath the
-      forest, the gently undulating lands sloped away to a considerable stream
-      that dashed down from one of the mountain canyons and debouched into the
-      great valley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Whew!&rdquo; exclaimed Munson admiringly, as they rode up and turned their
-      horses over to an attendant. &ldquo;Some swell architecture around here! Is this
-      your work, Dick?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0004" id="linkimage-0004"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
-      <img src="images/0055.jpg" alt="0055 " width="100%" /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h5>
-      <a href="images/0055.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
-    </h5>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, no!&rdquo; replied Willoughby. &ldquo;I had nothing to do with it. But I do like
-      the architectural lines of Mrs. Darlington&rsquo;s home. She&rsquo;s English and has
-      English tastes, and transplanted ideas are not always successful in a new
-      country. But in this case the building just seems to fit the scenery. It
-      has always delighted me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is certainly beautiful,&rdquo; concurred Munson as they walked along a
-      winding graveled pathway that climbed the gentle slope and led to the
-      portico of the mansion.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Around them were gay beds of flowers dotting the greensward. Almost hiding
-      the columns of the portico were climbing roses, one bush of the purest
-      white, the other of deep crimson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      As they passed under the porch roof, a handsome and well-preserved lady of
-      middle age appeared at the top of the steps with a welcoming smile. She
-      descended to give them gracious greeting.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How glad I am to see you, Mr. Willoughby. No one could be more welcome at
-      La Siesta.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Thank you,&rdquo; said Dick with marked chivalry.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mrs. Darlington, permit me to present my friend, Lieutenant Munson.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The introduction over, they ascended the steps together, and passed into a
-      spacious courtyard, with broad verandahs running all around and a fountain
-      playing in the centre. The hostess conducted her visitors to a cosy
-      corner, screened by glass panels from the open air and furnished with rich
-      Persian rugs, divans, cushions, tapestries, carved ebony tabarets, all in
-      oriental fashion. When they were comfortably settled, she opened the
-      conversation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Lieutenant, the young ladies of La Siesta are most impatient to meet you.
-      Mr. Willoughby has told us so much about you and yet has been so very
-      dilatory&mdash;yes, really you have, Mr. Willoughby&mdash;in bringing you
-      over, that we have put down several black marks against his name.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, thank you,&rdquo; stammered the young officer, reddening. &ldquo;I quite agree
-      with you about Willoughby, for I have been pleading with him to present me
-      from the very first day of my arrival.&rdquo; Turning to Mrs. Darlington, Dick
-      laughingly protested: &ldquo;My dear Mrs. Darlington, that is the first whopper
-      you have heard from my esteemed friend. You have yet to learn that he
-      always speaks in the superlative degree.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      At this moment Grace Darlington stepped through one of the French windows.
-      As she stood hesitating for a moment, Chester Munson there and then agreed
-      with all the preliminary praise Dick Willoughby had bestowed. She was
-      certainly a vision of loveliness, with a wealth of golden hair and eyes of
-      sapphire blue; petite, her figure plump but beautifully molded, her cheeks
-      aglow with the red roses of health and youth and happiness.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My daughter Grace,&rdquo; announced Mrs. Darlington, rising and formally
-      introducing the lieutenant to her as she joined the group.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Again Munson blushed and stammered. Dick was chuckling; he saw that the
-      gallant son of battle, with a penchant for blonde beauties, had succumbed
-      to the first glance from Grace Darlington&rsquo;s eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Delighted to meet you, Lieutenant Munson,&rdquo; she declared with frank
-      friendliness as they shook hands.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Where&rsquo;s Merle?&rdquo; asked Dick almost before Grace had time to turn to him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;There now, Mr. Impatience,&rdquo; she replied, shaking her finger teasingly at,
-      him, &ldquo;Merle will be here in her own good time. She&rsquo;s busy with Bob just
-      now.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Who the dickens is Bob?&rdquo; asked Dick, visibly disconcerted.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, her new Irish terrier,&rdquo; laughed Grace, her voice ringing with
-      mischievous merriment. &ldquo;And such a beauty!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick breathed again. The lieutenant had recovered his composure; it was
-      his turn now to bestow a sardonic smile upon his comrade.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll have afternoon tea,&rdquo; suggested Mrs. Darlington. &ldquo;And of course you
-      two young men will stay for dinner.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Both uttered a simultaneous protest&mdash;they were only in riding
-      clothes. But Mrs. Darlington made short work of the argument, and touched
-      a pushbutton by her side. A maid responded, the extra covers for dinner
-      were ordered, and meanwhile tea was to be sent on to the verandah.
-      Pleasant small talk succeeded, the lieutenant being called upon for his
-      first impressions of California.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Of a sudden Grace exclaimed in a voice, half of joy, half of surprise:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Why, here comes Mr. Robles!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Advancing along the verandah, hat in hand, was a man of striking presence
-      and dignity, perhaps fifty years of age. His jet black hair was streaked
-      with gray, the full beard almost verging on whiteness. Olive complexion
-      and brown eyes, together with the courtly manner of his salutation,
-      indicated the thoroughbred Castilian.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      He bowed and raised to his lips the hand of his hostess. To Grace he paid
-      the same deference. Next he turned to Dick Willoughby and extended his
-      hand.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have met Mr. Willoughby. I am pleased, sir, to see you again.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Then his eyes rested on Lieutenant Munson, and Mrs. Darlington presented
-      the young army officer.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And where, I pray, is Miss Merle?&rdquo; Mr. Robles finally asked, glancing
-      around.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s what I want to know,&rdquo; blurted out Dick. Then he reddened just a
-      little.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The older man looked kindly at Dick, and smilingly said: &ldquo;The audacity of
-      youth.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; put in Grace, &ldquo;the audacity and the impatience as well.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      But just at that moment there floated from the recesses of the home the
-      fragment of a song: &ldquo;I dreamt I dwelt in marble halls, with vassals and
-      serfs at my side.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ah, here comes the recreant now,&rdquo; exclaimed Mrs. Darlington.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The song stopped abruptly, and a moment later Merle Farnsworth appeared.
-      She went first of all to Mr. Robles and greeted him warmly, giving him
-      both her hands, which he kissed in his princely fashion. For Willoughby
-      she had a pleasant smile, and for his friend, the lieutenant, a kindly
-      welcome to California.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The tea tray had meanwhile arrived, and soon both the young ladies were
-      busy attending to their guests. While he sipped his tea, Munson completed
-      his inspection of Merle Farnsworth&mdash;dispassionately, for the brunette
-      type of beauty had never yet made his pulses beat faster. But he could
-      none the less admire. She was a stately girl, taller than Grace
-      Darlington, with fine, regular features and brown eyes that matched the
-      dark heavy braids of her hair. Her manner was alert and vivacious, yet
-      there was the quiet dignity of gentle breeding even in her smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      After half an hour of general conversation, Mr. Robles arose to take his
-      leave, notwithstanding Mrs. Darlington&rsquo;s pressing invitation that he
-      should remain and join the dinner party.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My home is not far away,&rdquo; he said when shaking hands with Munson, &ldquo;up in
-      the woods yonder. Perhaps you may have seen it as you came along the
-      road.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; observed Dick, &ldquo;I pointed it out to the lieutenant.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, both you gentlemen are cordially invited to pay me a visit any time
-      you are riding through this part of the country. Although I live far away
-      from the busy world, and am a recluse by choice, I have some things that
-      may interest you&mdash;pictures, old manuscripts and books of the Spanish
-      days.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Pictures?&rdquo; interposed Dick, inquiringly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, a few that I picked up during several visits to Europe.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;If people only knew it,&rdquo; remarked Mrs. Darlington, &ldquo;Mr. Robles has
-      perhaps one of the finest private picture galleries in America.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then I&rsquo;m certainly coming to see you,&rdquo; said Dick, eagerly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Me or my pictures?&rdquo; asked Mr. Robles with a quizzical smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Both,&rdquo; and the young fellow showed he meant it by a cordial hand grip.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You will pass our door, Mr. Willoughby?&rdquo; exclaimed Merle in half-laughing
-      reproachfulness. &ldquo;You will dare to give the go-by to La Siesta?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, art is art,&rdquo; replied Dick sturdily, although he did not trust
-      himself to look at Merle while he answered.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But perhaps the young ladies will show you the way through the oak
-      forest,&rdquo; suggested Mr. Robles.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That would be great,&rdquo; said Lieutenant Munson, with his eyes fixed on
-      Grace Darlington.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Delightful,&rdquo; she blushingly assented.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, arrange it among yourselves. For the present, <i>adios</i>.&rdquo; And
-      with a sweeping bow the senor took his departure.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      A stroll through the gardens and orchards, dinner and sprightly
-      conversation, an hour of piano-playing and singing to follow&mdash;altogether
-      a delightful evening was spent. The nearly full moon had risen before the
-      young men found themselves on the homeward trail.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      As side by side they rode down into the valley, Munson said:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dick, boy, there&rsquo;s no use talking. You have introduced me to some
-      perfectly charming people today&mdash;they&rsquo;re wonderful.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What did I tell you?&rdquo; asked Dick.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You surely did not tell me the half,&rdquo; replied the other. &ldquo;I think Grace
-      Darlington is the prettiest girl I have ever seen.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guess you&rsquo;ll be writing out your resignation and sending it to army
-      headquarters,&rdquo; laughed Dick. &ldquo;<i>Quien sabe?</i>&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The lieutenant made no reply, and quickening their pace, they pushed on in
-      silence.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At last they were nearing home&mdash;passing round the last spur of the
-      mountain. The moon was now riding high overhead, bathing the whole
-      landscape in bright effulgence. Willoughby brought his pony to a walk, and
-      Munson, coming up behind, soon joined him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How do you like riding by the light of the California moon?&rdquo; asked
-      Willoughby.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Really, Dick, you call even the moon a California moon, as if the same
-      moon didn&rsquo;t shine in New York City or in Paris.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not in the same way,&rdquo; said Dick soberly. &ldquo;The truth is, the moon really
-      looks larger and brighter here, and the stars, too, are more brilliant.
-      Haven&rsquo;t you noticed it?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have noticed that the atmosphere is exceedingly clear,&rdquo; replied Munson,
-      and, as if to verify his observation, he cast a glance up to the
-      rock-ribbed flank of the mountain above the belt of timber.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good God, what&rsquo;s that?&rdquo; he added breathlessly grasping the arm of his
-      friend.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Instinctively both halted their horses as they continued to gaze.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0005" id="linkimage-0005"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
-      <img src="images/0105.jpg" alt="0105 " width="100%" /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h5>
-      <a href="images/0105.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
-    </h5>
-    <p>
-      The bent form of the old Indian squaw Guadalupe was unmistakable as she
-      toiled slowly along a narrow ledge on the face of the precipice. But
-      following close behind her was a vague, shadowy figure&mdash;the figure of
-      some four-footed beast, bigger than a big dog.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The white wolf!&rdquo; gasped Dick.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Is it real, or is it a spectre?&rdquo; whispered Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Just then a scudding cloud momentarily obscured the moon, and when the
-      full light again shone forth, both woman and wolf had vanished.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The young men looked into each other&rsquo;s eyes in awe and wonderment.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0006" id="link2HCH0006"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER VI&mdash;The Quarrel
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>HE following days
-      were busy ones on San Antonio Rancho. Dick Willoughby was constantly in
-      the saddle, looking after his subordinates, watching the line fences, and
-      generally keeping track of the vast herds. Lieutenant Munson was becoming
-      acclimated. He not only accompanied Willoughby on many of his rides, but
-      had also paid several visits to La Siesta, and one afternoon in particular
-      had enjoyed immensely a successful trout fishing expedition with the young
-      ladies along the mountain stream that flowed through the property.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      One morning there was great excitement at San Antonio headquarters. Ben
-      Thurston returned from a visit he had been paying to Los Angeles, and with
-      him floated in a circumstantial story that the rancho had been really
-      sold. As usual, he was attended by the plain-clothes detective whom he
-      retained as bodyguard. Leach Sharkey was a big, hulking fellow, more than
-      six feet in height, with a tousled shock of reddish hair, a stubby red
-      mustache, and teeth that showed even when his face was in repose. Bulging
-      hip pockets indicated the brace of heavy revolvers which he invariably
-      carried.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Within an hour of Mr. Thurston&rsquo;s coming, Dick Willoughby, as foreman, was
-      summoned to an interview at the ranch house. The owner received him alone
-      in his office.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Ben Thurston was a squat, solidly built man, and despite his life of idle
-      luxury, carried his fifty odd years well. He was sullen and taciturn in
-      manner, but brusque and imperious when he did choose to speak. Two
-      features were markedly characteristic&mdash;the chin was weak and the eyes
-      had the restless, alert look of one who constantly lived in an atmosphere
-      of fear and suspicion.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Thurston opened the conversation without any preliminaries.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Willoughby, I want an accurate count of all the cattle and horses on the
-      ranch; and especially I require a fair idea as to the number of fatted
-      beeves&mdash;those ready for the market, you understand.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Very well,&rdquo; replied Dick, &ldquo;your orders shall be carried out as
-      expeditiously as possible, but it will require a few days to complete the
-      work.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How many days?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;If I make use of all the force it may take a week&mdash;perhaps a little
-      longer.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;All right, use all the help you can get. I must have these figures
-      promptly. There is a Los Angeles syndicate who are after an option on the
-      rancho. They are counting on buying me out&mdash;lock, stock and barrel.&rdquo;
-       Ben Thurston smiled, squinted his shifty eyes and blew his nose
-      vigorously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It always makes me laugh,&rdquo; he added pompously, &ldquo;to have these fellows
-      come around this great principality of mine and try to buy me out.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Just then someone outside flitted past the window, and, quick as
-      lightning, Thurston turned and exclaimed in a startled tone: &ldquo;Who was
-      that?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That was Jack Rover,&rdquo; replied Dick, &ldquo;one of our cowboys.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh,&rdquo; and the frightened look in the eyes subsided.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Tomorrow then,&rdquo; Dick went on, returning to their former topic of
-      conversation, &ldquo;we&rsquo;ll begin a round-up of the stock at this end of the
-      range. I&rsquo;ll put the boys on the job right now.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll join you tomorrow myself.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;All right, Mr. Thurston.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What time?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;At any time agreeable to you.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, say eight o&rsquo;clock in the morning. You see,&rdquo; he continued, &ldquo;I want
-      to get through with this damned business in a hurry and start back East. I
-      have friends who are waiting for me. Of course I will have to stay here
-      until the representatives of this syndicate come up from Los Angeles, but
-      I will make short work of them, believe me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      This time Ben Thurston laughed outright and rubbed his hands together in a
-      satisfied way. For once he seemed inclined to be communicative, and,
-      turning to Willoughby, resumed:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Do you know, I have collected over three hundred thousand dollars, first
-      and last, selling options on this San Antonio Rancho? It is quite a joke.
-      They all fall down. They make a first payment of twenty-five or fifty
-      thousand dollars, and then,&rdquo; throwing up both his hands and shrugging his
-      shoulders, &ldquo;their payments cease and I am just that much ahead of the
-      game.&rdquo; Willoughby listened in frigid silence; there was not even the
-      flicker of a responsive smile on his face.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Thurston, eyeing him for a moment, looked disconcerted. He drew himself up
-      stiffly in his chair. His voice assumed its usual gruff tone.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s all; get to work then,&rdquo; he said curtly as he lifted some papers to
-      show that the interview was at an end.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The first round-up was held some twenty miles southwest of the ranch
-      house, at the base of the foothills across the valley from La Siesta. Ben
-      Thurston, attended closely by his bodyguard, was there, his shifting eyes
-      scanning each new face. Not fewer than ten thousand head of cattle were
-      milling about, pawing the earth and bellowing in low tones of irritation
-      at being herded together and held away from their accustomed haunts of
-      juicy grasses.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      From a knoll at a little distance Lieutenant Munson, seated on a fine
-      riding pony, watched the great performance, which to him was more
-      wonderful than any hippodrome show or military parade. He was so engrossed
-      with the spectacle that he did not hear the patter of approaching hoofs.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good morning, Senor Lieutenant,&rdquo; came a lady&rsquo;s voice in cheery greeting.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Turning quickly in his saddle he saw Grace Darlington and Merle Farnsworth
-      on their ponies, which had been brought to a sudden halt close behind him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Really, Mr. Munson,&rdquo; said Grace Darlington, &ldquo;one would think you were so
-      completely lost in contemplation of a mob of cattle that you had no eyes
-      for your friends.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Chester bowed and raised his hat as he replied with a bright smile:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is certainly a great scene, isn&rsquo;t it? But you are none the less
-      welcome. Indeed when one is witnessing something unusual, it always adds
-      to the interest to have the companionship of friends.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Very prettily put,&rdquo; observed Merle Farnsworth. &ldquo;Fortunately the place
-      selected for the round-up this year isn&rsquo;t very far from La Siesta, so we
-      rode across the valley.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Have you anything in New York,&rdquo; asked Grace, &ldquo;to compare with this?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Indeed we have not,&rdquo; replied the lieutenant with conviction. &ldquo;I am
-      beginning to think that the West is a pretty good place in which to live.
-      By the way,&rdquo; he went on, taking a newspaper clipping from his pocket,
-      &ldquo;here is something that our mutual friend, Dick, gave me, and said I
-      should read once a day for a month, and then&mdash;well, then, he says I
-      will never go East again, but remain in this great picture country. Shall
-      I read it?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, do, by all means,&rdquo; said the girls in unison. &ldquo;Well, here goes! &lsquo;Every
-      idea we have in the East is run with a convention. We cannot think without
-      a chairman. Our whims have secretaries; our fads have by-laws. Literature
-      is a club. Philosophy is a society. Our reforms are mass meetings. We
-      cannot mourn our mighty dead without some great chairman and a half
-      hundred vice-presidents. We remember our novelists and poets with
-      trustees, while the immortality of a dead genius is looked after by a
-      standing committee. Charity is an association, and theology at best only a
-      set of resolutions.&rsquo;.rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What do you think of that?&rdquo; he asked, laughing. &ldquo;Isn&rsquo;t that an awful slam
-      on the East?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is rather severe,&rdquo; smiled Merle. &ldquo;But you know, Mr. Willoughby has
-      become a thorough Westerner. The lure of the hills and the valleys has
-      taken complete possession of him.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And yet he remains unspoiled.&rdquo; exclaimed the lieutenant. &ldquo;But are you
-      aware he is trying to tamper with my old allegiance to the East?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Indeed,&rdquo; asked Grace, &ldquo;in what way?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He wants me to resign my commission and take pot luck with him, as he
-      terms it.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You couldn&rsquo;t do better,&rdquo; exclaimed Grace enthusiastically.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      While this conversation was going on, an exciting incident was taking
-      place only a short distance away. Young Marshall Thurston had come with
-      his father to the round-up, and was riding about watching the operations.
-      Chancing to pass near, Dick Willoughby overheard him use an insulting
-      epithet in regard to Miss Farnsworth&mdash;the young man was evidently
-      peeved that the ladies had not sought him out instead of Munson, and it
-      was obvious, too, that he had been drinking even at that early hour in the
-      morning.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Swiftly wheeling, Dick rode up to him with a look of anger so intense that
-      even the cowboys who knew him were taken aback.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You foul-mouthed beast!&rdquo; he hissed, as he pushed his quirt into the
-      slanderer&rsquo;s face. &ldquo;Just let me overhear you make a rude remark again about
-      Miss Farnsworth and I will hammer the life out of you. You are nothing
-      better than a drunken hobo, not fit to associate with ladies.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The outburst was so sudden that young Thurston was cowed and attempted no
-      reply. But as Willoughby rode off he sent after him a look of sullen and
-      resentful hatred. Two or three of the cowboys, who really were good
-      friends of Dick Willoughby, but were nevertheless not above fawning for
-      the favor of the heir to the great rancho, indicated that they were on
-      Marshall&rsquo;s side.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guess two can play at the hammering game,&rdquo; remarked one.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He don&rsquo;t come any of his rough-house business over you, Marshall, while
-      I&rsquo;m around,&rdquo; affirmed another, pugnaciously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But the young man, still without uttering a word, turned gloomily away and
-      started his pony in the direction of home.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guess he feels like another drink,&rdquo; grinned an irreverent youth.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hell,&rdquo; exclaimed an elderly man, the blacksmith at the rancho, &ldquo;if the
-      Thurston family don&rsquo;t beat the band for quarrels and bloody feuds!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      But just then a bunch of cattle broke from the main herd and the group of
-      cowboys dispersed in a galloping scamper.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson and the young ladies, engrossed in their light conversation, knew
-      nothing of this unpleasant episode. They were now discussing the date of
-      the projected visit to the home of Mr. Ricardo Robles among the oaks above
-      La Siesta. It was decided to fix it for the first Sunday after the cattle
-      muster was completed, when Dick Willoughby would be free to make one of
-      the party.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But hold a moment,&rdquo; exclaimed the lieutenant suddenly, &ldquo;unless I&rsquo;m to be
-      court-martialled for absence without leave, I must take the train East
-      next Saturday, or&mdash;or&mdash;&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      His eyes fixed on Grace, he hesitated to complete the alternative.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Or what?&rdquo; she inquired.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Follow Dick&rsquo;s advice and send in my resignation.&rdquo; As he spoke he thrust a
-      hand into his breast pocket and drew forth a letter, sealed, addressed and
-      stamped, all ready for the mail. &ldquo;I really can&rsquo;t quite make up my mind,&rdquo;
-       he added, dubiously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0006" id="linkimage-0006"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
-      <img src="images/0155.jpg" alt="0155 " width="100%" /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h5>
-      <a href="images/0155.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
-    </h5>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Let me help you,&rdquo; said Grace with a gay smile as she extended her hand
-      for the letter.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How?&rdquo; he asked.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll mail your resignation for you. We shall be riding home by La Siesta
-      postoffice.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, Grace!&rdquo; murmured Merle in timid protest. &ldquo;Think of the responsibility
-      you are taking.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A woman&rsquo;s mission in life is to encourage men to do the proper thing,&rdquo;
-       replied Grace with roguish defiance. &ldquo;Our friend here is enamored of the
-      West, and the West is the very best place for him. I&rsquo;ll post your letter,
-      lieutenant.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He placed it between her fingers, doffed his hat, and bowed gallantly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Be it so. Let the gods&mdash;or should I say, a fair goddess?&mdash;decide.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Thanks for the compliment,&rdquo; cried Grace, with a pretty flush on her face.
-      &ldquo;Good-bye, then, for the present. Get ready for Sunday&rsquo;s picnic among the
-      oaks. Come along, Merle, my dear.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      And with a touch of the quirt she started her pony into a canter.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great guns, but she&rsquo;s worth while,&rdquo; exclaimed Munson as he gazed after
-      the retreating figures.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0007" id="link2HCH0007"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER VII&mdash;Old Bandit Days
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">O</span>N the evening of
-      the day that followed the big round-up of cattle, Dick Willoughby and
-      Chester Munson rode over to the store. As they cantered along, both men
-      were pre-occupied with their thoughts.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick was not worrying over his sharp passage of words with his employer&rsquo;s
-      son, for he knew that his services at the present time were quite
-      indispensable, more especially if the rancho was to be sold to the best
-      advantage. The owner had spoken lightly of the negotiations, and had
-      chuckled in a sinister way about the money he had frequently made over
-      unexercised options. But this time it was a Los Angeles syndicate that was
-      seeking the property, composed of men whose financial reputation and keen
-      business ability Willoughby knew well. For he had learned their names
-      after his interview with Ben Thurston, and he felt certain that this
-      particular group of capitalists would have entered into no serious
-      negotiations without having both the cash and the intention to put the
-      deal through. Therefore he scented a change of ownership in the rancho,
-      and consequently, perhaps, the necessity for his looking around to find
-      employment elsewhere. He hated to think of leaving a place that he had
-      come to look on as home and parting from all the friends he had made
-      throughout the countryside. Unconsciously to himself, the greatest tie of
-      all was proximity to La Siesta and to Merle Farnsworth. But Dick was not
-      thinking of Merle just then&mdash;he was merely turning things over
-      generally in his mind as he rode across the valley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson also was cogitating the change in his own outlook that had been
-      brought about by the mailing of the letter of resignation to army
-      headquarters. He was recalling the many years he had striven to reach the
-      lieutenancy now voluntarily surrendered&mdash;of his youthful zeal and
-      ambition for an army career which had been powerless to withstand the
-      witching call of the West. And although Grace Darlington&rsquo;s act of putting
-      the letter in the post had been only the last feather to tip an evenly
-      balanced scale, he could not but feel that thereby this beautiful girl of
-      the West had entered into his life and into all his future plans, hopes,
-      and aspirations. The thought gave him joy; he was more pleased than ever
-      that the decisive step had at last been taken.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Arriving at the store, they found old Tom Baker seated on a dry goods box,
-      while Buck Ashley leaned against the counter, waiting for the stage coach
-      and the mails. Already two or three others were beginning to congregate
-      under the trees, in readiness for the distribution of letters and
-      newspapers.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hello, Dick,&rdquo; called out the sheriff, &ldquo;I heard of your scrap yesterday
-      morning with that young ne&rsquo;er-do-well, Marshall Thurston. My God, I&rsquo;m glad
-      you gave him hell.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Please don&rsquo;t speak about it,&rdquo; replied Willoughby quietly. &ldquo;That was my
-      affair and mine alone. I guess we can find some more agreeable topic.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Wal,&rdquo; drawled Buck Ashley, &ldquo;Tom here was just a-tellin&rsquo; me a yarn that&rsquo;ll
-      interest both you boys a heap, or the lieutenant at all events, for he&rsquo;s
-      new to these parts and don&rsquo;t know the local hist&rsquo;ry yet. Of course I&rsquo;ve
-      heard the story before, but not all the pertic&rsquo;lars the way Tom can tell
-      &lsquo;em. And its a dangnation good story. So start from the beginnin&rsquo; again,
-      Tom.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Thus addressed, the sheriff, after taking a bite from his tobacco plug,
-      began:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The yarn has to do with the old-time bandit Joaquin Murietta, about whom
-      we were speakin&rsquo; the other morn in&rsquo;. Well, the way it all happened was
-      this: On a neighboring ranch, over Ventura way, beyond the Lagunita
-      Rancho, owned at that time by Senor Olivas, a rich cattle dealer comes
-      down from &lsquo;Frisco to buy a bunch of beeves. The stock had all been driven
-      up on a mesa near the Olivas ranch house, and for several days the herders
-      had been cuttin&rsquo; out the cows and the young calves from the steers, &lsquo;cause
-      this feller was only goin&rsquo; to buy the steers.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The great herd was bellerin&rsquo; and pawin&rsquo; in a big cloud of dust, through
-      which the vaqueros&mdash;cowboys, you know, lieutenant&mdash;could be seen
-      ridin&rsquo; round and round. Of course roundin&rsquo; up cattle is always more or
-      less excitin&rsquo; work, but this rich chap had come down from &lsquo;Frisco with his
-      saddle bags bulgin&rsquo; out with gold, and this sorta added a mighty sight to
-      the interest of the doin&rsquo;s. Part of the bargain was that the deal was to
-      be for spot cash, all in gold, too, mind you, and it was arranged that the
-      buyer and Senor Olivas were to take their stations at one side of the
-      narrow gate, and every time a steer was driven through that gate a
-      twenty-dollar gold piece was to be tossed into a big bag which Senor
-      Olivas was holdin&rsquo;.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;They do say as how the work continued all day, from early mornin&rsquo; until
-      dark, afore the last blamed steer passed that &lsquo;ere gate, and they claim
-      that there was eighty thousand dollars in the Senor&rsquo;s bag as pay for the
-      day&rsquo;s drive. They say, too, that Joaquin Murietta, disguised, was one of
-      the vaqueros doin&rsquo; the drivin&rsquo;. Anyway that very night old Olivas was
-      waked up mighty abruptly by feelin&rsquo; the cold nose of a revolver shoved
-      against his own nose.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, the long and short of it all was that Senor Olivas and his wife
-      were both gagged and bound hand and foot, while Murietta ransacked the
-      house, found the strong box and carried away every blamed gold coin that
-      Olivas had received for the sale of his steers. The outlaw succeeded in
-      makin&rsquo; his escape into the Tehachapi mountains with his cut-throat gang,
-      and they found a hidin&rsquo; place in the robbers&rsquo; cave that is somewhere
-      hereabouts on the San Antonio Rancho. It sure was as slick a piece of
-      rascality as was ever pulled off in the old lawless days.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; observed Buck Ashley, as he shook his head reflectively, &ldquo;I&rsquo;m
-      assoomin&rsquo; some of the cowboy fellers around here will find that cave one
-      of these days. I&rsquo;ve put in a good many Sundays huntin&rsquo; for it myself.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Just then there was the sound of horses&rsquo; hoofs outside, and a moment later
-      Jack Rover strolled into the store. Over his shoulder was slung the big
-      leather bag for the rancho mails.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hallo, everybody,&rdquo; was his greeting. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m ahead of time Buck, but the
-      stage will be here in five minutes. I saw its dust above the ridge. I
-      hear, lieutenant,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;you&rsquo;re going to stick to the West and be
-      one of us.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Quit the army?&rdquo; exclaimed Tom Baker in surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That is so,&rdquo; replied Munson. &ldquo;California has fairly got hold of me, and I
-      intend to make my home in the West.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then you just stick here, young man,&rdquo; said the sheriff, rising to his
-      feet and extending his hand. &ldquo;California is the pick of the States, and
-      our valley the pick of California. Don&rsquo;t you forget it. We&rsquo;re proud to
-      welcome you as a new resident.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s what I say, too,&rdquo; concurred Buck Ashley, cordially.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson smiled. &ldquo;Well, I don&rsquo;t know if you can put me in the resident class
-      all at once,&rdquo; he observed, diffidently. &ldquo;Guess I&rsquo;ve got to join the cowboy
-      brigade first, if Dick and Jack here will break me in.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Sure thing,&rdquo; assented Jack Hover. &ldquo;You&rsquo;re a good rider now&mdash;for an
-      army man.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;An ex-army man,&rdquo; corrected Willoughby, laughing.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It strikes me we should put you in as postmaster, Munson,&rdquo; suggested the
-      sheriff, a sly gleam of mischief in his eye. &ldquo;Buck Ashley here is growin&rsquo;
-      old.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, but not too old to hold down his job till your tombstone&rsquo;s in the
-      cemetery, Tom Baker,&rdquo; retorted the storekeeper, with a grin. &ldquo;No man takes
-      the Tejon postmastership while I&rsquo;m alive,&rdquo; he added defiantly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m forewarned and won&rsquo;t apply for your job, Buck,&rdquo; laughed Munson. &ldquo;But
-      here comes the stage, so show your spryness, old fellow, by getting us our
-      mail.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0008" id="link2HCH0008"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER VIII&mdash;A Letter from San Quentin
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">B</span>UCK ASHLEY had
-      retired into the partitioned-off section of the store that formed the
-      postoffice, and was busy stamping and sorting out the mail. The scattered
-      loiterers outside crowded into the building expectantly, and the local
-      parliament was in session. Amid the buzz of conversation Willoughby could
-      not but hear his own name mentioned, coupled with that of Marshall
-      Thurston. He understood quite well that all manner of gossip was flying
-      around in regard to the quarrel at the round-up. But he remained stoically
-      indifferent, shut his ears, and leaning against the counter busied himself
-      with an old <i>Saturday Evening Post</i> that had been lying there.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At last the wicket was shoved up with a bang, and those present began to
-      move toward the little aperture through which Buck Ashley proceeded to
-      hand out correspondence and newspapers. One by one the throng melted away.
-      Jack Rover was examining the big bunch of mail for San Antonio Rancho as
-      he stowed it into the letter bag. Munson was opening and gleaning the
-      contents of two or three letters that had come to him from New York. Dick
-      Willoughby continued his reading, unconcerned; Jack would pass over any
-      correspondence for him. Old Tom Baker had not risen from his accustomed
-      seat on an empty box; he had few correspondents, and the mail did not
-      worry him, although he invariably assisted with his presence at its
-      distribution.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      These four were now the only ones in the store besides Buck Ashley, who
-      still remained behind the partition. At last the postmaster appeared,
-      holding in his hand an open letter. His face showed great agitation as he
-      glanced around to take stock of those who might be present.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Say, boys,&rdquo; he whispered in a mysterious manner, as he held up the
-      letter, &ldquo;this is the most dangnation extr&rsquo;ornery thing that has ever
-      happened to me. You&rsquo;re just the bunch of fellers I&rsquo;d like to consult.
-      Close the door, Tom.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What&rsquo;s up, Buck?&rdquo; asked the sheriff as he rose to comply. &ldquo;You look as if
-      you had the ague shakes.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No ague in this here land of California,&rdquo; laughed Jack Rover. &ldquo;Is it a
-      proposal of marriage you&rsquo;ve been getting, Buck?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A derned heap better&rsquo;n that. God &lsquo;lmighty, boys, this may mean millions
-      for all of us. Shoot the bolt, Tom; I&rsquo;ll hand out no more groceries
-      tonight. Come close together, all of you. You read the letter aloud, Dick.
-      My hand&rsquo;s a-tremb-lin&rsquo;, and I can&rsquo;t get the Frenchie&rsquo;s lingo just right.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The Frenchie?&rdquo; echoed Tom Baker in puzzled surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s a letter from Pierre Luzon,&rdquo; explained Buck.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good God!&rdquo; The sheriff was now as deeply stirred as his old crony.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The bandit scout you were telling us about the other morning?&rdquo; exclaimed
-      Jack Rover, also fired with excitement.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I thought that fellow was in San Quentin for life.&rdquo; remarked Munson,
-      composedly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Wal, and ain&rsquo;t this letter from San Quentin?&rdquo; retorted Buck. &ldquo;See the
-      headin&rsquo;. But Dick&rsquo;ll read it aloud. I feel clean knocked out.&rdquo; And the old
-      man sank back on his chair behind the counter.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The four others were now clustered around Dick Willoughby. The latter,
-      deputized to do the reading, had nonchalantly taken the epistle from Buck
-      Ashley&rsquo;s trembling hand. While the others were speaking he had bestowed a
-      preliminary glance, and from his lips there escaped a murmur of surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great Caesar!&rdquo; As he uttered the ejaculation Dick sat up, keenly alert.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, what&rsquo;s it all about?&rdquo; inquired Munson, by this time the only cool
-      man in the bunch.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Read, read!&rdquo; cried the storekeeper hoarsely.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick Willoughby began:
-    </p>
-    <blockquote>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mr. Buck Ashley, Storekeeper, Tejon, California.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;If God in His goodness permits this letter to come to your hands,
-      remember it is from old Pierre, the Frenchman, who used to be about your
-      store sometimes a half a day at a time, smoking his pipe. You never knew
-      much about me or where I lived. But I will tell you.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I am an old man now&mdash;very old. I was born in the South of France,
-      came to this country in the &lsquo;40&rsquo;. and entered into the service of Joaquin
-      Murietta, who was one great man, but a big bandit. Peace to his soul!
-      Well, he was good to me, and I was faithful to him, taking care of the
-      cave, the big grotto, the cavern among the Tehachapi mountains where he
-      many times hid from the sheriff&rsquo;s posse, and also, where he brought all
-      his gold to stack up and keep from everybody.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You also know Don Manuel, him whom the people call White Wolf. Well, once
-      when a boy, Don Manuel he save Marietta&rsquo;s life from the sheriff by helping
-      him to escape from one close place. Murietta was very grateful, and one
-      day he bring the boy to the grotto cave, and there I see him and like him
-      very much. That was while Murietta still lived.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Afterward when the little boy grow up and was one man, and turned bitter
-      against the gringos because they wrong his sister, Senorita Rosetta, and
-      his old father and mother die of grief, he say to me, &lsquo;I will become a
-      bandit like Joaquin Murietta.&rsquo; He came to the cavern one night and tell me
-      and say, &lsquo;You be my servant.&rsquo; So I say, &lsquo;All right,&rsquo; because Don Manuel
-      one brave man.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So that night of the great stage robbery over near Lake of Tulare, I hold
-      horses. That&rsquo;s all I do, but all the same they put me in this horrid
-      prison, and here I am. The other two men, Felix Vasquez and Fox Cassidy,
-      were shot by the posse and I have been told by a Portugee in the jail here
-      about the White Wolf being killed away north in Seattle, and he is no
-      more.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don Manuel de Valencia, he was one great man. Peace to his soul!
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I am alone. I want to get away from this terrible prison. I have promised
-      one of my guards&mdash;a good Frenchman who comes from my town in France&mdash;$5,000
-      in gold if he can secretly get this letter into postoffice to you and get
-      me away from this living hell. You do this and I show you the cavern.
-      Nobody knows where it is but me.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Come and get me, please, my good Mr. Ashley, come, and may the spirit of
-      the Virgin Mary reward you. All I say here is truth. You come get me and I
-      show you the secret grotto. I show you the great stacks of gold hidden by
-      Joaquin Murietta and Don Manuel. Also the sand-bar in the hidden stream
-      where Guadalupe gathered up much gold.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I beg and pray you to keep what I say in this letter secret. I am old and
-      weak and sick. Come and get me.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Obedient servant,
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Pierre Luzon.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-</blockquote>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ain&rsquo;t that just one hell of a letter, boys?&rdquo; exclaimed Buck Ashley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Gospel truth, every word,&rdquo; cried Tom Baker, emphatically.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It certainly reads like the truth,&rdquo; concurred Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then what are we going to do about it?&rdquo; asked Jack Rover.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick Willoughby spoke now with the quiet and quick decision that marks the
-      leader of men:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What we will do is this. We five are partners in this secret, and, if
-      Buck is willing, we&rsquo;ll play the game together for all it is worth. To
-      begin with, we&rsquo;ll put up one hundred dollars apiece to send Tom Baker to
-      Sacramento. He will try to get a pardon or a parole for Pierre Luzon.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That can be managed,&rdquo; assented the sheriff. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve got a political pull,
-      you know, boys.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; continued Dick, &ldquo;we&rsquo;ll bring old Pierre here and we&rsquo;ll get from
-      him the information he promises about the secret grotto.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not forgetting Guadalupe&rsquo;s placer mine,&rdquo; interjected Jack Rover.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Everything will be attended to in its turn,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;One thing at
-      a time, and the first thing to be done is to get the Frenchman out of San
-      Quentin. When can you start, Tom?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The day after tomorrow.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, we&rsquo;ll have the cash ready for you by tomorrow night. You must bring
-      Pierre Luzon here without anyone else besides ourselves knowing his name
-      or getting next to him.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll fix up a cot for him in my own room behind the store,&rdquo; suggested
-      Buck Ashley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s a good plan,&rdquo; assented Dick. &ldquo;When the Frenchman&rsquo;s here, it will
-      be time then to discuss our next move. Meanwhile, it&rsquo;s an honorable
-      promise of secrecy all round, and to begin with I give my word.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      While speaking the last words, Dick solemnly raised his hand, and each man
-      in turn followed his example as he gave the pledge required.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0009" id="link2HCH0009"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER IX&mdash;Tia Teresa
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>EN days had passed
-      and the count of the stock on San Antonio Rancho had been completed, every
-      canyon searched, the last wandering maverick roped and branded, the number
-      of fat beeves accurately estimated. Three members of the Los Angeles
-      syndicate had arrived in a big automobile and remained over night at the
-      ranch house. Most of the time they had been closeted with Ben Thurston in
-      his office, and had finally taken their departure without exchanging a
-      word with anyone else on the rancho. Nobody knew whether the deal had gone
-      through or not, but rumor said that, after some disagreement on the first
-      day, terms had been arranged next morning.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick Willoughby, although he discussed the question with no one, made his
-      own inferences. The very fact that the visitors had not made any
-      inspection of the property proved that they already knew it thoroughly
-      well. The counting of the cattle and horses had been the final factor in
-      the negotiations, and the figures had enabled the deal to advance a
-      further stage toward completion. Ben Thurston might fool himself about
-      easy option money put up only to be forfeited, but Dick Willoughby was not
-      fooled. The days of closer settlement in California had come, and these
-      Los Angeles men were the most enterprising and skilful subdividers in the
-      West. They dealt only in big propositions, and after mopping up all the
-      available tracts in the southern end of the State, were extending their
-      operations northward. This vast so-called &ldquo;Spanish grant,&rdquo; an empire in
-      itself, had no doubt for several years been in their eye, and now they
-      were prepared to handle the San Antonio Rancho with the lavish expenditure
-      it deserved and required to transform the great sweep of cattle range&mdash;rich
-      agricultural land, as the luxuriant native grasses showed&mdash;into
-      smiling orchards and alfalfa farms, each provided with the irrigation
-      water which intelligent conservation would ensure in abundance.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick knew in his heart that the era of transformation had at last come,
-      that the roaming herds were to be pushed back into regions more remote,
-      that homes and schoolhouses and garden cities would soon be dotting the
-      landscape, that the passing of Ben Thurston, the cattle king, and of his
-      hard-riding, devil-may-care vaqueros was at hand.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Yet Thurston spoke no word&mdash;in fact, he seemed to be more grouchy and
-      taciturn than ever. Not even his son Marshall was in his confidence, for
-      the young man was seldom with his father, preferring to spend his time in
-      the drinking saloons and dance halls of Bakersfield, where the activity of
-      oil-developing operations attracted all sorts and conditions of men, among
-      whom the dissipated decadent had readily found friends to his liking.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Ben Thurston who had gone the pace himself in his early days, did not seek
-      to interfere with his son&rsquo;s pursuit of pleasures, but he had very promptly
-      squelched any interference from Marshall with his own business operations.
-      On the evening of the quarrel with Dick Willoughby at the round-up,
-      Marshall had attempted to tell his father about the affair and suggest
-      Dick&rsquo;s dismissal. But the old man had at once silenced him by saying:
-      &ldquo;Why, damn you! I brought you out to this country to enjoy yourself and
-      not to get into trouble. So far as Willoughby is concerned, I can&rsquo;t afford
-      to quarrel with him. He is my foreman, and I am right in the midst of a
-      big business transaction. So just you mind your own business, my boy, and
-      leave him alone.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Accordingly, Marshall Thurston, a coward at heart, had not sought to
-      pursue the feud singlehanded, and Dick had seen but little of him during
-      the rest of the mustering work. When they did happen to meet, it was a
-      case of a black scowl of hate from the one and a contemptuous smile of
-      indifference from the other. And so the days had passed until the task was
-      finished.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      It was the Sunday morning that had been fixed for the visit to the home of
-      Mr. Ricardo Robles, when the cattle foreman could at last conscientiously
-      take a day of recreation. With the first break of dawn he and Munson were
-      in the saddle, for they had been invited to breakfast at La Siesta before
-      starting with the young ladies on the ride through the oak forest.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The visitors arrived early, but not too early for their hostesses. Grace
-      and Merle were waiting to welcome them in the portico, looking more
-      charming than ever in their neat riding suits of khaki.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We saw you cross the bridge,&rdquo; declared Grace, &ldquo;and mother has gone in to
-      order breakfast to be served. You must be hungry after your early start.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, Sing Ling didn&rsquo;t let us go without a cup of coffee,&rdquo; laughed Dick.
-      &ldquo;But I fancy we&rsquo;ll do full justice, all right, to the bountiful fare of La
-      Siesta.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      It proved to be a delightful meal in every way, the viands seasoned with
-      gay repartee and laughter. A full hour had sped before Dick recalled the
-      real object of the day&rsquo;s excursion.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We usually walk to Mr. Robles&rsquo; place,&rdquo; remarked Merle. &ldquo;It is only a mile
-      or so by the short cuts up the hill, but by the winding road it is very
-      much longer. So we ordered our ponies.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I see,&rdquo; smiled Munson, &ldquo;to prolong the pleasure of our foursome among the
-      oaks.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not at all, sir,&rdquo; retorted Grace. &ldquo;The climb on foot is a stiff one, and
-      we knew that you must be out of condition from the lazy life you are
-      living.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I am only waiting for Willoughby to give me a cowboy&rsquo;s job,&rdquo; replied the
-      ex-lieutenant.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know if there will be any cowboy jobs going,&rdquo; observed
-      Willoughby. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s my belief that San Antonio Rancho is sold and is going
-      to be broken up into small holdings.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, what a pity!&rdquo; exclaimed Merle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;From one point of view, perhaps,&rdquo; answered Dick. &ldquo;But from a hundred
-      other points of view, what a blessing! There will be a dozen happy homes
-      for every steer the range now feeds!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But La Siesta will remain just as it is,&rdquo; cried Grace.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That will be all right,&rdquo; replied Dick, gallantly, &ldquo;It&rsquo;s already a happy
-      home.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The ladies smiled pleasantly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then this will mean the elimination of Mr. Ben Thurston,&rdquo; observed Mrs.
-      Darlington.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The greatest blessing of all,&rdquo; declared Merle, clapping her hands. &ldquo;You
-      see, I am already converted to the change, Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo; she added
-      merrily.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But what about my job?&rdquo; asked Munson in mock dolefulness.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Consult Mr. Robles,&rdquo; laughed Grace. &ldquo;He may take pity on you, and find
-      you a place as handy man on his estate.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      In merry mood they all sallied forth. The saddle horses were waiting, and
-      standing beside them was an elderly Spanish woman.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Tia Teresa, Mr. Munson,&rdquo; said Mrs. Darlington by way of introduction.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson had often enough heard the name, and in answer to an inquiry,
-      Willoughby had told him that the old dame had been the personal attendant
-      of the two young ladies ever since they could remember. Tia or Aunt Teresa
-      was now more a friend of the family than a servant of the house, and,
-      taking her hand in salutation, Munson treated her with the affable
-      courtesy that was her due.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I am glad to make your acquaintance,&rdquo; he said, raising his hat.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Tia Teresa looked pleased. Despite her seventy years, she was a buxom and
-      splendidly preserved woman, and there was still the flash of youthfulness
-      in her big dark eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You will look after my little girls,&rdquo; she said, as she gathered together
-      the folds of her black lace mantilla. &ldquo;By rights I should be coming with
-      you, too,&rdquo; she added, in the manner of a true Spanish duenna.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You forget that we are home again&mdash;in free America,&rdquo; laughed Merle
-      as she settled herself in the saddle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Too free, I sometimes think,&rdquo; rejoined Tia Teresa. &ldquo;But there is safety
-      in four,&rdquo; she added, turning with a smile to Mrs. Darlington.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And as the young folks rode away she waved them a pleasant <i>adios</i>.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0010" id="link2HCH0010"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER X&mdash;The Home of the Recluse
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span>T a gentle pace
-      they wound their way through the forest of magnificent old oaks.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      As for Munson, riding by Grace Darlington&rsquo;s side, the miles were the
-      shortest he had ever before traversed. It seemed only a few minutes before
-      the red tiled roof and towers of a house built in the California Mission
-      style were gleaming through the trees only a short distance ahead.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Great oaken doors closed the arched gateway, but at the clatter of hoofs
-      and the sound of voices, a little peep-hole wicket was withdrawn. The
-      inspection by unseen eyes apparently was satisfactory, for a moment later
-      a postern was opened, and two men, Mexicans obviously by their garb and
-      deferential manner, emerged to take and lead away the horses. Within the
-      patio stood Senor Robles, his usually grave face lighted by a smile of
-      cordial welcome.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Let me tell you, young men,&rdquo; he said while shaking hands, &ldquo;that while
-      Grace and Merle are quite at home here, you are the very first strangers
-      who have passed through my portals.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Strangers no longer then,&rdquo; said Dick, good-naturedly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Precisely,&rdquo; replied Mr. Robles, &ldquo;or you would not be here. But I foresee
-      that all of us are going to be very close friends. Isn&rsquo;t that so, Grace,
-      my dear?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m sure I cannot say,&rdquo; replied Grace, with a smile of demure innocence
-      toward Mr. Munson. Then she turned to Mr. Robles with a roguish twinkle in
-      her eye. &ldquo;But I&rsquo;ve news for you. Mr. Munson has resigned from the army and
-      is looking for a job.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Both facts are already known to me,&rdquo; answered Robles, smiling.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh,&rdquo; exclaimed Grace, &ldquo;one can never surprise you, Mr. Robles. Although
-      you live the life of a hermit, you seem to be always the first to learn
-      everything that is going on.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A hermit, my dear, need not necessarily be out of touch with the world,&rdquo;
-       replied Robles, playfully pinching her ear. &ldquo;And now, Mr. Willoughby, you
-      came specially to see my pictures. Lead the way, Merle. Gentlemen, I say
-      again&mdash;welcome to my mountain home.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      They lingered awhile in the patio to admire the marble columns of the
-      cloister that ran all around, the playing fountains at each of the four
-      comers, with groups of symbolical statuary, the wealth of beautiful shrubs
-      and flowers. On the side opposite to the gateway rose a tall tower,
-      fashioned like the campanile of an Old Mission and crowned with bright red
-      tiles.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We shall ascend there later on,&rdquo; remarked Mr. Robles, following Dick&rsquo;s
-      upward glance.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Then they passed through the wide-opened French window into the living
-      rooms.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The first was a great apartment that occupied one entire side of the
-      building. In the centre was a large globe of the world. Here and there
-      were glass cases displaying manuscripts and illuminated missals. Along the
-      walls were finely-carved bookcases filled with several thousands of
-      volumes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;When you have the leisure you can come and browse here,&rdquo; said the host,
-      addressing both young men. &ldquo;Meanwhile you may care to look at the bronzes
-      and statuary&rdquo;&mdash;this with a sweep of the hand that indicated the art
-      treasures distributed about the apartment.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      On the side of the house beneath the tower were the dining room and the
-      billiard and smoking room. Passing through these, the visitors came to the
-      picture gallery, a room corresponding in size to the library. Here were
-      hung treasures of the painter&rsquo;s art, masterpieces signed by names that are
-      immortal. These, as their owner again explained, had been acquired by him
-      during several prolonged visits to Europe.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Count this just as a preliminary survey, Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo; he said
-      finally. &ldquo;Then come again. There are guest chambers on either side of the
-      gateway, and one of these will always be at your disposal when I am at
-      home. I extend the same invitation to you, Mr. Munson.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My word, but you may feel honored,&rdquo; exclaimed Grace, in unconcealed
-      amazement.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;When I open my gates, I open my heart as well,&rdquo; said Mr. Robles, with a
-      courtly little bow to his new friends.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Next they ascended the tower. Its first floor, above the living rooms, was
-      a delightful den filled with curios of all kinds. From this sprang a
-      winding iron staircase, up which Mr. Robles led the way.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The upper chamber, extending on all sides some distance beyond the
-      supporting tower, proved larger than might have been expected. Its one
-      conspicuous article of furniture was a great terrestrial telescope. The
-      sliding panels of glass which formed a complete window all around the room
-      showed that the instrument could be used without obstruction in any
-      direction.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Here a Mexican boy was on duty. When the visitors entered, his hand was
-      resting on the telescope. A bright red sash around his waist imparted a
-      touch of picturesqueness to his costume. He was perhaps only twelve or
-      thirteen years of age, but wonderfully keen and alert-looking for his
-      years. At a glance from his master, the youngster took his departure,
-      closing the door behind him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Gentlemen,&rdquo; remarked Mr. Robles, when they were again alone, &ldquo;perhaps
-      before I brought you here I should have exacted the promise I am now going
-      to ask you to make. Grace and Merle know that I am a recluse and wish to
-      live undisturbed by curiosity-mongers or tittle-tattlers. I want nobody
-      but the friends I deliberately choose to know about my habits of living or
-      the contents of my home. Only in this way can I hope to be left alone.
-      Therefore, please give me your word, Mr. Willoughby and Lieutenant Munson,
-      that you will not speak with any outsider about the things I am showing
-      you today.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The promise was instantly given and sealed by a hearty hand clasp.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Now,&rdquo; resumed the host in lighter tone, &ldquo;perhaps you would like to view
-      the landscape. I may explain that I had this observatory, as I call it,
-      specially built and equipped so that I could sweep the valley from end to
-      end. For example, I saw you two young men riding along the road this
-      morning,&rdquo; he went on, with a smile. &ldquo;I saw one of you alight, about twelve
-      miles from here&mdash;it was you, lieutenant&mdash;and tighten the girths
-      of your saddle.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great Scott!&rdquo; murmured Munson, in half-incredulous surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Test the glass for yourself,&rdquo; continued Robles, as, placing one eye at
-      the lens, he adjusted the instrument. &ldquo;Look&rdquo;&mdash;and he stepped back,
-      motioning Munson to approach.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson peeped through the long tube and there came from his lips a cry of
-      mingled delight and amazement.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dick, Dick, there&rsquo;s the store as large as life&mdash;Buck Ashley standing
-      at the door and lighting a cigar. Geewhizz, and it must be twenty miles
-      away.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He rose erect and made room for Dick. The latter gazed in silence for a
-      few moments. When he turned to Mr. Robles he said:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s really wonderful&mdash;it is the most wonderful glass I ever looked
-      through.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      There was the glimmer of an exultant smile on the face of Ricardo Robles.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I saw you at the round-up across the valley the other day,&rdquo; he remarked.
-      &ldquo;You were much nearer to me than is the store. And while I do not invite
-      any confidence, Mr. Willoughby, you certainly engaged in a very spirited
-      conversation, to say the least, with young Marshall Thurston. Indeed, I
-      half expected to see you come to blows.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What was that?&rdquo; asked Merle in some trepidation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Willoughby had reddened.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Nothing of consequence,&rdquo; he responded, almost curtly. &ldquo;I had to tell the
-      young cub to mind his own business. That was all.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You certainly have the whole valley under observation,&rdquo; remarked Munson,
-      considerately diverting the conversation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; assented Mr. Robles, with an almost grim smile of satisfaction.
-      &ldquo;The telescope teaches one not merely to observe, but to reason from the
-      facts observed. Tia Teresa evidently thought that she should have come
-      along today to play duenna, eh, Merle?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t say you guessed that?&rdquo; exclaimed Merle in great astonishment.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guessed it! I knew it when she raised her protesting finger.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You are a magician, Mr. Robles,&rdquo; cried Grace.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, only a logician,&rdquo; was the sententious rejoinder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Please let me peep at our garden,&rdquo; asked Merle. &ldquo;I wonder if mother is
-      among her roses.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Without a word Robles swung round the instrument on its pivot and changed
-      the focus.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s about right,&rdquo; he said, stepping back. &ldquo;There is no one out of
-      doors at present. Move the glass slightly and you can see over the entire
-      garden.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Each girl in turn made a prolonged scrutiny; they were enchanted with the
-      clearness and marvellous detail of the picture.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Henceforth we&rsquo;ll have to be on our best behavior, Dick,&rdquo; laughed Munson,
-      as they turned toward the winding stairway. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ve got to remember Mr.
-      Robles has a constant eye on us.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Perhaps I&rsquo;ve had you under observation quite a while,&rdquo; laughed the senor,
-      tapping the young fellow on the shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Then he threw open the door, and, with a slight bow and extended hand,
-      motioned to his visitors to descend. At the foot of the narrow, winding
-      staircase they found the Mexican youth standing on guard. He bowed low as
-      the ladies passed, and when Mr. Robles followed last of all, saluted, and
-      then immediately returned to the chamber above, again without a single
-      word of instruction from his master. Munson and Willoughby exchanged
-      meaning looks; obviously a well-disciplined outlook was kept from the
-      observatory all the time, as if from the conning-tower of a battleship.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Again the party was in the patio. Mr. Robles turned to Willoughby.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I hope Grace and Merle have explained to you that at present I do not
-      entertain. My own fare is of the simplest.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mother is to have luncheon ready at one,&rdquo; interposed Grace. &ldquo;I caught the
-      broiled trout myself this morning.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You caught them ready broiled, eh?&rdquo; laughed Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, you know what I mean,&rdquo; rejoined Grace, with a pretty little <i>moue</i>.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Broiled trout!&rdquo; exclaimed Dick, appreciatively. &ldquo;Then I think we&rsquo;ll be
-      hurrying down the hill, senor.&rdquo; He had recognized with intuitive courtesy
-      that the interview was at an end.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Is he not delightful?&rdquo; asked Merle, as their horses started off at a
-      walk. &ldquo;And you would never guess how sweet and kind he can be.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t doubt it,&rdquo; assented Willoughby. &ldquo;A polished gentleman, but a man
-      of mystery, isn&rsquo;t he?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not when you come to know him. A recluse always has his little
-      idiosyncrasies.&rdquo; As she spoke, she set her pony at a canter down the
-      gentle incline.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      After luncheon, Dick found himself tête-à-tête with Mrs. Darlington in the
-      music room. The mystery attaching to the personality of the recluse was
-      still uppermost in his mind. But for the present the music claimed his
-      attention.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle had seated herself at the grand piano and was softly fingering the
-      keys, striking a chord here and there, until finally she drifted into
-      Chopin&rsquo;s Fifth Nocturne. There was something almost divine in her
-      interpretation. The music fairly rippled from her deft fingers, as they
-      glided on from one beautiful cadence to another until at last, note by
-      note, as if sobbing a reluctant adieu, the melody died away.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Both the visitors were generous in their tributes of congratulation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Thank you,&rdquo; said Merle, as she arose from the piano and proceeded to
-      unfasten the clasps of a violin case.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What now?&rdquo; exclaimed Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I am not the performer; I am merely the accompanist,&rdquo; and she held
-      out a beautiful old violin to Grace. As Merle sounded a key on the piano,
-      Grace touched the strings of the Stradivarius. When all was ready she
-      tenderly caressed the violin with her chin, and, her bow sweeping across
-      the instrument, Beethoven&rsquo;s Moonlight Sonata trembled from the strings, in
-      soft and plaintive melody, filling the room with echoing and re-echoing
-      notes of sweetness, while Merle&rsquo;s accompanying notes lent support, in
-      blending harmony, to the rich cadences.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Splendid! magnificent!&rdquo; exclaimed the young men in unison.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson was now called upon to sing, and Dick felt himself at full liberty
-      to converse with Mrs. Darlington. He broached the subject that had been
-      occupying his thoughts.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What is known of Senor Ricardo Robles?&rdquo; he enquired. &ldquo;Have you been long
-      acquainted?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I have known him for many, many years,&rdquo; replied Mrs. Darlington. &ldquo;We
-      used to be next door neighbors in Los Angeles. That was twenty years ago.
-      Then we returned to England&mdash;Mr. Darlington had fallen heir to the
-      family estates. Mr. Robles used to visit us off and on. He is, as you have
-      seen, very fond of Grace&rdquo;&mdash;she paused a moment, then went on&mdash;&ldquo;and
-      of my adopted daughter Merle as well. Merle, you know, was the child of my
-      dearest girl friend who died a year after her baby was born.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, Merle has told me this.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, six years ago my dear husband died, and it was Mr. Robles who
-      persuaded me to return to California. He selected this beautiful ranch for
-      us, near to his own home. And we have all been so happy here at La
-      Siesta.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mr. Robles is certainly a wonderful man, with all those art treasures
-      around him.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He has princely tastes and princely wealth as well&mdash;this you will
-      have seen for yourself today. He travels a great deal abroad, sometimes
-      for a whole year at a time, and then returns quietly to his hermitage. He
-      has taken a great fancy to you, Mr. Willoughby. You are lucky in gaining
-      the friendship of such a man.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I think I&rsquo;ll like him, too&mdash;when I know him better,&rdquo; replied
-      Willoughby, with cautious reserve.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0011" id="link2HCH0011"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XI&mdash;A Rejected Suitor
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>N Dick
-      Willoughby&rsquo;s presence Marshall Thurston contented himself with sullen
-      looks. But beyond his sight and hearing he spoke truculently of what he
-      was going to do some day to get level with &ldquo;the hired hand who had had the
-      infernal insolence to call him down in public.&rdquo; So all the little world on
-      the rancho knew, or at least believed, that a bitter feud was in progress.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Two or three of the cowboys fostered young Marshall&rsquo;s feelings of
-      animosity, partly out of sheer devilment, partly because they deemed it
-      good policy to keep in the good graces of the heir to the rancho.
-      Moreover, so long as old Ben Thurston knew nothing about it, they were
-      always willing to break a bottle with the dissipated spendthrift, not only
-      because good liquor was not to be despised at any time, but also for the
-      sake of the amusement afforded by Marshall, in his cups, with his stories
-      of fast life in New York and his apparently inexhaustible fund of highly
-      spiced anecdotes. Even his braggart threats against Willoughby had an
-      element of fun.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Why don&rsquo;t you cut him out with the girl?&rdquo; one of his boon companions had
-      suggested on an occasion of this kind.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;By gad, I will,&rdquo; Marshall had responded with vehemence. &ldquo;You just watch
-      me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Thenceforward this thought was uppermost in his alcohol-sodden brain.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Marshall Thurston had met Mrs. Darlington and her daughter on several
-      occasions, but, although he had been formally introduced, he had never
-      been invited to call at La Siesta. Nor up to the present had he felt any
-      inducement to take the initiative. Like clings to like, and these people
-      were not of his kind&mdash;in the presence of pure and refined womanhood
-      the human toad becomes uncomfortably conscious of his own loathsomeness.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But now there was a valid reason to egg him on. He would show Dick
-      Willoughby who was who on the San Antonio Rancho. If the heir to all those
-      broad acres chose to pay court to Merle Farnsworth, the girl would only be
-      too glad to jump at him and his millions. He would tell her, too, that
-      Willoughby was going to be fired and that the fellow was not worth a
-      moment&rsquo;s consideration.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Such was his mood one afternoon when, his motor car being in the repair
-      shop, he had not made his usual trip to Bakersfield. &ldquo;Yes, he would ride
-      over that very day to La Siesta;&rdquo; and he proceeded to fortify the resolve
-      by opening a bottle of champagne in the solitary seclusion of his den.
-      After gulping down the wine he felt brave enough to face the devil
-      himself. Yet, when mounted on his horse, he still evinced sufficient
-      discretion to make a wide detour lest Willoughby should catch sight of him
-      and divine his intentions.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      As he rode along young Thurston nursed his wrath to keep it warm. At the
-      same time the desire to possess the girl for her own sake began to inflame
-      his imagination. Unscrupulous passion had been bred in the very bone of
-      this worthless degenerate. Just as his father, Ben Thurston, had thirty
-      years before trampled on the virtue of the young Spanish beauty, Senorita
-      Rosetta, the sister of Don Manuel, so now was the son hatching in his
-      brain a foul plot of spoliation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll get even with Willoughby, by God, in the very way that will hurt his
-      pride the most. Women!&mdash;pshaw, they&rsquo;re all alike. And she&rsquo;s a
-      peacherino all right&mdash;those flashing dark eyes&mdash;she sure looks
-      good to me.&rdquo; This was now the tenor of his musing as his pony cantered up
-      the slope to La Siesta.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      He advanced on foot to the portico with a swagger and a smile, and there,
-      as luck would have it, he found Merle seated in a rocker, reading, and
-      alone. She rose with quiet courtesy and returned his greeting.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I am sorry,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;mother is not at home. She and my sister Grace
-      have driven over to the dairy. We have a model dairy, you know, on La
-      Siesta,&rdquo; she went on, anxious to make conversation that would not prove
-      embarrassing. For already she divined some particular object in the young
-      man&rsquo;s visit, knowing as she did that he and Willoughby had recently
-      exchanged angry words.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Won&rsquo;t you show me your famous rose gardens?&rdquo; asked Thurston, boldly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;With pleasure,&rdquo; she replied, assenting with a sweet smile of politeness,
-      although there was sore reluctance in her heart, as she stepped from under
-      the portico.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But, unknown to herself, she did not go unattended, for as Merle and her
-      visitor passed round the house and through the shrubberies there glided
-      after them the figure of a woman, clothed in black, wearing over her head
-      and shoulders a Spanish mantilla. It was Tia Teresa, the ever watchful
-      duenna.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The roses of La Siesta, as Marshall Thurston had said, were indeed famous.
-      Here were all the finest varieties, growing in the perfection to which
-      only care and scientific skill applied under ideal climatic conditions can
-      attain. Merle was glad to point out the different blooms and give them
-      their names&mdash;the topic was certainly an innocuous one, and she smiled
-      at the thought as they strolled along. She was vaguely wondering, too,
-      whether Dick Willoughby would approve even this slight measure of courtesy
-      toward the visitor to her home. Although she had as yet not the remotest
-      conception that the quarrel at the round-up had been in any way connected
-      with her name, she knew that the two young men were at daggers drawn, and
-      toward Dick there was the instinctive loyalty in her heart that prompted
-      her to count his enemies as her enemies, his friends as her friends.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The young girl was too unversed in the ways of the world to notice that
-      Marshall Thurston was under the influence of wine. He was too experienced
-      a toper to show any signs of unsteadiness on his feet, but all the same
-      there was undoubted tipsiness in his leering side-glances and occasional
-      slurring of his words. Of this Merle in her maidenly innocence was
-      supremely unconscious, nor did she dream that the very sparkle of her eyes
-      was completing the intoxication of wine fumes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Once she cast a look up the hill and asked herself whether the wizard of
-      the red-tiled tower had his spy-glass on La Siesta and was even then
-      quietly surveying the scene in the gardens. The thought made her
-      uncomfortable; she felt sure that her kind friend, Mr. Robles, would not
-      look with favor on her condescending to show even the slightest attention
-      to one whose evil ways of living were notorious.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Suddenly she came to a halt, close beside a little clump of oleander trees
-      laden with rich blossoms.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I am sorry I must leave you now,&rdquo; she said, quite abruptly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Leave me?&rdquo; stammered Thurston. &ldquo;What for?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have other things to attend to,&rdquo; she replied.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I say, Miss Farnsworth&rdquo;&mdash;the inebriate as he spoke made a
-      gesture of appeal&mdash;&ldquo;I hope you are not angry with me. If that
-      scalawag of a fellow Willoughby told you I said anything disrespectful of
-      you the other day, he is a demed liar&mdash;that&rsquo;s what he is, a derned
-      liar, and a poor penniless beggar as well, whom my father&rsquo;s going to fire
-      off the ranch.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle stood speechless. She stepped back when Thurston advanced with
-      outstretched hands.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The truth of the whole matter is,&rdquo; he rambled on, with growing
-      incoherence, &ldquo;I am madly in love with you myself. That&rsquo;s what I am, and
-      I&rsquo;m going to have you, too.&rdquo; And he grabbed her fiercely and attempted to
-      draw her to him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle screamed both in fear and in repulsion as she tried to push him
-      away.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Just then, from among the oleanders, rushed Tia Teresa. The old duenna
-      came like a cyclone. Her eyes blazed with anger. Grasping the young
-      libertine by the collar of his coat, she pulled him madly from the now
-      half-fainting girl. Then, whirling him around, she rushed him, with the
-      strength and ferocity of a tigress defending her whelps, down the
-      gravelled path and flung him bodily over the low retaining wall along the
-      embankment that separated the rose gardens from the public road. She spat
-      upon his prostrate figure below and rained down on him a torrent of
-      imprecations in the Spanish tongue.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      It was all over in one brief minute. When young Thurston picked himself
-      up, it was to see the aged fury half-leading, half-carrying Merle away in
-      the direction of the house.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The hell cat,&rdquo; he murmured.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Then he brushed the dirt from his coat and straightened out his tumbled
-      appearance as best he could. His horse was tied to the gate post a hundred
-      yards along the road. He slunk toward it, climbed into the saddle, and
-      rode slowly away in the falling twilight. He had been thoroughly sobered
-      by the incident, yet continued somewhat dazed, for his horse was headed
-      toward the woods and hills and not in the direction of home.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0012" id="link2HCH0012"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XII&mdash;The Sped Bullet
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">M</span>EANWHILE events
-      had been happening in the conning tower high up among the hills. The
-      Mexican boy on duty had observed the lone rider approaching the gateway at
-      La Siesta, and for a brief few moments had put the figure under
-      observation by the telescope. He had then sprung alertly erect and pressed
-      a button on the wall. Mr. Robles had quickly responded to the summons, and
-      it was he who had had his eye to the lens during the scene in the rose
-      garden which had terminated in the ignominious expulsion of young Thurston
-      at the hands of the infuriated duenna.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      When the recluse at last withdrew his gaze, his hands were clenched and he
-      stood absolutely rigid in the tenseness of his indignation. He had seen
-      Merle&rsquo;s insultor ride toward the hills and Merle herself taken indoors
-      under Tia Teresa&rsquo;s protecting care. For almost a minute the storm of rage
-      held him, then he relaxed and his look changed to one of terrible
-      determination. He seized a rifle that was hanging on one of the walls and
-      swiftly departed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At the arched gateway he spoke a few words to the two retainers on guard,
-      and when he passed through the postern one of them, also equipped with a
-      rifle, followed. Taking a cross-cut from the high road, together they
-      descended the wooded hillside.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      In a little canyon just below the forest Dick Willoughby was rounding up a
-      bunch of vagrant steers. He was alone, riding at a walking pace, driving a
-      dozen or more beasts in front of him, and keeping an eye among the
-      brushwood searching for more.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      On the roadway through the woods Marshall Thurston ambled along. He was a
-      poor and awkward rider at all times, the discreetly-veiled jest of the
-      nimble cowboys, to whom reins, saddle, and spurs were all as second
-      nature. Now, when he imagined himself free from observation, he did not
-      take pains to display even a semblance of horsemanship and, with bridle
-      dropped, steadied himself by a grip on the saddle horn.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      In her bedroom Merle had soon recovered from her distress of mind. Dashing
-      the tears from her eyes, she had enjoined Tia Teresa to say nothing to
-      anyone about the unpleasant incident. Mrs. Darlington would be angered and
-      would certainly tell Mr. Robles, while if the story ever reached Dick&rsquo;s
-      ears there could be no saying what further trouble might not ensue&mdash;a
-      horse-whipping at least, with jeopardy to Dick&rsquo;s position at the rancho
-      and embitterment of an already dangerous quarrel. So Tia Teresa, to
-      complete the comforting process, had assented to secrecy.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      On the pathway down through the forest the Mexican, now in advance,
-      uttered a low &ldquo;hist,&rdquo; halted, and held out a warning hand toward his
-      master. The gaze of both was now fixed in the same direction. Below them
-      could be seen the figure of the horseman coming around a bend in the
-      roadway. The Mexican raised his rifle to the shoulder, but the hand of
-      Robles detained him. The time was not yet&mdash;the distance was too great
-      in view of the obstructing timber.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Robles turned away and rested an arm against a tree trunk. His eyes were
-      downcast; for the moment his mind was far away. He saw once again the
-      little cemetery on the hill, with the marble cross inscribed &ldquo;Hermana,&rdquo;
-       and the other gravestone at the head of the twin mounds that marked the
-      resting place of his parents whose hearts had been broken by Rosetta&rsquo;s
-      tragic end. The fingers of the man who had long years ago sworn the
-      vendetta worked nervously, closing and unclosing themselves.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The rider was nearer now, in a higher loop of the road where the trees
-      were more scattered than below. Merle, drowsy from the reaction of her
-      emotions, had dropped off asleep on her sofa. Tia Teresa had returned to
-      the portico, to make sure that the interloper had taken himself off for
-      good and would not return. In the little canyon Dick Willoughby was
-      quietly riding behind his accumulating drove of cattle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Suddenly a shot from among the woods rang through the air. Tia Teresa
-      heard it, and after the start of first surprise, into her eyes came the
-      light of swift comprehension and her whole face was illumed by fierce
-      vindictive joy. &ldquo;At last, at last,&rdquo; she murmured, &ldquo;vengeance begins.&rdquo; And
-      in the fervor of her triumph she threw up her extended arms, as if to give
-      benediction to a righteous deed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick also heard the sharp detonation which his experienced ear knew at
-      once to be from a rifle, not from the shot-gun that some sportsman after
-      quail or rabbits might have been using. He betrayed no great surprise&mdash;just
-      the unspoken word &ldquo;curious&rdquo; hovered on his lips as, halting his horse, he
-      turned in his saddle to glance upward in the direction whence the sound
-      had come. Then after a moment he wheeled the pony round, and, abandoning
-      his drove for the present, ascended at a leisurely pace the narrow pathway
-      which he knew communicated with the winding highroad above.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      When the bullet had reached its fated billet, Marshall Thurston&rsquo;s fingers
-      were still gripping the saddle horn. And right there the missile of death
-      struck, glancing upward from the metal crown and piercing the victim right
-      through the heart. Not a cry&mdash;just an outflung arm, a swaying figure
-      slipping down onto the roadway, and a terrified riderless horse pivoting
-      quickly round on its haunches, then galloping madly for home.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick, glancing upward through the timber, caught a glimpse of the fleeing
-      steed, and he touched his own pony with the spur so that it, too, darted
-      forward.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Farther along the road Tia Teresa heard the clatter of the hoofs and saw
-      the animal in its swift stride disappear in the direction of the rancho.
-      She knew now for certain that her surmise was correct, and the first flush
-      of triumph on her fact settled down into an expression of grim
-      satisfaction. &ldquo;It served him right in any case.&rdquo; she muttered. &ldquo;It was
-      just what the young villain deserved.&rdquo; Then she re-entered the house and
-      passed upstairs. Her young mistress was placidly asleep, smiling in her
-      dreams. The duenna nodded her head in a satisfied sort of way; Merle would
-      learn the news at the proper time, and would not meanwhile be agitated by
-      wild conjectures. So she tiptoed from the room, and was soon busied with
-      domestic duties as if nothing had happened.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick, emerging on foot from the last steep ascent of the canyon, promptly
-      swung himself again into the saddle and started at a loping canter up the
-      winding roadway through the woods. After rounding the first comer he spied
-      the huddled figure on the ground. Before he turned the body over he knew
-      that the man was dead. But when the dead face looked up at his, it was
-      with a terrible shock of surprise that he recognized Marshall Thurston.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick stood for a few moments, gazing around in utter bewilderment. One
-      hand of the dead man was shattered and bloody, while a big splurge of red
-      on the shirt showed where the bullet had completed its work. Murder&mdash;palpable
-      murder! But who could have done this deed? Who had any valid motive to rid
-      the world of this stray piece of humanity&mdash;and in such coldblooded
-      manner, not in the heat of some angry quarrel, but by a deliberate act of
-      assassination in a place so lonely as these pine-clad hills? Dick sat him
-      down by the roadside and pondered these questions.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      There was no real pity in his heart. Young Thurston had been utterly bad&mdash;not
-      big-brained enough to belong to the social dregs, but just equally
-      worthless scum, the more repellent because it made itself visible all the
-      time. He would pass almost without a tear except from the father whose own
-      record had been so foully besmeared that there could be scant sympathy
-      even for him in the hour of his bereavement.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick just wondered and wondered. For the time being he had quite forgotten
-      that old legend&mdash;the Vendetta of the Hills.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0013" id="link2HCH0013"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XIII&mdash;Accused
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span>ROUND the horse
-      corral at the San Antonio Rancho some half-dozen cowboys were squatted on
-      their heels, cowboy-fashion, swapping the news of the day. They had ridden
-      in from various points of the compass, and two or three of their horses,
-      those of the latest comers, still stood saddled outside the enclosure, the
-      reins dropped loosely over their heads, which for the trained cow-pony is
-      just as effective an anchorage as any stake and rope.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Two or three cigarettes were a-light, and the &ldquo;makings&rdquo; were passing from
-      hand to hand among those not yet engaged in the leisurely blowing of smoke
-      rings. The topic of conversation was the rumored sale of the ranch, which
-      some declared to be assuredly impending, while others dismissed the
-      possibility of such a big deal going through as the merest moonshine.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Jack Rover was among those who had no illusions as to the future.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Believe me, fellers,&rdquo; he was remarking, &ldquo;it&rsquo;s no false alarm this time.
-      The old rancho is as good as sold, the stock is a-going to be shipped out,
-      the farmers is a-coming in, and in a few months&rsquo; time we&rsquo;ll all be hunting
-      jobs if there&rsquo;s any more cow-punching jobs left in this blamed new
-      topsy-turvy world. And that&rsquo;s the straight goods&mdash;hell!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Just as this terse and vigorous summation of the whole dispute found
-      utterance, all eyes were turned in a particular direction. It was young
-      Thurston&rsquo;s riderless steed that had attracted attention as it swept toward
-      its accustomed quarters in the corral.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s Marshall&rsquo;s horse,&rdquo; observed one of the boys.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Off again, on again, gone again, Flannigan,&rdquo; laughed another&mdash;an
-      adaptation of a popular story that evoked a general grin.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But one youth had sprung to his feet, and skilfully caught the bridle of
-      the panting animal as it passed him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Whoa, beauty!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The others had not stirred. The involuntary dismounting of the young boss
-      was too familiar an episode to provoke anything more than a laugh
-      tinctured with mild satisfaction&mdash;
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No Easterner can ride a Western broncho, anyhow.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Pass your baccy, Bob,&rdquo; came a voice from the ring. But the cowboy holding
-      the riderless horse now brought them all to instant attention.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;By God, he&rsquo;s been shot! There&rsquo;s blood on the horn, and here&rsquo;s the rip of
-      the bullet.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Everyone was on their feet now, and the situation was being eagerly
-      discussed while the saddle was undergoing confirmatory inspection.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Something&rsquo;s happened, boys,&rdquo; exclaimed the big husky fellow addressed as
-      Bob, conclusively, if somewhat obviously. &ldquo;And I guess we&rsquo;d better
-      investigate.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      As he spoke he swung himself into his saddle&mdash;he had been one of the
-      late arrivals and his horse was all ready for the road or the range.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Up toward the hills then,&rdquo; remarked another, indicating the direction
-      whence the riderless horse had come. And a moment later he, too, was
-      astride his broncho.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll borrow your pony, Ted,&rdquo; cried out Jack Rover as he jumped astride a
-      third mustang.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And a moment later all three riders were pelting along the road leading to
-      La Siesta. There was no difficulty whatever in picking up the long
-      galloping strides on the dusty highway, and the speed of the trackers
-      depended only on the swiftness and endurance of their mounts.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Meanwhile the boy who had caught Marshall&rsquo;s horse had disencumbered it of
-      saddle and bridle, and turned it into the corral with a kindly pat on its
-      heaving flank.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guess I&rsquo;ll report to the boss,&rdquo; he called out, as he picked up the saddle
-      and moved away toward the ranch home.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Look out for yourself,&rdquo; shouted one of the group. &ldquo;Old Thurston will be
-      madder than hell.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      But it was terror, selfish terror, not anger nor grief, that came into Ben
-      Thurston&rsquo;s eyes when he saw the saddle horn smeared with fresh blood and
-      scarred by a bullet.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My God, and I believed Don Manuel was dead,&rdquo; he whispered in a hoarse
-      voice to Leach Sharkey.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The two had been, as usual, in close companionship; Sharkey reading a
-      weekly newspaper, while the employer he was paid to protect, restlessly,
-      as was his wont, paced the room.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Disappeared and dead ain&rsquo;t exactly the same thing,&rdquo; replied the sleuth as
-      he critically examined the saddle. &ldquo;And there may be another explanation
-      to this. What about Dick Willoughby?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, yes, Dick Willoughby,&rdquo; eagerly assented the trembling man.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You saw them quarreling the other day&mdash;they hate each other like
-      poison,&rdquo; continued Sharkey. &ldquo;Where&rsquo;s Dick Willoughby now?&rdquo; he enquired,
-      with a swift glance at the cowboy.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good Lord, that&rsquo;s just where he is&mdash;searching the canyons below the
-      forest for mavericks,&rdquo; was the reply.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey smiled blandly; the informant looked disappointed, yet confident.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I couldn&rsquo;t have believed that of Dick,&rdquo; he added, regretfully.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, clear out now,&rdquo; said Sharkey. &ldquo;Mr. Thurston and I will want to be
-      alone. You say Jack Rover and two others have gone out to search? Well, we
-      can&rsquo;t do more till they bring us in some news. Let us know at once when
-      they return.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Ben Thurston had collapsed onto a chair, then raised himself, and was
-      leaning eagerly forward now. He met Sharkey&rsquo;s glance of hardly concealed
-      contempt.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s right,&rdquo; he murmured, &ldquo;It has been Dick Willoughby&rsquo;s work. I knew
-      Don Manuel was dead.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And what about your boy?&rdquo; asked the sleuth curtly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, yes, poor Marshall! I forgot about him. But perhaps he&rsquo;s only
-      wounded. We&rsquo;ll send to Bakersfield for a doctor.&rdquo; And he half rose from
-      his seat.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;ll just wait patiently here,&rdquo; replied Sharkey, as he pushed Thurston
-      back into his chair. &ldquo;All that is possible for the present is being done.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      And the rôles were now reversed&mdash;it was the bodyguard who slowly and
-      meditatively paced the room.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Meanwhile Dick Willoughby had ceased from his ruminations, and was
-      beginning to take practical steps for getting Marshall&rsquo;s body home. He had
-      no thought of coroner&rsquo;s regulations that a corpse should be left
-      undisturbed till the proper official investigation had been made. He had
-      got his riata ready, and was just going to sling the body across his
-      saddle and tie it there, when the rhythmic thud of clattering hoofs smote
-      upon his ear. Thank God! Help was coming. There would be others to assist
-      him in his gruesome task. So Dick patiently waited while the sound grew
-      nearer and nearer, until at last the three cowboys dashed round the bend.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I heard the rifle shot,&rdquo; Dick explained, &ldquo;and rode up from the canyon
-      below to have a look. I found him here, huddled up just as you see him by
-      the side of the road.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Who the devil did this?&rdquo; asked Jack Rover, contemplating the corpse.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;God only knows,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;You take him on your saddle, Bob,&rdquo; he
-      added, addressing the big cowboy, whose horse was a full hand taller than
-      the other ponies and more stalwart in proportion.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And so the cortege was formed, Jack Rover leading the way, with Bob and
-      the body following and Dick Willoughby bringing up the rear.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The sun was low when at last they gained the rancho. They made their way
-      quietly round to the bunk house and quite tenderly swathed the mortal
-      remains of the young boss in a blanket, before carrying it to his father&rsquo;s
-      home.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At the sound of approaching footsteps old Ben Thurston, with Leach Sharkey
-      close on his heels, emerged onto the verandah. There was no need to
-      announce the death of his son&mdash;the ominous bundle told its own sad
-      tale. The ranch owner stared at it, horrified, inarticulate from a
-      conflict of emotions, the hunted look of terror again in his eyes. Leach
-      Sharkey took up the work of interrogation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How did it happen?&rdquo; He was addressing Jack Rover, who chanced to stand
-      next to him after helping to deposit the body on a bench that stood
-      conveniently against the wall.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dick Willoughby heard the shot up among the woods, and found him lying
-      dead on the road.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey advanced a pace or two and confronted Dick.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Who fired the shot?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How should I know?&rdquo; retorted Dick, reddening slightly from the
-      brusqueness of the enquiry.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I reckon I can tell,&rdquo; cried Sharkey. And with a swift, experienced
-      movement he grabbed Dick by both arms and clicked a pair of handcuffs on
-      his wrists before anyone, Dick least of all, had fathomed his intention.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick Willoughby was a square-shouldered, powerful fellow, but the great
-      husky bodyguard, Leach Sharkey, towered above him. In the first flush of
-      anger and surprise Dick struggled to break the shackles of ignominy. But
-      the sleuth grabbed him by both shoulders with a grip that rendered its
-      recipient absolutely powerless.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Go easy, young man.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick&rsquo;s muscles relaxed, and Sharkey was content to release his hold.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Go easy. If you have any answer to make to the charge of murdering that
-      boy, you&rsquo;ll have the chance all in good time.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What right have you to arrest me?&rdquo; demanded Dick, somewhat recovering his
-      poise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;ve a special constable&rsquo;s star all right,&rdquo; replied Sharkey, throwing
-      open his coat and displaying, close to his armpit, the badge of the office
-      he had claimed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guess that&rsquo;s good enough for you and all others here. And now take my
-      advice, Willoughby. You&rsquo;ll come quietly with me to Bakersfield. I&rsquo;ve no
-      special grudge against you, but have my obvious duty to perform. You
-      threatened young Marshall more than once in all our hearing, and it will
-      be up to you to prove yourself guiltless of his death. You bring round Mr.
-      Thurston&rsquo;s automobile, Rover. We start right now.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Everything had happened so rapidly that none of the cowboys, had they so
-      desired, could have protested or interfered. Meanwhile the news had
-      spread, for others among the ranch hands were coming up and crowding
-      toward the verandah rails. General sympathy was obviously with Dick
-      Several of the onlookers advanced and shook his manacled hands. &ldquo;All
-      right, Mr. Willoughby.&rdquo; &ldquo;You&rsquo;ll be home again tomorrow,&rdquo; &ldquo;Buck up, it&rsquo;s a
-      ridiculous charge&rdquo;&mdash;these were among their expressions of
-      encouragement. Dick just smiled his thanks&mdash;a wan, wistful smile. He
-      now had himself under perfect control&mdash;even his resentment toward
-      Sharkey had been allowed to evaporate.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Very well,&rdquo; he said quietly, addressing the sleuth. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll give you no
-      trouble, Sharkey. Let us get away from here as quickly as possible.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Just then Lieutenant Munson came hurriedly onto the scene. For a moment he
-      looked thunderstruck when he saw the handcuffs around Dick&rsquo;s wrists.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great Scott, Dick! What&rsquo;s the meaning of this?&rdquo; Then without waiting for
-      a reply he turned to the sleuth.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve just heard about young Thurston&rsquo;s death, but you&rsquo;re surely not going
-      to mix up Dick Willoughby&rsquo;s name with it, Mr. Sharkey? You must know that
-      he would have nothing to do with such a cowardly crime.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He can prove all that at the proper time and place,&rdquo; was the cool,
-      determined rejoinder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t interfere, Munson,&rdquo; interposed Dick. &ldquo;Mr. Sharkey considers that he
-      is doing his duty. That&rsquo;s an end to all argument. I&rsquo;ll have no difficulty
-      in obtaining my release once we get to Bakersfield.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And the lieutenant can come along with us if he likes,&rdquo; observed the
-      sleuth, conciliated by his prisoner&rsquo;s sensible view of things. &ldquo;As Mr.
-      Willoughby&rsquo;s best friend, you can see that everything&rsquo;s done right, Mr.
-      Munson.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But why these handcuffs?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I know my own business,&rdquo; replied the sleuth, with returning severity, as
-      he touched the constable&rsquo;s star on his breast. &ldquo;And as a soldier you
-      should know the wisdom of letting it go at that, sir.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson turned to Mr. Thurston. All through the colloquy the ranch-owner
-      had spoken not a word. He had dropped onto the bench beside the still
-      swathed body of his son, and was sitting there with bowed head and
-      stolidly fixed eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You are no party to this accusation, Mr. Thurston?&rdquo; the lieutenant
-      enquired. &ldquo;I am sorry for the blow that has fallen on you. But you can&rsquo;t
-      seriously believe that Dick Willoughby&rsquo;s the man who fired that shot.&rdquo; As
-      he spoke he pointed at the dead rigid form.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Thurston raised his eyes. There was a dull glare of fury in them, a savage
-      snarl on his parted lips.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mind your own business, young man. He killed my boy, and by God he&rsquo;ll
-      hang for it.&rdquo; While speaking he rose to his feet, holding forth a
-      denouncing arm toward Willoughby, &ldquo;Yes, he&rsquo;ll hang for it,&rdquo; he growled
-      again with savage determination, turning round to the open door.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      With a gesture to the cowboys standing nearest, he bade them carry the
-      body within. He stood aside to let them pass with their burden, then
-      followed and slammed the door behind him with an angry bang.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Despite the tragedy of it all, a little smile went round the group of
-      onlookers. It meant to say that that was just Ben Thurston all over&mdash;irascible
-      and vindictive. But some faces looked grave.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;May go mighty hard with Willoughby,&rdquo; murmured one voice, that of the old
-      grey-headed man, the blacksmith at the rancho for twenty years or more. &ldquo;I
-      wouldn&rsquo;t like to feel the weight of the old devil&rsquo;s hand.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      But just then the automobile came round the house, piloted by Jack Rover.
-      Sharkey began to make his dispositions for the journey.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Do you want to take anything with you, Willoughby?&rdquo; he asked in a
-      considerate manner.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Nothing,&rdquo; was the prompt reply.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well then, you&rsquo;ll ride with me on the front seat. Lieutenant, you can
-      share the tonneau with Mr. Thurston.&rdquo; There was a slight grin on the
-      sleuth&rsquo;s face as he signified the arrangement.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mr. Thurston?&rdquo; queried Munson, taken somewhat aback. &ldquo;Does he come, too?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Sure,&rdquo; replied Sharkey. &ldquo;Who&rsquo;s going to make the charge, I&rsquo;d like to
-      know? Willoughby, I just need your promise that you won&rsquo;t move from this
-      verandah till I return.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick nodded assent. &ldquo;You have my word,&rdquo; he said with quiet dignity.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then I&rsquo;ll be back in a minute,&rdquo; added the sleuth, his hand on the door
-      knob.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Ben Thurston was standing alone in the centre of the living room, the body
-      with its bearers having passed to an inner apartment. His arms were folded
-      across his breast in an attitude of deep dejection. But it was with the
-      scared look of a hunted beast that he started away at the touch of Leach
-      Sharkey&rsquo;s hand upon his shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The sleuth smiled understandingly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t want to be left here all alone, do you?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no. For God&rsquo;s sake, no. I had forgotten that.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then you&rsquo;ve got to come with me to Bakersfield. In any case you will be
-      wanted to swear the information. And you can also make arrangements for
-      the funeral. So get your hat and overcoat. We are all ready outside.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, yes, I&rsquo;m coming,&rdquo; faltered Thurston. &ldquo;Wait for me, Sharkey,&rdquo; he
-      added, as with nervous fingers he detached his overcoat from a rack on the
-      wall.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And a few minutes later the automobile, with Sharkey at the wheel, the
-      handcuffed prisoner by his side, and Thurston and the lieutenant seated
-      frigidly apart in opposite comers of the tonneau, was spinning through the
-      gathering dusk of evening on its way to the county town of Bakersfield.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0014" id="link2HCH0014"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XIV&mdash;Entanglements
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">F</span>ROM the
-      observatory high up among the hills, Mr. Robles had witnessed the arrest
-      and the departure of the prisoner. He had understood every move just as if
-      he had been present on the verandah down below and had heard each spoken
-      word.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      As he stood erect, his hand still rested on the telescope. For a few
-      moments he pondered, then murmured to himself as he turned to leave the
-      room: &ldquo;A bad complication! I must break the news tonight to Merle. Poor
-      little girl!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      But it was two hours later before he wended his way down through the
-      moonlit forest in the direction of La Siesta.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      There dinner was over. No word of untoward happenings had as yet come from
-      the outside world to disturb the tranquillity of the little household. In
-      the drawing room Merle was at the piano, while Grace, close by, was curled
-      on a sofa reading the latest novel. At some distance from the young girls
-      was Mrs. Darlington, occupied intermittently over a piece of embroidery.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      She was seated in semi-darkness, only her hands and her work illumed by
-      the soft pink radiance of a shaded lamp resting on a little table by her
-      side. In the evening costume of the chatelaine of La Siesta was the
-      suggestion of old lace and old-time lavender&mdash;the old lace at her
-      bosom and around her neck, the subtle fragrance of lavender exhaled from
-      her garments that gave to her a sort of personal atmosphere. And as she
-      sat musingly, with the skeins of silk passing through her fingers, she
-      might have formed a picture of some Penelope seated at the loom of pensive
-      memory.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The music from the piano was in harmony with both her mood and her
-      attitude&mdash;the soft dreamy melodies of Mendelssohn&rsquo;s &ldquo;Songs without
-      Words&rdquo; to which she was vaguely listening while busy with her thoughts and
-      her stitches.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Downstairs amid the oriental luxuriousness of the cosy corner sat Tia
-      Teresa, waiting in the dark to intercept the visitor of whose coming she
-      had been apprized by a secret messenger. And at last Ricardo Robles came,
-      with the noiseless footfall that was characteristic of the man and
-      imparted to him an air of mystery. He was standing by the old duenna&rsquo;s
-      side before she had realized his presence.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I wanted a few words with you first of all, Tia Teresa,&rdquo; he murmured, as
-      she grasped his hand in both her own and affectionately kissed it.
-      &ldquo;Something has happened.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I know what has happened, Don Manuel,&rdquo; she whispered. &ldquo;The young man
-      deserved his fate, for I am sure you saw what occurred in the rose garden
-      during the afternoon. For one of his breed to have dared even to touch my
-      little girl!&rdquo; She hissed the words venomously, then added in calmer tone:
-      &ldquo;So all is well. He brought down his doom upon his own head, and vengeance
-      for Rosetta begins.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Robles pressed her hand as he disengaged his own from her almost fiercely
-      caressing touch.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I nursed you both,&rdquo; continued the duenna in a low impassioned voice.
-      &ldquo;Your people were my people, you children were my very life, and your
-      revenge has come to be my own. So I rejoice that the young ruffian died.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He had seated himself by her side on the divan. &ldquo;We shall say no more then
-      about that,&rdquo; he responded. &ldquo;In some ways I am sorry over the day&rsquo;s work.
-      At times I find it difficult to reconcile my firmness with my softness.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But you cannot forget that you are no longer the owner of your father&rsquo;s
-      lands and flocks, and are virtually childless besides.&rdquo; She breathed the
-      words with intense repressed fury, intensified as she added: &ldquo;And all
-      through the accursed gringo who wrecked our happy lives&mdash;Rosetta&rsquo;s,
-      yours, your beloved parents&rsquo; as well. While that abominable wretch lives,
-      the vendetta can never end.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      For a moment Robles remained silent. Then he spoke resolutely:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I know it, Tia Teresa. Today my work only begins. Rest assured that it
-      will be carried to the bitter finish. For this I have waited all through
-      those long years. But I wanted to tell you of another matter&mdash;to warn
-      you of a very serious complication. Dick Willoughby has been arrested for
-      the slaying of Marshall Thurston.&rdquo; The duenna sat bolt upright in shocked
-      surprise. &ldquo;Oh, my! What will this mean?&rdquo; she murmured.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Terrible grief for my little girl&mdash;possibly much suffering for him
-      until I choose to take the responsibility upon myself.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You must not do that.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No. Not yet, at all events. Or the victory will be his&mdash;my enemy&rsquo;s.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He mused again. She, too, remained silent. At last he broke the spell.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But I have already devised measures for his safety. Now I must go
-      upstairs. They have heard nothing yet?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not a word.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then I must tell them of the mysterious shooting in the woods, and at the
-      same time reassure Merle that her lover is in no real danger.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And Mrs. Darlington?&rdquo; asked Tia Teresa. &ldquo;How much is she to know?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Nothing! The vendetta is for us Spaniards. It is ours and ours alone. No
-      one knows of my vow but you and I. Let it remain so. <i>Adios</i>, my dear
-      friend.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      In the darkness he stooped and kissed her on both cheeks. For a moment she
-      clung to him, but he gently liberated himself from her embrace. He moved
-      toward the stairway, and Tia Teresa followed him cautiously up to the
-      drawing room door, outside of which she remained. Knowing that she was
-      there, he left the door ajar. The soft music was still playing, but
-      suddenly ceased when Robles advanced into the apartment.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My word, but this is an unexpected pleasure,&rdquo; exclaimed Merle, as she
-      came from the piano with outstretched hands.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      He took them both in his own, and bestowed on her a grave but kindly
-      smile. He also nodded to Grace, who had dropped her book and risen in
-      courteous greeting.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But you look sad and serious,&rdquo; Merle went on, with quick intuition that
-      his coming at this late hour meant something more than a mere neighborly
-      visit.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Something sad and serious has happened,&rdquo; he replied.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Mrs. Darlington had advanced from her lamp-lit table.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What?&rdquo; she enquired eagerly. &ldquo;Somehow I had a sense of impending trouble
-      all day long.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Young Thurston of the rancho has met with an accident.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dead?&rdquo; gasped Merle, her hands clasped against her bosom.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, dead, I am afraid. He was mysteriously shot this afternoon when
-      riding through the pine woods.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle was stricken dumb. Grace glided to her side and listened in silent
-      expectancy.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Shot! By whom?&rdquo; asked Mrs. Darlington.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That I cannot tell,&rdquo; gravely replied Robles. Then he smiled faintly. &ldquo;But
-      an amazingly stupid blunder has been made. By some combination of
-      circumstances suspicion is being fastened on our dear friend Dick
-      Willoughby.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dick!&rdquo; exclaimed Merle. &ldquo;Who dares to suggest such a thing?&rdquo; she added
-      indignantly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I infer that Mr. Thurston is his accuser,&rdquo; replied Robles.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The two young men quarreled,&rdquo; murmured Mrs. Darlington, in a voice of
-      deep agitation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mother!&rdquo; cried Merle reprovingly. &ldquo;Even to think for one moment that
-      Dick, whatever the provocation, could have done such a thing! He is
-      absolutely innocent, Mr. Robles,&rdquo; she went on decisively, again turning to
-      their visitor.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Of course he is innocent&mdash;absolutely innocent. No one knows that
-      better than myself.&rdquo; And he gave an enigmatic smile as he spoke the words
-      of reassuring confidence.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Where is Mr. Willoughby now?&rdquo; queried Grace.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He has been compelled to go to Bakersfield.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;To Bakersfield?&rdquo; exclaimed Merle, half wonderingly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;There to prove his innocence,&rdquo; replied Robles.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But Mrs. Darlington had probed the real significance of his words.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t mean to say that they have&mdash;arrested him?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Robles nodded gravely. &ldquo;That&rsquo;s how the law acts. A man under suspicion
-      must be taken into custody&mdash;he must be charged so that he can refute
-      the shameful calumny.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle had dropped into a settee&mdash;white and speechless. Her lips
-      trembled. Then she burst into a passion of weeping, burying her face
-      against an arm flung across the upholstery.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Mrs. Darlington moved forward quickly to comfort the sobbing girl.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, don&rsquo;t take on like this, my dear child. The arrest was a mere
-      formality. He will be immediately set at liberty.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle raised her tear-stained face. She spoke in gulping sobs.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But, mother, I never told you&mdash;I shrank from telling any of you.
-      While you and Grace were away this afternoon, Marshall Thurston called and
-      wanted to make love to me&mdash;he even dared to try to kiss me. Tia
-      Teresa flung him out of the rose garden. It was I who made Tia Teresa
-      promise to say nothing about it to anyone. I feared trouble. And, oh,
-      trouble, terrible trouble, has already come.&rdquo; Again she bowed her head and
-      continued weeping, but quietly weeping now. Grace was bending over her,
-      patting her shoulder in soothing sympathy.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Mrs. Darlington&rsquo;s eyes met those of Robles.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;This may prove serious,&rdquo; she said softly, that Merle might not overhear.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is decidedly unfortunate,&rdquo; replied Robles; &ldquo;an unfortunate
-      complication that may, of course, strengthen the suspicion against
-      Willoughby and so render it more difficult for us to help him.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle sprang to her feet, and with a hand dashed away her tears.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Suspicion!&rdquo; she exclaimed. &ldquo;There can be not one moment&rsquo;s suspicion.&rdquo; And
-      she gazed up into Robles&rsquo; face in ardent appeal.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Of course not, my dear, among us&mdash;among all those who know Dick
-      Willoughby. But there is the harshly judging world to reckon with besides.
-      They may say that this discloses a motive for the crime.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;However, Merle has just told us,&rdquo; commented Mrs. Darlington, &ldquo;that only
-      she and Tia Teresa know anything about this unhappy episode in the rose
-      garden. Mr. Willoughby has not been here at all today.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But I happen to know that he was not far away this afternoon&mdash;that
-      he was rounding up some cattle in the near-by canyons. Malice may suggest
-      that he was a witness of Thurston&rsquo;s insolent behavior.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then we should all keep silent on the subject.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Which might be compromising in the long run, my dear Mrs. Darlington.
-      Altogether it is a difficult situation.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle had been hardly listening to this conversation. She had been
-      thinking, and with thinking had regained her composure. Her mind was
-      quickly made up as to the line of prompt action that must be taken. She
-      spoke quite calmly now.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He is in prison. You have not spoken the word, Mr. Robles, but I know the
-      truth all the same. We shall go to him tonight.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not tonight, my dear,&rdquo; replied Robles, with gentle firmness. &ldquo;But
-      tomorrow morning, certainly, I would suggest that you drive over to
-      Bakersfield. He will appreciate your kindness in paying him this prompt
-      visit, and you can at the same time convey to him my message of absolute
-      belief in his innocence.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You will not come, too?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I can do more for him, Merle, by not going to Bakersfield for the
-      present. Do not forget that for reasons of my own I live in seclusion. My
-      name must be mentioned to no one but Mr. Willoughby. Trust me, all three
-      of you, and leave me to work quietly alone and by my own methods. There, I
-      give my promise. The captive will be set free within a short time. My hand
-      on that, and you know that I never break my word.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      There was a joyous smile of confidence on his face as he spoke the words.
-      Merle took the extended hand gratefully, trustfully, and pressed it to her
-      lips. Robles went on:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My advice is&mdash;try to sleep tonight. Tomorrow, or within a few brief
-      tomorrows, all will be well. Good night.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Tia Teresa followed him from the open door down into the outer hall.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You heard everything,&rdquo; he said as he paused to speak a final word of
-      parting. &ldquo;Comfort her, but at the same time guard our secret closer than
-      ever. Not one hair of Willoughby&rsquo;s head will be touched&mdash;make her
-      know that for certain. And everything will come right in a very little
-      time.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My poor little girl,&rdquo; he murmured to himself as he strode down the silent
-      tree-shadowed avenue.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0015" id="link2HCH0015"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XV&mdash;Behind the Bars
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">D</span>ick Willoughby had
-      been lodged in the county jail at Bakersfield, duly charged by Ben
-      Thurston as the murderer of his son. To his surprise, and indeed to his
-      dismay, the prisoner was informed that, the crime alleged being a capital
-      one, no bail could be accepted. This was first of all a blow to
-      Willoughby&rsquo;s pride. Here he was under the stigma of imprisonment, but with
-      no possibility of redress. It was not the loss of comforts, the
-      deprivation of personal liberty, the hardships to body and to soul,
-      inseparable from such restraint, that he resented, so much as the
-      semiconviction of guilt implied by the durance vile to which he was to be
-      subjected, although absolutely innocent of the deed of which he was
-      accused.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      However, after first chagrin came manly philosophy. The law might be right
-      or wrong, wise or unwise, necessary or superfluous. But all the same it
-      was the law of the state and had therefore to be obeyed. So, when the
-      situation was finally reviewed, it was Lieutenant Munson who, when bidding
-      his friend good-night, had been the angry man, fretting and fuming over
-      such an abominable act of injustice, while the prisoner himself was
-      tranquilly resigned to the ordeal through which he must pass and to which
-      unkind fate was subjecting him for reasons that he was powerless to
-      fathom.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good night, Ches, old man. You&rsquo;ll see me again in the morning. It&rsquo;s
-      mighty kind of you to stay in town all night. But we can decide on the
-      best lawyer to employ, and then you must hasten back to break the bad news
-      at La Siesta.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Such had been Dick&rsquo;s quiet words when their colloquy had been broken up,
-      and he had been ordered to the retirement of his prison cell. To enter
-      that place was for Dick a horrible experience. But he accepted the
-      experience calmly, bade the turnkey a cheerful good-night, and laid him
-      down to sleep on the narrow mattress resting upon the hard bench, at peace
-      with himself and the world, even with the bitter enemy who had all so
-      unexpectedly appeared on his path.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Although Munson was back in the jail betimes next morning, he found Dick
-      already conferring with a lawyer&mdash;the best and most honored in the
-      town, as Munson knew the moment his name was mentioned.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Let me introduce you to Mr. Bradley,&rdquo; said Dick, presenting him. &ldquo;Some
-      kind friend whose name he declines to reveal for the present, sent him a
-      special message last night retaining his services for my defence.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mrs. Darlington, I bet,&rdquo; interjected the lieutenant.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, not Mrs. Darlington, let me assure you,&rdquo; rejoined the lawyer,
-      &ldquo;although undoubtedly she would be willing to do the same thing. But I am
-      not permitted to say any more.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And he has <i>carte blanche</i> for all expenses,&rdquo; smiled Dick. &ldquo;Although
-      I should not think there will be much money required to clear an innocent
-      man,&rdquo; he added.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Wait till you see,&rdquo; said the lawyer crisply. &ldquo;We have to reckon with a
-      malignant persecutor, I am already informed.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, I&rsquo;ve got a bit to my bank credit,&rdquo; Dick replied. &ldquo;And we&rsquo;ll draw on
-      that first before I accept the generosity of an unknown friend. It will be
-      quite a saving here,&rdquo; he went on with a humorous twinkle in his eye as he
-      glanced around. &ldquo;Free board and lodging at the state&rsquo;s expense for a week
-      at all events.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Much longer than that, I am afraid,&rdquo; gravely remarked the lawyer. &ldquo;You
-      see, Mr. Munson, just before you arrived we were discussing the decidedly
-      unfortunate coincidence that at the time the shooting occurred, Mr.
-      Willoughby, by his own admission, was in the little canyon below the scene
-      of the tragedy.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Rounding up some cattle,&rdquo; observed Dick. &ldquo;Of course. But all the same,
-      open to suspicion as being on the ground, and indeed being the first to
-      reach the dead man&rsquo;s side.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That should be proof of innocence,&rdquo; observed Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Or may be taken as evidence of well-reasoned audacity to throw accusers
-      off the trail,&rdquo; retorted the attorney. &ldquo;You see we have to look at
-      everything, not from our own point of view, but from the other side. Now I
-      want to learn something more about that quarrel between you and young
-      Thurston at the cattle muster.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He made an insulting remark about one of the young ladies from La
-      Siesta,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;I told him I would tan his hide if he ever did it
-      again. That&rsquo;s all. But the last thing I want is that these ladies&rsquo; names
-      should be dragged into the case.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But his remark and your reproof were overheard by others,&rdquo; commented the
-      attorney.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, yes, by a bunch of ranch hands.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Whose evidence will undoubtedly be called for the prosecution,
-      necessitating, perhaps, the evidence of the young ladies on our side.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;By God, I won&rsquo;t stand for that,&rdquo; exclaimed Dick hotly. &ldquo;I can defend
-      myself without their being called to the witness stand. Think, Munson, of
-      subjecting Merle or Grace to any such thing&rdquo;&mdash;and his indignant face
-      appealed to the lieutenant&rsquo;s.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I saw nothing of the quarrel,&rdquo; observed Munson, addressing the lawyer,
-      &ldquo;although, of course, I heard something about it later on&mdash;not from
-      Willoughby, however, for he has never once referred to the matter in
-      conversation with me. But I say, Dick, old fellow, you know that Merle
-      Farnsworth and Grace Darlington, too, will be only too proud and happy to
-      stand up for you in a law court or anywhere else.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That may be,&rdquo; replied Dick gloomily, &ldquo;but I don&rsquo;t propose that they shall
-      be made the objects of vulgar curiosity in a crowded court-room, or that
-      their ears should ever hear the vile words that fell from that miserable
-      degenerate who has at last met the fate he properly deserved.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, it is a point that we shall have to consider carefully,&rdquo; spoke the
-      lawyer as he rose to take his departure. &ldquo;I have all the main facts of the
-      case now, Mr. Willoughby. Of course I shall apply formally to the court
-      for bail, but I know it is bound to be refused. I&rsquo;ll make all arrangements
-      outside for your comfort here&mdash;meals, etc., and no doubt your friend,
-      Mr. Munson, will bring you over clothing, toilet requisites, and the other
-      little things you will require. I&rsquo;ll see you again later on today.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The lawyer was gone, and the two comrades were alone in the little room,
-      stone-walled and bare of furniture except for a few chairs, where the
-      consultation had been held. Beyond the open door stood a constable, just
-      out of earshot. But he now took his stand within the room.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, Munson, old chap,&rdquo; said Dick with cheerful alacrity, &ldquo;you get back
-      to the rancho in double-quick time. Then go on to La Siesta and tell Merle
-      not to worry on my account. Tell her that I&rsquo;m bright and happy, and just
-      enjoying a good rest, and will be set at liberty within a week or so. But
-      remember, she is not to come here. Good Lord, I never want her to see me
-      in a place like this.&rdquo; And he glanced around forlornly, and in a measure
-      ashamed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But at the very moment there was a flutter along the corridor&mdash;the
-      sound of voices, and women&rsquo;s voices, too. A moment later the
-      superintendent of the jail appeared, bringing with him Mrs. Darlington and
-      Merle. At the doorway he spoke to the officer on guard; the man withdrew.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mr. Willoughby, here are some more friends,&rdquo; said the superintendent as
-      he ushered in the ladies. &ldquo;I am going to interpret the regulations as
-      leniently as possible&mdash;that&rsquo;s a matter which can rest between
-      ourselves. I&rsquo;ll come back for you, Mrs. Darlington, in half an hour.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle advanced toward Dick with outstretched hand. In her other hand was a
-      fine bouquet of roses.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What a shame that you should be here,&rdquo; she exclaimed. &ldquo;But I realize that
-      the only thing to do is to submit as cheerfully as possible to the
-      inevitable. Mother and I came over to give you our sympathy and proffer
-      our help in every possible way. Grace also sends her very kindest regards,
-      and I was bidden by Mr. Robles, whom we saw last night, to assure you of
-      his complete belief in your innocence.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m not afraid of any real friend thinking me capable of a cowardly
-      deed like that,&rdquo; replied Willoughby. &ldquo;But it is nice to have these kind
-      messages, although I could have wished, Miss Farnsworth, that you had not
-      seen me amid such surroundings.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Do you think that we would desert you in such a time of trouble as this?&rdquo;
-       replied Merle, as she sat down. &ldquo;But seeing that our visit is to be
-      restricted to half an hour, it is well that we should get to the important
-      points without delay. I have been talking over a certain matter both with
-      mother and Mr. Robles, and although I shrink from telling it, they have
-      decided that you must know about the affair.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      She then proceeded, in a low voice and with lips that trembled, to tell
-      how young Thurston had forced his attentions on her just a little time
-      before the shooting occurred and how Tia Teresa had rescued her from his
-      clutches.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      This was the first that Dick had heard of the incident and his face
-      flushed with anger. But Merle quieted him at once. &ldquo;You need not be angry
-      now, Mr. Willoughby. It is all over. But your lawyer will want to consider
-      what bearing this may possibly have upon the case.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It can have no bearing at all,&rdquo; maintained Dick. &ldquo;In the first place I
-      didn&rsquo;t even know till now that Marshall had been visiting at La Siesta.
-      And in the second place, just as I was saying to Munson a few minutes ago,
-      I am determined that the names of you ladies shall not be dragged into
-      this miserable affair. Isn&rsquo;t that right, Mrs. Darlington?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;In a measure. But all the same we are ready to stand by you so as to
-      establish your innocence with the least possible delay. I heard this
-      morning that Mr. Thurston is very bitter against you, keeps vowing
-      vengeance, and announces that no money will be spared to bring the slayer
-      of his son to retribution.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, I hope he&rsquo;ll find him without loss of time,&rdquo; smiled Dick. &ldquo;That
-      will be the quickest and easiest way to get me out of confinement. But at
-      this moment I have not the faintest idea on whom to fasten the charge.
-      Lots of the cowboys despised young Thurston, but none were really his
-      enemies, and I don&rsquo;t know any one among the bunch who would have shot him
-      in that dastardly, cold-blooded manner.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Which makes the situation for you all the more disagreeable,&rdquo; commented
-      Munson. &ldquo;You had been known to threaten him, and if there is no one else
-      to whom suspicion can point, you may be kept here, Dick, for quite a time&mdash;for
-      months, perhaps, until the case goes to trial.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick&rsquo;s face fell. &ldquo;For months!&rdquo; he exclaimed. &ldquo;Surely that would be an
-      outrage.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I wouldn&rsquo;t be too despondent,&rdquo; protested Merle. &ldquo;Besides, Mr. Robles
-      has pledged his word to me that you will be free in a very brief time.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then he may know who the culprit is,&rdquo; remarked Dick eagerly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; interposed Mrs. Darlington. &ldquo;He is like ourselves&mdash;quite in the
-      dark. But you may rest assured that Mr. Robles will leave no stone
-      unturned to solve the mystery and restore you to liberty, Mr. Willoughby,
-      for I happen to know that he holds you in highest esteem.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m glad of that,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;Well, I want you to tell him from me
-      how keen I am that you ladies shall be spared from all association with
-      this case. You know that I am exercising great self-denial, Miss
-      Farnsworth, when I say that you are never to come here again. This is no
-      place for you.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Pardon me,&rdquo; laughed Merle, &ldquo;but we are interested in you and will excuse
-      the hotel you have chosen to patronize. We brought these roses for you
-      from La Siesta&rdquo;&mdash;as she spoke she presented him with the beautiful
-      blooms&mdash;&ldquo;and if Lieutenant Munson will be kind enough to come out to
-      our automobile he will find there some books, also a box of fruit and a
-      few delicacies which we hope will help to make your stay here just a
-      little more tolerable.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;re kind indeed,&rdquo; murmured Dick gratefully. &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t worry about me,&rdquo; he
-      added cheerfully, &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll have a fine rest here, and will be able to catch
-      up with my arrears of reading.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      And in this philosophic frame of mind the prisoner was left to begin his
-      holiday.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0016" id="link2HCH0016"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XVI&mdash;Pierre Luzon Returns
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>N the outside
-      world the question on everybody&rsquo;s lips was&mdash;who had fired the fatal
-      shot among the pine woods? The young reprobate had been thoroughly
-      despised, but he had no known enemies except Willoughby. So while
-      Willoughby&rsquo;s staunch friends could only reiterate the question in vain
-      perplexity, most people were inclined to answer it with Dick&rsquo;s name. The
-      angry quarrel between the two young men was universally known and had been
-      subjected to sundry embellishments&mdash;for example, the threatened
-      horse-whipping had become an actual recorded event, and so on. And even
-      there were whispers about rivalry in some love affair&mdash;that Marshall
-      had had his eye on one of the young ladies at La Siesta where Dick for
-      some time had been a constant caller.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      So among the cowboys on the ranch, the oil drillers who frequented the
-      Bakersfield saloons and had often enough stood around while young Thurston
-      had set up the drinks, the newspaper reading public generally for whom all
-      the facts had been set forth in elaborate detail&mdash;the universal
-      concensus of opinion seemed to be that Dick Willoughby was the man. Not
-      that this verdict of popular opinion carried with it any real reprobation.
-      Everyone agreed that the worthless degenerate had met even a kindlier fate
-      than he merited. Had he lived, not all his father&rsquo;s millions could have
-      long saved him either from the penitentiary or an asylum for the insane.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      A week passed. Thurston brooded in solitude, but at his bidding Leach
-      Sharkey kept up active investigations with a view to nose out every bit of
-      evidence that could tell against the accused man. Sharkey worked, not from
-      any special animosity against Willoughby, but from keen professional
-      pride.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick accepted his confinement with manly fortitude. It. was one of those
-      untoward happenings that come into some people&rsquo;s lives for no obvious
-      reason, but he was calm in the confidence that everything would be made
-      clear in a very short time.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Moreover he was clear to his own conscience, which was the main thing.
-      Next in importance was that Merle, Grace and Mrs. Darlington, Robles and
-      Munson, all the friends whom he held in highest esteem, had never for one
-      moment doubted him. In their unshaken friendship was sufficient reward for
-      all the tribulations through which he was passing.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Meanwhile word had reached Buck Ashley that old Tom Baker was on his way
-      home in company with Pierre Luzon, to whom the Governor of the State had
-      at last granted parole. In view of Dick&rsquo;s imprisonment Munson had
-      well-nigh lost all interest in the romance of the buried treasure. But it
-      had been Dick himself who had insisted that his friend must attend to
-      their joint interests during his period of enforced sequestration.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Thus it had come about that Munson found himself one evening at the store,
-      awaiting with Jack Rover and Buck Ashley the arrival of the automobile in
-      which the sheriff was bringing the liberated convict from San Quentin. In
-      a brief letter Tom Baker had explained that he had decided on this manner
-      of transportation both because of its ensuring privacy and also because
-      Pierre Luzon was so enfeebled by age, sickness and prolonged confinement
-      that he could not travel by train. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve rigged up a stretcher,&rdquo; wrote
-      Tom, &ldquo;but the poor old Frenchie is as weak as a kitten, and we&rsquo;ll have to
-      run slow.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Nine o&rsquo;clock that night was the scheduled hour around which the automobile
-      might be expected. Buck Ashley had the extra cot for the invalid all ready
-      in his own bedroom at the rear of the store.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      It was close on ten o&rsquo;clock, however, before the headlight of the
-      automobile showed across the valley on the high-road. Buck piled another
-      big log on the fire in the sitting room. He saw that the doors were all
-      carefully closed and the shades pulled down. Then he brought in from the
-      bar a tray with glasses and a bottle of whisky.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Kentucky bourbon&mdash;that was old Pierre Luzon&rsquo;s favorite lotion,&rdquo; he
-      said as he set down the tray. &ldquo;And I guess he&rsquo;ll be glad of a good stiff
-      drink on a cold night like this.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      At last the automobile entered the yard, and the invalid was carried in on
-      the stretcher and propped up comfortably in a rocking chair near the
-      cheerful blaze. His teeth were chattering from cold, and he gratefully
-      gulped down the stiff glass of bourbon which Buck lost no time in
-      proffering him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You see,&rdquo; explained Tom Baker, as he bustled around, &ldquo;the Governor just
-      grants paroles; he can&rsquo;t grant pardons. Some sort of a board has to pass
-      on the pardons. But I got him out all right, and that&rsquo;s the main thing.
-      Eh, Pierre, old man?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The sheriff nodded with great friendliness to his protégé. Luzon responded
-      with a wan smile that silently spoke his thankfulness. His face was
-      deathly pale, but there was wonderful snap and vitality in the black
-      bead-like eyes that roamed around the room and searched each countenance.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck was now standing by the rocker. He laid a hand familiarly on the
-      Frenchman&rsquo;s shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You see, Pierre, old scout, I don&rsquo;t forget you&rdquo;&mdash;he pointed to the
-      bottle on the table. &ldquo;Kentucky bourbon, the best I&rsquo;ve got in the house,
-      and the very label you used to call for. Now we&rsquo;ve got to drink to your
-      speedy recovery. Fill up all round, boys. The drinks are on me tonight.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hip, hip, hooray!&rdquo; shouted Tom, as the glasses tinkled.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hush!&rdquo; exclaimed Buck, warningly. &ldquo;We don&rsquo;t want to bring any booze
-      fighters prowlin&rsquo; around here tonight. You see, Pierre, we four are in
-      cahoots and understand each other. You know Tom and myself&mdash;we ain&rsquo;t
-      in need of any guarantee. And you can trust Mr. Chester Munson and Jack
-      Rover here to the limit.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Luzon bowed acknowledgment of the informal introduction.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It was we who put up the cash to get you out of San Quentin,&rdquo; continued
-      Buck, as he dropped into a chair close beside Tom Baker.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Together with Dick Willoughby,&rdquo; interjected Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, yes, not forgettin&rsquo; Dick,&rdquo; resumed the storekeeper, &ldquo;as fine a young
-      feller as ever walked on shoe leather. But, by God, he&rsquo;s in jail just
-      now.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Eh?&rdquo; ejaculated the ex-convict, with a look of awakening, almost
-      fraternal, interest.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck turned to the sheriff.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Of course, Tom, you&rsquo;ll have read all about that terrible affair in the
-      newspapers?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The sheriff surreptitiously grabbed Buck&rsquo;s arm. He spoke in a confidential
-      whisper.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Drop that subject for the present. I&rsquo;ve said nothin&rsquo; about it to old
-      Pierre in case it might upset him. I ain&rsquo;t dared to mention the name
-      Thurston to him, for he shared the White Wolf&rsquo;s hatred of the breed.&rdquo; Then
-      Tom gave a little cough and glanced across the fireplace at the Frenchman.
-      &ldquo;Just a little cowboy shootin&rsquo; scrap, Pierre, in which our chum Dick
-      Willoughby has got himself temporarily involved. But say, boys,&rdquo; he went
-      on, casting his eyes toward Munson and Rover, &ldquo;I just thanked the Lord it
-      wasn&rsquo;t me as had to arrest Dick. Of course if I had still been sheriff I&rsquo;d
-      a done it&mdash;when I was a sworn-in officer, duty was duty all the time
-      with me, as every damned horse-thief within a hundred miles knows. But to
-      take an honest man into custody for shootin&rsquo; a miserable human coyote like
-      that young&mdash;&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, we&rsquo;re not a-goin&rsquo; to speak about him just now,&rdquo; interrupted Buck,
-      bestowing a cautioning kick on the sheriff&rsquo;s shins.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Tom took the timely reminder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That would have gone sore against the grain,&rdquo; he said emphatically, as he
-      reached for the whisky bottle and replenished his tumbler.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Glad to be back?&rdquo; asked Buck, beaming pleasantly on old Pierre.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The Frenchman lifted one thin hand and smiled.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Here I will become once more strong,&rdquo; he murmured. &ldquo;No place in ze world
-      like ze dear old Tehachapi mountains.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Wal, I see you&rsquo;ve begun to let your beard grow again,&rdquo; continued Buck,
-      pointing to the gray stubbled chin. &ldquo;And when your hair comes along, too,
-      you&rsquo;ll just be lookin&rsquo; fine and dandy. The same old Pierre that used to
-      sit for hours at a time in the store.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He paused a moment, surveying the visitor.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A leetle more whisky, please,&rdquo; murmured Pierre, as he watched the sheriff
-      lay down his glass.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;All the whisky you want, old fellow,&rdquo; exclaimed Buck, with effusive
-      hospitality. &ldquo;By gunnies, you&rsquo;re entitled to a good few nips after all the
-      long years you&rsquo;ve been locked up. Ain&rsquo;t that so, boys?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I should say,&rdquo; declared Tom, fervently, wiping his lips with the back of
-      his hand.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The Frenchman drank gratefully, and as he felt the warm alcoholic glow in
-      his vitals, uttered a deep-drawn &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; of appreciation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Tastes good, don&rsquo;t it?&rdquo; observed Buck. &ldquo;You never turned down a drink of
-      good whisky in the old days, did you, Pierre? Great times then! And gosh
-      almighty, don&rsquo;t it beat hell, I never suspected who you were all those
-      years you used to sit around the store smokin&rsquo; that big-bowled pipe of
-      yourn? And you knew about the cave then?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, Pierre Luzon, he know how to keep one secret,&rdquo; responded the
-      Frenchman, smiling.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, and good for us all you kept it, old man,&rdquo; exclaimed the sheriff.
-      &ldquo;He&rsquo;s a-goin&rsquo; to show us the cave tomorrow, Buck. There will be six in the
-      divvy-up now, boys, for of course Pierre Luzon stands in. That&rsquo;s agreeable
-      all round, fellers?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Sure, sure,&rdquo; responded the others in unison. Tom turned to the Frenchman.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I told you, Pierre, we&rsquo;d play the game fair and square with you. Ain&rsquo;t
-      that right?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I trust you all,&rdquo; replied Luzon. &ldquo;I show ze cave tomorrow to my friend,
-      Tom Baker, and you gentlemen who have been so kind to make up one purse to
-      bring me back here from zat horrid prison.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guess you&rsquo;re about the only feller that knows where it is?&rdquo; enquired
-      Buck, cautiously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Luzon looked at his questioner and spoke just one word: &ldquo;Guadalupe.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Does Gaudalupe know?&rdquo; exclaimed Jack Rover. &ldquo;I thought her long suit was
-      the riffle where she gets her placer gold.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guadalupe,&rdquo; answered Pierre, speaking slowly, &ldquo;she know ze cave, but she
-      not know where ze treasure is buried. Ze cave her home. She live zere.
-      Lots and lots of times she come out, and nobody ever track her when she go
-      back. Ze outlaws they sharp-shoot from places in ze hills nobody could
-      see. But I show you,&rdquo; he continued, nodding his head at Jack Rover, &ldquo;I,
-      Pierre, show you where zat riffle is. I know both where Guadalupe wash out
-      placer gold and ze secret chamber in ze big cave where Joaquin Murietta
-      bury him money and where ze White Wolf, Don Manuel&mdash;peace to his
-      soul!&rdquo;&mdash;Pierre Luzon crossed himself&mdash;&ldquo;hide sacks and sacks of
-      ze yellow gold. Oh, yes!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      This long speech had exhausted the old man. He dropped his head wearily.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What you need now is a good long sleep,&rdquo; exclaimed Tom Baker. &ldquo;Another
-      jolt of bourbon Pierre, and then you get in between the blankets, old
-      fellow.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve got your bed all ready in the next room,&rdquo; observed Buck.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I guess I go to bed zen,&rdquo; assented Luzon.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      He gulped down with relish a nightcap of the old whisky. Then Buck and Tom
-      helped him from his chair.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is good to be here,&rdquo; murmured the Frenchman. &ldquo;I grow strong again
-      among ze mountains. I never go back&mdash;never go back to San Quentin,
-      that one horrid prison.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll nurse you like a baby,&rdquo; said Buck assuringly, as he led the feeble
-      old man into the adjoining room.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0017" id="link2HCH0017"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XVII&mdash;The Bitter Bit
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">O</span>N the very night
-      of Pierre Luzon&rsquo;s return, Ben Thurston was in close colloquy with his
-      attorney, summoned specially from New York. It was not only the murder of
-      his son that had brought about this consultation. The owner of San Antonio
-      Rancho, while filled with fury against Dick Willoughby, was also gravely
-      perturbed over other things. Immediately after dinner the two men shut
-      themselves up in Thurston&rsquo;s office.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Thurston opened the safe and produced a little bundle of neatly-folded,
-      legal-looking documents.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;These are the option papers,&rdquo; he said gruffly, as he tossed them across
-      the table to the lawyer. &ldquo;Look them over, Mr. Hawkins.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The attorney glanced through the documents in a preliminary way.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I see the first big payment falls due on April 1st,&rdquo; he remarked.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, April 1st,&rdquo; responded Thurston, &ldquo;and I was a damned fool, too, to
-      let that Trust Company fellow inveigle me into making the date April 1st,
-      instead of March 1st. You see,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;the taxes come due on March
-      1st, and on this principality they amount to quite a pretty figure, I can
-      tell you.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How much?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, about $18,000.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The lawyer again read the papers through, this time more carefully.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, Mr. Thurston,&rdquo; he said, as he lighted a cigar and sat back in his
-      chair, &ldquo;I left some very important matters to come to you in answer to
-      your imperative message. What&rsquo;s the work in hand?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Why, this option for one thing; and then, too, I want you to help me put
-      the noose around the neck of that scoundrel who killed my son.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll take one thing at a time, please,&rdquo; replied the attorney, speaking
-      slowly and quietly. &ldquo;So far as this option on the rancho is concerned, it
-      seems to be quite regular. Nevertheless, five million dollars is a whole
-      lot of money. Is there any danger of their forfeiting their option payment
-      of $100,000?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Danger? Forfeiting?&rdquo; ejaculated Ben Thurston. &ldquo;Well, I&rsquo;m not at all
-      afraid of that. My fear now is that they may take up the option.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Why, didn&rsquo;t you wish to make the sale?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, but I am not getting money enough. The ranch is really worth ten
-      million dollars today, in cold cash. I have recently had some San
-      Francisco capitalists down here appraising it for me, but I had already
-      given the option.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I see that the agreement provides for your cattle and horses going in at
-      the stipulated price.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, I don&rsquo;t know why I should have been so infernally stupid. But you
-      see those Los Angeles fellows came over here one day in an automobile and
-      stayed all night. We had a sort of a tiff&mdash;didn&rsquo;t agree very well&mdash;and
-      I let them start away the next morning without their breakfast&mdash;rather
-      uncivil, I&rsquo;ll admit. After they had gone I got to thinking matters over,
-      and I sent a telephone message along the road to stop them and ask them to
-      come back. They returned all right. There was one of their number, this
-      fellow from some Title and Trust Company, who was pretty warm under the
-      collar, and, if I do say it myself, was as peeved as hell at me. Well, he
-      was the one who drew up the agreement, sitting here at this table. The
-      paper looked all right to me, and so I just went ahead and signed. I know
-      now they caught me for the $18,000 of taxes because I didn&rsquo;t just insist
-      on having the option expire March 1st, instead of April 1st. But, to be
-      frank with you, I really didn&rsquo;t much mind, for at that time I was only
-      keen to get their $100,000 for the option, never believing for a moment
-      that they would come across with the million-dollar first payment due
-      April 1st. You see the cattle and horses and all the stock on the ranch
-      was a sort of sheaf of oats that I hung out in order to get them to put up
-      their option money&mdash;just so much bait.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Mr. Hawkins shrugged his shoulders and said: &ldquo;Well, Mr. Thurston, judging
-      from this inventory before me, you certainly hung up a most generous
-      bait.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I didn&rsquo;t stop to think&mdash;that&rsquo;s all there is to be said. All these
-      details hadn&rsquo;t been worked out into cold figures at the time I gave the
-      option. When these men were here I just wanted to wheedle them into a
-      bargain which would leave a cool $100,000 in my hands. I never for one
-      moment believed they could make the million-dollar payment, although, by
-      God, I begin to realize the danger of their doing so now.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The lawyer looked up in silent surprise. Thurston continued:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Of course I should have had this detailed valuation made before I went
-      into the deal. Up to the time I read that inventory I had no real idea of
-      the increased value of the property and what was on it. Oh, you may shake
-      your head; I&rsquo;m not a good business man&mdash;never cared a damn for
-      business&mdash;and I know quite well I haven&rsquo;t given enough attention to
-      the ranch. You see I have been living mostly in the East, for good
-      reasons. I don&rsquo;t like it here at all&mdash;I&rsquo;ve never felt safe in
-      California,&rdquo; and he glanced nervously at the window of the room, as if
-      some enemy were lurking there.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Mr. Hawkins once more reached for the inventory, and carefully examined
-      the figures. Finally he said: &ldquo;Pardon me, Mr. Thurston, for the
-      observation. But you should have sent for me <i>before</i> the option was
-      signed, if you did not really intend to carry out its terms. I find that
-      you have twenty-six thousand head of cattle, and you say that the price of
-      cattle is very high just now&mdash;that the whole herd ought to average
-      forty dollars a head. This item alone makes one million and forty thousand
-      dollars, or, in other words, if they exercise the option and pay you the
-      first million dollars, they will have forty thousand dollars more than the
-      payment which they make at that time.&rdquo; The lawyer pencilled down the
-      figures while he spoke.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Ben Thurston had been listening with a gloomy look on his brow. But when
-      he saw the figures translated into dollars he fairly bounced from his
-      chair, walked rapidly up and down the room, and then, coming to a sudden
-      halt, shouted: &ldquo;By God, that&rsquo;s where they got me again. I see it all now;
-      these fellows were a damned sight too smart for me. Well, Hawkins, you are
-      my attorney. I don&rsquo;t want to go on with this deal, even if they are able
-      to dig up the money.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The lawyer puffed at his cigar, wholly undisturbed, and then replied: &ldquo;Mr.
-      Thurston, you have already made a sale.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, by God, I haven&rsquo;t; nothing of the kind,&rdquo; replied Thurston. &ldquo;The truth
-      is that I should get ten million dollars for this ranch, and keep all my
-      horses and cattle, too. I don&rsquo;t propose to be fleeced by that Los Angeles
-      outfit either,&rdquo; he continued, running his hands through his hair. &ldquo;I have
-      it; we&rsquo;ll break the contract. I&rsquo;ll bet that option is so faulty that you
-      can drive a load of hay right through it. Hunt up a flaw and we will send
-      them back their option money. I don&rsquo;t want their $100,000 now.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have already carefully studied the paper,&rdquo; replied Hawkins, &ldquo;and can
-      find no flaw in it. It was evidently drawn by a master hand.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Master hand be damned,&rdquo; thundered Thurston. &ldquo;Why, the stiff wasn&rsquo;t even a
-      lawyer. He was just one of the syndicate&mdash;the one I told you about a
-      while back. He knows so cussed much about titles that the other fellows
-      let him write the option.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I see,&rdquo; replied the attorney, as a half-smile flitted over his face;
-      &ldquo;about all you seemingly had to do was to sign the option papers and count
-      the option money. The sole hope you have now, Mr. Thurston, in my opinion,
-      is for those Los Angeles gentlemen to let this valuable option lapse. You
-      have only a few days to wait.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But I haven&rsquo;t told you the worst yet,&rdquo; said Thurston sullenly, dropping
-      again into his chair.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What do you mean?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I had a long-distance telephone this morning from the First National Bank
-      at Los Angeles saying that the million dollars due April 1st has been
-      already paid in to my credit. But I won&rsquo;t touch the money&mdash;I&rsquo;ll be
-      damned if I do.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You have no choice but to accept it,&rdquo; said the lawyer. &ldquo;It would be
-      foolish to deceive yourself; San Antonio Rancho is sold, and with the
-      payment just made, you, by the terms of your contract, are compelled to
-      give immediate possession. I can only advise you to take your medicine
-      like a man, but don&rsquo;t let those Los Angeles gentlemen know that you are
-      swallowing a bitter dose.&rdquo; He refolded the papers, and pushed them across
-      the table. &ldquo;Now, Mr. Thurston, if there is anything I can do to assist you
-      in the prosecution of your son&rsquo;s murderer, I stand ready to do so.&rdquo; Ben
-      Thurston arose.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll talk about that tomorrow. I&rsquo;ll hang Dick Willoughby right enough in
-      good time. Meanwhile you tell me the rancho is sold&mdash;that I have lost
-      my great estate for less than half its value? Hell! Isn&rsquo;t that enough for
-      one night?&rdquo; And he stalked wrathfully out of the room, slamming the door
-      behind him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He sold at the wrong price,&rdquo; mused the lawyer with a quiet smile.
-      &ldquo;Perhaps he&rsquo;ll be trying next to hang the wrong man.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0018" id="link2HCH0018"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XVIII&mdash;Elusive Riches
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>N the meantime the
-      quartet at the store were making a night of it. With old Pierre Luzon
-      peacefully asleep in the adjoining room, there were many things to speak
-      about. Tom Baker recounted in elaborate detail his story of interviews
-      with the governor and state officials at Sacramento, the weary and
-      harassing delays before parole was finally granted, his own dogged
-      determination, together with the artful pulling of political strings that
-      had finally brought about the results desired. Then there was the trip to
-      San Quentin, the breaking of the joyful news to Pierre Luzon in his cell,
-      the delivery of the paroled convict into Tom&rsquo;s hands, and the clever
-      solution of all further difficulties by hiring an automobile for the
-      journey south. The narrative was all very interesting, each listener
-      eagerly followed every word, and at the close Tom Baker&rsquo;s chest had
-      expanded several inches.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I tell you boys, there&rsquo;s no man alive could have done what I did. The
-      business was in the right hands. If it hadn&rsquo;t been for me, you wouldn&rsquo;t
-      have Pierre Luzon here tonight.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But if Pierre Luzon hadn&rsquo;t written that letter,&rdquo; growled Buck Ashley,
-      &ldquo;you would never have started for Sacramento and San Quentin.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, all&rsquo;s well that ends well,&rdquo; discreetly interposed Munson, as he
-      raked the smouldering wood ashes together. &ldquo;Gee, but its cold tonight.&rdquo;
-       Jack Rover rose and tossed another log onto the fire. In a moment a bright
-      flame sprang up.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The bottle&rsquo;s empty,&rdquo; observed the sheriff. &ldquo;The next one&rsquo;s on me, Buck.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guess we&rsquo;ll charge it to syndicate account,&rdquo; grinned the storekeeper,
-      whose momentary grouch seemed to have been dissipated by the cheerful
-      blaze. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll have to open books, boys, and go about things in a reg&rsquo;lar
-      way,&rdquo; he added, as he drew the bolt of the door that communicated with the
-      store and groped his way into the darkness beyond.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck needed no candle, and was soon back with another bottle of the
-      Kentucky bourbon. Glasses were filled and clinked and pledges of
-      brotherhood renewed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s champagne we&rsquo;ll be drinkin&rsquo; tomorrow night, Buck, old sport,&rdquo;
-       exclaimed Tom, slapping his old crony on the shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll long-distance Bakersfield for a case in the morning,&rdquo; responded
-      Buck, genially. &ldquo;By gosh, we&rsquo;ll be swimmin&rsquo; in wine afore long, boys.
-      First thing I&rsquo;ve got to do is to sell out this &lsquo;ere store.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Sell it!&rdquo; cried the sheriff, contemptuously. &ldquo;You can afford to give it
-      away, Buck. We ain&rsquo;t a-goin&rsquo; to be pikers in our old age, are we now?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I ain&rsquo;t old by a danged sight,&rdquo; snapped back the storekeeper, for Tom had
-      touched a sore spot once again. &ldquo;Besides, when I&rsquo;ve got a barrel of
-      Joaquin Murietta&rsquo;s gold safe in the bank, you&rsquo;ll see me friskin&rsquo; around
-      like a two-year-old colt,&rdquo; he added, his momentary surliness changing to a
-      smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And it ain&rsquo;t only gold, boys,&rdquo; said Tom Baker. &ldquo;That &lsquo;ere story old
-      Pierre told me about the grotto cavern havin&rsquo; a lake of oil in it as big
-      as a city block, sure &lsquo;nuff got me goin&rsquo;. Why, we&rsquo;ll be able to blossom
-      out into oil kings.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What&rsquo;s that?&rdquo; asked Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Why, the Frenchie told me, you know, confidential like, comin&rsquo; along on
-      our motor car that since fifty years back those bandit fellers skimmed oil
-      from the surface of that lake and burned it in lamps down in that cavern.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;By Jove, that&rsquo;s interesting,&rdquo; replied Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We know there is oil to the west, oil to the north, and oil to the south,
-      and it stands to reason there must be oil here as well.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; interposed Buck, &ldquo;but old Ben Thurston would never allow any
-      drillin&rsquo; on his place.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Who the hell wants oil anyhow?&rdquo; exclaimed Jack Rover. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll have all the
-      money we need with the buried gold and Guadalupe&rsquo;s placer mine.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, but oil is oil,&rdquo; replied the storekeeper, with a shrewd nod of his
-      head. &ldquo;They say Rockefeller has only to raise the price a quarter of a
-      cent a gallon whenever he wants to give away another million or so to a
-      university or a hospital.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, we ain&rsquo;t interested in universities or hospitals,&rdquo; said Tom Baker.
-      &ldquo;But I agree with Buck that oil&rsquo;s oil, and I, for one, intend to take
-      everything that&rsquo;s comin&rsquo; to me. My God, we can afford to buy Ben Thurston
-      out and do some drillin&rsquo; for ourselves on San Antonio Rancho. It&rsquo;ll help
-      to pass the time anyways.&rdquo; As he finished, he began to pour out another
-      round of drinks.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Help to keep you from the booze,&rdquo; muttered Buck, in an inaudible aside.
-      But he drained his own glass and smacked his lips with satisfaction.
-      &ldquo;Guess I&rsquo;ll be gettin&rsquo; another bottle, boys,&rdquo; he said aloud, genially.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, we&rsquo;ve had enough,&rdquo; mildly protested Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not by a jugful,&rdquo; replied Buck. &ldquo;You and Jack ain&rsquo;t goin&rsquo; to ride home
-      till mornin&rsquo;, and there&rsquo;s lots of things to be talked over yet.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great Scott, it&rsquo;s already two o&rsquo;clock,&rdquo; remarked Munson, consulting his
-      watch.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then the night&rsquo;s still young, boys,&rdquo; exclaimed Tom Baker, hilariously.
-      &ldquo;Get the brew, Buck. The empty bottles will keep the tally. Come on,
-      lieutenant, drain your glass. No heel taps in this crowd.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      They had started their conversation in low tones so as not to disturb the
-      slumbers of Pierre Luzon. But this precaution, or act of delicate
-      consideration, had been long since forgotten. They were talking loud now,
-      and often all together, and when Buck Ashley had returned from yet another
-      pilgrimage to the store, none heard or noticed the door of the bedroom
-      being cautiously pushed open by just the fraction of an inch.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      All four chairs had been again drawn around the cheerful log fire.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You were talking, Tom, of buying out Ben Thurston,&rdquo; remarked Jack Rover.
-      &ldquo;Then you haven&rsquo;t heard there&rsquo;s an option been given to a Los Angeles
-      syndicate? Guess mebbe Ben Thurston won&rsquo;t be the owner of the big rancho
-      very much longer.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And a good job, too,&rdquo; replied the sheriff, as he helped himself to yet
-      another drink.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck Ashley shook his head incredulously. &ldquo;Oh, lots of fellers have paid
-      down money for an option, as they call it, on the Thurston property, and
-      finally when the rub came they didn&rsquo;t come across and live up to their
-      bargain, and so they just naturally lost their option money.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I was talking to a geologist,&rdquo; intervened Munson, in whose mind the oil
-      question seemed to be still uppermost, &ldquo;and he says there is every
-      indication that the Midway Oil fields, a few miles north, are not one whit
-      better than wells that can be opened up right here.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But what&rsquo;s the use,&rdquo; said Tom Baker, &ldquo;of all the oil fields in California
-      to us fellers if we are about to be let into the secret door of a big
-      cavern where they&rsquo;ve got twelve or fifteen millions of twenty-dollar gold
-      pieces stacked up, jest awaitin&rsquo; for us to take &lsquo;em.&rdquo; The whisky was
-      beginning to do its work; he had already forgotten his aspirations of
-      being an oil king.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s right,&rdquo; said Jack Rover, &ldquo;and don&rsquo;t forget, while you&rsquo;re counting
-      them twenty-dollar gold pieces, that Pierre Luzon has promised to show us
-      the shallow riffle in the mountain stream where Guadalupe gets all that
-      placer gold.&rdquo; In the cowboy&rsquo;s case the alcohol was making only still more
-      fixed the one fixed idea in his brain.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Damn this store business anyway,&rdquo; said Buck Ashley, inconsequentially
-      returning to the theme that appealed to him most directly. &ldquo;Do you &lsquo;spose
-      I&rsquo;m goin&rsquo; to work my fingers off tying up groceries after we find old
-      Murietta&rsquo;s money and the White Wolf&rsquo;s treasure? Not by one hell of a
-      sight, if I know myself, and I &lsquo;low as how I do.&rdquo; And at the slightly
-      opened bedroom door old Pierre, Luzon whom they all thought to be fast
-      asleep, was listening to every word!
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But there is one thing,&rdquo; cried Tom Baker, striking the table fiercely as
-      he set down his glass, &ldquo;I want you fellers to get next to yourselves now
-      and make up your mind to.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Wa&rsquo;al, don&rsquo;t stop, Tom,&rdquo; said Rover. &ldquo;Go on and tell us what you&rsquo;re
-      thinking about. Get it off your chest, old man.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s just this way. By God, you fellers are not entitled to as much of
-      this &lsquo;ere twelve or fifteen million dollars as I am, for I&rsquo;m the feller
-      that went to the governor and got his parole and brought Pierre back here
-      to Tejon. Do you get me?&rdquo; Buck Ashley had straightened up and looked at
-      Tom Baker with an ugly scowl on his face. &ldquo;It was me,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;got that
-      letter from Pierre Luzon and we all throwed in, share and share alike, all
-      five of us. And we&rsquo;ll cut what we find, too, whether it&rsquo;s one million or
-      fifteen million, into five equal parts, or there&rsquo;ll be blood flowin good
-      and plenty.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Baker staggered to his feet, steadied himself for a moment and began to
-      roll up his sleeves.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;There be some things,&rdquo; he ejaculated, &ldquo;that you jest can&rsquo;t let wait and
-      settle up when the deal is all closed. I know what my rights are and you
-      fellers can&rsquo;t bluff me, not by a derned sight.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hold on, hold on, gentlemen,&rdquo; interposed Munson. &ldquo;Let&rsquo;s not commence
-      quarreling about something we are not even sure we shall ever see. Of
-      course we hope to be escorted into the cavern by old Pierre Luzon, and we
-      likewise hope that he&rsquo;ll find a hidden treasure. And by the way, Buck,
-      this reminds me&mdash;the cut has to be into six equal parts, not five,
-      for we owe Luzon the squarest of square deals.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m not agin&rsquo; that,&rdquo; muttered Buck. &ldquo;I just didn&rsquo;t remember him.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; resumed Munson, &ldquo;why quarrel about something that is as yet
-      nothing but a myth? It occurs to me that we should rather, individually
-      and collectively, be exceedingly thankful that Pierre Luzon is alive, and
-      that the White Wolf is dead, and that the one man who holds the secret has
-      promised to show us this treasure.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve never believed one cussed word about the White Wolf being dead,&rdquo;
-       growled Buck Ashley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, it sure was in the newspapers,&rdquo; said Tom Baker, turning down his
-      sleeves and resuming his seat.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, it sure was in the newspapers,&rdquo; replied Buck, &ldquo;and they jest seemed
-      to settle the fact, leastways to their own satisfaction. But I&rsquo;ve been
-      a-thinkin&rsquo; about Dick Willoughby. I don&rsquo;t believe he ever killed Marshall
-      Thurston, I don&rsquo;t.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Whoever did kill him,&rdquo; put in Jack Rover, &ldquo;did it good and plenty. Put
-      the shot right square through his heart.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said Tom Baker, reaching for more whisky, &ldquo;I ain&rsquo;t got much to
-      say, but what I says I stands to on this &lsquo;ere subject, and that is&mdash;&rdquo;
-       Almost with one accord all turned at the creaking of the bedroom door, and
-      <i>there</i> was Pierre Luzon, looking as if he had seen a ghost. His
-      short prison-cropped hair seemed to be standing on end like bristles, and
-      his eyes stared wildly at the four men. At last he cried out in a shrill
-      voice that was almost a scream:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ze son of Ben Thurston killed! Ah, ha!&rdquo; he laughed, hysterically. &ldquo;Shot
-      through ze heart!&mdash;vengeance at last begins! Ze White Wolf is not
-      dead! He is one live man!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0008" id="linkimage-0008"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
-      <img src="images/0205.jpg" alt="0205 " width="100%" /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h5>
-      <a href="images/0205.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
-    </h5>
-    <p>
-      The door was hastily closed with a loud bang, and the weird figure
-      vanished like an apparition.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      For a few moments the revellers sat in stupefied silence. Finally Buck
-      Ashley said in a low voice: &ldquo;Damn that whisky anyhow. It has made us talk
-      too loud.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; remarked Tom Baker, &ldquo;and also too dangnation much, I&rsquo;m a-thinkin&rsquo;.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Both were sober men now.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Believe I&rsquo;ll have a snooze,&rdquo; said Jack rover, seating himself on an old
-      lounge in a corner of the room. But he did not lie down.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Nothing more was said for perhaps a full half hour; all were nodding or
-      busy with their brooding thoughts.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At last Buck Ashley rose and tiptoed toward the bedroom.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guess I&rsquo;ll see if poor Pierre has gone to sleep again,&rdquo; he murmured.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      A moment later he shouted out from the inner chamber:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hell, boys!&mdash;he&rsquo;s gone! He&rsquo;s given us the slip&mdash;the damned old
-      jail-bird!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0019" id="link2HCH0019"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XIX&mdash;The Jail Delivery
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span>ROUND Dick
-      Willoughby there had been woven a web of circumstantial evidence that even
-      before his trial had convinced most people of his guilt. Only a few tried
-      friends who absolutely refused to believe him capable of shooting down an
-      unarmed man from ambush clung to their faith that he had had nothing to do
-      with the slaying of young Marshall Thurston. Among the general public the
-      only question in discussion was whether the jury were likely to find
-      extenuating circumstances and, should the life of the prisoner come to be
-      spared, how long would be his sentence.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Ben Thurston had lavished money with a free hand toward securing every
-      possible piece of testimony in support of the prosecution, and before his
-      return home even the cautious New York lawyer, Mr. Hawkins, had admitted
-      that the case against Willoughby appeared to be conclusive. It was only a
-      matter of a few weeks now when Thurston would be leaving the district.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Already San Antonio Rancho was in possession of the syndicate; their
-      foreman was in charge, the stock under their control, and it was only out
-      of consideration that the former owner was being permitted to linger a
-      little longer in residence. But for the gloomy and morose man there seemed
-      to be gloating satisfaction in the grim thought that before shaking off
-      forever the dust of his old home he would first of all ensure the hanging
-      of his son&rsquo;s murderer.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Among the most regular visitors at the jail were the ladies of La Siesta,
-      and rumor now began to run around that Miss Merle Farnsworth, despite
-      Willoughby&rsquo;s pleading that she should not mix her name up in the case,
-      would offer some surprising evidence in favor of the accused man&mdash;evidence
-      that might not exonerate Willoughby from responsibility for the deed, but
-      perhaps would fully justify his act to the minds of the jurymen.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      It was now only three days from the trial, and the whole county was agog
-      with expectation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      That night in the small hours five masked men rode very quietly through
-      the streets to the vicinity of the jail. All were heavily armed, and one
-      of them was leading an extra saddle horse. The party dismounted under the
-      shadow of some trees. One man held the horses, while his four companions,
-      with drawn revolvers, advanced to the gateway. Whether it was a simple
-      case of cowardly yielding to threats, or whether there had been
-      preliminary financial greasing of locks and bolts, aided perhaps by
-      sympathy for the prisoner, the fact remains that within a very few minutes
-      Dick Willoughby had been brought from his cell.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You are a free man, Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo; said the leader of the masked band
-      in a low voice. &ldquo;You will come with us.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Who are you?&rdquo; asked Dick.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We are friends&mdash;that is enough.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have no wish to go,&rdquo; protested Dick in the hearing of the jailers. &ldquo;The
-      jury must acquit me&mdash;I am ready to remain here until they do acquit
-      me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Take care. The man with the money can put the rope round your neck.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I am not afraid.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;There is another reason. The name of a certain young lady must not be
-      introduced into this case.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have begged her not to testify.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But she will testify if this trial goes on&mdash;that you know well. Now
-      you will come with us, for her sake if not for your own.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Be it so then,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;Lead the way.&rdquo; Just as quietly as they had
-      come the little band of riders rode through the silent and deserted
-      streets. They took the southern road, and for the first few miles kept to
-      the thoroughfare. Then, reaching a stretch of unreclaimed land, they
-      started across country. The night was moonless and dark, but Dick knew
-      instinctively that they were making for the mountainous country to the
-      north of the Tejon Pass.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The leader rode a short distance ahead. Not a word was spoken. In about
-      two hours they were among the foothills. The pace slackened, and then, as
-      they reached a clump of oaks, a halt was called. From under the shadow of
-      the trees a man appeared, leading two sturdy little mountain ponies. The
-      newcomer wore no mask.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;This man will be your guide from now on,&rdquo; announced the leader, whose
-      features were still concealed by the strip of black cloth tied around the
-      lower part of his face. &ldquo;I am sorry we must ask you to wear a blindfold,
-      Mr. Willoughby. But you are among friends, and I feel sure you will help
-      us all by your ready assent.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I am in your hands,&rdquo; replied Dick, quietly. A few minutes later he was
-      seated on one of the ponies, his eyes securely bandaged. The saddle was a
-      big comfortable Mexican one, and he rested his hands on the horn; for
-      there was no bridle, only a leading rein held by the man mounted on the
-      other pony.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;<i>Adios!</i>&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      It was the leader&rsquo;s voice again, and now once more Dick was on the move,
-      the nimble little pony cantering gently over the turf.
-    </p>
-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
-      <img src="images/0006.jpg" alt="0006 " width="100%" /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h5>
-      <a href="images/0006.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
-    </h5>
-    <p>
-      Hour succeeded hour. The sun had risen, as the blindfolded rider could
-      tell from the warmth of the atmosphere. The canter had long since changed
-      to a walk, and Dick knew that they had been climbing steadily, with many a
-      turn and sometimes up precipitous slopes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At last a strange chilliness came into the air. Dick imagined that he
-      heard a growl, as of some savage animal. Then there came a stop, and he
-      caught some whispered words&mdash;a woman&rsquo;s voice he could have sworn,
-      speaking in some strange tongue. After a few minutes his pony started
-      again.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But they had not gone more than a hundred yards further when his guide
-      called out.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Here we are, sir. I will help you to descend. Zen I take ze bandage away.
-      You see again.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The voice had a quaint foreign accent. For a little time Willoughby
-      remained blind. Then he began to see things, and involuntarily rubbed his
-      eyes in amazement.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      He was in a vast vaulted cavern with no visible entrance revealed by the
-      dim light of several lanterns suspended from the roof. In the far distance
-      a log fire was burning, and silhouetted against its ruddy glow was the
-      figure of the aged Indian squaw, Guadalupe, with a great dog-like creature
-      standing by her side.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guadalupe!&rdquo; exclaimed Dick in profound surprise, turning to his guide.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      This man he now saw was old, with short gray hair and a short gray beard.
-      His face was pale, but there was a pleasant gleam in his eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, Guadalupe,&rdquo; the guide replied. &ldquo;Guadalupe, she guard ze entrance to
-      our cave&mdash;she and ze white wolf. No one can get past ze white wolf
-      unless Guadalupe speaks ze word.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And who are you?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, call me Pierre. I am Mr. Willoughby&rsquo;s servant. Here are fine
-      beefsteaks ready for breakfast. Come.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Pierre!&rdquo; murmured Dick. &ldquo;Pierre Luzon?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Zat is my name. I am Pierre Luzon.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0020" id="link2HCH0020"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XX&mdash;In the Cavern
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">W</span>HEN Dick proceeded
-      to follow Pierre Luzon he found that the ponies had already trotted away
-      through the semidarkness, evidently quite capable on their own account of
-      finding their accustomed stable. Leading the way across the cavern, Pierre
-      entered a corridor at the far end of which bright lights were burning.
-      Soon, Dick, to his great wonderment, found himself in a comfortably,
-      almost luxuriously furnished apartment.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      There were big thick rugs on the floor, and the rock walls were completely
-      hidden by tapestries. The dining table in the centre was set with napery,
-      china, glass, cutlery and silverware that would have done credit to a
-      first-class hotel. Above swung a bronze lamp of antique pattern. Another
-      table was laden with books, newspapers and magazines. In one corner
-      gleamed the snow-white counterpane of a massive bedstead built of oak in
-      Old Mission style. Here and there portable oil stoves were burning,
-      diffusing a genial warmth throughout the grotto.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre watched the guest&rsquo;s look of bewilderment as he gazed around him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You will be very comfortable here,&rdquo; said the Frenchman. &ldquo;I have orders to
-      attend to all your wants.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Orders, from whom?&rdquo; asked Dick abruptly. &ldquo;After breakfast you will know.
-      I have one letter for you in my pocket.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      With characteristic philosophy Dick accepted the situation. The very
-      mention of breakfast gave a keener edge to an already sharply whetted
-      appetite. Pierre departed and presently returned with a superb sirloin
-      steak sizzling on a hot platter. Under his arm was tucked a bottle of
-      wine. As he set down the latter, Dick noted that it was dusty and
-      cobwebby, as if it had emerged from some ancient cellar.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Zis is not ze vintage of California,&rdquo; remarked Pierre, as he drew the
-      cork. &ldquo;It is rare old Burgundy&mdash;all ze way from my beloved France.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;<i>La belle</i> France,&rdquo; murmured Dick. &ldquo;I spent a year there, Pierre,
-      most of the time in Paris.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ah, monsieur knows France and Paris,&rdquo; exclaimed the old man in great
-      delight. &ldquo;Zen you speak French, too?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;<i>Un peu</i>,&rdquo; laughed Dick. &ldquo;<i>Mais je fais beaucoup de fautes, mon
-      ami</i>.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;<i>Non, non, monsieur</i>,&rdquo; cried Pierre, breaking into voluble French.
-      &ldquo;Your accent is perfect&mdash;it is delightful to hear my native language
-      again. We shall be great friends, Mr. Willoughby. Already I am your
-      devoted servant.&rdquo; He bowed deferentially, as he held Dick&rsquo;s chair ready
-      for him to be seated.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You will breakfast with me, Pierre?&rdquo; asked Dick, still in his best
-      French.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no. I wait on monsieur. I shall breakfast in good time.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre was not to be persuaded to take a place at the table, so Dick sat
-      down in solitary state and was served in lordly fashion.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      With the <i>demi-tasse</i> of black coffee at the close of the meal came a
-      box of cigars&mdash;cigars fit for a prince, as Dick knew from the first
-      fragrant whiff.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The table was now cleared and Pierre ready to withdraw. He had taken a
-      letter from his pocket and was holding it in his hand. But Dick, warmed
-      and fed and supremely contented, was watching the ascending rings of
-      tobacco smoke.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Do you know, Pierre,&rdquo; he said between complacent puffs, &ldquo;that I was one
-      of the bunch that helped to get you out of San Quentin?&rdquo; He had lapsed
-      into English.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, yes, I know,&rdquo; replied Pierre, also dropping his French. &ldquo;Ze five men
-      who made up ze purse&mdash;I am very grateful to you all.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then what about the hidden treasure?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ah, I was to show ze hidden treasure. But one great change come about. I
-      made one big mistake.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then the story of all this gold was a frame-up, was it?&rdquo; laughed
-      Willoughby.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; protested Pierre earnestly. &ldquo;Ze cave&mdash;you are here in ze
-      cave, although you do not know ze secret hiding place. Ze treasure, it is
-      here, too. But I can no longer show ze gold, for ze man to whom it all
-      belong he is not dead&mdash;he is alive.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Whom do you mean?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don Manuel de Valencia&mdash;him you call ze White Wolf.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great guns! So he has appeared again. The newspaper stories were all
-      wrong?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Zat is how I made my mistake. But I did not know until I came back to
-      Tehachapi. Ze White Wolf is alive. It is he who has brought you here as
-      his guest. Now you will read zis letter, and zen all things you will
-      comprehend.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre laid the missive on the damask table cloth in front of Dick. The
-      latter fastened his eyes on it in speechless surprise. Before he recovered
-      himself Pierre, lifting the tray of empty dishes, had noiselessly
-      disappeared.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mystery upon mystery,&rdquo; murmured Dick as he broke the seal. The letter was
-      a brief one, and began without any of the usual forms of personal address:
-    </p>
-    <blockquote>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You are in safe and honorable keeping. Have no care. Nor need you worry
-      about your friends&mdash;they will be informed of your safety.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Just as soon as possible the real slayer of Marshall Thurston will be
-      revealed. You will be completely exonerated and can then return to the
-      world, a free man. By this means a certain young lady will be spared from
-      the gossip and the publicity which, although she has been brave enough to
-      say it does not matter, would bring for her annoyance and pain.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;If she is dear to you, as the writer of this letter believes, you will
-      help to shield her from vulgar curiosity by remaining quietly where you
-      are until the proper hour for your deliverance comes. It is only necessary
-      for you to give your word of honor to Pierre Luzon that you will make no
-      attempt to escape or reveal your whereabouts. Your trustfulness will be
-      rewarded&mdash;this is the solemn promise of
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don Manuel de Valencia,
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Your friend.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    </blockquote>
-    <p>
-      Dick read and re-read the strange message. All at once he became conscious
-      that Pierre Luzon was again standing by his chair. Their eyes met.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Does Mr. Willoughby give ze promise required?&rdquo; asked Pierre.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick rose to his feet and extended his hand.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I promise, Pierre. You have my word of honor. The letter says that is
-      enough.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have read ze letter before it was sealed. We all know Mr. Willoughby&rsquo;s
-      word is enough&mdash;it is as good as one gold bond.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;d do anything for Merle Farnsworth,&rdquo; continued Dick, carried away by
-      his fervid emotion. &ldquo;I would die for her, if need be, to save her from one
-      moment&rsquo;s pain.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don Manuel he know that,&rdquo; replied Pierre. Dick paused and his look
-      changed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How the devil does he know I love the girl?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; The Frenchman shrugged his shoulders and smiled. &ldquo;Ah! Don Manuel he
-      know everything. But now, I am under orders not to speak. Over there you
-      will find ze latest newspapers, sir,&rdquo; he went on, pointing to the table
-      laden with literature, &ldquo;and every few days more will be brought for you&mdash;not
-      only ze newspapers of Los Angeles and San Francisco, but also, ze
-      newspapers of New York and London and Paris, all of which monsieur is
-      accustomed to read.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great Scott, you seem to know,&rdquo; exclaimed Dick in a low voice.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre continued placidly:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And you play chess. There is a box of chess&mdash;<i>échecs</i> we call
-      it in France, you will remember. I too play ze game. Don Manuel and I used
-      to spend many hours over ze board. After I have had my breakfast, I,
-      Pierre Luzon, challenge you to one game of chess.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Be it so,&rdquo; laughed Dick. &ldquo;But you must be hungry, man. For heaven&rsquo;s sake
-      go and eat. We&rsquo;ll yarn later on. Meanwhile, I&rsquo;ll have a glance through the
-      newspapers.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick handled the newspapers with renewed surprise&mdash;the very New York
-      papers he was accustomed to receive regularly, also the old familiar. <i>Times
-      Weekly</i> from London and the Paris <i>Figaro</i> to which he had
-      subscribed ever since the old Quartier Latin days! The same with the
-      magazines&mdash;all his favorites were on the table.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, I&rsquo;ll be blowed! Is it the guileless Sing Ling whom Don Manuel has
-      been tapping for information? This certainly looks like home,&rdquo; and again
-      he glanced over the table. He looked at the titles of the books&mdash;several
-      of the latest novels, a volume on socialism, another on the history of
-      architecture.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Seems to know my book tastes, too. I won&rsquo;t be lonesome, that&rsquo;s certain.
-      Well, I can&rsquo;t do better than make a start with the newspapers. I&rsquo;ve fallen
-      quite behind the times.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He stretched himself out on a long rattan chair, and started with a Los
-      Angeles daily. He had read lazily on for nearly an hour, when there came
-      from his lips a little cry of surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Starting up into a sitting posture, Dick again perused the paragraph that
-      had excited his special interest.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      It was an announcement stating that an ideal city was about to be built in
-      the Tehachapi valley, and that a prize of ten thousand dollars was to be
-      awarded to the designer of the best plans for laying out such a town.
-      Reference was made to an advertisement on another page giving the details
-      and the rules of the competition. To this Dick eagerly turned.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The advertisement set forth that the model city was to be located
-      somewhere near the centre of San Antonio Rancho, that the land was
-      traversed by the state highway, by two railroads, by two electric power
-      lines and two oil-carrying pipe lines, also the great Owen&rsquo;s River
-      aqueduct that supplied Los Angeles, some two hundred miles away, with
-      water from the high Sierras. It was further stated that the entire ranch
-      was to be subdivided into small tracts, and that already hundreds of
-      applicants were waiting to make choice of home sites just so soon as the
-      survey work was completed and the land thrown open to selection.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The plans required, and for which the prize of ten thousand dollars was
-      offered, were to show the finest landscape effects, the most impressive
-      and convenient location of public buildings, the most attractive ideas for
-      bringing into being a veritable ideal city provided with all the most
-      modern conveniences and sanitary equipment.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;By gad, I&rsquo;d like to have a shot at that,&rdquo; murmured Willoughby as he lay
-      back in his chair and meditated.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      After a time he picked up the London journal, and the very first thing
-      that met his eye was the identical advertisement on the back of the cover.
-      He rose and began to search through the week&rsquo;s file of the <i>Figaro</i>,
-      and there again he found the announcement of the contest. He was too
-      keenly excited now for more reading. He began to pace the chamber. What a
-      clever head had planned all this world-wide publicity!
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That Los Angeles bunch of fellows are certainly great. They are evidently
-      going into this thing right. Doubtless they are determined to build the
-      ideal&mdash;the model&mdash;city of California. They want the best brains
-      of all lands to help beautify the place. Gee! but I&rsquo;d like to be in this
-      contest game. But perhaps it would be presumption on my part. Yet, who
-      knows the country better than I do? When it comes to landscape effects,
-      I&rsquo;m Johnny-on-the-spot all right. And they&rsquo;re in a hurry&mdash;only sixty
-      days for the drawings. Unusual, such a short time. But I guess they&rsquo;re
-      going to make the dust fly without a week&rsquo;s unnecessary delay. They are
-      certainly live wires&mdash;they began by getting old Ben Thurston on the
-      run.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He was chuckling to himself at the thought when Pierre reappeared.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Pierre, old fellow,&rdquo; cried Dick, &ldquo;would you be able to get me a drawing
-      board, a box of instruments, india ink, water-colors, drawing paper, and
-      so on?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What are you going to do?&rdquo; asked the old man with a smile. &ldquo;Do you think
-      you are again in ze Quartier Latin, Mr. Willoughby?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No. But while I&rsquo;m here I&rsquo;m going back to the old Quartier Latin life,
-      that&rsquo;s a cinch. Can you buy me that stuff?&rdquo; he added, diving into his hip
-      pocket.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But he had forgotten&mdash;he had come out of jail, and his personal
-      possessions had been left behind.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre Luzon, however, had interpreted both the gesture and the thought
-      that had prompted it.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You need no money here, Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;My orders are to get
-      you everything you call for. Write all you need on a piece of paper. I
-      send a trusty messenger, and we have ze drawing paper, ze instruments, ze
-      ink and ze paints here very soon&mdash;yes, very soon.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then, by thunder, I&rsquo;m going to win that ten-thousand-dollar prize.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But she is worth millions of dollars.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What do you mean?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ze young lady&mdash;she very rich young lady, Miss Merle.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick laughed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, that&rsquo;s quite another prize, Pierre,&rdquo; he replied. &ldquo;And if she is so
-      very rich, as you say, why that puts her further out of my reach than
-      ever.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre nodded his head determinedly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;If I was you, Mr. Willoughby, ze prize I would try to win is ze beautiful
-      young lady.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      When Pierre had gone, Dick again lay back in the long chair. But he was
-      day-dreaming and love-dreaming now, wondering whether Merle Farnsworth
-      really cared for him, whether he might dare whisper to her the story of
-      his passionate love.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0021" id="link2HCH0021"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXI&mdash;A Debt of Honor
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">P</span>UBLIC excitement
-      had been running high over the approaching trial of Dick Willoughby, but
-      his delivery from jail by the masked night-riders came as the culminating
-      climax. Mystery and romance were piling up. Despite the strength of the
-      circumstantial evidence, the sudden fate that had overtaken the young heir
-      to San Antonio rancho had been shrouded with uncertainty; no witness had
-      seen the actual doing of the murderous deed. The sensational arrest of
-      Dick Willoughby had been followed by his still more sensational
-      disappearance; for he seemed to have vanished from the face of the earth&mdash;he
-      had been spirited to some place of concealment to which there was not the
-      slightest clue, while also the identity of his rescuers remained a
-      profound enigma.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      All sorts of speculations were rife, and it was small wonder that the name
-      of the famous bandit, Don Manuel, came to be revived. This was just the
-      sort of audacious work the White Wolf would have gloried in&mdash;breaking
-      into a prison, defying the authorities, leaving behind him a trail of
-      mystery and vague terror. But shrewd old-timers pointed out that Don
-      Manuel had never in his whole career helped a gringo&mdash;that his hand
-      had been against every American, and that in his earlier days at all
-      events he had killed ruthlessly, out of sheer lust for vengeance against
-      the race of newcomers who had despoiled him of his ancestral acres. What
-      reason, therefore, could he have had to help Dick Willoughby to liberty?
-      Even if it had been the outlaw&rsquo;s hand that had pulled the trigger against
-      the son of his hated enemy, Ben Thurston, little would he have cared if a
-      score of gringos had come to their end, justly or unjustly, as an
-      aftermath of the tragedy.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Old Ben Thurston had discussed this very question with himself. The
-      slaying of his only son, the clever business deal that had called his own
-      tricky and dishonest bluff and lost him his principality, the sight of his
-      herds being driven away, the approaching eviction from his home&mdash;all
-      these events crowding one upon the other had exasperated him beyond
-      measure and completed the change of the already grouchy, disgruntled man
-      into a veritable wild beast snapping and snarling at everyone. Yet his
-      mind was completely obsessed by the idea that it was Dick Willoughby, and
-      Dick Willoughby alone, who had shot his son, so there was no room in his
-      small and obfuscated brain for any seriously renewed apprehension that his
-      old enemy, the White Wolf, had come to life again.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick&rsquo;s escape from jail almost gave Ben Thurston a fit of apoplexy. It was
-      the sleuth, Leach Sharkey, who alone of those around him ventured to break
-      the news. After his first paroxysm of wrath, Thurston paced the room like
-      a caged animal. He had begun to make a confidant of this man, his constant
-      attendant, the protector with the handy guns in his hip pockets on whom he
-      had come to rely night and day, the one associate who phlegmatically
-      endured his irritable moods and abusive language.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      So, in Leach Sharkey&rsquo;s presence, Thurston, as he walked to and fro, spoke
-      his thoughts aloud.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Damn all pretty faces, anyhow. First and last they have cost me a fine
-      sum. And now it is a pretty face that has cost me my boy&rsquo;s life. It&rsquo;s
-      hell, that&rsquo;s what it is. But I will have my revenge. I&rsquo;ll hang Dick
-      Willoughby with my own hands if necessary&mdash;even if it is the last act
-      of my life I&rsquo;ll have his neck stretched for him.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He was glaring down at the sleuth, and the pause seemed to call for some
-      reply.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, he&rsquo;s given us the slip for the present,&rdquo; Sharkey ventured. Then he
-      caught the gathering fury in the other&rsquo;s eyes, and hurriedly went on: &ldquo;But
-      there is no question in the world we&rsquo;ll run the scoundrel down. I myself
-      will shoot him like the dog he is the moment I lay my two eyes on him.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, don&rsquo;t waste your breath telling me you are going to do it,&rdquo; growled
-      Thurston. &ldquo;Hunt him down. Take all the money you need. Get all the men you
-      can. Search every canyon. Guard every road out of the hill country. And
-      don&rsquo;t be misled by that damn fool talk about the White Wolf of which
-      you&rsquo;ve been telling me. That cursed outlaw is dead&mdash;dead as a
-      herring. I ran the story of his death to earth&mdash;stood on his very
-      grave in the potters&rsquo; field at Seattle. Dick Willoughby&rsquo;s the outlaw now.
-      Get him at any cost. Get him, or, by God, lose your own job, Leach
-      Sharkey. Do you follow me?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I follow you,&rdquo; replied the sleuth, a sardonic smile still further
-      exposing the teeth that were the most prominent feature of his face and at
-      all times gave him a hyena-like appearance. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll get him, make no
-      mistake, Mr. Thurston. Just draw me that check, and I&rsquo;ll have twenty more
-      men out on the range before morning.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      At the store, Dick Willoughby&rsquo;s disappearance was for days the sole topic
-      of conversation. One morning Tom Baker and Buck Ashley were gossiping
-      together.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What beats me,&rdquo; remarked the storekeeper, &ldquo;is that Chester Munson wears
-      such a spry look. He was Dick&rsquo;s closest chum, yet he don&rsquo;t seem to be one
-      bit anxious.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, he&rsquo;s got the word, make no mistake,&rdquo; replied Tom. &ldquo;Although the
-      lieutenant is as close as wax, he knows Dick&rsquo;s all right, for sure. And
-      I&rsquo;m told that up at La Siesta, where Dick has his girl, you know, they&rsquo;re
-      still a-playin&rsquo; the pianner and the fiddle all the time. Mark my words&mdash;there&rsquo;s
-      been some wireless telephone at work. Munson don&rsquo;t worry, his lady friends
-      don&rsquo;t worry, so I begin to think we&rsquo;re a couple of derned old fools to
-      fret ourselves on Dick&rsquo;s account.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s about Pierre Luzon I&rsquo;m frettin&rsquo; most,&rdquo; Buck Ashley rejoined. &ldquo;To
-      think that that damned Frenchman should have done us in the eye, got clean
-      away and robbed us of our share of the buried treasure&mdash;that&rsquo;s what
-      worries me, Tom Baker. And you&rsquo;ll allow now you made a mess of things by
-      not havin&rsquo; the old convict shackled to the bedpost.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A mess of things!&rdquo; cried the sheriff, rising anger in his voice and eyes.
-      &ldquo;You won&rsquo;t keep your mouth shut till I teach you&mdash;&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      But just then there was the clatter of hoofs outside, and Tom stopped in
-      the middle of his sentence. A moment later Munson and Jack Rover entered
-      in a state of visible excitement. Munson carried in his arms a rotund
-      canvas sack tied at the neck. The package was not very big, but clearly of
-      considerable weight.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great Caesar,&rdquo; exclaimed the lieutenant, without pausing to give any
-      greeting. &ldquo;A most surprising thing has happened. When I awoke this morning
-      I found this bag lying on my table. And what do you think it contains?&rdquo; As
-      he asked the question he dumped the sack on the counter with a heavy thud.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;ve got us guessin&rsquo;,&rdquo; drawled Tom.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ten thousand, five hundred dollars in gold!&rdquo; announced Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good Lord!&rdquo; ejaculated the sheriff in great surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson went on:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Five thousand dollars are for the French warder at San Quentin who
-      smuggled Pierre Luzon&rsquo;s letter out of the prison, and the balance is for
-      the syndicate.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What syndicate?&rdquo; gasped Buck, for the moment quite bewildered.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The Hidden Treasure Syndicate, of course,&rdquo; exclaimed Jack Rover. &ldquo;Pierre
-      Luzon has sent each man back the hundred dollars he put up to get him out
-      of the pen, and five thousand dollars extra to divide among us.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck and Tom sprang simultaneously to their feet.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hooroosh!&rdquo; shouted the sheriff. &ldquo;I always knew there was no yellow streak
-      in old Pierre Luzon.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And I always said I liked him, too,&rdquo; observed Buck. &ldquo;But come into the
-      parlor, boys,&rdquo; he went on, with a cautious look around. &ldquo;Let&rsquo;s count the
-      money.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And divvy it up,&rdquo; added Tom eagerly. &ldquo;Gosh &lsquo;lmighty, boys! I&rsquo;ve never yet
-      seen a thousand dollars in gold at one time outside a bank cashier&rsquo;s
-      window. And to think there&rsquo;s that amount cornin&rsquo; to me right now!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;One thousand, one hundred, pal, to be exact,&rdquo; laughed Jack Rover, lifting
-      the package and following the storekeeper into the sanctum beyond the
-      counter.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The gold was in United States twenty-dollar pieces, bearing dates which
-      showed they had been minted more than twenty years ago.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Some of Joaquin Murietta&rsquo;s loot,&rdquo; remarked Jack Rover, when attention had
-      been drawn to this detail.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; observed Tom Baker, holding up the coin he had been examining,
-      &ldquo;Murietta wasn&rsquo;t alive when this &lsquo;ere gold piece came from the mint. This
-      is some of Don Manuel&rsquo;s stuff.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The White Wolf!&rdquo; exclaimed Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, the White Wolf,&rdquo; continued the sheriff. &ldquo;So if the White Wolf ain&rsquo;t
-      dead, as Pierre declared that night&mdash;&rdquo; Tom gazed at the bedroom door
-      as if the spectral figure might reappear&mdash;&ldquo;he&rsquo;s honorin&rsquo; the
-      Frenchie&rsquo;s sight draft, that&rsquo;s sure.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I see,&rdquo; said Munson. &ldquo;He is paying the five thousand dollars old Pierre
-      promised in his letter if he was helped to freedom and five thousand
-      dollars besides.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Precisely,&rdquo; Tom Baker replied. &ldquo;But if the White Wolf is dead, as most
-      folks say, then the Frenchie&rsquo;s got the key to the treasure vault, all
-      right.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So we&rsquo;ve got to get him back here again, boys,&rdquo; murmured Buck, rubbing
-      his hands while his eyes feasted upon the heap of gold. &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t mind
-      boardin&rsquo; Pierre Luzon for a spell, and he can have all the bourbon he
-      wants.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Till he tells us where Guadalupe gets her nuggets,&rdquo; grinned Jack. &ldquo;But
-      you&rsquo;ve forgotten to show &lsquo;em, Munson, the card that came with the coin.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, yes,&rdquo; rejoined Munson, drawing a small piece of pasteboard from his
-      pocket. &ldquo;It is brief enough. Luzon gives his countryman&rsquo;s family address
-      in Marseilles where the first five thousand dollars is to be mailed. Then
-      he writes down our five names, Dick Willoughby&rsquo;s first, and says the five
-      of us are to share equally.&rdquo; He passed the card to Tom Baker for
-      inspection, and went on: &ldquo;Jack and I are going to ride over to
-      Bakersfield, get the French bank draft and put Dick&rsquo;s money in the bank
-      along with our own.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Where&rsquo;s Dick?&rdquo; asked Buck, with a quick uplift of his eyes into Munson&rsquo;s
-      face.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But the latter was not to be betrayed into divulging any information that
-      might be in his possession.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have not the slightest idea,&rdquo; he replied airily. &ldquo;But I feel sure
-      Dick&rsquo;s all right. He is the sort of fellow well able to look after
-      himself. Meanwhile, Jack and I will attend to his financial interests,&rdquo; he
-      added with a laugh, as he began to count the gold.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      In silence the task proceeded, five thousand dollars first being set
-      aside, and then the balance divided into five separate heaps. When all
-      were satisfied as to the correctness of the distribution, Munson swept the
-      gold back into the sack, except for the two little piles allotted to
-      Ashley and Baker. Then he securely tied the package, ready for the ride to
-      Bakersfield.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Buck will lock mine in his safe, boys,&rdquo; exclaimed Tom Baker. &ldquo;Gosh me,
-      but I&rsquo;ll want to look at it two or three times a day.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m drivin&rsquo; over to the bank myself tomorrer,&rdquo; declared Buck. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve
-      got a bit more to add to this pile.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A few handfuls of nuggets, I suppose,&rdquo; laughed Rover.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, I&rsquo;ll allow Guadalupe always pays her grocery bills. But this &lsquo;ere
-      store ain&rsquo;t goin&rsquo; to be a safe deposit vault, not on your demed life, with
-      bandits around again. So you&rsquo;d better arrange to come with me to town
-      tomorrer, Tom.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;ll need me to help you home, perhaps,&rdquo; grinned the sheriff. &ldquo;But, I
-      say, Munson, you ain&rsquo;t told us yet how this sack came to be delivered at
-      your place.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;There&rsquo;s a proper mystery for you!&rdquo; cried Munson. &ldquo;As I said before, I
-      found the bag this morning, lying on my dressing table. Sing Ling was the
-      only one besides myself in the shack, and he never heard a sound all
-      night.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;re still in Dick&rsquo;s old home?&rdquo; asked Buck. &ldquo;Yes, but I leave tomorrow&mdash;have
-      notice to quit, for some surveyor chaps are coming in. I&rsquo;m moving up to
-      Mr. Robles&rsquo; place. He wants me to catalog the books in his library.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And Sing Ling?&rdquo; queried Tom.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He goes, too. You see, Mr. Robles needs a crackerjack cook, now I&rsquo;ll be
-      boarding with him,&rdquo; Munson laughed, gaily. &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t happen to have a
-      porterhouse steak about the place, Buck?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I can heat you up a can of pork and beans.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Nothing doing! Jack and I wouldn&rsquo;t spoil our appetites with such truck as
-      that. We&rsquo;re going to set up a chicken dinner in Bakersfield.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Chicken and champagne,&rdquo; chimed in Jack, as he swung the sack over his
-      shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;re beginning to get big bugs these days,&rdquo; called out the storekeeper
-      as the young men left the room. &ldquo;Guess, Tom,&rdquo; he went on, turning to the
-      sheriff, &ldquo;we could do with a jolt of Kentucky.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Make it a bottle of bourbon,&rdquo; gurgled Tom, &ldquo;to remind us of our absent
-      friend.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dear old Pierre,&rdquo; murmured Buck, as he fumbled in his pocket for the key
-      of the safe, his eyes glued all the time on the two little heaps of gold.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0022" id="link2HCH0022"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXII&mdash;Underqround Wonders
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">D</span>ick Willoughby was
-      in a way happy in his retreat. At first he had been inclined to regret the
-      jail delivery&mdash;it might have been the manlier part to have faced the
-      music and cleared his name before the whole world. But then he reflected
-      on the uncertainties of a trial, the cases of innocent men having suffered
-      because of damning circumstantial evidence piled up against them, the
-      vindictiveness of Ben Thurston and the undoubted power of his money to
-      press the criminal charge by every unscrupulous means. So Dick soon came
-      round to the belief that he might be safer for the time being in the
-      guardianship of the White Wolf than at the mercy of a fallible jury.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Then there was Merle Farnsworth to consider. Yes; to have brought her into
-      a public court, to have allowed her to plead for him by telling the story
-      of Marshall Thurston&rsquo;s loathsome advances&mdash;that was a thing that
-      could never have been tolerated. The leader of the jail-breaking gang had
-      been right; Dick owed it to Merle to save her from such a cruel ordeal.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Finally Dick&rsquo;s contentment over his change of quarters was completed when
-      Pierre Luzon appeared with a superb equipment of drawing instruments and
-      materials. There was no time to worry now over surmises as to the wisdom
-      of this course or the other course. Work lay to his hand&mdash;work of the
-      most absorbing and delightful kind; and with all the ambitious enthusiasm
-      of his temperament he tackled it whole-heartedly there and then. Hour
-      after hour, day after day, Pierre watched in contemplative silence the
-      methodical advancement of the task to which the young architect had
-      applied himself.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But there were frequent intervals for conversation, sometimes in French,
-      sometimes in English, as the mood prompted. Occasionally Pierre drifted
-      into semi-confidential reminiscences, and Willoughby soon came to know in
-      close detail the story of Don Manuel&rsquo;s life&mdash;the tragedy of his
-      sister Rosetta&rsquo;s death, the vow of vengeance against Ben Thurston, the
-      early bandit days when the White Wolf counted every gringo in the land his
-      natural enemy, the often hairbreadth escapes of the outlaw, his sublime
-      courage and nerve in the direst emergencies.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don Manuel was one great man,&rdquo; remarked Pierre at the close of one of
-      these confidences&mdash;the phrase was a favorite one with the old
-      Frenchman. &ldquo;Many and many a time he could have shot his enemy from a
-      distance and got away. But Don Manuel had vowed zat he would kill him hand
-      to hand&mdash;zat ze villain must die with a last malediction in his ear,
-      and knowing zat it was he, ze White Wolf, who in ze end had revenged his
-      sister&rsquo;s shame.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He felt, too, didn&rsquo;t he, that his father had been wronged in being driven
-      from San Antonio Rancho?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Sure&mdash;zat was another great wrong&mdash;zat was why Don Manuel was
-      so bitter against all ze Americans. But he made zem pay for ze land many
-      and many times over.&rdquo; Then Pierre, as was now his custom in Dick&rsquo;s
-      presence when speaking at any length, lapsed into French as he continued:
-      &ldquo;But the White Wolf was a man of high honor. He never used any of the
-      proceeds of his robberies for himself. True, he spent the money to pay his
-      band, to pay the numerous scouts and spies whose services he secretly
-      retained, to plan and accomplish further hold-ups, to defy and outwit the
-      authorities. But on his own needs&mdash;never&mdash;not one dollar!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre went on to explain that after Ben Thurston had fled from California
-      and kept away in hiding, Don Manuel had visited Spain, to claim the family
-      estates in Valencia to which his father&rsquo;s death had left him the sole
-      heir. These he had sold for many millions of dollars, and most of that
-      money he kept in banks in London and Paris. So he was a very rich man, and
-      had no need to rob anyone except to gratify his vengeance. Even the
-      hoarded gold of Joaquin Murietta he had never touched. It remained intact
-      today in the treasure vault of the cave, boxes and sacks of gold and
-      jewels.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Won&rsquo;t I be allowed to see this wonderful treasure?&rdquo; asked Dick, half
-      jesting.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Perhaps, some day, if the White Wolf chooses to show you. But it is not
-      for me to do that&mdash;I swore an oath of secrecy when the White Wolf
-      trusted me&mdash;me and Felix Vasquez, who was also his confidant. But
-      Vasquez was killed at Tulare Lake. So now only we two know the secret, and
-      until the White Wolf himself dies my lips are sealed by the solemn oath I
-      swore to the Virgin Mary.&rdquo; The old man crossed himself devoutly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then where does the White Wolf live now?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ah, that is another secret. Again I would break my oath if I spoke one
-      word.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And Guadalupe&mdash;does she know these things?&rdquo; asked Dick in English.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guadalupe? Oh, no,&rdquo; responded Pierre, politely adopting the change of
-      language, &ldquo;she is just one servant, our cook&mdash;one very excellent
-      cook, as monsieur knows&mdash;and ze guardian of ze cave. For ze real
-      white wolf guards Guadalupe&mdash;ze big animal is just like one tame dog
-      to ze old squaw, but with his fierce jaws he would kill anyone who dared
-      to approach her or come near ze hidden entrance to zis cavern. No man can
-      ever find zat while ze white wolf is alive. In ze old days he killed
-      several men when zey dared to follow Guadalupe.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then the white wolf must be very old?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;As old as Guadalupe&mdash;as old as the Tehachapi mountains,&rdquo; exclaimed
-      Pierre, again crossing himself and thereby revealing the superstitious
-      dread in which he held the savage animal.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But you can pass the white wolf, can&rsquo;t you?&rsquo; asked Dick.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Never&mdash;except when Guadalupe give permission. Then ze wolf lies down
-      and I can come out of ze cave or enter. Ah! ze white wolf is one terrible
-      beast. But he never shows his teeth to Don Manuel. Only Don Manuel can
-      pass when Guadalupe is not there.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then where is Guadalupe&rsquo;s riffle of gold&mdash;where is the lake of oil
-      about which you told Tom Baker?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Come, I will show you zese,&rdquo; replied Pierre. As he rose he picked up the
-      lantern he usually carried.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick jumped to his feet with alacrity and followed his guide.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      They crossed the main cavern, then entered another side gallery. This had
-      many windings and from it ran several diverging rock corridors. But Pierre
-      led the way unfalteringly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Fully half a mile must have been traversed when at last the Frenchman
-      halted and swung his lantern aloft.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Zere!&rdquo; was all he said.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick followed the flash of the lantern, and there before him was a dark
-      pool stretching away indefinitely into the blackness beyond. He bent down
-      and scooped up a little of the fluid in his palm. It was a brown oil, as
-      thin as water, and therefore capable of use without any refining process.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great Scott, this is wonderful!&rdquo; exclaimed Dick in profound amazement.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Very wonderful,&rdquo; concurred Pierre. &ldquo;In zis cavern are oil and water, also
-      gold&mdash;Guadalupe&rsquo;s gold. Ze gold is close to here. Come.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre turned and again led the way through dark and winding corridors. At
-      a little distance Dick became conscious of the purling of a running
-      stream. Pierre stopped once more, but this time held the lantern close to
-      the ground.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Here Guadalupe come to wash out ze nuggets of gold, and since I have been
-      in prison she buy with zem, so Mr. Baker say to me, groceries at ze store.
-      Don Manuel, when I tell him, he very angry&mdash;she never do zat again.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Poor old Buck Ashley!&rdquo; laughed Dick. &ldquo;He lost you, Pierre, and now he&rsquo;ll
-      be losing his best paying customer, too.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      While speaking, he knelt and dipped his hands into the stream, bringing up
-      some gravel into the lantern rays. But Pierre shook his head.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You no find ze gold. Guadalupe wash many hours to get, perhaps, just one
-      nugget. But there is heaps and heaps, if ze miners came with spades and
-      cradles.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great guns, there must be the reef, too, from which the nuggets have
-      come!&rdquo; exclaimed Dick, rising erect and dropping the handful of pebbles.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Now, we must go back,&rdquo; said Pierre, &ldquo;for zis evening you are to be
-      allowed to come for a ride with me down ze mountains.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t say?&rdquo; Dick cried, surprised and delighted.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes; Don manuel he send word today that he give permission. But you must
-      wear ze bandage round your eyes, and you must promise to return when I
-      give ze word.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t for one moment think, old fellow, that I would leave my drawings.
-      But where are we going tonight?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;To La Siesta,&rdquo; replied Pierre.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hurrah!&rdquo; shouted Dick. &ldquo;Hurry up, Pierre! I&rsquo;m mighty glad you got me
-      those ties and things from Los Angeles. You say you can give me a
-      hair-cut?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ze old-time bandit learned to trim ze hair of his friends as well as ze
-      pocket-books of his enemies,&rdquo; was the laughing answer.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0023" id="link2HCH0023"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXIII&mdash;The Unexpected Visitor
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">M</span>OST of the cattle
-      had been driven off the land. The vaqueros had dispersed to the four
-      points of the compass. Chester Munson had vacated his room in Dick
-      Willoughby&rsquo;s old home, and had taken up his residence and library duties
-      at Mr. Robles&rsquo; mansion on the hill. Sing Ling had folded his tent like the
-      Arab and silently stolen away in the same direction. A small army of
-      surveyors had appeared on the scene and were quartered in the rancho
-      buildings.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The only one of the old-timers who still lingered on was Ben Thurston,
-      more gloomy and morose than ever, seldom stirring out of doors now, but
-      conducting all his business by telephone or through the agency of the
-      sleuth, Leach Sharkey, his only companion.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Jack Rover had pitched his camp temporarily at the store. Buck Ashley had
-      assigned him Pierre&rsquo;s cot, but the cowboy had fixed it under a
-      wide-spreading sycamore, preferring to sleep in the open rather than share
-      the grocery-perfumed atmosphere of the store building.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Tom Baker was around most of the time. The three men clung together with a
-      vague sense that they had a common interest in the vast treasure which had
-      so far eluded them, but which might any day come again within reach of
-      their eager claws. It afforded an endless theme of conversation, varied by
-      talk about the passing of the rancho and all the train of changes which
-      were bound to follow the close settlement of the valley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      One morning Jack Rover found Buck at the door of the store, with a pair of
-      antiquated-looking field glasses at his eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Where did you get the goggles, Buck?&rdquo; asked Jack.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I rummaged &lsquo;em out of a trunk&mdash;had almost forgot I had the
-      blamed things. But we used to keep a sharp lookout in the old bandit days&mdash;got
-      kinda ready for any suspicious lookin&rsquo; riders on the road.&rdquo; He had spoken
-      while still peering through the binoculars, but now he turned to Jack and
-      proffered him the glasses. &ldquo;I do wonder what &lsquo;n hell we&rsquo;re all cornin&rsquo; to
-      anyway. This here ranch that we&rsquo;ve bragged up as bein&rsquo; the biggest in all
-      California! Ugh!&rdquo; The grunt was one of unspeakable disgust. &ldquo;Take a look
-      for yourself.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Jack turned the glasses in the direction Buck had been gazing, and began
-      to adjust the focus.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What&rsquo;s the matter now?&rdquo; he asked.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Matter &lsquo;nough,&rdquo; growled the storekeeper. &ldquo;San Antonio Rancho is goin&rsquo; to
-      the dogs. Do you see them specks away out yonder in the valley? That&rsquo;s
-      another band of surveyors. One feller&rsquo;s peekin&rsquo; through a spy-glass set on
-      a tripod; another feller goes ahead and puts up tall stakes with big
-      figgers on &lsquo;em, and the other fellers are chainin&rsquo; off the distances. This
-      &lsquo;ere ranch &lsquo;ll surely look like a checker-board blamed soon.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Progress,&rdquo; said Jack, laconically.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Progress, hell!&rdquo; snapped Ashley. &ldquo;These new fellers that bought the ranch
-      have sure &lsquo;nuff driv&rsquo; off all the cattle and now they&rsquo;re dividin&rsquo; up the
-      land. I bet they&rsquo;ll take the postoffice away from me&mdash;not that it
-      pays much, for the Lord knows it don&rsquo;t&mdash;but it brings customers to my
-      store.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, Buck,&rdquo; said the cowboy, consolingly, &ldquo;there are lots worse things
-      than moving a postoffice. What&rsquo;s to prevent your setting up the finest
-      grocery store in the new model city the advertisements speak about?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That would suit me fine, wouldn&rsquo;t it?&rdquo; cried the old storekeeper, with
-      scathing contempt. &ldquo;Goin&rsquo; around in a biled shirt, and handin&rsquo; out pencils
-      and chewin&rsquo; gum to the little school gals that&rsquo;ll be swarmin&rsquo; all over the
-      place. Not on your life, Jack! I&rsquo;ll be losin&rsquo; both my postoffice and my
-      store in these new-fangled times.&rdquo; He paused a moment, then his tone
-      changed to one of aggressiveness. &ldquo;However, they ain&rsquo;t built their
-      doggoned new town yet, and it&rsquo;s my belief all this boom talk is just so
-      much hot air.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;In any case you won&rsquo;t need to worry, Buck, after we get on the tracks of
-      Pierre Luzon again. I intend to find the old squaw&rsquo;s sand-bar, or my name
-      isn&rsquo;t Jack Rover.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And I betche I&rsquo;m a-goin&rsquo; to find Joaquin Murietta&rsquo;s cache,&rdquo; concurred the
-      old man with equal determination.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Just then Tom Baker slouched out of the store, where he had overheard the
-      conversation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, things are a-goin&rsquo; to turn out all right in the end, boys, don&rsquo;t fret
-      over that. And there&rsquo;s one thing gol-dern certain, there&rsquo;ll be some great
-      things doin&rsquo; in this &lsquo;ere valley once they get started on buildin&rsquo; the
-      town. The new place will just spring up like Oklahomy City, or Liberal,
-      Kansas, or some of them big towns that had twenty thousand people livin&rsquo;
-      in &lsquo;em inside o&rsquo; thirty days from the time they were surveyed and laid
-      out.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That seems quite impossible,&rdquo; commented Jack.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not impossible by a derned sight. My brother was at Liberal, Kansas, down
-      there on the Rock Island, near No Man&rsquo;s Land, you know. The new town had
-      been talked of and talked of for mebbe three or four months, just as this
-      new town is bein&rsquo; talked about today. Then finally the mornin&rsquo; came when
-      the new town of Liberal was to be opened up. There was to be a regular
-      town openin&rsquo;, so to speak, and a sale of lots. Why, great guns, when the
-      management of that town company rode into the station, on the early train,
-      they found more&rsquo;n ten thousand people right there campin&rsquo; in covered
-      wagons, tents and all that sorta business, just awaitin&rsquo; for the
-      auctioneerin&rsquo; to start.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Tom paused to take a fresh chew of tobacco and then rambled on:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I tell you, boys, that within thirty days there was twenty thousand
-      people livin&rsquo; in that &lsquo;ere town. Two banks were established, and one of
-      them had one hundred and eighty-five thousand dollars in deposits, too.
-      Oh, there&rsquo;s lots of people who remember the rush to Liberal, and the
-      boomin&rsquo; of Oklahomy City also. And history&rsquo;s fixin&rsquo; to repeat itself right
-      here on this &lsquo;ere ranch. Things will be sizzlin&rsquo; when the town site is
-      finally located and the rush starts pourin&rsquo; in from Portland, Oregon, on
-      the north, to San Diego on the south, with a few thousands from Texas and
-      other states this side o&rsquo; the Rocky Mountains. They&rsquo;ll sure be great
-      doin&rsquo;s when the Los Angeles syndicate announce they&rsquo;ve awarded to some
-      feller that ten-thousand-dollar prize for the best plans for their ideal
-      city, as they keep on callin&rsquo; it.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Munson and I were speaking about the contest and the prize,&rdquo; remarked
-      Jack, &ldquo;and were saying that if Dick Willoughby were only here, he&rsquo;d about
-      win, hands down. You know he was an architect once, before he came West.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dick Willoughby,&rdquo; snorted Ashley, &ldquo;How can he compete when he don&rsquo;t know
-      anything about the blamed business? He&rsquo;s hid away, right enough.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Munson knows a thing or two,&rdquo; remarked Tom Baker. &ldquo;If he&rsquo;d only apeak, he
-      could tell us where Dick is. That&rsquo;s my opinion.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And there once again you&rsquo;re dead wrong,&rdquo; retorted Jack, warmly. &ldquo;If
-      Munson only knew where Dick is hiding, he would have got that very prize
-      competition advertisement into his hands long before now. He&rsquo;s sore
-      because he can&rsquo;t send Dick the word. Where is Dick Willoughby? By gad,
-      it&rsquo;s a mystery.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I guess you&rsquo;re right,&rdquo; said the sheriff. &ldquo;That sort o&rsquo; exonerates Munson
-      from keepin&rsquo; things from his partners. I think I owe it to Chester Munson
-      to drink his health&mdash;just for ever doubtin&rsquo; him. What shall it be,
-      boys?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      And the open-air meeting adjourned.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      It was the very evening of the day on which this conversation had been
-      held in Buck Ashley&rsquo;s store that Dick Willoughby rode forth from the
-      cavern blindfolded and under the guidance of Pierre Luzon. For the first
-      hour progress was slow&mdash;round many turnings, down steep declivities,
-      with just here and there a few miles of easier trail. But then there had
-      been a swift canter for another hour over grass land, and now at last the
-      riders were upon a well-made road. Dick divined that this must be the
-      highway leading to La Siesta, but from what point of the compass they had
-      come he had not the remotest conception.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Very soon Pierre Luzon, still riding ahead with the leading rein, came to
-      a halt.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Here we are. Dismount, please,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;You are free to remove ze
-      bandage.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick looked; they were right below the knoll on which the Darlington home
-      stood. Lights were gleaming from the windows. Dick could even hear the
-      faint tinkle of the piano.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I hide ze ponies here in zis little grove of trees,&rdquo; Pierre continued,
-      pointing to a coppice not fifty yards from the main road. &ldquo;In two hours&rsquo;
-      time, at eleven o&rsquo;clock&rdquo;&mdash;Pierre looked at his watch in the bright
-      moonlight&mdash;&ldquo;monsieur will return. I have your word?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My word as a gentleman, Pierre,&rdquo; exclaimed Dick, extending his hand. &ldquo;So
-      long then, old fellow. I&rsquo;ve got to make the best use of my time.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The piano playing stopped abruptly when Willoughby, unannounced, appeared
-      at the door of the music room.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dick!&rdquo; exclaimed Merle delightedly, leaving the instrument and rushing
-      toward him. If they had been alone Dick felt that right then she would
-      have jumped into his arms. But at the distance of a few paces she halted
-      and clasped her hands.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How ever did you get here, Mr. Willoughby?&rdquo; she asked intensely.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I rode here,&rdquo; he answered, as they shook hands. &ldquo;But it is only a brief
-      visit. Hallo, Miss Grace! I&rsquo;m delighted to see you again. And you, Ches,
-      old sport&mdash;why this is great luck to find you here! Mrs. Darlington,
-      I&rsquo;m mighty glad to see you all once more.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The whole bevy were crowding around him, shaking hands and expressing
-      their joyful surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We knew you were safe, that was all,&rdquo; explained Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So you were having just the same jolly good times,&rdquo; laughed Dick,
-      glancing at the piano. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m simply dying for some music.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But wait a minute,&rdquo; exclaimed Munson, drawing a fat wad of newspaper
-      cuttings from his pocket. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve got to tell you about a competition you
-      must get into&mdash;new plans for an ideal city here&mdash;&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;In the heart of the old rancho,&rdquo; smiled Dick, as he completed the
-      sentence. While he spoke, he placed his arm affectionately across his
-      chum&rsquo;s shoulders. &ldquo;I know all about it, old man. I&rsquo;m working hard on my
-      plans&mdash;they are already more than half done.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Bravo!&rdquo; shouted Munson. &ldquo;That&rsquo;s great news.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But here, too, is Mr. Robles,&rdquo; exclaimed Dick, breaking from the group
-      and stepping across the room. &ldquo;Excuse me, senor, but I did not notice you
-      were here till this moment.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No excuse needed, my friend. You were better engaged&rdquo;&mdash;this with a
-      humorous side-glance at the young ladies. &ldquo;But I am glad to see you
-      looking so well.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Where have you been, Mr. Willoughby?&rdquo; asked Grace.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That I cannot tell you,&rdquo; replied Dick gravely. &ldquo;I have pledged my solemn
-      word. I must leave you at eleven o&rsquo;clock, returning whence I came. And
-      meanwhile nobody must ask me a single question about my place of hiding.
-      There now&mdash;that&rsquo;s all. What shall it be first, Miss Merle, a piano
-      solo or a duet with the violin?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Supper, I should say,&rdquo; exclaimed Mrs. Darlington, as she left the room.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0024" id="link2HCH0024"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXIV&mdash;In a Tight Corner
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">D</span>ICK&rsquo;S after-dark
-      visit to La Siesta was only the first of several that followed at
-      intervals of a few days. He came and departed mysteriously, and during his
-      brief stay every precaution was taken that no one except his few trusted
-      friends should know of his presence. But by some means or other a whisper
-      had reached the ear of the sleuth, Leach Sharkey, that the fugitive had
-      been seen at the home of Mrs. Darlington.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      When the news was imparted to Ben Thurston, the old man quivered from
-      excitement.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;At La Siesta, do you tell me? Let us ride over there at once, and search
-      the place from basement to attic.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; replied Sharkey. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve got my scouts out. Don&rsquo;t you worry. We
-      must wait till the night bird comes back. Then we&rsquo;ll trap him like a fat
-      quail.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;All right. Have my automobile ready, and a bunch of well-armed fellows
-      right here, so that we can make a rush over at a moment&rsquo;s notice. By God,
-      I&rsquo;ve been disappointed in everything else&mdash;lost my son, lost my
-      ranch, lost my home. But I&rsquo;m not going to lose that man. I&rsquo;m going to get
-      him, even if we shoot him down on sight as an outlawed fugitive from
-      justice with a price on his head.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll get him,&rdquo; answered Sharkey, with a grim smile. &ldquo;You may count him a
-      dead bird. I guessed he wouldn&rsquo;t keep away from his girl very long.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;His girl! Curse her&mdash;it was she who lured my son to his death. But
-      I&rsquo;ll be avenged. If she has been harboring an outlaw, she, too, has broken
-      the law and shall go to jail.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, she no doubt thinks him innocent,&rdquo; suggested the sleuth.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Innocent! All women are alike&mdash;treacherous devils at heart. I would
-      give them the vote&mdash;yes, but the rope at the same time,&rdquo; he went on,
-      growling in savage incoherence.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And Sharkey, knowing that discussion or contradiction only added fresh
-      fuel to his vile temper, left him alone.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At last, a few nights later, a rider dashed up to Ben Thurston&rsquo;s house
-      with the news that Dick Willoughby had been seen entering La Siesta, and
-      that, following Sharkey&rsquo;s instructions, every avenue of escape was now
-      guarded.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hurry, hurry! I&rsquo;ve got to be in at the death,&rdquo; fairly screamed the old
-      man.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Five minutes later the big seven-passenger automobile, carrying three or
-      four armed men besides its owner and his personal guard, Leach Sharkey,
-      was devouring the twenty miles of road that lay between the two ranch
-      homes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      That evening the four young people were quietly chatting in the cosy
-      corner on the interior verandah&mdash;the comfortable little nook fixed up
-      with rugs and tapestries and oriental divans. It was summer now, and after
-      a sultry day the night air was sweet and balmy. Willoughby was smoking a
-      cigar in languid contentment with his surroundings, when all at once he
-      sprang to his feet.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Tia Teresa had rushed in, frantic with excitement.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A great big automobile is coming along the road,&rdquo; she cried, &ldquo;and there
-      are men watching outside the portico. Come with me,&rdquo; she went on,
-      addressing Dick. &ldquo;I know where your horses are hid. I can take you by a
-      secret path through the oleanders.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick vaguely wondered why the duenna should know anything about his mode
-      of coming. But there was no time to question, for just then there came the
-      sound of voices outside.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Mrs. Darlington, pale and agitated, emerged from the drawing room.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What has happened?&rdquo; she asked breathlessly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I guess I&rsquo;m trapped,&rdquo; replied Dick quietly. &ldquo;No doubt it&rsquo;s old Thurston.
-      There will be shooting if I resist. So there is nothing for it but to
-      surrender.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; exclaimed Merle. &ldquo;I dread that vindictive man. He must never get
-      you in his power again. We must gain time to smuggle you out of the house.
-      I have it. Tia Teresa&mdash;give me your mantilla and your cloak. Quick,
-      quick!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      A first loud knocking had come on the door at the head of the portico
-      steps. The duenna in a moment had divested herself of her loose black robe
-      and heavy lace veil.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Get something else to wear and meet us at the oleanders,&rdquo; continued
-      Merle, taking the garments from Tia Teresa. &ldquo;Put these on, Dick, and sit
-      right there in that corner. Mr. Munson, turn off two or three of the
-      lights. Mother, dear, control yourself. Take this book and be reading.
-      Now, that will do. They will be here in a moment.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      A second knock had been heard, and now they knew that the door was being
-      opened without further ceremony, for at placid La Siesta there were no
-      bolts or bars against unwelcome visitors.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      In that brief minute a wonderful transformation scene had taken place in
-      the cosy corner. Tia Teresa had disappeared. Munson was stretched on a
-      sofa, puffing his cigar. Merle and Grace had been playing patience during
-      the afternoon and had left the cards in scattered confusion. Mrs.
-      Darlington, beneath the single incandescent aglow, was quietly reading.
-      From the darksome corner the pretended duenna surveyed this peaceful scene
-      of domesticity.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      It was Ben Thurston himself who led the way for his swarm of myrmidons.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      He began without formality; his tone was coarse and rude.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We want the outlaw, Dick Willoughby. We know he is here. So make no fuss.
-      Deliver him over.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Mrs. Darlington had risen to her feet, and Munson, too, had sprung erect.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What do you mean?&rdquo; asked the lady with quiet dignity.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You know darned well what I mean.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson stepped forward, but he played the game best by keeping himself
-      under perfect control.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You will speak civilly, Mr. Thurston, or leave this house. What is
-      wanted?&rdquo; he added, turning to Leach Sharkey.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We want Dick Willoughby, of course,&rdquo; the sleuth replied, politely enough.
-      &ldquo;We have reason to believe he is here.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, you can see for yourself whether he is here or not,&rdquo; said Munson,
-      glancing around. &ldquo;But if you wish to look through the house, I don&rsquo;t
-      suppose Mrs. Darlington will refuse you permission.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The lady bowed her acquiescence.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;With your consent, Mrs. Darlington,&rdquo; Munson went on, &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll show these
-      gentlemen round and save you the annoyance. Come along then.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Ben Thurston had been fairly silenced by the army man&rsquo;s suave courtesy. He
-      was glowering at him, dully conscious of having been suppressed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson turned from the sleuth.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Perhaps Mr. Thurston would prefer to remain with the ladies?&rdquo; he asked,
-      with a touch of smiling irony.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t leave my man Sharkey,&rdquo; replied Thurston gruffly. &ldquo;Sharkey, keep
-      close watch on me. We&rsquo;ll search the place, but you stay near me all the
-      time.&rdquo; Once again there was the old hunted look in his eyes as he glanced
-      apprehensively into the courtyard.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then follow me,&rdquo; said Munson quietly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You have left a guard at the door of course?&rdquo; asked Thurston of Sharkey.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, you just allow me to know my business,&rdquo; replied the detective
-      sharply. He bowed to Mrs. Darlington and her daughters. &ldquo;I am really sorry
-      to disturb you, ladies.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then get the business over as soon as possible,&rdquo; said Munson. &ldquo;Come
-      along.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The moment the coast was clear, Merle jumped up.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Quick! Mr. Willoughby. Follow me downstairs. I&rsquo;ll take you through the
-      kitchen to the rose gardens.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      It was a strange looking duenna that stalked after Merle, with a robe
-      reaching only to the knees. But at the head of the kitchen stairway Dick
-      discarded the now useless garments, flinging them across the balustrade.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We must trust to our good luck now, Merle,&rdquo; he said.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Never fear. It won&rsquo;t desert us. Hurry on.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      At the clump of oleanders they found Tia Teresa, provided with another
-      shawl. Not a moment was to be wasted in words. Merle just pressed Dick&rsquo;s
-      hand by way of farewell. As he hastened away down the dark path, she, too,
-      sped from the spot.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Perhaps fifteen minutes later Ben Thurston, going the round of the house,
-      came to the head of the kitchen stairs. He saw the black cloak and
-      mantilla on the balustrade.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;By God!&rdquo; he cried with swift inspiration of what had happened. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ve
-      been properly fooled! Where is that old hag of a duenna?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Gathering the vestments in his hands he rushed through the house to the
-      verandah. Merle was quietly seated with her mother and Grace. But there
-      was no sign now of Tia Teresa.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey had followed close on his employer&rsquo;s heels. Munson came a few
-      paces behind.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Ben Thurston glared for a moment at the vacant place where the black-robed
-      figure had been seated. Then he turned round and, addressing Mrs.
-      Darlington, fairly shouted:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Where is Dick Willoughby? It was he who was wearing these damned
-      clothes.&rdquo; And he flung the garments on the rug before her.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No swearing, please,&rdquo; said Munson, tapping him on the shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;To hell! Who wouldn&rsquo;t swear? Where is the man I&rsquo;m after?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;An innocent man,&rdquo; exclaimed Merle, rising to her feet and proudly folding
-      her arms.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Looks like it&mdash;breaking jail and hiding in the hills,&rdquo; sneered
-      Thurston. &ldquo;He is nothing but a murderer and an outlaw. And I&rsquo;m going to
-      get him, dead or alive.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then catch him if you can,&rdquo; cried Merle, pointing toward the door that
-      opened on the portico.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Under the girl&rsquo;s fearless gaze Ben Thurston wilted. Baffled, humiliated,
-      speechless in his impotent rage, he allowed the sleuth to take him by the
-      arm and hustle him from the scene.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0025" id="link2HCH0025"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXV&mdash;Love and Revenge
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">B</span>EYOND the
-      oleanders a tall thick hedge of cypress favored the flight of the
-      fugitive. At the end of the gardens Tia Teresa took a little path that
-      dipped into the river bed, and when they ascended again out of the hollow,
-      Dick found himself quite close to the grove where Pierre was in hiding
-      with the ponies.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      By this time the young fellow was angry with himself for having fled so
-      precipitately. He was full of solicitude for Merle. Why had not he
-      remained to defend her from the brutality of that ruffian, Ben Thurston?
-      This was the question that was now making him both ashamed and anxious.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hush!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The caution came from Pierre, and showed that the Frenchman was alive to
-      what had happened.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I saw ze automobile rush by,&rdquo; he whispered. &ldquo;We will ride across country,
-      so zat it cannot follow us.&rdquo; He pointed in the direction he would go.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not yet,&rdquo; replied Dick, determinedly. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m off back to the house to see
-      that they are all safe there.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no, Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo; protested the duenna earnestly. &ldquo;You heard what
-      Miss Merle said&mdash;she is afraid of that raging old man. Besides I
-      know. He has vowed that he and his hired gunmen will shoot you on sight.
-      For my little girl&rsquo;s sake you must not go back,&rdquo; she implored.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Besides your word of honor is pledged to me,&rdquo; added Luzon. &ldquo;You must
-      return wiz me. I have your parole.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Parole be hanged,&rdquo; muttered Dick between his teeth.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The old Frenchman laid a kindly hand on the young man&rsquo;s shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no. Monsieur is a man of honor. And honor comes before love&mdash;always.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;If you love her,&rdquo; insisted Tia Teresa, &ldquo;you will save yourself tonight.
-      We will look after her. You need not worry on her account.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick for the moment was silenced, but unconvinced.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, at all events we&rsquo;ll wait a bit. I don&rsquo;t leave this spot till I&rsquo;m
-      sure that Ben Thurston himself has cleared.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;All right,&rdquo; assented Pierre. &ldquo;Stay where you are, Tia Teresa. You must
-      not be seen. Zey may be searching in ze gardens.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Even as he spoke there was the flash of a lantern among the rose bushes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      In tense silence they waited and watched. The leaden-winged minutes stole
-      on. For a time lights flitted about, then vanished. At last came the
-      &ldquo;honk-honk&rdquo; of the automobile, and a minute later the great machine with
-      its flaring headlights swept down the roadway. They could just see that it
-      was crowded with men. Then in a few seconds it had disappeared around the
-      bend.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Now we go,&rdquo; said Pierre.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Just a minute longer, please,&rdquo; replied Dick in a firm tone. &ldquo;Tia Teresa,
-      you slip back to the house. I will stay here till you bring me word from
-      Merle that she is safe and that all is well.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I will soon return,&rdquo; said the duenna as she hurried away on her mission.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Again an interval of high-tensioned waiting. Neither Dick nor Pierre spoke
-      a word. At last there came a rustle of the bushes from the direction of
-      the river bed, and a moment later Tia Teresa was again by their side.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo; she said, breathless from the speed she had made, &ldquo;Miss
-      Merle begs you to make good your escape. She is well, and happy because
-      you are safe. She sends this rose and&rdquo;&mdash;the old lady hesitated a
-      moment&mdash;&ldquo;her love.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;She said that?&rdquo; murmured Dick, tremblingly, as he took the white blossom
-      and breathed its fragrance.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, does not the flower speak her love?&rdquo; replied the duenna. &ldquo;Now go,
-      go.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Come,&rdquo; said Pierre, as he raised himself into the saddle. &ldquo;We shall fix
-      the blindfold later on.&rdquo; Dick furtively kissed the rose before he placed
-      it in the breast pocket of his coat. Then he mounted, and, bringing his
-      pony alongside of Pierre&rsquo;s, started off at a canter across the starlit
-      plain.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Ben Thurston did not feel inclined to sleep that night. He paced his
-      sitting room like an angry bear, and kept Leach Sharkey out of bed to
-      listen to his growls and threatenings.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;By God, I&rsquo;ll have that girl shoved into jail. Harboring an outlaw! It&rsquo;s a
-      criminal offence.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You can&rsquo;t do it,&rdquo; objected the sleuth.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Can&rsquo;t do it?&rdquo; shouted Thurston, halting and glowering down upon the man
-      who had dared to contradict him. &ldquo;You&rsquo;ll see damned quick if I can&rsquo;t.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not one of us could swear that Willoughby was there. Neither you nor I
-      could. We never saw him.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He wore that disguise,&rdquo; thundered Thurston. &ldquo;So you think. But thinking
-      ain&rsquo;t proof&mdash;not by a long chalk.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Thurston was now almost speechless from rage. Half articulate words of
-      blasphemy were upon his stuttering lips. But Sharkey went coolly on.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Besides the sympathy of everyone would be with the girl. You can&rsquo;t
-      succeed that way. You yourself would be covered with ridicule.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      At last the torrent of curses broke forth. &ldquo;Damn you, Leach Sharkey!
-      That&rsquo;s what I pay you for, is it? To let that scoundrel slip through our
-      very fingers? And you had the nerve to ask me for another big check this
-      evening. It&rsquo;s all a confounded plot. You&rsquo;re bleeding me. Leach is your
-      name, and leech is your nature.&rdquo; Leach Sharkey rose to his feet. His white
-      teeth gleamed as his short upper lip curled in a contemptuous smile. He
-      raised a threatening finger. It was his turn now to give free vent to
-      profanity.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Stop right there, you doggoned old fool. I bleed you, do I? Well, take my
-      resignation. All your pay ain&rsquo;t worth another five minutes of your
-      infernal temper. No man ever dared to browbeat me and insult me as you
-      have done. And now you may go to hell&mdash;where you belong.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The sleuth turned on his heel, and strode to the doorway. But Thurston was
-      after him in an instant, penitent, trembling, ashen pale. He grabbed
-      Sharkey by the coat sleeve.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no, don&rsquo;t go, I beg of you,&rdquo; he whined, &ldquo;I was wrong. I spoke in
-      anger. I apologize. Good God, some one or other will get me within an hour
-      if you leave me unprotected. I haven&rsquo;t a single friend&mdash;no one to
-      stand by me.&rdquo; There was craven fear in his eyes as he looked timidly
-      around. &ldquo;I hear the prowling footsteps of my enemies in the night. You
-      alone can save me, Mr. Sharkey.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Your damned civility comes too late,&rdquo; replied the sleuth, as he shook the
-      clutching hands from his shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no. Don&rsquo;t say that. Sit down again. See, here is my check book. I&rsquo;ll
-      pay you that money now&mdash;I&rsquo;ll double the amount&mdash;I&rsquo;ll never
-      haggle with you again. Stay with me till we go East together.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey showed himself somewhat mollified. He had played his game well,
-      for after all, cash with him was the main consideration. So smiling over
-      the success of his bluff, he watched the unnerved coward as he tottered to
-      his desk, dropped into a chair and drew the check with slow and painful
-      effort, and then returned with it between his still trembling fingers.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;ll stand by me, Mr. Sharkey, won&rsquo;t you?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, no more of that nonsense,&rdquo; was the curt reply, as the sleuth
-      glanced at the slip of paper, then thrust it in his waistcoat pocket.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      To Thurston the reconciliation brought instant relief. He drew himself up;
-      he rubbed his hands; he even attempted a smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s a good fellow, Sharkey. You know I&rsquo;ve always held you in high
-      esteem. And we&rsquo;ll get that man yet&rdquo;&mdash;the glare of vindictiveness was
-      again in his eyes, the rasp of accustomed irritability was returning to
-      his voice. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll get him, I say, even if it costs double the money I&rsquo;ve
-      already spent. And that devil of a girl, too&mdash;I hate her more than
-      ever now. She&rsquo;ll pay for her insults tonight with her lover&rsquo;s life.
-      Remember, Sharkey, no more chances. When you get the scoundrel within
-      gunshot, it&rsquo;s up to you to shoot. That will be best in any case. It will
-      save the cost of a judge and jury. You understand me?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I understand,&rdquo; nodded Sharkey. &ldquo;Then, as you&rsquo;re speaking about doubling.
-      Mr. Thurston, I suppose that ten-thousand-dollar reward coming to me goes
-      up to twenty thousand.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes; twenty thousand if you shoot him like a dog, and let me get away
-      from this damned place. I have come to loathe the very name of it. Well,
-      spread your cot now across my door. I&rsquo;ll try to get an hour&rsquo;s sleep. Good
-      night.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      And Ben Thurston disappeared into the inner room.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0026" id="link2HCH0026"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXVI&mdash;A Date is Fixed
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">O</span>N the morning
-      after the exciting episode at La Siesta, Chester Munson was in the library
-      of Mr. Robles&rsquo; home ready for his day&rsquo;s duties. But he was in no mood for
-      the routine work of cataloging and classifying the volumes on the
-      bookshelves. Up to now the task had been one of absorbing interest, for
-      Munson, although not a scholar, had always been fond of reading, and it
-      was a treat to dip at times into the contents of the rare and curious
-      works which wealth and the educated taste of a true bibliophile had
-      accumulated.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But today the amateur librarian was thinking of other things. He was
-      feverishly awaiting the usual morning visit of his employer, so that he
-      might tell him the story of the previous night&rsquo;s happenings. At last Mr.
-      Robles made his appearance, and gave his usual quiet greetings.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I see you are making great progress with your work,&rdquo; he remarked,
-      glancing at the pile of classified volumes resting temporarily on the
-      library table.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m getting along,&rdquo; replied Munson. &ldquo;But I have most surprising news
-      for you, Mr. Robles.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Indeed?&rdquo; The recluse arched his eyebrows in expectant curiosity as he
-      took a chair beside the desk at which Munson had been seated. &ldquo;Sit down,
-      please. Let me hear the story.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You know that I was at La Siesta yesterday evening?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I know that you are very often there,&rdquo; replied Mr. Robles, smiling. &ldquo;I
-      understand the attraction and congratulate you on your good fortune. Grace
-      Darlington is certainly a charming young lady.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson flushed and bowed his acquiescence in the compliment as he said:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It was not of her, however, that I was going to speak. I want to say to
-      you, Mr. Robles, that Miss Farnsworth did one of the bravest and cleverest
-      things imaginable last evening.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Tell me about it. I am all attention.&rdquo; Munson then proceeded to relate in
-      full detail the events of the preceding evening&mdash;the surprise visit
-      of Ben Thurston, the brutality of the man, the quick wit of Merle, the
-      escape of Dick Willoughby, and his final message by Tia Teresa that he was
-      safe and, in obedience to Merle&rsquo;s injunction, was returning to his place
-      of hiding. During the narrative only once did the listener betray emotion;
-      when Thurston&rsquo;s rude insults were repeated there came a flash into Robles&rsquo;
-      eyes, and he clenched his hands to restrain his indignation. But he
-      interrupted with no word, and at the end spoke no comment.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson was a little taken aback at this silence and impassivity.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My story does not seem to surprise you?&rdquo; he remarked, with a note of
-      interrogation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; was the quiet reply, &ldquo;I already knew it.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How?&rdquo; exclaimed Munson, wonderingly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You have forgotten, young man, that there is a private telephone between
-      my home here and La Siesta. Mrs. Darlington has already told me about the
-      matter. But I am pleased to have your version, and delighted more than I
-      can tell to know that Merle proved equal to the emergency&mdash;that it
-      was she who may be truly said to have saved Dick Willoughby.&rdquo; There was a
-      ring of pride and admiration in his voice as he spoke the words.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;She&rsquo;s the real stuff,&rdquo; cried Munson, enthusiastically.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It was well done,&rdquo; continued Mr. Robles, his tone taking a graver note.
-      &ldquo;For I want to warn you, Munson, as Willoughby&rsquo;s closest friend, that Ben
-      Thurston or one of his hired assassins will certainly shoot on sight the
-      instant they get the chance to do so. But by the Lord, if anything like
-      that happens, I will hang that villain Thurston to the highest tree in
-      Tejon for the buzzards to pick his bones.&rdquo; And the upraised hand, the
-      voice vibrating with passionate determination, showed that Ricardo Robles
-      meant just what he said.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Mr. Robles had risen to his feet. For a moment he turned his face away.
-      Then he again spoke, but now in his customary, sedate manner.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;This morning, Mr. Munson, I leave home for a few days. Go on with your
-      work, of course, but remember that it is quite a minor consideration.
-      During my absence I shall rely on you to see that Ben Thurston, on any
-      pretence of searching for Willoughby, does not cross my door.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He shall never do that, so long as I&rsquo;m here,&rdquo; declared the young army
-      man, with quiet confidence.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t think he will, either,&rdquo; replied Robles. &ldquo;I have given orders for
-      him to be shot down,&rdquo; he added grimly, &ldquo;if he should dare to approach my
-      gates. But I&rsquo;ll count on you all the same as a second guard to the
-      sanctity of my home.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You may count on me to the death,&rdquo; responded Munson, extending his hand.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I know it, and therefore I go away on a necessary duty with an easy mind.
-      But I have good news for you, Munson. I have instructed Sing Ling to
-      prepare luncheon for the ladies of La Siesta every day they choose to
-      come. So, while I prefer you to remain here on guard while I am gone, you
-      need not be lonely. Perhaps you&rsquo;ll hardly wish me to come back again,&rdquo; he
-      added with a smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, don&rsquo;t say that. But you&rsquo;re mighty kind thinking of such things at
-      all.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, you may expect our friends today about one o&rsquo;clock. Now, goodbye&mdash;but
-      not for long.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The library work proceeded but slowly during the hours that followed.
-      Munson was all impatience now for Grace and Merle to arrive. Books were of
-      little account, for there was none ever printed that could rival for him
-      the charm of a certain pair of laughing blue eyes. And it was a
-      self-confessed pseudo man-of-letters who at last rushed to the gateway to
-      greet the fair visitors.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mother couldn&rsquo;t come,&rdquo; cried Grace, as she jumped from her horse and
-      flung the bridle to a Mexican groom. &ldquo;She&rsquo;s putting up fruit with Tia
-      Teresa, and I think she really believes everything would go wrong if she
-      didn&rsquo;t superintend.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson, as he led the girls through the arched gateway, was inclined to
-      bless both the fruit and the fallacy.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Sing Ling came across the patio with a welcoming smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dinnel all leady,&rdquo; he announced in tinkling syllables.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And we&rsquo;re all ready, too, Sing Ling,&rdquo; laughed Merle, as she went up and
-      shook the Chinaman&rsquo;s hand.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Me vely glad to see you again, missie.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I didn&rsquo;t know you were old friends,&rdquo; exclaimed Munson, in some surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, didn&rsquo;t you? Sing Ling has been Mr. Robles&rsquo; cook off and on for nearly
-      twenty years. When Mr. Robles is abroad of course he works elsewhere.
-      That&rsquo;s why you found him at San Antonio Rancho.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But Dick told me he was his cook&mdash;had been for several years.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;With Mr. Robles&rsquo; tacit consent, then,&rdquo; replied Merle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The Chinaman was grinning in a vacuous sort of way, as if all the
-      conversation was so much Greek to him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Sing Ling, you scamp,&rdquo; cried Munson, &ldquo;I begin to understand now how Mr.
-      Robles comes to know so much about Dick and myself. You&rsquo;ve been telling
-      tales out of school.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, no; me cookee allee time; me no go school,&rdquo; replied the Celestial, in
-      guileless incomprehension.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      After the dainty luncheon, Merle proposed that they should visit the watch
-      tower. There they found the Mexican lad on duty. He had been strumming a
-      guitar to pass the time, but at the sound of voices had sprung erect and
-      alert. Munson noticed at a glance that the big telescope was ready trained
-      on San Antonio Rancho.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;<i>Como estas, Francisco?</i>&rdquo; asked Merle, addressing the boy in
-      Spanish.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;<i>Bien, gracias, senorita</i>,&rdquo; he replied, with a deferential bow. But
-      he averted his glance instantly, and gazed out on the landscape.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle turned to Munson: &ldquo;We are not allowed to converse with the servants
-      here,&rdquo; she explained. &ldquo;Just a word of greeting&mdash;that is all.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m under similar orders,&rdquo; replied Munson. &ldquo;Not that it much matters in
-      my case, for I haven&rsquo;t your accomplishment of knowing the Spanish
-      language.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, Grace and I speak Spanish almost as well as English. You see, Mr.
-      Robles, who has always been interested in us two girls, insisted that we
-      should be taught his native tongue.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And we&rsquo;ve been all over Spain, too,&rdquo; interposed Grace. &ldquo;Lived there a
-      whole year. That&rsquo;s where I fell in love with the violin and took my first
-      lessons.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;An inspiring country obviously,&rdquo; remarked Munson with a flattering
-      gesture.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Thank you for the subtle compliment,&rdquo; laughed Grace, tossing the vagrant,
-      wind-blown curls from her face.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I never come here but I love to gaze at the view,&rdquo; observed Merle. &ldquo;Is it
-      not glorious&mdash;this valley of Tehachapi?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      It was indeed a glorious scene&mdash;that noble sweep of verdured plain,
-      stretching north far as the eye could reach, on the south guarded by the
-      rugged pass, east and west embosoming hills twenty miles apart etching the
-      sky with peaks and domes and lines of beauty. For a few moments all three
-      visitors to the tower remained silent and enraptured.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Grace was the one to break the spell.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m going down now to the library to inspect your work, lieutenant,&rdquo; she
-      announced with a roguish smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Spare me,&rdquo; protested Munson. &ldquo;But perhaps you would help me with some of
-      those Spanish books,&rdquo; he added as an afterthought.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Delighted! Come along.&rdquo; And she led the way down the winding iron
-      staircase.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      In the library the three were for the first time during the visit quite
-      alone. Munson carefully closed the door.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Now I&rsquo;ve got the chance, Miss Merle,&rdquo; he began, &ldquo;I want to compliment you
-      on your splendid bravery last night.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Bravery!&rdquo; she laughed. &ldquo;Why I was so scared I could hardly stand.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, you deceived us all finely, then.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And that Ben Thurston&mdash;what an old ruffian!&rdquo; cried Grace. &ldquo;But I
-      agree with you, Mr. Munson; Merle was a hero.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A heroine,&rdquo; suggested the lieutenant.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, in these days we don&rsquo;t make such fine sex distinctions,&rdquo; laughed
-      Grace. &ldquo;A real hero, that&rsquo;s what I call her.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Rubbish,&rdquo; protested Merle. &ldquo;I just did what anyone else would have done
-      in the circumstances.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m afraid men are not so ready of wit in an emergency as are women,&rdquo;
-       remarked Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Just listen to that, Merle,&rdquo; exclaimed Grace. &ldquo;I verily believe the
-      lieutenant is a suffragette.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A suffragist,&rdquo; corrected Munson, emphatically this time. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m hanged if
-      I&rsquo;m going to wear a petticoat even if the women are determined to don&mdash;the
-      other things.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      They all laughed merrily.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Grace turned and began examining the carefully written library cards.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Any more news from Mr. Willoughby?&rdquo; asked Merle, with a look of
-      solicitude in her eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Nothing,&rdquo; replied Munson. &ldquo;But I&rsquo;m beginning to put two and two
-      together,&rdquo; he continued. &ldquo;Early every morning a horseman comes down here
-      from the mountains and evidently brings a report of some kind to Mr.
-      Robles. And when he rides off again Sing Ling has always ready a basket of
-      grub, all sorts of nice things, fried chicken, spiced beef&mdash;&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Sounds quite epicurean,&rdquo; interrupted Grace, tossing away the card she had
-      been pretending to examine.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, hang it all&mdash;just the little delicacies Dick used to like.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I never knew you fared so bountifully at San Antonio Rancho,&rdquo; remarked
-      Merle with a smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, Dick&rsquo;s no candy kid, as you know well,&rdquo; replied Munson. &ldquo;It was
-      mostly rough and ready fare all right, but Sing Ling had a knack of adding
-      a few dainty trifles to our meals, and it strikes me that for the purposes
-      of this mysterious and capacious lunch basket he is trying to excel
-      himself.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No doubt it goes to Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo; said Merle. &ldquo;Well, I&rsquo;m real glad to
-      know that they are making him comfortable.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I guess, though, he&rsquo;ll miss his occasional visits to La Siesta. Mr.
-      Robles says you were quite right, Miss Merle. Dick is in real danger.
-      Those gunmen of old Thurston have orders to shoot him on sight.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I knew it,&rdquo; exclaimed Merle. &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m so thankful he got away. Even
-      though we miss seeing him, he must never run such a risk again.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is all very mysterious,&rdquo; said Munson, in a musing tone. &ldquo;And I had no
-      idea, too, that this was such a lovely place. Mr. Robles has taken me
-      around several times. He has the choicest dairy cattle, the finest blooded
-      horses, rare trees and plants from every corner of the world.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;These are his hobbies,&rdquo; commented Merle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He says he wants to give me some practical lessons in estate management.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Why?&rdquo; asked Grace.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; laughed Munson, &ldquo;he thinks I may some day own a rancho of my own.
-      But that will be a mighty long time.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Who can tell?&rdquo; said Merle, glancing mischievously from the lieutenant to
-      Grace. &ldquo;Even in these humdrum days soldiers have been known to come in and
-      conquer.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Grace blushed crimson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Merle, how dare you?&rdquo; she exclaimed, half angry, half laughing. &ldquo;Next
-      time we visit you, Mr. Munson, I&rsquo;ll have to bring along Tia Teresa.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, dear Aunt Teresa has a soft side for the lieutenant,&rdquo; retorted Merle,
-      with merry audacity.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But Grace had recovered from her momentary confusion.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then I&rsquo;ll help you all I can, Mr. Munson, with dear Aunt Teresa,&rdquo; she
-      laughingly said. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll send her along tomorrow instead of coming
-      ourselves.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Heaven forbid!&rdquo; murmured the lieutenant, with pious fervor. He, too, had
-      been looking and feeling awkward.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So we&rsquo;ll say goodbye for the present,&rdquo; continued Grace, frankly extending
-      her hand.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I hope I haven&rsquo;t said anything to offend you,&rdquo; stammered Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is perhaps what you haven&rsquo;t said that is the cause of trouble,&rdquo;
-       laughed the irrepressible Merle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But Grace had fled from the room, and as the others followed, Merle went
-      on:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I said when we left home that two would be company but three&mdash;a
-      complication. Wasn&rsquo;t I right, lieutenant?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You are always right,&rdquo; murmured Munson, too bewildered to think of
-      anything else but the obvious gallant reply.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      He stood at the gateway watching the two young ladies as they cantered
-      away. At the bend of the road Merle turned round in the saddle and waved
-      her hand. But Grace rode steadily on.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;By jove, that&rsquo;s as good as telling me that I can sail in and win,&rdquo; he
-      said to himself. &ldquo;Thank you, Merle, little girl. Next time Grace and I are
-      alone, my fate will be sealed.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      But no one called again during Mr. Robles&rsquo; absence&mdash;not even Tia
-      Teresa.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      It was toward evening a few days later when the recluse strolled into the
-      library. Munson did not know that he had returned, and rose from his seat
-      in some surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Still hard at work?&rdquo; said Mr. Robles, as he nodded and shook hands.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;When did you get back, sir?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Last night. And today I have been busy with some important letters.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Any word of Dick?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;There is nothing new so far as I am aware.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mr. Robles, excuse me,&rdquo; said Munson earnestly. &ldquo;But I&rsquo;m anxious on Dick&rsquo;s
-      account. You know of his whereabouts, of course?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have indicated as much, although for the present I prefer to say
-      nothing.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, when is he to be restored to liberty?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;In due time. At latest he will be free on the eleventh of October.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, that&rsquo;s months ahead yet. But why the eleventh of October? You excite
-      my curiosity.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The date is not of my choosing&mdash;it was fixed many years ago, by
-      another than myself.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The enigmatic reply puzzled Chester Munson&mdash;not only the words
-      themselves, but the tremor of deep emotion in the voice of Ricardo Robles
-      as he gave them utterance.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0027" id="link2HCH0027"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXVII&mdash;Among the Old Oaks
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">P</span>IERRE, now my
-      sketches and plans are finished, how am I going to pass the time?&rdquo; It was
-      some ten days after the affair at La Siesta, and Dick had spent the
-      interval in close and absorbed work over his drawing board. Happy in his
-      occupation, he had not felt the restraints of confinement.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But now that the task was completed, and the big cardboard cylinder
-      containing the set of drawings rested on the ledge of the easel all ready
-      to be sent away on its mission, a feeling of chafing restlessness had
-      ensued.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good Lord, a fellow can&rsquo;t read all day,&rdquo; Dick went on, half in soliloquy,
-      half addressing his companion.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Monsieur is comfortable here?&rdquo; asked the latter solicitously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I should say, old fellow. I was never in better quarters in all my life.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And zere is nothing more I could get for ze table?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;For goodness sake, don&rsquo;t talk like that, Pierre! In any ease I don&rsquo;t
-      worry about what I eat. But this is a regular Delmonico&rsquo;s. Guadalupe is
-      certainly a crackerjack cook. She is even better than Sing Ling. Wherever
-      did she learn to turn out all these little delicacies? And just my
-      favorite dishes, too.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre smiled enigmatically.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guadalupe very clever old squaw,&rdquo; he remarked.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I would like to know her better. But she keeps out of my sight all the
-      time.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guadalupe is very old. She has her fixed ideas.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I suppose that means she does not love the Americans.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No doubt. She prefer to be alone&mdash;alone with ze white wolf all ze
-      time. And where the white wolf is, monsieur dare not go.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I understand that all right,&rdquo; laughed Willoughby. &ldquo;I strolled only once
-      toward the log fire, and the brute showed me a set of teeth which I never
-      wish to see again.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ze white wolf guard ze cave well,&rdquo; remarked Pierre, sententiously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m not thinking of trying to run away. You know I would never break
-      my word. But what the dickens am I to do all day long?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What do you say? Suppose we go to ze riffle and wash out some gold.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great Scott!&rdquo; exclaimed Dick eagerly. &ldquo;That&rsquo;s not a bad suggestion. But
-      Don Manuel won&rsquo;t mind?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He will be very pleased&mdash;he has no use for ze gold.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And Guadalupe?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Long ago she would have killed you if you had gone zere. But not now. She
-      very old, and all her people are dead.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And the white wolf? That confounded beast won&rsquo;t interfere?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no. Ze white wolf stay near Guadalupe all ze time.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then, by jove, it&rsquo;s a bully idea,&rdquo; cried Dick. &ldquo;It gets me all right.
-      We&rsquo;ll turn miners, Pierre, and we&rsquo;ll have a rare old sack of nuggets to
-      divide when the time comes for me to go free. I&rsquo;ll be better off in the
-      end than if I were holding down my old job at the rancho,&rdquo; he laughed
-      gaily.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I will find ze spades and ze pans to wash ze gravel. When shall we
-      begin?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, wait now,&rdquo; replied Dick, glancing reflectively at the roll of
-      drawings. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve got to send these plans away. I want you to get them at
-      once into the hands of my friend, Lieutenant Chester Munson. He will know
-      how to forward them to their proper destination.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;May I suggest one zing?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Go ahead, Pierre. What&rsquo;s in your mind?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I venture to make one little suggestion. Why not ask ze young lady to
-      take ze plans to your friend?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Miss Merle Farnsworth?&rdquo; asked Dick in surprise. &ldquo;But how am I to do
-      that?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I will promise to arrange a meeting&mdash;zat is, if you are not afraid
-      of Mr. Thurston and his men.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Afraid!&rdquo; shouted Dick. &ldquo;You give me the chance to see Merle again, and
-      old Ben Thurston and all his sleuths may go to blazes.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Zen I will arrange, and I zink it will please ze young lady very much to
-      have ze honor of taking care of ze plans.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You mean it will be a mighty honor for the plans to be in her care,
-      Pierre. But I know she will gladly do me this service. How and when can I
-      see her?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Be ready tomorrow morning by ten o&rsquo;clock. I will take you to a quiet
-      place among ze old oak trees.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Pierre, you&rsquo;re a regular brick,&rdquo; cried Dick, as he slapped the old
-      Frenchman on the shoulder in the exuberance of his delight.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The following morning they started out for the trysting place. Dick
-      without demur submitted to the usual precautions. He was blindfolded
-      before mounting his pony in the great central domed cavern and it was not
-      until a couple of hours later, after a veritable switchback ride up and
-      down and round about in a bewildering maze, that he was permitted to
-      remove the bandage. Dismounting, he found himself in the heart of a great
-      oak forest, in what precise locality he could not tell, for there was
-      nothing in sight but endless vistas of tree trunks under their thick
-      canopy of green leaves.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre touched him on the shoulder, and he followed the direction of the
-      Frenchman&rsquo;s eyes. There, advancing through the sylvan twilight, was Merle
-      Farnsworth, her hands eagerly extended, her face lighted with joy.
-      Following at a little distance came Tia Teresa.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick, hastening to meet Merle, took both her hands into his, and gazed
-      deep into her eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, it&rsquo;s great to meet you again,&rdquo; he exclaimed. &ldquo;And this is my first
-      chance to thank you for having saved me the other night. My word, but you
-      were quick to think and to act. You cannot know how I admired your courage
-      and coolness.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Nonsense, nonsense,&rdquo; protested Merle, in sweet blushing confusion. &ldquo;You
-      make far too much of the little I did.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You saved my life,&rdquo; said Dick, determinedly. &ldquo;You can call that a little
-      thing if you choose.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; she replied, earnestly. &ldquo;If I really did that, then it was truly
-      a big thing.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;For me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And for all of us,&rdquo; she added, with face half-averted.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And you, too?&rdquo; pressed Dick.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, for me, too,&rdquo; answered Merle, turning round and frankly meeting his
-      gaze. &ldquo;I should never have been happy again had any harm come to you there&mdash;that
-      night&mdash;in my very home&mdash;without a proper effort to get you away
-      to a place of safety.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;God bless you, Merle, dear,&rdquo; exclaimed Dick, as again he pressed her
-      hands. He had been carried away by his fervent emotions, but she did not
-      resent the familiar and endearing manner of his address.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      He would have taken her in his arms there and then, but Merle drew back
-      and gave a little glance aside. Then Dick remembered Tia Teresa. To his
-      astonishment he found her chatting with Pierre Luzon as if they were old
-      friends.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick left Merle for the moment to greet the duenna.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And I have to thank you, too, for helping me,&rdquo; he said. Then he added
-      with a laugh: &ldquo;When am I to be privileged to wear that mantilla again?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You are not to be allowed to endanger yourself again,&rdquo; replied Tia
-      Teresa. &ldquo;And I warn you now. We remain here only half an hour&mdash;these
-      are our orders.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Whose orders?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Never mind. Just one half hour, that is all.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then I&rsquo;ll make the best of my time,&rdquo; exclaimed Dick, turning toward
-      Merle. &ldquo;I see you won&rsquo;t be lonely with my gallant friend, Pierre Luzon,&rdquo;
-       he added with a smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I knew Pierre when he was just as handsome a young fellow as
-      yourself,&rdquo; retorted Tia Teresa. &ldquo;But we&rsquo;ll excuse you, and Pierre will
-      keep the time.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick led Merle down a glade of the forest, but before doing so he had
-      unstrapped the roll of drawings from the horn of his saddle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What are you carrying so very carefully?&rdquo; asked Merle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My plans for the ideal city. I told you I was going to have a try in that
-      competition.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I hope you&rsquo;ll have good luck.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, I want you to help me. Will you take this package, please, to
-      Chester Munson and ask him to send it to the proper address?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;With the greatest of pleasure, Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo;&mdash;and she put forth
-      her hands for the roll.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No&mdash;we&rsquo;ll lay it down here for the present. This log will serve as a
-      seat. See, this twisted, limb makes quite a comfortable nook for you.&rdquo; He
-      had halted at a fallen tree, had dropped the drawing on the turf, and was
-      now dusting away the twigs and leaves from the seat he had chosen.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Cannot I look at the drawings?&rdquo; she asked, after settling herself cosily.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Before handing them to Munson, if you like. But there are other things to
-      talk about now.&rdquo; As he spoke he tossed his hat on the ground at her feet.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Are you growing impatient over your confinement?&rdquo; she asked.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Impatient&mdash;it is hardly the word. I long to be out in the world
-      again. I could never have endured the long seclusion but for my work over
-      these drawings and my thoughts of you.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Why me?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have felt that I am doing the best for your sake as well as my own. I
-      would not have had you subjected to the vulgar gaze of a crowded court
-      room&mdash;not for worlds. The very thought that I have saved you from
-      that has made me contented with my enforced idleness.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not idleness,&rdquo; she said, tapping the roll of drawings with the toe of her
-      shoe.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, no, not idleness exactly.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And I do hope you&rsquo;ll win the prize,&rdquo; she added, looking up into his eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So do I. But perhaps you don&rsquo;t know what I count to be the real prize.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0010" id="linkimage-0010"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
-      <img src="images/0255.jpg" alt="0255 " width="100%" /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h5>
-      <a href="images/0255.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
-    </h5>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Pray, what is that?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick thrust a hand into the breast of his coat and brought forth a pocket
-      book. From this he produced a little package, and opening the folds of
-      paper disclosed the white rose which she had sent him on the night of his
-      escape from La Siesta.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Where did you get that?&rdquo; she asked demurely.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is your rose&mdash;the rose you sent me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I did not know you were so partial to roses as to keep them after they
-      are withered.&rdquo; Her voice trembled; she bravely tried to keep up the
-      pretence of not understanding.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is not the gift I treasure&mdash;it is the thought of who was the
-      giver.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      A blush stole over her beautiful face, while the long drooping eyelashes
-      half concealed her brown eyes. Dick&rsquo;s arms slipped around the girl&rsquo;s
-      slender waist.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Merle, my dear, I love you. For months past I have known that there is no
-      woman on earth for me but you. I would have spoken before, but I have
-      always been afraid that you could not love me, and that talk of such a
-      thing might terminate a friendship that had become my greatest pleasure in
-      life.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      For reply, placing one hand on his shoulder, she just buried her face in
-      his breast and gave way to tears&mdash;tears of joy, he knew, as he kissed
-      her hair again and again, and then at last her lips when she allowed him
-      to raise her face toward his.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My darling,&rdquo; he murmured, and the kiss she gave him back accepted and
-      returned the words of fond endearment.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      A moment of restful bliss followed; then Merle gently disengaged herself
-      and rose to her feet.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What will Tia Teresa say?&rdquo; she asked, laughingly, as she glanced over her
-      shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I think Tia Teresa knew all about my love long ago,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;Yes,
-      both she and Pierre Luzon, too.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then you have been wearing your heart on your sleeve.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Or we have been surrounded by very observant people. But, I say, Merle,
-      this reminds me of a thing I had quite forgotten for the moment.&rdquo; His face
-      fell. &ldquo;There is one great barrier that stands between us.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What do you mean? You are surely too strong and purposeful a man to care
-      for barriers.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I never knew until the other day that you are so very rich.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Rich!&rdquo; laughed Merle. &ldquo;Who ever told you such a foolish thing? While of
-      course I have never felt poverty, don&rsquo;t you know that I am absolutely
-      dependent upon Mrs. Darlington&rsquo;s kindness and generosity to me, her
-      adopted daughter?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      A smile of understanding broke over Dick&rsquo;s face.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You tell me that? I am so delighted,&rdquo; he exclaimed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You surely know my story well enough,&rdquo; continued Merle, &ldquo;not to have
-      mistaken me for an heiress. I lost both father and mother when I was a
-      baby. Mrs. Darlington took me to her heart, and no mother could have been
-      dearer and sweeter than she, no sister kinder and more loving than Grace.
-      But I am proud to think they have loved me for my own sake, not for any
-      wealth I might have owned.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then there is no barrier,&rdquo; cried Dick, as once again he drew her to him.
-      &ldquo;Unless my poverty is a barrier,&rdquo; he added. &ldquo;But won&rsquo;t I work hard all my
-      life to give you every comfort you can desire!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, we&rsquo;ll have a good start at all events,&rdquo; said Merle, with a merry
-      little upglance.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How&rsquo;s that?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The ten-thousand-dollar prize for the best plans. Have you forgotten
-      about that already?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But it is not won yet.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I have the firm presentiment that you are going to win, Dick, dear. I
-      am sure of it&mdash;sure!&rdquo; she repeated in a tone of conviction.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Her face was aglow and Dick caught the spirit of her enthusiasm.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then I&rsquo;m sure, too. And, by jove, won&rsquo;t we have one grand honeymoon trip,
-      dearest?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0028" id="link2HCH0028"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXVIII&mdash;The Prize Winner
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">D</span>ICK WILLOUGHBY&rsquo;S
-      sensational escape from La Siesta had added another thrill to the mystery
-      surrounding the murder of Marshall Thurston. But as week succeeded week
-      without further incident, the affair gradually faded away as a topic of
-      conversation. All the talk now was about the coming of the new town. The
-      fever of speculation was in the air.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Say, boys,&rdquo; remarked Jack Rover one evening to his two cronies at the
-      store, &ldquo;I&rsquo;m sure getting crazy about the new town. I&rsquo;ve got a thousand
-      bones of my own savings besides the money from old Pierre Luzon, and I&rsquo;m
-      going to invest every dangnation cent of it in town lots on opening day.
-      You bet I&rsquo;ll be there mighty early in the morning when the sale starts.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m sorta locoed myself,&rdquo; said Baker, &ldquo;about them lots in the new town.
-      Guess I&rsquo;ll grab off a few good corners. I look for an early rise&mdash;prices&rsquo;ll
-      go up like blazes,&rsquo; I&rsquo;m &lsquo;lowin&rsquo;.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck Ashley snorted contemptuously. &ldquo;Say, you fellers are two dippy ones.
-      That new town talk is a lot o&rsquo; hot air, d&rsquo;you hear? Jest the agitatin&rsquo;
-      work of them pesky town boomers. Won&rsquo;t &lsquo;mount to nothin&rsquo;.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Jack Rover started a defence, but was quickly motioned to silence by old
-      Tom Baker, who, after clearing his throat, pushed his hat back and glared
-      at Buck Ashley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Buck,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;you&rsquo;re a thick-headed fool. The openin&rsquo; of that town
-      will amount to one hell of a sight, don&rsquo;t you fergit it. Why, that Los
-      Angeles syndicate cuss who&rsquo;s a-runnin&rsquo; the machine is sharper than a razor
-      blade. Just think for one little puny moment,&rdquo; Tom Baker went on,
-      enthusiastically, &ldquo;of that printed notice being in every blamed newspaper
-      in the whole country&mdash;yes, and on the other side of the Atlantic pond&mdash;offerin&rsquo;
-      ten thousand dollars for the best plans for an ideal city. Gosh all
-      hemlock, they do say as how the mails were just chuck full of answers&mdash;architect
-      fellers as well as them as ain&rsquo;t architects, a-tryin&rsquo; to get their hooks
-      on that ten-thousand-dollar prize. It was a mighty smart business notion,
-      I&rsquo;m a-tellin&rsquo; you, and has boomed the town to beat the band.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But,&rdquo; inquired Buck Ashley, in a sarcastic way, &ldquo;who is confounded fool
-      enough to buy lots in such a wild-cat scheme, no matter how much they
-      advertise it? That&rsquo;s what I&rsquo;m askin&rsquo;.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I will, for one,&rdquo; said Jack Rover. &ldquo;As I said before, I&rsquo;m going to put in
-      my last dollar.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;As for me,&rdquo; chimed in Tom Baker, &ldquo;I will lay my money on this &lsquo;ere
-      proposed new town bein&rsquo; the biggest town in the whole dangnation State of
-      California outside of sea-board towns.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Just then through the gathering darkness a lone horseman rode up to the
-      store, dismounted and came hurriedly in. It was none other than Chester
-      Munson, flushed and excited, as he sang out a good-natured salute: &ldquo;Hallo,
-      boys. I have news for you.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      As he spoke he pulled a Bakersfield daily paper from his pocket. &ldquo;The new
-      town!&rdquo; he fairly shouted. &ldquo;All about it, right on the front page, pictures
-      and all. And it is Dick Willoughby who wins the ten-thousand-dollar
-      prize!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s great news, sure,&rdquo; cried Jack.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s a mighty pity Dick ain&rsquo;t here to celebrate,&rdquo; growled the sheriff.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What&rsquo;s to be the name of the town?&rdquo; asked Buck Ashley, in a disbelieving
-      tone.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Tejon, after the old fort here,&rdquo; replied Munson, as he pointed to the
-      featured article with its big-type headlines and started to cull a few
-      sentences.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It says that the new city of Tejon, right here in the heart of a rich
-      horticultural valley, is bound to be one of the top-notch towns of
-      California. And the opening day is going to be immense. Next Tuesday is
-      the date fixed. Maps and plans of the new town will be ready for
-      distribution from the land company&rsquo;s office, corner Main Street and
-      Broadway, at nine o&rsquo;clock Monday morning. Let me see,&rdquo; he went on, looking
-      up from the paper, &ldquo;this is Wednesday. Mighty few days to wait, boys. You
-      just ought to see the excitement in Bakersfield.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, I say there ain&rsquo;t no such town,&rdquo; snapped Buck Ashley, &ldquo;nor no such
-      a company&rsquo;s office buildin&rsquo;, &lsquo;cause I was down there day before yesterday
-      myself, right where them surveyin&rsquo; fellers have been foolin&rsquo; &lsquo;round for
-      weeks, peekin&rsquo; through spy-glasses at each other and measurin&rsquo; off so many
-      feet this way and so many feet that way, like a bunch o&rsquo; kids playin&rsquo; some
-      game. No, siree, there&rsquo;s nothin&rsquo; but long rows of white stakes driv in the
-      ground. Looks to me as if they was a-gettin&rsquo; ready to build a lot of
-      henhouses. Of course the railroad&rsquo;s there, and the only thing changed that
-      I could see was a lot of side-tracks they&rsquo;ve put in.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, things have been humming the last two days,&rdquo; laughed Munson. &ldquo;This
-      afternoon I found all the side-tracks filled with trains of lumber,
-      carload after carload, and not less than two or three hundred workmen, all
-      as busy as nailers. Looked to me as if a three-ring circus were getting
-      ready for a big show. They are already running up electric light poles and
-      stringing the wires. Some of the men are unloading cars, some stacking up
-      lumber, others are putting up tents, and the entire business reminded me
-      of a hive of extremely busy bees. Go down and look for yourself, Buck, and
-      you&rsquo;ll be convinced at last that the new town has arrived.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The old storekeeper had come from behind the counter, and stood leaning
-      against a stack of boxes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve been here for more&rsquo;n a quarter of a century, boys,&rdquo; he said, in a
-      tone of seriousness that approached to sadness, &ldquo;and this old store seems
-      like home to me. I&rsquo;m some fighter and I&rsquo;m some stayer. But, hell, I reckon
-      I know when I&rsquo;m licked. I guess this new town puts a crimp in me and my
-      business, and&mdash;&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Honk-honk; honk-honk&rdquo;&mdash;it was the distant warning of an automobile
-      that interrupted Buck&rsquo;s speech, and drew all four present to the doorway.
-      There was the glare of twin headlights on the southern road.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Some of the Los Angeles buyers, most likely,&rdquo; suggested the sheriff.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And so the travellers proved to be. The automobile halted at the store,
-      but only one of the party of four or five descended.. He was a
-      bright-faced, clean-shaven man, of dapper build and faultlessly attired.
-      In his hand was a bunch of papers.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mr. Buck Ashley?&rdquo; he inquired.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m your man,&rdquo; replied Buck, stepping from the doorway.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, we can&rsquo;t stop tonight. But we wanted to say &lsquo;how-do.&rsquo; I represent
-      the Los Angeles Trust Syndicate, and these documents just arrived
-      yesterday from Washington, D. C.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Can&rsquo;t be for me, then,&rdquo; replied Buck, hesitating to take the proffered
-      papers.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But they are,&rdquo; replied the stranger with a laugh. &ldquo;Oh, we haven&rsquo;t
-      forgotten the interests of the old identities. We&rsquo;ve had your name in mind
-      all the time, and this is a removal order from the Government to change
-      your postoffice over to the new town of Tejon.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck was speechless as his fingers closed on the documents.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll hope to see you over on Tuesday morning, Mr. Ashley, so that you
-      can secure a good site for your new store. Now I must be going. We have
-      got to be in Bakersfield by eleven o&rsquo;clock.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Honk-honk,&rdquo; and the automobile was gone.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hell, Buck, have you lost your tongue?&rdquo; cried Tom Baker, slipping the
-      storekeeper on the shoulder. &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t you see what it all means? You&rsquo;re
-      goin&rsquo; to shift camp, old man; you&rsquo;re goin&rsquo; into the new town.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Gosh &lsquo;lmighty!&rdquo; murmured Buck, at last recovering the power of
-      articulation. &ldquo;I think the first thing to do is to lubricate.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A taste from the mystery keg,&rdquo; suggested the sheriff, as they all crowded
-      back into the store.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The mystery keg? What&rsquo;s that?&rdquo; asked Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck laid his hand on a small barrel at the end of the counter.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We call it the mystery keg,&rdquo; he replied, &ldquo;because we just found it
-      yesterday mornin&rsquo; settin&rsquo; at my back door. It has come to us sorta like
-      manna from heaven.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And tastes like manna, too,&rdquo; interjected Baker.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It means free drinks for all this pertic&rsquo;lar bunch,&rdquo; continued Buck, &ldquo;for
-      there is no question as to where the keg came from. Look at the date on
-      the top&mdash;1853. This &lsquo;ere barrel came out of Joaquin Murietta&rsquo;s wine
-      cellar.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t say?&rdquo; exclaimed Munson, pressing forward eagerly to examine the
-      little brass-hooped keg, looking bright and sound despite its antiquity.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;This whisky is sixty years old at least,&rdquo; Buck went on, turning the tap
-      and filling a small pitcher.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Tastes like it might be a hundred years older,&rdquo; remarked the sheriff.
-      &ldquo;Mellow as fresh drawn milk.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck handed Munson a pony glass of the rare old beverage.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;By jove, it is fine,&rdquo; said the lieutenant, judicially smacking his lips.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Just makes my internals feel as soft and roly-poly as a ripe
-      pomegranate,&rdquo; murmured Tom, as he set down his empty glass and rubbed his
-      belt-line in a complacent way.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, we&rsquo;ll fill up again, boys,&rdquo; cried Buck. &ldquo;Here&rsquo;s to dear old Pierre
-      Luzon, for it was sure him who sent us the mystery keg.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And to Dick Willoughby who won the prize,&rdquo; cried Jack Rover.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And to our host,&rdquo; added Munson in a courtly way. &ldquo;To Buck Ashley, boys,
-      the postmaster of the new city of Tejon.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hip, hip, hurrah!&rdquo;&mdash;all four voices shouted the triple toast as the
-      upraised glasses clinked merrily.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck resumed his former position, with his back against the cracker boxes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;As I was sayin&rsquo;, boys, when that automobile interrupted us, I know when
-      I&rsquo;m licked. But I know, too, that the fightin&rsquo; blood is still left in me,
-      and I was a-goin&rsquo; to remark that this new town sure &lsquo;nuff looks a winner.
-      I&rsquo;ve got plenty of lumber right in my back yard, and tomorrer mornin&rsquo; I
-      begin to have the scantlin&rsquo;s cut, for, by jingoes, I&rsquo;ll be the chap who
-      will build the first buildin&rsquo; in the new town.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Bully for you,&rdquo; cried Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I say what I mean,&rdquo; continued Buck, his face aglow with enthusiasm, &ldquo;and
-      on Tuesday mornin&rsquo; I&rsquo;ll buy the first town lot if I have to stand in line
-      for forty-eight hours to get it.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Life in the old dog yet,&rdquo; laughed Jack Rover. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s wonderful the effect
-      of Pierre Luzon&rsquo;s brew,&rdquo; smiled the sheriff. &ldquo;I think we&rsquo;ll just have four
-      more spoonfuls, Buck, of that distilled nectar of sunshine. Success to the
-      new store, old man!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0029" id="link2HCH0029"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXIX&mdash;-The Rendezvous
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">S</span>UMMER had come and
-      gone and it was now the early days of October. The mystery of Dick
-      Willoughby&rsquo;s disappearance had remained unsolved, yet it was on his plans
-      that the new city of Tejon had been laid out, and, like the fabled palace
-      in the Arabian Nights&rsquo; tale, had sprung into being with such rapidity that
-      men rubbed their eyes to satisfy themselves whether the transformation
-      scene were an actuality or the baseless fabric of a dream. Within three
-      months of the opening day auction of lots Tejon was a thriving, hustling
-      centre of population, with whole avenues of beautiful homes, several
-      blocks of stores on the main street, schoolhouse and other public
-      buildings well on the way to completion.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Electricity had helped to the accomplishment of the miracle, for it had
-      been only necessary to tap the great power cables running across the old
-      rancho from the Kern River canyon to secure the supplies of &ldquo;juice&rdquo; both
-      for lighting and traction purposes. So there was already an interurban
-      tramway service connecting with the county seat, Bakersfield, while at
-      night the new town was a blaze of electricity. All around country homes
-      were going up, and ten and twenty acre holdings were being planted to
-      fruit trees or ploughed for alfalfa.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Ben Thurston still clung to the ranch house, although it was definitely
-      understood now between him and the new owners that Thanksgiving Day was to
-      be the extreme limit of his occupancy. The hue and cry after Dick
-      Willoughby had in a measure subsided, but, if the authorities had relaxed
-      their efforts, Thurston still sought relentlessly and indefatigably for
-      the man accused of the slaying of his son.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      One night at a lonely road-house on the outskirts of Bakersfield, the
-      sleuth, Leach Sharkey, was in close and secret conference with a bent and
-      bowed old man. This was none other than Pierre Luzon, although his
-      physical condition seemed to have greatly changed and he answered now to
-      the name of José.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The two men had met a few days before on the range; Pierre had spoken of
-      the scant living he was making from a herd of goats he pastured on the
-      mountains, and in the course of conversation had thrown out a hint for
-      information as to the amount of the reward that Mr. Thurston would be
-      willing to pay if Dick Willoughby were handed over to him. Sharkey had
-      eagerly followed the lead thus given. Hence this midnight meeting in the
-      road-house parlor for the discussion of terms and conditions over the
-      bottle of whisky that helps so efficaciously to dispel distrust and
-      unloosen tongues.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      More than an hour had been spent in skirmishing preliminaries, but now
-      Leach Sharkey was congratulating himself that he had got his man fixed
-      just right. He was running over the final arrangements so as to make sure
-      that everything was clearly understood.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then Mr. Thurston and myself are to come to Comanche Point. You will take
-      us from there to the place where we&rsquo;ll find Willoughby. That&rsquo;s the
-      understanding, José?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre nodded in acquiescence.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And you will bring wiz you ze reward of five tousand dollars&mdash;not
-      gold or silver, remember, but treasury bills, for I am not strong enough
-      now to carry a very heavy weight. Zen when you have paid me ze money, I
-      will lead you to Mr. Willoughby.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;All right. I&rsquo;m going to trust you and take my chances. But bear in mind
-      that you don&rsquo;t get away with the cash until I have actually put the
-      handcuffs on the man I&rsquo;m after.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I will not run away, Mr. Sharkey.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;By God, if you try any monkey tricks on me, I&rsquo;ll shoot you in your
-      tracks. Make no mistake about that, José. And it will be hands up first to
-      prove to me you have no gun.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;As I have promised,&rdquo; replied Pierre with some dignity, &ldquo;I shall come
-      unarmed. But remember, Mr. Thurston and you must be alone. If zere are any
-      ozers I will not show myself&mdash;I will give no sign.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t worry about that. We&rsquo;ll be alone. I need no other protection than
-      the two guns I always carry.&rdquo; As he spoke, the sleuth slipped a hand to
-      one of his hip pockets, and with a grim smile, laid a vicious-looking
-      revolver on the table.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Luzon evinced no disquietude; he merely smiled.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mr. Sharkey he is ze famous man wiz ze two guns. I would take no risk wiz
-      him. But I wish to win ze reward.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, then, the reward is yours if you play the game straight. Thurston
-      and I will be there, and you will be there unarmed. The hour?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Four o&rsquo;clock. I will watch you come to Comanche Point all alone along ze
-      road.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;re certainly a cautious old duck,&rdquo; laughed Sharkey. &ldquo;However, that&rsquo;s
-      all right. Four o&rsquo;clock, then. And you said Tuesday next week, didn&rsquo;t
-      you?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, Tuesday.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey glanced at a big advertisement calendar on the wall.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That will be the eleventh of the month. Then I think everything is
-      understood. Now I want to be off. I can just catch the last car to Tejon.
-      Shake. You can finish that drop of whisky by yourself, old man.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      They shook hands and Sharkey was gone.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The other waited for a few moments, cautiously and cunningly listening to
-      the retreating footsteps. Then he sprang erect, transformed in an instant
-      into a hale and vigorous man. Into his eyes there leapt a flash of joy, in
-      his heart was a song of triumph.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So the villain Ben Thurston will be there at Comanche Point on the very
-      anniversary of the night, just thirty years ago, when he committed that
-      foul crime&mdash;at the very spot where the poor little Senorita Rosetta
-      and her unborn babe perished at his hands. Glory be to God! At last the
-      hour of vengeance comes!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0030" id="link2HCH0030"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXX&mdash;Don Manuel Appears
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span> GOODLY little
-      sack of water-worn nuggets of gold had been washed out of the subterranean
-      stream by Pierre Luzon and Dick Willoughby. The captive had found in the
-      work both an exciting pastime and the ease of mind that comes from the
-      thought that his time was being spent to profitable account. So week after
-      week he had toiled on cheerfully, setting for himself each day a full
-      day&rsquo;s task. In this way also, although the want of sunshine had paled his
-      cheeks, he had maintained his health by the regular physical exercise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But as the appointed date of his release drew near, Dick&rsquo;s mining
-      enthusiasm suffered an eclipse. The gold no longer tempted him, the
-      eight-hour day became a burden to his soul, his whole being was possessed
-      with feverish restlessness. He was not only filled with eager excitement
-      at the thought of again folding Merle in his arms, but he was fired with
-      curiosity to know what events were happening outside which would enable
-      him to step forth a free man, exculpated from all connection with the
-      crime of which he had been suspected, restored to an honorable place among
-      his fellow men.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But Pierre remained obstinately deaf to all hints for information.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I can say nozing,&rdquo; was his invariable reply. Then, to divert Dick&rsquo;s mind,
-      he would challenge him at chess, a game in which they had proved to be
-      pretty equally matched, or he would produce the latest batch of
-      newspapers.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The young fellow had read with great delight the announcement that his
-      plans for the ideal city had been awarded the prize of ten thousand
-      dollars. Still more welcome had been the warmly congratulatory note
-      received from Merle at the hands of Pierre; for this letter, while it made
-      no reference to the point, virtually sealed the pact between the two
-      lovers that the money would provide for a glorious honeymoon trip to
-      Europe. Dick had sent instructions to Munson to notify the Los Angeles
-      syndicate in his name that the reward was to remain to the credit of the
-      winner until he would come personally to Tejon to claim it, probably about
-      the middle of October.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      It wanted now only two days of the fateful date, the eleventh of that
-      month. Dick had already gathered together his personal belongings ready
-      for removal. He was pacing the grotto, when his eye chanced to fall upon
-      the sack of gold.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I forgot about that, Pierre, old fellow,&rdquo; he remarked. &ldquo;We have to divide
-      this spoil.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; replied Pierre, with quiet determination, &ldquo;it is all yours, Mr.
-      Willoughby, honestly earned, too. I have no need for any of ze gold. I
-      have all ze money I can ever spend during ze rest of my life.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      No amount of argument could shake the old Frenchman&rsquo;s resolution.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then what is to be done with the sack? By jove, I&rsquo;ll share it with our
-      Hidden Treasure Syndicate. By the way, where is Jack Rover now, Pierre?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He is living in Buck Ashley&rsquo;s old store. Buck, you know, is ze postmaster
-      at Tejon, and has a splendid store in ze new city. But Jack Rover, he just
-      hang about ze old place.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, Pierre, I&rsquo;ve got a plan. You say it will not be until Tuesday
-      afternoon that I leave these quarters?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Zat is so, and I am sorry you must still wear ze blindfold, but it will
-      be for ze last time now.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m not kicking about that. I know the conditions under which I came
-      here. But it will be evening when we get clear of the hills, and I won&rsquo;t
-      have any particular place to go to. Next morning it will be best for me to
-      ride right over to Bakersfield, to surrender myself and secure my formal
-      discharge. When, did you say, am I to get the necessary documents for all
-      this?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Before you depart from ze cave.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, everything will fit in fine. Tomorrow you have kindly promised to
-      take out my things. Just carry the nuggets along with you also, and leave
-      everything in Jack&rsquo;s charge. But tell him that nothing must be opened or
-      disturbed until I arrive. I&rsquo;m going to give Jack Rover the surprise of his
-      life when he sees that gold. The sack is too heavy to handle, but I guess
-      we can make it into several packages. Jack was always crazy to find
-      Guadalupe&rsquo;s sand-bar.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So were lots of ozers,&rdquo; grinned Pierre. &ldquo;But they have never found it
-      yet. Even you will not be able to find it again when you are led out of
-      zese hills wearing ze blindfold.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I am fully aware of that, old man,&rdquo; laughed Dick in reply. &ldquo;I suppose I
-      couldn&rsquo;t discover the place again in a hundred years. But Jack&rsquo;s eyes will
-      fairly pop when he sees that bunch of gold marbles. He will be mighty
-      pleased to show the nuggets around to some of the boys who have laughed
-      over his enthusiasm, always declaring that Guadalupe&rsquo;s gold simply came
-      from some old-timer&rsquo;s sack of dust that had been part of Joaquin
-      Murietta&rsquo;s plunder.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, no. All ze bandits get out much gold from ze riffle in zose days&mdash;Don
-      Manuel himself had plenty.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, Pierre, you just pack all my belongings to Buck Ashley&rsquo;s old store.
-      And you tell Jack Rover to expect me about six o&rsquo;clock the night after
-      tomorrow&mdash;that&rsquo;s Tuesday. And I wish Munson to be there, too&mdash;I&rsquo;ll
-      want him to accompany me to Bakersfield.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;If you write a leetle note to ze lieutenant,&rdquo; suggested Pierre, &ldquo;I will
-      see zat it reaches his hands. But you must say very leetle&mdash;just a
-      few words. For nozing must be told to anyone outside until you are free.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;All right, Pierre. Here goes.&rdquo; And Dick seated himself at the writing
-      table. In a very few moments he had completed his task.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;See,&rdquo; he said, returning to Pierre&rsquo;s side. &ldquo;I wish you to know exactly
-      what I have written&mdash;just a hurried scrawl.&rdquo; And he read aloud while
-      the old Frenchman&rsquo;s eyes rested on the paper:
-    </p>
-    <blockquote>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;On Tuesday night next, about six o&rsquo;clock, meet me at Buck Ashley&rsquo;s old
-      store. I shall want you to ride over to Bakersfield with me next morning,
-      where my acquittal is assured. Give Merle the glad news. Yours, Dick.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    </blockquote>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guess that&rsquo;s all right?&rdquo; he added, as he folded the note and placed it in
-      an envelope on which he had already inscribed the name of Lieutenant
-      Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre had signified his approval with a nod, and now he carefully
-      bestowed the letter in the pocket of his shirt.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He will get ze letter&mdash;he will surely be zere.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then you say I cannot write to Merle&mdash;Miss Farnsworth, I mean?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have ze strictest orders,&rdquo; replied Pierre. &ldquo;Nozing must be told just
-      yet. Bah! It is only two days more.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Two mighty long days for me, old sport,&rdquo; said Dick, half in jest and half
-      in sober earnest, as he sat down and began cutting at a plug of tobacco.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Most of next day Willoughby was alone. But at the regular dinner hour
-      Pierre appeared, and announced that he had safely packed the valise and
-      the gold in four bags to the old store, and Jack Rover had been apprised
-      of Dick&rsquo;s coming on the following night.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He knew what was in ze sacks,&rdquo; laughed Pierre. &ldquo;Zey were so very heavy,
-      oh my! But I told him I would come back and shoot him like a jack-rabbit
-      if he opened zem before you came.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guess it needed an old bandit like you to scare Jack Rover,&rdquo; replied
-      Dick, jocularly. But he was very happy&mdash;everything was going along
-      well&mdash;only another four-and-twenty hours now and his captivity would
-      be at an end.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      That night Dick could hardly sleep a wink, and next morning he was too
-      restless and impatient for his approaching liberation to keep within the
-      confines of the little grotto. In the darkness of the big central cavern
-      he walked up and down, casting occasional glances at the distant glow of
-      the log fire where, as he could see, both the aged squaw and the white
-      wolf were on vigilant and ceaseless guard.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Suddenly his steps were arrested. With great surprise he gazed toward the
-      log fire. There, with Guadalupe and the white wolf, stood the figure of a
-      strange man, cloaked and wearing a big sombrero. All their shapes were
-      outlined against the ruddy glow, and the monstrous beast was actually
-      fawning at the newcomer&rsquo;s feet. A moment later the stranger, with a
-      parting wave of his hand to Guadalupe, advanced toward the spot where Dick
-      was standing. Close by was an oil lantern set in a socket of the rock wall
-      to mark the entrance to the inner grotto.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      For a minute the approaching figure had been swallowed up in the darkness,
-      but now came the sound of his footsteps crunching on the sandy floor, and
-      a few seconds later he appeared in the flickering radiance. Dick
-      Willoughby had already made his inference as to the identity of the
-      newcomer&mdash;he had been so often told that no living man but the bandit
-      chief, Don Manuel, could pass the white wolf with impunity.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But the name Dick pronounced was quite a different one.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Senor Ricardo Robles&mdash;it is you&mdash;<i>you?</i>&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is I,&rdquo; replied the Spaniard, quietly, as he extended his hand.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then you are&mdash;Don Manuel&mdash;the&mdash;&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick faltered and paused.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, I am Don Manuel de Valencia, the outlaw, the bandit of Tehachapi,
-      the White Wolf, as he is commonly called. Come within, my friend. I have
-      matters of importance to communicate.&rdquo; And the visitor led the way with an
-      ease that showed his perfect familiarity with every opening and turning in
-      the great subterranean series of chambers.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I cannot remain with you very long,&rdquo; said Mr. Robles, when they were
-      seated in the inner grotto, &ldquo;for I have a number of things to attend to
-      during the few hours that still remain at my disposal.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I must not ask questions,&rdquo; remarked Dick, although his words belied the
-      questioning look in his eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, although I speak in confidence,&rdquo; Mr. Robles replied, &ldquo;having learned
-      to trust you, I shall make no secret of my contemplated movements. Tonight
-      I hope to settle my last score&rdquo;&mdash;he paused, then corrected himself&mdash;&ldquo;my
-      last piece of business in California. If all goes well, within twenty-four
-      hours I shall be on the high seas. Never mind my exact route, but my final
-      destination is Spain, the land of my fathers. There, perhaps, you and I
-      may meet again.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I hope so. I have come to be deeply interested in you, Mr. Robles.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And I in you, young man, all the more because you are now engaged to one
-      I hold very dear. Since her birth, Merle Farnsworth has been a&mdash;little
-      protégée of mine.&rdquo; Again he had hesitated, and his voice had vibrated from
-      emotion. But he was smiling now as he went on: &ldquo;I have watched with
-      sympathetic interest and approval the progress of your love affair.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Through your spy-glass on the tower?&rdquo; laughed Dick.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, partly in that way, perhaps,&rdquo; replied Mr. Robles, with eyebrows
-      humorously upraised. &ldquo;You have had my quiet support from beginning to end,
-      and now that you have won the young lady&rsquo;s heart, you have my most sincere
-      congratulations. May you have long years together, and every happiness.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He had clasped Dick&rsquo;s hand, and placed his disengaged hand affectionately
-      on the young man&rsquo;s shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You are really very kind,&rdquo; said Dick, cordially responding to the hand
-      clasp.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Because I have counted you worthy of your great good fortune in winning
-      such a girl as Merle. And I have taken much the same liking to your
-      friend, Chester Munson. Have you heard the news:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, but I can guess it.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, he and Grace Darlington are engaged. And to them I give my heartiest
-      blessing just as I have given it to you and Merle. For Grace, like her
-      adopted sister, has been always very dear to me. I have loved them both
-      very dearly indeed all through their young lives.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And both are devoted to you, as I happen to know,&rdquo; affirmed Dick with
-      warm conviction.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I believe it,&rdquo; replied Mr. Robles. His hand sought an inner pocket and
-      drew forth a legal-looking document. &ldquo;I came here not only to bid you
-      good-bye, but more important still to place this in your possession.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My release?&rdquo; exclaimed Dick eagerly, as his fingers closed on the paper.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, not exactly&mdash;but it will lead to that, never fear. It is an
-      affidavit which has been properly sworn to before a San Francisco notary
-      public. It briefly sets out my confession. It was I, Don Manuel de
-      Valencia, who killed Marshall Thurston, or at least was responsible for
-      his killing.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      As he spoke the words, the outlaw drew himself proudly erect. Dick was too
-      overwhelmed with amazement to reply.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The young ruffian was shot partly because he deserved his fate for
-      insulting Merle, partly because, as you cannot but know, Don Manuel, the
-      White Wolf, had sworn a vendetta against the whole Thurston brood.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then Ben Thurston&mdash;is he dead, too?&rdquo; gasped the listener.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not yet,&rdquo; was the grim reply. Then he paused and changed his tone.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But I want to speak not another word about this. What happens to Ben
-      Thurston is nothing of your concern&mdash;must be nothing of your concern.
-      For this document here frees you from all legal entanglements, and I have
-      no wish that you should by any chance become enmeshed again. So we dismiss
-      Ben Thurston from our talk and from our minds. When you lodge this paper
-      with the authorities at Bakersfield, it will be a matter only of a few
-      formalities to secure dismissal of the charge against you. For I even put
-      it on sworn record that your jail delivery that night was against your
-      will.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have forgotten to thank you for that same delivery. I never dreamed you
-      were my liberator, Mr. Robles.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Because that night I was Don Manuel de Valencia. But at present I am
-      Ricardo Robles, and in that capacity it is for me to thank you for having
-      so chivalrously protected our dear Merle from the necessity of associating
-      her name in any way with the death of that worthless young scoundrel. I
-      appreciate the cheerful manner in which you have, for her sake, and let me
-      add, for my sake, too, borne your long imprisonment here.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve been mighty comfortable,&rdquo; laughed Dick, with a glance around his
-      luxurious quarters. &ldquo;And Pierre Luzon has been a treasure&mdash;a good
-      comrade all the time.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ah, yes, Pierre,&rdquo; exclaimed the outlaw, musingly. &ldquo;Pierre is a very good
-      fellow. He has been faithful to me for thirty long years.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And where does he go after tonight?&rdquo; asked Dick. &ldquo;He cannot stay here,
-      all alone except for Guadalupe.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Everything is arranged. Guadalupe is accustomed to live alone. But
-      tonight Pierre accompanies me on my long journey.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So we may all meet again?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, we may all meet again,&rdquo; responded Robles, slowly and gravely, &ldquo;far,
-      far away from the Tehachapi mountains. But now I must go,&rdquo; he went on in a
-      brisk tone, &ldquo;for I have to make some final preparations. You have the
-      affidavit; see that you do not lose it on your ride down the mountains.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You just bet I won&rsquo;t,&rdquo; replied Dick, as he held tightly to the precious
-      document with both hands.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Pierre will come for you here early in the afternoon. Be prepared to go
-      with him then. As for myself, Willoughby, there is for the present only
-      one word more to be spoken. Adios!&rdquo; Again they clasped hands, and a moment
-      later Don Manuel was gone.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0031" id="link2HCH0031"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXXI&mdash;Shadows of the Past
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>N a little
-      summer-house at the edge of the rose garden of La Siesta, Tia Teresa was
-      seated all alone. She was awaiting the coming of Mr. Robles to a
-      rendezvous which he had arranged by a confidential message sent on the
-      previous evening. It wanted some time yet of the appointed hour, but in
-      her state of deep emotion and repressed excitement she had gladly sought
-      the solitude of this secluded corner. Deep in thought, her mind was
-      divided between the faraway past and the near-impending future.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Each recurring year this day to her had always been a sad and tragic
-      anniversary. In the early hours of the morning she had been to the old
-      Mexican cemetery on the hillside, and had bedecked with flowers the grave
-      marked by the marble cross bearing the single word &ldquo;Hermana,&rdquo; also the
-      graves close by of the parents of Don Manuel and Rosetta, the children she
-      had nursed and tended and fondled from infancy to early manhood and
-      womanhood, through twenty years of unalloyed happiness until the gringo
-      had come, the ancestral acres had been filched away, and dishonor and
-      death been brought to the slumbrously peaceful home.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And from that slumbrous peace what a sudden and terrible change! On this
-      day thirty years ago poor little Rosetta had been found done to death
-      beneath the precipice at Comanche Point. No less done to death by the
-      shock and shame of the pitiful story thus revealed, the aged parents of
-      the beautiful young girl were, within a few days, sleeping their long last
-      sleep by her side in the churchyard on the hill. A whole family blighted
-      and withered as by the blast of some death-laden sirocco.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Then had followed the years of terror during which Don Manuel, the White
-      Wolf, the dreaded outlaw, had wreaked his vengeance on the whole race of
-      gringos. She had never seen him all through that time, although at
-      intervals money had reached her by Pierre Luzon&rsquo;s trusted hand, enabling
-      her to maintain herself in the little Mexican village near the old fort of
-      Tejon. At last had come the fight when the band of outlaws had been
-      finally dispersed, Pierre Luzon wounded and dragged away to serve the rest
-      of his days in prison, Don Manuel vanished like a wraith in the mist, gone
-      where no man could tell.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But through the years that succeeded, Tia Teresa had known that he lived&mdash;had
-      known in her heart of hearts that he would live until the vendetta he had
-      sworn against Ben Thurston would be accomplished. The remittances that
-      arrived from time to time, first from Spain, then from England, needed no
-      signature to show that they were from her young master of former years and
-      that he still held his faithful old nurse in affectionate remembrance. And
-      at last had come the crowning surprise of all.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Tia Teresa had been bidden to come to Los Angeles by a letter which bore a
-      strange signature, but the handwriting of which she had immediately
-      recognized. And there, in a fine home beneath the foothills that skirt the
-      city to the north, she had found Don Manuel again, much older in manner
-      than by lapse of years&mdash;quiet, reserved, tinged with a sadness of
-      which she knew the cause, but happy withal, for he was married to a
-      beautiful English girl and had a little baby daughter. And as nurse to
-      this child Tia Teresa, to her great joy, was promptly installed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Thus again she had become the trusted servant in Don Manuel&rsquo;s home, the
-      only one around him possessing his full confidence and knowing the secret
-      story of his past. For, amid these changed surroundings, his name was
-      Ricardo Robles, his standing that of a Spaniard or Mexican of wealth, of
-      scholarly tastes, and devoted to the seclusion of his home with its
-      spacious surrounding gardens.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Their next door neighbors were an English family named Darlington, Mrs.
-      Darlington and Mrs. Robles having been life-long friends. And here, too,
-      was another tiny child in the home, likewise a daughter.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Seated in the summer-house, Tia Teresa was going over in her mind the
-      whole chain of happenings&mdash;the new era that had dawned and had
-      brought the hope of restored and abiding happiness for Don Manuel. But it
-      had been fated not so to be. Within a year his young wife had died, his
-      child was motherless, he himself, if not alone in the world, was
-      broken-hearted. For a spell he had fits of brooding, then all of a sudden
-      he had sold the home that could only henceforth be for him a place of
-      saddening memories.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      His daughter Merle, taking her English mother&rsquo;s maiden name of Farnsworth,
-      was transferred to the loving care of Mrs. Darlington. Thus had it come
-      about that Grace Darlington and Merle Farnsworth had been brought up as
-      sisters, with Tia Teresa their nurse, and in later years their devoted
-      attendant.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Ricardo Robles had resolved to travel, but Tia Teresa had quickly divined
-      that the vendetta was again in his heart. For no other reason could he
-      have decided on masking the paternity of his infant daughter by giving her
-      the maternal name. And from Tia Teresa Don Manuel had no secret to
-      conceal. &ldquo;Yes.&rdquo; He had sworn he would hunt Ben Thurston through Europe,
-      and it was to protect the future life of his child from any association
-      with future consequences of the blood feud that he had handed her over to
-      his friends under their solemn promise that, as Merle grew up, she should
-      never know anything more than that both her parents had died.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      So once again Don Manuel had gone his way and disappeared. Some years
-      later the Darlington home had been transferred to England, where Mr.
-      Darlington had fallen heir to some ancestral estates. Again, after a lapse
-      of years, another change had occurred&mdash;Mr. Darlington dying, and Mrs.
-      Darlington being left a widow in the big, now gloomy, English
-      country-house, with Grace and Merle approaching young womanhood, and all
-      of them, Tia Teresa included, longing again for the sunshine of
-      California.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Intermittently during those years in England, Ricardo Robles had visited
-      his friends, but the secret about his real relationship to Merle had
-      always been preserved. Both daughters in the home had been brought up
-      alike to regard him simply as a dear and valued friend, whose comings
-      brought much happiness to their lives in the shape of gifts which
-      preserved fond memories during his prolonged spells of absence.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And while the little family was still plunged in deep sorrow for the death
-      of Mr. Darlington, Mr. Robles had reappeared as the messenger of great
-      joy. For he brought the news that the beautiful rancho of La Siesta, lying
-      in mid-California, among the foothills of the Tejon Valley, had been
-      purchased for the express purpose that the widow and children should make
-      it their future place of abode. In this way had come about the return to
-      the land which each and all already loved best and regarded as truly
-      &ldquo;home.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Five years ago!&rdquo; murmured Tia Teresa pensively. And they had been all so
-      happy here, the young girls growing up with every accomplishment money and
-      the best governesses could bestow, Don Manuel not far away watching the
-      progress and developing beauty of his daughter, always hovering near for
-      acts of helpful kindness.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Five years of placid enjoyment, of unbroken tranquility, till all of a
-      sudden the old enemy had returned and all the rankling wounds of the old
-      vendetta had been reopened!
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      In the Spanish soul of Tia Teresa there was bitter hate still, and fierce
-      joy even now that the hour of retribution was approaching&mdash;that at
-      last after all those years her little Rosetta would be avenged. Yet time
-      had had some mellowing influences, for in her musings now she experienced
-      a vague sense of uneasiness for possible consequences that in former times
-      had never for a moment been tolerated. The true spirit of the vendetta had
-      always been in her very blood&mdash;strike when you can, without thought
-      of what may happen next.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But now she was thinking of coming happenings&mdash;of sorrow perhaps for
-      Merle, of the undoubted danger for Don Manuel himself.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And while thus she conned the chances, her head bent in deep meditation,
-      her eyes half closed, Ricardo Robles, approaching with noiseless step,
-      stood by her side and laid an affectionate hand upon her shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have come, Tia Teresa,&rdquo; he said simply, as he sat down at the edge of
-      the little rustic table.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0032" id="link2HCH0032"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXXII&mdash;Forebodings
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">F</span>OR this last hour,
-      Don Manuel,&rdquo; she said, placing a hand on his, &ldquo;I have been going over all
-      the long story of the past, from the days when you were a little boy and
-      Rosetta was suckled at my bosom. Why should I not have loved her?&rdquo; asked
-      the old duenna almost fiercely. &ldquo;Why should I not love her still?&rdquo; she
-      added, in a lower tone, as she bowed her head and covered her eyes with
-      her disengaged hand. &ldquo;There is love that can never die, Don Manuel.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Nor should we wish it otherwise,&rdquo; he said gently, caressing the hand
-      extended toward him. &ldquo;And this very night our undying love for dear little
-      Rosetta will be proved&mdash;tonight at last she will be avenged.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      With a start Tia Teresa sat erect.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then it is all arranged?&rdquo; she asked breathlessly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, all finally arranged,&rdquo; was his quiet rejoinder. &ldquo;We meet this
-      evening on Comanche Point&mdash;the place where I have always vowed he
-      should answer for his crime. And you remember what day this is?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I remember&mdash;can I ever forget?&mdash;the very day we found her dead
-      beneath the cliff.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The very day, Tia Teresa. So my vengeance will be complete. Before now I
-      could have shot him a dozen times. But he would never have known that his
-      death was by my hand. Tonight, however, he will know. And he will realize
-      that the vendetta is the law of God&mdash;an eye for an eye, a tooth for a
-      tooth; his life, so precious to himself, for hers so dear to us in the
-      happy old-time days.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But you, Don Manuel?&rdquo; she asked fearfully.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It does not matter much about me,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;But all the same I have
-      come to speak a little in regard to myself. Tonight Ben Thurston assuredly
-      will die, and should I perish with him, the story of the vendetta cannot
-      fail to be revived and the identity of the recluse, Ricardo Robles, with
-      Don Manuel, the outlaw, will be established. This will come as a great
-      shock to all my dear friends at La Siesta&mdash;to Mrs. Darlington as well
-      as to Grace and Merle. But this counts for little&mdash;the name of Don
-      Manuel is just as honorable a name as that of Robles. And you can tell
-      them further that all the loot I ever took from the gringos lies today
-      untouched in Joaquin Murietta&rsquo;s cave. I sullied my hands with none of it.
-      I was made rich by the sale of, my ancestral estates in Spain. And that
-      wealth the law cannot confiscate, for I have been only its trustee during
-      all those years. Everything I possess has been vested from the first in
-      the names of Merle Farnsworth and Grace Darlington.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Grace as well?&rdquo; murmured Tia Teresa, enquiringly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Certainly, for I love both the girls dearly; there is ample to divide
-      between them, and by ranking them together I guard Merle from the thought
-      that I was anything more to her than to Grace. To both alike I was just a
-      deeply attached friend.&rdquo; He paused a moment, then regarded Tia Teresa
-      fixedly. &ldquo;For my little girl must never know that her father was an
-      outlaw, with a price on his head; yes, with blood on his hands, if it is
-      only the blood of the worthless Thurston breed.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That is no stain&mdash;it is an honor&mdash;it is a duty that you owed,&rdquo;
-       exclaimed the duenna with fervency, her hands clenched against her bosom
-      as she spoke.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You understand&mdash;we understand the vendetta, you and I, Tia Teresa.
-      But the Americanos do not understand. And I have brought up my little girl
-      as an American, for her own happiness I long ago realized. So she would
-      never understand. When she comes to know that her old friend Ricardo
-      Robles was Don Manuel de Valencia as well, she will breathe a gentle
-      prayer of rest for his soul. But she will not be distressed by the
-      knowledge that her father was the bandit and outlaw&mdash;she will not
-      have to face the cruel world with that stigma attached to her name. For
-      that I have contrived, for that I have suffered the dumb agony of
-      childlessness all these years.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And that, in God&rsquo;s name,&rdquo; exclaimed Tia Teresa, &ldquo;is part of the price Ben
-      Thurston, thrice accursed, has to pay.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And tonight will pay,&rdquo; responded Don Manuel, determinedly. &ldquo;But I speak
-      of all this just to put you on your guard. It will be necessary for me to
-      say something to Mrs. Darlington as well. I have brought for her the
-      papers that will establish the rights of Merle and Grace to all I leave
-      behind.&rdquo; As he spoke he touched his coat where the shape of a packet in an
-      inner pocket showed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Your will?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No. As I have explained, I require no will. The property is theirs
-      already. And I do not need to tell you, my dear Tia Teresa, my beloved
-      friend, that you, too, have not been forgotten.&rdquo; As he spoke he raised her
-      hand and pressed it reverently to his lips.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t speak like that, Don Manuel,&rdquo; she protested.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I know that all I owe to you can never be repaid,&rdquo; he continued, humbly,
-      gratefully&mdash;&ldquo;the devoted life-service for me and for Rosetta and our
-      beloved parents as well.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Again he kissed her hand, and this time she accepted the seal of his
-      high-souled and chivalrous regard. There were tears in her eyes now.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But, Don Manuel, you need not die tonight. Death for him&mdash;that is
-      right. But why for you?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Perhaps not for me&mdash;most certainly,&rdquo; he replied with a little,
-      reassuring smile. &ldquo;Oh, do not imagine that I deliberately court death for
-      tonight. On the contrary, I have all my plans carefully laid. An
-      automobile is ready for the road, and I have a yacht waiting for me at a
-      quiet spot on the coast, and if all is well, by tomorrow&rsquo;s dawn Pierre and
-      I will be on the ocean. No one around here except at La Siesta will miss
-      Ricardo Robles, and if the name of Don Manuel is associated with the death
-      of Ben Thurston, only once more will the White Wolf have strangely
-      disappeared just as he used to do in the old times.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He was laughing, not loudly, but just with carefree, almost joyous
-      triumph, as he rose to say good-bye.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then, Tia Teresa, if events work out just as I have planned, we may all
-      meet again, somewhere, somehow&mdash;I cannot say more at present. For I
-      shall be happy to see my little girl happy in her married love, and later
-      on I shall close my eyes contentedly when I can feel assured that nothing
-      from the past will ever emerge to spoil her life or bring to her distress
-      of mind.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Tia Teresa, too, had arisen.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;God grant it may be so,&rdquo; she fervently exclaimed. &ldquo;But somehow my mind
-      misgives me. Today I am softened as I have never been before. Even for the
-      sake of our dear Rosetta in Heaven I feel inclined to plead with you to
-      let Thurston go his way and the vendetta be forgotten.&rdquo; And she clung to
-      his arm imploringly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Never!&rdquo; cried Don Manuel, putting her gently but resolutely aside. &ldquo;That
-      can never be, Tia Teresa. You know it. A vow sworn over my wronged and
-      murdered sister&rsquo;s grave, over the graves of my parents as well, must be
-      fulfilled. To break it at the very moment when it is in my power to give
-      it fulfillment would be the act of a coward&mdash;a sacrilege that could
-      never be atoned. No more words like that. I must not even listen.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      She was sobbing as she dropped back into her chair. Her silence was the
-      confession that she was powerless to argue against the unwritten law of
-      the vendetta.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So I kiss you good-bye for the present, Tia Teresa.&rdquo; He suited the action
-      to the word, and, stooping, saluted her first on one cheek, then on the
-      other. &ldquo;Be your old brave and resolute self again. Where shall I find Mrs.
-      Darlington?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Alone in her boudoir. This is her day for correspondence,&rdquo; replied the
-      duenna, resolutely striving to repress her tears.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then I&rsquo;ll leave you here. Let your best wishes go with me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Almost lightly he touched her hand and was gone, disappearing among the
-      roses.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Tia Teresa bowed her head across her folded arms. She was thinking not of
-      the past now, but solely of the future.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How would it all end?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0033" id="link2HCH0033"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXXIII&mdash;Old Friends
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span>M glad to find you
-      alone,&rdquo; spoke Mr. Robles, as he advanced into the subdued light of Mrs.
-      Darlington&rsquo;s boudoir.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      She was seated at her escritoire. Around her were letters lying open for
-      answer, others sealed and ready for the mail, also sundry books of account
-      which indicated that the chatelaine of La Siesta was a business woman who
-      paid attention to the running of her household and the management of her
-      estate.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Always so pleased to see you,&rdquo; she replied, as she rose to give her
-      visitor welcome.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Pray, keep your seat, Mrs. Darlington. You form an attractive picture&mdash;the
-      lady who is not too much of a lady to neglect her correspondence and her
-      business affairs. And it is about some business matters that I have come
-      to talk with you this evening.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      She smiled pleasedly over the compliment paid in the old-fashioned courtly
-      style of the true Spanish grandee. She herself always suggested the
-      old-time, old-world lady of fashion&mdash;one belonging to the old lace
-      and sweet lavender era that has so nearly passed away.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Business matters?&rdquo; echoed Mrs. Darlington. &ldquo;That sounds quite serious. We
-      have had no cause to talk business for years and years. La Siesta has
-      certainly justified its name.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But even the most pleasant siesta must in time come to an end,&rdquo; he
-      replied with a grave smile. &ldquo;There are things in this world that must be
-      accomplished&mdash;calls of duty that interfere sadly with continuous
-      repose. I am leaving tonight on a journey&mdash;perhaps a long journey,&rdquo;
-       he added slowly and thoughtfully.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, going abroad? The wanderlust again? That&rsquo;s too bad. We shall all miss
-      you so much.&rdquo; She spoke the words with real concern in her tone and in her
-      eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not exactly the wanderlust,&rdquo; he responded. &ldquo;But there is a certain task I
-      must perform. And it takes me away&mdash;far away from your delightful La
-      Siesta.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And for a long time?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That will be decided by events. I shall write you a long letter when once
-      I am on the ocean. Meanwhile there are certain documents I wish to leave
-      in your charge, my good kind friend.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He drew the packet from the breast pocket of his coat. &ldquo;They are important
-      papers, and I wish them to be locked in your safe.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Under seal, I see,&rdquo; she remarked, indicating the big circle of wax that
-      closed the cover.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, sealed with my signet,&rdquo; he answered, touching the ring on his
-      finger. &ldquo;But all the same I wish you to know the nature of their contents.
-      That is why I have sought this little private talk.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Silently she settled herself to listen, and he went on:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You are aware that many years ago I sold out all my interests in Spain&mdash;lands
-      and flocks and mines. Well, except for the money I used in building and
-      furnishing my home, I invested the whole amount so realized in British
-      Government bonds. But not in my own name. They stand in the names of Merle
-      Farnsworth and Grace Darlington.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Mrs. Darlington showed some surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Merle, of course. But why Grace, Mr. Robles? I need not tell you that she
-      is already well provided for.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That I fully understand. But I preferred it so. To me both children were
-      very dear, and have always continued to be very dear. There was more than
-      a sufficiency to divide. I wished them to share my patrimony, even though
-      the one might have a greater claim on me than the other. But it was
-      precisely, to guard against such a thought occurring to the mind of any
-      outsider that I have treated Merle and Grace exactly alike. The secret
-      that Merle is my daughter is known only to you and Tia Teresa and me, and,
-      as I have always wished, it must be kept from Merle herself and from all
-      others&mdash;now, more than ever,&rdquo; he added after a little pause.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have never sought to pry into this mystery,&rdquo; replied Mrs. Darlington.
-      &ldquo;You had valid reasons for it, I well understood. But I was glad for the
-      wee baby&rsquo;s sake to take her to my heart&mdash;the child of the dearest
-      friend of my girlhood days. And it was nice, too, for her to have her
-      mother&rsquo;s maiden name&mdash;Merle Farnsworth. So, from the very first, I
-      loved her just as much as my own baby, Grace.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That I know,&rdquo; said Robles, gratefully touching her hand. &ldquo;I can never
-      adequately thank you for the mother love you have so generously bestowed
-      on my child. And I have always been grateful, too, for the chivalrous
-      manner in which you have never sought to have me explain my actions in
-      this matter&mdash;my virtual separation from the daughter whom, while
-      hiding our relationship, I have loved all through her young life with
-      passionate devotion.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Mr. Robles was deeply moved. He bowed his head and covered his eyes with
-      his hand. In sympathy, Mrs. Darlington also was greatly affected.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You have been the best of fathers to Merle,&rdquo; she said in a trembling
-      voice, &ldquo;even though Merle little dreams of what she really means to your
-      life. But oh, Mr. Robles, how often have I not pitied you when I have seen
-      you restraining in her presence the natural impulses of your heart!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It was my duty,&rdquo; he replied, regaining his composure by stern
-      self-command and sitting erect again. &ldquo;My bounden duty to her,&rdquo; he added,
-      resolutely. &ldquo;So, as you have so kindly done before, we shall leave that
-      subject alone. You call it a mystery. Be it so. Just let it abide a
-      mystery to the end. Now, Mrs. Darlington,&rdquo; he went on in a changed tone,
-      &ldquo;please lock up these papers. If I ever want them again I shall come to
-      you. But if anything should happen to me, the seal is to be broken. You
-      are my trustee. But there is no troublesome will to prove and execute. As
-      I have already indicated, all the property I die possessed of, all the
-      property that is inalienably and rightfully mine, including my home on the
-      hill&mdash;everything is already apportioned between Merle and Grace, and
-      stands in their names by a deed that dates back almost to their days of
-      infancy.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is unheard-of generosity,&rdquo; protested Mrs. Darlington. &ldquo;I mean so far
-      as Grace is concerned.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not another word, I beg of you. I have already given valid reasons
-      besides those of affection and gratitude. Now, Mrs. Darlington, let me see
-      you lock up these documents, and my mind will be at rest.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Without further speech she took the packet of papers from his hand,
-      crossed the room, and, standing before a safe inset into the wall and
-      already open, deposited the papers in a little drawer. Then she swung back
-      the safe door, and the click of the combination as she turned the knob
-      told that her visitor&rsquo;s wishes had been fully complied with. Slowly she
-      returned to her seat at the desk.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Thank you,&rdquo; said Mr. Robles, pressing her hand.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then I am not to ask why you are leaving us tonight?&rdquo; enquired Mrs.
-      Darlington.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Please not. I just came to you, as I have many times done before, to
-      speak the little word&mdash;<i>Adios</i>. And it has always been spoken
-      brightly between us, my dear friend. For have I not returned again and
-      again like the proverbial bad penny?&rdquo; he continued with a smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And so it will be yet again, I hope,&rdquo; she replied. &ldquo;Bad pennies of your
-      kind, Mr. Robles, are better than minted gold. And you must think of the
-      young people. Engagements should not be too long. Everything is settled so
-      far as Dick and Merle are concerned&mdash;with your full approval?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;With my fullest approval, and to my great joy and peace of mind.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, and you know, too, that it is just the same old story as regards
-      Chester Munson and my little girl.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Munson has so informed me. He wanted my congratulations on his good
-      fortune. Chester Munson is certainly a fine fellow, and Grace could have
-      made no better choice for the bestowal of her love. Again I am filled with
-      happiness at the turn events have taken.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But if there are to be wedding bells for four, their peal will not be so
-      joyous if you are absent, my dear Mr. Robles.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I shall try to be present,&rdquo; he replied, with a little wistful smile. &ldquo;Who
-      knows? Wouldn&rsquo;t it be fine if the wedding bells were to ring in Spain?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no, my friend. You forget that all four are young Americans. The
-      honeymoons in Spain, if you like. But the weddings in California, please.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So be it,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;Then if I cannot get back for the wedding bells,
-      we may have a family reunion during the honeymoons.&rdquo; He laughed almost
-      gaily as he rose. &ldquo;Now, where are our young Americans? I wish to say
-      good-bye to them, too.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Where Dick Willoughby is, I cannot say. But he is safe&mdash;you still
-      assure me of his safety, Mr. Robles?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Assuredly. And I have good news for our dear Merle. Tomorrow Willoughby
-      will be free, with every suspicion removed from his name.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, that will be glad tidings indeed for Merle&mdash;for both the girls.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then let us take the news to them. Where shall we find them?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;As usual, I fancy, in their favorite cosy corner. And Mr. Munson is here,
-      too. He is to have luncheon with us. He said you had given him a day off
-      from his onerous library duties.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Quite correct. I told him I would meet him here, for I have a message for
-      him as well. Come then, let us join the young people.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Again, like the courtly hidalgo, he presented a hand to his hostess and
-      led her from the room.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0034" id="link2HCH0034"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXXIV&mdash;Heart Searchings
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span>S Mrs. Darlington
-      had anticipated, the trio of young Americans were discovered in the cosy
-      corner. Grace and Munson were engaged in a tête-à-tête that was obviously
-      very delightful to themselves, while Merle at a discreet distance was
-      busily engaged in watering the pot plants and flowers. She was the first
-      to sound a note of warning.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Here comes mother, and Mr. Robles, also, I do declare.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The young lovers started a little apart, and Grace in a moment was
-      demurely busy over a bit of sewing that had been resting undisturbed in
-      her lap during the previous half hour.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle advanced toward Mr. Robles.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;This is delightful,&rdquo; she exclaimed, as she warmly shook hands. &ldquo;You will
-      stay to luncheon, of course.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, my dear. This is to be only a brief visit, I am sorry to say.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Grace had also come forward, and he saluted her in his usual quiet, kindly
-      manner. But for Munson he had a word of sly banter.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Better than drilling a squad or cataloguing musty old books,&rdquo; he
-      remarked, bestowing a significant side glance in Grace&rsquo;s direction.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Infinitely better,&rdquo; replied the ex-soldier and amateur librarian, with
-      frank and unabashed satisfaction.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Mr. Robles took a seat close to Merle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I came to bring you two pieces of news,&rdquo; he said, taking her hand, yet
-      addressing his words to all the company. &ldquo;First and foremost, by tomorrow
-      the charge against Dick Willoughby will be withdrawn, and he will be a
-      free man.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, that is good news indeed,&rdquo; cried Merle, fairly hugging its bearer.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then they have at last discovered the murderer of young Thurston?&rdquo;
-       enquired Munson in a tone of eager satisfaction.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, or rather he has discovered himself, I believe. Oh, you need not ask
-      me for the name. It will only be made public when Willoughby formally
-      claims his liberty.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I am so thankful,&rdquo; murmured Grace. &ldquo;But of course Dick&rsquo;s complete
-      exoneration was bound to come.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And I am the bearer of a special message to you, Mr. Munson. I have not
-      read it. But it was given to me as the one most likely to get it promptly
-      into your hands.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Speaking thus, he passed over to Munson the hasty scrawl that Dick had
-      written in the cavern and entrusted to Pierre Luzon for delivery.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson ripped open the envelope, first scanned the contents, then read
-      aloud:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;On Tuesday night next, about six o&rsquo;clock, meet me at Buck Ashley&rsquo;s old
-      store. I shall want you to ride over to Bakersfield with me next morning,
-      where my acquittal is assured. Give Merle the glad news. Yours, Dick.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That I have already been privileged to do,&rdquo; said Mr. Robles, as he smiled
-      down on the young girl by his side. Their eyes met, and a look of grave
-      earnestness came into Merle&rsquo;s.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And the second item of news, Mr. Robles?&rdquo; she asked, in a low tone. &ldquo;I
-      hope it is also gladsome tidings.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, it is of comparative unimportance,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;Simply that I am
-      going away on a long journey, and may not see all you happy young people
-      again for quite awhile.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle&rsquo;s face fell. &ldquo;I am so sorry,&rdquo; she murmured, a note of real feeling
-      in the softly-spoken words.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;As you grow older you will realize that the world is full of partings,
-      Merle,&rdquo; he answered.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But why should there be partings among us?&rdquo; she protested. &ldquo;Now that Dick
-      is free, there is not a shadow on all our happiness. And we do so wish you
-      to share it, Mr. Robles. It will not be just the same if you are gone.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is very kind of you to think like that.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s just how we all think,&rdquo; interjected Grace. &ldquo;But when duty calls,
-      one must needs answer,&rdquo; replied Robles. &ldquo;Right there is an end to all
-      argument.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And where are you going this time, Mr. Robles?&rdquo; enquired Merle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;On a long journey&mdash;as far as Europe, I hope. But my plans are not
-      quite certain, except that I start tonight. However, I shall be in
-      correspondence with Mrs. Darlington, and I trust that when you young
-      people come to make that contemplated foreign tour, your footsteps will be
-      turned in my direction. Meanwhile you have, all of you, as you already
-      know, my warmest congratulations and heartiest good wishes.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      As he spoke, Mr. Robles rose. His manner indicated that he wished no
-      further questioning. After a comprehensive glance around, he advanced,
-      first of all, to Munson and extended his hand.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mr. Munson, you will receive a letter tomorrow that contains an offer for
-      you to continue your work in my library, which I hope will prove
-      acceptable, at least for the present. Grace, my dear, I take the liberty
-      of an old friend.&rdquo; And he kissed her brow. &ldquo;With your mother I already
-      have had a good long talk,&rdquo; he continued, as he pressed Mrs. Darlington&rsquo;s
-      hand and looked into her eyes. &ldquo;And now, Merle, dear, I am going to ask
-      you to gather me some roses in your garden. I want them for a particular
-      purpose, and, as you know, there are no roses like those of La Siesta.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle was standing eager and happy to do his bidding&mdash;privileged to
-      have the chance of conferring such a little service on her dear old
-      friend, her friend from the earliest childhood days of her remembrance.
-      With impulsive good-nature, Grace was ready to help as well. But a quiet
-      look from her mother restrained her, and Merle and Mr. Robles passed from
-      the verandah, hand in hand.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      For nearly an hour they wandered among the rose bushes, picking the
-      choicest blooms, talking a little on many things, silent at times, but
-      both happy in each other&rsquo;s companionship. At last Mr. Robles looked at his
-      watch. The hour of parting had come.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle had deftly tied the roses in a bunch, and now she placed them in his
-      hands.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A bouquet from me&mdash;from your little friend Merle,&rdquo; she murmured,
-      with a wistful attempt at a smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;From my dear little friend, Merle,&rdquo; he replied, gravely repeating her
-      words as he looked down into her upraised face. It was a beautiful face,
-      in its fresh youthfulness, its eager joy of living, the sublime
-      unconsciousness of self that reveals the spotless soul. For an instant
-      their eyes met.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      During that brief spell Robles&rsquo; whole being trembled. His arms moved as if
-      to enfold the sweet girl to his breast. But with a mighty effort he
-      controlled himself, and he simply kissed her on the brow, just as he had
-      done to Grace in the cosy corner.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;God bless you, Merle, my dear,&rdquo; he murmured as he turned away with a
-      final wave of his hand.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      In a moment he was gone from her view. But the girl&rsquo;s gaze remained fixed&mdash;still
-      directed down the avenue of trees along which the figure of her life-long
-      friend had disappeared. There was a look of dazed wonderment in her eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, can it be so&mdash;could it be so?&rdquo; she faltered, as she raised a
-      hand to hold back the tears.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      An hour later Robles was in the little Mexican churchyard, scattering the
-      rose blooms gathered by his daughter Merle on the graves of the dead
-      relatives whose names she would never know as such. Already there were the
-      flowers that Tia Teresa had that morning brought&mdash;a garland of white
-      arum lilies around the cross that marked the sleeping place of Rosetta,
-      wreaths of rich red carnations on the tombstone inscribed with the
-      father&rsquo;s and the mother&rsquo;s names.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And now on the turf beneath the memorials Don Manuel, with lingering
-      fingers, dropped the roses here and there, as if to rest with their beauty
-      and their fragrance on the forms of his beloved dead. The last bloom
-      fluttered to the ground. Then, standing erect, hands upraised, no words
-      uttered, but with the unspoken words none the less reverberating through
-      his very soul, he vowed once again the vendetta which he had sworn on the
-      identical spot thirty long years before.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      When he turned to leave the tiny hamlet of the dead, a wonderful
-      transformation had come over his countenance. The placid calm was gone;
-      the fierce fire of implacable hatred and unswervable resolve burned in his
-      eyes. He had bidden adieu to all the softer things in this life. His sole
-      concern now was with the enemy whom he had marked down for death that
-      night.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0035" id="link2HCH0035"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXXV&mdash;At Comanche Point
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">B</span>EN THURSTON,
-      during the afternoon, seated in his big armchair, had first nodded over a
-      newspaper and then dropped off to sleep. He was awakened by a touch on the
-      shoulder&mdash;rudely awakened, for he jumped to his feet, and in a dazed
-      way glared at the disturber.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Excuse me,&rdquo; apologized Leach Sharkey, &ldquo;but I want to remind you that this
-      is the afternoon when we are to meet that old Portugee I told you about.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I need no reminder,&rdquo; was the gruff reply. &ldquo;I am ready to start when you
-      are. By the way, what&rsquo;s the fellow&rsquo;s name?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;José, he said. He claims to know every nook and corner in the range. Has
-      lived in the mountains for many years; keeps goats and bees, and shoots a
-      mountain lion occasionally, earning the bounty as well as getting the
-      skin.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Shoots,&rdquo; echoed Thurston, somewhat nervously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, that was in his younger days mostly, I fancy. Today he is a tottering
-      old man who couldn&rsquo;t hold a rifle straight if he tried. But he&rsquo;s well
-      acquainted with the mountains, that&rsquo;s the main thing. He tells me he has
-      known where Dick Willoughby is hiding since the very day after he broke
-      jail.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then why didn&rsquo;t he come to me?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Because he knew nothing about the reward. But at our very first chance
-      meeting among the hills I very soon made five thousand dollars look mighty
-      good to him. By gad, you should have seen his eyes pop and his hands
-      tremble.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is a fortune for such a man.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s what got him. He has been supplying Willoughby with goats&rsquo; milk,
-      but is paid only two bits a quart. So he grabbed at my bait like a hungry
-      coyote. You have the money ready, I suppose? Treasury bills&mdash;that&rsquo;s
-      what he stipulated for, because he&rsquo;s too frail to hump a sack of gold
-      around.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The money is in that wallet on my desk. You had better carry it.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey stepped across the room and shoved a fat leather wallet into the
-      breast pocket of his coat.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So frail, is he?&rdquo; Thurston went on, musingly. &ldquo;Well, I needn&rsquo;t take a
-      gun.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey smiled. He knew Ben Thurston&rsquo;s timidity in even handling a
-      revolver, and the man&rsquo;s abject reliance on his armed bodyguard.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not the slightest necessity,&rdquo; assented the sleuth. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve always got my
-      brace of bulldogs ready;&rdquo; and the professional gunman, touching the broad
-      leather belt to which his holsters were attached, grinned complacently.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And no danger to be feared from Willoughby himself, you said?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;None whatever. In fact, he don&rsquo;t have a gun, José declares. So he only
-      sneaks out after dark for a constitutional. The old fellow will take us to
-      the spot where we can grab him by the neck.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That sounds like business,&rdquo; replied Thurston, rubbing his hands. &ldquo;And
-      shoot him down, Sharkey, if he runs.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He won&rsquo;t give us the slip this time&mdash;you can bet dollars to
-      doughnuts on that. But of course he&rsquo;s got to have the chance of hands-up
-      before I fire. Killing is killing, and I prefer the handcuffs. There is
-      really less trouble in the long run.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, perhaps I, too, would prefer to see him hanged,&rdquo; murmured Thurston,
-      with gloating satisfaction. &ldquo;But don&rsquo;t forget that we must get him this
-      afternoon, dead or alive. I&rsquo;m sick of this life of watching and waiting.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The end&rsquo;s in sight at last.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then we&rsquo;ll go back East&mdash;after I have had my revenge. It will be
-      sweeter to me after all the trouble we&rsquo;ve encountered. And by God, we&rsquo;ll
-      drag that Farnsworth girl, too, through the mire. Hell to all of them!
-      I&rsquo;ve never had anyone but enemies around me here.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      While speaking, Thurston reached for his overcoat thrown across the back
-      of a chair.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;All right, we&rsquo;ll start,&rdquo; said Sharkey. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll go and get the horses
-      ready.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      It was about half past three o&rsquo;clock when the riders reached the base of
-      the mountain barrier not far from the entrance to Tejon Pass.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ve got to make it on foot now,&rdquo; remarked Sharkey, as he swung himself
-      from the saddle. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll tether the horses to this manzanita.&rdquo; Thurston
-      dismounted, and while his companion led the animals under the trees, he
-      gazed aloft at the precipice beetling in front of them.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Damn it, I wish you had chosen any other place than Comanche Point,&rdquo; he
-      exclaimed irritably.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We had to come to the spot where we can find our man,&rdquo; replied Sharkey
-      complacently. &ldquo;It is on the ridge above that Willoughby has his place of
-      hiding. Come along, we have a good stiff climb before us.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He led the way up the first slope of the winding trail and Ben Thurston
-      followed, reluctantly now, half doubting the wisdom of his having left his
-      home for such an adventure.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Meanwhile there had been two other riders on the range that afternoon,
-      mounted on little hill ponies. The one man was blindfolded; the other rode
-      in advance and guided the second pony by a leading rein. It had been the
-      usual experience to which Dick Willoughby had now become accustomed&mdash;hour
-      after hour along winding, maze-like trails. At last the call had come to
-      dismount, and the bandage had been removed from Dick&rsquo;s eyes. He saw that
-      he was in a little box-like nook in the mountains.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You will remain here,&rdquo; said Pierre Luzon, &ldquo;until I whistle for you&mdash;you
-      know my signal. Zen you will lead ze ponies along zis path. When you come
-      to me, I will put you on ze road for home, and we will say good-bye.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I suppose I may smoke,&rdquo; laughed Dick, philosophically. The day of
-      surprises had left him dulled to any further wonderment.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Sure, smoke,&rdquo; replied Pierre. &ldquo;But remember ze forest regulations,&rdquo; he
-      added with a chuckle, &ldquo;and do not set ze brush on fire.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m no green tenderfoot,&rdquo; laughed
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Willoughby, as he drew his briar-root from his pocket. &ldquo;And it&rsquo;s quite a
-      balmy afternoon for October.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He sat down and propped his back against a moss-grown rock.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You must not stir from here,&rdquo; continued Pierre. &ldquo;Remember I have to find
-      you again.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guess I&rsquo;ve learned to obey orders. I&rsquo;m quite comfortable where I am.&rdquo; And
-      Dick started contentedly smoking.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre, following the little path to which he had drawn Dick&rsquo;s attention,
-      pushed through the brushwood and disappeared.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Just ten minutes later Pierre Luzon stood on Comanche Point and gazed down
-      the trail leading up from the pass below.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Zey are coming, zey are coming!&rdquo; he exclaimed eagerly to himself, with
-      finger outpointed in the direction of the two climbers on foot half way up
-      the ascent. Then he slipped back into the shadow of a clump of stunted
-      pines that grew close to the cliff.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Fifteen minutes or so passed. Then the heads of Ben Thurston and Leach
-      Sharkey showed above the final steep ascent that led directly on to the
-      projecting spur known as Comanche Point. Thurston was breathing hard after
-      the difficult climb.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Here we are at last,&rdquo; remarked Sharkey cheerfully, as he glanced around.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Even as he spoke, a tottering figure came forth from among the pines. A
-      few minutes before, Pierre Luzon had been erect and vigorous and nimble on
-      his feet, but now he seemed to be indeed a frail and bowed old man.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have come,&rdquo; he said, as he approached the figures on the cliff.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hands up, then,&rdquo; cried the sleuth, half laughing. &ldquo;You remember, I said I
-      would search you for a gun.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have no gun,&rdquo; Pierre answered, as he halted and elevated his arms.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey advanced and, without taking the trouble to draw either of his own
-      weapons, ran his fingers with the quick touch of experience over the old
-      man&rsquo;s clothes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I knew you were on the square, José,&rdquo; said the bodyguard, quickly
-      satisfied. &ldquo;Well, I&rsquo;ve brought the mazuma.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He drew from his pocket the fat wallet, opening it for a moment to display
-      the wads of greenbacks. Then he put it back again.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Now where is our man?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He is down here, just a little distance,&rdquo; replied Pierre, in a cautious
-      whisper. &ldquo;I am not strong enough to hold him. But you come. Ze boss, he
-      can remain here for ze present.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Ben Thurston had turned away and was looking down into the valley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll be back in a short time,&rdquo; called out Sharkey.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But Thurston, if he had heard, made no reply.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Now show the way, old fellow,&rdquo; continued the sleuth, addressing his
-      guide.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      A moment later Ben Thurston was alone.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Alone on Comanche Point&mdash;gazing over the broad sweep of lands that
-      had been his princely heritage, but which he had now lost forever! The
-      valley lay beneath him, bathed in the mellow evening sunshine. But his
-      eyes were riveted on a single spot. And what a transformation scene for
-      the erstwhile cattle king&mdash;this new city with its checkerboard of
-      streets and all around it new homes amid plots of young fruit trees and
-      meadows of alfalfa!
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The whole picture was one of fascinating beauty&mdash;the city itself the
-      finishing touch that gave it human interest. But in Ben Thurston&rsquo;s soul
-      there was nothing but bitterness and disgust. He had kept on complaining
-      that he had been unscrupulously plundered by the Los Angeles syndicate,
-      and with the realization now of what enterprise and enlightened progress
-      could achieve, he began to feel that he had been mercilessly stripped of
-      what was rightfully his. Greed and envy and vain regrets were all
-      commingled in his surge of envenomed thoughts. But avarice predominated.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good God, to think I parted with the rancho at a beggarly acreage price,
-      when I might have been selling town lots today. There will be a dozen
-      other towns springing up to follow this one.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      In his agony he groaned aloud and covered his eyes with his hands to shut
-      out the hateful sight.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Just at that moment the sound of a twig crackling underfoot smote his ear.
-      He turned round; into his face stole an ashen look of terror as he watched
-      an approaching figure wrapped in a Spanish cloak and crowned by a
-      broad-brimmed sombrero. His haggard eyes asked: &ldquo;Is it man or ghost?&rdquo; He
-      would have screamed aloud, but found himself voiceless from fear.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At last the figure stood before him with proudly folded arms.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The White Wolf!&rdquo; gasped Thurston, in a faint whisper.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, Don Manuel de Valencia&mdash;the White Wolf, as you choose to call
-      him. And now at last, Ben Thurston, we meet face to face, and alone&mdash;after
-      thirty long years, and without a woman&rsquo;s tears this time to save you!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Ben Thurston sank to the ground, a huddled heap, trembling in every limb.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0036" id="link2HCH0036"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXXVI&mdash;-Outwitted
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">P</span>IERRE LUZON led
-      Leach Sharkey along the trail. Beyond Comanche Point it dipped again owing
-      to the contour of the mountain, then at a distance of about fifty yards,
-      took a sharp turn round an abrupt face of rock.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Where the hell are you taking me?&rdquo; asked the sleuth, as they approached
-      this bend.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Only a little further,&rdquo; replied the guide, in a feeble quavering voice as
-      he glanced over his shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The men were only a few paces apart. In the shadow cast by the cliff,
-      Pierre&rsquo;s pallid face with its stubbly white beard looked like that of a
-      veritable ancient, and his bent form and tottering steps completed the
-      picture. The sleuth smiled at his momentary discomposure.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Around the turn, however, Pierre grabbed at a revolver lying ready to his
-      hand on a ledge of rock, and when Sharkey followed, it was to find a hale
-      and stalwart man, erect, alert, with the flash of conscious power in his
-      eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hands up!&rdquo; cried Pierre, in a voice of stern command. Leach Sharkey was
-      standing three short steps away and was looking now into the muzzle of a
-      big automatic pistol. Over his countenance there stole a sickly smile. But
-      he knew the rules of the game too well to attempt any resistance. His
-      hands went slowly above his head until both arms were fully extended.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;ve got the drop on me all right, José,&rdquo; he murmured, in self-apology.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Face the rock,&rdquo; came the next curt order&mdash;the very tone was
-      reminiscent of old bandit days.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey obeyed in silence, and in a trice both his guns were withdrawn
-      from their holsters and flung among the brushwood.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You go ahead now,&rdquo; said Pierre, stepping aside to let the other pass.
-      &ldquo;You can drop your hands, but if you cry out or attempt to run, zen you
-      are one dead man.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The discomfited sleuth meekly complied, although there was now a black
-      scowl on his face as he stepped on ahead. In all his professional career,
-      Leach Sharkey had never before fallen so ignominiously into a trap like
-      this.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Not a word was spoken while a distance of some two hundred yards was being
-      traversed. Then Pierre called out the one word: &ldquo;Halt!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey did not dare even to look round. He stood still as a piece of
-      statuary.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You sit on zat stone over zere,&rdquo; continued Pierre, &ldquo;and do not rise until
-      I give you permission. Now we will proceed to business.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey sat down as ordered.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hell, you can have your five thousand dollars right enough,&rdquo; he said,
-      pulling the wallet from his pocket.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, my friend. I did not bring you here to rob you. I am out on parole,
-      and I never break my word. I am Pierre Luzon!&rdquo; He spoke the name with
-      triumphant pride.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good God!&rdquo; exclaimed Sharkey, in dumfounded surprise. &ldquo;You belonged to
-      the White Wolf&rsquo;s gang?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I belong now to ze gang. Ze White Wolf is alive!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Leach Sharkey had looked sick before, but a ghastly grey pallor came into
-      his face now.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then he has got hold of Ben Thurston&mdash;at last?&rdquo; he faltered.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, at last,&rdquo; replied Pierre, with a grim smile of joy. &ldquo;Don Manuel and
-      Ben Thurston are alone on Comanche Point just now. Zey will settle old
-      scores&mdash;zat is zeir affair. Now, I attend to my affair.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey looked up enquiringly, but said no more.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Leach Sharkey,&rdquo; continued the old Frenchman, &ldquo;you are one strong man. You
-      will now take ze handcuffs from your pocket&mdash;I know you carry zem&mdash;and
-      drop zem over your shoulder. Zere, zat is right. I am glad you obey wizout
-      giving me any further trouble. Now, you will hold out your hands, behind
-      your back&mdash;you know exactly how.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Yes, Leach Sharkey knew exactly how. And he also knew what the business
-      end of a big revolver meant, with the forefinger of a daring bandit like
-      Pierre Luzon on the trigger. He was handcuffed and helpless right enough
-      in very short order. For the first time in his life the man who had so
-      often slipped the bracelets on others, found the bracelets around his own
-      wrists.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Next I want ze key of ze handcuffs,&rdquo; Pierre resumed. &ldquo;Which pocket,
-      please?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey, with a downward thrust of his chin, indicated the waistcoat
-      pocket.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Zank you,&rdquo; said Pierre, as he thrust in his fingers and produced the key.
-      &ldquo;Now, we will throw zis zing away&rdquo;&mdash;as he spoke it went whizzing
-      through the air&mdash;&ldquo;and when you get home to ze rancho, ze blacksmith
-      zere will set you free.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m going home, am I?&rdquo; said the sleuth, considerably reassured.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, Pierre Luzon no longer rob or kill or break ze law. He keep his word
-      of honor always. And I promised to bring Dick Willoughby to you tonight.
-      Now I shall be true to zat promise, too.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      And through his teeth he blew a shrill whistle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At the sound Dick Willoughby started up, and shook the ashes from his
-      pipe. Following Pierre&rsquo;s instructions, he led the two ponies along the
-      little trail through the chaparral. Within five minutes he emerged on a
-      broader trail, right at the spot where the Frenchman was standing.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hello, Pierre!&rdquo; Then Dick&rsquo;s eyes fell on Leach Sharkey, and at the very
-      first glance he saw the shackled hands. &ldquo;But what&rsquo;s the meaning of all
-      this?&rdquo; he asked in bewildered surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It means zat you will take zis man down ze mountains. He came to arrest
-      you, but you can tell him now zat you are one free man. You can show him
-      ze paper which proves it was not you, but Don Manuel, who is responsible
-      for ze death of young Thurston.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great Caesar!&rdquo; muttered the sleuth, &ldquo;I thought that from the first, but
-      the old fool would not listen to me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mr. Sharkey,&rdquo; said Dick, &ldquo;you and I have no quarrel. What Pierre says is
-      true&mdash;I have a sworn affidavit in my pocket, fixing the
-      responsibility for that unhappy affair where it belongs.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I believe you, Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo; replied the sleuth. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m glad you are
-      innocent, but I was only doing my duty in trying to arrest the man charged
-      with the crime.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I understand all that. I bear you no ill will.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And I&rsquo;d shake hands if it were not for these damned bracelets,&rdquo; continued
-      Sharkey.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Pierre, there is no need of handcuffs,&rdquo; said Dick, turning to the
-      Frenchman. &ldquo;Set him free. We will go peaceably home together.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; replied Pierre, determinedly. &ldquo;Leach Sharkey, he is one giant in
-      strength. He will go home as he is. Besides, I have trown ze key away.&rdquo;
-       And he laughed aloud.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey nodded in helpless admission of his sorry plight.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Too bad,&rdquo; murmured Dick.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And now,&rdquo; continued Pierre, &ldquo;zere is no time to be lost. We will help zis
-      man onto your pony, and you will ride my pony and hold ze leading rein.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But he can&rsquo;t ride with his hands behind his back like that,&rdquo; objected
-      Dick.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, yes, he can,&rdquo; grinned Pierre. &ldquo;Ze good horseman ride wid his knees,
-      and most of ze road you can be by his side and hold him on. And it is ze
-      only way, for ze key, as I have said, is gone.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I suppose we&rsquo;ve got to accept the situation,&rdquo; said Dick, with a glance at
-      Sharkey&rsquo;s lugubrious countenance. The man of strength was obviously
-      crestfallen at his almost ridiculous plight of powerlessness.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre resumed his instructions. &ldquo;You will not go back to Comanche Point,
-      but will take ze mule trail down into ze valley. You know it, Mr.
-      Willoughby&mdash;it is about one mile furzer on.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I know it,&rdquo; replied Dick.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You will leave Mr. Sharkey at the rancho and zen ride to ze place where
-      your friends are waiting for you. Now, zat is all. I must go. We have
-      already said our <i>adios</i>, my dear young friend.&rdquo; Dick grasped the
-      proffered hand and warmly pressed it.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good-bye, Pierre. I can never thank you enough for all you have done for
-      me. Good-bye.&rdquo; Leach Sharkey was assisted into the saddle, and the
-      horsemen started on their way.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good-bye,&rdquo; shouted back Dick Willoughby, yet once again.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;<i>Adios!</i>&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      And as the two figures disappeared around a bend, the Frenchman uttered a
-      deep sigh. &ldquo;A splendid young fellow! I wonder shall we ever meet again!&rdquo;&mdash;this
-      was the thought in his mind as for just a moment he stood in an attitude
-      of deep dejection.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Then swinging around, he started back at a run for Comanche Point.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0037" id="link2HCH0037"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXXVII&mdash;The Dawn of Comprehension
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span>LL through the
-      afternoon at La Siesta, Merle was in a meditative mood. After luncheon
-      Mrs. Darlington had returned to her letter-writing and her book-keeping.
-      Munson and Grace had departed for a walk through the pine woods, after
-      vain but not too strenuous endeavors to get Merle to accompany them. Left
-      to her own resources she had retired to the drawing room, had tried to
-      interest herself at the piano, but after a little while had given up the
-      attempt; and, coiled in a big chair, had surrendered herself to a &ldquo;big
-      think,&rdquo; as she mentally termed it.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      In that momentary searching of the eyes between her and Mr. Robles just
-      before their parting in the rose garden, there had come a flash of
-      revelation to her soul. She had divined a yearning in his gaze that was
-      surely more than the affection of an old and devoted friend. There was
-      passionate tenderness that belied the gentle yet almost perfunctory kiss
-      on the brow that he had finally bestowed at parting. Nor had she failed to
-      notice the restraint which the strong man had imposed upon himself. And
-      strangely enough, her own momentary impulse had been to throw her arms
-      around his neck and kiss him, just as a fond daughter might have kissed a
-      father at such an emotional moment&mdash;on the eve of a long journey, the
-      whither unrevealed, the return all so uncertain.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      She recalled, too, their previous conversation while she was gathering the
-      roses&mdash;his words of kindly wisdom, his little bits of advice that now
-      seemed to be weighted by more than mere friendly interest in her future
-      happiness. Then her mind traveled back slowly, step by step, all the way
-      to childhood days&mdash;a long vista marked by his comings and his goings,
-      his prolonged absences, his unexpected but always welcome reappearances,
-      his numberless acts of thoughtful kindness. Once she had been seriously
-      ill, when a little girl, and the memory of that illness had ever been the
-      memory of his face hovering over her cot, night and day, till the crisis
-      had been passed and she had been on the way to assured convalescence.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      There had always been an air of mystery about Mr. Robles, but she had
-      never sought to penetrate it, instinctively recognizing that there had
-      been some great sorrow in his life, and almost unconsciously accepting the
-      affectionate regard he had lavished on Grace and herself as some sort of
-      consolation for him in his loneliness. She knew that Grace was only her
-      sister in name, but none the less Grace was to her a real sister, just as
-      Mrs. Darlington was a real mother&mdash;the only mother she had ever
-      known. Weaving together now the threads of memory, she became conscious of
-      the mystery in her own life. There was assuredly some fuller story than
-      the story she had been told in the past and had always tacitly accepted&mdash;that
-      her parents had been neighbors and dear friends of Mrs. Darlington in the
-      long ago, and when they had died, the baby girl left behind had been
-      bequeathed to her motherly care.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At this stage in her ruminations Merle sat bolt upright in her chair. The
-      shadows of evening were beginning to close around her, but the dawn of
-      revelation was in her heart.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Would Mrs. Darlington still be alone in her boudoir? Merle answered the
-      unspoken thought by stealing from the room.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Yes, Mrs. Darlington was at her writing table, lighted now by candles on
-      each side which, covered by little red shades, only dimly illuminated the
-      apartment. Merle flitted in without her coming being observed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Mrs. Darlington was no longer writing&mdash;her elbows were resting on the
-      table and both hands were covering her eyes in an attitude of deep
-      thought, perhaps of sleep, as Merle for a moment imagined when she had
-      noiselessly gained her side.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mother dear,&rdquo; she said softly, laying a hand on her shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You here, my child?&rdquo; exclaimed Mrs. Darlington. There was no trace of
-      slumber in her eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, and I want to have a little talk with you&mdash;all alone,&rdquo; said
-      Merle, as she dropped into a chair, the very chair which Mr. Robles had
-      previously occupied.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The look of vague sadness and anxiety in Mrs. Darlington&rsquo;s face deepened.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What about, dear?&rdquo; she asked.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle&rsquo;s mind had been made up, and she came to the issue with point-blank
-      abruptness.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Is Mr. Robles my father?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The startled look on the other&rsquo;s face was almost in itself an admission of
-      the truth&mdash;Mrs. Darlington had been caught off her guard. But she
-      made a desperate attempt to parry the question.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What makes you fancy such a thing?&rdquo; she faltered.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Because there is certainty in my heart,&rdquo; replied
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle bravely. &ldquo;It came to me first when he bade me good-bye in the
-      garden. And now I see it in your face.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The young girl dropped on her knees, and, an arm around her mother&rsquo;s
-      waist, gazed up imploringly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Eyes met eyes. Falsehood was impossible in either case. Mrs. Darlington
-      stooped and folded the kneeling girl in a fond embrace. Both were weeping
-      now. No word had been spoken, but Merle knew that she had correctly
-      divined.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      It was a few minutes before there was sufficient self-control for the
-      conversation to be resumed. But then, Merle still kneeling by her side,
-      Mrs. Darlington spoke:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I had promised to keep this secret, dear,&rdquo; she began, fondling the girl&rsquo;s
-      tresses. &ldquo;But you have gained your knowledge apart from me, so I cannot be
-      held to have betrayed my trust. Yes, Mr. Robles is your father&mdash;your
-      loving and devoted father. Your real name is his&mdash;Merle Robles you
-      should always have been called.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And why not?&rdquo; asked Merle. &ldquo;Oh, I am proud and overjoyed to think of him
-      as my father.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Because he has some important reason to have the world think otherwise. I
-      know you will believe me, dear Merle, when I say I do not know that
-      reason. He is too grand and honorable a man for me to have ever pressed
-      for an explanation. I just accepted you as a gift from his hands&mdash;his
-      child and the child of my girlhood chum, named Merle, as you know, like
-      yourself.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So, if I have solved one mystery, there is still another mystery beyond,&rdquo;
-       murmured Merle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      She rose, seated herself, and remained silent for a moment, her hands
-      locked across her knees, her brows knit in thought.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But why distress your heart over unknown things?&rdquo; said Mrs. Darlington.
-      &ldquo;As you have learned by your today&rsquo;s experience, mysteries solve
-      themselves in due time.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; replied Merle, &ldquo;but somehow I feel that this is the due time that I
-      should know everything&mdash;for my dear father&rsquo;s sake,&rdquo; she added, &ldquo;not
-      for my own. Oh, mother, you should have seen his face of anguish just
-      before he parted from me this afternoon. It was revealed to me only for an
-      instant. But now I feel sure that something terrible is going to happen&mdash;to
-      him.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      She was sobbing again, as she flung her arms impulsively around Mrs.
-      Darlington&rsquo;s neck and sat in her lap, just as if once again she had become
-      a little child.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, mother mine&mdash;I shall always call you mother mine, for you have
-      been a dear, sweet, kind mother to me ever since I can remember. But don&rsquo;t
-      you see that today I have also found a father whom I deeply love? Nothing
-      must happen to him.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Why should anything happen to him?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I do not know. Where is Tia Teresa?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The question came with startling suddenness as Merle started up with
-      another ray of illumination in her mind.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I haven&rsquo;t seen her since morning,&rdquo; replied Mrs. Darlington.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Nor have I,&rdquo; said Merle, standing erect, wiping away the traces of her
-      tears, and with a few pats adjusting her rumpled hair. &ldquo;That is very
-      strange.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No. I happen to know that this day, the eleventh of October, is always a
-      sad anniversary for Tia Teresa&mdash;the death of some dear friend who
-      lies buried in the little Mexican cemetery on the hill. She has always
-      refused to tell me the story. But early this morning she went, as usual,
-      to place flowers upon the grave.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Flowers&mdash;for a grave!&rdquo; exclaimed Merle. She was thinking of the
-      roses she had gathered that afternoon for Mr. Robles&mdash;for her father&mdash;because
-      he specially wanted the most beautiful blooms. But she did not give her
-      thought to Mrs. Darlington.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is all so strange,&rdquo; continued Merle. Then her air of decisiveness
-      returned. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll go and see if Tia Teresa is in her room.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Mrs. Darlington was gravely perturbed at this persistency. Oh, if only the
-      mysteries of the past could be left alone, the joys of the present
-      accepted for themselves! Probing into trouble cannot but lead to further
-      trouble&mdash;that, for her, had been the secret of contentment. But she
-      was powerless to intervene. Merle had already departed on her mission of
-      enquiry.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0038" id="link2HCH0038"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXXVIII&mdash;Exit Leach Sharkey
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>HE ponies were
-      jogging down the trail, Leach Sharkey uncomfortably lurching in his saddle
-      when some sudden bend or dip was encountered, Dick Willoughby
-      good-humoredly holding him on when such emergencies rendered the service
-      advisable if an ignominious fall were to be avoided. There was a song of
-      joy in Dick&rsquo;s heart&mdash;liberty was at hand; he was riding down from the
-      hills to join his loved one again. But there was sullen brooding in the
-      soul of the outwitted sleuth&mdash;growing more sullen with every mile
-      traversed, with every kindness rendered, with the very realization of his
-      own ridiculous predicament and the contrast of his companion&rsquo;s
-      light-hearted happiness.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At last they reached the foot of the trail, leading on to the road that
-      crossed the plain. At the distance of a few miles the Rancho San Antonio
-      showed amid its clustering shade and orchard trees.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Let us dismount for a bit,&rdquo; suggested Sharkey. &ldquo;I feel all in&mdash;dead
-      beat and tired.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But how will I get you on to your horse again?&rdquo; replied Dick, a trifle
-      dubiously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, we&rsquo;ll manage that. Please help me down.&rdquo; Dick sprang to the ground,
-      dropped the reins over his pony&rsquo;s head, and soon had Leach Sharkey on <i>terra
-      firma</i>.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;re no light weight to handle,&rdquo; he laughed. &ldquo;By the way, Sharkey, I
-      forgot to ask: Where&rsquo;s your boss this afternoon?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey eyed Dick curiously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t know?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Why should I know? It&rsquo;s quite a time since I met the gentleman.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You are aware who Pierre Luzon is?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Certainly. Pierre has come to be quite a friend of mine. He&rsquo;s a good
-      fellow all right.&rdquo; There was a moment&rsquo;s pause. Dick was rolling a
-      cigarette, Sharkey furtively watching every expression on his face.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, the Frenchie played me a dirty trick when he threw that key away,&rdquo;
-       remarked the sleuth, rattling, the handcuffs behind his back.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I guess Pierre was resolved to take no chances,&rdquo; replied Dick, grinning
-      through the tobacco smoke as he surveyed the helpless bodyguard. &ldquo;He only
-      needed a pair of hobbles to complete the job.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      A muttered curse came from Sharkey&rsquo;s lips&mdash;but this was an aside. For
-      Dick he had an insinuating smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You might get these blamed handcuffs off all right, Willoughby. Look at
-      that big boulder there. If I set my hands across it, you might hammer
-      through the chain. Or if you have a pistol, that might do the trick.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, I&rsquo;ve got no pistol,&rdquo; Dick replied.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      He did not notice the gleam of satisfaction in Sharkey&rsquo;s eyes&mdash;the
-      wolfish smile at the corners of his wolf-like teeth. At the moment he was
-      looking around for a convenient stone that might serve as a hammer.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But I think I might break that chain all right with this,&rdquo; he went on, as
-      he stooped and picked up a heavy, sharp-edged fragment of granite from the
-      rock-strewn ground. &ldquo;Come along, then. Set your wrists just here. At
-      least, we can try.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The trial succeeded&mdash;the slender steel strain stretched across the
-      boulder soon yielded to the succession of battering blows.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey flung his great big brawny arms aloft. He was still wearing the
-      bracelets, but his hands were free.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Feels better, don&rsquo;t it?&rdquo; said Dick, with a sympathetic smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A damned sight better,&rdquo; roared the sleuth, as he turned quickly round.
-      &ldquo;Now, young man, you are my prisoner. I arrest you for jail-breaking.
-      There&rsquo;s my star. I don&rsquo;t say hands up, for I know you haven&rsquo;t a gun.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      As he spoke, Sharkey opened his coat so that the official badge might be
-      displayed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick in his amazement stepped back, just one pace. Sharkey advanced, his
-      high hands outstretched.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Make no trouble, now. You know I am only doing my duty.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Duty be hanged,&rdquo; cried Dick, as with a swift uppercut he caught his
-      would-be captor on the jaw. Sharkey staggered, and Dick, with a right-arm
-      swing, banged him on the temple, bowling him over like a ninepin.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey was soon on his hands and knees; then dazed and tottering, he got
-      onto his feet again. But Dick was watchfully waiting, and with sharp jabs,
-      right and left, sent him down once more. The sleuth lay motionless now.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Like a flash Dick grabbed the riata hanging from the saddle-horn of his
-      pony, and without a moment&rsquo;s loss of time had its coils around the arms
-      and chest of the prostrate man, roping him like a thrown steer with all
-      the skill of the trained cowboy. In a brief minute the knots were tied,
-      and with the final clove-hitch the fallen Samson was turned over on his
-      back. Sharkey&rsquo;s eyes opened, glaring dully at his conqueror.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You contemptible hound!&rdquo; exclaimed Dick, as he tossed the loose end of
-      the lariat from him. &ldquo;By God, I&rsquo;ve seen a few low-down things done in my
-      lifetime, but this is certainly the limit. I suppose you would have
-      betrayed me for the sake of the reward, even though you know now for
-      certain that I was wrongfully arrested at the start. You damned Judas! You
-      deserve to be hanged like a horse-thief, Leach Sharkey&mdash;that&rsquo;s about
-      your proper finish.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      And Dick in his righteous indignation glanced around as if in search of a
-      convenient tree for the operation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll give no further trouble,&rdquo; mumbled Sharkey.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It will be my particular care that you don&rsquo;t,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;Get up, you
-      hulking brute.&rdquo; And grabbing the coils of the riata, he fairly lifted
-      Sharkey to his feet.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Now, I wouldn&rsquo;t shame the pony by putting you on his back again. Follow
-      me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Picking up the free end of the rope, and gathering the leading rein of
-      Sharkey&rsquo;s horse into the same hand, Willoughby vaulted into his saddle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Come along,&rdquo; he called out, turning round as the riata came taut. And
-      thus, a dozen paces behind, the sleuth, discomfited again a second time
-      that day, and humiliated worse than ever, followed perforce in his
-      victor&rsquo;s trail.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Perhaps half a mile of the open road was thus traversed, Dick speaking not
-      another word, but looking round occasionally and giving an energetic yank
-      at the rope whenever there was evidence of laggard steps. Sharkey stumbled
-      along, his chin buried in his breast, his eyes half-closed to conceal
-      their dumb, vicious glare of concentrated but impotent fury.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      They had now reached a gate; Dick dismounted and threw it open, pointing
-      the way for Sharkey to take.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s about five miles to the rancho,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know how you&rsquo;ll
-      get through the other gates, but I reckon you can crawl under them, like
-      the snake you&rsquo;ve proved yourself to be. Now, off you go,&rdquo; and with the
-      words he looped the loose end of the riata around the victim&rsquo;s shoulders.
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s a better necktie than you deserve, Leach Sharkey. If it was any
-      one but myself, you would be helped to a start by a few vigorous kicks
-      behind.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The sleuth shambled through the gateway, with shamed, averted face. With a
-      click the gate was closed. For just a few minutes Dick watched the figure
-      moving away through the now gathering dusk. Then he laid a hand on his
-      saddle-horn.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I hope it&rsquo;s the last I&rsquo;ll see of that animal,&rdquo; he murmured to himself, as
-      he sprang lightly into the saddle. And at a canter he started along the
-      road, the led pony, after a few heel-kicks as if in joy at being relieved
-      of its burden, soon dropping into the swinging stride.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0039" id="link2HCH0039"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXXIX&mdash;The Fight on the Cliff
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">F</span>OR a few moments
-      Don Manuel contemplated the cowering figure of Ben Thurston in
-      contemptuous silence. His end was accomplished; his enemy was in his
-      power; like the cat with the mouse just a few inches from its paw, he
-      could strike at any moment. He spoke now with measured calm.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Do you remember what day this is? The eleventh of October.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He paused for a reply. Thurston&rsquo;s lips were parted but remained dumb. Don
-      Manuel resumed:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Thirty years ago this very night&mdash;here at this very spot, you
-      brutally killed my poor little sister, Rosetta.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Thurston shrank back. His lips moved, but no sound came.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, attempt no denial,&rdquo; continued Don Manuel, for the moment clenching a
-      menacing fist over him. &ldquo;You cannot forget the tell-tale button which you
-      snatched from my hand to hide the proof. Nor have I forgotten the lash of
-      your quirt that drew blood from my cheek&rdquo;&mdash;and he wiped his face with
-      the tips of his fingers as if to rub away the memory of the deadly insult&mdash;&ldquo;the
-      very day on which I buried my dear father and mother,&rdquo; he added, in a
-      voice vibrant with emotion.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      He bowed his head; there was another brief period of silence. Then he
-      recovered himself and went on:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The deaths of my beloved parents are just as much on your head, Ben
-      Thurston, as the death of the guileless, innocent, young girl whom you
-      betrayed, and then with coward hands pushed over this cliff, mangling her
-      body on the rocks below. My vengeance has been slow in coming, but after
-      all, I am glad of the delay. For all through these years you have not only
-      suffered the agony of constant fear, but I have lived to see you landless,
-      bereft of the broad rich acres which belonged to my father and were never
-      rightfully yours.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s not so&mdash;my claim was established in the law courts.&rdquo; Thurston
-      managed to articulate the words. The sound of his voice seemed to restore
-      some little measure of courage, for he sat up, and leaning an elbow on a
-      rock, adjusted himself in a more comfortable position. But he did not seek
-      to gain his feet&mdash;the bandit&rsquo;s figure still towered over him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Law courts&mdash;your American law courts!&rdquo; exclaimed Don Manuel, with
-      ineffable scorn. &ldquo;You know you bribed the judge who gave the decision.
-      Dare you deny it?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Thurston ventured no denial&mdash;his dropped jaw proclaimed his
-      consciousness of guilt.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Nothing was too base for you,&rdquo; Don Manuel proceeded. &ldquo;You robbed,
-      despoiled, destroyed my home. But now at last your hour has come. I have
-      waited patiently for this hour. On many an occasion, Ben Thurston, I could
-      have shot you dead from a distance. But I have waited&mdash;waited&mdash;waited
-      for the time when you would know that it was I, the White Wolf, who was
-      sending you to your doom just as I have already sent your ruffian son to
-      his.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So it was really you&mdash;who murdered my boy?&rdquo; stammered Thurston.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t call it murder&mdash;it was righteous retribution for both him and
-      you. Oh, I can tell you something tonight, for a secret does not pass from
-      a dead man&rsquo;s lips.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The victim so confidently doomed, shuddered. Don Manuel continued:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Merle Farnsworth is my daughter; your vile and debauched son dared to
-      insult her, and so he died&mdash;rightly died. Yes, at my hands&mdash;I
-      take full responsibility. And I am glad to tell you this before you follow
-      him out of the world. Tonight, Ben Thurston, you go over this cliff&mdash;you
-      die the death you gave to my sister.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      As he spoke, Don Manuel cast loose his Spanish cloak, and dropped both it
-      and his sombrero to the ground.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Thurston at last staggered to his feet.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So get ready now to fight for your life,&rdquo; Don Manuel resumed, folding his
-      arms across his breast as he surveyed his victim.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But I am unarmed,&rdquo; cried Thurston, pointing to the revolver at the
-      other&rsquo;s belt. His outstretched hand trembled, his voice was a terrified
-      shriek.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then I, too, shall be unarmed,&rdquo; replied Don Manuel, as he unbuckled his
-      belt and tossed it lightly from him. &ldquo;Come along, then&mdash;it is man to
-      man with naked hands.&rdquo; His tone now was one of concentrated passion and
-      hate, and he advanced with arms extended for an enfolding embrace.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Now did Ben Thurston realize that his only chance for life lay in his
-      superior weight, possibly his superior strength. At the thought, craven
-      fear changed of a sudden to the courage of desperation, and like a wild
-      cat he leaped at the throat of his adversary.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Then began a terrible struggle&mdash;two strong men writhing in each
-      other&rsquo;s grip like savage beasts. Soon their clothes were torn, their
-      bodies begrimed with sweat and mud, their faces and naked arms bespattered
-      with blood, for Ben Thurston&rsquo;s nose had been broken in one of the first
-      falls. Thurston, besides his extra pounds, had also the advantage of being
-      younger by a few years. But Don Manuel was in better physical condition
-      and his muscles were like bands of steel. So it was pretty much of a level
-      match in this grim fight to the death.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0011" id="linkimage-0011"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
-      <img src="images/0305.jpg" alt="0305 " width="100%" /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h5>
-      <a href="images/0305.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
-    </h5>
-    <p>
-      As they tugged at each other, as each attempted to bear the other down or
-      trip and throw him, as at times, each tried in their locked embrace to
-      crush in his adversary&rsquo;s ribs and squeeze the last breath out of his body,
-      as they milled round and round, swayed and fell and rolled over and then
-      for a moment regained a kneeling or an upright position&mdash;both men
-      realized that it was the one who could last the longest with whom the
-      mastery would rest.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre Luzon, running up the trail, came to the edge of the open space
-      where the desperate contest was in progress. But the onlooker did not
-      attempt to interfere&mdash;he had had his orders; he just crouched and
-      watched the swaying, writhing figures.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      For an hour or more the fight proceeded, at times fast and furious, with
-      breathing spells to follow, during which grips were tenaciously
-      maintained. Points of advantage alternated now to the one side, now to the
-      other, but after each succeeding tussle both combatants were exhausted
-      without victory being pronounced for either. Every vestige of clothing
-      above the belt line had long since been torn away, and they were sweating
-      like lathered horses.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The milling and wrestling had gradually grown weaker, and it was clear now
-      that the final test of endurance could not be much longer delayed. Yet
-      again Don Manuel renewed the attack, and had forced Thurston to his knees,
-      when the latter by a supreme effort raised himself again, and then by
-      sheer weight pressed his opponent back a pace or two. But just at this
-      moment Thurston&rsquo;s strength seemed to give out, for he dropped down
-      sideways, dragging his enemy after him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Then Pierre Luzon saw the object of the manoeuvre. Thurston had gained the
-      spot where Don Manuel&rsquo;s discarded pistol belt was lying, and now he was
-      reaching out with a disengaged hand to grab the gun.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The Frenchman darted forward.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Keep out of this,&rdquo; cried Don Manuel, peremptorily, although he was
-      breathing hard.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Look out! Your gun!&rdquo; screamed Pierre, as he seized Thurston&rsquo;s wrist in a
-      vice-like grip.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Just an instant too late, however, for Thurston&rsquo;s fingers had already
-      closed round the weapon and it went off with a bang.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre dropped to his knees. It was he who had received the bullet&mdash;through
-      one of his lungs. But he had wrested the pistol from the treacherous
-      villain&rsquo;s grasp and now it fell, still smoking, to the ground.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The wounded man coughed a great mouthful of crimson blood on to the slab
-      of rock. Then he recovered himself and raised his head. Thurston and Don
-      Manuel, even in their weakened state, were fighting more desperately than
-      ever, blinded by hate to every sense of danger, and Pierre was just in
-      time to see them slip on some loosened stones and then, still locked in
-      the death clench, go rolling over the edge of the precipice.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;<i>Mon Dieu! Mon Dieu!</i>&rdquo; murmured the Frenchman. He staggered to his
-      feet and without waiting turned and started down the steep trail,
-      stumbling like a drunken man.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At the foot of the zig-zag pathway he gazed helplessly around. He would
-      have pushed his way through the brushwood to seek his beloved chief. Dead!
-      He must be dead. No one could have dropped that sheer three hundred feet
-      onto the cruel jagged rocks below and live. Yet, who knows? A tree might
-      have broken the fall&mdash;Don Manuel might still be alive.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre, however, was incapable of further effort. His limbs trembled
-      beneath him, and again he was spitting blood.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      All of a sudden he spied the two horses tethered under the manzanita tree.
-      He tottered toward them, untied the first one he reached, and with
-      difficulty pulled himself up into the saddle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      To reach Dick Willoughby and get help&mdash;that was the thought in the
-      reeling brain of Pierre Luzon as with a final effort, leaning forward over
-      the saddle, he turned his steed in the direction of Buck Ashley&rsquo;s old
-      store, and urged it to a canter.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0040" id="link2HCH0040"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XL&mdash;Revelation
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">M</span>ERLE paused at the
-      foot of the stairway leading up to one of the towers where Tia Teresa had
-      her room. She deliberated for a moment, consulted the tiny watch on her
-      wrist, then turned to retrace her footsteps.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;There will be plenty of time,&rdquo; she murmured to herself. &ldquo;I shall be best
-      able to manage Tia Teresa when I know still more than I do now.&rdquo; She
-      repaired to her own room and put on her automobile cloak, cap, and veil.
-      Without telling anyone of her plan, she left the house, went to the
-      garage, selected a runabout that was specially her own, and was soon
-      speeding along the highway in the direction of the cluster of hills amid
-      which the little Mexican cemetery was nestled.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      She had been there just once before, several years ago, and she knew that
-      her machine would have no difficulty in ascending the trail. Within less
-      than an hour, indeed, she was at her destination.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      In the grey evening twilight the place looked very dismal and desolate.
-      The tiny adobe chapel in one corner was falling into ruins because of
-      disuse and neglect. A tall rank growth of weeds overran most of the
-      graves. But there were two that showed marks of loving attention, and
-      toward these Merle advanced. Here she found the fresh wreaths around the
-      headstones, and her own roses scattered on the turf.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hermana&rdquo;&mdash;she read the single word on the white marble cross adorned
-      with spotless arum lilies. &ldquo;Sister,&rdquo; Merle murmured, translating the word.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Then she turned to the big gravestone close at hand, and moved the wreaths
-      of red carnations so that she might read the words inscribed. From these
-      she soon knew that this was the family burial place of the de Valencias&mdash;that
-      here rested the former owners of the San Antonio Rancho, the beloved
-      parents of two children, Manuel and Rosetta.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Manuel,&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Rosetta&rdquo;&mdash;she repeated the names. The latter awakened no memory, but
-      when she filled out the former to &ldquo;Don Manuel de Valencia,&rdquo; she instantly
-      recalled the old-time bandit of whom she had heard many a tale.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The White Wolf,&rdquo; she murmured eagerly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, yes. His father once owned the rancho, and that was the cause of the
-      deadly feud&mdash;the Vendetta of the Hills. But I thought all that was
-      forgotten. Yet here are the beautiful fresh flowers.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Seating herself on a flat monument near by, Merle pondered, piecing things
-      together. &ldquo;Sister&rdquo;&mdash;the cross must mark the grave of the girl
-      Rosetta, and have been erected by her brother, Don Manuel. Then whose hand
-      had strewn the roses? Mr. Robles! In a flash she knew that Mr. Robles was
-      Don Manuel.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And her father, too! The further thought came with such suddenness, with
-      such absolute conviction of certainty, that for a moment she felt
-      appalled. Her father the notorious robber chief, the desperado on whose
-      head a price had been set, the outlaw who had defied the whole state of
-      California to arrest him. Somehow she felt no shame&mdash;Don Manuel de
-      Valencia had been a sort of heroic knight-errant in all the stories she
-      had heard&mdash;his hand only against the rich, his heart always for the
-      poor and oppressed, his attitude toward the intrusive gringos quite
-      justified by the sharp practice whereby he had been robbed of his
-      patrimonial acres. It was this very story of wrong which had been one of
-      the reasons that had from the first predisposed the household at La Siesta
-      to despise the Thurston family at the Rancho San Antonio.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Then from thinking of Don Manuel, Merle&rsquo;s mind passed to Ricardo Robles&mdash;the
-      courteous, dignified, generous, lovable man she had known all her life,
-      the very man whom she had rejoiced that day to call her own father. Don
-      Manuel could be judged only by this standard, and her heart went out again
-      to Mr. Robles, whatever the name which he had formerly worn.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The shadows were closing around her, the night air bit sharply, and Merle
-      arose. Two or three of the rose blooms had fallen beyond the lines of
-      white stones that marked the graves. Merle advanced, and picking these up
-      gently, placed them on the breasts of the sleeping dead. Her own kith and
-      kin! Now she realized how she came to have brown eyes and raven tresses&mdash;the
-      blood of Spain was in her veins. With this thought throbbing in her heart,
-      she left the cemetery and hurried away for home.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Tia Teresa was the only Roman Catholic at La Siesta, a devout member of
-      the faith of her fathers and of her childhood days with which no one
-      around her had ever sought to interfere. Her room was her private chapel,
-      a curtained recess at one end being fitted up with a crucifix, a small
-      altar, and a <i>prie-dieu</i>.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Here Tia Teresa was kneeling and praying, the only light in the apartment
-      coming from the altar candles, when Merle softly tiptoed in, still wearing
-      her automobile cloak. She hesitated to advance, and momentarily turned to
-      withdraw. But Tia Teresa had seen her, and by a gesture had bidden her to
-      remain. For a few moments the old duenna&rsquo;s lips continued to move, then
-      she told another bead on her rosary, arose from her knees, crossed herself
-      devoutly, and with a final prostration before the crucifix, terminated her
-      devotional exercises.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What brought you here, my child?&rdquo; she asked, approaching Merle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Why are you engaged in prayer tonight?&rdquo; asked Merle, answering question
-      with question.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You know I often pray,&rdquo; replied Tia Teresa. &ldquo;You have seen me many, many
-      times.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, but not at this hour, when you are always with my mother.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;She will be wondering where I am. I had better go to her now.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; rejoined Merle. &ldquo;I wish to speak to you. Come here, Tia Teresa; sit
-      down by my side, and treat me once again as the little girl of the long
-      ago whom you used to pet and fondle.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s very easily done,&rdquo; responded Tia Teresa, with a pleased smile,
-      seating herself on the low sofa close to Merle. &ldquo;Come to my heart, my
-      darling, as in the long ago.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      And the duenna drew the girl to her loving, protecting bosom. She noticed
-      now that Merle was trembling under the influence of some deep emotion.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What is wrong with you, my dear?&rdquo; she asked anxiously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have learned many things today, Tia Teresa,&rdquo; replied Merle, taking her
-      old nurse&rsquo;s hands and softly stroking them. &ldquo;First, that Mr. Robles is my
-      father&rdquo;&mdash;the duenna started, but Merle went quietly on&mdash;&ldquo;and
-      that he is really Don Manuel de Valencia, the famous outlaw.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Whoever told you that?&rdquo; fairly gasped Tia Teresa.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No one. I found everything out for myself. After I had looked into Mr.
-      Robles&rsquo; eyes at our parting this afternoon, I knew the truth. It was
-      impossible for mother to deny it, but it is not she who has told me
-      anything. I have just returned from the little Mexican cemetery on the
-      hillside where Mr. Robles, my father, had taken the flowers for which he
-      asked me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And you saw his flowers&mdash;and my flowers, too?&rdquo; faltered the duenna,
-      realizing now how Merle had gleaned her knowledge.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes; I inferred that the wreaths were yours, and of course I knew that
-      the scattered roses were from my father. He is Don Manuel. But I want you
-      to tell me a little about Rosetta.&rdquo; It was Merle now who put her arms
-      around Tia Teresa and drew her affectionately to her.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You have always loved me, you know, my dear,&rdquo; the girl went on coaxingly.
-      &ldquo;Now I understand why you were so deeply attached to Mr. Robles, for you
-      told me once that you had nursed Don Manuel. And that is why I have been,
-      perhaps, just a little closer to you than Grace&rdquo;&mdash;the pressure of Tia
-      Teresa&rsquo;s arms told that Merle had correctly divined&mdash;&ldquo;because I was
-      of the blood of your old master. But why has there been all this secrecy
-      toward me?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don Manuel&rsquo;s name could not be revealed&mdash;he had been outlawed.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And Rosetta&mdash;tell me about Rosetta?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;She was the real cause of the feud between Mr. Thurston and Don Manuel.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The duenna had spoken the words before she had realized how much they
-      told. With unfaltering intuition Merle guessed their meaning.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You mean to tell me that Thurston wronged Rosetta&mdash;betrayed her?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Tia Teresa nodded assent&mdash;she was too deeply agitated to speak
-      another word.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And this day&mdash;the eleventh of October&mdash;the day when you
-      decorate her grave?&rdquo; enquired Merle, in a tone and with a look that
-      compelled an answer.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Is the day she was found dead on the rocks below Comanche Point,&rdquo; replied
-      Tia Teresa.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At the same moment the duenna started to her feet. A wonderful and
-      terrible transition came over her usually placid countenance. Her eyes
-      fairly blazed with mingled fury and hatred. Her fists were clenched by her
-      side. Her whole frame trembled.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Murdered by Ben Thurston!&rdquo; she added, the words hissing like hot lava
-      from her lips.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Murdered?&rdquo; cried Merle, incredulously. She too, had risen.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, pushed over the cliff by his coward hands. His torn coat, one of the
-      buttons between her dead fingers, proclaimed his guilt before God and man.
-      But there was no justice in the land in those days&mdash;the days when the
-      gringos broke up our Spanish homes. Now you know everything&mdash;that was
-      the real reason of the Vendetta of the Hills.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Tia Teresa was calm again&mdash;it was Merle who was deeply agitated, too
-      deeply agitated for a moment to speak.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The duenna went on triumphantly. &ldquo;But the vendetta once sworn will always
-      be fulfilled. Tonight at Comanche Point&mdash;&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Then she stopped short, as she saw the look of terror and horror on
-      Merle&rsquo;s pale face.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Tonight?&rdquo; queried the young girl tremulously. &ldquo;They meet tonight? Then
-      that is where Mr. Robles is going&mdash;that is why he bade us all that
-      sad good-bye? My father, oh, my dear father!&rdquo; And dropping down again on
-      the sofa, she burst into a passion of weeping.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Tia Teresa sought to soothe her. But Merle was not to be comforted. Yet
-      while she sobbed she was thinking, for suddenly she rose again and dashed
-      away her tears.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;At what hour tonight?&rdquo; she asked.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I do not know,&rdquo; answered the duenna.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then he is in danger&mdash;perhaps at this very moment he is in danger.
-      Don Manuel&rsquo;s life&mdash;my father&rsquo;s life is worth a hundred lives of such
-      a man as Ben Thurston. Quick, quick, Teresa. Get your mantilla and cloak.
-      My runabout is in readiness. There, let me help you.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle was speaking with swift insistence.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Where are you going?&rdquo; whispered Tia Teresa, as the girl&rsquo;s fingers were
-      buttoning her cloak.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;To Comanche Point. We may not be too late to save him.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      A minute later the two women had stolen down the narrow stairway of the
-      tower and were speeding through the gathering darkness of the night.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0041" id="link2HCH0041"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XLI&mdash;Beneath the Precipice
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">W</span>ILLOUGHBY had
-      found his friends Munson and Jack Rover at Buck Ashley&rsquo;s old store,
-      eagerly awaiting his coming, with a fine supper sizzling on the cook
-      stove, prepared in Jack&rsquo;s finest professional cowboy style.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ve got to feed you up a bit, I reckon,&rdquo; grinned Jack, as he slipped
-      the Gargantuan slab of beef-steak from the griller on to the big hot dish
-      waiting for its reception.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And some potatoes, too,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;not forgetting the fried onions
-      that beat all your newfangled sauces to a frazzle.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick was nothing loth to fall to. He had been too excited to do more than
-      taste the midday meal that Pierre Luzon had prepared for him in the
-      cavern. It had been a long hard day, and now he was hungry as a wolf. In
-      ordinary circumstances he had no objection to fried onions, but, with
-      delicate regard for possible contingencies, he left to the others a
-      monopoly over this item in the bill-of-fare.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      There were so many things to talk about that it was a difficult matter to
-      know where to begin. But at the close of the meal Jack Rover solved the
-      question by sweeping the supper things from the table, and emptying
-      thereon the contents of one of the bags of gold.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good old Guadalupe!&rdquo; exclaimed the delighted cowboy, as he patted the
-      nuggets with a loving hand. &ldquo;I always told you that the ancient squaw had
-      a real gold mine. I guess we&rsquo;ll be able to stake out our claims tomorrow,
-      eh, Dick, my boy?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m afraid not,&rdquo; smiled Willoughby. &ldquo;The fact is that, although I helped
-      to wash out that gold, I have not the faintest idea where the riffle is up
-      among the hills.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Jack&rsquo;s face fell. There was a moment of disappointed silence, and just
-      then there came the sound of a faint tapping at the outer door.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What&rsquo;s that?&rdquo; asked Munson. The faces of all three showed that they had
-      heard simultaneously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick rose, crossed over, and threw the door wide open.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My God, who&rsquo;s this?&rdquo; he asked, as he stooped over the figure lying prone
-      across the steps. &ldquo;Pierre, Pierre!&rdquo; he added, as he turned over the face.
-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s Pierre Luzon, boys, and desperately wounded!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The others were pressed together in the doorway.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Looks as if he had crawled here on his hands and knees,&rdquo; remarked Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;There&rsquo;s his horse out among the chaparral,&rdquo; exclaimed Jack, pointing to
-      the shadowy form of the animal from which the wounded man had obviously
-      tumbled.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Stand clear,&rdquo; cried Dick, gathering up Pierre in his arms. &ldquo;He has
-      fainted, but is still alive.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      And Dick, carrying the senseless form, passed into the bedroom beyond the
-      living room, and there laid poor old Pierre on the very cot which he had
-      occupied once before&mdash;on the eventful night when Tom Baker had
-      brought the paroled convict from San Quentin.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      A few drops of whisky brought the wounded man back to consciousness. Dick
-      leaned over him and caught the faintly whispered words. Piérre was
-      speaking in the French of his childhood days.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He is dead&mdash;he is dead! At last Rosetta is avenged!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick motioned his companions to silence. He bent down close to the dying
-      bandit.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Who is dead, Pierre? Ben Thurston?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, yes. Ben Thurston. Glory be to God! Don Manuel is avenged!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And how did you come to be shot, Pierre? Where is Don Manuel?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dead&mdash;dead, too!&rdquo; The wounded man this time cried out the words and
-      struggled to sit up. His eyes opened wide, and fastened themselves on
-      Dick. His voice again dropped to a whisper; he was speaking lucidly now.
-      &ldquo;But perhaps he lives. Who knows? Go and save him, Dick&mdash;Don Manuel&mdash;go,
-      go.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Exhausted, Pierre sank back on the pillow. His eyes closed. The death
-      rattle was in his throat. &ldquo;Where is he&mdash;where shall I find Don
-      Manuel?&rdquo; Dick uttered the words close to Pierre&rsquo;s ear. He alone caught the
-      faint answer. Pierre Luzon was dead.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He&rsquo;s gone, Chester,&rdquo; said Dick, standing erect. Munson stooped, put his
-      ear to Pierre&rsquo;s breast, then pressed apart one pair of the eyelids.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, it&rsquo;s all over,&rdquo; he said solemnly, as he folded the coverlet over the
-      already marble-like face.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      In stricken silence the three men passed to the outer room, shutting the
-      door softly behind them.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What&rsquo;s happened?&rdquo; asked Jack Rover, &ldquo;I couldn&rsquo;t catch his bloomin&rsquo;
-      lingo.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Something terrible. There has evidently been a fight to the death on
-      Comanche Point between Ben Thurston and Don Manuel. Looks as if both of
-      them had gone over the cliff in the struggle.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Gee!&rdquo; muttered the cowboy.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick remained just a moment in deep thought. His plan of action was
-      promptly decided on.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Munson, old man, you saddle my pony, and ride to Tejon for help. Jack,
-      you remain here with the body.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And with the nuggets,&rdquo; remarked the cowboy drily.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick paid no heed to the interruption. He continued:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll take the horse outside, and ride back to Comanche Point. That&rsquo;s the
-      best we can do, and the main thing is to do it quickly. Pass me that flask
-      of whisky&mdash;it may come in handy. I&rsquo;m off now, boys. You&rsquo;ll find me at
-      the cliff. Bring a doctor, Ches. So long!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The moon had now risen, and while Dick was galloping toward Comanche Point
-      from the one direction, the runabout, with Merle at the wheel and Tia
-      Teresa by her side, was speeding from the other end of the valley toward
-      the same destination. The horseman was the first to arrive.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Willoughby had no need to search long beneath the precipice. A loud,
-      continuous cry of lamentation guided him to the spot. There, wailing over
-      the corpse of Don Manuel, was the old Indian squaw, Guadalupe. Even in
-      death the two bodies were locked in each other&rsquo;s embrace, and Dick noted
-      with horror that Ben Thurston&rsquo;s teeth were buried in the flesh of his
-      enemy&rsquo;s shoulder. Guadalupe was in the act of trying to separate the dead
-      men when Dick intervened.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Great heavens, what a withered, aged face was raised toward his own! It
-      was the first time he had ever seen Guadalupe unveiled and at close
-      quarters. Her cheeks were wrinkled into a hundred folds; her eyes were
-      sunken in deep cavernous hollows. When he touched her, she rose and,
-      jabbering furiously for all the world like an angry ape, reviled him with
-      curses, her meaning unmistakable, although she spoke in some strange
-      Indian tongue.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Just then Dick caught the distant chug-chug of the automobile. He looked
-      up the valley, wondering who might be passing at that hour of night. This
-      was not the main highway; nobody ever came to Comanche Point after dark.
-      Some intervening spur of the foothills dulled the sound; all was still and
-      silent.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      He became conscious that Guadalupe&rsquo;s fury had spent itself, and turned
-      round. The squaw was gone. His eyes searched the scrub; at one place he
-      saw the twigs bending, and he even fancied he could detect the outline of
-      the white wolf gliding away through the brushwood. But that was all.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Again the sound of the automobile smote his ears; louder now, and only a
-      few hundred yards away he beheld the headlights sweeping toward the spot
-      where he stood. He resolved to intercept the vehicle and stepped across
-      the belt of chaparral that intervened between him and the roadway. Gaining
-      the thoroughfare, he called aloud and the machine slowed down.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But what was his utter amazement when Merle jumped&rsquo; from the runabout. To
-      her there could be no more surprises on this night of surprises.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dick,&rdquo; she exclaimed, as she accepted his embrace almost as a matter of
-      course.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How do you come to be here, Merle, my darling?&rdquo; he asked, holding her in
-      his arms.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Something terrible is going to happen. I have come to try to prevent it.
-      Have you seen Don Manuel?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don Manuel!&rdquo; He repeated the name in great surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mr. Robles is Don Manuel,&rdquo; she gasped by way of explanation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I am aware. He told me so today.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, where is he now? And his enemy, Mr. Thurston?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick still had an arm on her shoulder. She was gazing up into his face,
-      her voice trembling with emotion as she breathlessly plied him with her
-      questions.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You have come too late, dearest,&rdquo; Willoughby gently replied.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dead!&rdquo; she exclaimed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Both are dead. They fought and rolled over the precipice. I have just
-      found their bodies lying in the chaparral back there.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle leaned forward, sobbing on his breast.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Take me to him, take me to him,&rdquo; she cried.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, Merle, my dear. It is better not. You must go home. Tia Teresa,&rdquo; he
-      added, addressing the duenna who had drawn near, &ldquo;she must go home. Munson
-      has gone to Tejon for help. There will be people arriving here very soon
-      now.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He is really dead&mdash;Don Manuel?&rdquo; asked Tia Teresa in a voice of awed
-      sadness.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;There can be nothing but the one answer,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;Don Manuel has
-      passed on.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Take me to him,&rdquo; moaned Merle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no, Merle. This is no sight for you.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But, Dick, Dick, don&rsquo;t you know one other thing?&rdquo; she pleaded, raising
-      her tearful eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What other thing?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don Manuel&mdash;was my father&mdash;my dear, dear father.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Again Willoughby was overwhelmed with amazement.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Your father?&rdquo; he murmured.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, I only came to know it today. So, Dick, dear, even though he is
-      dead, let me kiss him now, let me kneel by his side and tell him that I
-      loved him, and will always love and revere his memory. Let me watch by him
-      until the others come.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick drew the sobbing girl close to him. His eyes sought those of Tia
-      Teresa. He shook his head, telling the duenna in an unmistakable way that
-      Merle must be taken home&mdash;that she must not be shocked by the
-      gruesome spectacle hidden in the chaparral.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Even as their eyes met, the faint throb of an automobile was heard, and
-      glancing across the plain Dick saw the far-away headlights twinkling like
-      twin stars. With a gesture he directed Tia Teresa&rsquo;s attention to the
-      coming help.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I shall watch by our beloved dead one,&rdquo; said the duenna. &ldquo;My place is by
-      his side. Come, dearie,&rdquo; she went on, placing an arm around Merle&rsquo;s waist.
-      &ldquo;Mr. Willoughby will drive you back to La Siesta, and I shall see that
-      your father&rsquo;s body is taken to his home. There we shall pay all honor to
-      the dead.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Together they led Merle, unresisting now, to the runabout. Dick got in
-      beside her, and took the wheel.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;They will be here very soon now,&rdquo; he said to Tia Teresa. &ldquo;Mr. Munson will
-      give you all the help you require. I&rsquo;ll look after Merle.&rdquo; He backed the
-      machine, turned, and the little red light swept up the roadway into the
-      distance. From across the valley the headlights of a big automobile were
-      now glaring like flashing suns in the soft moonlight.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      It was the hands of Tia Teresa that separated the bodies. That of Ben
-      Thurston she flung from her as if it had been carrion for the buzzards and
-      coyotes. Then she knelt down and stroked with loving hand the brow of Don
-      Manuel. On the dead face was a look of ineffable calm.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Manuel, my Manuel, the little child I nursed! My beautiful, brave
-      Manuel!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Thus lamenting, she awaited the coming of Munson and his friends.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0042" id="link2HCH0042"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XLII&mdash;Wedding Bells
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span> FULL year had
-      passed, and the good people of Tejon had at last ceased to speak daily
-      about Dick Willoughby&rsquo;s exciting adventures, Ben Thurston&rsquo;s inglorious
-      death, and the romantic and now indubitable ending of the famous outlaw,
-      Don Manuel.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Both the victims of the desperate fight on Comanche Point had been laid to
-      rest&mdash;Don Manuel, in the little Mission churchyard above the hill,
-      side by side with the beloved sister of his youthful days, whose betrayal
-      and death he had at last avenged, although at the cost of his own life;
-      Ben Thurston, in the modern cemetery beside his son, the poor weak youth
-      in whom the once sturdy family of pioneers had sunk to final decadency.
-      Pierre Luzon, the brave and chivalrous old Frenchman, slept near the grave
-      of the chief he had served so loyally, and, according to the old-time
-      bandit code of ethics, so nobly and so well. In the God&rsquo;s acres where all
-      feuds pass to oblivion there was perfect peace.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Sing Ling had unobtrusively departed for China, a wealthy man, as the bank
-      manager at Bakersfield could have told, no doubt destined to become a
-      leading magnate in the Flowery Land. Guadalupe was never seen again; the
-      aged squaw had probably died in her secret cave. The white wolf, too, had
-      perished; a cowboy riding the range had been attracted by some buzzards
-      flying and circling round and round far up on the mountain side, and on
-      making his way to the indicated spot, had found the animal&rsquo;s carcass
-      picked almost to the bones. The old days were forever gone.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But in the beautiful city of Tejon a glorious era of happiness was in
-      progress. Christmas-tide had come round again, and had been made gay with
-      a tournament of roses, and then with the dawning of the New Year had
-      followed a round of festivities in honor of the double wedding of Dick
-      Willoughby and Merle Farnsworth, Chester Munson and Grace Darlington.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      In no place was there more sincere and hilarious rejoicing than in the
-      back parlor of Buck Ashley&rsquo;s fine new store, where the mystery keg,
-      sacredly reserved for this great occasion, was once more on tap and the
-      postmaster, assisted by Tom Baker and Jack Rover, dispensed hospitality to
-      a few chosen friends. But all good things come to an end, and it was with
-      a regretful sigh that the sheriff squeezed out the last few drops from the
-      tilted keg and sipped for the last time &ldquo;the blessed nectar&rdquo; that had
-      served to keep green the memory of &ldquo;dear old Pierre.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The marriage ceremonies had been performed in a fine little church that
-      sheltered all denominations in the new town, and amidst a shower of rice
-      and old shoes the happy couples had departed for the wedding breakfast at
-      La Siesta.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      To Merle the day was one of blissful joy, but of tender regrets as well.
-      During the quiet afternoon hours she and Dick had conversed about their
-      dear old friend, Mr. Robles&mdash;the gallant and chivalrous Don Manuel&mdash;the
-      beloved father whose identity as such was known only to their own two
-      selves besides Mrs. Darlington and Tia Teresa.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And now the hour of departure on the honeymoon trail had come. The idea of
-      a trip to Europe had been abandoned for the present. The young couples
-      were going up among the Canadian Rockies, by divergent routes which would
-      meet a little later on, and all were full of enthusiasm at the thought of
-      seeing the mighty mountains in their wintry grandeur.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Mrs. Darlington accompanied the young people to the railway station, but
-      Tia Teresa was too deeply affected to trust herself away from home. Merle
-      had kissed her a tender good-bye in the apartment in the tower, and,
-      despite the joyful promise that they would soon meet again, had left the
-      old duenna in prayerful tears before her little altar.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At last they were pulling out from the depot, where the church crowd of
-      the morning had reassembled in full force, with fresh supplies of
-      good-luck munitions.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0012" id="linkimage-0012"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
-      <img src="images/0371.jpg" alt="0371 " width="100%" /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h5>
-      <a href="images/0371.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
-    </h5>
-    <p>
-      Thus, like a disbanding company of players, the actors in this tale of
-      California, pass into history. The olden days of bandits are no more,
-      while the hatred of the gringo is only a tradition. The broad acres of the
-      San Antonio Rancho no longer lie comparatively fallow in Nature&rsquo;s pasture,
-      but are tilled by the thrifty plowman as he labors afield with fullest
-      confidence of a bountiful reward. Meanwhile, the mountains that look down
-      upon the beauteous valley guard their secret well. But searching eyes will
-      yet, undoubtedly, sometime, somewhere, rediscover the mysterious cavern
-      with its hoarded millions of loot, stored by the rapacious hands of
-      Joaquin Murietta, the White Wolf, and their brigand bands, its lake of oil
-      from which outlaws fed their lamps, and its subterranean river from whose
-      shallow riffles Guadalupe, and Dick Willoughby also, gathered a wealth of
-      golden spoil.
-    </p>
-    <h3>
-      THE END
-    </h3>
-    <div style="height: 6em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-
-<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 52289 ***</div>
-  </body>
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-  <head>

-    <title>

-      A Vendetta of the Hills, by Willis George Emerson

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-Project Gutenberg's A Vendetta of the Hills, by Willis George Emerson

-

-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most

-other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions

-whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of

-the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at

-www.gutenberg.org.  If you are not located in the United States, you'll have

-to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook.

-

-

-

-Title: A Vendetta of the Hills

-

-Author: Willis George Emerson

-

-Illustrator: A. Hutchins

-

-Release Date: June 9, 2016 [EBook #52289]

-Last Updated: August 2, 2016

-

-Language: English

-

-Character set encoding: UTF-8

-

-*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A VENDETTA OF THE HILLS ***

-

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-Produced by David Widger from page images generously

-provided by the Internet Archive

-

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-

-</pre>

-

-    <div style="height: 8em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h1>

-      A VENDETTA OF THE HILLS

-    </h1>

-    <h2>

-      By Willis George Emerson

-    </h2>

-    <h4>

-      Author of &ldquo;The Treasure of Hidden Valley,&rdquo; &ldquo;Buell Hampton,&rdquo; &ldquo;The

-      Builders,&rdquo; etc.

-    </h4>

-    <h3>

-      Illustrated by A. Hutchins

-    </h3>

-    <h5>

-      Boston: The Chappie Publishing Company, Ltd.

-    </h5>

-    <h3>

-      1917

-    </h3>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0001" id="linkimage-0001"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">

-      <img src="images/0001.jpg" alt="0001 " width="100%" /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h5>

-      <a href="images/0001.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>

-    </h5>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0002" id="linkimage-0002"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">

-      <img src="images/0006.jpg" alt="0006 " width="100%" /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h5>

-      <a href="images/0006.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>

-    </h5>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0003" id="linkimage-0003"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">

-      <img src="images/0007.jpg" alt="0007 " width="100%" /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h5>

-      <a href="images/0007.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>

-    </h5>

-    <h3>

-      TO MY WIFE

-    </h3>

-    <h3>

-      BONNIE O&rsquo;NEAL EMERSON

-    </h3>

-    <p>

-      Our enchanting years of pleasure, dear, are speeding all too fast,

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      As our ever-fleeting joys become blest mem&rsquo;ries of the past.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Heaven&rsquo;s blessings, glad and golden, strew with bliss the paths of life

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      When a sweetheart, fond and cheery,

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Has her &ldquo;hubby&rdquo; for her dearie,

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      And her &ldquo;hubby&rdquo; has a sweetheart for his wife.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &mdash;The Author.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      January 18, 1917.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <b>CONTENTS</b>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0001"> CHAPTER I&mdash;Guadalupe </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0002"> CHAPTER II&mdash;Charmed Lives </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0003"> CHAPTER III&mdash;Feminine Attractions </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0004"> CHAPTER IV&mdash;Back to the Soil </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0005"> CHAPTER V&mdash;At La Siesta </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0006"> CHAPTER VI&mdash;The Quarrel </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0007"> CHAPTER VII&mdash;Old Bandit Days </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0008"> CHAPTER VIII&mdash;A Letter from San Quentin </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0009"> CHAPTER IX&mdash;Tia Teresa </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0010"> CHAPTER X&mdash;The Home of the Recluse </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0011"> CHAPTER XI&mdash;A Rejected Suitor </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0012"> CHAPTER XII&mdash;The Sped Bullet </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0013"> CHAPTER XIII&mdash;Accused </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0014"> CHAPTER XIV&mdash;Entanglements </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0015"> CHAPTER XV&mdash;Behind the Bars </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0016"> CHAPTER XVI&mdash;Pierre Luzon Returns </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0017"> CHAPTER XVII&mdash;The Bitter Bit </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0018"> CHAPTER XVIII&mdash;Elusive Riches </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0019"> CHAPTER XIX&mdash;The Jail Delivery </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0020"> CHAPTER XX&mdash;In the Cavern </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0021"> CHAPTER XXI&mdash;A Debt of Honor </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0022"> CHAPTER XXII&mdash;Underqround Wonders </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0023"> CHAPTER XXIII&mdash;The Unexpected Visitor </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0024"> CHAPTER XXIV&mdash;In a Tight Corner </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0025"> CHAPTER XXV&mdash;Love and Revenge </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0026"> CHAPTER XXVI&mdash;A Date is Fixed </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0027"> CHAPTER XXVII&mdash;Among the Old Oaks </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0028"> CHAPTER XXVIII&mdash;The Prize Winner </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0029"> CHAPTER XXIX&mdash;-The Rendezvous </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0030"> CHAPTER XXX&mdash;Don Manuel Appears </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0031"> CHAPTER XXXI&mdash;Shadows of the Past </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0032"> CHAPTER XXXII&mdash;Forebodings </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0033"> CHAPTER XXXIII&mdash;Old Friends </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0034"> CHAPTER XXXIV&mdash;Heart Searchings </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0035"> CHAPTER XXXV&mdash;At Comanche Point </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0036"> CHAPTER XXXVI&mdash;-Outwitted </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0037"> CHAPTER XXXVII&mdash;The Dawn of Comprehension

-      </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0038"> CHAPTER XXXVIII&mdash;Exit Leach Sharkey </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0039"> CHAPTER XXXIX&mdash;The Fight on the Cliff </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0040"> CHAPTER XL&mdash;Revelation </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0041"> CHAPTER XLI&mdash;Beneath the Precipice </a>

-    </p>

-    <p class="toc">

-      <a href="#link2HCH0042"> CHAPTER XLII&mdash;Wedding Bells </a>

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0001" id="link2HCH0001"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER I&mdash;Guadalupe

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>T was a June

-      morning in mid-California. The sun was just rising over the rim of the

-      horizon, dissipating the purple haze of dawn and bathing in golden

-      sunshine a great valley spread out like a parchment scroll. It was a rural

-      scene of magnificent grandeur&mdash;encircling mountains, rolling

-      foothills, and then the vast expanse of plain dotted here and there with

-      clumps of trees and clothed with luxuriant grasses.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Thousands of cattle were bestirring themselves from their slumbers&mdash;some

-      sniffing the air and bellowing lowly, others paving the earth in an

-      indifferent way, and all moving slowly toward one or other of the mountain

-      streams that wound serpent-like through the valley, as if they deemed it

-      proper to begin the day with a morning libation.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      To the south, commanding a narrow pass that pierced the Tehachapi mountain

-      range, stood old Fort Tejon, dismantled now and partly in ruins,

-      picturesque if no longer formidable&mdash;a romantic relic of old frontier

-      fighting days. In the foreground of the crumbling adobe walls, sheltered

-      under giant oaks, was a trading store and postoffice combined.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Within this building half a dozen men were in earnest conversation,

-      swapping yarns even at that early hour. Perhaps they, too, like the

-      cattle, had felt the call for their &ldquo;morning&rsquo;s morning.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      A young army officer, Lieutenant Chester Munson, was telling of a rough

-      experience he had had a few days before with a mountain lion in one of the

-      near-by rugged canyons.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The story was interrupted by a sound of galloping hoofs.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Here&rsquo;s Dick Willoughby,&rdquo; someone announced.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The rider brought his mustang to a panting stop, threw the bridle rein

-      over its head, and, leaping lightly from his saddle, entered the store.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick Willoughby was a tall, athletic, square-jawed, grey-eyed young fellow

-      who looked determinedly purposeful. He was originally an architect from

-      New York City, but during the last five years had become an adopted son of

-      the West&mdash;had made the sacrifice, or rather gone through the

-      improving metamorphosis, of assimilation.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Good morning, Ches, old boy,&rdquo; he shouted to the lieutenant.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The latter returned the salutation with a friendly nod.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The camp was lonely without you last night, Dick,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Who is the

-      fair senorita that keeps you away?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s all right,&rdquo; replied Willoughby, smiling. &ldquo;I will tell you later.&rdquo;

-       Then after a genial allround greeting for the others present, he eagerly

-      exclaimed: &ldquo;Boys, she is coming.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What! Guadalupe?&rdquo; shouted everyone in chorus of surprise.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, Guadalupe is headed this way. I spied her on the mountain trail an

-      hour ago, and thanks to my field glasses, was able to determine the moving

-      speck was none other than the old squaw herself. She is just beyond yon

-      clump of trees and will be here shortly.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I am wonderin&rsquo; if she&rsquo;s got her apron filled again with them there gold

-      nuggets,&rdquo; remarked Tom Baker inquiringly, while a smile flitted over his

-      grey-bearded countenance. &ldquo;That squaw is a regular free-gold placer

-      proposition.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;She would have been held up before now in the old days, eh, sheriff?&rdquo;

-       laughed one of the cowboys. Tom Baker had been sheriff for a long term of

-      years in early times, and, although no longer in office, the title had

-      still clung to him.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;By gad!&rdquo; exclaimed Jack Rover, another cowboy, and a gentlemanly young

-      fellow in manner and appearance. &ldquo;She&rsquo;s not going to get back to her

-      hiding-place this time, nor to that will-o&rsquo;-the-wisp placer gold mine of

-      hers unless she shows me.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That will do for you,&rdquo; said Dick Willoughby with an admonishing look.

-      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t you forget that Guadalupe, although an old Indian squaw, is also a

-      human being. There is going to be no violence if I can prevent it.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; laughed Jack, pushing his hat back as if to acknowledge that he

-      had been checkmated, &ldquo;you&rsquo;re my boss on the cattle ranch, and I&rsquo;ll have to

-      take your tip, I guess.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I say, Dick,&rdquo; asked the other cowboy, &ldquo;did you see anything of the white

-      wolf?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Do you mean the real wolf?&rdquo; interjected Jack Rover, &ldquo;or the bandit, Don

-      Manuel?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Willoughby was looking along the road and took no notice.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I guess both are real,&rdquo; mused Tom Baker, grimly smiling, and a general

-      laugh followed.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, I for one will subscribe to that,&rdquo; exclaimed Buck Ashley,

-      storekeeper, postmaster, bartender, and all-round <i>generalissimo</i> of

-      the trading establishment. &ldquo;If Don Manuel is not a wolf in human form, and

-      a bigger outlaw than Joaquin Murietta ever thought of being, why you may

-      take my head for a football.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But he&rsquo;s dead, ain&rsquo;t he?&rdquo; asked the cowboy who had introduced the subject

-      of the white wolf.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Just one thing that I want to emphasize good and plenty to you fellers,&rdquo;

-       said Tom Baker, &ldquo;and that is&mdash;&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Here she comes!&rdquo; interrupted Dick Willoughby.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      A hush fell over the group as the bent, aged figure of an Indian woman was

-      seen approaching the store. Her features were hidden by a shawl that

-      closely muffled her head and shoulders.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Buck Ashley saluted Guadalupe with a &ldquo;How?&rdquo; The squaw answered with the

-      same abrupt salutation, shuffled up to the counter and said brokenly,

-      &ldquo;Coffee&mdash;sugar&mdash;tea&mdash;rice.&rdquo; With her left hand she had

-      gathered up the lower portion of her calico apron and held it pouch

-      fashion. She thrust her right hand into the pocket so formed, and bringing

-      forth a handful of gold nuggets, laid them on the counter. Some were the

-      size of peas, and others as large as hulled hickory nuts. Not a word was

-      spoken by the onlookers, who were wild-eyed in their astonishment. Soon

-      interest rose to high tension.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Buck Ashley tied up a large package of sugar and pushed it toward the bent

-      form of his customer; then resting his hand on the counter, he looked

-      fixedly at the squaw and said, &ldquo;More gold.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Again she thrust her hand into the apron pocket and brought out another

-      handful of nuggets, whereupon Ashley proceeded to tie up a large package

-      of coffee. This done, he repeated the request for more gold. Old Guadalupe

-      added another handful of nuggets to those already on the counter, and

-      Ashley tied up a package of rice.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The squaw looked up at the storekeeper for a moment and then said, &ldquo;Tea.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Buck Ashley&rsquo;s laconic response was &ldquo;More gold,&rdquo; and immediately another

-      handful of nuggets was brought forth, whereupon a fourth package was

-      deposited on the counter.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Old Guadalupe stowed the parcels in her apron on top of any remaining gold

-      nuggets she might have brought. Then she turned and walked limpingly away,

-      through the low brushwood toward a little grove of gnarled and twisted

-      sycamores close to the ruined fort.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      When she had gone Buck Ashley observed, &ldquo;No use following her&mdash;not a

-      damn bit of use in the world! She&rsquo;ll make camp out there under the trees

-      until some time tonight, and then vanish like a shadow into the dark.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      While speaking, Ashley had been gathering up the gold.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I say, Buck,&rdquo; observed Dick Willoughby, winking at his friend Lieutenant

-      Munson, &ldquo;it is my private opinion that that bandit, the White Wolf, has

-      nothing on you.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Tom Baker laughingly chimed in: &ldquo;If I am any judge, and I allow as how I

-      am, Buck here would make that pound-of-flesh Shylock feller look like

-      thirty cents Mex.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Ashley smiled greedily, but in a satisfied way, as he said with unruffled

-      calm: &ldquo;Guess I&rsquo;d better weigh them nuggets and see how much the old

-      squaw&rsquo;s groceries cost her.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The treacherous Indian and the honest paleface,&rdquo; laughed Dick Willoughby

-      in a half-rebuking tone.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Buck Ashley bridled up. His voice rang with deep feeling.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Boys,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;you think I&rsquo;m a Shylock, a robber, a devil I expect, and

-      everything that&rsquo;s bad. I don&rsquo;t talk much about myself, but just so you&rsquo;ll

-      not think too blamed hard of me, I&rsquo;ll ask you a question. Supposen when

-      you was only about fifteen years old, you stood by, tied hand and foot,

-      and saw a lot of redskins scalp and kill your father and mother and two

-      little sisters, and then rob your dead father of over ten thousand dollars

-      in gold, run off the family stock, and take you to their camp to burn at

-      the stake as a sort of incidental diversion at one of their pow-wow

-      dances; and supposen you performed a miracle and got away and took an oath

-      to kill and rob every derned Indian you might see throughout the remaining

-      days of your life&mdash;what, then, if I reformed and gave up the kilin&rsquo;

-      and stuck to robbin&rsquo;, would you blame me?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      During this tragic recital of his wrongs the old storekeeper had become

-      noticeably excited.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick Willoughby got up from the cracker-box where he had been resting, and

-      advancing with hand extended, said: &ldquo;Buck, what you have told us presents

-      the whole matter in a new light. Shake!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Thanks,&rdquo; replied the storekeeper as he turned away to wipe a mist from

-      his eyes.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Then quickly facing about, he called out in his usual gruff, hale and

-      hearty manner: &ldquo;Say, boys, what&rsquo;ll you all have? This round is on the

-      house.&rdquo; They drank in silence. A fragment of Buck Ashley&rsquo;s history had

-      cleared away a good deal of previous misunderstanding.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0002" id="link2HCH0002"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER II&mdash;Charmed Lives

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>HE spell of

-      restraint that resulted from Buck Ashley&rsquo;s story was at last broken by the

-      cowboy, Jack Rover.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Look here, Dick,&rdquo; he exclaimed, &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll give a month&rsquo;s salary if you will

-      let me take a chance and follow old Guadalupe. I&rsquo;ve simply got to find out

-      and locate that sand-bar in some mountain stream from which she brings in

-      all this gold. This is the third time I&rsquo;ve seen our friend Buck Ashley

-      collect a grocery bill from the old squaw, and the whole business, gold

-      nuggets and all, is getting on my nerves. Why, I dreamed about it for a

-      week last time I saw her forking out whole handfuls of gold.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Very well,&rdquo; replied Willoughby, &ldquo;if you want to take the chance, Jack, go

-      ahead. But it is a mad project which will end in my expressing your

-      remains back East or else planting you in the cemetery on the hill. It&rsquo;s

-      up to you to make your choice before you tackle the job. You certainly

-      know what happened to four or five others who attempted to follow the old

-      squaw. Each mother&rsquo;s son of them was buried the next day.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, that&rsquo;s ancient history,&rdquo; Jack retorted.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Not such very ancient hist&rsquo;ry,&rdquo; remarked Tom Baker. &ldquo;I myself saw young

-      Bill McNab drilled through the heart with a bullet that seemed to come

-      from nowhere. After that I&rsquo;ll allow I wasn&rsquo;t filled up with too much

-      curiosity as to where Guadalupe hiked over the mountains.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;There was a regular sharp-shootin&rsquo; outfit,&rdquo; concurred Buck Ashley.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And there wasn&rsquo;t a sheriff in the country would have led a posse into

-      that damned ambush,&rdquo; Tom went on. &ldquo;There wasn&rsquo;t a sportin&rsquo; chance along

-      that narrow ledge round which Guadalupe always disappeared. And with all

-      them outlaws in the mountains!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But the outlaws have been wiped out years ago,&rdquo; persisted Jack Rover.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Mebbe,&rdquo; said Tom Baker, sententiously.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You forget the White Wolf,&rdquo; added Buck Ashley.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Which white wolf?&rdquo; asked Jack. &ldquo;I put that question before but got no

-      answer.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Both,&rdquo; replied Tom. &ldquo;To begin with I don&rsquo;t believe that Don Manuel is

-      dead at all. That was only a newspaper story. You may take it from me that

-      the bandit won&rsquo;t pass in his checks till he gets old Ben Thurston. I&rsquo;m

-      allowin&rsquo; as how Ben Thurston would quick enough give a thousand head of

-      his fattest beeves just to rest easy in his mind on that score. He&rsquo;ll find

-      out, sure enough, some day.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, when the White Wolf finds him,&rdquo; interjected the storekeeper with a

-      terse emphasis.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What&rsquo;s that old feud anyway?&rdquo; queried Lieutenant Munson. &ldquo;Tell me, Tom.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, it is an old story,&rdquo; the sheriff answered. &ldquo;I thought everybody knew

-      about it, but of course you&rsquo;re a newcomer. Well, you see,&rdquo; he continued,

-      clearing his throat and expectorating a copious and accurately aimed

-      pit-tew of tobacco juice toward a knot-hole in the floor, &ldquo;the White

-      Wolf&rsquo;s father, Don Antonio de Valencia, a reg&rsquo;lar high-toned grandee from

-      Spain, had settled in these here parts away back longer than anyone could

-      remember. He claimed this whole stretch of country from horizon to

-      horizon. Then came the Americans, among them a government surveyor named

-      Thurston. He had a pull at Washington and managed to get a legal grant to

-      the San Antonio property. Of course the old Spaniard had no real title&mdash;his

-      was just a sort of squatter&rsquo;s claim. But they do say as how he had lived

-      in this here valley more than half a century, so it was mighty hard luck

-      to lose the land. And the boy Manuel never would admit the Thurstons had

-      any right to call it theirs.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Don Manuel had a younger sister,&rdquo; interposed Buck Ashley. &ldquo;Rosetta, a

-      beautiful girl&mdash;looked like a morning-glory. Gad! but she sure had a

-      purty face. You remember, Tom, don&rsquo;t you?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, yes,&rdquo; replied Tom Baker, &ldquo;it&rsquo;s not likely I should forget the poor

-      girl. It was &lsquo;cause of her the quarrel became a bitter blood feud&mdash;the

-      Vendetta of the Hills, as we got to calling it. You see,&rdquo; he went on,

-      resuming the thread of his story, &ldquo;old man Thurston&rsquo;s son, Ben, the

-      present owner of the rancho, was in his younger days a gay Lothario scamp,

-      and he came from the East to his new home in California loaded down with a

-      college education and a mighty intimate knowledge of the ways of the world

-      that decent folks don&rsquo;t talk about, much less practice. He had not been

-      here a month until he commenced makin&rsquo; love to little Senorita Rosetta.

-      Before the second sheep-shearin&rsquo; time came around, she was&mdash;well, in

-      a delicate condition. To save himself and, as he thought, cover up the

-      disgrace&mdash;you see he was engaged to a rich Eastern girl of prominent

-      family&mdash;why, the young scoundrel conceived the hellish plot of lurin&rsquo;

-      little Rosetta to Comanche Point one dark night. And when he got her there

-      he threw her over the cliff&mdash;at least that&rsquo;s the way the story goes.

-      Guess Don Manuel was about twenty-five years old at that time, and Ben

-      Thurston two or three years his junior. Well, the disgrace killed

-      Rosetta&rsquo;s father and mother. They died of grief and shame soon after the

-      affair, almost on the same day, and Don Manuel buried them together in the

-      old churchyard on the hill by the side of his murdered sister. And it was

-      there and then, they say, that he took an oath to kill Ben Thurston. That

-      was mor&rsquo;n thirty years ago and the feud has been on ever since, and all us

-      old-timers know hell will be poppin&rsquo; &lsquo;round here one of these days.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But nobody ever sees the White Wolf, Don Manuel,&rdquo; added Buck Ashley.

-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s the ex-tr&rsquo;ornery part of it.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, you yourself are likely to see him one of these dark nights, Buck,&rdquo;

-       laughed Jack Rover, as he winked at the other boys. &ldquo;A storekeeper that&rsquo;ll

-      work night and day stacking up money year in and year out is liable to

-      have a call sooner or later from the bandit and his friends.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, hell!&rdquo; was the laconic response of Buck Ashley. &ldquo;Guess I sure can

-      take care of myself.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But Don Manuel may not be alive,&rdquo; suggested the young lieutenant.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He&rsquo;s alive right enough, make no mistake,&rdquo; said Tom Baker, &ldquo;although I&rsquo;ll

-      allow I don&rsquo;t know a single soul who has actually seen him personally for

-      more&rsquo;n twenty years. He is a kind o&rsquo; shadowy cuss. Everybody knows him by

-      his old-time deeds of high-way robbin&rsquo; and all-round murderin&rsquo; for golden

-      loot. I heard of a feller last year who claims to have seen the White Wolf

-      when he was makin&rsquo; that last big stage delivery over by Tulare Lake. He

-      was masked, and had all the passengers out on the roadside with their

-      hands thrown up over their heads while he was takin&rsquo; their valuables away

-      from them.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s a dead cinch,&rdquo; Buck Ashley observed, &ldquo;that whenever there was a

-      hold-up or a robbery, or a murder in cold blood for money, why everybody

-      knew that the White Wolf was again in the hills and playin&rsquo; his cut-throat

-      game for pelf and plunder, or mebbe just for revenge against the gringos,

-      whom he hated like hell. Sometimes he was not heard of in these parts for

-      two or three years, and then he showed up more blood-thirsty than ever.

-      His hand was agin every man, and it looked like as every man&rsquo;s hand was

-      agin him.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve been told,&rdquo; said Dick Willoughby, &ldquo;that when the White Wolf was a

-      boy he saved the life of the old highwayman, Joaquin Murietta.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, them are facts,&rdquo; replied Tom Baker. &ldquo;Leastways I&rsquo;ve heard say so.

-      They claim that he saved Murietta&rsquo;s life from a posse of deputies one

-      night, and altho&rsquo; the White Wolf was only a boy at that time, yet a heap

-      of people think he&rsquo;s the only livin&rsquo; soul who knows the whereabouts and

-      location of the secret cavern where Joaquin Murietta planted his loot,

-      amountin&rsquo;, they say, to millions of dollars in gold and jewels and

-      valuables of all kinds. The retreat always proved a safe one for the

-      murderin&rsquo; gang, and now they&rsquo;re gone no one even to this day can find the

-      place. It&rsquo;s somewhere on San Antonio Rancho, but where? The White Wolf

-      kept his secret well.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;If old Pierre Luzon ever gets out of San Quentin,&rdquo; remarked the

-      storekeeper, &ldquo;I guess he could tell, but he&rsquo;s up for life. He was nabbed

-      in that same Tulare Lake affair &lsquo;bout which Tom had been talkin&rsquo;.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said the sheriff, &ldquo;two others were shot dead before they got back

-      to the mountains. The White Wolf and Pierre were ridin&rsquo; alone when the

-      Frenchie&rsquo;s horse stumbled. They picked him up insensible, a broken leg and

-      concussion of the brain, and he was the only one of the gang who ever went

-      to jail.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;God &lsquo;lmighty,&rdquo; exclaimed Buck, &ldquo;old Pierre used to sit around in this

-      here store day after day, smokin&rsquo; an old foreign-lookin&rsquo; pipe, and hardly

-      speakin&rsquo; a word. He used to pretend he knew no English. We never once

-      suspected that he was one of Don Manuel&rsquo;s bunch&mdash;always thought of

-      him as an old sheepherder, a bit off his nut, who had saved a few dollars

-      and was takin&rsquo; things easy. And hell, all the time he was the White Wolf&rsquo;s

-      look-out man, makin&rsquo; note of everything and passin&rsquo; the word o&rsquo; warnin&rsquo;

-      when there was talk of the sheriff gettin&rsquo; busy.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll allow Pierre Luzon fooled me proper,&rdquo; concurred Tom Baker. &ldquo;However,

-      he got what was cornin&rsquo; to him all right, a life sentence, though he ought

-      to have been hanged. Well, perhaps it is only the White Wolf and Pierre

-      Luzon who now know the cave where Joaquin Murietta cached his treasure.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And Guadalupe perhaps as well,&rdquo; remarked Buck Ashley.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, perhaps Guadalupe also,&rdquo; assented the sheriff. &ldquo;But the White Wolf

-      keeps guard over her.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s the real White Wolf this time,&rdquo; laughed

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick Willoughby, with a nod toward the young lieutenant, who had been

-      listening intently to the tale of weird romance.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The real White Wolf?&rdquo; replied Munson, enquiringly. &ldquo;You&rsquo;ve got me all

-      tangled up. What do you mean?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t you know how Don Manuel came by his name of the White Wolf?&rdquo; asked

-      the sheriff.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No, all this folk lore is new to me.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Why, gosh all hemlock! He is named because of a darn big white wolf that

-      has been seen at different times in this here country for a hundred

-      years.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Wolves don&rsquo;t live so long,&rdquo; protested the lieutenant incredulously.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, this one does,&rdquo; retorted Tom, curtly. &ldquo;Leastwise he&rsquo;s been seen

-      from time to time since ever I can remember. In the old days they named

-      the White Wolf Rancho after this monster animal. It has a charmed life. No

-      one can kill this big fellow, altho&rsquo; lots of shots have been fired at him.

-      And the same was true of Don Manuel de Valencia. He escaped so often that

-      folks believed his life a charmed one. And so they called him the White

-      Wolf.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I saw the white wolf once myself,&rdquo; said Buck Ashley, &ldquo;the real white wolf

-      that even now, as Tom says, guards old Guadalupe and makes it best for

-      young fellows like you, Jack Rover, to leave the squaw alone when she

-      makes back for her hidin&rsquo; place in the mountains. I&rsquo;ll never forget that

-      morning, although it&rsquo;s more or less twenty years ago. The great shaggy

-      brute was following Guadalupe along the trail like a Newfoundland dog. In

-      those days I was out on the hills roundin&rsquo; up some mavericks. One of the

-      calves broke from the herd and scampered along a trail that led directly

-      in front of the old squaw. And say, boys, would you believe it? From less

-      than half a mile away I saw with my own eyes that monster devil of a white

-      wolf&mdash;white as the driven snow&mdash;make one terrific mad leap and

-      grab that yearlin&rsquo; by the neck. Guadalupe spotted me and disappeared, and

-      the white wolf trotted after her round the bend, carryin&rsquo; the dead calf in

-      its jaws as a cat carries a mouse.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Did you not shoot at the wolf?&rdquo; excitedly asked Lieutenant Munson.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Shoot, hell! What would have been the use? Didn&rsquo;t you hear what Tom Baker

-      said? White wolves have charmed lives whether they go on two legs or

-      four.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0003" id="link2HCH0003"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER III&mdash;Feminine Attractions

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>OM BAKER, the

-      sheriff, cleared his throat. &ldquo;You fellers, I&rsquo;m assoomin&rsquo;, are all boys. I

-      have been loafin&rsquo; &lsquo;round in this man&rsquo;s land for forty years. I was here

-      the day Don Manuel had been buryin&rsquo; his old father and mother from the

-      little Mission Church, less than a quarter of a mile from where we are

-      settin&rsquo;. He was standin&rsquo; right in front of this store when young Ben

-      Thurston and two of his ranch hands rode up. If ever I saw real bravery it

-      was that mornin&rsquo;. Don&rsquo;t take much bravery to do some things heroic when

-      you have your artillery handy, but it requires the real stuff when you&rsquo;re

-      gunless.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Young Thurston spoke to his companions and they drew their guns and kept

-      them leveled at Don Manuel as their boss dismounted.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Don Manuel was one of the handsomest young fellers I ever laid my two

-      eyes on. He walked straight up to Thurston, and notwithstandin&rsquo; the two

-      loaded pieces of artillery was pintin&rsquo; straight at him said:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;&lsquo;Ben Thurston, you are the man who killed my sister.&rsquo;

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;&lsquo;You are a damned liar!&rsquo; retorted Thurston.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;&lsquo;Yes, you killed her,&rsquo; went on Don Manuel. I found this button in her

-      dead hand, and right there, by God! is where it came from. Look at your

-      coat. Your life shall pay for this dastardly murder. If I had my gun I

-      would settle the matter now, notwithstandin&rsquo; that today I have been

-      burying my beloved father and mother.&rsquo;

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;When young Thurston heard about there bein&rsquo; no gun, he snatched the

-      tell-tale button from his accuser&rsquo;s hand, swung himself into his saddle,

-      laughed mockingly, and with his quirt struck Don Manuel across the face;

-      then he wheeled round his pony and rode away with his bodyguards in a

-      cloud of dust.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;God! I will never forget it. Don Manuel stood there, as white as a piece

-      of paper, and never moved for a whole minute. The quirt had drawn the

-      blood from his face in one long streak. At last he turned away with a

-      resolve in his eyes&mdash;one of them there terrible resolves that change

-      the life of a man, and went back to the little church to finish the last

-      sad rites to his people. It&rsquo;s my opinion Don Manuel, from that very hour,

-      turned bandit in his heart and took oath to murder all the gringos in

-      California.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;As I said before, that was thirty years back, and mebbe a little more,

-      and I have never seen him since. But we all heard of him good and plenty.

-      He certainly left a red trail.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      A silence followed. Presently Buck Ashley in the way of explanation, said:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That tombstone on his sister&rsquo;s grave was put up one night. Nobody saw it

-      done, but everyone knows, of course, it was the work of Don Manuel. It has

-      just one word&mdash;&rsquo;Hermana&rsquo;&mdash;chiseled on the cross of white marble.

-      That&rsquo;s the Mexican for &lsquo;sister,&rsquo; guess you all know. So the name Rosetta

-      is only remembered by old-stagers here, like Tom Baker and me. And we

-      ain&rsquo;t forgotten her pretty face either. Poor little girl!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;A doggoned shame,&rdquo; muttered the sheriff, meditatively, his eyes cast

-      down.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;How about the law?&rdquo; asked Lieutenant Munson. &ldquo;The law!&rdquo; exclaimed Baker,

-      raising his eyes and flashing a look of withering contempt. &ldquo;What kind o&rsquo;

-      law was there in those days and in these parts? A gun was usually both

-      judge and jury. Besides, with the only bit of evidence gone, how could Don

-      Manuel prove anything agin a rich young feller like Ben Thurston?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But if he was laying for him all the time, how is it that the White Wolf

-      never got his man all through those thirty years?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Because Ben Thurston lit out&mdash;he was too demed scared to live on the

-      rancho any longer. But that&rsquo;s another story.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Let&rsquo;s have it, sheriff.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, it&rsquo;s a longish yarn, and p&rsquo;raps you fellers are about tired of

-      hearing me.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      No one protested; there was rather a movement of settling down in pleased

-      expectancy of something worth listening to. So Tom Baker continued:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Ben Thurston had one warnin&rsquo;, good and plenty, and he didn&rsquo;t wait around

-      for a second one. After Don Manuel&rsquo;s threat, he seldom left his home, and

-      a little later went back East again. It wasn&rsquo;t till more&rsquo;n a year that he

-      showed up agin at the rancho. This time he brought with him his Eastern

-      bride, a fine slap-dash young woman who could ride a horse and handle a

-      team in good shape. But we could all see that she wasn&rsquo;t too happy, for

-      Ben Thurston started in to drink heavily, and she was ashamed of him and

-      showed it.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Guess it was to drown his conscience and keep from thinkin&rsquo; about

-      Rosetta,&rdquo; interjected Buck Ashley.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Like as not,&rdquo; assented Tom. &ldquo;Well, anyhow, he hadn&rsquo;t been here very long

-      afore Don Manuel got him&mdash;yes, got him fair and square, although he

-      managed to save his neck at the last moment. There was card-playin&rsquo; and

-      drinkin&rsquo; one night at the rancho&mdash;Thurston had got a bunch o&rsquo; gay

-      young dogs down from San Francisco. Mrs. Thurston had left the room, and

-      was sittin&rsquo; out alone in the moonlight on the verandah. Suddenly she heard

-      a sound that made her sit up and listen&mdash;the clatter o&rsquo; twenty pairs

-      o&rsquo; gallopin&rsquo; hoofs a-comin&rsquo; straight for the house. She must ha&rsquo; known

-      something about the vendetta, for she rushed in terror to her husband and

-      gave him warnin&rsquo;. He escaped by a back door, and a minute later the place

-      was surrounded. The shootin&rsquo; came first from some of the ranch hands, who

-      had tumbled out of the bunk house and were spyin&rsquo; around corners. They

-      said later that the hold-up party numbered more&rsquo;n twenty, some of them

-      masked with handkerchiefs tied around their faces, but others bold as

-      brass and not carin&rsquo; a dang who saw &lsquo;em. Among these last was Don Manuel.

-      But Pierre Luzon was a downy duck, for no one spotted him, although later

-      on we came to know that he played the principal part that night, next to

-      the leader of the gang.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, after the shootin&rsquo;-scrap became general, there was a pretty scare

-      in the ranch house&mdash;one of the card-players dropped, and the others

-      were hiding under tables, when Don Manuel appeared and asked for Ben

-      Thurston. His wife, mighty brave, denied that he was there&mdash;he had

-      left that afternoon for Visalia to buy some cattle, she boldly declared.

-      Don Manuel, always the true gentleman, mark ye, was for believin&rsquo; her when

-      Pierre, his face masked, came in from the verandah and in a low voice

-      passed some words to his chief. Mrs. Thurston knew in a moment that her

-      bluff was goin&rsquo; to be called, and, while the outlaws were confabbin&rsquo;,

-      darted from the room.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But Pierre was just as quick out by the verandah, and before she got to

-      the door o&rsquo; the woolshed beyond the horse corral, he was there to block

-      her passage. It was Pierre who had caught a glimpse of the fugitive

-      sneakin&rsquo; into this outbuilding, and now he knew for certain that Thurston

-      was hiding among the bags o&rsquo; wool inside. But a cornered man is a

-      dangerous animal, and it might mean a good few lives if the door was

-      opened and any attempt made to rush the place.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The gang was soon buzzin&rsquo; all around; the woman, now almost in hysterics,

-      was hustled aside, and a few bundles of loose hay was being dumped into

-      the shed through an open window. A match did the rest. Within three

-      minutes the door opened and Thurston came staggerin&rsquo; out through thick

-      clouds of smoke. Pierre grabbed him and had a noose around his neck in

-      doublequick time.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The shootin&rsquo; was over before this, and some of the ranch hands were

-      lookin&rsquo; on from a little distance, for now everyone knew that it was only

-      the boss that the night-riders were after. So more&rsquo;n one was able

-      afterwards to tell the story&mdash;how the young wife threw herself at Don

-      Manuel&rsquo;s feet, and with sobs and tears pleaded for mercy. And by the

-      living God she won out even after the rope, with her husband at the end of

-      it, had been swung over the limb of a near-by sycamore.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The White Wolf stood stock-still for perhaps a minute, weighin&rsquo; things

-      like, his arms folded across his breast. Then he raised the weepin&rsquo; woman,

-      and, turnin&rsquo; to Thurston, now half-dead with fear, laid hold of him by the

-      shoulder and shook him as a terrier shakes a rat. Then with his other hand

-      he flung the noose from around his neck. &lsquo;Take your miserable life, then,

-      this time&rsquo;&mdash;that&rsquo;s what Don Manuel said. &lsquo;Take it, but the day will

-      come when we shall meet again, man to man, with no woman&rsquo;s tears to save

-      you.&rsquo; And he pushed Thurston away contemptuously, topplin&rsquo; him over like a

-      ninepin, and a minute later rode off at the head of his men.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The narrator paused, and there was a general murmur of repressed

-      excitement.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;My word, that&rsquo;s a peach of a story,&rdquo; exclaimed Jack Rover.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He certainly was a chivalrous fellow, this oldtime Don Manuel,&rdquo; remarked

-      the lieutenant.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And don&rsquo;t you see,&rdquo; said the sheriff, &ldquo;that, when a man acted like that

-      and spoke like that, his words must come true? Don&rsquo;t tell me that Don

-      Manuel today is dead while Ben Thurston is still alive. But he has taken

-      mighty good care of himself ever since that day. He an&rsquo; his wife skipped

-      East the very next morning, and I&rsquo;m told they never stopped till they got

-      to Europe. Nobody knows where exactly they lived during the time that

-      followed, but news came through years later that the wife had died,

-      somewhere in the south of England, leaving a son behind. That&rsquo;s young

-      Marshall who has come West with his dad now&mdash;the young man&rsquo;s first

-      visit and his father&rsquo;s last one, I reckon, if he sells the ranch, as I&rsquo;m

-      told he&rsquo;s trying to do.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But I say, boys,&rdquo; observed Jack Rover, &ldquo;what do you suppose the White

-      Wolf did with all the gold he took away from the people? It&rsquo;s said that in

-      one stage robbery he got over fifty thousand dollars of the yellow stuff.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Hid it,&rdquo; replied Buck Ashley, &ldquo;with Joaquin Murietta&rsquo;s hoarded gold. For

-      it&rsquo;s sure as sure can be that Don Manuel came to know the secret o&rsquo; the

-      bandits&rsquo; cave where Murietta used to store his loot. The only thing

-      anybody else knows is that it is around here somewheres.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But they do say,&rdquo; observed one of the cowboys, &ldquo;whatever Sheriff Baker

-      may think, and you, too, Buck, that Don Manuel is sure &lsquo;nuff dead. Most

-      folks herabouts believe that the White Wolf has gone to his long restin&rsquo;

-      place, sort a j&rsquo;ined forces with old Joaquin Murietta. The Tulare Lake

-      affair was, I guess, his last raid.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He ain&rsquo;t dead,&rdquo; muttered Tom, determinedly, while Buck Ashley also shook

-      his head in repudiation of the cowboy&rsquo;s theory.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, I happen to know,&rdquo; observed Dick Willoughby, &ldquo;that Mr. Thurston has

-      run down the story of the White Wolf&rsquo;s death in that Seattle saloon brawl

-      pretty thoroughly, and he is of the opinion that the big-featured articles

-      in the San Francisco and Los Angeles papers were correct&mdash;that the

-      dead man&rsquo;s identity was absolutely established.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s how he&rsquo;d wish it to be, at all events,&rdquo; said Buck Ashley. &ldquo;But

-      even now, when Ben Thurston ventures to come home to the rancho, he brings

-      with him a great big hulking bodyguard&mdash;Leach Sharkey, I&rsquo;m told is

-      the fellow&rsquo;s name. That don&rsquo;t look much like believin&rsquo; the White Wolf to

-      be dead and the vendetta played out, does it? You can see it in his

-      hang-dog face that it isn&rsquo;t any real pleasure for him to be around in

-      these parts. He ain&rsquo;t once paid me a visit at the store. Guess he thinks

-      his hide&rsquo;ll last longer by stickin&rsquo; close to home. You owe your job o&rsquo;

-      runnin&rsquo; his cattle, Dick Willoughby, to the fact that he&rsquo;s still plumb

-      scared.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, well, I am in his employ,&rdquo; said Dick loyally, &ldquo;and I&rsquo;m inclined to

-      give him the benefit of the doubt as regards these ugly rumors and idle

-      stories. He has always been on the square with me. But perhaps he&rsquo;ll stick

-      to the rancho, now he believes the White Wolf to be dead.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He may believe it, but, as Buck says, why then the bodyguard?&rdquo; commented

-      the sheriff as he relighted his pipe.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes.&rdquo; replied Dick Willoughby, &ldquo;but I believe he is thinking of letting

-      Leach Sharkey go. Personally I would be willing to wager that Don Manuel,

-      whom no one has seen since that last raid on the stage coach, is dead and

-      sleeping with his sires.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, dead or alive,&rdquo; exclaimed Jack Rover, &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t care a hang for the

-      White Wolf and his-buried treasure. But what I would like to know is the

-      exact location of that rippling mountain stream, the identical sandbar

-      where the old squaw Guadalupe gathers up her pocket change with which to

-      buy groceries. That would be a heap better than any blooming cave. Them&rsquo;s

-      my sentiments.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      As he said this he threw some silver on the bar and invited everybody to

-      lubricate.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Just nominate your poison, boys, and let&rsquo;s drink to my finding old

-      Guadalupe&rsquo;s gold mine.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      They all laughed good-naturedly, and Lieutenant Munson declared that he

-      thought he would put in the balance of his furlough days prospecting. &ldquo;You

-      know,&rdquo; he explained in an aside to the storekeeper while the latter was

-      preparing the drinks, &ldquo;I am only here to visit my old college pal, Dick

-      Willoughby, and incidentally see the place where my father was a soldier

-      in the early California days. He was stationed several years in Fort

-      Tejon.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That was before my time,&rdquo; said Buck Ashley.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The soldiers had abandoned the old fort when I came first into these

-      parts.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Meanwhile Dick Willoughby was clinking glasses with Jack Hover.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;There are some mighty pretty little senoritas hereabouts,&rdquo; said Dick,

-      &ldquo;good American blood mixed with Spanish blood, you know, and all that. If

-      a fellow could only find the right one&mdash;understand, I say the right

-      one, Jack&mdash;he wouldn&rsquo;t be losing any time in chasing after the old

-      squaw&rsquo;s secret gold mine or the White Wolf&rsquo;s buried millions.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Jack Rover laughed outright.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I say, Dick, what are you reddening up about? Gee, if I had as fine a

-      lead as you have staked out, I&rsquo;d feel the same way. Ain&rsquo;t that right,

-      Buck?&rdquo; Buck Ashley winked at Jack Rover and said: &ldquo;If you mean who I think

-      you mean, you sure are righter than right. I speak wide open and

-      unrestrained when I give it as my opinion that Miss Merle Farnsworth is

-      the finest specimen of young womanhood that I ever set eyes on, and I have

-      seen some girls East as well as West. Take it from me, she is a jewel, she

-      is a regular beauty rose. Yes,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;and too damned good for that

-      young Thurston whelp, who hangs around tryin&rsquo; to act smart whenever she

-      and that old duenna chaperon of hers comes here to trade. I&rsquo;ll simply boot

-      him out of the store one of these days.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick Willoughby smiled in a satisfied way as he moved toward the door.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, hold on, Dick,&rdquo; called out Jack Rover, &ldquo;don&rsquo;t be in such a

-      dangnation hurry. I&rsquo;ll ride with you in a minute. I&rsquo;ve just got this to

-      say to you, Buck Ashley, that I like you better than ever for what you&rsquo;ve

-      said about Marshall Thurston. Even though I&rsquo;m working for the Thurston

-      outfit, I&rsquo;m free to express my opinion that that young feller is about the

-      meanest specimen of low-down humanity I&rsquo;ve ever struck.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s a case of the second decadency, I suppose,&rdquo; remarked Munson. &ldquo;The

-      worthless profligate, spawn of the rich old roué, Ben Thurston.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Such a drunken pup,&rdquo; continued Rover, &ldquo;aint&rsquo; good enough for a half-breed

-      Indian, much less for the likes of the young ladies of La Siesta. Gee, if

-      I thought there was one chance in a thousand for me with either of them,

-      why goodbye to that placer gold mine ambition that&rsquo;s eating my vitals, or

-      to the planted millions of the White Wolf.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      As he spoke the last words, he followed Dick Willoughby into the open.

-      Dick was standing by his pony.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;re superlatively in earnest, aren&rsquo;t you?&rdquo; he said as he laughed

-      good-naturedly at the cowboy.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You bet your life I&rsquo;m in earnest,&rdquo; replied Jack. &ldquo;And if you don&rsquo;t get

-      busy with that love affair of yours, well, take it from me, you had better

-      look out, for somebody will be picking the peach right from under your

-      very nose. Well, so long, Dick; I&rsquo;ve changed my mind; I&rsquo;ll not ride with

-      you. I&rsquo;ll see to that bit of fence repairing up on the range. And who

-      knows but I may find a sand-bar and a riffle sparkling with yellow gold?&rdquo;

-       He laughed like a big overgrown boy as he touched the rowel to his pony

-      and galloped away across the valley.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0004" id="link2HCH0004"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER IV&mdash;Back to the Soil

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">J</span>ACK ROVER is a

-      great boy,&rdquo; said Dick Willoughby to Lieutenant Munson as the two rode off

-      at a leisurely pace toward the group of ranch buildings peeping through a

-      clump of trees at the edge of the foothills.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;A type of Western character,&rdquo; replied Munson, &ldquo;that in a way is quite new

-      to me. And yet, do you know, I rather like this Western atmosphere.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Like it!&rdquo; exclaimed Dick. &ldquo;Why, man, it is <i>the</i> atmosphere in which

-      to live, move and have one&rsquo;s being.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      They both laughed at his enthusiasm.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Really,&rdquo; continued Dick, soberly, &ldquo;I would not live another year in New

-      York City for all the property fronting on the Circle, the coming centre

-      of old Gotham. Out here a man is a man for what he is worth. You grow

-      bigger, you think broader thoughts, you are not confined to following

-      precedents or taking orders from the man higher up.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, I know,&rdquo; replied Munson, &ldquo;or at least I am beginning to understand

-      something of what you mean. I have only been here ten days and I am

-      already feeling loath to return to my post.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Ches,&rdquo; exclaimed Dick, turning abruptly and facing his companion, &ldquo;give

-      it all up, old fellow, and come and live in this glorious country&mdash;California!

-      There&rsquo;s music in the very name. It is the land of sunshine, of fruits and

-      flowers, and of pretty girls into the bargain.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You keep telling me of the pretty girls, but when am I to see them?&rdquo;

-       questioned Munson. &ldquo;If you have any real senoritas who will cause a fellow

-      to forsake his Eastern home and send in his resignation to army

-      headquarters, let me get a peep at them.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Again they both laughed, this time at the challenge in Munson&rsquo;s words.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;All right,&rdquo; said Dick, &ldquo;you shall see them. And, by the way, don&rsquo;t you

-      remember that this is the very day we have arranged to call on Mrs.

-      Darlington at the Rancho La Siesta? It is a beautiful place, this little

-      rancho, and Mrs. Darlington you will find to be a most admirable woman.

-      But just wait until you see Grace Darlington.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;How about Miss Farnsworth?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Not for you, old man,&rdquo; replied the other quickly, reddening at the

-      temples. &ldquo;Not as long as my name is Dick Willoughby&mdash;providing, you

-      understand, always providing that I shall prove successful in my wooing.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Is it as bad as that, Dick?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo;&mdash;his laughing tone was only a mask to deeper feelings&mdash;&ldquo;I

-      cannot deny that I am pretty hard hit.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;My, but you do whet my impatience,&rdquo; said the lieutenant. &ldquo;And I am about

-      as anxious to be paying that afternoon call as I am to have my breakfast.

-      I don&rsquo;t know how you feel, Dick, but I&rsquo;m as hungry as a lean coyote.&rdquo; He

-      paused a moment, then asked in a musing tone: &ldquo;How far away is this

-      wonderful La Siesta Rancho?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, only about twenty miles.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Twenty miles! You speak of miles out here in the same way as we speak of

-      city blocks back in New York. Surely it must be quite a farm.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Quite a farm? I should say! You musn&rsquo;t confound our Californian ranchos

-      with Eastern farms, old man. Why, this rancho of San Antonio covers over

-      four hundred square miles of territory.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You astonish me.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;La Siesta Rancho adjoins the great San Antonio possession and contains

-      comparatively few acres, just under three thousand. But it surely is a

-      beautiful little place, fixed up like a nobleman&rsquo;s park in the old world.

-      And then the ladies&mdash;&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Aha, the ladies,&rdquo; repeated Munson, doffing his hat in courtly fashion and

-      smiling audaciously.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick touched the flank of his pony with his spur, and for a few miles they

-      rode on at a quicker pace and in silence. Soon they were approaching the

-      ranch buildings. On the outer edge was a little cottage, covered with

-      vines and surrounded by fruit trees, the place which Dick Willoughby, the

-      cattle foreman, had called &ldquo;home&rdquo; for the past five years.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      After turning their horses into a corral, they passed by way of a broad

-      verandah into a big room, roughly but comfortably furnished. Some logs

-      were smouldering in the fireplace, and quickly started into a bright blaze

-      when Dick kicked them together. The warmth was grateful, for while out of

-      doors everything was now bathed in genial sunshine, here the morning air

-      was still keen.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      A Chinaman appeared from the back quarters, and smiled expectantly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Breakfast, Sing Ling,&rdquo; called out Dick, &ldquo;and just as quick as you can

-      serve it.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Sing Ling departed as noiselessly as he had come.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;These are certainly great quarters,&rdquo; observed Munson, settling himself in

-      a big Old Mission rocker and glancing around.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The walls, curiously enough, were pretty well covered with pen-and-ink

-      sketches and designs of buildings that might have adorned an architect&rsquo;s

-      office, while there was a partly completed landscape painting in oils

-      standing on a rudely fashioned easel.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And you&rsquo;ve certainly stuck to the old line of work, Dick,&rdquo; the lieutenant

-      went on.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Of course one must have something to think about when he is all alone in

-      a new country,&rdquo; replied Willoughby. &ldquo;But most of that stuff I did in my

-      first year here,&rdquo; he added, following the other&rsquo;s survey of the walls.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You still paint, however,&rdquo; remarked Munson, his eyes resting on the

-      unfinished canvas.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Or try to,&rdquo; was the laughing response.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, that&rsquo;s a modest way of putting it. Do you know, old man,&rdquo; Munson went

-      on, &ldquo;since I came here I have often thought what a marvelous change has

-      been wrought in you&mdash;what a transplanting has taken place? You were a

-      chronic New Yorker, except for that one year you spent in the Latin

-      Quarter of gay Paree. You thought then you were going to make a great

-      painter. And, by gad, I almost believe so myself,&rdquo; he added, bending

-      forward to make a more critical scrutiny of the work on the easel. &ldquo;By

-      jove, that&rsquo;s really fine, Dick.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m afraid that&rsquo;s flattery, Chester, my boy,&rdquo; responded Willoughby.

-      &ldquo;However, it sounds good to hear you say so. A word of appreciation is

-      what all hearts hunger for. Personally I even believe in a moderate amount

-      of flattery. Its psychic influence is more potent in arousing and causing

-      the heart to throb with ambition than all the stimulants, drugs or

-      reasoning in the world. Indeed, without a certain amount of flattery one

-      becomes ambitionless, languid, and perishes; whereas the unexpected caress

-      or kindly words of praise from loved ones, just or unjust, adds more

-      strength to the good right arm of the breadwinner than all the beef in

-      Christendom, and makes the sunshine seem brighter and earth&rsquo;s every breeze

-      a south wind blowing across beds of violets.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;A bit of a poet, too, I see,&rdquo; smiled Munson.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Willoughby made no reply. He had crossed over to the open door and was

-      looking out on the valley that stretched away for miles&mdash;great oak

-      trees in the foreground, with cattle-dotted pasture lands beyond. Waving

-      his hand toward the vast expanse, he said:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Just look at that for a picture, and see how tame a man-made gallery is

-      as compared with this great art gallery of Nature. Do you know, Ches, I

-      despise New York? There was a time, when I first came here, that I felt I

-      should die of ennui, yearning for the Great White Way once again. But I

-      have outgrown all that. I know now, thank God, there&rsquo;s nothing to it. Here

-      a man can fill his lungs with pure air, and at the same time feast his

-      soul all day long with beautiful things.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      There followed a brief interval of silence. Munson had risen and joined

-      his comrade at the door. Both were gazing over the glorious sunlit sweep

-      of territory rimmed by the distant, pine-clad hills. In the heart of Dick

-      Willoughby was supreme contentment, in that of Chester Munson a vague

-      longing to get away from red-tape army routine and breathe the

-      exhilarating and inspiring freedom of life in the open.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Blakeflast,&rdquo; bleated a soft voice behind them, and turning round they

-      found the suave, smiling Chinaman with hand outstretched toward the

-      smoking viands upon the table. Sentiment was instantly forgotten in favor

-      of lamb chops grilled to a turn, a great fluffled omelette with fine herbs

-      that would have done credit to a Parisian chef, and coffee that was

-      veritable nectar.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      At last appetite was satisfied. The lieutenant had produced his cigar

-      case, Dick was filling his briar-root pipe with tobacco from the humidor.

-      The latter spoke:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Say, Ches, we were talking about New York. Do you want me to give you a

-      toast on that modern Babylon?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Sure, old man, go ahead! You know I haven&rsquo;t lost my interest in old

-      Gotham, by any manner of means. It may the a modern Babylon. But to me it

-      is none the less the greatest of American cities.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s just the trouble,&rdquo; said Dick, seriously. &ldquo;It is too great. There

-      identities are swallowed up. Individualism cannot survive. It is all one

-      great composite.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, let us hear the toast.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick raised his cup of coffee and said: &ldquo;Very well, here it is; here is my

-      opinion of New York:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br />

-    </p>

-    <p class="indent15">

-      &lsquo;Vulgar in manners; overfed,

-    </p>

-    <p class="indent15">

-      Over-dressed and under-bred;

-    </p>

-    <p class="indent15">

-      Heartless, godless, hell&rsquo;s delight,

-    </p>

-    <p class="indent15">

-      Rude by day and lewd by night.

-    </p>

-    <p class="indent15">

-      Bedwarfed the man, enlarged the brute;

-    </p>

-    <p class="indent15">

-      Ruled by boss and prostitute.

-    </p>

-    <p class="indent15">

-      Purple robed and pauper clad;

-    </p>

-    <p class="indent15">

-      Raving, rotten, money mad;

-    </p>

-    <p class="indent15">

-      A squirming herd in Mammon&rsquo;s mesh;

-    </p>

-    <p class="indent15">

-      A wilderness of human flesh;

-    </p>

-    <p class="indent15">

-      Crazed by avarice, lust and rum&mdash;

-    </p>

-    <p class="indent15">

-      New York! thy name&rsquo;s delirium.&rsquo;.rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      <br />

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Great Heavens, old man,&rdquo; exclaimed Munson, when Dick had finished, &ldquo;you

-      are severe, to say the least.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Willoughby laughed good-naturedly as he passed the match box to his

-      friend.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Not severe, only truthful,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;You see, in New York no man dares

-      think for himself. Everything is controlled by a machine-appointed

-      chairman, secretary and committee, and you must hear the resolutions read

-      before you know the doctrine you are perforce to advocate.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Then he lit his pipe and rose from the table.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Now, I have a lot of things to attend to, old fellow,&rdquo; he resumed. &ldquo;Make

-      yourself comfortable. Here&rsquo;s a bunch of Eastern newspapers&mdash;oh, I

-      read them regularly, haven&rsquo;t got rid of that bad habit yet. I&rsquo;ll tell Sing

-      Ling to have lunch ready on the stroke of noon. Then we&rsquo;ll be in good time

-      to start out for the Rancho La Siesta. So long!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0005" id="link2HCH0005"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER V&mdash;At La Siesta

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">S</span>OON after one

-      o&rsquo;clock Dick Willoughby and Chester Munson were again in the saddle. They

-      galloped along the foothills for some time in silence. But coming to the

-      boulder-strewn wash of a mountain stream, they had perforce to rein their

-      horses to a walk. Conversation was now possible.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Dick, will you give me a job as a cowboy if I quit the army?&rdquo; asked

-      Munson abruptly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Surest thing you know,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;But why try to kid me like that?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh,&rdquo; laughed the other, &ldquo;I am not jesting.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, by gad, if you feel that way already, the chances are you will

-      write out your resignation when you get back to the shack tonight.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You mean by that&mdash;&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I mean,&rdquo; said Dick, smiling benignly at his friend, &ldquo;that when you have

-      once seen Grace Darlington you will feel like browsing on the California

-      range until you have learned to throw a riata.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, it is not the thought of any mere girl that will influence my

-      decision. I feel like getting back to Nature&mdash;back to the soil&mdash;back

-      to a life of untrammeled freedom.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Back to unspoiled womanhood,&rdquo; added Dick sententiously.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, you&rsquo;ve certainly got my curiosity aroused over these young ladies

-      at La Siesta. How much farther do we have to go?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Within an hour, sir, within the hour, my lord, shall you see the lady

-      fair. But remember,&rdquo; Dick went on banteringly, &ldquo;that you are not to

-      practise any riata-throwing on Miss Merle Farnsworth.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I understand. But we won&rsquo;t fall out over her. You may have your beautiful

-      brunette. I have always been partial to blondes.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;In the plural number,&rdquo; grinned Dick. &ldquo;But Grace Darlington will dim the

-      light of all your previous flames. She is the most perfect blonde you have

-      ever yet encountered.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You are certainly enthusiastic&mdash;for a disinterested party.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, you&rsquo;ll say the same thing, Ches, my boy, when you see her.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      It was not yet four o&rsquo;clock when they approached the Rancho La Siesta. The

-      house was of a style quite unusual in California&mdash;a miniature castle

-      that might have been planned by some European architect of renown. It

-      stood amid noble oak trees, old and gnarled and of gigantic size, but not

-      too numerous to hide the architectural features of the building. To the

-      rear the trees grew more thickly till they finally merged into one great

-      forest that covered the lower ridge of the mountain beyond. Far up, just

-      within the timber line, could be seen the red-tiled roof of a house which

-      Dick told his friend was the home of a Mr. Ricardo Robles. Beneath the

-      forest, the gently undulating lands sloped away to a considerable stream

-      that dashed down from one of the mountain canyons and debouched into the

-      great valley.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Whew!&rdquo; exclaimed Munson admiringly, as they rode up and turned their

-      horses over to an attendant. &ldquo;Some swell architecture around here! Is this

-      your work, Dick?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0004" id="linkimage-0004"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">

-      <img src="images/0055.jpg" alt="0055 " width="100%" /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h5>

-      <a href="images/0055.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>

-    </h5>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, no!&rdquo; replied Willoughby. &ldquo;I had nothing to do with it. But I do like

-      the architectural lines of Mrs. Darlington&rsquo;s home. She&rsquo;s English and has

-      English tastes, and transplanted ideas are not always successful in a new

-      country. But in this case the building just seems to fit the scenery. It

-      has always delighted me.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It is certainly beautiful,&rdquo; concurred Munson as they walked along a

-      winding graveled pathway that climbed the gentle slope and led to the

-      portico of the mansion.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Around them were gay beds of flowers dotting the greensward. Almost hiding

-      the columns of the portico were climbing roses, one bush of the purest

-      white, the other of deep crimson.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      As they passed under the porch roof, a handsome and well-preserved lady of

-      middle age appeared at the top of the steps with a welcoming smile. She

-      descended to give them gracious greeting.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;How glad I am to see you, Mr. Willoughby. No one could be more welcome at

-      La Siesta.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Thank you,&rdquo; said Dick with marked chivalry.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Mrs. Darlington, permit me to present my friend, Lieutenant Munson.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The introduction over, they ascended the steps together, and passed into a

-      spacious courtyard, with broad verandahs running all around and a fountain

-      playing in the centre. The hostess conducted her visitors to a cosy

-      corner, screened by glass panels from the open air and furnished with rich

-      Persian rugs, divans, cushions, tapestries, carved ebony tabarets, all in

-      oriental fashion. When they were comfortably settled, she opened the

-      conversation.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Lieutenant, the young ladies of La Siesta are most impatient to meet you.

-      Mr. Willoughby has told us so much about you and yet has been so very

-      dilatory&mdash;yes, really you have, Mr. Willoughby&mdash;in bringing you

-      over, that we have put down several black marks against his name.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, thank you,&rdquo; stammered the young officer, reddening. &ldquo;I quite agree

-      with you about Willoughby, for I have been pleading with him to present me

-      from the very first day of my arrival.&rdquo; Turning to Mrs. Darlington, Dick

-      laughingly protested: &ldquo;My dear Mrs. Darlington, that is the first whopper

-      you have heard from my esteemed friend. You have yet to learn that he

-      always speaks in the superlative degree.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      At this moment Grace Darlington stepped through one of the French windows.

-      As she stood hesitating for a moment, Chester Munson there and then agreed

-      with all the preliminary praise Dick Willoughby had bestowed. She was

-      certainly a vision of loveliness, with a wealth of golden hair and eyes of

-      sapphire blue; petite, her figure plump but beautifully molded, her cheeks

-      aglow with the red roses of health and youth and happiness.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;My daughter Grace,&rdquo; announced Mrs. Darlington, rising and formally

-      introducing the lieutenant to her as she joined the group.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Again Munson blushed and stammered. Dick was chuckling; he saw that the

-      gallant son of battle, with a penchant for blonde beauties, had succumbed

-      to the first glance from Grace Darlington&rsquo;s eyes.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Delighted to meet you, Lieutenant Munson,&rdquo; she declared with frank

-      friendliness as they shook hands.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Where&rsquo;s Merle?&rdquo; asked Dick almost before Grace had time to turn to him.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;There now, Mr. Impatience,&rdquo; she replied, shaking her finger teasingly at,

-      him, &ldquo;Merle will be here in her own good time. She&rsquo;s busy with Bob just

-      now.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Who the dickens is Bob?&rdquo; asked Dick, visibly disconcerted.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, her new Irish terrier,&rdquo; laughed Grace, her voice ringing with

-      mischievous merriment. &ldquo;And such a beauty!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick breathed again. The lieutenant had recovered his composure; it was

-      his turn now to bestow a sardonic smile upon his comrade.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll have afternoon tea,&rdquo; suggested Mrs. Darlington. &ldquo;And of course you

-      two young men will stay for dinner.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Both uttered a simultaneous protest&mdash;they were only in riding

-      clothes. But Mrs. Darlington made short work of the argument, and touched

-      a pushbutton by her side. A maid responded, the extra covers for dinner

-      were ordered, and meanwhile tea was to be sent on to the verandah.

-      Pleasant small talk succeeded, the lieutenant being called upon for his

-      first impressions of California.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Of a sudden Grace exclaimed in a voice, half of joy, half of surprise:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Why, here comes Mr. Robles!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Advancing along the verandah, hat in hand, was a man of striking presence

-      and dignity, perhaps fifty years of age. His jet black hair was streaked

-      with gray, the full beard almost verging on whiteness. Olive complexion

-      and brown eyes, together with the courtly manner of his salutation,

-      indicated the thoroughbred Castilian.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      He bowed and raised to his lips the hand of his hostess. To Grace he paid

-      the same deference. Next he turned to Dick Willoughby and extended his

-      hand.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I have met Mr. Willoughby. I am pleased, sir, to see you again.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Then his eyes rested on Lieutenant Munson, and Mrs. Darlington presented

-      the young army officer.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And where, I pray, is Miss Merle?&rdquo; Mr. Robles finally asked, glancing

-      around.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s what I want to know,&rdquo; blurted out Dick. Then he reddened just a

-      little.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The older man looked kindly at Dick, and smilingly said: &ldquo;The audacity of

-      youth.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; put in Grace, &ldquo;the audacity and the impatience as well.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      But just at that moment there floated from the recesses of the home the

-      fragment of a song: &ldquo;I dreamt I dwelt in marble halls, with vassals and

-      serfs at my side.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Ah, here comes the recreant now,&rdquo; exclaimed Mrs. Darlington.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The song stopped abruptly, and a moment later Merle Farnsworth appeared.

-      She went first of all to Mr. Robles and greeted him warmly, giving him

-      both her hands, which he kissed in his princely fashion. For Willoughby

-      she had a pleasant smile, and for his friend, the lieutenant, a kindly

-      welcome to California.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The tea tray had meanwhile arrived, and soon both the young ladies were

-      busy attending to their guests. While he sipped his tea, Munson completed

-      his inspection of Merle Farnsworth&mdash;dispassionately, for the brunette

-      type of beauty had never yet made his pulses beat faster. But he could

-      none the less admire. She was a stately girl, taller than Grace

-      Darlington, with fine, regular features and brown eyes that matched the

-      dark heavy braids of her hair. Her manner was alert and vivacious, yet

-      there was the quiet dignity of gentle breeding even in her smile.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      After half an hour of general conversation, Mr. Robles arose to take his

-      leave, notwithstanding Mrs. Darlington&rsquo;s pressing invitation that he

-      should remain and join the dinner party.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;My home is not far away,&rdquo; he said when shaking hands with Munson, &ldquo;up in

-      the woods yonder. Perhaps you may have seen it as you came along the

-      road.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; observed Dick, &ldquo;I pointed it out to the lieutenant.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, both you gentlemen are cordially invited to pay me a visit any time

-      you are riding through this part of the country. Although I live far away

-      from the busy world, and am a recluse by choice, I have some things that

-      may interest you&mdash;pictures, old manuscripts and books of the Spanish

-      days.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Pictures?&rdquo; interposed Dick, inquiringly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, a few that I picked up during several visits to Europe.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;If people only knew it,&rdquo; remarked Mrs. Darlington, &ldquo;Mr. Robles has

-      perhaps one of the finest private picture galleries in America.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then I&rsquo;m certainly coming to see you,&rdquo; said Dick, eagerly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Me or my pictures?&rdquo; asked Mr. Robles with a quizzical smile.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Both,&rdquo; and the young fellow showed he meant it by a cordial hand grip.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You will pass our door, Mr. Willoughby?&rdquo; exclaimed Merle in half-laughing

-      reproachfulness. &ldquo;You will dare to give the go-by to La Siesta?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, art is art,&rdquo; replied Dick sturdily, although he did not trust

-      himself to look at Merle while he answered.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But perhaps the young ladies will show you the way through the oak

-      forest,&rdquo; suggested Mr. Robles.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That would be great,&rdquo; said Lieutenant Munson, with his eyes fixed on

-      Grace Darlington.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Delightful,&rdquo; she blushingly assented.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, arrange it among yourselves. For the present, <i>adios</i>.&rdquo; And

-      with a sweeping bow the senor took his departure.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      A stroll through the gardens and orchards, dinner and sprightly

-      conversation, an hour of piano-playing and singing to follow&mdash;altogether

-      a delightful evening was spent. The nearly full moon had risen before the

-      young men found themselves on the homeward trail.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      As side by side they rode down into the valley, Munson said:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Dick, boy, there&rsquo;s no use talking. You have introduced me to some

-      perfectly charming people today&mdash;they&rsquo;re wonderful.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What did I tell you?&rdquo; asked Dick.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You surely did not tell me the half,&rdquo; replied the other. &ldquo;I think Grace

-      Darlington is the prettiest girl I have ever seen.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Guess you&rsquo;ll be writing out your resignation and sending it to army

-      headquarters,&rdquo; laughed Dick. &ldquo;<i>Quien sabe?</i>&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The lieutenant made no reply, and quickening their pace, they pushed on in

-      silence.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      At last they were nearing home&mdash;passing round the last spur of the

-      mountain. The moon was now riding high overhead, bathing the whole

-      landscape in bright effulgence. Willoughby brought his pony to a walk, and

-      Munson, coming up behind, soon joined him.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;How do you like riding by the light of the California moon?&rdquo; asked

-      Willoughby.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Really, Dick, you call even the moon a California moon, as if the same

-      moon didn&rsquo;t shine in New York City or in Paris.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Not in the same way,&rdquo; said Dick soberly. &ldquo;The truth is, the moon really

-      looks larger and brighter here, and the stars, too, are more brilliant.

-      Haven&rsquo;t you noticed it?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I have noticed that the atmosphere is exceedingly clear,&rdquo; replied Munson,

-      and, as if to verify his observation, he cast a glance up to the

-      rock-ribbed flank of the mountain above the belt of timber.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Good God, what&rsquo;s that?&rdquo; he added breathlessly grasping the arm of his

-      friend.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Instinctively both halted their horses as they continued to gaze.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0005" id="linkimage-0005"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">

-      <img src="images/0105.jpg" alt="0105 " width="100%" /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h5>

-      <a href="images/0105.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>

-    </h5>

-    <p>

-      The bent form of the old Indian squaw Guadalupe was unmistakable as she

-      toiled slowly along a narrow ledge on the face of the precipice. But

-      following close behind her was a vague, shadowy figure&mdash;the figure of

-      some four-footed beast, bigger than a big dog.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The white wolf!&rdquo; gasped Dick.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Is it real, or is it a spectre?&rdquo; whispered Munson.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Just then a scudding cloud momentarily obscured the moon, and when the

-      full light again shone forth, both woman and wolf had vanished.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The young men looked into each other&rsquo;s eyes in awe and wonderment.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0006" id="link2HCH0006"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER VI&mdash;The Quarrel

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>HE following days

-      were busy ones on San Antonio Rancho. Dick Willoughby was constantly in

-      the saddle, looking after his subordinates, watching the line fences, and

-      generally keeping track of the vast herds. Lieutenant Munson was becoming

-      acclimated. He not only accompanied Willoughby on many of his rides, but

-      had also paid several visits to La Siesta, and one afternoon in particular

-      had enjoyed immensely a successful trout fishing expedition with the young

-      ladies along the mountain stream that flowed through the property.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      One morning there was great excitement at San Antonio headquarters. Ben

-      Thurston returned from a visit he had been paying to Los Angeles, and with

-      him floated in a circumstantial story that the rancho had been really

-      sold. As usual, he was attended by the plain-clothes detective whom he

-      retained as bodyguard. Leach Sharkey was a big, hulking fellow, more than

-      six feet in height, with a tousled shock of reddish hair, a stubby red

-      mustache, and teeth that showed even when his face was in repose. Bulging

-      hip pockets indicated the brace of heavy revolvers which he invariably

-      carried.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Within an hour of Mr. Thurston&rsquo;s coming, Dick Willoughby, as foreman, was

-      summoned to an interview at the ranch house. The owner received him alone

-      in his office.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Ben Thurston was a squat, solidly built man, and despite his life of idle

-      luxury, carried his fifty odd years well. He was sullen and taciturn in

-      manner, but brusque and imperious when he did choose to speak. Two

-      features were markedly characteristic&mdash;the chin was weak and the eyes

-      had the restless, alert look of one who constantly lived in an atmosphere

-      of fear and suspicion.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Thurston opened the conversation without any preliminaries.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Willoughby, I want an accurate count of all the cattle and horses on the

-      ranch; and especially I require a fair idea as to the number of fatted

-      beeves&mdash;those ready for the market, you understand.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Very well,&rdquo; replied Dick, &ldquo;your orders shall be carried out as

-      expeditiously as possible, but it will require a few days to complete the

-      work.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;How many days?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;If I make use of all the force it may take a week&mdash;perhaps a little

-      longer.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;All right, use all the help you can get. I must have these figures

-      promptly. There is a Los Angeles syndicate who are after an option on the

-      rancho. They are counting on buying me out&mdash;lock, stock and barrel.&rdquo;

-       Ben Thurston smiled, squinted his shifty eyes and blew his nose

-      vigorously.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It always makes me laugh,&rdquo; he added pompously, &ldquo;to have these fellows

-      come around this great principality of mine and try to buy me out.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Just then someone outside flitted past the window, and, quick as

-      lightning, Thurston turned and exclaimed in a startled tone: &ldquo;Who was

-      that?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That was Jack Rover,&rdquo; replied Dick, &ldquo;one of our cowboys.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh,&rdquo; and the frightened look in the eyes subsided.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Tomorrow then,&rdquo; Dick went on, returning to their former topic of

-      conversation, &ldquo;we&rsquo;ll begin a round-up of the stock at this end of the

-      range. I&rsquo;ll put the boys on the job right now.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll join you tomorrow myself.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;All right, Mr. Thurston.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What time?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;At any time agreeable to you.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, say eight o&rsquo;clock in the morning. You see,&rdquo; he continued, &ldquo;I want

-      to get through with this damned business in a hurry and start back East. I

-      have friends who are waiting for me. Of course I will have to stay here

-      until the representatives of this syndicate come up from Los Angeles, but

-      I will make short work of them, believe me.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      This time Ben Thurston laughed outright and rubbed his hands together in a

-      satisfied way. For once he seemed inclined to be communicative, and,

-      turning to Willoughby, resumed:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Do you know, I have collected over three hundred thousand dollars, first

-      and last, selling options on this San Antonio Rancho? It is quite a joke.

-      They all fall down. They make a first payment of twenty-five or fifty

-      thousand dollars, and then,&rdquo; throwing up both his hands and shrugging his

-      shoulders, &ldquo;their payments cease and I am just that much ahead of the

-      game.&rdquo; Willoughby listened in frigid silence; there was not even the

-      flicker of a responsive smile on his face.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Thurston, eyeing him for a moment, looked disconcerted. He drew himself up

-      stiffly in his chair. His voice assumed its usual gruff tone.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s all; get to work then,&rdquo; he said curtly as he lifted some papers to

-      show that the interview was at an end.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The first round-up was held some twenty miles southwest of the ranch

-      house, at the base of the foothills across the valley from La Siesta. Ben

-      Thurston, attended closely by his bodyguard, was there, his shifting eyes

-      scanning each new face. Not fewer than ten thousand head of cattle were

-      milling about, pawing the earth and bellowing in low tones of irritation

-      at being herded together and held away from their accustomed haunts of

-      juicy grasses.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      From a knoll at a little distance Lieutenant Munson, seated on a fine

-      riding pony, watched the great performance, which to him was more

-      wonderful than any hippodrome show or military parade. He was so engrossed

-      with the spectacle that he did not hear the patter of approaching hoofs.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Good morning, Senor Lieutenant,&rdquo; came a lady&rsquo;s voice in cheery greeting.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Turning quickly in his saddle he saw Grace Darlington and Merle Farnsworth

-      on their ponies, which had been brought to a sudden halt close behind him.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Really, Mr. Munson,&rdquo; said Grace Darlington, &ldquo;one would think you were so

-      completely lost in contemplation of a mob of cattle that you had no eyes

-      for your friends.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Chester bowed and raised his hat as he replied with a bright smile:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It is certainly a great scene, isn&rsquo;t it? But you are none the less

-      welcome. Indeed when one is witnessing something unusual, it always adds

-      to the interest to have the companionship of friends.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Very prettily put,&rdquo; observed Merle Farnsworth. &ldquo;Fortunately the place

-      selected for the round-up this year isn&rsquo;t very far from La Siesta, so we

-      rode across the valley.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Have you anything in New York,&rdquo; asked Grace, &ldquo;to compare with this?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Indeed we have not,&rdquo; replied the lieutenant with conviction. &ldquo;I am

-      beginning to think that the West is a pretty good place in which to live.

-      By the way,&rdquo; he went on, taking a newspaper clipping from his pocket,

-      &ldquo;here is something that our mutual friend, Dick, gave me, and said I

-      should read once a day for a month, and then&mdash;well, then, he says I

-      will never go East again, but remain in this great picture country. Shall

-      I read it?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, do, by all means,&rdquo; said the girls in unison. &ldquo;Well, here goes! &lsquo;Every

-      idea we have in the East is run with a convention. We cannot think without

-      a chairman. Our whims have secretaries; our fads have by-laws. Literature

-      is a club. Philosophy is a society. Our reforms are mass meetings. We

-      cannot mourn our mighty dead without some great chairman and a half

-      hundred vice-presidents. We remember our novelists and poets with

-      trustees, while the immortality of a dead genius is looked after by a

-      standing committee. Charity is an association, and theology at best only a

-      set of resolutions.&rsquo;.rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What do you think of that?&rdquo; he asked, laughing. &ldquo;Isn&rsquo;t that an awful slam

-      on the East?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It is rather severe,&rdquo; smiled Merle. &ldquo;But you know, Mr. Willoughby has

-      become a thorough Westerner. The lure of the hills and the valleys has

-      taken complete possession of him.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And yet he remains unspoiled.&rdquo; exclaimed the lieutenant. &ldquo;But are you

-      aware he is trying to tamper with my old allegiance to the East?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Indeed,&rdquo; asked Grace, &ldquo;in what way?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He wants me to resign my commission and take pot luck with him, as he

-      terms it.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You couldn&rsquo;t do better,&rdquo; exclaimed Grace enthusiastically.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      While this conversation was going on, an exciting incident was taking

-      place only a short distance away. Young Marshall Thurston had come with

-      his father to the round-up, and was riding about watching the operations.

-      Chancing to pass near, Dick Willoughby overheard him use an insulting

-      epithet in regard to Miss Farnsworth&mdash;the young man was evidently

-      peeved that the ladies had not sought him out instead of Munson, and it

-      was obvious, too, that he had been drinking even at that early hour in the

-      morning.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Swiftly wheeling, Dick rode up to him with a look of anger so intense that

-      even the cowboys who knew him were taken aback.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You foul-mouthed beast!&rdquo; he hissed, as he pushed his quirt into the

-      slanderer&rsquo;s face. &ldquo;Just let me overhear you make a rude remark again about

-      Miss Farnsworth and I will hammer the life out of you. You are nothing

-      better than a drunken hobo, not fit to associate with ladies.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The outburst was so sudden that young Thurston was cowed and attempted no

-      reply. But as Willoughby rode off he sent after him a look of sullen and

-      resentful hatred. Two or three of the cowboys, who really were good

-      friends of Dick Willoughby, but were nevertheless not above fawning for

-      the favor of the heir to the great rancho, indicated that they were on

-      Marshall&rsquo;s side.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Guess two can play at the hammering game,&rdquo; remarked one.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He don&rsquo;t come any of his rough-house business over you, Marshall, while

-      I&rsquo;m around,&rdquo; affirmed another, pugnaciously.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      But the young man, still without uttering a word, turned gloomily away and

-      started his pony in the direction of home.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Guess he feels like another drink,&rdquo; grinned an irreverent youth.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Hell,&rdquo; exclaimed an elderly man, the blacksmith at the rancho, &ldquo;if the

-      Thurston family don&rsquo;t beat the band for quarrels and bloody feuds!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      But just then a bunch of cattle broke from the main herd and the group of

-      cowboys dispersed in a galloping scamper.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Munson and the young ladies, engrossed in their light conversation, knew

-      nothing of this unpleasant episode. They were now discussing the date of

-      the projected visit to the home of Mr. Ricardo Robles among the oaks above

-      La Siesta. It was decided to fix it for the first Sunday after the cattle

-      muster was completed, when Dick Willoughby would be free to make one of

-      the party.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But hold a moment,&rdquo; exclaimed the lieutenant suddenly, &ldquo;unless I&rsquo;m to be

-      court-martialled for absence without leave, I must take the train East

-      next Saturday, or&mdash;or&mdash;&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      His eyes fixed on Grace, he hesitated to complete the alternative.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Or what?&rdquo; she inquired.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Follow Dick&rsquo;s advice and send in my resignation.&rdquo; As he spoke he thrust a

-      hand into his breast pocket and drew forth a letter, sealed, addressed and

-      stamped, all ready for the mail. &ldquo;I really can&rsquo;t quite make up my mind,&rdquo;

-       he added, dubiously.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0006" id="linkimage-0006"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">

-      <img src="images/0155.jpg" alt="0155 " width="100%" /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h5>

-      <a href="images/0155.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>

-    </h5>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Let me help you,&rdquo; said Grace with a gay smile as she extended her hand

-      for the letter.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;How?&rdquo; he asked.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll mail your resignation for you. We shall be riding home by La Siesta

-      postoffice.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, Grace!&rdquo; murmured Merle in timid protest. &ldquo;Think of the responsibility

-      you are taking.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;A woman&rsquo;s mission in life is to encourage men to do the proper thing,&rdquo;

-       replied Grace with roguish defiance. &ldquo;Our friend here is enamored of the

-      West, and the West is the very best place for him. I&rsquo;ll post your letter,

-      lieutenant.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      He placed it between her fingers, doffed his hat, and bowed gallantly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Be it so. Let the gods&mdash;or should I say, a fair goddess?&mdash;decide.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Thanks for the compliment,&rdquo; cried Grace, with a pretty flush on her face.

-      &ldquo;Good-bye, then, for the present. Get ready for Sunday&rsquo;s picnic among the

-      oaks. Come along, Merle, my dear.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      And with a touch of the quirt she started her pony into a canter.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Great guns, but she&rsquo;s worth while,&rdquo; exclaimed Munson as he gazed after

-      the retreating figures.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0007" id="link2HCH0007"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER VII&mdash;Old Bandit Days

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">O</span>N the evening of

-      the day that followed the big round-up of cattle, Dick Willoughby and

-      Chester Munson rode over to the store. As they cantered along, both men

-      were pre-occupied with their thoughts.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick was not worrying over his sharp passage of words with his employer&rsquo;s

-      son, for he knew that his services at the present time were quite

-      indispensable, more especially if the rancho was to be sold to the best

-      advantage. The owner had spoken lightly of the negotiations, and had

-      chuckled in a sinister way about the money he had frequently made over

-      unexercised options. But this time it was a Los Angeles syndicate that was

-      seeking the property, composed of men whose financial reputation and keen

-      business ability Willoughby knew well. For he had learned their names

-      after his interview with Ben Thurston, and he felt certain that this

-      particular group of capitalists would have entered into no serious

-      negotiations without having both the cash and the intention to put the

-      deal through. Therefore he scented a change of ownership in the rancho,

-      and consequently, perhaps, the necessity for his looking around to find

-      employment elsewhere. He hated to think of leaving a place that he had

-      come to look on as home and parting from all the friends he had made

-      throughout the countryside. Unconsciously to himself, the greatest tie of

-      all was proximity to La Siesta and to Merle Farnsworth. But Dick was not

-      thinking of Merle just then&mdash;he was merely turning things over

-      generally in his mind as he rode across the valley.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Munson also was cogitating the change in his own outlook that had been

-      brought about by the mailing of the letter of resignation to army

-      headquarters. He was recalling the many years he had striven to reach the

-      lieutenancy now voluntarily surrendered&mdash;of his youthful zeal and

-      ambition for an army career which had been powerless to withstand the

-      witching call of the West. And although Grace Darlington&rsquo;s act of putting

-      the letter in the post had been only the last feather to tip an evenly

-      balanced scale, he could not but feel that thereby this beautiful girl of

-      the West had entered into his life and into all his future plans, hopes,

-      and aspirations. The thought gave him joy; he was more pleased than ever

-      that the decisive step had at last been taken.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Arriving at the store, they found old Tom Baker seated on a dry goods box,

-      while Buck Ashley leaned against the counter, waiting for the stage coach

-      and the mails. Already two or three others were beginning to congregate

-      under the trees, in readiness for the distribution of letters and

-      newspapers.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Hello, Dick,&rdquo; called out the sheriff, &ldquo;I heard of your scrap yesterday

-      morning with that young ne&rsquo;er-do-well, Marshall Thurston. My God, I&rsquo;m glad

-      you gave him hell.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Please don&rsquo;t speak about it,&rdquo; replied Willoughby quietly. &ldquo;That was my

-      affair and mine alone. I guess we can find some more agreeable topic.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Wal,&rdquo; drawled Buck Ashley, &ldquo;Tom here was just a-tellin&rsquo; me a yarn that&rsquo;ll

-      interest both you boys a heap, or the lieutenant at all events, for he&rsquo;s

-      new to these parts and don&rsquo;t know the local hist&rsquo;ry yet. Of course I&rsquo;ve

-      heard the story before, but not all the pertic&rsquo;lars the way Tom can tell

-      &lsquo;em. And its a dangnation good story. So start from the beginnin&rsquo; again,

-      Tom.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Thus addressed, the sheriff, after taking a bite from his tobacco plug,

-      began:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The yarn has to do with the old-time bandit Joaquin Murietta, about whom

-      we were speakin&rsquo; the other morn in&rsquo;. Well, the way it all happened was

-      this: On a neighboring ranch, over Ventura way, beyond the Lagunita

-      Rancho, owned at that time by Senor Olivas, a rich cattle dealer comes

-      down from &lsquo;Frisco to buy a bunch of beeves. The stock had all been driven

-      up on a mesa near the Olivas ranch house, and for several days the herders

-      had been cuttin&rsquo; out the cows and the young calves from the steers, &lsquo;cause

-      this feller was only goin&rsquo; to buy the steers.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The great herd was bellerin&rsquo; and pawin&rsquo; in a big cloud of dust, through

-      which the vaqueros&mdash;cowboys, you know, lieutenant&mdash;could be seen

-      ridin&rsquo; round and round. Of course roundin&rsquo; up cattle is always more or

-      less excitin&rsquo; work, but this rich chap had come down from &lsquo;Frisco with his

-      saddle bags bulgin&rsquo; out with gold, and this sorta added a mighty sight to

-      the interest of the doin&rsquo;s. Part of the bargain was that the deal was to

-      be for spot cash, all in gold, too, mind you, and it was arranged that the

-      buyer and Senor Olivas were to take their stations at one side of the

-      narrow gate, and every time a steer was driven through that gate a

-      twenty-dollar gold piece was to be tossed into a big bag which Senor

-      Olivas was holdin&rsquo;.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;They do say as how the work continued all day, from early mornin&rsquo; until

-      dark, afore the last blamed steer passed that &lsquo;ere gate, and they claim

-      that there was eighty thousand dollars in the Senor&rsquo;s bag as pay for the

-      day&rsquo;s drive. They say, too, that Joaquin Murietta, disguised, was one of

-      the vaqueros doin&rsquo; the drivin&rsquo;. Anyway that very night old Olivas was

-      waked up mighty abruptly by feelin&rsquo; the cold nose of a revolver shoved

-      against his own nose.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, the long and short of it all was that Senor Olivas and his wife

-      were both gagged and bound hand and foot, while Murietta ransacked the

-      house, found the strong box and carried away every blamed gold coin that

-      Olivas had received for the sale of his steers. The outlaw succeeded in

-      makin&rsquo; his escape into the Tehachapi mountains with his cut-throat gang,

-      and they found a hidin&rsquo; place in the robbers&rsquo; cave that is somewhere

-      hereabouts on the San Antonio Rancho. It sure was as slick a piece of

-      rascality as was ever pulled off in the old lawless days.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; observed Buck Ashley, as he shook his head reflectively, &ldquo;I&rsquo;m

-      assoomin&rsquo; some of the cowboy fellers around here will find that cave one

-      of these days. I&rsquo;ve put in a good many Sundays huntin&rsquo; for it myself.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Just then there was the sound of horses&rsquo; hoofs outside, and a moment later

-      Jack Rover strolled into the store. Over his shoulder was slung the big

-      leather bag for the rancho mails.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Hallo, everybody,&rdquo; was his greeting. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m ahead of time Buck, but the

-      stage will be here in five minutes. I saw its dust above the ridge. I

-      hear, lieutenant,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;you&rsquo;re going to stick to the West and be

-      one of us.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Quit the army?&rdquo; exclaimed Tom Baker in surprise.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That is so,&rdquo; replied Munson. &ldquo;California has fairly got hold of me, and I

-      intend to make my home in the West.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then you just stick here, young man,&rdquo; said the sheriff, rising to his

-      feet and extending his hand. &ldquo;California is the pick of the States, and

-      our valley the pick of California. Don&rsquo;t you forget it. We&rsquo;re proud to

-      welcome you as a new resident.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s what I say, too,&rdquo; concurred Buck Ashley, cordially.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Munson smiled. &ldquo;Well, I don&rsquo;t know if you can put me in the resident class

-      all at once,&rdquo; he observed, diffidently. &ldquo;Guess I&rsquo;ve got to join the cowboy

-      brigade first, if Dick and Jack here will break me in.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Sure thing,&rdquo; assented Jack Hover. &ldquo;You&rsquo;re a good rider now&mdash;for an

-      army man.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;An ex-army man,&rdquo; corrected Willoughby, laughing.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It strikes me we should put you in as postmaster, Munson,&rdquo; suggested the

-      sheriff, a sly gleam of mischief in his eye. &ldquo;Buck Ashley here is growin&rsquo;

-      old.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, but not too old to hold down his job till your tombstone&rsquo;s in the

-      cemetery, Tom Baker,&rdquo; retorted the storekeeper, with a grin. &ldquo;No man takes

-      the Tejon postmastership while I&rsquo;m alive,&rdquo; he added defiantly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m forewarned and won&rsquo;t apply for your job, Buck,&rdquo; laughed Munson. &ldquo;But

-      here comes the stage, so show your spryness, old fellow, by getting us our

-      mail.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0008" id="link2HCH0008"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER VIII&mdash;A Letter from San Quentin

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">B</span>UCK ASHLEY had

-      retired into the partitioned-off section of the store that formed the

-      postoffice, and was busy stamping and sorting out the mail. The scattered

-      loiterers outside crowded into the building expectantly, and the local

-      parliament was in session. Amid the buzz of conversation Willoughby could

-      not but hear his own name mentioned, coupled with that of Marshall

-      Thurston. He understood quite well that all manner of gossip was flying

-      around in regard to the quarrel at the round-up. But he remained stoically

-      indifferent, shut his ears, and leaning against the counter busied himself

-      with an old <i>Saturday Evening Post</i> that had been lying there.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      At last the wicket was shoved up with a bang, and those present began to

-      move toward the little aperture through which Buck Ashley proceeded to

-      hand out correspondence and newspapers. One by one the throng melted away.

-      Jack Rover was examining the big bunch of mail for San Antonio Rancho as

-      he stowed it into the letter bag. Munson was opening and gleaning the

-      contents of two or three letters that had come to him from New York. Dick

-      Willoughby continued his reading, unconcerned; Jack would pass over any

-      correspondence for him. Old Tom Baker had not risen from his accustomed

-      seat on an empty box; he had few correspondents, and the mail did not

-      worry him, although he invariably assisted with his presence at its

-      distribution.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      These four were now the only ones in the store besides Buck Ashley, who

-      still remained behind the partition. At last the postmaster appeared,

-      holding in his hand an open letter. His face showed great agitation as he

-      glanced around to take stock of those who might be present.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Say, boys,&rdquo; he whispered in a mysterious manner, as he held up the

-      letter, &ldquo;this is the most dangnation extr&rsquo;ornery thing that has ever

-      happened to me. You&rsquo;re just the bunch of fellers I&rsquo;d like to consult.

-      Close the door, Tom.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What&rsquo;s up, Buck?&rdquo; asked the sheriff as he rose to comply. &ldquo;You look as if

-      you had the ague shakes.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No ague in this here land of California,&rdquo; laughed Jack Rover. &ldquo;Is it a

-      proposal of marriage you&rsquo;ve been getting, Buck?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;A derned heap better&rsquo;n that. God &lsquo;lmighty, boys, this may mean millions

-      for all of us. Shoot the bolt, Tom; I&rsquo;ll hand out no more groceries

-      tonight. Come close together, all of you. You read the letter aloud, Dick.

-      My hand&rsquo;s a-tremb-lin&rsquo;, and I can&rsquo;t get the Frenchie&rsquo;s lingo just right.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The Frenchie?&rdquo; echoed Tom Baker in puzzled surprise.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s a letter from Pierre Luzon,&rdquo; explained Buck.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Good God!&rdquo; The sheriff was now as deeply stirred as his old crony.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The bandit scout you were telling us about the other morning?&rdquo; exclaimed

-      Jack Rover, also fired with excitement.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I thought that fellow was in San Quentin for life.&rdquo; remarked Munson,

-      composedly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Wal, and ain&rsquo;t this letter from San Quentin?&rdquo; retorted Buck. &ldquo;See the

-      headin&rsquo;. But Dick&rsquo;ll read it aloud. I feel clean knocked out.&rdquo; And the old

-      man sank back on his chair behind the counter.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The four others were now clustered around Dick Willoughby. The latter,

-      deputized to do the reading, had nonchalantly taken the epistle from Buck

-      Ashley&rsquo;s trembling hand. While the others were speaking he had bestowed a

-      preliminary glance, and from his lips there escaped a murmur of surprise.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Great Caesar!&rdquo; As he uttered the ejaculation Dick sat up, keenly alert.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, what&rsquo;s it all about?&rdquo; inquired Munson, by this time the only cool

-      man in the bunch.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Read, read!&rdquo; cried the storekeeper hoarsely.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick Willoughby began:

-    </p>

-    <blockquote>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Mr. Buck Ashley, Storekeeper, Tejon, California.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;If God in His goodness permits this letter to come to your hands,

-      remember it is from old Pierre, the Frenchman, who used to be about your

-      store sometimes a half a day at a time, smoking his pipe. You never knew

-      much about me or where I lived. But I will tell you.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I am an old man now&mdash;very old. I was born in the South of France,

-      came to this country in the &lsquo;40&rsquo;. and entered into the service of Joaquin

-      Murietta, who was one great man, but a big bandit. Peace to his soul!

-      Well, he was good to me, and I was faithful to him, taking care of the

-      cave, the big grotto, the cavern among the Tehachapi mountains where he

-      many times hid from the sheriff&rsquo;s posse, and also, where he brought all

-      his gold to stack up and keep from everybody.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You also know Don Manuel, him whom the people call White Wolf. Well, once

-      when a boy, Don Manuel he save Marietta&rsquo;s life from the sheriff by helping

-      him to escape from one close place. Murietta was very grateful, and one

-      day he bring the boy to the grotto cave, and there I see him and like him

-      very much. That was while Murietta still lived.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Afterward when the little boy grow up and was one man, and turned bitter

-      against the gringos because they wrong his sister, Senorita Rosetta, and

-      his old father and mother die of grief, he say to me, &lsquo;I will become a

-      bandit like Joaquin Murietta.&rsquo; He came to the cavern one night and tell me

-      and say, &lsquo;You be my servant.&rsquo; So I say, &lsquo;All right,&rsquo; because Don Manuel

-      one brave man.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;So that night of the great stage robbery over near Lake of Tulare, I hold

-      horses. That&rsquo;s all I do, but all the same they put me in this horrid

-      prison, and here I am. The other two men, Felix Vasquez and Fox Cassidy,

-      were shot by the posse and I have been told by a Portugee in the jail here

-      about the White Wolf being killed away north in Seattle, and he is no

-      more.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Don Manuel de Valencia, he was one great man. Peace to his soul!

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I am alone. I want to get away from this terrible prison. I have promised

-      one of my guards&mdash;a good Frenchman who comes from my town in France&mdash;$5,000

-      in gold if he can secretly get this letter into postoffice to you and get

-      me away from this living hell. You do this and I show you the cavern.

-      Nobody knows where it is but me.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Come and get me, please, my good Mr. Ashley, come, and may the spirit of

-      the Virgin Mary reward you. All I say here is truth. You come get me and I

-      show you the secret grotto. I show you the great stacks of gold hidden by

-      Joaquin Murietta and Don Manuel. Also the sand-bar in the hidden stream

-      where Guadalupe gathered up much gold.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I beg and pray you to keep what I say in this letter secret. I am old and

-      weak and sick. Come and get me.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Obedient servant,

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Pierre Luzon.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-</blockquote>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Ain&rsquo;t that just one hell of a letter, boys?&rdquo; exclaimed Buck Ashley.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Gospel truth, every word,&rdquo; cried Tom Baker, emphatically.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It certainly reads like the truth,&rdquo; concurred Munson.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then what are we going to do about it?&rdquo; asked Jack Rover.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick Willoughby spoke now with the quiet and quick decision that marks the

-      leader of men:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What we will do is this. We five are partners in this secret, and, if

-      Buck is willing, we&rsquo;ll play the game together for all it is worth. To

-      begin with, we&rsquo;ll put up one hundred dollars apiece to send Tom Baker to

-      Sacramento. He will try to get a pardon or a parole for Pierre Luzon.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That can be managed,&rdquo; assented the sheriff. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve got a political pull,

-      you know, boys.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; continued Dick, &ldquo;we&rsquo;ll bring old Pierre here and we&rsquo;ll get from

-      him the information he promises about the secret grotto.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Not forgetting Guadalupe&rsquo;s placer mine,&rdquo; interjected Jack Rover.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Everything will be attended to in its turn,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;One thing at

-      a time, and the first thing to be done is to get the Frenchman out of San

-      Quentin. When can you start, Tom?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The day after tomorrow.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, we&rsquo;ll have the cash ready for you by tomorrow night. You must bring

-      Pierre Luzon here without anyone else besides ourselves knowing his name

-      or getting next to him.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll fix up a cot for him in my own room behind the store,&rdquo; suggested

-      Buck Ashley.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s a good plan,&rdquo; assented Dick. &ldquo;When the Frenchman&rsquo;s here, it will

-      be time then to discuss our next move. Meanwhile, it&rsquo;s an honorable

-      promise of secrecy all round, and to begin with I give my word.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      While speaking the last words, Dick solemnly raised his hand, and each man

-      in turn followed his example as he gave the pledge required.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0009" id="link2HCH0009"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER IX&mdash;Tia Teresa

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>EN days had passed

-      and the count of the stock on San Antonio Rancho had been completed, every

-      canyon searched, the last wandering maverick roped and branded, the number

-      of fat beeves accurately estimated. Three members of the Los Angeles

-      syndicate had arrived in a big automobile and remained over night at the

-      ranch house. Most of the time they had been closeted with Ben Thurston in

-      his office, and had finally taken their departure without exchanging a

-      word with anyone else on the rancho. Nobody knew whether the deal had gone

-      through or not, but rumor said that, after some disagreement on the first

-      day, terms had been arranged next morning.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick Willoughby, although he discussed the question with no one, made his

-      own inferences. The very fact that the visitors had not made any

-      inspection of the property proved that they already knew it thoroughly

-      well. The counting of the cattle and horses had been the final factor in

-      the negotiations, and the figures had enabled the deal to advance a

-      further stage toward completion. Ben Thurston might fool himself about

-      easy option money put up only to be forfeited, but Dick Willoughby was not

-      fooled. The days of closer settlement in California had come, and these

-      Los Angeles men were the most enterprising and skilful subdividers in the

-      West. They dealt only in big propositions, and after mopping up all the

-      available tracts in the southern end of the State, were extending their

-      operations northward. This vast so-called &ldquo;Spanish grant,&rdquo; an empire in

-      itself, had no doubt for several years been in their eye, and now they

-      were prepared to handle the San Antonio Rancho with the lavish expenditure

-      it deserved and required to transform the great sweep of cattle range&mdash;rich

-      agricultural land, as the luxuriant native grasses showed&mdash;into

-      smiling orchards and alfalfa farms, each provided with the irrigation

-      water which intelligent conservation would ensure in abundance.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick knew in his heart that the era of transformation had at last come,

-      that the roaming herds were to be pushed back into regions more remote,

-      that homes and schoolhouses and garden cities would soon be dotting the

-      landscape, that the passing of Ben Thurston, the cattle king, and of his

-      hard-riding, devil-may-care vaqueros was at hand.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Yet Thurston spoke no word&mdash;in fact, he seemed to be more grouchy and

-      taciturn than ever. Not even his son Marshall was in his confidence, for

-      the young man was seldom with his father, preferring to spend his time in

-      the drinking saloons and dance halls of Bakersfield, where the activity of

-      oil-developing operations attracted all sorts and conditions of men, among

-      whom the dissipated decadent had readily found friends to his liking.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Ben Thurston who had gone the pace himself in his early days, did not seek

-      to interfere with his son&rsquo;s pursuit of pleasures, but he had very promptly

-      squelched any interference from Marshall with his own business operations.

-      On the evening of the quarrel with Dick Willoughby at the round-up,

-      Marshall had attempted to tell his father about the affair and suggest

-      Dick&rsquo;s dismissal. But the old man had at once silenced him by saying:

-      &ldquo;Why, damn you! I brought you out to this country to enjoy yourself and

-      not to get into trouble. So far as Willoughby is concerned, I can&rsquo;t afford

-      to quarrel with him. He is my foreman, and I am right in the midst of a

-      big business transaction. So just you mind your own business, my boy, and

-      leave him alone.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Accordingly, Marshall Thurston, a coward at heart, had not sought to

-      pursue the feud singlehanded, and Dick had seen but little of him during

-      the rest of the mustering work. When they did happen to meet, it was a

-      case of a black scowl of hate from the one and a contemptuous smile of

-      indifference from the other. And so the days had passed until the task was

-      finished.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      It was the Sunday morning that had been fixed for the visit to the home of

-      Mr. Ricardo Robles, when the cattle foreman could at last conscientiously

-      take a day of recreation. With the first break of dawn he and Munson were

-      in the saddle, for they had been invited to breakfast at La Siesta before

-      starting with the young ladies on the ride through the oak forest.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The visitors arrived early, but not too early for their hostesses. Grace

-      and Merle were waiting to welcome them in the portico, looking more

-      charming than ever in their neat riding suits of khaki.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;We saw you cross the bridge,&rdquo; declared Grace, &ldquo;and mother has gone in to

-      order breakfast to be served. You must be hungry after your early start.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, Sing Ling didn&rsquo;t let us go without a cup of coffee,&rdquo; laughed Dick.

-      &ldquo;But I fancy we&rsquo;ll do full justice, all right, to the bountiful fare of La

-      Siesta.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      It proved to be a delightful meal in every way, the viands seasoned with

-      gay repartee and laughter. A full hour had sped before Dick recalled the

-      real object of the day&rsquo;s excursion.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;We usually walk to Mr. Robles&rsquo; place,&rdquo; remarked Merle. &ldquo;It is only a mile

-      or so by the short cuts up the hill, but by the winding road it is very

-      much longer. So we ordered our ponies.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I see,&rdquo; smiled Munson, &ldquo;to prolong the pleasure of our foursome among the

-      oaks.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Not at all, sir,&rdquo; retorted Grace. &ldquo;The climb on foot is a stiff one, and

-      we knew that you must be out of condition from the lazy life you are

-      living.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I am only waiting for Willoughby to give me a cowboy&rsquo;s job,&rdquo; replied the

-      ex-lieutenant.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know if there will be any cowboy jobs going,&rdquo; observed

-      Willoughby. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s my belief that San Antonio Rancho is sold and is going

-      to be broken up into small holdings.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, what a pity!&rdquo; exclaimed Merle.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;From one point of view, perhaps,&rdquo; answered Dick. &ldquo;But from a hundred

-      other points of view, what a blessing! There will be a dozen happy homes

-      for every steer the range now feeds!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But La Siesta will remain just as it is,&rdquo; cried Grace.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That will be all right,&rdquo; replied Dick, gallantly, &ldquo;It&rsquo;s already a happy

-      home.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The ladies smiled pleasantly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then this will mean the elimination of Mr. Ben Thurston,&rdquo; observed Mrs.

-      Darlington.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The greatest blessing of all,&rdquo; declared Merle, clapping her hands. &ldquo;You

-      see, I am already converted to the change, Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo; she added

-      merrily.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But what about my job?&rdquo; asked Munson in mock dolefulness.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Consult Mr. Robles,&rdquo; laughed Grace. &ldquo;He may take pity on you, and find

-      you a place as handy man on his estate.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      In merry mood they all sallied forth. The saddle horses were waiting, and

-      standing beside them was an elderly Spanish woman.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Tia Teresa, Mr. Munson,&rdquo; said Mrs. Darlington by way of introduction.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Munson had often enough heard the name, and in answer to an inquiry,

-      Willoughby had told him that the old dame had been the personal attendant

-      of the two young ladies ever since they could remember. Tia or Aunt Teresa

-      was now more a friend of the family than a servant of the house, and,

-      taking her hand in salutation, Munson treated her with the affable

-      courtesy that was her due.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I am glad to make your acquaintance,&rdquo; he said, raising his hat.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Tia Teresa looked pleased. Despite her seventy years, she was a buxom and

-      splendidly preserved woman, and there was still the flash of youthfulness

-      in her big dark eyes.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You will look after my little girls,&rdquo; she said, as she gathered together

-      the folds of her black lace mantilla. &ldquo;By rights I should be coming with

-      you, too,&rdquo; she added, in the manner of a true Spanish duenna.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You forget that we are home again&mdash;in free America,&rdquo; laughed Merle

-      as she settled herself in the saddle.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Too free, I sometimes think,&rdquo; rejoined Tia Teresa. &ldquo;But there is safety

-      in four,&rdquo; she added, turning with a smile to Mrs. Darlington.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      And as the young folks rode away she waved them a pleasant <i>adios</i>.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0010" id="link2HCH0010"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER X&mdash;The Home of the Recluse

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span>T a gentle pace

-      they wound their way through the forest of magnificent old oaks.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      As for Munson, riding by Grace Darlington&rsquo;s side, the miles were the

-      shortest he had ever before traversed. It seemed only a few minutes before

-      the red tiled roof and towers of a house built in the California Mission

-      style were gleaming through the trees only a short distance ahead.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Great oaken doors closed the arched gateway, but at the clatter of hoofs

-      and the sound of voices, a little peep-hole wicket was withdrawn. The

-      inspection by unseen eyes apparently was satisfactory, for a moment later

-      a postern was opened, and two men, Mexicans obviously by their garb and

-      deferential manner, emerged to take and lead away the horses. Within the

-      patio stood Senor Robles, his usually grave face lighted by a smile of

-      cordial welcome.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Let me tell you, young men,&rdquo; he said while shaking hands, &ldquo;that while

-      Grace and Merle are quite at home here, you are the very first strangers

-      who have passed through my portals.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Strangers no longer then,&rdquo; said Dick, good-naturedly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Precisely,&rdquo; replied Mr. Robles, &ldquo;or you would not be here. But I foresee

-      that all of us are going to be very close friends. Isn&rsquo;t that so, Grace,

-      my dear?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m sure I cannot say,&rdquo; replied Grace, with a smile of demure innocence

-      toward Mr. Munson. Then she turned to Mr. Robles with a roguish twinkle in

-      her eye. &ldquo;But I&rsquo;ve news for you. Mr. Munson has resigned from the army and

-      is looking for a job.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Both facts are already known to me,&rdquo; answered Robles, smiling.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh,&rdquo; exclaimed Grace, &ldquo;one can never surprise you, Mr. Robles. Although

-      you live the life of a hermit, you seem to be always the first to learn

-      everything that is going on.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;A hermit, my dear, need not necessarily be out of touch with the world,&rdquo;

-       replied Robles, playfully pinching her ear. &ldquo;And now, Mr. Willoughby, you

-      came specially to see my pictures. Lead the way, Merle. Gentlemen, I say

-      again&mdash;welcome to my mountain home.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      They lingered awhile in the patio to admire the marble columns of the

-      cloister that ran all around, the playing fountains at each of the four

-      comers, with groups of symbolical statuary, the wealth of beautiful shrubs

-      and flowers. On the side opposite to the gateway rose a tall tower,

-      fashioned like the campanile of an Old Mission and crowned with bright red

-      tiles.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;We shall ascend there later on,&rdquo; remarked Mr. Robles, following Dick&rsquo;s

-      upward glance.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Then they passed through the wide-opened French window into the living

-      rooms.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The first was a great apartment that occupied one entire side of the

-      building. In the centre was a large globe of the world. Here and there

-      were glass cases displaying manuscripts and illuminated missals. Along the

-      walls were finely-carved bookcases filled with several thousands of

-      volumes.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;When you have the leisure you can come and browse here,&rdquo; said the host,

-      addressing both young men. &ldquo;Meanwhile you may care to look at the bronzes

-      and statuary&rdquo;&mdash;this with a sweep of the hand that indicated the art

-      treasures distributed about the apartment.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      On the side of the house beneath the tower were the dining room and the

-      billiard and smoking room. Passing through these, the visitors came to the

-      picture gallery, a room corresponding in size to the library. Here were

-      hung treasures of the painter&rsquo;s art, masterpieces signed by names that are

-      immortal. These, as their owner again explained, had been acquired by him

-      during several prolonged visits to Europe.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Count this just as a preliminary survey, Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo; he said

-      finally. &ldquo;Then come again. There are guest chambers on either side of the

-      gateway, and one of these will always be at your disposal when I am at

-      home. I extend the same invitation to you, Mr. Munson.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;My word, but you may feel honored,&rdquo; exclaimed Grace, in unconcealed

-      amazement.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;When I open my gates, I open my heart as well,&rdquo; said Mr. Robles, with a

-      courtly little bow to his new friends.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Next they ascended the tower. Its first floor, above the living rooms, was

-      a delightful den filled with curios of all kinds. From this sprang a

-      winding iron staircase, up which Mr. Robles led the way.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The upper chamber, extending on all sides some distance beyond the

-      supporting tower, proved larger than might have been expected. Its one

-      conspicuous article of furniture was a great terrestrial telescope. The

-      sliding panels of glass which formed a complete window all around the room

-      showed that the instrument could be used without obstruction in any

-      direction.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Here a Mexican boy was on duty. When the visitors entered, his hand was

-      resting on the telescope. A bright red sash around his waist imparted a

-      touch of picturesqueness to his costume. He was perhaps only twelve or

-      thirteen years of age, but wonderfully keen and alert-looking for his

-      years. At a glance from his master, the youngster took his departure,

-      closing the door behind him.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Gentlemen,&rdquo; remarked Mr. Robles, when they were again alone, &ldquo;perhaps

-      before I brought you here I should have exacted the promise I am now going

-      to ask you to make. Grace and Merle know that I am a recluse and wish to

-      live undisturbed by curiosity-mongers or tittle-tattlers. I want nobody

-      but the friends I deliberately choose to know about my habits of living or

-      the contents of my home. Only in this way can I hope to be left alone.

-      Therefore, please give me your word, Mr. Willoughby and Lieutenant Munson,

-      that you will not speak with any outsider about the things I am showing

-      you today.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The promise was instantly given and sealed by a hearty hand clasp.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Now,&rdquo; resumed the host in lighter tone, &ldquo;perhaps you would like to view

-      the landscape. I may explain that I had this observatory, as I call it,

-      specially built and equipped so that I could sweep the valley from end to

-      end. For example, I saw you two young men riding along the road this

-      morning,&rdquo; he went on, with a smile. &ldquo;I saw one of you alight, about twelve

-      miles from here&mdash;it was you, lieutenant&mdash;and tighten the girths

-      of your saddle.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Great Scott!&rdquo; murmured Munson, in half-incredulous surprise.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Test the glass for yourself,&rdquo; continued Robles, as, placing one eye at

-      the lens, he adjusted the instrument. &ldquo;Look&rdquo;&mdash;and he stepped back,

-      motioning Munson to approach.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Munson peeped through the long tube and there came from his lips a cry of

-      mingled delight and amazement.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Dick, Dick, there&rsquo;s the store as large as life&mdash;Buck Ashley standing

-      at the door and lighting a cigar. Geewhizz, and it must be twenty miles

-      away.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      He rose erect and made room for Dick. The latter gazed in silence for a

-      few moments. When he turned to Mr. Robles he said:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s really wonderful&mdash;it is the most wonderful glass I ever looked

-      through.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      There was the glimmer of an exultant smile on the face of Ricardo Robles.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I saw you at the round-up across the valley the other day,&rdquo; he remarked.

-      &ldquo;You were much nearer to me than is the store. And while I do not invite

-      any confidence, Mr. Willoughby, you certainly engaged in a very spirited

-      conversation, to say the least, with young Marshall Thurston. Indeed, I

-      half expected to see you come to blows.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What was that?&rdquo; asked Merle in some trepidation.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Willoughby had reddened.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Nothing of consequence,&rdquo; he responded, almost curtly. &ldquo;I had to tell the

-      young cub to mind his own business. That was all.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You certainly have the whole valley under observation,&rdquo; remarked Munson,

-      considerately diverting the conversation.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; assented Mr. Robles, with an almost grim smile of satisfaction.

-      &ldquo;The telescope teaches one not merely to observe, but to reason from the

-      facts observed. Tia Teresa evidently thought that she should have come

-      along today to play duenna, eh, Merle?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t say you guessed that?&rdquo; exclaimed Merle in great astonishment.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Guessed it! I knew it when she raised her protesting finger.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You are a magician, Mr. Robles,&rdquo; cried Grace.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No, only a logician,&rdquo; was the sententious rejoinder.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Please let me peep at our garden,&rdquo; asked Merle. &ldquo;I wonder if mother is

-      among her roses.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Without a word Robles swung round the instrument on its pivot and changed

-      the focus.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s about right,&rdquo; he said, stepping back. &ldquo;There is no one out of

-      doors at present. Move the glass slightly and you can see over the entire

-      garden.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Each girl in turn made a prolonged scrutiny; they were enchanted with the

-      clearness and marvellous detail of the picture.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Henceforth we&rsquo;ll have to be on our best behavior, Dick,&rdquo; laughed Munson,

-      as they turned toward the winding stairway. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ve got to remember Mr.

-      Robles has a constant eye on us.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Perhaps I&rsquo;ve had you under observation quite a while,&rdquo; laughed the senor,

-      tapping the young fellow on the shoulder.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Then he threw open the door, and, with a slight bow and extended hand,

-      motioned to his visitors to descend. At the foot of the narrow, winding

-      staircase they found the Mexican youth standing on guard. He bowed low as

-      the ladies passed, and when Mr. Robles followed last of all, saluted, and

-      then immediately returned to the chamber above, again without a single

-      word of instruction from his master. Munson and Willoughby exchanged

-      meaning looks; obviously a well-disciplined outlook was kept from the

-      observatory all the time, as if from the conning-tower of a battleship.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Again the party was in the patio. Mr. Robles turned to Willoughby.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I hope Grace and Merle have explained to you that at present I do not

-      entertain. My own fare is of the simplest.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Mother is to have luncheon ready at one,&rdquo; interposed Grace. &ldquo;I caught the

-      broiled trout myself this morning.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You caught them ready broiled, eh?&rdquo; laughed Munson.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, you know what I mean,&rdquo; rejoined Grace, with a pretty little <i>moue</i>.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Broiled trout!&rdquo; exclaimed Dick, appreciatively. &ldquo;Then I think we&rsquo;ll be

-      hurrying down the hill, senor.&rdquo; He had recognized with intuitive courtesy

-      that the interview was at an end.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Is he not delightful?&rdquo; asked Merle, as their horses started off at a

-      walk. &ldquo;And you would never guess how sweet and kind he can be.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t doubt it,&rdquo; assented Willoughby. &ldquo;A polished gentleman, but a man

-      of mystery, isn&rsquo;t he?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Not when you come to know him. A recluse always has his little

-      idiosyncrasies.&rdquo; As she spoke, she set her pony at a canter down the

-      gentle incline.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      After luncheon, Dick found himself tête-à-tête with Mrs. Darlington in the

-      music room. The mystery attaching to the personality of the recluse was

-      still uppermost in his mind. But for the present the music claimed his

-      attention.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Merle had seated herself at the grand piano and was softly fingering the

-      keys, striking a chord here and there, until finally she drifted into

-      Chopin&rsquo;s Fifth Nocturne. There was something almost divine in her

-      interpretation. The music fairly rippled from her deft fingers, as they

-      glided on from one beautiful cadence to another until at last, note by

-      note, as if sobbing a reluctant adieu, the melody died away.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Both the visitors were generous in their tributes of congratulation.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Thank you,&rdquo; said Merle, as she arose from the piano and proceeded to

-      unfasten the clasps of a violin case.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What now?&rdquo; exclaimed Munson.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, I am not the performer; I am merely the accompanist,&rdquo; and she held

-      out a beautiful old violin to Grace. As Merle sounded a key on the piano,

-      Grace touched the strings of the Stradivarius. When all was ready she

-      tenderly caressed the violin with her chin, and, her bow sweeping across

-      the instrument, Beethoven&rsquo;s Moonlight Sonata trembled from the strings, in

-      soft and plaintive melody, filling the room with echoing and re-echoing

-      notes of sweetness, while Merle&rsquo;s accompanying notes lent support, in

-      blending harmony, to the rich cadences.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Splendid! magnificent!&rdquo; exclaimed the young men in unison.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Munson was now called upon to sing, and Dick felt himself at full liberty

-      to converse with Mrs. Darlington. He broached the subject that had been

-      occupying his thoughts.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What is known of Senor Ricardo Robles?&rdquo; he enquired. &ldquo;Have you been long

-      acquainted?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, I have known him for many, many years,&rdquo; replied Mrs. Darlington. &ldquo;We

-      used to be next door neighbors in Los Angeles. That was twenty years ago.

-      Then we returned to England&mdash;Mr. Darlington had fallen heir to the

-      family estates. Mr. Robles used to visit us off and on. He is, as you have

-      seen, very fond of Grace&rdquo;&mdash;she paused a moment, then went on&mdash;&ldquo;and

-      of my adopted daughter Merle as well. Merle, you know, was the child of my

-      dearest girl friend who died a year after her baby was born.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, Merle has told me this.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, six years ago my dear husband died, and it was Mr. Robles who

-      persuaded me to return to California. He selected this beautiful ranch for

-      us, near to his own home. And we have all been so happy here at La

-      Siesta.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Mr. Robles is certainly a wonderful man, with all those art treasures

-      around him.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He has princely tastes and princely wealth as well&mdash;this you will

-      have seen for yourself today. He travels a great deal abroad, sometimes

-      for a whole year at a time, and then returns quietly to his hermitage. He

-      has taken a great fancy to you, Mr. Willoughby. You are lucky in gaining

-      the friendship of such a man.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I think I&rsquo;ll like him, too&mdash;when I know him better,&rdquo; replied

-      Willoughby, with cautious reserve.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0011" id="link2HCH0011"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XI&mdash;A Rejected Suitor

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>N Dick

-      Willoughby&rsquo;s presence Marshall Thurston contented himself with sullen

-      looks. But beyond his sight and hearing he spoke truculently of what he

-      was going to do some day to get level with &ldquo;the hired hand who had had the

-      infernal insolence to call him down in public.&rdquo; So all the little world on

-      the rancho knew, or at least believed, that a bitter feud was in progress.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Two or three of the cowboys fostered young Marshall&rsquo;s feelings of

-      animosity, partly out of sheer devilment, partly because they deemed it

-      good policy to keep in the good graces of the heir to the rancho.

-      Moreover, so long as old Ben Thurston knew nothing about it, they were

-      always willing to break a bottle with the dissipated spendthrift, not only

-      because good liquor was not to be despised at any time, but also for the

-      sake of the amusement afforded by Marshall, in his cups, with his stories

-      of fast life in New York and his apparently inexhaustible fund of highly

-      spiced anecdotes. Even his braggart threats against Willoughby had an

-      element of fun.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Why don&rsquo;t you cut him out with the girl?&rdquo; one of his boon companions had

-      suggested on an occasion of this kind.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;By gad, I will,&rdquo; Marshall had responded with vehemence. &ldquo;You just watch

-      me.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Thenceforward this thought was uppermost in his alcohol-sodden brain.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Marshall Thurston had met Mrs. Darlington and her daughter on several

-      occasions, but, although he had been formally introduced, he had never

-      been invited to call at La Siesta. Nor up to the present had he felt any

-      inducement to take the initiative. Like clings to like, and these people

-      were not of his kind&mdash;in the presence of pure and refined womanhood

-      the human toad becomes uncomfortably conscious of his own loathsomeness.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      But now there was a valid reason to egg him on. He would show Dick

-      Willoughby who was who on the San Antonio Rancho. If the heir to all those

-      broad acres chose to pay court to Merle Farnsworth, the girl would only be

-      too glad to jump at him and his millions. He would tell her, too, that

-      Willoughby was going to be fired and that the fellow was not worth a

-      moment&rsquo;s consideration.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Such was his mood one afternoon when, his motor car being in the repair

-      shop, he had not made his usual trip to Bakersfield. &ldquo;Yes, he would ride

-      over that very day to La Siesta;&rdquo; and he proceeded to fortify the resolve

-      by opening a bottle of champagne in the solitary seclusion of his den.

-      After gulping down the wine he felt brave enough to face the devil

-      himself. Yet, when mounted on his horse, he still evinced sufficient

-      discretion to make a wide detour lest Willoughby should catch sight of him

-      and divine his intentions.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      As he rode along young Thurston nursed his wrath to keep it warm. At the

-      same time the desire to possess the girl for her own sake began to inflame

-      his imagination. Unscrupulous passion had been bred in the very bone of

-      this worthless degenerate. Just as his father, Ben Thurston, had thirty

-      years before trampled on the virtue of the young Spanish beauty, Senorita

-      Rosetta, the sister of Don Manuel, so now was the son hatching in his

-      brain a foul plot of spoliation.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll get even with Willoughby, by God, in the very way that will hurt his

-      pride the most. Women!&mdash;pshaw, they&rsquo;re all alike. And she&rsquo;s a

-      peacherino all right&mdash;those flashing dark eyes&mdash;she sure looks

-      good to me.&rdquo; This was now the tenor of his musing as his pony cantered up

-      the slope to La Siesta.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      He advanced on foot to the portico with a swagger and a smile, and there,

-      as luck would have it, he found Merle seated in a rocker, reading, and

-      alone. She rose with quiet courtesy and returned his greeting.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I am sorry,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;mother is not at home. She and my sister Grace

-      have driven over to the dairy. We have a model dairy, you know, on La

-      Siesta,&rdquo; she went on, anxious to make conversation that would not prove

-      embarrassing. For already she divined some particular object in the young

-      man&rsquo;s visit, knowing as she did that he and Willoughby had recently

-      exchanged angry words.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Won&rsquo;t you show me your famous rose gardens?&rdquo; asked Thurston, boldly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;With pleasure,&rdquo; she replied, assenting with a sweet smile of politeness,

-      although there was sore reluctance in her heart, as she stepped from under

-      the portico.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      But, unknown to herself, she did not go unattended, for as Merle and her

-      visitor passed round the house and through the shrubberies there glided

-      after them the figure of a woman, clothed in black, wearing over her head

-      and shoulders a Spanish mantilla. It was Tia Teresa, the ever watchful

-      duenna.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The roses of La Siesta, as Marshall Thurston had said, were indeed famous.

-      Here were all the finest varieties, growing in the perfection to which

-      only care and scientific skill applied under ideal climatic conditions can

-      attain. Merle was glad to point out the different blooms and give them

-      their names&mdash;the topic was certainly an innocuous one, and she smiled

-      at the thought as they strolled along. She was vaguely wondering, too,

-      whether Dick Willoughby would approve even this slight measure of courtesy

-      toward the visitor to her home. Although she had as yet not the remotest

-      conception that the quarrel at the round-up had been in any way connected

-      with her name, she knew that the two young men were at daggers drawn, and

-      toward Dick there was the instinctive loyalty in her heart that prompted

-      her to count his enemies as her enemies, his friends as her friends.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The young girl was too unversed in the ways of the world to notice that

-      Marshall Thurston was under the influence of wine. He was too experienced

-      a toper to show any signs of unsteadiness on his feet, but all the same

-      there was undoubted tipsiness in his leering side-glances and occasional

-      slurring of his words. Of this Merle in her maidenly innocence was

-      supremely unconscious, nor did she dream that the very sparkle of her eyes

-      was completing the intoxication of wine fumes.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Once she cast a look up the hill and asked herself whether the wizard of

-      the red-tiled tower had his spy-glass on La Siesta and was even then

-      quietly surveying the scene in the gardens. The thought made her

-      uncomfortable; she felt sure that her kind friend, Mr. Robles, would not

-      look with favor on her condescending to show even the slightest attention

-      to one whose evil ways of living were notorious.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Suddenly she came to a halt, close beside a little clump of oleander trees

-      laden with rich blossoms.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I am sorry I must leave you now,&rdquo; she said, quite abruptly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Leave me?&rdquo; stammered Thurston. &ldquo;What for?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I have other things to attend to,&rdquo; she replied.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, I say, Miss Farnsworth&rdquo;&mdash;the inebriate as he spoke made a

-      gesture of appeal&mdash;&ldquo;I hope you are not angry with me. If that

-      scalawag of a fellow Willoughby told you I said anything disrespectful of

-      you the other day, he is a demed liar&mdash;that&rsquo;s what he is, a derned

-      liar, and a poor penniless beggar as well, whom my father&rsquo;s going to fire

-      off the ranch.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Merle stood speechless. She stepped back when Thurston advanced with

-      outstretched hands.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The truth of the whole matter is,&rdquo; he rambled on, with growing

-      incoherence, &ldquo;I am madly in love with you myself. That&rsquo;s what I am, and

-      I&rsquo;m going to have you, too.&rdquo; And he grabbed her fiercely and attempted to

-      draw her to him.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Merle screamed both in fear and in repulsion as she tried to push him

-      away.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Just then, from among the oleanders, rushed Tia Teresa. The old duenna

-      came like a cyclone. Her eyes blazed with anger. Grasping the young

-      libertine by the collar of his coat, she pulled him madly from the now

-      half-fainting girl. Then, whirling him around, she rushed him, with the

-      strength and ferocity of a tigress defending her whelps, down the

-      gravelled path and flung him bodily over the low retaining wall along the

-      embankment that separated the rose gardens from the public road. She spat

-      upon his prostrate figure below and rained down on him a torrent of

-      imprecations in the Spanish tongue.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      It was all over in one brief minute. When young Thurston picked himself

-      up, it was to see the aged fury half-leading, half-carrying Merle away in

-      the direction of the house.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The hell cat,&rdquo; he murmured.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Then he brushed the dirt from his coat and straightened out his tumbled

-      appearance as best he could. His horse was tied to the gate post a hundred

-      yards along the road. He slunk toward it, climbed into the saddle, and

-      rode slowly away in the falling twilight. He had been thoroughly sobered

-      by the incident, yet continued somewhat dazed, for his horse was headed

-      toward the woods and hills and not in the direction of home.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0012" id="link2HCH0012"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XII&mdash;The Sped Bullet

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">M</span>EANWHILE events

-      had been happening in the conning tower high up among the hills. The

-      Mexican boy on duty had observed the lone rider approaching the gateway at

-      La Siesta, and for a brief few moments had put the figure under

-      observation by the telescope. He had then sprung alertly erect and pressed

-      a button on the wall. Mr. Robles had quickly responded to the summons, and

-      it was he who had had his eye to the lens during the scene in the rose

-      garden which had terminated in the ignominious expulsion of young Thurston

-      at the hands of the infuriated duenna.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      When the recluse at last withdrew his gaze, his hands were clenched and he

-      stood absolutely rigid in the tenseness of his indignation. He had seen

-      Merle&rsquo;s insultor ride toward the hills and Merle herself taken indoors

-      under Tia Teresa&rsquo;s protecting care. For almost a minute the storm of rage

-      held him, then he relaxed and his look changed to one of terrible

-      determination. He seized a rifle that was hanging on one of the walls and

-      swiftly departed.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      At the arched gateway he spoke a few words to the two retainers on guard,

-      and when he passed through the postern one of them, also equipped with a

-      rifle, followed. Taking a cross-cut from the high road, together they

-      descended the wooded hillside.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      In a little canyon just below the forest Dick Willoughby was rounding up a

-      bunch of vagrant steers. He was alone, riding at a walking pace, driving a

-      dozen or more beasts in front of him, and keeping an eye among the

-      brushwood searching for more.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      On the roadway through the woods Marshall Thurston ambled along. He was a

-      poor and awkward rider at all times, the discreetly-veiled jest of the

-      nimble cowboys, to whom reins, saddle, and spurs were all as second

-      nature. Now, when he imagined himself free from observation, he did not

-      take pains to display even a semblance of horsemanship and, with bridle

-      dropped, steadied himself by a grip on the saddle horn.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      In her bedroom Merle had soon recovered from her distress of mind. Dashing

-      the tears from her eyes, she had enjoined Tia Teresa to say nothing to

-      anyone about the unpleasant incident. Mrs. Darlington would be angered and

-      would certainly tell Mr. Robles, while if the story ever reached Dick&rsquo;s

-      ears there could be no saying what further trouble might not ensue&mdash;a

-      horse-whipping at least, with jeopardy to Dick&rsquo;s position at the rancho

-      and embitterment of an already dangerous quarrel. So Tia Teresa, to

-      complete the comforting process, had assented to secrecy.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      On the pathway down through the forest the Mexican, now in advance,

-      uttered a low &ldquo;hist,&rdquo; halted, and held out a warning hand toward his

-      master. The gaze of both was now fixed in the same direction. Below them

-      could be seen the figure of the horseman coming around a bend in the

-      roadway. The Mexican raised his rifle to the shoulder, but the hand of

-      Robles detained him. The time was not yet&mdash;the distance was too great

-      in view of the obstructing timber.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Robles turned away and rested an arm against a tree trunk. His eyes were

-      downcast; for the moment his mind was far away. He saw once again the

-      little cemetery on the hill, with the marble cross inscribed &ldquo;Hermana,&rdquo;

-       and the other gravestone at the head of the twin mounds that marked the

-      resting place of his parents whose hearts had been broken by Rosetta&rsquo;s

-      tragic end. The fingers of the man who had long years ago sworn the

-      vendetta worked nervously, closing and unclosing themselves.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The rider was nearer now, in a higher loop of the road where the trees

-      were more scattered than below. Merle, drowsy from the reaction of her

-      emotions, had dropped off asleep on her sofa. Tia Teresa had returned to

-      the portico, to make sure that the interloper had taken himself off for

-      good and would not return. In the little canyon Dick Willoughby was

-      quietly riding behind his accumulating drove of cattle.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Suddenly a shot from among the woods rang through the air. Tia Teresa

-      heard it, and after the start of first surprise, into her eyes came the

-      light of swift comprehension and her whole face was illumed by fierce

-      vindictive joy. &ldquo;At last, at last,&rdquo; she murmured, &ldquo;vengeance begins.&rdquo; And

-      in the fervor of her triumph she threw up her extended arms, as if to give

-      benediction to a righteous deed.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick also heard the sharp detonation which his experienced ear knew at

-      once to be from a rifle, not from the shot-gun that some sportsman after

-      quail or rabbits might have been using. He betrayed no great surprise&mdash;just

-      the unspoken word &ldquo;curious&rdquo; hovered on his lips as, halting his horse, he

-      turned in his saddle to glance upward in the direction whence the sound

-      had come. Then after a moment he wheeled the pony round, and, abandoning

-      his drove for the present, ascended at a leisurely pace the narrow pathway

-      which he knew communicated with the winding highroad above.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      When the bullet had reached its fated billet, Marshall Thurston&rsquo;s fingers

-      were still gripping the saddle horn. And right there the missile of death

-      struck, glancing upward from the metal crown and piercing the victim right

-      through the heart. Not a cry&mdash;just an outflung arm, a swaying figure

-      slipping down onto the roadway, and a terrified riderless horse pivoting

-      quickly round on its haunches, then galloping madly for home.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick, glancing upward through the timber, caught a glimpse of the fleeing

-      steed, and he touched his own pony with the spur so that it, too, darted

-      forward.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Farther along the road Tia Teresa heard the clatter of the hoofs and saw

-      the animal in its swift stride disappear in the direction of the rancho.

-      She knew now for certain that her surmise was correct, and the first flush

-      of triumph on her fact settled down into an expression of grim

-      satisfaction. &ldquo;It served him right in any case.&rdquo; she muttered. &ldquo;It was

-      just what the young villain deserved.&rdquo; Then she re-entered the house and

-      passed upstairs. Her young mistress was placidly asleep, smiling in her

-      dreams. The duenna nodded her head in a satisfied sort of way; Merle would

-      learn the news at the proper time, and would not meanwhile be agitated by

-      wild conjectures. So she tiptoed from the room, and was soon busied with

-      domestic duties as if nothing had happened.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick, emerging on foot from the last steep ascent of the canyon, promptly

-      swung himself again into the saddle and started at a loping canter up the

-      winding roadway through the woods. After rounding the first comer he spied

-      the huddled figure on the ground. Before he turned the body over he knew

-      that the man was dead. But when the dead face looked up at his, it was

-      with a terrible shock of surprise that he recognized Marshall Thurston.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick stood for a few moments, gazing around in utter bewilderment. One

-      hand of the dead man was shattered and bloody, while a big splurge of red

-      on the shirt showed where the bullet had completed its work. Murder&mdash;palpable

-      murder! But who could have done this deed? Who had any valid motive to rid

-      the world of this stray piece of humanity&mdash;and in such coldblooded

-      manner, not in the heat of some angry quarrel, but by a deliberate act of

-      assassination in a place so lonely as these pine-clad hills? Dick sat him

-      down by the roadside and pondered these questions.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      There was no real pity in his heart. Young Thurston had been utterly bad&mdash;not

-      big-brained enough to belong to the social dregs, but just equally

-      worthless scum, the more repellent because it made itself visible all the

-      time. He would pass almost without a tear except from the father whose own

-      record had been so foully besmeared that there could be scant sympathy

-      even for him in the hour of his bereavement.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick just wondered and wondered. For the time being he had quite forgotten

-      that old legend&mdash;the Vendetta of the Hills.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0013" id="link2HCH0013"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XIII&mdash;Accused

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span>ROUND the horse

-      corral at the San Antonio Rancho some half-dozen cowboys were squatted on

-      their heels, cowboy-fashion, swapping the news of the day. They had ridden

-      in from various points of the compass, and two or three of their horses,

-      those of the latest comers, still stood saddled outside the enclosure, the

-      reins dropped loosely over their heads, which for the trained cow-pony is

-      just as effective an anchorage as any stake and rope.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Two or three cigarettes were a-light, and the &ldquo;makings&rdquo; were passing from

-      hand to hand among those not yet engaged in the leisurely blowing of smoke

-      rings. The topic of conversation was the rumored sale of the ranch, which

-      some declared to be assuredly impending, while others dismissed the

-      possibility of such a big deal going through as the merest moonshine.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Jack Rover was among those who had no illusions as to the future.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Believe me, fellers,&rdquo; he was remarking, &ldquo;it&rsquo;s no false alarm this time.

-      The old rancho is as good as sold, the stock is a-going to be shipped out,

-      the farmers is a-coming in, and in a few months&rsquo; time we&rsquo;ll all be hunting

-      jobs if there&rsquo;s any more cow-punching jobs left in this blamed new

-      topsy-turvy world. And that&rsquo;s the straight goods&mdash;hell!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Just as this terse and vigorous summation of the whole dispute found

-      utterance, all eyes were turned in a particular direction. It was young

-      Thurston&rsquo;s riderless steed that had attracted attention as it swept toward

-      its accustomed quarters in the corral.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s Marshall&rsquo;s horse,&rdquo; observed one of the boys.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Off again, on again, gone again, Flannigan,&rdquo; laughed another&mdash;an

-      adaptation of a popular story that evoked a general grin.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      But one youth had sprung to his feet, and skilfully caught the bridle of

-      the panting animal as it passed him.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Whoa, beauty!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The others had not stirred. The involuntary dismounting of the young boss

-      was too familiar an episode to provoke anything more than a laugh

-      tinctured with mild satisfaction&mdash;

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No Easterner can ride a Western broncho, anyhow.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Pass your baccy, Bob,&rdquo; came a voice from the ring. But the cowboy holding

-      the riderless horse now brought them all to instant attention.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;By God, he&rsquo;s been shot! There&rsquo;s blood on the horn, and here&rsquo;s the rip of

-      the bullet.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Everyone was on their feet now, and the situation was being eagerly

-      discussed while the saddle was undergoing confirmatory inspection.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Something&rsquo;s happened, boys,&rdquo; exclaimed the big husky fellow addressed as

-      Bob, conclusively, if somewhat obviously. &ldquo;And I guess we&rsquo;d better

-      investigate.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      As he spoke he swung himself into his saddle&mdash;he had been one of the

-      late arrivals and his horse was all ready for the road or the range.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Up toward the hills then,&rdquo; remarked another, indicating the direction

-      whence the riderless horse had come. And a moment later he, too, was

-      astride his broncho.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll borrow your pony, Ted,&rdquo; cried out Jack Rover as he jumped astride a

-      third mustang.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      And a moment later all three riders were pelting along the road leading to

-      La Siesta. There was no difficulty whatever in picking up the long

-      galloping strides on the dusty highway, and the speed of the trackers

-      depended only on the swiftness and endurance of their mounts.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Meanwhile the boy who had caught Marshall&rsquo;s horse had disencumbered it of

-      saddle and bridle, and turned it into the corral with a kindly pat on its

-      heaving flank.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Guess I&rsquo;ll report to the boss,&rdquo; he called out, as he picked up the saddle

-      and moved away toward the ranch home.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Look out for yourself,&rdquo; shouted one of the group. &ldquo;Old Thurston will be

-      madder than hell.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      But it was terror, selfish terror, not anger nor grief, that came into Ben

-      Thurston&rsquo;s eyes when he saw the saddle horn smeared with fresh blood and

-      scarred by a bullet.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;My God, and I believed Don Manuel was dead,&rdquo; he whispered in a hoarse

-      voice to Leach Sharkey.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The two had been, as usual, in close companionship; Sharkey reading a

-      weekly newspaper, while the employer he was paid to protect, restlessly,

-      as was his wont, paced the room.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Disappeared and dead ain&rsquo;t exactly the same thing,&rdquo; replied the sleuth as

-      he critically examined the saddle. &ldquo;And there may be another explanation

-      to this. What about Dick Willoughby?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, yes, Dick Willoughby,&rdquo; eagerly assented the trembling man.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You saw them quarreling the other day&mdash;they hate each other like

-      poison,&rdquo; continued Sharkey. &ldquo;Where&rsquo;s Dick Willoughby now?&rdquo; he enquired,

-      with a swift glance at the cowboy.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Good Lord, that&rsquo;s just where he is&mdash;searching the canyons below the

-      forest for mavericks,&rdquo; was the reply.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Sharkey smiled blandly; the informant looked disappointed, yet confident.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I couldn&rsquo;t have believed that of Dick,&rdquo; he added, regretfully.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, clear out now,&rdquo; said Sharkey. &ldquo;Mr. Thurston and I will want to be

-      alone. You say Jack Rover and two others have gone out to search? Well, we

-      can&rsquo;t do more till they bring us in some news. Let us know at once when

-      they return.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Ben Thurston had collapsed onto a chair, then raised himself, and was

-      leaning eagerly forward now. He met Sharkey&rsquo;s glance of hardly concealed

-      contempt.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s right,&rdquo; he murmured, &ldquo;It has been Dick Willoughby&rsquo;s work. I knew

-      Don Manuel was dead.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And what about your boy?&rdquo; asked the sleuth curtly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, yes, poor Marshall! I forgot about him. But perhaps he&rsquo;s only

-      wounded. We&rsquo;ll send to Bakersfield for a doctor.&rdquo; And he half rose from

-      his seat.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;ll just wait patiently here,&rdquo; replied Sharkey, as he pushed Thurston

-      back into his chair. &ldquo;All that is possible for the present is being done.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      And the rôles were now reversed&mdash;it was the bodyguard who slowly and

-      meditatively paced the room.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Meanwhile Dick Willoughby had ceased from his ruminations, and was

-      beginning to take practical steps for getting Marshall&rsquo;s body home. He had

-      no thought of coroner&rsquo;s regulations that a corpse should be left

-      undisturbed till the proper official investigation had been made. He had

-      got his riata ready, and was just going to sling the body across his

-      saddle and tie it there, when the rhythmic thud of clattering hoofs smote

-      upon his ear. Thank God! Help was coming. There would be others to assist

-      him in his gruesome task. So Dick patiently waited while the sound grew

-      nearer and nearer, until at last the three cowboys dashed round the bend.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I heard the rifle shot,&rdquo; Dick explained, &ldquo;and rode up from the canyon

-      below to have a look. I found him here, huddled up just as you see him by

-      the side of the road.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Who the devil did this?&rdquo; asked Jack Rover, contemplating the corpse.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;God only knows,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;You take him on your saddle, Bob,&rdquo; he

-      added, addressing the big cowboy, whose horse was a full hand taller than

-      the other ponies and more stalwart in proportion.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      And so the cortege was formed, Jack Rover leading the way, with Bob and

-      the body following and Dick Willoughby bringing up the rear.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The sun was low when at last they gained the rancho. They made their way

-      quietly round to the bunk house and quite tenderly swathed the mortal

-      remains of the young boss in a blanket, before carrying it to his father&rsquo;s

-      home.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      At the sound of approaching footsteps old Ben Thurston, with Leach Sharkey

-      close on his heels, emerged onto the verandah. There was no need to

-      announce the death of his son&mdash;the ominous bundle told its own sad

-      tale. The ranch owner stared at it, horrified, inarticulate from a

-      conflict of emotions, the hunted look of terror again in his eyes. Leach

-      Sharkey took up the work of interrogation.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;How did it happen?&rdquo; He was addressing Jack Rover, who chanced to stand

-      next to him after helping to deposit the body on a bench that stood

-      conveniently against the wall.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Dick Willoughby heard the shot up among the woods, and found him lying

-      dead on the road.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Sharkey advanced a pace or two and confronted Dick.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Who fired the shot?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;How should I know?&rdquo; retorted Dick, reddening slightly from the

-      brusqueness of the enquiry.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I reckon I can tell,&rdquo; cried Sharkey. And with a swift, experienced

-      movement he grabbed Dick by both arms and clicked a pair of handcuffs on

-      his wrists before anyone, Dick least of all, had fathomed his intention.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick Willoughby was a square-shouldered, powerful fellow, but the great

-      husky bodyguard, Leach Sharkey, towered above him. In the first flush of

-      anger and surprise Dick struggled to break the shackles of ignominy. But

-      the sleuth grabbed him by both shoulders with a grip that rendered its

-      recipient absolutely powerless.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Go easy, young man.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick&rsquo;s muscles relaxed, and Sharkey was content to release his hold.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Go easy. If you have any answer to make to the charge of murdering that

-      boy, you&rsquo;ll have the chance all in good time.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What right have you to arrest me?&rdquo; demanded Dick, somewhat recovering his

-      poise.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;ve a special constable&rsquo;s star all right,&rdquo; replied Sharkey, throwing

-      open his coat and displaying, close to his armpit, the badge of the office

-      he had claimed.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Guess that&rsquo;s good enough for you and all others here. And now take my

-      advice, Willoughby. You&rsquo;ll come quietly with me to Bakersfield. I&rsquo;ve no

-      special grudge against you, but have my obvious duty to perform. You

-      threatened young Marshall more than once in all our hearing, and it will

-      be up to you to prove yourself guiltless of his death. You bring round Mr.

-      Thurston&rsquo;s automobile, Rover. We start right now.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Everything had happened so rapidly that none of the cowboys, had they so

-      desired, could have protested or interfered. Meanwhile the news had

-      spread, for others among the ranch hands were coming up and crowding

-      toward the verandah rails. General sympathy was obviously with Dick

-      Several of the onlookers advanced and shook his manacled hands. &ldquo;All

-      right, Mr. Willoughby.&rdquo; &ldquo;You&rsquo;ll be home again tomorrow,&rdquo; &ldquo;Buck up, it&rsquo;s a

-      ridiculous charge&rdquo;&mdash;these were among their expressions of

-      encouragement. Dick just smiled his thanks&mdash;a wan, wistful smile. He

-      now had himself under perfect control&mdash;even his resentment toward

-      Sharkey had been allowed to evaporate.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Very well,&rdquo; he said quietly, addressing the sleuth. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll give you no

-      trouble, Sharkey. Let us get away from here as quickly as possible.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Just then Lieutenant Munson came hurriedly onto the scene. For a moment he

-      looked thunderstruck when he saw the handcuffs around Dick&rsquo;s wrists.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Great Scott, Dick! What&rsquo;s the meaning of this?&rdquo; Then without waiting for

-      a reply he turned to the sleuth.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve just heard about young Thurston&rsquo;s death, but you&rsquo;re surely not going

-      to mix up Dick Willoughby&rsquo;s name with it, Mr. Sharkey? You must know that

-      he would have nothing to do with such a cowardly crime.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He can prove all that at the proper time and place,&rdquo; was the cool,

-      determined rejoinder.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t interfere, Munson,&rdquo; interposed Dick. &ldquo;Mr. Sharkey considers that he

-      is doing his duty. That&rsquo;s an end to all argument. I&rsquo;ll have no difficulty

-      in obtaining my release once we get to Bakersfield.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And the lieutenant can come along with us if he likes,&rdquo; observed the

-      sleuth, conciliated by his prisoner&rsquo;s sensible view of things. &ldquo;As Mr.

-      Willoughby&rsquo;s best friend, you can see that everything&rsquo;s done right, Mr.

-      Munson.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But why these handcuffs?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I know my own business,&rdquo; replied the sleuth, with returning severity, as

-      he touched the constable&rsquo;s star on his breast. &ldquo;And as a soldier you

-      should know the wisdom of letting it go at that, sir.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Munson turned to Mr. Thurston. All through the colloquy the ranch-owner

-      had spoken not a word. He had dropped onto the bench beside the still

-      swathed body of his son, and was sitting there with bowed head and

-      stolidly fixed eyes.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You are no party to this accusation, Mr. Thurston?&rdquo; the lieutenant

-      enquired. &ldquo;I am sorry for the blow that has fallen on you. But you can&rsquo;t

-      seriously believe that Dick Willoughby&rsquo;s the man who fired that shot.&rdquo; As

-      he spoke he pointed at the dead rigid form.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Thurston raised his eyes. There was a dull glare of fury in them, a savage

-      snarl on his parted lips.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Mind your own business, young man. He killed my boy, and by God he&rsquo;ll

-      hang for it.&rdquo; While speaking he rose to his feet, holding forth a

-      denouncing arm toward Willoughby, &ldquo;Yes, he&rsquo;ll hang for it,&rdquo; he growled

-      again with savage determination, turning round to the open door.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      With a gesture to the cowboys standing nearest, he bade them carry the

-      body within. He stood aside to let them pass with their burden, then

-      followed and slammed the door behind him with an angry bang.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Despite the tragedy of it all, a little smile went round the group of

-      onlookers. It meant to say that that was just Ben Thurston all over&mdash;irascible

-      and vindictive. But some faces looked grave.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;May go mighty hard with Willoughby,&rdquo; murmured one voice, that of the old

-      grey-headed man, the blacksmith at the rancho for twenty years or more. &ldquo;I

-      wouldn&rsquo;t like to feel the weight of the old devil&rsquo;s hand.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      But just then the automobile came round the house, piloted by Jack Rover.

-      Sharkey began to make his dispositions for the journey.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Do you want to take anything with you, Willoughby?&rdquo; he asked in a

-      considerate manner.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Nothing,&rdquo; was the prompt reply.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well then, you&rsquo;ll ride with me on the front seat. Lieutenant, you can

-      share the tonneau with Mr. Thurston.&rdquo; There was a slight grin on the

-      sleuth&rsquo;s face as he signified the arrangement.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Mr. Thurston?&rdquo; queried Munson, taken somewhat aback. &ldquo;Does he come, too?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Sure,&rdquo; replied Sharkey. &ldquo;Who&rsquo;s going to make the charge, I&rsquo;d like to

-      know? Willoughby, I just need your promise that you won&rsquo;t move from this

-      verandah till I return.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick nodded assent. &ldquo;You have my word,&rdquo; he said with quiet dignity.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then I&rsquo;ll be back in a minute,&rdquo; added the sleuth, his hand on the door

-      knob.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Ben Thurston was standing alone in the centre of the living room, the body

-      with its bearers having passed to an inner apartment. His arms were folded

-      across his breast in an attitude of deep dejection. But it was with the

-      scared look of a hunted beast that he started away at the touch of Leach

-      Sharkey&rsquo;s hand upon his shoulder.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The sleuth smiled understandingly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t want to be left here all alone, do you?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No, no. For God&rsquo;s sake, no. I had forgotten that.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then you&rsquo;ve got to come with me to Bakersfield. In any case you will be

-      wanted to swear the information. And you can also make arrangements for

-      the funeral. So get your hat and overcoat. We are all ready outside.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, yes, I&rsquo;m coming,&rdquo; faltered Thurston. &ldquo;Wait for me, Sharkey,&rdquo; he

-      added, as with nervous fingers he detached his overcoat from a rack on the

-      wall.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      And a few minutes later the automobile, with Sharkey at the wheel, the

-      handcuffed prisoner by his side, and Thurston and the lieutenant seated

-      frigidly apart in opposite comers of the tonneau, was spinning through the

-      gathering dusk of evening on its way to the county town of Bakersfield.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0014" id="link2HCH0014"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XIV&mdash;Entanglements

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">F</span>ROM the

-      observatory high up among the hills, Mr. Robles had witnessed the arrest

-      and the departure of the prisoner. He had understood every move just as if

-      he had been present on the verandah down below and had heard each spoken

-      word.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      As he stood erect, his hand still rested on the telescope. For a few

-      moments he pondered, then murmured to himself as he turned to leave the

-      room: &ldquo;A bad complication! I must break the news tonight to Merle. Poor

-      little girl!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      But it was two hours later before he wended his way down through the

-      moonlit forest in the direction of La Siesta.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      There dinner was over. No word of untoward happenings had as yet come from

-      the outside world to disturb the tranquillity of the little household. In

-      the drawing room Merle was at the piano, while Grace, close by, was curled

-      on a sofa reading the latest novel. At some distance from the young girls

-      was Mrs. Darlington, occupied intermittently over a piece of embroidery.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      She was seated in semi-darkness, only her hands and her work illumed by

-      the soft pink radiance of a shaded lamp resting on a little table by her

-      side. In the evening costume of the chatelaine of La Siesta was the

-      suggestion of old lace and old-time lavender&mdash;the old lace at her

-      bosom and around her neck, the subtle fragrance of lavender exhaled from

-      her garments that gave to her a sort of personal atmosphere. And as she

-      sat musingly, with the skeins of silk passing through her fingers, she

-      might have formed a picture of some Penelope seated at the loom of pensive

-      memory.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The music from the piano was in harmony with both her mood and her

-      attitude&mdash;the soft dreamy melodies of Mendelssohn&rsquo;s &ldquo;Songs without

-      Words&rdquo; to which she was vaguely listening while busy with her thoughts and

-      her stitches.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Downstairs amid the oriental luxuriousness of the cosy corner sat Tia

-      Teresa, waiting in the dark to intercept the visitor of whose coming she

-      had been apprized by a secret messenger. And at last Ricardo Robles came,

-      with the noiseless footfall that was characteristic of the man and

-      imparted to him an air of mystery. He was standing by the old duenna&rsquo;s

-      side before she had realized his presence.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I wanted a few words with you first of all, Tia Teresa,&rdquo; he murmured, as

-      she grasped his hand in both her own and affectionately kissed it.

-      &ldquo;Something has happened.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I know what has happened, Don Manuel,&rdquo; she whispered. &ldquo;The young man

-      deserved his fate, for I am sure you saw what occurred in the rose garden

-      during the afternoon. For one of his breed to have dared even to touch my

-      little girl!&rdquo; She hissed the words venomously, then added in calmer tone:

-      &ldquo;So all is well. He brought down his doom upon his own head, and vengeance

-      for Rosetta begins.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Robles pressed her hand as he disengaged his own from her almost fiercely

-      caressing touch.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I nursed you both,&rdquo; continued the duenna in a low impassioned voice.

-      &ldquo;Your people were my people, you children were my very life, and your

-      revenge has come to be my own. So I rejoice that the young ruffian died.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      He had seated himself by her side on the divan. &ldquo;We shall say no more then

-      about that,&rdquo; he responded. &ldquo;In some ways I am sorry over the day&rsquo;s work.

-      At times I find it difficult to reconcile my firmness with my softness.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But you cannot forget that you are no longer the owner of your father&rsquo;s

-      lands and flocks, and are virtually childless besides.&rdquo; She breathed the

-      words with intense repressed fury, intensified as she added: &ldquo;And all

-      through the accursed gringo who wrecked our happy lives&mdash;Rosetta&rsquo;s,

-      yours, your beloved parents&rsquo; as well. While that abominable wretch lives,

-      the vendetta can never end.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      For a moment Robles remained silent. Then he spoke resolutely:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I know it, Tia Teresa. Today my work only begins. Rest assured that it

-      will be carried to the bitter finish. For this I have waited all through

-      those long years. But I wanted to tell you of another matter&mdash;to warn

-      you of a very serious complication. Dick Willoughby has been arrested for

-      the slaying of Marshall Thurston.&rdquo; The duenna sat bolt upright in shocked

-      surprise. &ldquo;Oh, my! What will this mean?&rdquo; she murmured.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Terrible grief for my little girl&mdash;possibly much suffering for him

-      until I choose to take the responsibility upon myself.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You must not do that.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No. Not yet, at all events. Or the victory will be his&mdash;my enemy&rsquo;s.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      He mused again. She, too, remained silent. At last he broke the spell.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But I have already devised measures for his safety. Now I must go

-      upstairs. They have heard nothing yet?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Not a word.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then I must tell them of the mysterious shooting in the woods, and at the

-      same time reassure Merle that her lover is in no real danger.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And Mrs. Darlington?&rdquo; asked Tia Teresa. &ldquo;How much is she to know?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Nothing! The vendetta is for us Spaniards. It is ours and ours alone. No

-      one knows of my vow but you and I. Let it remain so. <i>Adios</i>, my dear

-      friend.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      In the darkness he stooped and kissed her on both cheeks. For a moment she

-      clung to him, but he gently liberated himself from her embrace. He moved

-      toward the stairway, and Tia Teresa followed him cautiously up to the

-      drawing room door, outside of which she remained. Knowing that she was

-      there, he left the door ajar. The soft music was still playing, but

-      suddenly ceased when Robles advanced into the apartment.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;My word, but this is an unexpected pleasure,&rdquo; exclaimed Merle, as she

-      came from the piano with outstretched hands.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      He took them both in his own, and bestowed on her a grave but kindly

-      smile. He also nodded to Grace, who had dropped her book and risen in

-      courteous greeting.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But you look sad and serious,&rdquo; Merle went on, with quick intuition that

-      his coming at this late hour meant something more than a mere neighborly

-      visit.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Something sad and serious has happened,&rdquo; he replied.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Mrs. Darlington had advanced from her lamp-lit table.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What?&rdquo; she enquired eagerly. &ldquo;Somehow I had a sense of impending trouble

-      all day long.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Young Thurston of the rancho has met with an accident.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Dead?&rdquo; gasped Merle, her hands clasped against her bosom.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, dead, I am afraid. He was mysteriously shot this afternoon when

-      riding through the pine woods.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Merle was stricken dumb. Grace glided to her side and listened in silent

-      expectancy.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Shot! By whom?&rdquo; asked Mrs. Darlington.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That I cannot tell,&rdquo; gravely replied Robles. Then he smiled faintly. &ldquo;But

-      an amazingly stupid blunder has been made. By some combination of

-      circumstances suspicion is being fastened on our dear friend Dick

-      Willoughby.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Dick!&rdquo; exclaimed Merle. &ldquo;Who dares to suggest such a thing?&rdquo; she added

-      indignantly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I infer that Mr. Thurston is his accuser,&rdquo; replied Robles.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The two young men quarreled,&rdquo; murmured Mrs. Darlington, in a voice of

-      deep agitation.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Mother!&rdquo; cried Merle reprovingly. &ldquo;Even to think for one moment that

-      Dick, whatever the provocation, could have done such a thing! He is

-      absolutely innocent, Mr. Robles,&rdquo; she went on decisively, again turning to

-      their visitor.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Of course he is innocent&mdash;absolutely innocent. No one knows that

-      better than myself.&rdquo; And he gave an enigmatic smile as he spoke the words

-      of reassuring confidence.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Where is Mr. Willoughby now?&rdquo; queried Grace.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He has been compelled to go to Bakersfield.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;To Bakersfield?&rdquo; exclaimed Merle, half wonderingly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;There to prove his innocence,&rdquo; replied Robles.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      But Mrs. Darlington had probed the real significance of his words.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t mean to say that they have&mdash;arrested him?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Robles nodded gravely. &ldquo;That&rsquo;s how the law acts. A man under suspicion

-      must be taken into custody&mdash;he must be charged so that he can refute

-      the shameful calumny.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Merle had dropped into a settee&mdash;white and speechless. Her lips

-      trembled. Then she burst into a passion of weeping, burying her face

-      against an arm flung across the upholstery.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Mrs. Darlington moved forward quickly to comfort the sobbing girl.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, don&rsquo;t take on like this, my dear child. The arrest was a mere

-      formality. He will be immediately set at liberty.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Merle raised her tear-stained face. She spoke in gulping sobs.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But, mother, I never told you&mdash;I shrank from telling any of you.

-      While you and Grace were away this afternoon, Marshall Thurston called and

-      wanted to make love to me&mdash;he even dared to try to kiss me. Tia

-      Teresa flung him out of the rose garden. It was I who made Tia Teresa

-      promise to say nothing about it to anyone. I feared trouble. And, oh,

-      trouble, terrible trouble, has already come.&rdquo; Again she bowed her head and

-      continued weeping, but quietly weeping now. Grace was bending over her,

-      patting her shoulder in soothing sympathy.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Mrs. Darlington&rsquo;s eyes met those of Robles.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;This may prove serious,&rdquo; she said softly, that Merle might not overhear.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It is decidedly unfortunate,&rdquo; replied Robles; &ldquo;an unfortunate

-      complication that may, of course, strengthen the suspicion against

-      Willoughby and so render it more difficult for us to help him.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Merle sprang to her feet, and with a hand dashed away her tears.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Suspicion!&rdquo; she exclaimed. &ldquo;There can be not one moment&rsquo;s suspicion.&rdquo; And

-      she gazed up into Robles&rsquo; face in ardent appeal.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Of course not, my dear, among us&mdash;among all those who know Dick

-      Willoughby. But there is the harshly judging world to reckon with besides.

-      They may say that this discloses a motive for the crime.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;However, Merle has just told us,&rdquo; commented Mrs. Darlington, &ldquo;that only

-      she and Tia Teresa know anything about this unhappy episode in the rose

-      garden. Mr. Willoughby has not been here at all today.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But I happen to know that he was not far away this afternoon&mdash;that

-      he was rounding up some cattle in the near-by canyons. Malice may suggest

-      that he was a witness of Thurston&rsquo;s insolent behavior.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then we should all keep silent on the subject.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Which might be compromising in the long run, my dear Mrs. Darlington.

-      Altogether it is a difficult situation.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Merle had been hardly listening to this conversation. She had been

-      thinking, and with thinking had regained her composure. Her mind was

-      quickly made up as to the line of prompt action that must be taken. She

-      spoke quite calmly now.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He is in prison. You have not spoken the word, Mr. Robles, but I know the

-      truth all the same. We shall go to him tonight.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Not tonight, my dear,&rdquo; replied Robles, with gentle firmness. &ldquo;But

-      tomorrow morning, certainly, I would suggest that you drive over to

-      Bakersfield. He will appreciate your kindness in paying him this prompt

-      visit, and you can at the same time convey to him my message of absolute

-      belief in his innocence.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You will not come, too?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I can do more for him, Merle, by not going to Bakersfield for the

-      present. Do not forget that for reasons of my own I live in seclusion. My

-      name must be mentioned to no one but Mr. Willoughby. Trust me, all three

-      of you, and leave me to work quietly alone and by my own methods. There, I

-      give my promise. The captive will be set free within a short time. My hand

-      on that, and you know that I never break my word.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      There was a joyous smile of confidence on his face as he spoke the words.

-      Merle took the extended hand gratefully, trustfully, and pressed it to her

-      lips. Robles went on:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;My advice is&mdash;try to sleep tonight. Tomorrow, or within a few brief

-      tomorrows, all will be well. Good night.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Tia Teresa followed him from the open door down into the outer hall.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You heard everything,&rdquo; he said as he paused to speak a final word of

-      parting. &ldquo;Comfort her, but at the same time guard our secret closer than

-      ever. Not one hair of Willoughby&rsquo;s head will be touched&mdash;make her

-      know that for certain. And everything will come right in a very little

-      time.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;My poor little girl,&rdquo; he murmured to himself as he strode down the silent

-      tree-shadowed avenue.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0015" id="link2HCH0015"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XV&mdash;Behind the Bars

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">D</span>ick Willoughby had

-      been lodged in the county jail at Bakersfield, duly charged by Ben

-      Thurston as the murderer of his son. To his surprise, and indeed to his

-      dismay, the prisoner was informed that, the crime alleged being a capital

-      one, no bail could be accepted. This was first of all a blow to

-      Willoughby&rsquo;s pride. Here he was under the stigma of imprisonment, but with

-      no possibility of redress. It was not the loss of comforts, the

-      deprivation of personal liberty, the hardships to body and to soul,

-      inseparable from such restraint, that he resented, so much as the

-      semiconviction of guilt implied by the durance vile to which he was to be

-      subjected, although absolutely innocent of the deed of which he was

-      accused.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      However, after first chagrin came manly philosophy. The law might be right

-      or wrong, wise or unwise, necessary or superfluous. But all the same it

-      was the law of the state and had therefore to be obeyed. So, when the

-      situation was finally reviewed, it was Lieutenant Munson who, when bidding

-      his friend good-night, had been the angry man, fretting and fuming over

-      such an abominable act of injustice, while the prisoner himself was

-      tranquilly resigned to the ordeal through which he must pass and to which

-      unkind fate was subjecting him for reasons that he was powerless to

-      fathom.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Good night, Ches, old man. You&rsquo;ll see me again in the morning. It&rsquo;s

-      mighty kind of you to stay in town all night. But we can decide on the

-      best lawyer to employ, and then you must hasten back to break the bad news

-      at La Siesta.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Such had been Dick&rsquo;s quiet words when their colloquy had been broken up,

-      and he had been ordered to the retirement of his prison cell. To enter

-      that place was for Dick a horrible experience. But he accepted the

-      experience calmly, bade the turnkey a cheerful good-night, and laid him

-      down to sleep on the narrow mattress resting upon the hard bench, at peace

-      with himself and the world, even with the bitter enemy who had all so

-      unexpectedly appeared on his path.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Although Munson was back in the jail betimes next morning, he found Dick

-      already conferring with a lawyer&mdash;the best and most honored in the

-      town, as Munson knew the moment his name was mentioned.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Let me introduce you to Mr. Bradley,&rdquo; said Dick, presenting him. &ldquo;Some

-      kind friend whose name he declines to reveal for the present, sent him a

-      special message last night retaining his services for my defence.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Mrs. Darlington, I bet,&rdquo; interjected the lieutenant.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No, not Mrs. Darlington, let me assure you,&rdquo; rejoined the lawyer,

-      &ldquo;although undoubtedly she would be willing to do the same thing. But I am

-      not permitted to say any more.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And he has <i>carte blanche</i> for all expenses,&rdquo; smiled Dick. &ldquo;Although

-      I should not think there will be much money required to clear an innocent

-      man,&rdquo; he added.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Wait till you see,&rdquo; said the lawyer crisply. &ldquo;We have to reckon with a

-      malignant persecutor, I am already informed.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, I&rsquo;ve got a bit to my bank credit,&rdquo; Dick replied. &ldquo;And we&rsquo;ll draw on

-      that first before I accept the generosity of an unknown friend. It will be

-      quite a saving here,&rdquo; he went on with a humorous twinkle in his eye as he

-      glanced around. &ldquo;Free board and lodging at the state&rsquo;s expense for a week

-      at all events.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Much longer than that, I am afraid,&rdquo; gravely remarked the lawyer. &ldquo;You

-      see, Mr. Munson, just before you arrived we were discussing the decidedly

-      unfortunate coincidence that at the time the shooting occurred, Mr.

-      Willoughby, by his own admission, was in the little canyon below the scene

-      of the tragedy.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Rounding up some cattle,&rdquo; observed Dick. &ldquo;Of course. But all the same,

-      open to suspicion as being on the ground, and indeed being the first to

-      reach the dead man&rsquo;s side.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That should be proof of innocence,&rdquo; observed Munson.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Or may be taken as evidence of well-reasoned audacity to throw accusers

-      off the trail,&rdquo; retorted the attorney. &ldquo;You see we have to look at

-      everything, not from our own point of view, but from the other side. Now I

-      want to learn something more about that quarrel between you and young

-      Thurston at the cattle muster.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He made an insulting remark about one of the young ladies from La

-      Siesta,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;I told him I would tan his hide if he ever did it

-      again. That&rsquo;s all. But the last thing I want is that these ladies&rsquo; names

-      should be dragged into the case.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But his remark and your reproof were overheard by others,&rdquo; commented the

-      attorney.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, yes, by a bunch of ranch hands.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Whose evidence will undoubtedly be called for the prosecution,

-      necessitating, perhaps, the evidence of the young ladies on our side.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;By God, I won&rsquo;t stand for that,&rdquo; exclaimed Dick hotly. &ldquo;I can defend

-      myself without their being called to the witness stand. Think, Munson, of

-      subjecting Merle or Grace to any such thing&rdquo;&mdash;and his indignant face

-      appealed to the lieutenant&rsquo;s.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I saw nothing of the quarrel,&rdquo; observed Munson, addressing the lawyer,

-      &ldquo;although, of course, I heard something about it later on&mdash;not from

-      Willoughby, however, for he has never once referred to the matter in

-      conversation with me. But I say, Dick, old fellow, you know that Merle

-      Farnsworth and Grace Darlington, too, will be only too proud and happy to

-      stand up for you in a law court or anywhere else.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That may be,&rdquo; replied Dick gloomily, &ldquo;but I don&rsquo;t propose that they shall

-      be made the objects of vulgar curiosity in a crowded court-room, or that

-      their ears should ever hear the vile words that fell from that miserable

-      degenerate who has at last met the fate he properly deserved.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, it is a point that we shall have to consider carefully,&rdquo; spoke the

-      lawyer as he rose to take his departure. &ldquo;I have all the main facts of the

-      case now, Mr. Willoughby. Of course I shall apply formally to the court

-      for bail, but I know it is bound to be refused. I&rsquo;ll make all arrangements

-      outside for your comfort here&mdash;meals, etc., and no doubt your friend,

-      Mr. Munson, will bring you over clothing, toilet requisites, and the other

-      little things you will require. I&rsquo;ll see you again later on today.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The lawyer was gone, and the two comrades were alone in the little room,

-      stone-walled and bare of furniture except for a few chairs, where the

-      consultation had been held. Beyond the open door stood a constable, just

-      out of earshot. But he now took his stand within the room.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, Munson, old chap,&rdquo; said Dick with cheerful alacrity, &ldquo;you get back

-      to the rancho in double-quick time. Then go on to La Siesta and tell Merle

-      not to worry on my account. Tell her that I&rsquo;m bright and happy, and just

-      enjoying a good rest, and will be set at liberty within a week or so. But

-      remember, she is not to come here. Good Lord, I never want her to see me

-      in a place like this.&rdquo; And he glanced around forlornly, and in a measure

-      ashamed.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      But at the very moment there was a flutter along the corridor&mdash;the

-      sound of voices, and women&rsquo;s voices, too. A moment later the

-      superintendent of the jail appeared, bringing with him Mrs. Darlington and

-      Merle. At the doorway he spoke to the officer on guard; the man withdrew.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Mr. Willoughby, here are some more friends,&rdquo; said the superintendent as

-      he ushered in the ladies. &ldquo;I am going to interpret the regulations as

-      leniently as possible&mdash;that&rsquo;s a matter which can rest between

-      ourselves. I&rsquo;ll come back for you, Mrs. Darlington, in half an hour.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Merle advanced toward Dick with outstretched hand. In her other hand was a

-      fine bouquet of roses.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What a shame that you should be here,&rdquo; she exclaimed. &ldquo;But I realize that

-      the only thing to do is to submit as cheerfully as possible to the

-      inevitable. Mother and I came over to give you our sympathy and proffer

-      our help in every possible way. Grace also sends her very kindest regards,

-      and I was bidden by Mr. Robles, whom we saw last night, to assure you of

-      his complete belief in your innocence.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m not afraid of any real friend thinking me capable of a cowardly

-      deed like that,&rdquo; replied Willoughby. &ldquo;But it is nice to have these kind

-      messages, although I could have wished, Miss Farnsworth, that you had not

-      seen me amid such surroundings.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Do you think that we would desert you in such a time of trouble as this?&rdquo;

-       replied Merle, as she sat down. &ldquo;But seeing that our visit is to be

-      restricted to half an hour, it is well that we should get to the important

-      points without delay. I have been talking over a certain matter both with

-      mother and Mr. Robles, and although I shrink from telling it, they have

-      decided that you must know about the affair.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      She then proceeded, in a low voice and with lips that trembled, to tell

-      how young Thurston had forced his attentions on her just a little time

-      before the shooting occurred and how Tia Teresa had rescued her from his

-      clutches.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      This was the first that Dick had heard of the incident and his face

-      flushed with anger. But Merle quieted him at once. &ldquo;You need not be angry

-      now, Mr. Willoughby. It is all over. But your lawyer will want to consider

-      what bearing this may possibly have upon the case.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It can have no bearing at all,&rdquo; maintained Dick. &ldquo;In the first place I

-      didn&rsquo;t even know till now that Marshall had been visiting at La Siesta.

-      And in the second place, just as I was saying to Munson a few minutes ago,

-      I am determined that the names of you ladies shall not be dragged into

-      this miserable affair. Isn&rsquo;t that right, Mrs. Darlington?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;In a measure. But all the same we are ready to stand by you so as to

-      establish your innocence with the least possible delay. I heard this

-      morning that Mr. Thurston is very bitter against you, keeps vowing

-      vengeance, and announces that no money will be spared to bring the slayer

-      of his son to retribution.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, I hope he&rsquo;ll find him without loss of time,&rdquo; smiled Dick. &ldquo;That

-      will be the quickest and easiest way to get me out of confinement. But at

-      this moment I have not the faintest idea on whom to fasten the charge.

-      Lots of the cowboys despised young Thurston, but none were really his

-      enemies, and I don&rsquo;t know any one among the bunch who would have shot him

-      in that dastardly, cold-blooded manner.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Which makes the situation for you all the more disagreeable,&rdquo; commented

-      Munson. &ldquo;You had been known to threaten him, and if there is no one else

-      to whom suspicion can point, you may be kept here, Dick, for quite a time&mdash;for

-      months, perhaps, until the case goes to trial.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick&rsquo;s face fell. &ldquo;For months!&rdquo; he exclaimed. &ldquo;Surely that would be an

-      outrage.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, I wouldn&rsquo;t be too despondent,&rdquo; protested Merle. &ldquo;Besides, Mr. Robles

-      has pledged his word to me that you will be free in a very brief time.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then he may know who the culprit is,&rdquo; remarked Dick eagerly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; interposed Mrs. Darlington. &ldquo;He is like ourselves&mdash;quite in the

-      dark. But you may rest assured that Mr. Robles will leave no stone

-      unturned to solve the mystery and restore you to liberty, Mr. Willoughby,

-      for I happen to know that he holds you in highest esteem.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m glad of that,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;Well, I want you to tell him from me

-      how keen I am that you ladies shall be spared from all association with

-      this case. You know that I am exercising great self-denial, Miss

-      Farnsworth, when I say that you are never to come here again. This is no

-      place for you.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Pardon me,&rdquo; laughed Merle, &ldquo;but we are interested in you and will excuse

-      the hotel you have chosen to patronize. We brought these roses for you

-      from La Siesta&rdquo;&mdash;as she spoke she presented him with the beautiful

-      blooms&mdash;&ldquo;and if Lieutenant Munson will be kind enough to come out to

-      our automobile he will find there some books, also a box of fruit and a

-      few delicacies which we hope will help to make your stay here just a

-      little more tolerable.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;re kind indeed,&rdquo; murmured Dick gratefully. &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t worry about me,&rdquo; he

-      added cheerfully, &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll have a fine rest here, and will be able to catch

-      up with my arrears of reading.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      And in this philosophic frame of mind the prisoner was left to begin his

-      holiday.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0016" id="link2HCH0016"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XVI&mdash;Pierre Luzon Returns

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>N the outside

-      world the question on everybody&rsquo;s lips was&mdash;who had fired the fatal

-      shot among the pine woods? The young reprobate had been thoroughly

-      despised, but he had no known enemies except Willoughby. So while

-      Willoughby&rsquo;s staunch friends could only reiterate the question in vain

-      perplexity, most people were inclined to answer it with Dick&rsquo;s name. The

-      angry quarrel between the two young men was universally known and had been

-      subjected to sundry embellishments&mdash;for example, the threatened

-      horse-whipping had become an actual recorded event, and so on. And even

-      there were whispers about rivalry in some love affair&mdash;that Marshall

-      had had his eye on one of the young ladies at La Siesta where Dick for

-      some time had been a constant caller.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      So among the cowboys on the ranch, the oil drillers who frequented the

-      Bakersfield saloons and had often enough stood around while young Thurston

-      had set up the drinks, the newspaper reading public generally for whom all

-      the facts had been set forth in elaborate detail&mdash;the universal

-      concensus of opinion seemed to be that Dick Willoughby was the man. Not

-      that this verdict of popular opinion carried with it any real reprobation.

-      Everyone agreed that the worthless degenerate had met even a kindlier fate

-      than he merited. Had he lived, not all his father&rsquo;s millions could have

-      long saved him either from the penitentiary or an asylum for the insane.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      A week passed. Thurston brooded in solitude, but at his bidding Leach

-      Sharkey kept up active investigations with a view to nose out every bit of

-      evidence that could tell against the accused man. Sharkey worked, not from

-      any special animosity against Willoughby, but from keen professional

-      pride.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick accepted his confinement with manly fortitude. It. was one of those

-      untoward happenings that come into some people&rsquo;s lives for no obvious

-      reason, but he was calm in the confidence that everything would be made

-      clear in a very short time.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Moreover he was clear to his own conscience, which was the main thing.

-      Next in importance was that Merle, Grace and Mrs. Darlington, Robles and

-      Munson, all the friends whom he held in highest esteem, had never for one

-      moment doubted him. In their unshaken friendship was sufficient reward for

-      all the tribulations through which he was passing.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Meanwhile word had reached Buck Ashley that old Tom Baker was on his way

-      home in company with Pierre Luzon, to whom the Governor of the State had

-      at last granted parole. In view of Dick&rsquo;s imprisonment Munson had

-      well-nigh lost all interest in the romance of the buried treasure. But it

-      had been Dick himself who had insisted that his friend must attend to

-      their joint interests during his period of enforced sequestration.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Thus it had come about that Munson found himself one evening at the store,

-      awaiting with Jack Rover and Buck Ashley the arrival of the automobile in

-      which the sheriff was bringing the liberated convict from San Quentin. In

-      a brief letter Tom Baker had explained that he had decided on this manner

-      of transportation both because of its ensuring privacy and also because

-      Pierre Luzon was so enfeebled by age, sickness and prolonged confinement

-      that he could not travel by train. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve rigged up a stretcher,&rdquo; wrote

-      Tom, &ldquo;but the poor old Frenchie is as weak as a kitten, and we&rsquo;ll have to

-      run slow.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Nine o&rsquo;clock that night was the scheduled hour around which the automobile

-      might be expected. Buck Ashley had the extra cot for the invalid all ready

-      in his own bedroom at the rear of the store.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      It was close on ten o&rsquo;clock, however, before the headlight of the

-      automobile showed across the valley on the high-road. Buck piled another

-      big log on the fire in the sitting room. He saw that the doors were all

-      carefully closed and the shades pulled down. Then he brought in from the

-      bar a tray with glasses and a bottle of whisky.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Kentucky bourbon&mdash;that was old Pierre Luzon&rsquo;s favorite lotion,&rdquo; he

-      said as he set down the tray. &ldquo;And I guess he&rsquo;ll be glad of a good stiff

-      drink on a cold night like this.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      At last the automobile entered the yard, and the invalid was carried in on

-      the stretcher and propped up comfortably in a rocking chair near the

-      cheerful blaze. His teeth were chattering from cold, and he gratefully

-      gulped down the stiff glass of bourbon which Buck lost no time in

-      proffering him.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You see,&rdquo; explained Tom Baker, as he bustled around, &ldquo;the Governor just

-      grants paroles; he can&rsquo;t grant pardons. Some sort of a board has to pass

-      on the pardons. But I got him out all right, and that&rsquo;s the main thing.

-      Eh, Pierre, old man?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The sheriff nodded with great friendliness to his protégé. Luzon responded

-      with a wan smile that silently spoke his thankfulness. His face was

-      deathly pale, but there was wonderful snap and vitality in the black

-      bead-like eyes that roamed around the room and searched each countenance.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Buck was now standing by the rocker. He laid a hand familiarly on the

-      Frenchman&rsquo;s shoulder.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You see, Pierre, old scout, I don&rsquo;t forget you&rdquo;&mdash;he pointed to the

-      bottle on the table. &ldquo;Kentucky bourbon, the best I&rsquo;ve got in the house,

-      and the very label you used to call for. Now we&rsquo;ve got to drink to your

-      speedy recovery. Fill up all round, boys. The drinks are on me tonight.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Hip, hip, hooray!&rdquo; shouted Tom, as the glasses tinkled.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Hush!&rdquo; exclaimed Buck, warningly. &ldquo;We don&rsquo;t want to bring any booze

-      fighters prowlin&rsquo; around here tonight. You see, Pierre, we four are in

-      cahoots and understand each other. You know Tom and myself&mdash;we ain&rsquo;t

-      in need of any guarantee. And you can trust Mr. Chester Munson and Jack

-      Rover here to the limit.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Luzon bowed acknowledgment of the informal introduction.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It was we who put up the cash to get you out of San Quentin,&rdquo; continued

-      Buck, as he dropped into a chair close beside Tom Baker.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Together with Dick Willoughby,&rdquo; interjected Munson.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, yes, not forgettin&rsquo; Dick,&rdquo; resumed the storekeeper, &ldquo;as fine a young

-      feller as ever walked on shoe leather. But, by God, he&rsquo;s in jail just

-      now.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Eh?&rdquo; ejaculated the ex-convict, with a look of awakening, almost

-      fraternal, interest.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Buck turned to the sheriff.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Of course, Tom, you&rsquo;ll have read all about that terrible affair in the

-      newspapers?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The sheriff surreptitiously grabbed Buck&rsquo;s arm. He spoke in a confidential

-      whisper.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Drop that subject for the present. I&rsquo;ve said nothin&rsquo; about it to old

-      Pierre in case it might upset him. I ain&rsquo;t dared to mention the name

-      Thurston to him, for he shared the White Wolf&rsquo;s hatred of the breed.&rdquo; Then

-      Tom gave a little cough and glanced across the fireplace at the Frenchman.

-      &ldquo;Just a little cowboy shootin&rsquo; scrap, Pierre, in which our chum Dick

-      Willoughby has got himself temporarily involved. But say, boys,&rdquo; he went

-      on, casting his eyes toward Munson and Rover, &ldquo;I just thanked the Lord it

-      wasn&rsquo;t me as had to arrest Dick. Of course if I had still been sheriff I&rsquo;d

-      a done it&mdash;when I was a sworn-in officer, duty was duty all the time

-      with me, as every damned horse-thief within a hundred miles knows. But to

-      take an honest man into custody for shootin&rsquo; a miserable human coyote like

-      that young&mdash;&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, we&rsquo;re not a-goin&rsquo; to speak about him just now,&rdquo; interrupted Buck,

-      bestowing a cautioning kick on the sheriff&rsquo;s shins.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Tom took the timely reminder.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That would have gone sore against the grain,&rdquo; he said emphatically, as he

-      reached for the whisky bottle and replenished his tumbler.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Glad to be back?&rdquo; asked Buck, beaming pleasantly on old Pierre.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The Frenchman lifted one thin hand and smiled.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Here I will become once more strong,&rdquo; he murmured. &ldquo;No place in ze world

-      like ze dear old Tehachapi mountains.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Wal, I see you&rsquo;ve begun to let your beard grow again,&rdquo; continued Buck,

-      pointing to the gray stubbled chin. &ldquo;And when your hair comes along, too,

-      you&rsquo;ll just be lookin&rsquo; fine and dandy. The same old Pierre that used to

-      sit for hours at a time in the store.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      He paused a moment, surveying the visitor.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;A leetle more whisky, please,&rdquo; murmured Pierre, as he watched the sheriff

-      lay down his glass.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;All the whisky you want, old fellow,&rdquo; exclaimed Buck, with effusive

-      hospitality. &ldquo;By gunnies, you&rsquo;re entitled to a good few nips after all the

-      long years you&rsquo;ve been locked up. Ain&rsquo;t that so, boys?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I should say,&rdquo; declared Tom, fervently, wiping his lips with the back of

-      his hand.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The Frenchman drank gratefully, and as he felt the warm alcoholic glow in

-      his vitals, uttered a deep-drawn &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; of appreciation.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Tastes good, don&rsquo;t it?&rdquo; observed Buck. &ldquo;You never turned down a drink of

-      good whisky in the old days, did you, Pierre? Great times then! And gosh

-      almighty, don&rsquo;t it beat hell, I never suspected who you were all those

-      years you used to sit around the store smokin&rsquo; that big-bowled pipe of

-      yourn? And you knew about the cave then?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, Pierre Luzon, he know how to keep one secret,&rdquo; responded the

-      Frenchman, smiling.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, and good for us all you kept it, old man,&rdquo; exclaimed the sheriff.

-      &ldquo;He&rsquo;s a-goin&rsquo; to show us the cave tomorrow, Buck. There will be six in the

-      divvy-up now, boys, for of course Pierre Luzon stands in. That&rsquo;s agreeable

-      all round, fellers?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Sure, sure,&rdquo; responded the others in unison. Tom turned to the Frenchman.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I told you, Pierre, we&rsquo;d play the game fair and square with you. Ain&rsquo;t

-      that right?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I trust you all,&rdquo; replied Luzon. &ldquo;I show ze cave tomorrow to my friend,

-      Tom Baker, and you gentlemen who have been so kind to make up one purse to

-      bring me back here from zat horrid prison.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Guess you&rsquo;re about the only feller that knows where it is?&rdquo; enquired

-      Buck, cautiously.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Luzon looked at his questioner and spoke just one word: &ldquo;Guadalupe.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Does Gaudalupe know?&rdquo; exclaimed Jack Rover. &ldquo;I thought her long suit was

-      the riffle where she gets her placer gold.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Guadalupe,&rdquo; answered Pierre, speaking slowly, &ldquo;she know ze cave, but she

-      not know where ze treasure is buried. Ze cave her home. She live zere.

-      Lots and lots of times she come out, and nobody ever track her when she go

-      back. Ze outlaws they sharp-shoot from places in ze hills nobody could

-      see. But I show you,&rdquo; he continued, nodding his head at Jack Rover, &ldquo;I,

-      Pierre, show you where zat riffle is. I know both where Guadalupe wash out

-      placer gold and ze secret chamber in ze big cave where Joaquin Murietta

-      bury him money and where ze White Wolf, Don Manuel&mdash;peace to his

-      soul!&rdquo;&mdash;Pierre Luzon crossed himself&mdash;&ldquo;hide sacks and sacks of

-      ze yellow gold. Oh, yes!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      This long speech had exhausted the old man. He dropped his head wearily.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What you need now is a good long sleep,&rdquo; exclaimed Tom Baker. &ldquo;Another

-      jolt of bourbon Pierre, and then you get in between the blankets, old

-      fellow.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve got your bed all ready in the next room,&rdquo; observed Buck.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I guess I go to bed zen,&rdquo; assented Luzon.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      He gulped down with relish a nightcap of the old whisky. Then Buck and Tom

-      helped him from his chair.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It is good to be here,&rdquo; murmured the Frenchman. &ldquo;I grow strong again

-      among ze mountains. I never go back&mdash;never go back to San Quentin,

-      that one horrid prison.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll nurse you like a baby,&rdquo; said Buck assuringly, as he led the feeble

-      old man into the adjoining room.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0017" id="link2HCH0017"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XVII&mdash;The Bitter Bit

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">O</span>N the very night

-      of Pierre Luzon&rsquo;s return, Ben Thurston was in close colloquy with his

-      attorney, summoned specially from New York. It was not only the murder of

-      his son that had brought about this consultation. The owner of San Antonio

-      Rancho, while filled with fury against Dick Willoughby, was also gravely

-      perturbed over other things. Immediately after dinner the two men shut

-      themselves up in Thurston&rsquo;s office.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Thurston opened the safe and produced a little bundle of neatly-folded,

-      legal-looking documents.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;These are the option papers,&rdquo; he said gruffly, as he tossed them across

-      the table to the lawyer. &ldquo;Look them over, Mr. Hawkins.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The attorney glanced through the documents in a preliminary way.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I see the first big payment falls due on April 1st,&rdquo; he remarked.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, April 1st,&rdquo; responded Thurston, &ldquo;and I was a damned fool, too, to

-      let that Trust Company fellow inveigle me into making the date April 1st,

-      instead of March 1st. You see,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;the taxes come due on March

-      1st, and on this principality they amount to quite a pretty figure, I can

-      tell you.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;How much?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, about $18,000.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The lawyer again read the papers through, this time more carefully.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, Mr. Thurston,&rdquo; he said, as he lighted a cigar and sat back in his

-      chair, &ldquo;I left some very important matters to come to you in answer to

-      your imperative message. What&rsquo;s the work in hand?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Why, this option for one thing; and then, too, I want you to help me put

-      the noose around the neck of that scoundrel who killed my son.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll take one thing at a time, please,&rdquo; replied the attorney, speaking

-      slowly and quietly. &ldquo;So far as this option on the rancho is concerned, it

-      seems to be quite regular. Nevertheless, five million dollars is a whole

-      lot of money. Is there any danger of their forfeiting their option payment

-      of $100,000?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Danger? Forfeiting?&rdquo; ejaculated Ben Thurston. &ldquo;Well, I&rsquo;m not at all

-      afraid of that. My fear now is that they may take up the option.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Why, didn&rsquo;t you wish to make the sale?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, but I am not getting money enough. The ranch is really worth ten

-      million dollars today, in cold cash. I have recently had some San

-      Francisco capitalists down here appraising it for me, but I had already

-      given the option.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I see that the agreement provides for your cattle and horses going in at

-      the stipulated price.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, I don&rsquo;t know why I should have been so infernally stupid. But you

-      see those Los Angeles fellows came over here one day in an automobile and

-      stayed all night. We had a sort of a tiff&mdash;didn&rsquo;t agree very well&mdash;and

-      I let them start away the next morning without their breakfast&mdash;rather

-      uncivil, I&rsquo;ll admit. After they had gone I got to thinking matters over,

-      and I sent a telephone message along the road to stop them and ask them to

-      come back. They returned all right. There was one of their number, this

-      fellow from some Title and Trust Company, who was pretty warm under the

-      collar, and, if I do say it myself, was as peeved as hell at me. Well, he

-      was the one who drew up the agreement, sitting here at this table. The

-      paper looked all right to me, and so I just went ahead and signed. I know

-      now they caught me for the $18,000 of taxes because I didn&rsquo;t just insist

-      on having the option expire March 1st, instead of April 1st. But, to be

-      frank with you, I really didn&rsquo;t much mind, for at that time I was only

-      keen to get their $100,000 for the option, never believing for a moment

-      that they would come across with the million-dollar first payment due

-      April 1st. You see the cattle and horses and all the stock on the ranch

-      was a sort of sheaf of oats that I hung out in order to get them to put up

-      their option money&mdash;just so much bait.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Mr. Hawkins shrugged his shoulders and said: &ldquo;Well, Mr. Thurston, judging

-      from this inventory before me, you certainly hung up a most generous

-      bait.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I didn&rsquo;t stop to think&mdash;that&rsquo;s all there is to be said. All these

-      details hadn&rsquo;t been worked out into cold figures at the time I gave the

-      option. When these men were here I just wanted to wheedle them into a

-      bargain which would leave a cool $100,000 in my hands. I never for one

-      moment believed they could make the million-dollar payment, although, by

-      God, I begin to realize the danger of their doing so now.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The lawyer looked up in silent surprise. Thurston continued:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Of course I should have had this detailed valuation made before I went

-      into the deal. Up to the time I read that inventory I had no real idea of

-      the increased value of the property and what was on it. Oh, you may shake

-      your head; I&rsquo;m not a good business man&mdash;never cared a damn for

-      business&mdash;and I know quite well I haven&rsquo;t given enough attention to

-      the ranch. You see I have been living mostly in the East, for good

-      reasons. I don&rsquo;t like it here at all&mdash;I&rsquo;ve never felt safe in

-      California,&rdquo; and he glanced nervously at the window of the room, as if

-      some enemy were lurking there.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Mr. Hawkins once more reached for the inventory, and carefully examined

-      the figures. Finally he said: &ldquo;Pardon me, Mr. Thurston, for the

-      observation. But you should have sent for me <i>before</i> the option was

-      signed, if you did not really intend to carry out its terms. I find that

-      you have twenty-six thousand head of cattle, and you say that the price of

-      cattle is very high just now&mdash;that the whole herd ought to average

-      forty dollars a head. This item alone makes one million and forty thousand

-      dollars, or, in other words, if they exercise the option and pay you the

-      first million dollars, they will have forty thousand dollars more than the

-      payment which they make at that time.&rdquo; The lawyer pencilled down the

-      figures while he spoke.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Ben Thurston had been listening with a gloomy look on his brow. But when

-      he saw the figures translated into dollars he fairly bounced from his

-      chair, walked rapidly up and down the room, and then, coming to a sudden

-      halt, shouted: &ldquo;By God, that&rsquo;s where they got me again. I see it all now;

-      these fellows were a damned sight too smart for me. Well, Hawkins, you are

-      my attorney. I don&rsquo;t want to go on with this deal, even if they are able

-      to dig up the money.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The lawyer puffed at his cigar, wholly undisturbed, and then replied: &ldquo;Mr.

-      Thurston, you have already made a sale.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No, by God, I haven&rsquo;t; nothing of the kind,&rdquo; replied Thurston. &ldquo;The truth

-      is that I should get ten million dollars for this ranch, and keep all my

-      horses and cattle, too. I don&rsquo;t propose to be fleeced by that Los Angeles

-      outfit either,&rdquo; he continued, running his hands through his hair. &ldquo;I have

-      it; we&rsquo;ll break the contract. I&rsquo;ll bet that option is so faulty that you

-      can drive a load of hay right through it. Hunt up a flaw and we will send

-      them back their option money. I don&rsquo;t want their $100,000 now.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I have already carefully studied the paper,&rdquo; replied Hawkins, &ldquo;and can

-      find no flaw in it. It was evidently drawn by a master hand.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Master hand be damned,&rdquo; thundered Thurston. &ldquo;Why, the stiff wasn&rsquo;t even a

-      lawyer. He was just one of the syndicate&mdash;the one I told you about a

-      while back. He knows so cussed much about titles that the other fellows

-      let him write the option.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I see,&rdquo; replied the attorney, as a half-smile flitted over his face;

-      &ldquo;about all you seemingly had to do was to sign the option papers and count

-      the option money. The sole hope you have now, Mr. Thurston, in my opinion,

-      is for those Los Angeles gentlemen to let this valuable option lapse. You

-      have only a few days to wait.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But I haven&rsquo;t told you the worst yet,&rdquo; said Thurston sullenly, dropping

-      again into his chair.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What do you mean?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I had a long-distance telephone this morning from the First National Bank

-      at Los Angeles saying that the million dollars due April 1st has been

-      already paid in to my credit. But I won&rsquo;t touch the money&mdash;I&rsquo;ll be

-      damned if I do.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You have no choice but to accept it,&rdquo; said the lawyer. &ldquo;It would be

-      foolish to deceive yourself; San Antonio Rancho is sold, and with the

-      payment just made, you, by the terms of your contract, are compelled to

-      give immediate possession. I can only advise you to take your medicine

-      like a man, but don&rsquo;t let those Los Angeles gentlemen know that you are

-      swallowing a bitter dose.&rdquo; He refolded the papers, and pushed them across

-      the table. &ldquo;Now, Mr. Thurston, if there is anything I can do to assist you

-      in the prosecution of your son&rsquo;s murderer, I stand ready to do so.&rdquo; Ben

-      Thurston arose.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll talk about that tomorrow. I&rsquo;ll hang Dick Willoughby right enough in

-      good time. Meanwhile you tell me the rancho is sold&mdash;that I have lost

-      my great estate for less than half its value? Hell! Isn&rsquo;t that enough for

-      one night?&rdquo; And he stalked wrathfully out of the room, slamming the door

-      behind him.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He sold at the wrong price,&rdquo; mused the lawyer with a quiet smile.

-      &ldquo;Perhaps he&rsquo;ll be trying next to hang the wrong man.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0018" id="link2HCH0018"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XVIII&mdash;Elusive Riches

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>N the meantime the

-      quartet at the store were making a night of it. With old Pierre Luzon

-      peacefully asleep in the adjoining room, there were many things to speak

-      about. Tom Baker recounted in elaborate detail his story of interviews

-      with the governor and state officials at Sacramento, the weary and

-      harassing delays before parole was finally granted, his own dogged

-      determination, together with the artful pulling of political strings that

-      had finally brought about the results desired. Then there was the trip to

-      San Quentin, the breaking of the joyful news to Pierre Luzon in his cell,

-      the delivery of the paroled convict into Tom&rsquo;s hands, and the clever

-      solution of all further difficulties by hiring an automobile for the

-      journey south. The narrative was all very interesting, each listener

-      eagerly followed every word, and at the close Tom Baker&rsquo;s chest had

-      expanded several inches.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I tell you boys, there&rsquo;s no man alive could have done what I did. The

-      business was in the right hands. If it hadn&rsquo;t been for me, you wouldn&rsquo;t

-      have Pierre Luzon here tonight.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But if Pierre Luzon hadn&rsquo;t written that letter,&rdquo; growled Buck Ashley,

-      &ldquo;you would never have started for Sacramento and San Quentin.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, all&rsquo;s well that ends well,&rdquo; discreetly interposed Munson, as he

-      raked the smouldering wood ashes together. &ldquo;Gee, but its cold tonight.&rdquo;

-       Jack Rover rose and tossed another log onto the fire. In a moment a bright

-      flame sprang up.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The bottle&rsquo;s empty,&rdquo; observed the sheriff. &ldquo;The next one&rsquo;s on me, Buck.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Guess we&rsquo;ll charge it to syndicate account,&rdquo; grinned the storekeeper,

-      whose momentary grouch seemed to have been dissipated by the cheerful

-      blaze. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll have to open books, boys, and go about things in a reg&rsquo;lar

-      way,&rdquo; he added, as he drew the bolt of the door that communicated with the

-      store and groped his way into the darkness beyond.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Buck needed no candle, and was soon back with another bottle of the

-      Kentucky bourbon. Glasses were filled and clinked and pledges of

-      brotherhood renewed.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s champagne we&rsquo;ll be drinkin&rsquo; tomorrow night, Buck, old sport,&rdquo;

-       exclaimed Tom, slapping his old crony on the shoulder.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll long-distance Bakersfield for a case in the morning,&rdquo; responded

-      Buck, genially. &ldquo;By gosh, we&rsquo;ll be swimmin&rsquo; in wine afore long, boys.

-      First thing I&rsquo;ve got to do is to sell out this &lsquo;ere store.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Sell it!&rdquo; cried the sheriff, contemptuously. &ldquo;You can afford to give it

-      away, Buck. We ain&rsquo;t a-goin&rsquo; to be pikers in our old age, are we now?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I ain&rsquo;t old by a danged sight,&rdquo; snapped back the storekeeper, for Tom had

-      touched a sore spot once again. &ldquo;Besides, when I&rsquo;ve got a barrel of

-      Joaquin Murietta&rsquo;s gold safe in the bank, you&rsquo;ll see me friskin&rsquo; around

-      like a two-year-old colt,&rdquo; he added, his momentary surliness changing to a

-      smile.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And it ain&rsquo;t only gold, boys,&rdquo; said Tom Baker. &ldquo;That &lsquo;ere story old

-      Pierre told me about the grotto cavern havin&rsquo; a lake of oil in it as big

-      as a city block, sure &lsquo;nuff got me goin&rsquo;. Why, we&rsquo;ll be able to blossom

-      out into oil kings.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What&rsquo;s that?&rdquo; asked Munson.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Why, the Frenchie told me, you know, confidential like, comin&rsquo; along on

-      our motor car that since fifty years back those bandit fellers skimmed oil

-      from the surface of that lake and burned it in lamps down in that cavern.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;By Jove, that&rsquo;s interesting,&rdquo; replied Munson.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;We know there is oil to the west, oil to the north, and oil to the south,

-      and it stands to reason there must be oil here as well.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; interposed Buck, &ldquo;but old Ben Thurston would never allow any

-      drillin&rsquo; on his place.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Who the hell wants oil anyhow?&rdquo; exclaimed Jack Rover. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll have all the

-      money we need with the buried gold and Guadalupe&rsquo;s placer mine.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, but oil is oil,&rdquo; replied the storekeeper, with a shrewd nod of his

-      head. &ldquo;They say Rockefeller has only to raise the price a quarter of a

-      cent a gallon whenever he wants to give away another million or so to a

-      university or a hospital.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, we ain&rsquo;t interested in universities or hospitals,&rdquo; said Tom Baker.

-      &ldquo;But I agree with Buck that oil&rsquo;s oil, and I, for one, intend to take

-      everything that&rsquo;s comin&rsquo; to me. My God, we can afford to buy Ben Thurston

-      out and do some drillin&rsquo; for ourselves on San Antonio Rancho. It&rsquo;ll help

-      to pass the time anyways.&rdquo; As he finished, he began to pour out another

-      round of drinks.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Help to keep you from the booze,&rdquo; muttered Buck, in an inaudible aside.

-      But he drained his own glass and smacked his lips with satisfaction.

-      &ldquo;Guess I&rsquo;ll be gettin&rsquo; another bottle, boys,&rdquo; he said aloud, genially.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, we&rsquo;ve had enough,&rdquo; mildly protested Munson.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Not by a jugful,&rdquo; replied Buck. &ldquo;You and Jack ain&rsquo;t goin&rsquo; to ride home

-      till mornin&rsquo;, and there&rsquo;s lots of things to be talked over yet.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Great Scott, it&rsquo;s already two o&rsquo;clock,&rdquo; remarked Munson, consulting his

-      watch.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then the night&rsquo;s still young, boys,&rdquo; exclaimed Tom Baker, hilariously.

-      &ldquo;Get the brew, Buck. The empty bottles will keep the tally. Come on,

-      lieutenant, drain your glass. No heel taps in this crowd.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      They had started their conversation in low tones so as not to disturb the

-      slumbers of Pierre Luzon. But this precaution, or act of delicate

-      consideration, had been long since forgotten. They were talking loud now,

-      and often all together, and when Buck Ashley had returned from yet another

-      pilgrimage to the store, none heard or noticed the door of the bedroom

-      being cautiously pushed open by just the fraction of an inch.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      All four chairs had been again drawn around the cheerful log fire.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You were talking, Tom, of buying out Ben Thurston,&rdquo; remarked Jack Rover.

-      &ldquo;Then you haven&rsquo;t heard there&rsquo;s an option been given to a Los Angeles

-      syndicate? Guess mebbe Ben Thurston won&rsquo;t be the owner of the big rancho

-      very much longer.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And a good job, too,&rdquo; replied the sheriff, as he helped himself to yet

-      another drink.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Buck Ashley shook his head incredulously. &ldquo;Oh, lots of fellers have paid

-      down money for an option, as they call it, on the Thurston property, and

-      finally when the rub came they didn&rsquo;t come across and live up to their

-      bargain, and so they just naturally lost their option money.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I was talking to a geologist,&rdquo; intervened Munson, in whose mind the oil

-      question seemed to be still uppermost, &ldquo;and he says there is every

-      indication that the Midway Oil fields, a few miles north, are not one whit

-      better than wells that can be opened up right here.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But what&rsquo;s the use,&rdquo; said Tom Baker, &ldquo;of all the oil fields in California

-      to us fellers if we are about to be let into the secret door of a big

-      cavern where they&rsquo;ve got twelve or fifteen millions of twenty-dollar gold

-      pieces stacked up, jest awaitin&rsquo; for us to take &lsquo;em.&rdquo; The whisky was

-      beginning to do its work; he had already forgotten his aspirations of

-      being an oil king.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s right,&rdquo; said Jack Rover, &ldquo;and don&rsquo;t forget, while you&rsquo;re counting

-      them twenty-dollar gold pieces, that Pierre Luzon has promised to show us

-      the shallow riffle in the mountain stream where Guadalupe gets all that

-      placer gold.&rdquo; In the cowboy&rsquo;s case the alcohol was making only still more

-      fixed the one fixed idea in his brain.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Damn this store business anyway,&rdquo; said Buck Ashley, inconsequentially

-      returning to the theme that appealed to him most directly. &ldquo;Do you &lsquo;spose

-      I&rsquo;m goin&rsquo; to work my fingers off tying up groceries after we find old

-      Murietta&rsquo;s money and the White Wolf&rsquo;s treasure? Not by one hell of a

-      sight, if I know myself, and I &lsquo;low as how I do.&rdquo; And at the slightly

-      opened bedroom door old Pierre, Luzon whom they all thought to be fast

-      asleep, was listening to every word!

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But there is one thing,&rdquo; cried Tom Baker, striking the table fiercely as

-      he set down his glass, &ldquo;I want you fellers to get next to yourselves now

-      and make up your mind to.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Wa&rsquo;al, don&rsquo;t stop, Tom,&rdquo; said Rover. &ldquo;Go on and tell us what you&rsquo;re

-      thinking about. Get it off your chest, old man.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s just this way. By God, you fellers are not entitled to as much of

-      this &lsquo;ere twelve or fifteen million dollars as I am, for I&rsquo;m the feller

-      that went to the governor and got his parole and brought Pierre back here

-      to Tejon. Do you get me?&rdquo; Buck Ashley had straightened up and looked at

-      Tom Baker with an ugly scowl on his face. &ldquo;It was me,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;got that

-      letter from Pierre Luzon and we all throwed in, share and share alike, all

-      five of us. And we&rsquo;ll cut what we find, too, whether it&rsquo;s one million or

-      fifteen million, into five equal parts, or there&rsquo;ll be blood flowin good

-      and plenty.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Baker staggered to his feet, steadied himself for a moment and began to

-      roll up his sleeves.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;There be some things,&rdquo; he ejaculated, &ldquo;that you jest can&rsquo;t let wait and

-      settle up when the deal is all closed. I know what my rights are and you

-      fellers can&rsquo;t bluff me, not by a derned sight.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Hold on, hold on, gentlemen,&rdquo; interposed Munson. &ldquo;Let&rsquo;s not commence

-      quarreling about something we are not even sure we shall ever see. Of

-      course we hope to be escorted into the cavern by old Pierre Luzon, and we

-      likewise hope that he&rsquo;ll find a hidden treasure. And by the way, Buck,

-      this reminds me&mdash;the cut has to be into six equal parts, not five,

-      for we owe Luzon the squarest of square deals.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m not agin&rsquo; that,&rdquo; muttered Buck. &ldquo;I just didn&rsquo;t remember him.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; resumed Munson, &ldquo;why quarrel about something that is as yet

-      nothing but a myth? It occurs to me that we should rather, individually

-      and collectively, be exceedingly thankful that Pierre Luzon is alive, and

-      that the White Wolf is dead, and that the one man who holds the secret has

-      promised to show us this treasure.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve never believed one cussed word about the White Wolf being dead,&rdquo;

-       growled Buck Ashley.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, it sure was in the newspapers,&rdquo; said Tom Baker, turning down his

-      sleeves and resuming his seat.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, it sure was in the newspapers,&rdquo; replied Buck, &ldquo;and they jest seemed

-      to settle the fact, leastways to their own satisfaction. But I&rsquo;ve been

-      a-thinkin&rsquo; about Dick Willoughby. I don&rsquo;t believe he ever killed Marshall

-      Thurston, I don&rsquo;t.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Whoever did kill him,&rdquo; put in Jack Rover, &ldquo;did it good and plenty. Put

-      the shot right square through his heart.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said Tom Baker, reaching for more whisky, &ldquo;I ain&rsquo;t got much to

-      say, but what I says I stands to on this &lsquo;ere subject, and that is&mdash;&rdquo;

-       Almost with one accord all turned at the creaking of the bedroom door, and

-      <i>there</i> was Pierre Luzon, looking as if he had seen a ghost. His

-      short prison-cropped hair seemed to be standing on end like bristles, and

-      his eyes stared wildly at the four men. At last he cried out in a shrill

-      voice that was almost a scream:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Ze son of Ben Thurston killed! Ah, ha!&rdquo; he laughed, hysterically. &ldquo;Shot

-      through ze heart!&mdash;vengeance at last begins! Ze White Wolf is not

-      dead! He is one live man!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0008" id="linkimage-0008"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">

-      <img src="images/0205.jpg" alt="0205 " width="100%" /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h5>

-      <a href="images/0205.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>

-    </h5>

-    <p>

-      The door was hastily closed with a loud bang, and the weird figure

-      vanished like an apparition.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      For a few moments the revellers sat in stupefied silence. Finally Buck

-      Ashley said in a low voice: &ldquo;Damn that whisky anyhow. It has made us talk

-      too loud.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; remarked Tom Baker, &ldquo;and also too dangnation much, I&rsquo;m a-thinkin&rsquo;.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Both were sober men now.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Believe I&rsquo;ll have a snooze,&rdquo; said Jack rover, seating himself on an old

-      lounge in a corner of the room. But he did not lie down.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Nothing more was said for perhaps a full half hour; all were nodding or

-      busy with their brooding thoughts.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      At last Buck Ashley rose and tiptoed toward the bedroom.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Guess I&rsquo;ll see if poor Pierre has gone to sleep again,&rdquo; he murmured.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      A moment later he shouted out from the inner chamber:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Hell, boys!&mdash;he&rsquo;s gone! He&rsquo;s given us the slip&mdash;the damned old

-      jail-bird!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0019" id="link2HCH0019"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XIX&mdash;The Jail Delivery

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span>ROUND Dick

-      Willoughby there had been woven a web of circumstantial evidence that even

-      before his trial had convinced most people of his guilt. Only a few tried

-      friends who absolutely refused to believe him capable of shooting down an

-      unarmed man from ambush clung to their faith that he had had nothing to do

-      with the slaying of young Marshall Thurston. Among the general public the

-      only question in discussion was whether the jury were likely to find

-      extenuating circumstances and, should the life of the prisoner come to be

-      spared, how long would be his sentence.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Ben Thurston had lavished money with a free hand toward securing every

-      possible piece of testimony in support of the prosecution, and before his

-      return home even the cautious New York lawyer, Mr. Hawkins, had admitted

-      that the case against Willoughby appeared to be conclusive. It was only a

-      matter of a few weeks now when Thurston would be leaving the district.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Already San Antonio Rancho was in possession of the syndicate; their

-      foreman was in charge, the stock under their control, and it was only out

-      of consideration that the former owner was being permitted to linger a

-      little longer in residence. But for the gloomy and morose man there seemed

-      to be gloating satisfaction in the grim thought that before shaking off

-      forever the dust of his old home he would first of all ensure the hanging

-      of his son&rsquo;s murderer.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Among the most regular visitors at the jail were the ladies of La Siesta,

-      and rumor now began to run around that Miss Merle Farnsworth, despite

-      Willoughby&rsquo;s pleading that she should not mix her name up in the case,

-      would offer some surprising evidence in favor of the accused man&mdash;evidence

-      that might not exonerate Willoughby from responsibility for the deed, but

-      perhaps would fully justify his act to the minds of the jurymen.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      It was now only three days from the trial, and the whole county was agog

-      with expectation.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      That night in the small hours five masked men rode very quietly through

-      the streets to the vicinity of the jail. All were heavily armed, and one

-      of them was leading an extra saddle horse. The party dismounted under the

-      shadow of some trees. One man held the horses, while his four companions,

-      with drawn revolvers, advanced to the gateway. Whether it was a simple

-      case of cowardly yielding to threats, or whether there had been

-      preliminary financial greasing of locks and bolts, aided perhaps by

-      sympathy for the prisoner, the fact remains that within a very few minutes

-      Dick Willoughby had been brought from his cell.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You are a free man, Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo; said the leader of the masked band

-      in a low voice. &ldquo;You will come with us.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Who are you?&rdquo; asked Dick.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;We are friends&mdash;that is enough.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I have no wish to go,&rdquo; protested Dick in the hearing of the jailers. &ldquo;The

-      jury must acquit me&mdash;I am ready to remain here until they do acquit

-      me.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Take care. The man with the money can put the rope round your neck.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I am not afraid.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;There is another reason. The name of a certain young lady must not be

-      introduced into this case.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I have begged her not to testify.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But she will testify if this trial goes on&mdash;that you know well. Now

-      you will come with us, for her sake if not for your own.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Be it so then,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;Lead the way.&rdquo; Just as quietly as they had

-      come the little band of riders rode through the silent and deserted

-      streets. They took the southern road, and for the first few miles kept to

-      the thoroughfare. Then, reaching a stretch of unreclaimed land, they

-      started across country. The night was moonless and dark, but Dick knew

-      instinctively that they were making for the mountainous country to the

-      north of the Tejon Pass.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The leader rode a short distance ahead. Not a word was spoken. In about

-      two hours they were among the foothills. The pace slackened, and then, as

-      they reached a clump of oaks, a halt was called. From under the shadow of

-      the trees a man appeared, leading two sturdy little mountain ponies. The

-      newcomer wore no mask.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;This man will be your guide from now on,&rdquo; announced the leader, whose

-      features were still concealed by the strip of black cloth tied around the

-      lower part of his face. &ldquo;I am sorry we must ask you to wear a blindfold,

-      Mr. Willoughby. But you are among friends, and I feel sure you will help

-      us all by your ready assent.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I am in your hands,&rdquo; replied Dick, quietly. A few minutes later he was

-      seated on one of the ponies, his eyes securely bandaged. The saddle was a

-      big comfortable Mexican one, and he rested his hands on the horn; for

-      there was no bridle, only a leading rein held by the man mounted on the

-      other pony.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;<i>Adios!</i>&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      It was the leader&rsquo;s voice again, and now once more Dick was on the move,

-      the nimble little pony cantering gently over the turf.

-    </p>

-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">

-      <img src="images/0006.jpg" alt="0006 " width="100%" /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h5>

-      <a href="images/0006.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>

-    </h5>

-    <p>

-      Hour succeeded hour. The sun had risen, as the blindfolded rider could

-      tell from the warmth of the atmosphere. The canter had long since changed

-      to a walk, and Dick knew that they had been climbing steadily, with many a

-      turn and sometimes up precipitous slopes.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      At last a strange chilliness came into the air. Dick imagined that he

-      heard a growl, as of some savage animal. Then there came a stop, and he

-      caught some whispered words&mdash;a woman&rsquo;s voice he could have sworn,

-      speaking in some strange tongue. After a few minutes his pony started

-      again.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      But they had not gone more than a hundred yards further when his guide

-      called out.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Here we are, sir. I will help you to descend. Zen I take ze bandage away.

-      You see again.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The voice had a quaint foreign accent. For a little time Willoughby

-      remained blind. Then he began to see things, and involuntarily rubbed his

-      eyes in amazement.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      He was in a vast vaulted cavern with no visible entrance revealed by the

-      dim light of several lanterns suspended from the roof. In the far distance

-      a log fire was burning, and silhouetted against its ruddy glow was the

-      figure of the aged Indian squaw, Guadalupe, with a great dog-like creature

-      standing by her side.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Guadalupe!&rdquo; exclaimed Dick in profound surprise, turning to his guide.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      This man he now saw was old, with short gray hair and a short gray beard.

-      His face was pale, but there was a pleasant gleam in his eyes.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, Guadalupe,&rdquo; the guide replied. &ldquo;Guadalupe, she guard ze entrance to

-      our cave&mdash;she and ze white wolf. No one can get past ze white wolf

-      unless Guadalupe speaks ze word.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And who are you?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, call me Pierre. I am Mr. Willoughby&rsquo;s servant. Here are fine

-      beefsteaks ready for breakfast. Come.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Pierre!&rdquo; murmured Dick. &ldquo;Pierre Luzon?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Zat is my name. I am Pierre Luzon.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0020" id="link2HCH0020"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XX&mdash;In the Cavern

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">W</span>HEN Dick proceeded

-      to follow Pierre Luzon he found that the ponies had already trotted away

-      through the semidarkness, evidently quite capable on their own account of

-      finding their accustomed stable. Leading the way across the cavern, Pierre

-      entered a corridor at the far end of which bright lights were burning.

-      Soon, Dick, to his great wonderment, found himself in a comfortably,

-      almost luxuriously furnished apartment.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      There were big thick rugs on the floor, and the rock walls were completely

-      hidden by tapestries. The dining table in the centre was set with napery,

-      china, glass, cutlery and silverware that would have done credit to a

-      first-class hotel. Above swung a bronze lamp of antique pattern. Another

-      table was laden with books, newspapers and magazines. In one corner

-      gleamed the snow-white counterpane of a massive bedstead built of oak in

-      Old Mission style. Here and there portable oil stoves were burning,

-      diffusing a genial warmth throughout the grotto.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Pierre watched the guest&rsquo;s look of bewilderment as he gazed around him.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You will be very comfortable here,&rdquo; said the Frenchman. &ldquo;I have orders to

-      attend to all your wants.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Orders, from whom?&rdquo; asked Dick abruptly. &ldquo;After breakfast you will know.

-      I have one letter for you in my pocket.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      With characteristic philosophy Dick accepted the situation. The very

-      mention of breakfast gave a keener edge to an already sharply whetted

-      appetite. Pierre departed and presently returned with a superb sirloin

-      steak sizzling on a hot platter. Under his arm was tucked a bottle of

-      wine. As he set down the latter, Dick noted that it was dusty and

-      cobwebby, as if it had emerged from some ancient cellar.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Zis is not ze vintage of California,&rdquo; remarked Pierre, as he drew the

-      cork. &ldquo;It is rare old Burgundy&mdash;all ze way from my beloved France.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;<i>La belle</i> France,&rdquo; murmured Dick. &ldquo;I spent a year there, Pierre,

-      most of the time in Paris.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Ah, monsieur knows France and Paris,&rdquo; exclaimed the old man in great

-      delight. &ldquo;Zen you speak French, too?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;<i>Un peu</i>,&rdquo; laughed Dick. &ldquo;<i>Mais je fais beaucoup de fautes, mon

-      ami</i>.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;<i>Non, non, monsieur</i>,&rdquo; cried Pierre, breaking into voluble French.

-      &ldquo;Your accent is perfect&mdash;it is delightful to hear my native language

-      again. We shall be great friends, Mr. Willoughby. Already I am your

-      devoted servant.&rdquo; He bowed deferentially, as he held Dick&rsquo;s chair ready

-      for him to be seated.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You will breakfast with me, Pierre?&rdquo; asked Dick, still in his best

-      French.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No, no. I wait on monsieur. I shall breakfast in good time.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Pierre was not to be persuaded to take a place at the table, so Dick sat

-      down in solitary state and was served in lordly fashion.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      With the <i>demi-tasse</i> of black coffee at the close of the meal came a

-      box of cigars&mdash;cigars fit for a prince, as Dick knew from the first

-      fragrant whiff.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The table was now cleared and Pierre ready to withdraw. He had taken a

-      letter from his pocket and was holding it in his hand. But Dick, warmed

-      and fed and supremely contented, was watching the ascending rings of

-      tobacco smoke.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Do you know, Pierre,&rdquo; he said between complacent puffs, &ldquo;that I was one

-      of the bunch that helped to get you out of San Quentin?&rdquo; He had lapsed

-      into English.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, yes, I know,&rdquo; replied Pierre, also dropping his French. &ldquo;Ze five men

-      who made up ze purse&mdash;I am very grateful to you all.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then what about the hidden treasure?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Ah, I was to show ze hidden treasure. But one great change come about. I

-      made one big mistake.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then the story of all this gold was a frame-up, was it?&rdquo; laughed

-      Willoughby.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; protested Pierre earnestly. &ldquo;Ze cave&mdash;you are here in ze

-      cave, although you do not know ze secret hiding place. Ze treasure, it is

-      here, too. But I can no longer show ze gold, for ze man to whom it all

-      belong he is not dead&mdash;he is alive.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Whom do you mean?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Don Manuel de Valencia&mdash;him you call ze White Wolf.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Great guns! So he has appeared again. The newspaper stories were all

-      wrong?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Zat is how I made my mistake. But I did not know until I came back to

-      Tehachapi. Ze White Wolf is alive. It is he who has brought you here as

-      his guest. Now you will read zis letter, and zen all things you will

-      comprehend.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Pierre laid the missive on the damask table cloth in front of Dick. The

-      latter fastened his eyes on it in speechless surprise. Before he recovered

-      himself Pierre, lifting the tray of empty dishes, had noiselessly

-      disappeared.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Mystery upon mystery,&rdquo; murmured Dick as he broke the seal. The letter was

-      a brief one, and began without any of the usual forms of personal address:

-    </p>

-    <blockquote>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You are in safe and honorable keeping. Have no care. Nor need you worry

-      about your friends&mdash;they will be informed of your safety.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Just as soon as possible the real slayer of Marshall Thurston will be

-      revealed. You will be completely exonerated and can then return to the

-      world, a free man. By this means a certain young lady will be spared from

-      the gossip and the publicity which, although she has been brave enough to

-      say it does not matter, would bring for her annoyance and pain.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;If she is dear to you, as the writer of this letter believes, you will

-      help to shield her from vulgar curiosity by remaining quietly where you

-      are until the proper hour for your deliverance comes. It is only necessary

-      for you to give your word of honor to Pierre Luzon that you will make no

-      attempt to escape or reveal your whereabouts. Your trustfulness will be

-      rewarded&mdash;this is the solemn promise of

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Don Manuel de Valencia,

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Your friend.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    </blockquote>

-    <p>

-      Dick read and re-read the strange message. All at once he became conscious

-      that Pierre Luzon was again standing by his chair. Their eyes met.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Does Mr. Willoughby give ze promise required?&rdquo; asked Pierre.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick rose to his feet and extended his hand.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I promise, Pierre. You have my word of honor. The letter says that is

-      enough.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I have read ze letter before it was sealed. We all know Mr. Willoughby&rsquo;s

-      word is enough&mdash;it is as good as one gold bond.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;d do anything for Merle Farnsworth,&rdquo; continued Dick, carried away by

-      his fervid emotion. &ldquo;I would die for her, if need be, to save her from one

-      moment&rsquo;s pain.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Don Manuel he know that,&rdquo; replied Pierre. Dick paused and his look

-      changed.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;How the devil does he know I love the girl?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; The Frenchman shrugged his shoulders and smiled. &ldquo;Ah! Don Manuel he

-      know everything. But now, I am under orders not to speak. Over there you

-      will find ze latest newspapers, sir,&rdquo; he went on, pointing to the table

-      laden with literature, &ldquo;and every few days more will be brought for you&mdash;not

-      only ze newspapers of Los Angeles and San Francisco, but also, ze

-      newspapers of New York and London and Paris, all of which monsieur is

-      accustomed to read.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Great Scott, you seem to know,&rdquo; exclaimed Dick in a low voice.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Pierre continued placidly:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And you play chess. There is a box of chess&mdash;<i>échecs</i> we call

-      it in France, you will remember. I too play ze game. Don Manuel and I used

-      to spend many hours over ze board. After I have had my breakfast, I,

-      Pierre Luzon, challenge you to one game of chess.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Be it so,&rdquo; laughed Dick. &ldquo;But you must be hungry, man. For heaven&rsquo;s sake

-      go and eat. We&rsquo;ll yarn later on. Meanwhile, I&rsquo;ll have a glance through the

-      newspapers.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick handled the newspapers with renewed surprise&mdash;the very New York

-      papers he was accustomed to receive regularly, also the old familiar. <i>Times

-      Weekly</i> from London and the Paris <i>Figaro</i> to which he had

-      subscribed ever since the old Quartier Latin days! The same with the

-      magazines&mdash;all his favorites were on the table.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, I&rsquo;ll be blowed! Is it the guileless Sing Ling whom Don Manuel has

-      been tapping for information? This certainly looks like home,&rdquo; and again

-      he glanced over the table. He looked at the titles of the books&mdash;several

-      of the latest novels, a volume on socialism, another on the history of

-      architecture.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Seems to know my book tastes, too. I won&rsquo;t be lonesome, that&rsquo;s certain.

-      Well, I can&rsquo;t do better than make a start with the newspapers. I&rsquo;ve fallen

-      quite behind the times.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      He stretched himself out on a long rattan chair, and started with a Los

-      Angeles daily. He had read lazily on for nearly an hour, when there came

-      from his lips a little cry of surprise.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Starting up into a sitting posture, Dick again perused the paragraph that

-      had excited his special interest.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      It was an announcement stating that an ideal city was about to be built in

-      the Tehachapi valley, and that a prize of ten thousand dollars was to be

-      awarded to the designer of the best plans for laying out such a town.

-      Reference was made to an advertisement on another page giving the details

-      and the rules of the competition. To this Dick eagerly turned.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The advertisement set forth that the model city was to be located

-      somewhere near the centre of San Antonio Rancho, that the land was

-      traversed by the state highway, by two railroads, by two electric power

-      lines and two oil-carrying pipe lines, also the great Owen&rsquo;s River

-      aqueduct that supplied Los Angeles, some two hundred miles away, with

-      water from the high Sierras. It was further stated that the entire ranch

-      was to be subdivided into small tracts, and that already hundreds of

-      applicants were waiting to make choice of home sites just so soon as the

-      survey work was completed and the land thrown open to selection.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The plans required, and for which the prize of ten thousand dollars was

-      offered, were to show the finest landscape effects, the most impressive

-      and convenient location of public buildings, the most attractive ideas for

-      bringing into being a veritable ideal city provided with all the most

-      modern conveniences and sanitary equipment.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;By gad, I&rsquo;d like to have a shot at that,&rdquo; murmured Willoughby as he lay

-      back in his chair and meditated.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      After a time he picked up the London journal, and the very first thing

-      that met his eye was the identical advertisement on the back of the cover.

-      He rose and began to search through the week&rsquo;s file of the <i>Figaro</i>,

-      and there again he found the announcement of the contest. He was too

-      keenly excited now for more reading. He began to pace the chamber. What a

-      clever head had planned all this world-wide publicity!

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That Los Angeles bunch of fellows are certainly great. They are evidently

-      going into this thing right. Doubtless they are determined to build the

-      ideal&mdash;the model&mdash;city of California. They want the best brains

-      of all lands to help beautify the place. Gee! but I&rsquo;d like to be in this

-      contest game. But perhaps it would be presumption on my part. Yet, who

-      knows the country better than I do? When it comes to landscape effects,

-      I&rsquo;m Johnny-on-the-spot all right. And they&rsquo;re in a hurry&mdash;only sixty

-      days for the drawings. Unusual, such a short time. But I guess they&rsquo;re

-      going to make the dust fly without a week&rsquo;s unnecessary delay. They are

-      certainly live wires&mdash;they began by getting old Ben Thurston on the

-      run.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      He was chuckling to himself at the thought when Pierre reappeared.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Pierre, old fellow,&rdquo; cried Dick, &ldquo;would you be able to get me a drawing

-      board, a box of instruments, india ink, water-colors, drawing paper, and

-      so on?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What are you going to do?&rdquo; asked the old man with a smile. &ldquo;Do you think

-      you are again in ze Quartier Latin, Mr. Willoughby?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No. But while I&rsquo;m here I&rsquo;m going back to the old Quartier Latin life,

-      that&rsquo;s a cinch. Can you buy me that stuff?&rdquo; he added, diving into his hip

-      pocket.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      But he had forgotten&mdash;he had come out of jail, and his personal

-      possessions had been left behind.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Pierre Luzon, however, had interpreted both the gesture and the thought

-      that had prompted it.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You need no money here, Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;My orders are to get

-      you everything you call for. Write all you need on a piece of paper. I

-      send a trusty messenger, and we have ze drawing paper, ze instruments, ze

-      ink and ze paints here very soon&mdash;yes, very soon.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then, by thunder, I&rsquo;m going to win that ten-thousand-dollar prize.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But she is worth millions of dollars.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What do you mean?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Ze young lady&mdash;she very rich young lady, Miss Merle.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick laughed.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, that&rsquo;s quite another prize, Pierre,&rdquo; he replied. &ldquo;And if she is so

-      very rich, as you say, why that puts her further out of my reach than

-      ever.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Pierre nodded his head determinedly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;If I was you, Mr. Willoughby, ze prize I would try to win is ze beautiful

-      young lady.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      When Pierre had gone, Dick again lay back in the long chair. But he was

-      day-dreaming and love-dreaming now, wondering whether Merle Farnsworth

-      really cared for him, whether he might dare whisper to her the story of

-      his passionate love.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0021" id="link2HCH0021"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XXI&mdash;A Debt of Honor

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">P</span>UBLIC excitement

-      had been running high over the approaching trial of Dick Willoughby, but

-      his delivery from jail by the masked night-riders came as the culminating

-      climax. Mystery and romance were piling up. Despite the strength of the

-      circumstantial evidence, the sudden fate that had overtaken the young heir

-      to San Antonio rancho had been shrouded with uncertainty; no witness had

-      seen the actual doing of the murderous deed. The sensational arrest of

-      Dick Willoughby had been followed by his still more sensational

-      disappearance; for he seemed to have vanished from the face of the earth&mdash;he

-      had been spirited to some place of concealment to which there was not the

-      slightest clue, while also the identity of his rescuers remained a

-      profound enigma.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      All sorts of speculations were rife, and it was small wonder that the name

-      of the famous bandit, Don Manuel, came to be revived. This was just the

-      sort of audacious work the White Wolf would have gloried in&mdash;breaking

-      into a prison, defying the authorities, leaving behind him a trail of

-      mystery and vague terror. But shrewd old-timers pointed out that Don

-      Manuel had never in his whole career helped a gringo&mdash;that his hand

-      had been against every American, and that in his earlier days at all

-      events he had killed ruthlessly, out of sheer lust for vengeance against

-      the race of newcomers who had despoiled him of his ancestral acres. What

-      reason, therefore, could he have had to help Dick Willoughby to liberty?

-      Even if it had been the outlaw&rsquo;s hand that had pulled the trigger against

-      the son of his hated enemy, Ben Thurston, little would he have cared if a

-      score of gringos had come to their end, justly or unjustly, as an

-      aftermath of the tragedy.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Old Ben Thurston had discussed this very question with himself. The

-      slaying of his only son, the clever business deal that had called his own

-      tricky and dishonest bluff and lost him his principality, the sight of his

-      herds being driven away, the approaching eviction from his home&mdash;all

-      these events crowding one upon the other had exasperated him beyond

-      measure and completed the change of the already grouchy, disgruntled man

-      into a veritable wild beast snapping and snarling at everyone. Yet his

-      mind was completely obsessed by the idea that it was Dick Willoughby, and

-      Dick Willoughby alone, who had shot his son, so there was no room in his

-      small and obfuscated brain for any seriously renewed apprehension that his

-      old enemy, the White Wolf, had come to life again.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick&rsquo;s escape from jail almost gave Ben Thurston a fit of apoplexy. It was

-      the sleuth, Leach Sharkey, who alone of those around him ventured to break

-      the news. After his first paroxysm of wrath, Thurston paced the room like

-      a caged animal. He had begun to make a confidant of this man, his constant

-      attendant, the protector with the handy guns in his hip pockets on whom he

-      had come to rely night and day, the one associate who phlegmatically

-      endured his irritable moods and abusive language.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      So, in Leach Sharkey&rsquo;s presence, Thurston, as he walked to and fro, spoke

-      his thoughts aloud.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Damn all pretty faces, anyhow. First and last they have cost me a fine

-      sum. And now it is a pretty face that has cost me my boy&rsquo;s life. It&rsquo;s

-      hell, that&rsquo;s what it is. But I will have my revenge. I&rsquo;ll hang Dick

-      Willoughby with my own hands if necessary&mdash;even if it is the last act

-      of my life I&rsquo;ll have his neck stretched for him.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      He was glaring down at the sleuth, and the pause seemed to call for some

-      reply.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, he&rsquo;s given us the slip for the present,&rdquo; Sharkey ventured. Then he

-      caught the gathering fury in the other&rsquo;s eyes, and hurriedly went on: &ldquo;But

-      there is no question in the world we&rsquo;ll run the scoundrel down. I myself

-      will shoot him like the dog he is the moment I lay my two eyes on him.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, don&rsquo;t waste your breath telling me you are going to do it,&rdquo; growled

-      Thurston. &ldquo;Hunt him down. Take all the money you need. Get all the men you

-      can. Search every canyon. Guard every road out of the hill country. And

-      don&rsquo;t be misled by that damn fool talk about the White Wolf of which

-      you&rsquo;ve been telling me. That cursed outlaw is dead&mdash;dead as a

-      herring. I ran the story of his death to earth&mdash;stood on his very

-      grave in the potters&rsquo; field at Seattle. Dick Willoughby&rsquo;s the outlaw now.

-      Get him at any cost. Get him, or, by God, lose your own job, Leach

-      Sharkey. Do you follow me?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, I follow you,&rdquo; replied the sleuth, a sardonic smile still further

-      exposing the teeth that were the most prominent feature of his face and at

-      all times gave him a hyena-like appearance. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll get him, make no

-      mistake, Mr. Thurston. Just draw me that check, and I&rsquo;ll have twenty more

-      men out on the range before morning.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      At the store, Dick Willoughby&rsquo;s disappearance was for days the sole topic

-      of conversation. One morning Tom Baker and Buck Ashley were gossiping

-      together.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What beats me,&rdquo; remarked the storekeeper, &ldquo;is that Chester Munson wears

-      such a spry look. He was Dick&rsquo;s closest chum, yet he don&rsquo;t seem to be one

-      bit anxious.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, he&rsquo;s got the word, make no mistake,&rdquo; replied Tom. &ldquo;Although the

-      lieutenant is as close as wax, he knows Dick&rsquo;s all right, for sure. And

-      I&rsquo;m told that up at La Siesta, where Dick has his girl, you know, they&rsquo;re

-      still a-playin&rsquo; the pianner and the fiddle all the time. Mark my words&mdash;there&rsquo;s

-      been some wireless telephone at work. Munson don&rsquo;t worry, his lady friends

-      don&rsquo;t worry, so I begin to think we&rsquo;re a couple of derned old fools to

-      fret ourselves on Dick&rsquo;s account.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s about Pierre Luzon I&rsquo;m frettin&rsquo; most,&rdquo; Buck Ashley rejoined. &ldquo;To

-      think that that damned Frenchman should have done us in the eye, got clean

-      away and robbed us of our share of the buried treasure&mdash;that&rsquo;s what

-      worries me, Tom Baker. And you&rsquo;ll allow now you made a mess of things by

-      not havin&rsquo; the old convict shackled to the bedpost.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;A mess of things!&rdquo; cried the sheriff, rising anger in his voice and eyes.

-      &ldquo;You won&rsquo;t keep your mouth shut till I teach you&mdash;&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      But just then there was the clatter of hoofs outside, and Tom stopped in

-      the middle of his sentence. A moment later Munson and Jack Rover entered

-      in a state of visible excitement. Munson carried in his arms a rotund

-      canvas sack tied at the neck. The package was not very big, but clearly of

-      considerable weight.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Great Caesar,&rdquo; exclaimed the lieutenant, without pausing to give any

-      greeting. &ldquo;A most surprising thing has happened. When I awoke this morning

-      I found this bag lying on my table. And what do you think it contains?&rdquo; As

-      he asked the question he dumped the sack on the counter with a heavy thud.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;ve got us guessin&rsquo;,&rdquo; drawled Tom.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Ten thousand, five hundred dollars in gold!&rdquo; announced Munson.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Good Lord!&rdquo; ejaculated the sheriff in great surprise.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Munson went on:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Five thousand dollars are for the French warder at San Quentin who

-      smuggled Pierre Luzon&rsquo;s letter out of the prison, and the balance is for

-      the syndicate.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What syndicate?&rdquo; gasped Buck, for the moment quite bewildered.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The Hidden Treasure Syndicate, of course,&rdquo; exclaimed Jack Rover. &ldquo;Pierre

-      Luzon has sent each man back the hundred dollars he put up to get him out

-      of the pen, and five thousand dollars extra to divide among us.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Buck and Tom sprang simultaneously to their feet.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Hooroosh!&rdquo; shouted the sheriff. &ldquo;I always knew there was no yellow streak

-      in old Pierre Luzon.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And I always said I liked him, too,&rdquo; observed Buck. &ldquo;But come into the

-      parlor, boys,&rdquo; he went on, with a cautious look around. &ldquo;Let&rsquo;s count the

-      money.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And divvy it up,&rdquo; added Tom eagerly. &ldquo;Gosh &lsquo;lmighty, boys! I&rsquo;ve never yet

-      seen a thousand dollars in gold at one time outside a bank cashier&rsquo;s

-      window. And to think there&rsquo;s that amount cornin&rsquo; to me right now!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;One thousand, one hundred, pal, to be exact,&rdquo; laughed Jack Rover, lifting

-      the package and following the storekeeper into the sanctum beyond the

-      counter.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The gold was in United States twenty-dollar pieces, bearing dates which

-      showed they had been minted more than twenty years ago.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Some of Joaquin Murietta&rsquo;s loot,&rdquo; remarked Jack Rover, when attention had

-      been drawn to this detail.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; observed Tom Baker, holding up the coin he had been examining,

-      &ldquo;Murietta wasn&rsquo;t alive when this &lsquo;ere gold piece came from the mint. This

-      is some of Don Manuel&rsquo;s stuff.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The White Wolf!&rdquo; exclaimed Munson.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, the White Wolf,&rdquo; continued the sheriff. &ldquo;So if the White Wolf ain&rsquo;t

-      dead, as Pierre declared that night&mdash;&rdquo; Tom gazed at the bedroom door

-      as if the spectral figure might reappear&mdash;&ldquo;he&rsquo;s honorin&rsquo; the

-      Frenchie&rsquo;s sight draft, that&rsquo;s sure.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I see,&rdquo; said Munson. &ldquo;He is paying the five thousand dollars old Pierre

-      promised in his letter if he was helped to freedom and five thousand

-      dollars besides.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Precisely,&rdquo; Tom Baker replied. &ldquo;But if the White Wolf is dead, as most

-      folks say, then the Frenchie&rsquo;s got the key to the treasure vault, all

-      right.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;So we&rsquo;ve got to get him back here again, boys,&rdquo; murmured Buck, rubbing

-      his hands while his eyes feasted upon the heap of gold. &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t mind

-      boardin&rsquo; Pierre Luzon for a spell, and he can have all the bourbon he

-      wants.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Till he tells us where Guadalupe gets her nuggets,&rdquo; grinned Jack. &ldquo;But

-      you&rsquo;ve forgotten to show &lsquo;em, Munson, the card that came with the coin.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, yes,&rdquo; rejoined Munson, drawing a small piece of pasteboard from his

-      pocket. &ldquo;It is brief enough. Luzon gives his countryman&rsquo;s family address

-      in Marseilles where the first five thousand dollars is to be mailed. Then

-      he writes down our five names, Dick Willoughby&rsquo;s first, and says the five

-      of us are to share equally.&rdquo; He passed the card to Tom Baker for

-      inspection, and went on: &ldquo;Jack and I are going to ride over to

-      Bakersfield, get the French bank draft and put Dick&rsquo;s money in the bank

-      along with our own.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Where&rsquo;s Dick?&rdquo; asked Buck, with a quick uplift of his eyes into Munson&rsquo;s

-      face.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      But the latter was not to be betrayed into divulging any information that

-      might be in his possession.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I have not the slightest idea,&rdquo; he replied airily. &ldquo;But I feel sure

-      Dick&rsquo;s all right. He is the sort of fellow well able to look after

-      himself. Meanwhile, Jack and I will attend to his financial interests,&rdquo; he

-      added with a laugh, as he began to count the gold.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      In silence the task proceeded, five thousand dollars first being set

-      aside, and then the balance divided into five separate heaps. When all

-      were satisfied as to the correctness of the distribution, Munson swept the

-      gold back into the sack, except for the two little piles allotted to

-      Ashley and Baker. Then he securely tied the package, ready for the ride to

-      Bakersfield.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Buck will lock mine in his safe, boys,&rdquo; exclaimed Tom Baker. &ldquo;Gosh me,

-      but I&rsquo;ll want to look at it two or three times a day.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m drivin&rsquo; over to the bank myself tomorrer,&rdquo; declared Buck. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve

-      got a bit more to add to this pile.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;A few handfuls of nuggets, I suppose,&rdquo; laughed Rover.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, I&rsquo;ll allow Guadalupe always pays her grocery bills. But this &lsquo;ere

-      store ain&rsquo;t goin&rsquo; to be a safe deposit vault, not on your demed life, with

-      bandits around again. So you&rsquo;d better arrange to come with me to town

-      tomorrer, Tom.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;ll need me to help you home, perhaps,&rdquo; grinned the sheriff. &ldquo;But, I

-      say, Munson, you ain&rsquo;t told us yet how this sack came to be delivered at

-      your place.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;There&rsquo;s a proper mystery for you!&rdquo; cried Munson. &ldquo;As I said before, I

-      found the bag this morning, lying on my dressing table. Sing Ling was the

-      only one besides myself in the shack, and he never heard a sound all

-      night.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;re still in Dick&rsquo;s old home?&rdquo; asked Buck. &ldquo;Yes, but I leave tomorrow&mdash;have

-      notice to quit, for some surveyor chaps are coming in. I&rsquo;m moving up to

-      Mr. Robles&rsquo; place. He wants me to catalog the books in his library.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And Sing Ling?&rdquo; queried Tom.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He goes, too. You see, Mr. Robles needs a crackerjack cook, now I&rsquo;ll be

-      boarding with him,&rdquo; Munson laughed, gaily. &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t happen to have a

-      porterhouse steak about the place, Buck?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I can heat you up a can of pork and beans.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Nothing doing! Jack and I wouldn&rsquo;t spoil our appetites with such truck as

-      that. We&rsquo;re going to set up a chicken dinner in Bakersfield.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Chicken and champagne,&rdquo; chimed in Jack, as he swung the sack over his

-      shoulder.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;re beginning to get big bugs these days,&rdquo; called out the storekeeper

-      as the young men left the room. &ldquo;Guess, Tom,&rdquo; he went on, turning to the

-      sheriff, &ldquo;we could do with a jolt of Kentucky.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Make it a bottle of bourbon,&rdquo; gurgled Tom, &ldquo;to remind us of our absent

-      friend.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Dear old Pierre,&rdquo; murmured Buck, as he fumbled in his pocket for the key

-      of the safe, his eyes glued all the time on the two little heaps of gold.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0022" id="link2HCH0022"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XXII&mdash;Underqround Wonders

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">D</span>ick Willoughby was

-      in a way happy in his retreat. At first he had been inclined to regret the

-      jail delivery&mdash;it might have been the manlier part to have faced the

-      music and cleared his name before the whole world. But then he reflected

-      on the uncertainties of a trial, the cases of innocent men having suffered

-      because of damning circumstantial evidence piled up against them, the

-      vindictiveness of Ben Thurston and the undoubted power of his money to

-      press the criminal charge by every unscrupulous means. So Dick soon came

-      round to the belief that he might be safer for the time being in the

-      guardianship of the White Wolf than at the mercy of a fallible jury.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Then there was Merle Farnsworth to consider. Yes; to have brought her into

-      a public court, to have allowed her to plead for him by telling the story

-      of Marshall Thurston&rsquo;s loathsome advances&mdash;that was a thing that

-      could never have been tolerated. The leader of the jail-breaking gang had

-      been right; Dick owed it to Merle to save her from such a cruel ordeal.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Finally Dick&rsquo;s contentment over his change of quarters was completed when

-      Pierre Luzon appeared with a superb equipment of drawing instruments and

-      materials. There was no time to worry now over surmises as to the wisdom

-      of this course or the other course. Work lay to his hand&mdash;work of the

-      most absorbing and delightful kind; and with all the ambitious enthusiasm

-      of his temperament he tackled it whole-heartedly there and then. Hour

-      after hour, day after day, Pierre watched in contemplative silence the

-      methodical advancement of the task to which the young architect had

-      applied himself.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      But there were frequent intervals for conversation, sometimes in French,

-      sometimes in English, as the mood prompted. Occasionally Pierre drifted

-      into semi-confidential reminiscences, and Willoughby soon came to know in

-      close detail the story of Don Manuel&rsquo;s life&mdash;the tragedy of his

-      sister Rosetta&rsquo;s death, the vow of vengeance against Ben Thurston, the

-      early bandit days when the White Wolf counted every gringo in the land his

-      natural enemy, the often hairbreadth escapes of the outlaw, his sublime

-      courage and nerve in the direst emergencies.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Don Manuel was one great man,&rdquo; remarked Pierre at the close of one of

-      these confidences&mdash;the phrase was a favorite one with the old

-      Frenchman. &ldquo;Many and many a time he could have shot his enemy from a

-      distance and got away. But Don Manuel had vowed zat he would kill him hand

-      to hand&mdash;zat ze villain must die with a last malediction in his ear,

-      and knowing zat it was he, ze White Wolf, who in ze end had revenged his

-      sister&rsquo;s shame.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He felt, too, didn&rsquo;t he, that his father had been wronged in being driven

-      from San Antonio Rancho?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Sure&mdash;zat was another great wrong&mdash;zat was why Don Manuel was

-      so bitter against all ze Americans. But he made zem pay for ze land many

-      and many times over.&rdquo; Then Pierre, as was now his custom in Dick&rsquo;s

-      presence when speaking at any length, lapsed into French as he continued:

-      &ldquo;But the White Wolf was a man of high honor. He never used any of the

-      proceeds of his robberies for himself. True, he spent the money to pay his

-      band, to pay the numerous scouts and spies whose services he secretly

-      retained, to plan and accomplish further hold-ups, to defy and outwit the

-      authorities. But on his own needs&mdash;never&mdash;not one dollar!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Pierre went on to explain that after Ben Thurston had fled from California

-      and kept away in hiding, Don Manuel had visited Spain, to claim the family

-      estates in Valencia to which his father&rsquo;s death had left him the sole

-      heir. These he had sold for many millions of dollars, and most of that

-      money he kept in banks in London and Paris. So he was a very rich man, and

-      had no need to rob anyone except to gratify his vengeance. Even the

-      hoarded gold of Joaquin Murietta he had never touched. It remained intact

-      today in the treasure vault of the cave, boxes and sacks of gold and

-      jewels.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Won&rsquo;t I be allowed to see this wonderful treasure?&rdquo; asked Dick, half

-      jesting.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Perhaps, some day, if the White Wolf chooses to show you. But it is not

-      for me to do that&mdash;I swore an oath of secrecy when the White Wolf

-      trusted me&mdash;me and Felix Vasquez, who was also his confidant. But

-      Vasquez was killed at Tulare Lake. So now only we two know the secret, and

-      until the White Wolf himself dies my lips are sealed by the solemn oath I

-      swore to the Virgin Mary.&rdquo; The old man crossed himself devoutly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then where does the White Wolf live now?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Ah, that is another secret. Again I would break my oath if I spoke one

-      word.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And Guadalupe&mdash;does she know these things?&rdquo; asked Dick in English.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Guadalupe? Oh, no,&rdquo; responded Pierre, politely adopting the change of

-      language, &ldquo;she is just one servant, our cook&mdash;one very excellent

-      cook, as monsieur knows&mdash;and ze guardian of ze cave. For ze real

-      white wolf guards Guadalupe&mdash;ze big animal is just like one tame dog

-      to ze old squaw, but with his fierce jaws he would kill anyone who dared

-      to approach her or come near ze hidden entrance to zis cavern. No man can

-      ever find zat while ze white wolf is alive. In ze old days he killed

-      several men when zey dared to follow Guadalupe.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then the white wolf must be very old?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;As old as Guadalupe&mdash;as old as the Tehachapi mountains,&rdquo; exclaimed

-      Pierre, again crossing himself and thereby revealing the superstitious

-      dread in which he held the savage animal.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But you can pass the white wolf, can&rsquo;t you?&rsquo; asked Dick.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Never&mdash;except when Guadalupe give permission. Then ze wolf lies down

-      and I can come out of ze cave or enter. Ah! ze white wolf is one terrible

-      beast. But he never shows his teeth to Don Manuel. Only Don Manuel can

-      pass when Guadalupe is not there.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then where is Guadalupe&rsquo;s riffle of gold&mdash;where is the lake of oil

-      about which you told Tom Baker?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Come, I will show you zese,&rdquo; replied Pierre. As he rose he picked up the

-      lantern he usually carried.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick jumped to his feet with alacrity and followed his guide.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      They crossed the main cavern, then entered another side gallery. This had

-      many windings and from it ran several diverging rock corridors. But Pierre

-      led the way unfalteringly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Fully half a mile must have been traversed when at last the Frenchman

-      halted and swung his lantern aloft.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Zere!&rdquo; was all he said.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick followed the flash of the lantern, and there before him was a dark

-      pool stretching away indefinitely into the blackness beyond. He bent down

-      and scooped up a little of the fluid in his palm. It was a brown oil, as

-      thin as water, and therefore capable of use without any refining process.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Great Scott, this is wonderful!&rdquo; exclaimed Dick in profound amazement.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Very wonderful,&rdquo; concurred Pierre. &ldquo;In zis cavern are oil and water, also

-      gold&mdash;Guadalupe&rsquo;s gold. Ze gold is close to here. Come.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Pierre turned and again led the way through dark and winding corridors. At

-      a little distance Dick became conscious of the purling of a running

-      stream. Pierre stopped once more, but this time held the lantern close to

-      the ground.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Here Guadalupe come to wash out ze nuggets of gold, and since I have been

-      in prison she buy with zem, so Mr. Baker say to me, groceries at ze store.

-      Don Manuel, when I tell him, he very angry&mdash;she never do zat again.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Poor old Buck Ashley!&rdquo; laughed Dick. &ldquo;He lost you, Pierre, and now he&rsquo;ll

-      be losing his best paying customer, too.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      While speaking, he knelt and dipped his hands into the stream, bringing up

-      some gravel into the lantern rays. But Pierre shook his head.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You no find ze gold. Guadalupe wash many hours to get, perhaps, just one

-      nugget. But there is heaps and heaps, if ze miners came with spades and

-      cradles.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Great guns, there must be the reef, too, from which the nuggets have

-      come!&rdquo; exclaimed Dick, rising erect and dropping the handful of pebbles.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Now, we must go back,&rdquo; said Pierre, &ldquo;for zis evening you are to be

-      allowed to come for a ride with me down ze mountains.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t say?&rdquo; Dick cried, surprised and delighted.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes; Don manuel he send word today that he give permission. But you must

-      wear ze bandage round your eyes, and you must promise to return when I

-      give ze word.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t for one moment think, old fellow, that I would leave my drawings.

-      But where are we going tonight?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;To La Siesta,&rdquo; replied Pierre.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Hurrah!&rdquo; shouted Dick. &ldquo;Hurry up, Pierre! I&rsquo;m mighty glad you got me

-      those ties and things from Los Angeles. You say you can give me a

-      hair-cut?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Ze old-time bandit learned to trim ze hair of his friends as well as ze

-      pocket-books of his enemies,&rdquo; was the laughing answer.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0023" id="link2HCH0023"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XXIII&mdash;The Unexpected Visitor

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">M</span>OST of the cattle

-      had been driven off the land. The vaqueros had dispersed to the four

-      points of the compass. Chester Munson had vacated his room in Dick

-      Willoughby&rsquo;s old home, and had taken up his residence and library duties

-      at Mr. Robles&rsquo; mansion on the hill. Sing Ling had folded his tent like the

-      Arab and silently stolen away in the same direction. A small army of

-      surveyors had appeared on the scene and were quartered in the rancho

-      buildings.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The only one of the old-timers who still lingered on was Ben Thurston,

-      more gloomy and morose than ever, seldom stirring out of doors now, but

-      conducting all his business by telephone or through the agency of the

-      sleuth, Leach Sharkey, his only companion.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Jack Rover had pitched his camp temporarily at the store. Buck Ashley had

-      assigned him Pierre&rsquo;s cot, but the cowboy had fixed it under a

-      wide-spreading sycamore, preferring to sleep in the open rather than share

-      the grocery-perfumed atmosphere of the store building.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Tom Baker was around most of the time. The three men clung together with a

-      vague sense that they had a common interest in the vast treasure which had

-      so far eluded them, but which might any day come again within reach of

-      their eager claws. It afforded an endless theme of conversation, varied by

-      talk about the passing of the rancho and all the train of changes which

-      were bound to follow the close settlement of the valley.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      One morning Jack Rover found Buck at the door of the store, with a pair of

-      antiquated-looking field glasses at his eyes.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Where did you get the goggles, Buck?&rdquo; asked Jack.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, I rummaged &lsquo;em out of a trunk&mdash;had almost forgot I had the

-      blamed things. But we used to keep a sharp lookout in the old bandit days&mdash;got

-      kinda ready for any suspicious lookin&rsquo; riders on the road.&rdquo; He had spoken

-      while still peering through the binoculars, but now he turned to Jack and

-      proffered him the glasses. &ldquo;I do wonder what &lsquo;n hell we&rsquo;re all cornin&rsquo; to

-      anyway. This here ranch that we&rsquo;ve bragged up as bein&rsquo; the biggest in all

-      California! Ugh!&rdquo; The grunt was one of unspeakable disgust. &ldquo;Take a look

-      for yourself.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Jack turned the glasses in the direction Buck had been gazing, and began

-      to adjust the focus.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What&rsquo;s the matter now?&rdquo; he asked.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Matter &lsquo;nough,&rdquo; growled the storekeeper. &ldquo;San Antonio Rancho is goin&rsquo; to

-      the dogs. Do you see them specks away out yonder in the valley? That&rsquo;s

-      another band of surveyors. One feller&rsquo;s peekin&rsquo; through a spy-glass set on

-      a tripod; another feller goes ahead and puts up tall stakes with big

-      figgers on &lsquo;em, and the other fellers are chainin&rsquo; off the distances. This

-      &lsquo;ere ranch &lsquo;ll surely look like a checker-board blamed soon.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Progress,&rdquo; said Jack, laconically.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Progress, hell!&rdquo; snapped Ashley. &ldquo;These new fellers that bought the ranch

-      have sure &lsquo;nuff driv&rsquo; off all the cattle and now they&rsquo;re dividin&rsquo; up the

-      land. I bet they&rsquo;ll take the postoffice away from me&mdash;not that it

-      pays much, for the Lord knows it don&rsquo;t&mdash;but it brings customers to my

-      store.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, Buck,&rdquo; said the cowboy, consolingly, &ldquo;there are lots worse things

-      than moving a postoffice. What&rsquo;s to prevent your setting up the finest

-      grocery store in the new model city the advertisements speak about?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That would suit me fine, wouldn&rsquo;t it?&rdquo; cried the old storekeeper, with

-      scathing contempt. &ldquo;Goin&rsquo; around in a biled shirt, and handin&rsquo; out pencils

-      and chewin&rsquo; gum to the little school gals that&rsquo;ll be swarmin&rsquo; all over the

-      place. Not on your life, Jack! I&rsquo;ll be losin&rsquo; both my postoffice and my

-      store in these new-fangled times.&rdquo; He paused a moment, then his tone

-      changed to one of aggressiveness. &ldquo;However, they ain&rsquo;t built their

-      doggoned new town yet, and it&rsquo;s my belief all this boom talk is just so

-      much hot air.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;In any case you won&rsquo;t need to worry, Buck, after we get on the tracks of

-      Pierre Luzon again. I intend to find the old squaw&rsquo;s sand-bar, or my name

-      isn&rsquo;t Jack Rover.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And I betche I&rsquo;m a-goin&rsquo; to find Joaquin Murietta&rsquo;s cache,&rdquo; concurred the

-      old man with equal determination.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Just then Tom Baker slouched out of the store, where he had overheard the

-      conversation.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, things are a-goin&rsquo; to turn out all right in the end, boys, don&rsquo;t fret

-      over that. And there&rsquo;s one thing gol-dern certain, there&rsquo;ll be some great

-      things doin&rsquo; in this &lsquo;ere valley once they get started on buildin&rsquo; the

-      town. The new place will just spring up like Oklahomy City, or Liberal,

-      Kansas, or some of them big towns that had twenty thousand people livin&rsquo;

-      in &lsquo;em inside o&rsquo; thirty days from the time they were surveyed and laid

-      out.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That seems quite impossible,&rdquo; commented Jack.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Not impossible by a derned sight. My brother was at Liberal, Kansas, down

-      there on the Rock Island, near No Man&rsquo;s Land, you know. The new town had

-      been talked of and talked of for mebbe three or four months, just as this

-      new town is bein&rsquo; talked about today. Then finally the mornin&rsquo; came when

-      the new town of Liberal was to be opened up. There was to be a regular

-      town openin&rsquo;, so to speak, and a sale of lots. Why, great guns, when the

-      management of that town company rode into the station, on the early train,

-      they found more&rsquo;n ten thousand people right there campin&rsquo; in covered

-      wagons, tents and all that sorta business, just awaitin&rsquo; for the

-      auctioneerin&rsquo; to start.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Tom paused to take a fresh chew of tobacco and then rambled on:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I tell you, boys, that within thirty days there was twenty thousand

-      people livin&rsquo; in that &lsquo;ere town. Two banks were established, and one of

-      them had one hundred and eighty-five thousand dollars in deposits, too.

-      Oh, there&rsquo;s lots of people who remember the rush to Liberal, and the

-      boomin&rsquo; of Oklahomy City also. And history&rsquo;s fixin&rsquo; to repeat itself right

-      here on this &lsquo;ere ranch. Things will be sizzlin&rsquo; when the town site is

-      finally located and the rush starts pourin&rsquo; in from Portland, Oregon, on

-      the north, to San Diego on the south, with a few thousands from Texas and

-      other states this side o&rsquo; the Rocky Mountains. They&rsquo;ll sure be great

-      doin&rsquo;s when the Los Angeles syndicate announce they&rsquo;ve awarded to some

-      feller that ten-thousand-dollar prize for the best plans for their ideal

-      city, as they keep on callin&rsquo; it.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Munson and I were speaking about the contest and the prize,&rdquo; remarked

-      Jack, &ldquo;and were saying that if Dick Willoughby were only here, he&rsquo;d about

-      win, hands down. You know he was an architect once, before he came West.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Dick Willoughby,&rdquo; snorted Ashley, &ldquo;How can he compete when he don&rsquo;t know

-      anything about the blamed business? He&rsquo;s hid away, right enough.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Munson knows a thing or two,&rdquo; remarked Tom Baker. &ldquo;If he&rsquo;d only apeak, he

-      could tell us where Dick is. That&rsquo;s my opinion.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And there once again you&rsquo;re dead wrong,&rdquo; retorted Jack, warmly. &ldquo;If

-      Munson only knew where Dick is hiding, he would have got that very prize

-      competition advertisement into his hands long before now. He&rsquo;s sore

-      because he can&rsquo;t send Dick the word. Where is Dick Willoughby? By gad,

-      it&rsquo;s a mystery.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I guess you&rsquo;re right,&rdquo; said the sheriff. &ldquo;That sort o&rsquo; exonerates Munson

-      from keepin&rsquo; things from his partners. I think I owe it to Chester Munson

-      to drink his health&mdash;just for ever doubtin&rsquo; him. What shall it be,

-      boys?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      And the open-air meeting adjourned.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      It was the very evening of the day on which this conversation had been

-      held in Buck Ashley&rsquo;s store that Dick Willoughby rode forth from the

-      cavern blindfolded and under the guidance of Pierre Luzon. For the first

-      hour progress was slow&mdash;round many turnings, down steep declivities,

-      with just here and there a few miles of easier trail. But then there had

-      been a swift canter for another hour over grass land, and now at last the

-      riders were upon a well-made road. Dick divined that this must be the

-      highway leading to La Siesta, but from what point of the compass they had

-      come he had not the remotest conception.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Very soon Pierre Luzon, still riding ahead with the leading rein, came to

-      a halt.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Here we are. Dismount, please,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;You are free to remove ze

-      bandage.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick looked; they were right below the knoll on which the Darlington home

-      stood. Lights were gleaming from the windows. Dick could even hear the

-      faint tinkle of the piano.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I hide ze ponies here in zis little grove of trees,&rdquo; Pierre continued,

-      pointing to a coppice not fifty yards from the main road. &ldquo;In two hours&rsquo;

-      time, at eleven o&rsquo;clock&rdquo;&mdash;Pierre looked at his watch in the bright

-      moonlight&mdash;&ldquo;monsieur will return. I have your word?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;My word as a gentleman, Pierre,&rdquo; exclaimed Dick, extending his hand. &ldquo;So

-      long then, old fellow. I&rsquo;ve got to make the best use of my time.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The piano playing stopped abruptly when Willoughby, unannounced, appeared

-      at the door of the music room.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Dick!&rdquo; exclaimed Merle delightedly, leaving the instrument and rushing

-      toward him. If they had been alone Dick felt that right then she would

-      have jumped into his arms. But at the distance of a few paces she halted

-      and clasped her hands.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;How ever did you get here, Mr. Willoughby?&rdquo; she asked intensely.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I rode here,&rdquo; he answered, as they shook hands. &ldquo;But it is only a brief

-      visit. Hallo, Miss Grace! I&rsquo;m delighted to see you again. And you, Ches,

-      old sport&mdash;why this is great luck to find you here! Mrs. Darlington,

-      I&rsquo;m mighty glad to see you all once more.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The whole bevy were crowding around him, shaking hands and expressing

-      their joyful surprise.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;We knew you were safe, that was all,&rdquo; explained Munson.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;So you were having just the same jolly good times,&rdquo; laughed Dick,

-      glancing at the piano. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m simply dying for some music.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But wait a minute,&rdquo; exclaimed Munson, drawing a fat wad of newspaper

-      cuttings from his pocket. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve got to tell you about a competition you

-      must get into&mdash;new plans for an ideal city here&mdash;&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;In the heart of the old rancho,&rdquo; smiled Dick, as he completed the

-      sentence. While he spoke, he placed his arm affectionately across his

-      chum&rsquo;s shoulders. &ldquo;I know all about it, old man. I&rsquo;m working hard on my

-      plans&mdash;they are already more than half done.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Bravo!&rdquo; shouted Munson. &ldquo;That&rsquo;s great news.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But here, too, is Mr. Robles,&rdquo; exclaimed Dick, breaking from the group

-      and stepping across the room. &ldquo;Excuse me, senor, but I did not notice you

-      were here till this moment.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No excuse needed, my friend. You were better engaged&rdquo;&mdash;this with a

-      humorous side-glance at the young ladies. &ldquo;But I am glad to see you

-      looking so well.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Where have you been, Mr. Willoughby?&rdquo; asked Grace.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That I cannot tell you,&rdquo; replied Dick gravely. &ldquo;I have pledged my solemn

-      word. I must leave you at eleven o&rsquo;clock, returning whence I came. And

-      meanwhile nobody must ask me a single question about my place of hiding.

-      There now&mdash;that&rsquo;s all. What shall it be first, Miss Merle, a piano

-      solo or a duet with the violin?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Supper, I should say,&rdquo; exclaimed Mrs. Darlington, as she left the room.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0024" id="link2HCH0024"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XXIV&mdash;In a Tight Corner

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">D</span>ICK&rsquo;S after-dark

-      visit to La Siesta was only the first of several that followed at

-      intervals of a few days. He came and departed mysteriously, and during his

-      brief stay every precaution was taken that no one except his few trusted

-      friends should know of his presence. But by some means or other a whisper

-      had reached the ear of the sleuth, Leach Sharkey, that the fugitive had

-      been seen at the home of Mrs. Darlington.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      When the news was imparted to Ben Thurston, the old man quivered from

-      excitement.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;At La Siesta, do you tell me? Let us ride over there at once, and search

-      the place from basement to attic.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; replied Sharkey. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve got my scouts out. Don&rsquo;t you worry. We

-      must wait till the night bird comes back. Then we&rsquo;ll trap him like a fat

-      quail.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;All right. Have my automobile ready, and a bunch of well-armed fellows

-      right here, so that we can make a rush over at a moment&rsquo;s notice. By God,

-      I&rsquo;ve been disappointed in everything else&mdash;lost my son, lost my

-      ranch, lost my home. But I&rsquo;m not going to lose that man. I&rsquo;m going to get

-      him, even if we shoot him down on sight as an outlawed fugitive from

-      justice with a price on his head.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll get him,&rdquo; answered Sharkey, with a grim smile. &ldquo;You may count him a

-      dead bird. I guessed he wouldn&rsquo;t keep away from his girl very long.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;His girl! Curse her&mdash;it was she who lured my son to his death. But

-      I&rsquo;ll be avenged. If she has been harboring an outlaw, she, too, has broken

-      the law and shall go to jail.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, she no doubt thinks him innocent,&rdquo; suggested the sleuth.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Innocent! All women are alike&mdash;treacherous devils at heart. I would

-      give them the vote&mdash;yes, but the rope at the same time,&rdquo; he went on,

-      growling in savage incoherence.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      And Sharkey, knowing that discussion or contradiction only added fresh

-      fuel to his vile temper, left him alone.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      At last, a few nights later, a rider dashed up to Ben Thurston&rsquo;s house

-      with the news that Dick Willoughby had been seen entering La Siesta, and

-      that, following Sharkey&rsquo;s instructions, every avenue of escape was now

-      guarded.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Hurry, hurry! I&rsquo;ve got to be in at the death,&rdquo; fairly screamed the old

-      man.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Five minutes later the big seven-passenger automobile, carrying three or

-      four armed men besides its owner and his personal guard, Leach Sharkey,

-      was devouring the twenty miles of road that lay between the two ranch

-      homes.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      That evening the four young people were quietly chatting in the cosy

-      corner on the interior verandah&mdash;the comfortable little nook fixed up

-      with rugs and tapestries and oriental divans. It was summer now, and after

-      a sultry day the night air was sweet and balmy. Willoughby was smoking a

-      cigar in languid contentment with his surroundings, when all at once he

-      sprang to his feet.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Tia Teresa had rushed in, frantic with excitement.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;A great big automobile is coming along the road,&rdquo; she cried, &ldquo;and there

-      are men watching outside the portico. Come with me,&rdquo; she went on,

-      addressing Dick. &ldquo;I know where your horses are hid. I can take you by a

-      secret path through the oleanders.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick vaguely wondered why the duenna should know anything about his mode

-      of coming. But there was no time to question, for just then there came the

-      sound of voices outside.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Mrs. Darlington, pale and agitated, emerged from the drawing room.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What has happened?&rdquo; she asked breathlessly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I guess I&rsquo;m trapped,&rdquo; replied Dick quietly. &ldquo;No doubt it&rsquo;s old Thurston.

-      There will be shooting if I resist. So there is nothing for it but to

-      surrender.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; exclaimed Merle. &ldquo;I dread that vindictive man. He must never get

-      you in his power again. We must gain time to smuggle you out of the house.

-      I have it. Tia Teresa&mdash;give me your mantilla and your cloak. Quick,

-      quick!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      A first loud knocking had come on the door at the head of the portico

-      steps. The duenna in a moment had divested herself of her loose black robe

-      and heavy lace veil.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Get something else to wear and meet us at the oleanders,&rdquo; continued

-      Merle, taking the garments from Tia Teresa. &ldquo;Put these on, Dick, and sit

-      right there in that corner. Mr. Munson, turn off two or three of the

-      lights. Mother, dear, control yourself. Take this book and be reading.

-      Now, that will do. They will be here in a moment.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      A second knock had been heard, and now they knew that the door was being

-      opened without further ceremony, for at placid La Siesta there were no

-      bolts or bars against unwelcome visitors.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      In that brief minute a wonderful transformation scene had taken place in

-      the cosy corner. Tia Teresa had disappeared. Munson was stretched on a

-      sofa, puffing his cigar. Merle and Grace had been playing patience during

-      the afternoon and had left the cards in scattered confusion. Mrs.

-      Darlington, beneath the single incandescent aglow, was quietly reading.

-      From the darksome corner the pretended duenna surveyed this peaceful scene

-      of domesticity.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      It was Ben Thurston himself who led the way for his swarm of myrmidons.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      He began without formality; his tone was coarse and rude.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;We want the outlaw, Dick Willoughby. We know he is here. So make no fuss.

-      Deliver him over.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Mrs. Darlington had risen to her feet, and Munson, too, had sprung erect.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What do you mean?&rdquo; asked the lady with quiet dignity.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You know darned well what I mean.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Munson stepped forward, but he played the game best by keeping himself

-      under perfect control.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You will speak civilly, Mr. Thurston, or leave this house. What is

-      wanted?&rdquo; he added, turning to Leach Sharkey.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;We want Dick Willoughby, of course,&rdquo; the sleuth replied, politely enough.

-      &ldquo;We have reason to believe he is here.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, you can see for yourself whether he is here or not,&rdquo; said Munson,

-      glancing around. &ldquo;But if you wish to look through the house, I don&rsquo;t

-      suppose Mrs. Darlington will refuse you permission.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The lady bowed her acquiescence.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;With your consent, Mrs. Darlington,&rdquo; Munson went on, &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll show these

-      gentlemen round and save you the annoyance. Come along then.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Ben Thurston had been fairly silenced by the army man&rsquo;s suave courtesy. He

-      was glowering at him, dully conscious of having been suppressed.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Munson turned from the sleuth.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Perhaps Mr. Thurston would prefer to remain with the ladies?&rdquo; he asked,

-      with a touch of smiling irony.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t leave my man Sharkey,&rdquo; replied Thurston gruffly. &ldquo;Sharkey, keep

-      close watch on me. We&rsquo;ll search the place, but you stay near me all the

-      time.&rdquo; Once again there was the old hunted look in his eyes as he glanced

-      apprehensively into the courtyard.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then follow me,&rdquo; said Munson quietly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You have left a guard at the door of course?&rdquo; asked Thurston of Sharkey.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, you just allow me to know my business,&rdquo; replied the detective

-      sharply. He bowed to Mrs. Darlington and her daughters. &ldquo;I am really sorry

-      to disturb you, ladies.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then get the business over as soon as possible,&rdquo; said Munson. &ldquo;Come

-      along.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The moment the coast was clear, Merle jumped up.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Quick! Mr. Willoughby. Follow me downstairs. I&rsquo;ll take you through the

-      kitchen to the rose gardens.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      It was a strange looking duenna that stalked after Merle, with a robe

-      reaching only to the knees. But at the head of the kitchen stairway Dick

-      discarded the now useless garments, flinging them across the balustrade.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;We must trust to our good luck now, Merle,&rdquo; he said.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Never fear. It won&rsquo;t desert us. Hurry on.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      At the clump of oleanders they found Tia Teresa, provided with another

-      shawl. Not a moment was to be wasted in words. Merle just pressed Dick&rsquo;s

-      hand by way of farewell. As he hastened away down the dark path, she, too,

-      sped from the spot.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Perhaps fifteen minutes later Ben Thurston, going the round of the house,

-      came to the head of the kitchen stairs. He saw the black cloak and

-      mantilla on the balustrade.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;By God!&rdquo; he cried with swift inspiration of what had happened. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ve

-      been properly fooled! Where is that old hag of a duenna?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Gathering the vestments in his hands he rushed through the house to the

-      verandah. Merle was quietly seated with her mother and Grace. But there

-      was no sign now of Tia Teresa.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Sharkey had followed close on his employer&rsquo;s heels. Munson came a few

-      paces behind.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Ben Thurston glared for a moment at the vacant place where the black-robed

-      figure had been seated. Then he turned round and, addressing Mrs.

-      Darlington, fairly shouted:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Where is Dick Willoughby? It was he who was wearing these damned

-      clothes.&rdquo; And he flung the garments on the rug before her.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No swearing, please,&rdquo; said Munson, tapping him on the shoulder.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;To hell! Who wouldn&rsquo;t swear? Where is the man I&rsquo;m after?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;An innocent man,&rdquo; exclaimed Merle, rising to her feet and proudly folding

-      her arms.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Looks like it&mdash;breaking jail and hiding in the hills,&rdquo; sneered

-      Thurston. &ldquo;He is nothing but a murderer and an outlaw. And I&rsquo;m going to

-      get him, dead or alive.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then catch him if you can,&rdquo; cried Merle, pointing toward the door that

-      opened on the portico.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Under the girl&rsquo;s fearless gaze Ben Thurston wilted. Baffled, humiliated,

-      speechless in his impotent rage, he allowed the sleuth to take him by the

-      arm and hustle him from the scene.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0025" id="link2HCH0025"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XXV&mdash;Love and Revenge

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">B</span>EYOND the

-      oleanders a tall thick hedge of cypress favored the flight of the

-      fugitive. At the end of the gardens Tia Teresa took a little path that

-      dipped into the river bed, and when they ascended again out of the hollow,

-      Dick found himself quite close to the grove where Pierre was in hiding

-      with the ponies.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      By this time the young fellow was angry with himself for having fled so

-      precipitately. He was full of solicitude for Merle. Why had not he

-      remained to defend her from the brutality of that ruffian, Ben Thurston?

-      This was the question that was now making him both ashamed and anxious.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Hush!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The caution came from Pierre, and showed that the Frenchman was alive to

-      what had happened.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I saw ze automobile rush by,&rdquo; he whispered. &ldquo;We will ride across country,

-      so zat it cannot follow us.&rdquo; He pointed in the direction he would go.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Not yet,&rdquo; replied Dick, determinedly. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m off back to the house to see

-      that they are all safe there.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No, no, Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo; protested the duenna earnestly. &ldquo;You heard what

-      Miss Merle said&mdash;she is afraid of that raging old man. Besides I

-      know. He has vowed that he and his hired gunmen will shoot you on sight.

-      For my little girl&rsquo;s sake you must not go back,&rdquo; she implored.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Besides your word of honor is pledged to me,&rdquo; added Luzon. &ldquo;You must

-      return wiz me. I have your parole.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Parole be hanged,&rdquo; muttered Dick between his teeth.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The old Frenchman laid a kindly hand on the young man&rsquo;s shoulder.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No, no. Monsieur is a man of honor. And honor comes before love&mdash;always.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;If you love her,&rdquo; insisted Tia Teresa, &ldquo;you will save yourself tonight.

-      We will look after her. You need not worry on her account.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick for the moment was silenced, but unconvinced.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, at all events we&rsquo;ll wait a bit. I don&rsquo;t leave this spot till I&rsquo;m

-      sure that Ben Thurston himself has cleared.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;All right,&rdquo; assented Pierre. &ldquo;Stay where you are, Tia Teresa. You must

-      not be seen. Zey may be searching in ze gardens.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Even as he spoke there was the flash of a lantern among the rose bushes.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      In tense silence they waited and watched. The leaden-winged minutes stole

-      on. For a time lights flitted about, then vanished. At last came the

-      &ldquo;honk-honk&rdquo; of the automobile, and a minute later the great machine with

-      its flaring headlights swept down the roadway. They could just see that it

-      was crowded with men. Then in a few seconds it had disappeared around the

-      bend.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Now we go,&rdquo; said Pierre.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Just a minute longer, please,&rdquo; replied Dick in a firm tone. &ldquo;Tia Teresa,

-      you slip back to the house. I will stay here till you bring me word from

-      Merle that she is safe and that all is well.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I will soon return,&rdquo; said the duenna as she hurried away on her mission.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Again an interval of high-tensioned waiting. Neither Dick nor Pierre spoke

-      a word. At last there came a rustle of the bushes from the direction of

-      the river bed, and a moment later Tia Teresa was again by their side.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo; she said, breathless from the speed she had made, &ldquo;Miss

-      Merle begs you to make good your escape. She is well, and happy because

-      you are safe. She sends this rose and&rdquo;&mdash;the old lady hesitated a

-      moment&mdash;&ldquo;her love.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;She said that?&rdquo; murmured Dick, tremblingly, as he took the white blossom

-      and breathed its fragrance.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, does not the flower speak her love?&rdquo; replied the duenna. &ldquo;Now go,

-      go.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Come,&rdquo; said Pierre, as he raised himself into the saddle. &ldquo;We shall fix

-      the blindfold later on.&rdquo; Dick furtively kissed the rose before he placed

-      it in the breast pocket of his coat. Then he mounted, and, bringing his

-      pony alongside of Pierre&rsquo;s, started off at a canter across the starlit

-      plain.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Ben Thurston did not feel inclined to sleep that night. He paced his

-      sitting room like an angry bear, and kept Leach Sharkey out of bed to

-      listen to his growls and threatenings.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;By God, I&rsquo;ll have that girl shoved into jail. Harboring an outlaw! It&rsquo;s a

-      criminal offence.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You can&rsquo;t do it,&rdquo; objected the sleuth.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Can&rsquo;t do it?&rdquo; shouted Thurston, halting and glowering down upon the man

-      who had dared to contradict him. &ldquo;You&rsquo;ll see damned quick if I can&rsquo;t.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Not one of us could swear that Willoughby was there. Neither you nor I

-      could. We never saw him.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He wore that disguise,&rdquo; thundered Thurston. &ldquo;So you think. But thinking

-      ain&rsquo;t proof&mdash;not by a long chalk.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Thurston was now almost speechless from rage. Half articulate words of

-      blasphemy were upon his stuttering lips. But Sharkey went coolly on.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Besides the sympathy of everyone would be with the girl. You can&rsquo;t

-      succeed that way. You yourself would be covered with ridicule.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      At last the torrent of curses broke forth. &ldquo;Damn you, Leach Sharkey!

-      That&rsquo;s what I pay you for, is it? To let that scoundrel slip through our

-      very fingers? And you had the nerve to ask me for another big check this

-      evening. It&rsquo;s all a confounded plot. You&rsquo;re bleeding me. Leach is your

-      name, and leech is your nature.&rdquo; Leach Sharkey rose to his feet. His white

-      teeth gleamed as his short upper lip curled in a contemptuous smile. He

-      raised a threatening finger. It was his turn now to give free vent to

-      profanity.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Stop right there, you doggoned old fool. I bleed you, do I? Well, take my

-      resignation. All your pay ain&rsquo;t worth another five minutes of your

-      infernal temper. No man ever dared to browbeat me and insult me as you

-      have done. And now you may go to hell&mdash;where you belong.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The sleuth turned on his heel, and strode to the doorway. But Thurston was

-      after him in an instant, penitent, trembling, ashen pale. He grabbed

-      Sharkey by the coat sleeve.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No, no, don&rsquo;t go, I beg of you,&rdquo; he whined, &ldquo;I was wrong. I spoke in

-      anger. I apologize. Good God, some one or other will get me within an hour

-      if you leave me unprotected. I haven&rsquo;t a single friend&mdash;no one to

-      stand by me.&rdquo; There was craven fear in his eyes as he looked timidly

-      around. &ldquo;I hear the prowling footsteps of my enemies in the night. You

-      alone can save me, Mr. Sharkey.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Your damned civility comes too late,&rdquo; replied the sleuth, as he shook the

-      clutching hands from his shoulder.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No, no. Don&rsquo;t say that. Sit down again. See, here is my check book. I&rsquo;ll

-      pay you that money now&mdash;I&rsquo;ll double the amount&mdash;I&rsquo;ll never

-      haggle with you again. Stay with me till we go East together.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Sharkey showed himself somewhat mollified. He had played his game well,

-      for after all, cash with him was the main consideration. So smiling over

-      the success of his bluff, he watched the unnerved coward as he tottered to

-      his desk, dropped into a chair and drew the check with slow and painful

-      effort, and then returned with it between his still trembling fingers.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;ll stand by me, Mr. Sharkey, won&rsquo;t you?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, no more of that nonsense,&rdquo; was the curt reply, as the sleuth

-      glanced at the slip of paper, then thrust it in his waistcoat pocket.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      To Thurston the reconciliation brought instant relief. He drew himself up;

-      he rubbed his hands; he even attempted a smile.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s a good fellow, Sharkey. You know I&rsquo;ve always held you in high

-      esteem. And we&rsquo;ll get that man yet&rdquo;&mdash;the glare of vindictiveness was

-      again in his eyes, the rasp of accustomed irritability was returning to

-      his voice. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll get him, I say, even if it costs double the money I&rsquo;ve

-      already spent. And that devil of a girl, too&mdash;I hate her more than

-      ever now. She&rsquo;ll pay for her insults tonight with her lover&rsquo;s life.

-      Remember, Sharkey, no more chances. When you get the scoundrel within

-      gunshot, it&rsquo;s up to you to shoot. That will be best in any case. It will

-      save the cost of a judge and jury. You understand me?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I understand,&rdquo; nodded Sharkey. &ldquo;Then, as you&rsquo;re speaking about doubling.

-      Mr. Thurston, I suppose that ten-thousand-dollar reward coming to me goes

-      up to twenty thousand.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes; twenty thousand if you shoot him like a dog, and let me get away

-      from this damned place. I have come to loathe the very name of it. Well,

-      spread your cot now across my door. I&rsquo;ll try to get an hour&rsquo;s sleep. Good

-      night.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      And Ben Thurston disappeared into the inner room.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0026" id="link2HCH0026"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XXVI&mdash;A Date is Fixed

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">O</span>N the morning

-      after the exciting episode at La Siesta, Chester Munson was in the library

-      of Mr. Robles&rsquo; home ready for his day&rsquo;s duties. But he was in no mood for

-      the routine work of cataloging and classifying the volumes on the

-      bookshelves. Up to now the task had been one of absorbing interest, for

-      Munson, although not a scholar, had always been fond of reading, and it

-      was a treat to dip at times into the contents of the rare and curious

-      works which wealth and the educated taste of a true bibliophile had

-      accumulated.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      But today the amateur librarian was thinking of other things. He was

-      feverishly awaiting the usual morning visit of his employer, so that he

-      might tell him the story of the previous night&rsquo;s happenings. At last Mr.

-      Robles made his appearance, and gave his usual quiet greetings.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I see you are making great progress with your work,&rdquo; he remarked,

-      glancing at the pile of classified volumes resting temporarily on the

-      library table.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m getting along,&rdquo; replied Munson. &ldquo;But I have most surprising news

-      for you, Mr. Robles.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Indeed?&rdquo; The recluse arched his eyebrows in expectant curiosity as he

-      took a chair beside the desk at which Munson had been seated. &ldquo;Sit down,

-      please. Let me hear the story.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You know that I was at La Siesta yesterday evening?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I know that you are very often there,&rdquo; replied Mr. Robles, smiling. &ldquo;I

-      understand the attraction and congratulate you on your good fortune. Grace

-      Darlington is certainly a charming young lady.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Munson flushed and bowed his acquiescence in the compliment as he said:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It was not of her, however, that I was going to speak. I want to say to

-      you, Mr. Robles, that Miss Farnsworth did one of the bravest and cleverest

-      things imaginable last evening.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Tell me about it. I am all attention.&rdquo; Munson then proceeded to relate in

-      full detail the events of the preceding evening&mdash;the surprise visit

-      of Ben Thurston, the brutality of the man, the quick wit of Merle, the

-      escape of Dick Willoughby, and his final message by Tia Teresa that he was

-      safe and, in obedience to Merle&rsquo;s injunction, was returning to his place

-      of hiding. During the narrative only once did the listener betray emotion;

-      when Thurston&rsquo;s rude insults were repeated there came a flash into Robles&rsquo;

-      eyes, and he clenched his hands to restrain his indignation. But he

-      interrupted with no word, and at the end spoke no comment.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Munson was a little taken aback at this silence and impassivity.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;My story does not seem to surprise you?&rdquo; he remarked, with a note of

-      interrogation.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; was the quiet reply, &ldquo;I already knew it.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;How?&rdquo; exclaimed Munson, wonderingly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You have forgotten, young man, that there is a private telephone between

-      my home here and La Siesta. Mrs. Darlington has already told me about the

-      matter. But I am pleased to have your version, and delighted more than I

-      can tell to know that Merle proved equal to the emergency&mdash;that it

-      was she who may be truly said to have saved Dick Willoughby.&rdquo; There was a

-      ring of pride and admiration in his voice as he spoke the words.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;She&rsquo;s the real stuff,&rdquo; cried Munson, enthusiastically.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It was well done,&rdquo; continued Mr. Robles, his tone taking a graver note.

-      &ldquo;For I want to warn you, Munson, as Willoughby&rsquo;s closest friend, that Ben

-      Thurston or one of his hired assassins will certainly shoot on sight the

-      instant they get the chance to do so. But by the Lord, if anything like

-      that happens, I will hang that villain Thurston to the highest tree in

-      Tejon for the buzzards to pick his bones.&rdquo; And the upraised hand, the

-      voice vibrating with passionate determination, showed that Ricardo Robles

-      meant just what he said.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Mr. Robles had risen to his feet. For a moment he turned his face away.

-      Then he again spoke, but now in his customary, sedate manner.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;This morning, Mr. Munson, I leave home for a few days. Go on with your

-      work, of course, but remember that it is quite a minor consideration.

-      During my absence I shall rely on you to see that Ben Thurston, on any

-      pretence of searching for Willoughby, does not cross my door.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He shall never do that, so long as I&rsquo;m here,&rdquo; declared the young army

-      man, with quiet confidence.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t think he will, either,&rdquo; replied Robles. &ldquo;I have given orders for

-      him to be shot down,&rdquo; he added grimly, &ldquo;if he should dare to approach my

-      gates. But I&rsquo;ll count on you all the same as a second guard to the

-      sanctity of my home.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You may count on me to the death,&rdquo; responded Munson, extending his hand.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I know it, and therefore I go away on a necessary duty with an easy mind.

-      But I have good news for you, Munson. I have instructed Sing Ling to

-      prepare luncheon for the ladies of La Siesta every day they choose to

-      come. So, while I prefer you to remain here on guard while I am gone, you

-      need not be lonely. Perhaps you&rsquo;ll hardly wish me to come back again,&rdquo; he

-      added with a smile.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, don&rsquo;t say that. But you&rsquo;re mighty kind thinking of such things at

-      all.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, you may expect our friends today about one o&rsquo;clock. Now, goodbye&mdash;but

-      not for long.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The library work proceeded but slowly during the hours that followed.

-      Munson was all impatience now for Grace and Merle to arrive. Books were of

-      little account, for there was none ever printed that could rival for him

-      the charm of a certain pair of laughing blue eyes. And it was a

-      self-confessed pseudo man-of-letters who at last rushed to the gateway to

-      greet the fair visitors.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Mother couldn&rsquo;t come,&rdquo; cried Grace, as she jumped from her horse and

-      flung the bridle to a Mexican groom. &ldquo;She&rsquo;s putting up fruit with Tia

-      Teresa, and I think she really believes everything would go wrong if she

-      didn&rsquo;t superintend.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Munson, as he led the girls through the arched gateway, was inclined to

-      bless both the fruit and the fallacy.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Sing Ling came across the patio with a welcoming smile.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Dinnel all leady,&rdquo; he announced in tinkling syllables.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And we&rsquo;re all ready, too, Sing Ling,&rdquo; laughed Merle, as she went up and

-      shook the Chinaman&rsquo;s hand.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Me vely glad to see you again, missie.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I didn&rsquo;t know you were old friends,&rdquo; exclaimed Munson, in some surprise.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, didn&rsquo;t you? Sing Ling has been Mr. Robles&rsquo; cook off and on for nearly

-      twenty years. When Mr. Robles is abroad of course he works elsewhere.

-      That&rsquo;s why you found him at San Antonio Rancho.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But Dick told me he was his cook&mdash;had been for several years.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;With Mr. Robles&rsquo; tacit consent, then,&rdquo; replied Merle.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The Chinaman was grinning in a vacuous sort of way, as if all the

-      conversation was so much Greek to him.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Sing Ling, you scamp,&rdquo; cried Munson, &ldquo;I begin to understand now how Mr.

-      Robles comes to know so much about Dick and myself. You&rsquo;ve been telling

-      tales out of school.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, no; me cookee allee time; me no go school,&rdquo; replied the Celestial, in

-      guileless incomprehension.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      After the dainty luncheon, Merle proposed that they should visit the watch

-      tower. There they found the Mexican lad on duty. He had been strumming a

-      guitar to pass the time, but at the sound of voices had sprung erect and

-      alert. Munson noticed at a glance that the big telescope was ready trained

-      on San Antonio Rancho.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;<i>Como estas, Francisco?</i>&rdquo; asked Merle, addressing the boy in

-      Spanish.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;<i>Bien, gracias, senorita</i>,&rdquo; he replied, with a deferential bow. But

-      he averted his glance instantly, and gazed out on the landscape.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Merle turned to Munson: &ldquo;We are not allowed to converse with the servants

-      here,&rdquo; she explained. &ldquo;Just a word of greeting&mdash;that is all.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m under similar orders,&rdquo; replied Munson. &ldquo;Not that it much matters in

-      my case, for I haven&rsquo;t your accomplishment of knowing the Spanish

-      language.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, Grace and I speak Spanish almost as well as English. You see, Mr.

-      Robles, who has always been interested in us two girls, insisted that we

-      should be taught his native tongue.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And we&rsquo;ve been all over Spain, too,&rdquo; interposed Grace. &ldquo;Lived there a

-      whole year. That&rsquo;s where I fell in love with the violin and took my first

-      lessons.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;An inspiring country obviously,&rdquo; remarked Munson with a flattering

-      gesture.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Thank you for the subtle compliment,&rdquo; laughed Grace, tossing the vagrant,

-      wind-blown curls from her face.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I never come here but I love to gaze at the view,&rdquo; observed Merle. &ldquo;Is it

-      not glorious&mdash;this valley of Tehachapi?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      It was indeed a glorious scene&mdash;that noble sweep of verdured plain,

-      stretching north far as the eye could reach, on the south guarded by the

-      rugged pass, east and west embosoming hills twenty miles apart etching the

-      sky with peaks and domes and lines of beauty. For a few moments all three

-      visitors to the tower remained silent and enraptured.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Grace was the one to break the spell.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m going down now to the library to inspect your work, lieutenant,&rdquo; she

-      announced with a roguish smile.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Spare me,&rdquo; protested Munson. &ldquo;But perhaps you would help me with some of

-      those Spanish books,&rdquo; he added as an afterthought.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Delighted! Come along.&rdquo; And she led the way down the winding iron

-      staircase.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      In the library the three were for the first time during the visit quite

-      alone. Munson carefully closed the door.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Now I&rsquo;ve got the chance, Miss Merle,&rdquo; he began, &ldquo;I want to compliment you

-      on your splendid bravery last night.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Bravery!&rdquo; she laughed. &ldquo;Why I was so scared I could hardly stand.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, you deceived us all finely, then.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And that Ben Thurston&mdash;what an old ruffian!&rdquo; cried Grace. &ldquo;But I

-      agree with you, Mr. Munson; Merle was a hero.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;A heroine,&rdquo; suggested the lieutenant.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, in these days we don&rsquo;t make such fine sex distinctions,&rdquo; laughed

-      Grace. &ldquo;A real hero, that&rsquo;s what I call her.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Rubbish,&rdquo; protested Merle. &ldquo;I just did what anyone else would have done

-      in the circumstances.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m afraid men are not so ready of wit in an emergency as are women,&rdquo;

-       remarked Munson.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Just listen to that, Merle,&rdquo; exclaimed Grace. &ldquo;I verily believe the

-      lieutenant is a suffragette.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;A suffragist,&rdquo; corrected Munson, emphatically this time. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m hanged if

-      I&rsquo;m going to wear a petticoat even if the women are determined to don&mdash;the

-      other things.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      They all laughed merrily.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Grace turned and began examining the carefully written library cards.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Any more news from Mr. Willoughby?&rdquo; asked Merle, with a look of

-      solicitude in her eyes.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Nothing,&rdquo; replied Munson. &ldquo;But I&rsquo;m beginning to put two and two

-      together,&rdquo; he continued. &ldquo;Early every morning a horseman comes down here

-      from the mountains and evidently brings a report of some kind to Mr.

-      Robles. And when he rides off again Sing Ling has always ready a basket of

-      grub, all sorts of nice things, fried chicken, spiced beef&mdash;&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Sounds quite epicurean,&rdquo; interrupted Grace, tossing away the card she had

-      been pretending to examine.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, hang it all&mdash;just the little delicacies Dick used to like.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I never knew you fared so bountifully at San Antonio Rancho,&rdquo; remarked

-      Merle with a smile.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, Dick&rsquo;s no candy kid, as you know well,&rdquo; replied Munson. &ldquo;It was

-      mostly rough and ready fare all right, but Sing Ling had a knack of adding

-      a few dainty trifles to our meals, and it strikes me that for the purposes

-      of this mysterious and capacious lunch basket he is trying to excel

-      himself.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No doubt it goes to Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo; said Merle. &ldquo;Well, I&rsquo;m real glad to

-      know that they are making him comfortable.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I guess, though, he&rsquo;ll miss his occasional visits to La Siesta. Mr.

-      Robles says you were quite right, Miss Merle. Dick is in real danger.

-      Those gunmen of old Thurston have orders to shoot him on sight.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I knew it,&rdquo; exclaimed Merle. &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m so thankful he got away. Even

-      though we miss seeing him, he must never run such a risk again.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It is all very mysterious,&rdquo; said Munson, in a musing tone. &ldquo;And I had no

-      idea, too, that this was such a lovely place. Mr. Robles has taken me

-      around several times. He has the choicest dairy cattle, the finest blooded

-      horses, rare trees and plants from every corner of the world.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;These are his hobbies,&rdquo; commented Merle.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He says he wants to give me some practical lessons in estate management.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Why?&rdquo; asked Grace.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; laughed Munson, &ldquo;he thinks I may some day own a rancho of my own.

-      But that will be a mighty long time.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Who can tell?&rdquo; said Merle, glancing mischievously from the lieutenant to

-      Grace. &ldquo;Even in these humdrum days soldiers have been known to come in and

-      conquer.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Grace blushed crimson.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Merle, how dare you?&rdquo; she exclaimed, half angry, half laughing. &ldquo;Next

-      time we visit you, Mr. Munson, I&rsquo;ll have to bring along Tia Teresa.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, dear Aunt Teresa has a soft side for the lieutenant,&rdquo; retorted Merle,

-      with merry audacity.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      But Grace had recovered from her momentary confusion.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then I&rsquo;ll help you all I can, Mr. Munson, with dear Aunt Teresa,&rdquo; she

-      laughingly said. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll send her along tomorrow instead of coming

-      ourselves.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Heaven forbid!&rdquo; murmured the lieutenant, with pious fervor. He, too, had

-      been looking and feeling awkward.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;So we&rsquo;ll say goodbye for the present,&rdquo; continued Grace, frankly extending

-      her hand.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I hope I haven&rsquo;t said anything to offend you,&rdquo; stammered Munson.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It is perhaps what you haven&rsquo;t said that is the cause of trouble,&rdquo;

-       laughed the irrepressible Merle.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      But Grace had fled from the room, and as the others followed, Merle went

-      on:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I said when we left home that two would be company but three&mdash;a

-      complication. Wasn&rsquo;t I right, lieutenant?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You are always right,&rdquo; murmured Munson, too bewildered to think of

-      anything else but the obvious gallant reply.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      He stood at the gateway watching the two young ladies as they cantered

-      away. At the bend of the road Merle turned round in the saddle and waved

-      her hand. But Grace rode steadily on.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;By jove, that&rsquo;s as good as telling me that I can sail in and win,&rdquo; he

-      said to himself. &ldquo;Thank you, Merle, little girl. Next time Grace and I are

-      alone, my fate will be sealed.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      But no one called again during Mr. Robles&rsquo; absence&mdash;not even Tia

-      Teresa.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      It was toward evening a few days later when the recluse strolled into the

-      library. Munson did not know that he had returned, and rose from his seat

-      in some surprise.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Still hard at work?&rdquo; said Mr. Robles, as he nodded and shook hands.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;When did you get back, sir?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Last night. And today I have been busy with some important letters.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Any word of Dick?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;There is nothing new so far as I am aware.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Mr. Robles, excuse me,&rdquo; said Munson earnestly. &ldquo;But I&rsquo;m anxious on Dick&rsquo;s

-      account. You know of his whereabouts, of course?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I have indicated as much, although for the present I prefer to say

-      nothing.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, when is he to be restored to liberty?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;In due time. At latest he will be free on the eleventh of October.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, that&rsquo;s months ahead yet. But why the eleventh of October? You excite

-      my curiosity.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The date is not of my choosing&mdash;it was fixed many years ago, by

-      another than myself.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The enigmatic reply puzzled Chester Munson&mdash;not only the words

-      themselves, but the tremor of deep emotion in the voice of Ricardo Robles

-      as he gave them utterance.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0027" id="link2HCH0027"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XXVII&mdash;Among the Old Oaks

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">P</span>IERRE, now my

-      sketches and plans are finished, how am I going to pass the time?&rdquo; It was

-      some ten days after the affair at La Siesta, and Dick had spent the

-      interval in close and absorbed work over his drawing board. Happy in his

-      occupation, he had not felt the restraints of confinement.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      But now that the task was completed, and the big cardboard cylinder

-      containing the set of drawings rested on the ledge of the easel all ready

-      to be sent away on its mission, a feeling of chafing restlessness had

-      ensued.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Good Lord, a fellow can&rsquo;t read all day,&rdquo; Dick went on, half in soliloquy,

-      half addressing his companion.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Monsieur is comfortable here?&rdquo; asked the latter solicitously.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I should say, old fellow. I was never in better quarters in all my life.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And zere is nothing more I could get for ze table?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;For goodness sake, don&rsquo;t talk like that, Pierre! In any ease I don&rsquo;t

-      worry about what I eat. But this is a regular Delmonico&rsquo;s. Guadalupe is

-      certainly a crackerjack cook. She is even better than Sing Ling. Wherever

-      did she learn to turn out all these little delicacies? And just my

-      favorite dishes, too.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Pierre smiled enigmatically.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Guadalupe very clever old squaw,&rdquo; he remarked.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I would like to know her better. But she keeps out of my sight all the

-      time.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Guadalupe is very old. She has her fixed ideas.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I suppose that means she does not love the Americans.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No doubt. She prefer to be alone&mdash;alone with ze white wolf all ze

-      time. And where the white wolf is, monsieur dare not go.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I understand that all right,&rdquo; laughed Willoughby. &ldquo;I strolled only once

-      toward the log fire, and the brute showed me a set of teeth which I never

-      wish to see again.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Ze white wolf guard ze cave well,&rdquo; remarked Pierre, sententiously.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m not thinking of trying to run away. You know I would never break

-      my word. But what the dickens am I to do all day long?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What do you say? Suppose we go to ze riffle and wash out some gold.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Great Scott!&rdquo; exclaimed Dick eagerly. &ldquo;That&rsquo;s not a bad suggestion. But

-      Don Manuel won&rsquo;t mind?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He will be very pleased&mdash;he has no use for ze gold.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And Guadalupe?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Long ago she would have killed you if you had gone zere. But not now. She

-      very old, and all her people are dead.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And the white wolf? That confounded beast won&rsquo;t interfere?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No, no. Ze white wolf stay near Guadalupe all ze time.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then, by jove, it&rsquo;s a bully idea,&rdquo; cried Dick. &ldquo;It gets me all right.

-      We&rsquo;ll turn miners, Pierre, and we&rsquo;ll have a rare old sack of nuggets to

-      divide when the time comes for me to go free. I&rsquo;ll be better off in the

-      end than if I were holding down my old job at the rancho,&rdquo; he laughed

-      gaily.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I will find ze spades and ze pans to wash ze gravel. When shall we

-      begin?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, wait now,&rdquo; replied Dick, glancing reflectively at the roll of

-      drawings. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve got to send these plans away. I want you to get them at

-      once into the hands of my friend, Lieutenant Chester Munson. He will know

-      how to forward them to their proper destination.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;May I suggest one zing?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Go ahead, Pierre. What&rsquo;s in your mind?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I venture to make one little suggestion. Why not ask ze young lady to

-      take ze plans to your friend?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Miss Merle Farnsworth?&rdquo; asked Dick in surprise. &ldquo;But how am I to do

-      that?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I will promise to arrange a meeting&mdash;zat is, if you are not afraid

-      of Mr. Thurston and his men.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Afraid!&rdquo; shouted Dick. &ldquo;You give me the chance to see Merle again, and

-      old Ben Thurston and all his sleuths may go to blazes.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Zen I will arrange, and I zink it will please ze young lady very much to

-      have ze honor of taking care of ze plans.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You mean it will be a mighty honor for the plans to be in her care,

-      Pierre. But I know she will gladly do me this service. How and when can I

-      see her?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Be ready tomorrow morning by ten o&rsquo;clock. I will take you to a quiet

-      place among ze old oak trees.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Pierre, you&rsquo;re a regular brick,&rdquo; cried Dick, as he slapped the old

-      Frenchman on the shoulder in the exuberance of his delight.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The following morning they started out for the trysting place. Dick

-      without demur submitted to the usual precautions. He was blindfolded

-      before mounting his pony in the great central domed cavern and it was not

-      until a couple of hours later, after a veritable switchback ride up and

-      down and round about in a bewildering maze, that he was permitted to

-      remove the bandage. Dismounting, he found himself in the heart of a great

-      oak forest, in what precise locality he could not tell, for there was

-      nothing in sight but endless vistas of tree trunks under their thick

-      canopy of green leaves.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Pierre touched him on the shoulder, and he followed the direction of the

-      Frenchman&rsquo;s eyes. There, advancing through the sylvan twilight, was Merle

-      Farnsworth, her hands eagerly extended, her face lighted with joy.

-      Following at a little distance came Tia Teresa.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick, hastening to meet Merle, took both her hands into his, and gazed

-      deep into her eyes.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, it&rsquo;s great to meet you again,&rdquo; he exclaimed. &ldquo;And this is my first

-      chance to thank you for having saved me the other night. My word, but you

-      were quick to think and to act. You cannot know how I admired your courage

-      and coolness.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Nonsense, nonsense,&rdquo; protested Merle, in sweet blushing confusion. &ldquo;You

-      make far too much of the little I did.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You saved my life,&rdquo; said Dick, determinedly. &ldquo;You can call that a little

-      thing if you choose.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; she replied, earnestly. &ldquo;If I really did that, then it was truly

-      a big thing.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;For me.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And for all of us,&rdquo; she added, with face half-averted.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And you, too?&rdquo; pressed Dick.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, for me, too,&rdquo; answered Merle, turning round and frankly meeting his

-      gaze. &ldquo;I should never have been happy again had any harm come to you there&mdash;that

-      night&mdash;in my very home&mdash;without a proper effort to get you away

-      to a place of safety.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;God bless you, Merle, dear,&rdquo; exclaimed Dick, as again he pressed her

-      hands. He had been carried away by his fervent emotions, but she did not

-      resent the familiar and endearing manner of his address.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      He would have taken her in his arms there and then, but Merle drew back

-      and gave a little glance aside. Then Dick remembered Tia Teresa. To his

-      astonishment he found her chatting with Pierre Luzon as if they were old

-      friends.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick left Merle for the moment to greet the duenna.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And I have to thank you, too, for helping me,&rdquo; he said. Then he added

-      with a laugh: &ldquo;When am I to be privileged to wear that mantilla again?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You are not to be allowed to endanger yourself again,&rdquo; replied Tia

-      Teresa. &ldquo;And I warn you now. We remain here only half an hour&mdash;these

-      are our orders.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Whose orders?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Never mind. Just one half hour, that is all.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then I&rsquo;ll make the best of my time,&rdquo; exclaimed Dick, turning toward

-      Merle. &ldquo;I see you won&rsquo;t be lonely with my gallant friend, Pierre Luzon,&rdquo;

-       he added with a smile.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, I knew Pierre when he was just as handsome a young fellow as

-      yourself,&rdquo; retorted Tia Teresa. &ldquo;But we&rsquo;ll excuse you, and Pierre will

-      keep the time.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick led Merle down a glade of the forest, but before doing so he had

-      unstrapped the roll of drawings from the horn of his saddle.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What are you carrying so very carefully?&rdquo; asked Merle.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;My plans for the ideal city. I told you I was going to have a try in that

-      competition.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I hope you&rsquo;ll have good luck.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, I want you to help me. Will you take this package, please, to

-      Chester Munson and ask him to send it to the proper address?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;With the greatest of pleasure, Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo;&mdash;and she put forth

-      her hands for the roll.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No&mdash;we&rsquo;ll lay it down here for the present. This log will serve as a

-      seat. See, this twisted, limb makes quite a comfortable nook for you.&rdquo; He

-      had halted at a fallen tree, had dropped the drawing on the turf, and was

-      now dusting away the twigs and leaves from the seat he had chosen.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Cannot I look at the drawings?&rdquo; she asked, after settling herself cosily.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Before handing them to Munson, if you like. But there are other things to

-      talk about now.&rdquo; As he spoke he tossed his hat on the ground at her feet.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Are you growing impatient over your confinement?&rdquo; she asked.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Impatient&mdash;it is hardly the word. I long to be out in the world

-      again. I could never have endured the long seclusion but for my work over

-      these drawings and my thoughts of you.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Why me?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I have felt that I am doing the best for your sake as well as my own. I

-      would not have had you subjected to the vulgar gaze of a crowded court

-      room&mdash;not for worlds. The very thought that I have saved you from

-      that has made me contented with my enforced idleness.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Not idleness,&rdquo; she said, tapping the roll of drawings with the toe of her

-      shoe.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, no, not idleness exactly.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And I do hope you&rsquo;ll win the prize,&rdquo; she added, looking up into his eyes.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;So do I. But perhaps you don&rsquo;t know what I count to be the real prize.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0010" id="linkimage-0010"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">

-      <img src="images/0255.jpg" alt="0255 " width="100%" /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h5>

-      <a href="images/0255.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>

-    </h5>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Pray, what is that?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick thrust a hand into the breast of his coat and brought forth a pocket

-      book. From this he produced a little package, and opening the folds of

-      paper disclosed the white rose which she had sent him on the night of his

-      escape from La Siesta.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Where did you get that?&rdquo; she asked demurely.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It is your rose&mdash;the rose you sent me.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I did not know you were so partial to roses as to keep them after they

-      are withered.&rdquo; Her voice trembled; she bravely tried to keep up the

-      pretence of not understanding.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It is not the gift I treasure&mdash;it is the thought of who was the

-      giver.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      A blush stole over her beautiful face, while the long drooping eyelashes

-      half concealed her brown eyes. Dick&rsquo;s arms slipped around the girl&rsquo;s

-      slender waist.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Merle, my dear, I love you. For months past I have known that there is no

-      woman on earth for me but you. I would have spoken before, but I have

-      always been afraid that you could not love me, and that talk of such a

-      thing might terminate a friendship that had become my greatest pleasure in

-      life.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      For reply, placing one hand on his shoulder, she just buried her face in

-      his breast and gave way to tears&mdash;tears of joy, he knew, as he kissed

-      her hair again and again, and then at last her lips when she allowed him

-      to raise her face toward his.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;My darling,&rdquo; he murmured, and the kiss she gave him back accepted and

-      returned the words of fond endearment.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      A moment of restful bliss followed; then Merle gently disengaged herself

-      and rose to her feet.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What will Tia Teresa say?&rdquo; she asked, laughingly, as she glanced over her

-      shoulder.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I think Tia Teresa knew all about my love long ago,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;Yes,

-      both she and Pierre Luzon, too.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then you have been wearing your heart on your sleeve.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Or we have been surrounded by very observant people. But, I say, Merle,

-      this reminds me of a thing I had quite forgotten for the moment.&rdquo; His face

-      fell. &ldquo;There is one great barrier that stands between us.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What do you mean? You are surely too strong and purposeful a man to care

-      for barriers.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I never knew until the other day that you are so very rich.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Rich!&rdquo; laughed Merle. &ldquo;Who ever told you such a foolish thing? While of

-      course I have never felt poverty, don&rsquo;t you know that I am absolutely

-      dependent upon Mrs. Darlington&rsquo;s kindness and generosity to me, her

-      adopted daughter?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      A smile of understanding broke over Dick&rsquo;s face.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You tell me that? I am so delighted,&rdquo; he exclaimed.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You surely know my story well enough,&rdquo; continued Merle, &ldquo;not to have

-      mistaken me for an heiress. I lost both father and mother when I was a

-      baby. Mrs. Darlington took me to her heart, and no mother could have been

-      dearer and sweeter than she, no sister kinder and more loving than Grace.

-      But I am proud to think they have loved me for my own sake, not for any

-      wealth I might have owned.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then there is no barrier,&rdquo; cried Dick, as once again he drew her to him.

-      &ldquo;Unless my poverty is a barrier,&rdquo; he added. &ldquo;But won&rsquo;t I work hard all my

-      life to give you every comfort you can desire!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, we&rsquo;ll have a good start at all events,&rdquo; said Merle, with a merry

-      little upglance.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;How&rsquo;s that?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The ten-thousand-dollar prize for the best plans. Have you forgotten

-      about that already?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But it is not won yet.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, I have the firm presentiment that you are going to win, Dick, dear. I

-      am sure of it&mdash;sure!&rdquo; she repeated in a tone of conviction.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Her face was aglow and Dick caught the spirit of her enthusiasm.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then I&rsquo;m sure, too. And, by jove, won&rsquo;t we have one grand honeymoon trip,

-      dearest?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0028" id="link2HCH0028"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XXVIII&mdash;The Prize Winner

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">D</span>ICK WILLOUGHBY&rsquo;S

-      sensational escape from La Siesta had added another thrill to the mystery

-      surrounding the murder of Marshall Thurston. But as week succeeded week

-      without further incident, the affair gradually faded away as a topic of

-      conversation. All the talk now was about the coming of the new town. The

-      fever of speculation was in the air.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Say, boys,&rdquo; remarked Jack Rover one evening to his two cronies at the

-      store, &ldquo;I&rsquo;m sure getting crazy about the new town. I&rsquo;ve got a thousand

-      bones of my own savings besides the money from old Pierre Luzon, and I&rsquo;m

-      going to invest every dangnation cent of it in town lots on opening day.

-      You bet I&rsquo;ll be there mighty early in the morning when the sale starts.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m sorta locoed myself,&rdquo; said Baker, &ldquo;about them lots in the new town.

-      Guess I&rsquo;ll grab off a few good corners. I look for an early rise&mdash;prices&rsquo;ll

-      go up like blazes,&rsquo; I&rsquo;m &lsquo;lowin&rsquo;.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Buck Ashley snorted contemptuously. &ldquo;Say, you fellers are two dippy ones.

-      That new town talk is a lot o&rsquo; hot air, d&rsquo;you hear? Jest the agitatin&rsquo;

-      work of them pesky town boomers. Won&rsquo;t &lsquo;mount to nothin&rsquo;.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Jack Rover started a defence, but was quickly motioned to silence by old

-      Tom Baker, who, after clearing his throat, pushed his hat back and glared

-      at Buck Ashley.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Buck,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;you&rsquo;re a thick-headed fool. The openin&rsquo; of that town

-      will amount to one hell of a sight, don&rsquo;t you fergit it. Why, that Los

-      Angeles syndicate cuss who&rsquo;s a-runnin&rsquo; the machine is sharper than a razor

-      blade. Just think for one little puny moment,&rdquo; Tom Baker went on,

-      enthusiastically, &ldquo;of that printed notice being in every blamed newspaper

-      in the whole country&mdash;yes, and on the other side of the Atlantic pond&mdash;offerin&rsquo;

-      ten thousand dollars for the best plans for an ideal city. Gosh all

-      hemlock, they do say as how the mails were just chuck full of answers&mdash;architect

-      fellers as well as them as ain&rsquo;t architects, a-tryin&rsquo; to get their hooks

-      on that ten-thousand-dollar prize. It was a mighty smart business notion,

-      I&rsquo;m a-tellin&rsquo; you, and has boomed the town to beat the band.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But,&rdquo; inquired Buck Ashley, in a sarcastic way, &ldquo;who is confounded fool

-      enough to buy lots in such a wild-cat scheme, no matter how much they

-      advertise it? That&rsquo;s what I&rsquo;m askin&rsquo;.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I will, for one,&rdquo; said Jack Rover. &ldquo;As I said before, I&rsquo;m going to put in

-      my last dollar.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;As for me,&rdquo; chimed in Tom Baker, &ldquo;I will lay my money on this &lsquo;ere

-      proposed new town bein&rsquo; the biggest town in the whole dangnation State of

-      California outside of sea-board towns.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Just then through the gathering darkness a lone horseman rode up to the

-      store, dismounted and came hurriedly in. It was none other than Chester

-      Munson, flushed and excited, as he sang out a good-natured salute: &ldquo;Hallo,

-      boys. I have news for you.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      As he spoke he pulled a Bakersfield daily paper from his pocket. &ldquo;The new

-      town!&rdquo; he fairly shouted. &ldquo;All about it, right on the front page, pictures

-      and all. And it is Dick Willoughby who wins the ten-thousand-dollar

-      prize!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s great news, sure,&rdquo; cried Jack.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s a mighty pity Dick ain&rsquo;t here to celebrate,&rdquo; growled the sheriff.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What&rsquo;s to be the name of the town?&rdquo; asked Buck Ashley, in a disbelieving

-      tone.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Tejon, after the old fort here,&rdquo; replied Munson, as he pointed to the

-      featured article with its big-type headlines and started to cull a few

-      sentences.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It says that the new city of Tejon, right here in the heart of a rich

-      horticultural valley, is bound to be one of the top-notch towns of

-      California. And the opening day is going to be immense. Next Tuesday is

-      the date fixed. Maps and plans of the new town will be ready for

-      distribution from the land company&rsquo;s office, corner Main Street and

-      Broadway, at nine o&rsquo;clock Monday morning. Let me see,&rdquo; he went on, looking

-      up from the paper, &ldquo;this is Wednesday. Mighty few days to wait, boys. You

-      just ought to see the excitement in Bakersfield.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, I say there ain&rsquo;t no such town,&rdquo; snapped Buck Ashley, &ldquo;nor no such

-      a company&rsquo;s office buildin&rsquo;, &lsquo;cause I was down there day before yesterday

-      myself, right where them surveyin&rsquo; fellers have been foolin&rsquo; &lsquo;round for

-      weeks, peekin&rsquo; through spy-glasses at each other and measurin&rsquo; off so many

-      feet this way and so many feet that way, like a bunch o&rsquo; kids playin&rsquo; some

-      game. No, siree, there&rsquo;s nothin&rsquo; but long rows of white stakes driv in the

-      ground. Looks to me as if they was a-gettin&rsquo; ready to build a lot of

-      henhouses. Of course the railroad&rsquo;s there, and the only thing changed that

-      I could see was a lot of side-tracks they&rsquo;ve put in.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, things have been humming the last two days,&rdquo; laughed Munson. &ldquo;This

-      afternoon I found all the side-tracks filled with trains of lumber,

-      carload after carload, and not less than two or three hundred workmen, all

-      as busy as nailers. Looked to me as if a three-ring circus were getting

-      ready for a big show. They are already running up electric light poles and

-      stringing the wires. Some of the men are unloading cars, some stacking up

-      lumber, others are putting up tents, and the entire business reminded me

-      of a hive of extremely busy bees. Go down and look for yourself, Buck, and

-      you&rsquo;ll be convinced at last that the new town has arrived.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The old storekeeper had come from behind the counter, and stood leaning

-      against a stack of boxes.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve been here for more&rsquo;n a quarter of a century, boys,&rdquo; he said, in a

-      tone of seriousness that approached to sadness, &ldquo;and this old store seems

-      like home to me. I&rsquo;m some fighter and I&rsquo;m some stayer. But, hell, I reckon

-      I know when I&rsquo;m licked. I guess this new town puts a crimp in me and my

-      business, and&mdash;&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Honk-honk; honk-honk&rdquo;&mdash;it was the distant warning of an automobile

-      that interrupted Buck&rsquo;s speech, and drew all four present to the doorway.

-      There was the glare of twin headlights on the southern road.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Some of the Los Angeles buyers, most likely,&rdquo; suggested the sheriff.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      And so the travellers proved to be. The automobile halted at the store,

-      but only one of the party of four or five descended.. He was a

-      bright-faced, clean-shaven man, of dapper build and faultlessly attired.

-      In his hand was a bunch of papers.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Mr. Buck Ashley?&rdquo; he inquired.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m your man,&rdquo; replied Buck, stepping from the doorway.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, we can&rsquo;t stop tonight. But we wanted to say &lsquo;how-do.&rsquo; I represent

-      the Los Angeles Trust Syndicate, and these documents just arrived

-      yesterday from Washington, D. C.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Can&rsquo;t be for me, then,&rdquo; replied Buck, hesitating to take the proffered

-      papers.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But they are,&rdquo; replied the stranger with a laugh. &ldquo;Oh, we haven&rsquo;t

-      forgotten the interests of the old identities. We&rsquo;ve had your name in mind

-      all the time, and this is a removal order from the Government to change

-      your postoffice over to the new town of Tejon.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Buck was speechless as his fingers closed on the documents.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll hope to see you over on Tuesday morning, Mr. Ashley, so that you

-      can secure a good site for your new store. Now I must be going. We have

-      got to be in Bakersfield by eleven o&rsquo;clock.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Honk-honk,&rdquo; and the automobile was gone.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Hell, Buck, have you lost your tongue?&rdquo; cried Tom Baker, slipping the

-      storekeeper on the shoulder. &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t you see what it all means? You&rsquo;re

-      goin&rsquo; to shift camp, old man; you&rsquo;re goin&rsquo; into the new town.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Gosh &lsquo;lmighty!&rdquo; murmured Buck, at last recovering the power of

-      articulation. &ldquo;I think the first thing to do is to lubricate.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;A taste from the mystery keg,&rdquo; suggested the sheriff, as they all crowded

-      back into the store.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The mystery keg? What&rsquo;s that?&rdquo; asked Munson.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Buck laid his hand on a small barrel at the end of the counter.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;We call it the mystery keg,&rdquo; he replied, &ldquo;because we just found it

-      yesterday mornin&rsquo; settin&rsquo; at my back door. It has come to us sorta like

-      manna from heaven.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And tastes like manna, too,&rdquo; interjected Baker.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It means free drinks for all this pertic&rsquo;lar bunch,&rdquo; continued Buck, &ldquo;for

-      there is no question as to where the keg came from. Look at the date on

-      the top&mdash;1853. This &lsquo;ere barrel came out of Joaquin Murietta&rsquo;s wine

-      cellar.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t say?&rdquo; exclaimed Munson, pressing forward eagerly to examine the

-      little brass-hooped keg, looking bright and sound despite its antiquity.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;This whisky is sixty years old at least,&rdquo; Buck went on, turning the tap

-      and filling a small pitcher.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Tastes like it might be a hundred years older,&rdquo; remarked the sheriff.

-      &ldquo;Mellow as fresh drawn milk.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Buck handed Munson a pony glass of the rare old beverage.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;By jove, it is fine,&rdquo; said the lieutenant, judicially smacking his lips.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Just makes my internals feel as soft and roly-poly as a ripe

-      pomegranate,&rdquo; murmured Tom, as he set down his empty glass and rubbed his

-      belt-line in a complacent way.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, we&rsquo;ll fill up again, boys,&rdquo; cried Buck. &ldquo;Here&rsquo;s to dear old Pierre

-      Luzon, for it was sure him who sent us the mystery keg.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And to Dick Willoughby who won the prize,&rdquo; cried Jack Rover.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And to our host,&rdquo; added Munson in a courtly way. &ldquo;To Buck Ashley, boys,

-      the postmaster of the new city of Tejon.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Hip, hip, hurrah!&rdquo;&mdash;all four voices shouted the triple toast as the

-      upraised glasses clinked merrily.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Buck resumed his former position, with his back against the cracker boxes.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;As I was sayin&rsquo;, boys, when that automobile interrupted us, I know when

-      I&rsquo;m licked. But I know, too, that the fightin&rsquo; blood is still left in me,

-      and I was a-goin&rsquo; to remark that this new town sure &lsquo;nuff looks a winner.

-      I&rsquo;ve got plenty of lumber right in my back yard, and tomorrer mornin&rsquo; I

-      begin to have the scantlin&rsquo;s cut, for, by jingoes, I&rsquo;ll be the chap who

-      will build the first buildin&rsquo; in the new town.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Bully for you,&rdquo; cried Munson.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I say what I mean,&rdquo; continued Buck, his face aglow with enthusiasm, &ldquo;and

-      on Tuesday mornin&rsquo; I&rsquo;ll buy the first town lot if I have to stand in line

-      for forty-eight hours to get it.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Life in the old dog yet,&rdquo; laughed Jack Rover. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s wonderful the effect

-      of Pierre Luzon&rsquo;s brew,&rdquo; smiled the sheriff. &ldquo;I think we&rsquo;ll just have four

-      more spoonfuls, Buck, of that distilled nectar of sunshine. Success to the

-      new store, old man!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0029" id="link2HCH0029"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XXIX&mdash;-The Rendezvous

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">S</span>UMMER had come and

-      gone and it was now the early days of October. The mystery of Dick

-      Willoughby&rsquo;s disappearance had remained unsolved, yet it was on his plans

-      that the new city of Tejon had been laid out, and, like the fabled palace

-      in the Arabian Nights&rsquo; tale, had sprung into being with such rapidity that

-      men rubbed their eyes to satisfy themselves whether the transformation

-      scene were an actuality or the baseless fabric of a dream. Within three

-      months of the opening day auction of lots Tejon was a thriving, hustling

-      centre of population, with whole avenues of beautiful homes, several

-      blocks of stores on the main street, schoolhouse and other public

-      buildings well on the way to completion.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Electricity had helped to the accomplishment of the miracle, for it had

-      been only necessary to tap the great power cables running across the old

-      rancho from the Kern River canyon to secure the supplies of &ldquo;juice&rdquo; both

-      for lighting and traction purposes. So there was already an interurban

-      tramway service connecting with the county seat, Bakersfield, while at

-      night the new town was a blaze of electricity. All around country homes

-      were going up, and ten and twenty acre holdings were being planted to

-      fruit trees or ploughed for alfalfa.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Ben Thurston still clung to the ranch house, although it was definitely

-      understood now between him and the new owners that Thanksgiving Day was to

-      be the extreme limit of his occupancy. The hue and cry after Dick

-      Willoughby had in a measure subsided, but, if the authorities had relaxed

-      their efforts, Thurston still sought relentlessly and indefatigably for

-      the man accused of the slaying of his son.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      One night at a lonely road-house on the outskirts of Bakersfield, the

-      sleuth, Leach Sharkey, was in close and secret conference with a bent and

-      bowed old man. This was none other than Pierre Luzon, although his

-      physical condition seemed to have greatly changed and he answered now to

-      the name of José.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The two men had met a few days before on the range; Pierre had spoken of

-      the scant living he was making from a herd of goats he pastured on the

-      mountains, and in the course of conversation had thrown out a hint for

-      information as to the amount of the reward that Mr. Thurston would be

-      willing to pay if Dick Willoughby were handed over to him. Sharkey had

-      eagerly followed the lead thus given. Hence this midnight meeting in the

-      road-house parlor for the discussion of terms and conditions over the

-      bottle of whisky that helps so efficaciously to dispel distrust and

-      unloosen tongues.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      More than an hour had been spent in skirmishing preliminaries, but now

-      Leach Sharkey was congratulating himself that he had got his man fixed

-      just right. He was running over the final arrangements so as to make sure

-      that everything was clearly understood.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then Mr. Thurston and myself are to come to Comanche Point. You will take

-      us from there to the place where we&rsquo;ll find Willoughby. That&rsquo;s the

-      understanding, José?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Pierre nodded in acquiescence.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And you will bring wiz you ze reward of five tousand dollars&mdash;not

-      gold or silver, remember, but treasury bills, for I am not strong enough

-      now to carry a very heavy weight. Zen when you have paid me ze money, I

-      will lead you to Mr. Willoughby.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;All right. I&rsquo;m going to trust you and take my chances. But bear in mind

-      that you don&rsquo;t get away with the cash until I have actually put the

-      handcuffs on the man I&rsquo;m after.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, I will not run away, Mr. Sharkey.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;By God, if you try any monkey tricks on me, I&rsquo;ll shoot you in your

-      tracks. Make no mistake about that, José. And it will be hands up first to

-      prove to me you have no gun.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;As I have promised,&rdquo; replied Pierre with some dignity, &ldquo;I shall come

-      unarmed. But remember, Mr. Thurston and you must be alone. If zere are any

-      ozers I will not show myself&mdash;I will give no sign.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t worry about that. We&rsquo;ll be alone. I need no other protection than

-      the two guns I always carry.&rdquo; As he spoke, the sleuth slipped a hand to

-      one of his hip pockets, and with a grim smile, laid a vicious-looking

-      revolver on the table.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Luzon evinced no disquietude; he merely smiled.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Mr. Sharkey he is ze famous man wiz ze two guns. I would take no risk wiz

-      him. But I wish to win ze reward.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, then, the reward is yours if you play the game straight. Thurston

-      and I will be there, and you will be there unarmed. The hour?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Four o&rsquo;clock. I will watch you come to Comanche Point all alone along ze

-      road.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;re certainly a cautious old duck,&rdquo; laughed Sharkey. &ldquo;However, that&rsquo;s

-      all right. Four o&rsquo;clock, then. And you said Tuesday next week, didn&rsquo;t

-      you?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, Tuesday.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Sharkey glanced at a big advertisement calendar on the wall.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That will be the eleventh of the month. Then I think everything is

-      understood. Now I want to be off. I can just catch the last car to Tejon.

-      Shake. You can finish that drop of whisky by yourself, old man.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      They shook hands and Sharkey was gone.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The other waited for a few moments, cautiously and cunningly listening to

-      the retreating footsteps. Then he sprang erect, transformed in an instant

-      into a hale and vigorous man. Into his eyes there leapt a flash of joy, in

-      his heart was a song of triumph.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;So the villain Ben Thurston will be there at Comanche Point on the very

-      anniversary of the night, just thirty years ago, when he committed that

-      foul crime&mdash;at the very spot where the poor little Senorita Rosetta

-      and her unborn babe perished at his hands. Glory be to God! At last the

-      hour of vengeance comes!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0030" id="link2HCH0030"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XXX&mdash;Don Manuel Appears

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span> GOODLY little

-      sack of water-worn nuggets of gold had been washed out of the subterranean

-      stream by Pierre Luzon and Dick Willoughby. The captive had found in the

-      work both an exciting pastime and the ease of mind that comes from the

-      thought that his time was being spent to profitable account. So week after

-      week he had toiled on cheerfully, setting for himself each day a full

-      day&rsquo;s task. In this way also, although the want of sunshine had paled his

-      cheeks, he had maintained his health by the regular physical exercise.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      But as the appointed date of his release drew near, Dick&rsquo;s mining

-      enthusiasm suffered an eclipse. The gold no longer tempted him, the

-      eight-hour day became a burden to his soul, his whole being was possessed

-      with feverish restlessness. He was not only filled with eager excitement

-      at the thought of again folding Merle in his arms, but he was fired with

-      curiosity to know what events were happening outside which would enable

-      him to step forth a free man, exculpated from all connection with the

-      crime of which he had been suspected, restored to an honorable place among

-      his fellow men.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      But Pierre remained obstinately deaf to all hints for information.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I can say nozing,&rdquo; was his invariable reply. Then, to divert Dick&rsquo;s mind,

-      he would challenge him at chess, a game in which they had proved to be

-      pretty equally matched, or he would produce the latest batch of

-      newspapers.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The young fellow had read with great delight the announcement that his

-      plans for the ideal city had been awarded the prize of ten thousand

-      dollars. Still more welcome had been the warmly congratulatory note

-      received from Merle at the hands of Pierre; for this letter, while it made

-      no reference to the point, virtually sealed the pact between the two

-      lovers that the money would provide for a glorious honeymoon trip to

-      Europe. Dick had sent instructions to Munson to notify the Los Angeles

-      syndicate in his name that the reward was to remain to the credit of the

-      winner until he would come personally to Tejon to claim it, probably about

-      the middle of October.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      It wanted now only two days of the fateful date, the eleventh of that

-      month. Dick had already gathered together his personal belongings ready

-      for removal. He was pacing the grotto, when his eye chanced to fall upon

-      the sack of gold.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I forgot about that, Pierre, old fellow,&rdquo; he remarked. &ldquo;We have to divide

-      this spoil.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; replied Pierre, with quiet determination, &ldquo;it is all yours, Mr.

-      Willoughby, honestly earned, too. I have no need for any of ze gold. I

-      have all ze money I can ever spend during ze rest of my life.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      No amount of argument could shake the old Frenchman&rsquo;s resolution.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then what is to be done with the sack? By jove, I&rsquo;ll share it with our

-      Hidden Treasure Syndicate. By the way, where is Jack Rover now, Pierre?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He is living in Buck Ashley&rsquo;s old store. Buck, you know, is ze postmaster

-      at Tejon, and has a splendid store in ze new city. But Jack Rover, he just

-      hang about ze old place.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, Pierre, I&rsquo;ve got a plan. You say it will not be until Tuesday

-      afternoon that I leave these quarters?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Zat is so, and I am sorry you must still wear ze blindfold, but it will

-      be for ze last time now.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m not kicking about that. I know the conditions under which I came

-      here. But it will be evening when we get clear of the hills, and I won&rsquo;t

-      have any particular place to go to. Next morning it will be best for me to

-      ride right over to Bakersfield, to surrender myself and secure my formal

-      discharge. When, did you say, am I to get the necessary documents for all

-      this?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Before you depart from ze cave.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, everything will fit in fine. Tomorrow you have kindly promised to

-      take out my things. Just carry the nuggets along with you also, and leave

-      everything in Jack&rsquo;s charge. But tell him that nothing must be opened or

-      disturbed until I arrive. I&rsquo;m going to give Jack Rover the surprise of his

-      life when he sees that gold. The sack is too heavy to handle, but I guess

-      we can make it into several packages. Jack was always crazy to find

-      Guadalupe&rsquo;s sand-bar.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;So were lots of ozers,&rdquo; grinned Pierre. &ldquo;But they have never found it

-      yet. Even you will not be able to find it again when you are led out of

-      zese hills wearing ze blindfold.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I am fully aware of that, old man,&rdquo; laughed Dick in reply. &ldquo;I suppose I

-      couldn&rsquo;t discover the place again in a hundred years. But Jack&rsquo;s eyes will

-      fairly pop when he sees that bunch of gold marbles. He will be mighty

-      pleased to show the nuggets around to some of the boys who have laughed

-      over his enthusiasm, always declaring that Guadalupe&rsquo;s gold simply came

-      from some old-timer&rsquo;s sack of dust that had been part of Joaquin

-      Murietta&rsquo;s plunder.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, no. All ze bandits get out much gold from ze riffle in zose days&mdash;Don

-      Manuel himself had plenty.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, Pierre, you just pack all my belongings to Buck Ashley&rsquo;s old store.

-      And you tell Jack Rover to expect me about six o&rsquo;clock the night after

-      tomorrow&mdash;that&rsquo;s Tuesday. And I wish Munson to be there, too&mdash;I&rsquo;ll

-      want him to accompany me to Bakersfield.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;If you write a leetle note to ze lieutenant,&rdquo; suggested Pierre, &ldquo;I will

-      see zat it reaches his hands. But you must say very leetle&mdash;just a

-      few words. For nozing must be told to anyone outside until you are free.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;All right, Pierre. Here goes.&rdquo; And Dick seated himself at the writing

-      table. In a very few moments he had completed his task.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;See,&rdquo; he said, returning to Pierre&rsquo;s side. &ldquo;I wish you to know exactly

-      what I have written&mdash;just a hurried scrawl.&rdquo; And he read aloud while

-      the old Frenchman&rsquo;s eyes rested on the paper:

-    </p>

-    <blockquote>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;On Tuesday night next, about six o&rsquo;clock, meet me at Buck Ashley&rsquo;s old

-      store. I shall want you to ride over to Bakersfield with me next morning,

-      where my acquittal is assured. Give Merle the glad news. Yours, Dick.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    </blockquote>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Guess that&rsquo;s all right?&rdquo; he added, as he folded the note and placed it in

-      an envelope on which he had already inscribed the name of Lieutenant

-      Munson.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Pierre had signified his approval with a nod, and now he carefully

-      bestowed the letter in the pocket of his shirt.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He will get ze letter&mdash;he will surely be zere.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then you say I cannot write to Merle&mdash;Miss Farnsworth, I mean?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I have ze strictest orders,&rdquo; replied Pierre. &ldquo;Nozing must be told just

-      yet. Bah! It is only two days more.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Two mighty long days for me, old sport,&rdquo; said Dick, half in jest and half

-      in sober earnest, as he sat down and began cutting at a plug of tobacco.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Most of next day Willoughby was alone. But at the regular dinner hour

-      Pierre appeared, and announced that he had safely packed the valise and

-      the gold in four bags to the old store, and Jack Rover had been apprised

-      of Dick&rsquo;s coming on the following night.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He knew what was in ze sacks,&rdquo; laughed Pierre. &ldquo;Zey were so very heavy,

-      oh my! But I told him I would come back and shoot him like a jack-rabbit

-      if he opened zem before you came.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Guess it needed an old bandit like you to scare Jack Rover,&rdquo; replied

-      Dick, jocularly. But he was very happy&mdash;everything was going along

-      well&mdash;only another four-and-twenty hours now and his captivity would

-      be at an end.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      That night Dick could hardly sleep a wink, and next morning he was too

-      restless and impatient for his approaching liberation to keep within the

-      confines of the little grotto. In the darkness of the big central cavern

-      he walked up and down, casting occasional glances at the distant glow of

-      the log fire where, as he could see, both the aged squaw and the white

-      wolf were on vigilant and ceaseless guard.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Suddenly his steps were arrested. With great surprise he gazed toward the

-      log fire. There, with Guadalupe and the white wolf, stood the figure of a

-      strange man, cloaked and wearing a big sombrero. All their shapes were

-      outlined against the ruddy glow, and the monstrous beast was actually

-      fawning at the newcomer&rsquo;s feet. A moment later the stranger, with a

-      parting wave of his hand to Guadalupe, advanced toward the spot where Dick

-      was standing. Close by was an oil lantern set in a socket of the rock wall

-      to mark the entrance to the inner grotto.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      For a minute the approaching figure had been swallowed up in the darkness,

-      but now came the sound of his footsteps crunching on the sandy floor, and

-      a few seconds later he appeared in the flickering radiance. Dick

-      Willoughby had already made his inference as to the identity of the

-      newcomer&mdash;he had been so often told that no living man but the bandit

-      chief, Don Manuel, could pass the white wolf with impunity.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      But the name Dick pronounced was quite a different one.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Senor Ricardo Robles&mdash;it is you&mdash;<i>you?</i>&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It is I,&rdquo; replied the Spaniard, quietly, as he extended his hand.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then you are&mdash;Don Manuel&mdash;the&mdash;&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick faltered and paused.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, I am Don Manuel de Valencia, the outlaw, the bandit of Tehachapi,

-      the White Wolf, as he is commonly called. Come within, my friend. I have

-      matters of importance to communicate.&rdquo; And the visitor led the way with an

-      ease that showed his perfect familiarity with every opening and turning in

-      the great subterranean series of chambers.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I cannot remain with you very long,&rdquo; said Mr. Robles, when they were

-      seated in the inner grotto, &ldquo;for I have a number of things to attend to

-      during the few hours that still remain at my disposal.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I must not ask questions,&rdquo; remarked Dick, although his words belied the

-      questioning look in his eyes.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, although I speak in confidence,&rdquo; Mr. Robles replied, &ldquo;having learned

-      to trust you, I shall make no secret of my contemplated movements. Tonight

-      I hope to settle my last score&rdquo;&mdash;he paused, then corrected himself&mdash;&ldquo;my

-      last piece of business in California. If all goes well, within twenty-four

-      hours I shall be on the high seas. Never mind my exact route, but my final

-      destination is Spain, the land of my fathers. There, perhaps, you and I

-      may meet again.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I hope so. I have come to be deeply interested in you, Mr. Robles.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And I in you, young man, all the more because you are now engaged to one

-      I hold very dear. Since her birth, Merle Farnsworth has been a&mdash;little

-      protégée of mine.&rdquo; Again he had hesitated, and his voice had vibrated from

-      emotion. But he was smiling now as he went on: &ldquo;I have watched with

-      sympathetic interest and approval the progress of your love affair.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Through your spy-glass on the tower?&rdquo; laughed Dick.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, partly in that way, perhaps,&rdquo; replied Mr. Robles, with eyebrows

-      humorously upraised. &ldquo;You have had my quiet support from beginning to end,

-      and now that you have won the young lady&rsquo;s heart, you have my most sincere

-      congratulations. May you have long years together, and every happiness.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      He had clasped Dick&rsquo;s hand, and placed his disengaged hand affectionately

-      on the young man&rsquo;s shoulder.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You are really very kind,&rdquo; said Dick, cordially responding to the hand

-      clasp.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Because I have counted you worthy of your great good fortune in winning

-      such a girl as Merle. And I have taken much the same liking to your

-      friend, Chester Munson. Have you heard the news:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No, but I can guess it.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, he and Grace Darlington are engaged. And to them I give my heartiest

-      blessing just as I have given it to you and Merle. For Grace, like her

-      adopted sister, has been always very dear to me. I have loved them both

-      very dearly indeed all through their young lives.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And both are devoted to you, as I happen to know,&rdquo; affirmed Dick with

-      warm conviction.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I believe it,&rdquo; replied Mr. Robles. His hand sought an inner pocket and

-      drew forth a legal-looking document. &ldquo;I came here not only to bid you

-      good-bye, but more important still to place this in your possession.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;My release?&rdquo; exclaimed Dick eagerly, as his fingers closed on the paper.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, not exactly&mdash;but it will lead to that, never fear. It is an

-      affidavit which has been properly sworn to before a San Francisco notary

-      public. It briefly sets out my confession. It was I, Don Manuel de

-      Valencia, who killed Marshall Thurston, or at least was responsible for

-      his killing.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      As he spoke the words, the outlaw drew himself proudly erect. Dick was too

-      overwhelmed with amazement to reply.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The young ruffian was shot partly because he deserved his fate for

-      insulting Merle, partly because, as you cannot but know, Don Manuel, the

-      White Wolf, had sworn a vendetta against the whole Thurston brood.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then Ben Thurston&mdash;is he dead, too?&rdquo; gasped the listener.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Not yet,&rdquo; was the grim reply. Then he paused and changed his tone.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But I want to speak not another word about this. What happens to Ben

-      Thurston is nothing of your concern&mdash;must be nothing of your concern.

-      For this document here frees you from all legal entanglements, and I have

-      no wish that you should by any chance become enmeshed again. So we dismiss

-      Ben Thurston from our talk and from our minds. When you lodge this paper

-      with the authorities at Bakersfield, it will be a matter only of a few

-      formalities to secure dismissal of the charge against you. For I even put

-      it on sworn record that your jail delivery that night was against your

-      will.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I have forgotten to thank you for that same delivery. I never dreamed you

-      were my liberator, Mr. Robles.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Because that night I was Don Manuel de Valencia. But at present I am

-      Ricardo Robles, and in that capacity it is for me to thank you for having

-      so chivalrously protected our dear Merle from the necessity of associating

-      her name in any way with the death of that worthless young scoundrel. I

-      appreciate the cheerful manner in which you have, for her sake, and let me

-      add, for my sake, too, borne your long imprisonment here.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve been mighty comfortable,&rdquo; laughed Dick, with a glance around his

-      luxurious quarters. &ldquo;And Pierre Luzon has been a treasure&mdash;a good

-      comrade all the time.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Ah, yes, Pierre,&rdquo; exclaimed the outlaw, musingly. &ldquo;Pierre is a very good

-      fellow. He has been faithful to me for thirty long years.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And where does he go after tonight?&rdquo; asked Dick. &ldquo;He cannot stay here,

-      all alone except for Guadalupe.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Everything is arranged. Guadalupe is accustomed to live alone. But

-      tonight Pierre accompanies me on my long journey.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;So we may all meet again?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, we may all meet again,&rdquo; responded Robles, slowly and gravely, &ldquo;far,

-      far away from the Tehachapi mountains. But now I must go,&rdquo; he went on in a

-      brisk tone, &ldquo;for I have to make some final preparations. You have the

-      affidavit; see that you do not lose it on your ride down the mountains.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You just bet I won&rsquo;t,&rdquo; replied Dick, as he held tightly to the precious

-      document with both hands.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Pierre will come for you here early in the afternoon. Be prepared to go

-      with him then. As for myself, Willoughby, there is for the present only

-      one word more to be spoken. Adios!&rdquo; Again they clasped hands, and a moment

-      later Don Manuel was gone.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0031" id="link2HCH0031"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XXXI&mdash;Shadows of the Past

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>N a little

-      summer-house at the edge of the rose garden of La Siesta, Tia Teresa was

-      seated all alone. She was awaiting the coming of Mr. Robles to a

-      rendezvous which he had arranged by a confidential message sent on the

-      previous evening. It wanted some time yet of the appointed hour, but in

-      her state of deep emotion and repressed excitement she had gladly sought

-      the solitude of this secluded corner. Deep in thought, her mind was

-      divided between the faraway past and the near-impending future.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Each recurring year this day to her had always been a sad and tragic

-      anniversary. In the early hours of the morning she had been to the old

-      Mexican cemetery on the hillside, and had bedecked with flowers the grave

-      marked by the marble cross bearing the single word &ldquo;Hermana,&rdquo; also the

-      graves close by of the parents of Don Manuel and Rosetta, the children she

-      had nursed and tended and fondled from infancy to early manhood and

-      womanhood, through twenty years of unalloyed happiness until the gringo

-      had come, the ancestral acres had been filched away, and dishonor and

-      death been brought to the slumbrously peaceful home.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      And from that slumbrous peace what a sudden and terrible change! On this

-      day thirty years ago poor little Rosetta had been found done to death

-      beneath the precipice at Comanche Point. No less done to death by the

-      shock and shame of the pitiful story thus revealed, the aged parents of

-      the beautiful young girl were, within a few days, sleeping their long last

-      sleep by her side in the churchyard on the hill. A whole family blighted

-      and withered as by the blast of some death-laden sirocco.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Then had followed the years of terror during which Don Manuel, the White

-      Wolf, the dreaded outlaw, had wreaked his vengeance on the whole race of

-      gringos. She had never seen him all through that time, although at

-      intervals money had reached her by Pierre Luzon&rsquo;s trusted hand, enabling

-      her to maintain herself in the little Mexican village near the old fort of

-      Tejon. At last had come the fight when the band of outlaws had been

-      finally dispersed, Pierre Luzon wounded and dragged away to serve the rest

-      of his days in prison, Don Manuel vanished like a wraith in the mist, gone

-      where no man could tell.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      But through the years that succeeded, Tia Teresa had known that he lived&mdash;had

-      known in her heart of hearts that he would live until the vendetta he had

-      sworn against Ben Thurston would be accomplished. The remittances that

-      arrived from time to time, first from Spain, then from England, needed no

-      signature to show that they were from her young master of former years and

-      that he still held his faithful old nurse in affectionate remembrance. And

-      at last had come the crowning surprise of all.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Tia Teresa had been bidden to come to Los Angeles by a letter which bore a

-      strange signature, but the handwriting of which she had immediately

-      recognized. And there, in a fine home beneath the foothills that skirt the

-      city to the north, she had found Don Manuel again, much older in manner

-      than by lapse of years&mdash;quiet, reserved, tinged with a sadness of

-      which she knew the cause, but happy withal, for he was married to a

-      beautiful English girl and had a little baby daughter. And as nurse to

-      this child Tia Teresa, to her great joy, was promptly installed.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Thus again she had become the trusted servant in Don Manuel&rsquo;s home, the

-      only one around him possessing his full confidence and knowing the secret

-      story of his past. For, amid these changed surroundings, his name was

-      Ricardo Robles, his standing that of a Spaniard or Mexican of wealth, of

-      scholarly tastes, and devoted to the seclusion of his home with its

-      spacious surrounding gardens.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Their next door neighbors were an English family named Darlington, Mrs.

-      Darlington and Mrs. Robles having been life-long friends. And here, too,

-      was another tiny child in the home, likewise a daughter.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Seated in the summer-house, Tia Teresa was going over in her mind the

-      whole chain of happenings&mdash;the new era that had dawned and had

-      brought the hope of restored and abiding happiness for Don Manuel. But it

-      had been fated not so to be. Within a year his young wife had died, his

-      child was motherless, he himself, if not alone in the world, was

-      broken-hearted. For a spell he had fits of brooding, then all of a sudden

-      he had sold the home that could only henceforth be for him a place of

-      saddening memories.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      His daughter Merle, taking her English mother&rsquo;s maiden name of Farnsworth,

-      was transferred to the loving care of Mrs. Darlington. Thus had it come

-      about that Grace Darlington and Merle Farnsworth had been brought up as

-      sisters, with Tia Teresa their nurse, and in later years their devoted

-      attendant.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Ricardo Robles had resolved to travel, but Tia Teresa had quickly divined

-      that the vendetta was again in his heart. For no other reason could he

-      have decided on masking the paternity of his infant daughter by giving her

-      the maternal name. And from Tia Teresa Don Manuel had no secret to

-      conceal. &ldquo;Yes.&rdquo; He had sworn he would hunt Ben Thurston through Europe,

-      and it was to protect the future life of his child from any association

-      with future consequences of the blood feud that he had handed her over to

-      his friends under their solemn promise that, as Merle grew up, she should

-      never know anything more than that both her parents had died.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      So once again Don Manuel had gone his way and disappeared. Some years

-      later the Darlington home had been transferred to England, where Mr.

-      Darlington had fallen heir to some ancestral estates. Again, after a lapse

-      of years, another change had occurred&mdash;Mr. Darlington dying, and Mrs.

-      Darlington being left a widow in the big, now gloomy, English

-      country-house, with Grace and Merle approaching young womanhood, and all

-      of them, Tia Teresa included, longing again for the sunshine of

-      California.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Intermittently during those years in England, Ricardo Robles had visited

-      his friends, but the secret about his real relationship to Merle had

-      always been preserved. Both daughters in the home had been brought up

-      alike to regard him simply as a dear and valued friend, whose comings

-      brought much happiness to their lives in the shape of gifts which

-      preserved fond memories during his prolonged spells of absence.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      And while the little family was still plunged in deep sorrow for the death

-      of Mr. Darlington, Mr. Robles had reappeared as the messenger of great

-      joy. For he brought the news that the beautiful rancho of La Siesta, lying

-      in mid-California, among the foothills of the Tejon Valley, had been

-      purchased for the express purpose that the widow and children should make

-      it their future place of abode. In this way had come about the return to

-      the land which each and all already loved best and regarded as truly

-      &ldquo;home.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Five years ago!&rdquo; murmured Tia Teresa pensively. And they had been all so

-      happy here, the young girls growing up with every accomplishment money and

-      the best governesses could bestow, Don Manuel not far away watching the

-      progress and developing beauty of his daughter, always hovering near for

-      acts of helpful kindness.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Five years of placid enjoyment, of unbroken tranquility, till all of a

-      sudden the old enemy had returned and all the rankling wounds of the old

-      vendetta had been reopened!

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      In the Spanish soul of Tia Teresa there was bitter hate still, and fierce

-      joy even now that the hour of retribution was approaching&mdash;that at

-      last after all those years her little Rosetta would be avenged. Yet time

-      had had some mellowing influences, for in her musings now she experienced

-      a vague sense of uneasiness for possible consequences that in former times

-      had never for a moment been tolerated. The true spirit of the vendetta had

-      always been in her very blood&mdash;strike when you can, without thought

-      of what may happen next.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      But now she was thinking of coming happenings&mdash;of sorrow perhaps for

-      Merle, of the undoubted danger for Don Manuel himself.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      And while thus she conned the chances, her head bent in deep meditation,

-      her eyes half closed, Ricardo Robles, approaching with noiseless step,

-      stood by her side and laid an affectionate hand upon her shoulder.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I have come, Tia Teresa,&rdquo; he said simply, as he sat down at the edge of

-      the little rustic table.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0032" id="link2HCH0032"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XXXII&mdash;Forebodings

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">F</span>OR this last hour,

-      Don Manuel,&rdquo; she said, placing a hand on his, &ldquo;I have been going over all

-      the long story of the past, from the days when you were a little boy and

-      Rosetta was suckled at my bosom. Why should I not have loved her?&rdquo; asked

-      the old duenna almost fiercely. &ldquo;Why should I not love her still?&rdquo; she

-      added, in a lower tone, as she bowed her head and covered her eyes with

-      her disengaged hand. &ldquo;There is love that can never die, Don Manuel.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Nor should we wish it otherwise,&rdquo; he said gently, caressing the hand

-      extended toward him. &ldquo;And this very night our undying love for dear little

-      Rosetta will be proved&mdash;tonight at last she will be avenged.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      With a start Tia Teresa sat erect.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then it is all arranged?&rdquo; she asked breathlessly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, all finally arranged,&rdquo; was his quiet rejoinder. &ldquo;We meet this

-      evening on Comanche Point&mdash;the place where I have always vowed he

-      should answer for his crime. And you remember what day this is?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I remember&mdash;can I ever forget?&mdash;the very day we found her dead

-      beneath the cliff.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The very day, Tia Teresa. So my vengeance will be complete. Before now I

-      could have shot him a dozen times. But he would never have known that his

-      death was by my hand. Tonight, however, he will know. And he will realize

-      that the vendetta is the law of God&mdash;an eye for an eye, a tooth for a

-      tooth; his life, so precious to himself, for hers so dear to us in the

-      happy old-time days.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But you, Don Manuel?&rdquo; she asked fearfully.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It does not matter much about me,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;But all the same I have

-      come to speak a little in regard to myself. Tonight Ben Thurston assuredly

-      will die, and should I perish with him, the story of the vendetta cannot

-      fail to be revived and the identity of the recluse, Ricardo Robles, with

-      Don Manuel, the outlaw, will be established. This will come as a great

-      shock to all my dear friends at La Siesta&mdash;to Mrs. Darlington as well

-      as to Grace and Merle. But this counts for little&mdash;the name of Don

-      Manuel is just as honorable a name as that of Robles. And you can tell

-      them further that all the loot I ever took from the gringos lies today

-      untouched in Joaquin Murietta&rsquo;s cave. I sullied my hands with none of it.

-      I was made rich by the sale of, my ancestral estates in Spain. And that

-      wealth the law cannot confiscate, for I have been only its trustee during

-      all those years. Everything I possess has been vested from the first in

-      the names of Merle Farnsworth and Grace Darlington.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Grace as well?&rdquo; murmured Tia Teresa, enquiringly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Certainly, for I love both the girls dearly; there is ample to divide

-      between them, and by ranking them together I guard Merle from the thought

-      that I was anything more to her than to Grace. To both alike I was just a

-      deeply attached friend.&rdquo; He paused a moment, then regarded Tia Teresa

-      fixedly. &ldquo;For my little girl must never know that her father was an

-      outlaw, with a price on his head; yes, with blood on his hands, if it is

-      only the blood of the worthless Thurston breed.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That is no stain&mdash;it is an honor&mdash;it is a duty that you owed,&rdquo;

-       exclaimed the duenna with fervency, her hands clenched against her bosom

-      as she spoke.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You understand&mdash;we understand the vendetta, you and I, Tia Teresa.

-      But the Americanos do not understand. And I have brought up my little girl

-      as an American, for her own happiness I long ago realized. So she would

-      never understand. When she comes to know that her old friend Ricardo

-      Robles was Don Manuel de Valencia as well, she will breathe a gentle

-      prayer of rest for his soul. But she will not be distressed by the

-      knowledge that her father was the bandit and outlaw&mdash;she will not

-      have to face the cruel world with that stigma attached to her name. For

-      that I have contrived, for that I have suffered the dumb agony of

-      childlessness all these years.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And that, in God&rsquo;s name,&rdquo; exclaimed Tia Teresa, &ldquo;is part of the price Ben

-      Thurston, thrice accursed, has to pay.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And tonight will pay,&rdquo; responded Don Manuel, determinedly. &ldquo;But I speak

-      of all this just to put you on your guard. It will be necessary for me to

-      say something to Mrs. Darlington as well. I have brought for her the

-      papers that will establish the rights of Merle and Grace to all I leave

-      behind.&rdquo; As he spoke he touched his coat where the shape of a packet in an

-      inner pocket showed.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Your will?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No. As I have explained, I require no will. The property is theirs

-      already. And I do not need to tell you, my dear Tia Teresa, my beloved

-      friend, that you, too, have not been forgotten.&rdquo; As he spoke he raised her

-      hand and pressed it reverently to his lips.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t speak like that, Don Manuel,&rdquo; she protested.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I know that all I owe to you can never be repaid,&rdquo; he continued, humbly,

-      gratefully&mdash;&ldquo;the devoted life-service for me and for Rosetta and our

-      beloved parents as well.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Again he kissed her hand, and this time she accepted the seal of his

-      high-souled and chivalrous regard. There were tears in her eyes now.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But, Don Manuel, you need not die tonight. Death for him&mdash;that is

-      right. But why for you?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Perhaps not for me&mdash;most certainly,&rdquo; he replied with a little,

-      reassuring smile. &ldquo;Oh, do not imagine that I deliberately court death for

-      tonight. On the contrary, I have all my plans carefully laid. An

-      automobile is ready for the road, and I have a yacht waiting for me at a

-      quiet spot on the coast, and if all is well, by tomorrow&rsquo;s dawn Pierre and

-      I will be on the ocean. No one around here except at La Siesta will miss

-      Ricardo Robles, and if the name of Don Manuel is associated with the death

-      of Ben Thurston, only once more will the White Wolf have strangely

-      disappeared just as he used to do in the old times.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      He was laughing, not loudly, but just with carefree, almost joyous

-      triumph, as he rose to say good-bye.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then, Tia Teresa, if events work out just as I have planned, we may all

-      meet again, somewhere, somehow&mdash;I cannot say more at present. For I

-      shall be happy to see my little girl happy in her married love, and later

-      on I shall close my eyes contentedly when I can feel assured that nothing

-      from the past will ever emerge to spoil her life or bring to her distress

-      of mind.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Tia Teresa, too, had arisen.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;God grant it may be so,&rdquo; she fervently exclaimed. &ldquo;But somehow my mind

-      misgives me. Today I am softened as I have never been before. Even for the

-      sake of our dear Rosetta in Heaven I feel inclined to plead with you to

-      let Thurston go his way and the vendetta be forgotten.&rdquo; And she clung to

-      his arm imploringly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Never!&rdquo; cried Don Manuel, putting her gently but resolutely aside. &ldquo;That

-      can never be, Tia Teresa. You know it. A vow sworn over my wronged and

-      murdered sister&rsquo;s grave, over the graves of my parents as well, must be

-      fulfilled. To break it at the very moment when it is in my power to give

-      it fulfillment would be the act of a coward&mdash;a sacrilege that could

-      never be atoned. No more words like that. I must not even listen.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      She was sobbing as she dropped back into her chair. Her silence was the

-      confession that she was powerless to argue against the unwritten law of

-      the vendetta.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;So I kiss you good-bye for the present, Tia Teresa.&rdquo; He suited the action

-      to the word, and, stooping, saluted her first on one cheek, then on the

-      other. &ldquo;Be your old brave and resolute self again. Where shall I find Mrs.

-      Darlington?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Alone in her boudoir. This is her day for correspondence,&rdquo; replied the

-      duenna, resolutely striving to repress her tears.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then I&rsquo;ll leave you here. Let your best wishes go with me.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Almost lightly he touched her hand and was gone, disappearing among the

-      roses.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Tia Teresa bowed her head across her folded arms. She was thinking not of

-      the past now, but solely of the future.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;How would it all end?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0033" id="link2HCH0033"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XXXIII&mdash;Old Friends

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span>M glad to find you

-      alone,&rdquo; spoke Mr. Robles, as he advanced into the subdued light of Mrs.

-      Darlington&rsquo;s boudoir.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      She was seated at her escritoire. Around her were letters lying open for

-      answer, others sealed and ready for the mail, also sundry books of account

-      which indicated that the chatelaine of La Siesta was a business woman who

-      paid attention to the running of her household and the management of her

-      estate.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Always so pleased to see you,&rdquo; she replied, as she rose to give her

-      visitor welcome.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Pray, keep your seat, Mrs. Darlington. You form an attractive picture&mdash;the

-      lady who is not too much of a lady to neglect her correspondence and her

-      business affairs. And it is about some business matters that I have come

-      to talk with you this evening.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      She smiled pleasedly over the compliment paid in the old-fashioned courtly

-      style of the true Spanish grandee. She herself always suggested the

-      old-time, old-world lady of fashion&mdash;one belonging to the old lace

-      and sweet lavender era that has so nearly passed away.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Business matters?&rdquo; echoed Mrs. Darlington. &ldquo;That sounds quite serious. We

-      have had no cause to talk business for years and years. La Siesta has

-      certainly justified its name.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But even the most pleasant siesta must in time come to an end,&rdquo; he

-      replied with a grave smile. &ldquo;There are things in this world that must be

-      accomplished&mdash;calls of duty that interfere sadly with continuous

-      repose. I am leaving tonight on a journey&mdash;perhaps a long journey,&rdquo;

-       he added slowly and thoughtfully.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, going abroad? The wanderlust again? That&rsquo;s too bad. We shall all miss

-      you so much.&rdquo; She spoke the words with real concern in her tone and in her

-      eyes.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Not exactly the wanderlust,&rdquo; he responded. &ldquo;But there is a certain task I

-      must perform. And it takes me away&mdash;far away from your delightful La

-      Siesta.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And for a long time?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That will be decided by events. I shall write you a long letter when once

-      I am on the ocean. Meanwhile there are certain documents I wish to leave

-      in your charge, my good kind friend.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      He drew the packet from the breast pocket of his coat. &ldquo;They are important

-      papers, and I wish them to be locked in your safe.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Under seal, I see,&rdquo; she remarked, indicating the big circle of wax that

-      closed the cover.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, sealed with my signet,&rdquo; he answered, touching the ring on his

-      finger. &ldquo;But all the same I wish you to know the nature of their contents.

-      That is why I have sought this little private talk.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Silently she settled herself to listen, and he went on:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You are aware that many years ago I sold out all my interests in Spain&mdash;lands

-      and flocks and mines. Well, except for the money I used in building and

-      furnishing my home, I invested the whole amount so realized in British

-      Government bonds. But not in my own name. They stand in the names of Merle

-      Farnsworth and Grace Darlington.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Mrs. Darlington showed some surprise.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Merle, of course. But why Grace, Mr. Robles? I need not tell you that she

-      is already well provided for.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That I fully understand. But I preferred it so. To me both children were

-      very dear, and have always continued to be very dear. There was more than

-      a sufficiency to divide. I wished them to share my patrimony, even though

-      the one might have a greater claim on me than the other. But it was

-      precisely, to guard against such a thought occurring to the mind of any

-      outsider that I have treated Merle and Grace exactly alike. The secret

-      that Merle is my daughter is known only to you and Tia Teresa and me, and,

-      as I have always wished, it must be kept from Merle herself and from all

-      others&mdash;now, more than ever,&rdquo; he added after a little pause.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I have never sought to pry into this mystery,&rdquo; replied Mrs. Darlington.

-      &ldquo;You had valid reasons for it, I well understood. But I was glad for the

-      wee baby&rsquo;s sake to take her to my heart&mdash;the child of the dearest

-      friend of my girlhood days. And it was nice, too, for her to have her

-      mother&rsquo;s maiden name&mdash;Merle Farnsworth. So, from the very first, I

-      loved her just as much as my own baby, Grace.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That I know,&rdquo; said Robles, gratefully touching her hand. &ldquo;I can never

-      adequately thank you for the mother love you have so generously bestowed

-      on my child. And I have always been grateful, too, for the chivalrous

-      manner in which you have never sought to have me explain my actions in

-      this matter&mdash;my virtual separation from the daughter whom, while

-      hiding our relationship, I have loved all through her young life with

-      passionate devotion.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Mr. Robles was deeply moved. He bowed his head and covered his eyes with

-      his hand. In sympathy, Mrs. Darlington also was greatly affected.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You have been the best of fathers to Merle,&rdquo; she said in a trembling

-      voice, &ldquo;even though Merle little dreams of what she really means to your

-      life. But oh, Mr. Robles, how often have I not pitied you when I have seen

-      you restraining in her presence the natural impulses of your heart!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It was my duty,&rdquo; he replied, regaining his composure by stern

-      self-command and sitting erect again. &ldquo;My bounden duty to her,&rdquo; he added,

-      resolutely. &ldquo;So, as you have so kindly done before, we shall leave that

-      subject alone. You call it a mystery. Be it so. Just let it abide a

-      mystery to the end. Now, Mrs. Darlington,&rdquo; he went on in a changed tone,

-      &ldquo;please lock up these papers. If I ever want them again I shall come to

-      you. But if anything should happen to me, the seal is to be broken. You

-      are my trustee. But there is no troublesome will to prove and execute. As

-      I have already indicated, all the property I die possessed of, all the

-      property that is inalienably and rightfully mine, including my home on the

-      hill&mdash;everything is already apportioned between Merle and Grace, and

-      stands in their names by a deed that dates back almost to their days of

-      infancy.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It is unheard-of generosity,&rdquo; protested Mrs. Darlington. &ldquo;I mean so far

-      as Grace is concerned.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Not another word, I beg of you. I have already given valid reasons

-      besides those of affection and gratitude. Now, Mrs. Darlington, let me see

-      you lock up these documents, and my mind will be at rest.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Without further speech she took the packet of papers from his hand,

-      crossed the room, and, standing before a safe inset into the wall and

-      already open, deposited the papers in a little drawer. Then she swung back

-      the safe door, and the click of the combination as she turned the knob

-      told that her visitor&rsquo;s wishes had been fully complied with. Slowly she

-      returned to her seat at the desk.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Thank you,&rdquo; said Mr. Robles, pressing her hand.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then I am not to ask why you are leaving us tonight?&rdquo; enquired Mrs.

-      Darlington.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Please not. I just came to you, as I have many times done before, to

-      speak the little word&mdash;<i>Adios</i>. And it has always been spoken

-      brightly between us, my dear friend. For have I not returned again and

-      again like the proverbial bad penny?&rdquo; he continued with a smile.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And so it will be yet again, I hope,&rdquo; she replied. &ldquo;Bad pennies of your

-      kind, Mr. Robles, are better than minted gold. And you must think of the

-      young people. Engagements should not be too long. Everything is settled so

-      far as Dick and Merle are concerned&mdash;with your full approval?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;With my fullest approval, and to my great joy and peace of mind.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, and you know, too, that it is just the same old story as regards

-      Chester Munson and my little girl.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Munson has so informed me. He wanted my congratulations on his good

-      fortune. Chester Munson is certainly a fine fellow, and Grace could have

-      made no better choice for the bestowal of her love. Again I am filled with

-      happiness at the turn events have taken.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But if there are to be wedding bells for four, their peal will not be so

-      joyous if you are absent, my dear Mr. Robles.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I shall try to be present,&rdquo; he replied, with a little wistful smile. &ldquo;Who

-      knows? Wouldn&rsquo;t it be fine if the wedding bells were to ring in Spain?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No, no, my friend. You forget that all four are young Americans. The

-      honeymoons in Spain, if you like. But the weddings in California, please.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;So be it,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;Then if I cannot get back for the wedding bells,

-      we may have a family reunion during the honeymoons.&rdquo; He laughed almost

-      gaily as he rose. &ldquo;Now, where are our young Americans? I wish to say

-      good-bye to them, too.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Where Dick Willoughby is, I cannot say. But he is safe&mdash;you still

-      assure me of his safety, Mr. Robles?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Assuredly. And I have good news for our dear Merle. Tomorrow Willoughby

-      will be free, with every suspicion removed from his name.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, that will be glad tidings indeed for Merle&mdash;for both the girls.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then let us take the news to them. Where shall we find them?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;As usual, I fancy, in their favorite cosy corner. And Mr. Munson is here,

-      too. He is to have luncheon with us. He said you had given him a day off

-      from his onerous library duties.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Quite correct. I told him I would meet him here, for I have a message for

-      him as well. Come then, let us join the young people.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Again, like the courtly hidalgo, he presented a hand to his hostess and

-      led her from the room.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0034" id="link2HCH0034"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XXXIV&mdash;Heart Searchings

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span>S Mrs. Darlington

-      had anticipated, the trio of young Americans were discovered in the cosy

-      corner. Grace and Munson were engaged in a tête-à-tête that was obviously

-      very delightful to themselves, while Merle at a discreet distance was

-      busily engaged in watering the pot plants and flowers. She was the first

-      to sound a note of warning.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Here comes mother, and Mr. Robles, also, I do declare.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The young lovers started a little apart, and Grace in a moment was

-      demurely busy over a bit of sewing that had been resting undisturbed in

-      her lap during the previous half hour.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Merle advanced toward Mr. Robles.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;This is delightful,&rdquo; she exclaimed, as she warmly shook hands. &ldquo;You will

-      stay to luncheon, of course.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No, my dear. This is to be only a brief visit, I am sorry to say.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Grace had also come forward, and he saluted her in his usual quiet, kindly

-      manner. But for Munson he had a word of sly banter.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Better than drilling a squad or cataloguing musty old books,&rdquo; he

-      remarked, bestowing a significant side glance in Grace&rsquo;s direction.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Infinitely better,&rdquo; replied the ex-soldier and amateur librarian, with

-      frank and unabashed satisfaction.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Mr. Robles took a seat close to Merle.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I came to bring you two pieces of news,&rdquo; he said, taking her hand, yet

-      addressing his words to all the company. &ldquo;First and foremost, by tomorrow

-      the charge against Dick Willoughby will be withdrawn, and he will be a

-      free man.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, that is good news indeed,&rdquo; cried Merle, fairly hugging its bearer.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then they have at last discovered the murderer of young Thurston?&rdquo;

-       enquired Munson in a tone of eager satisfaction.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, or rather he has discovered himself, I believe. Oh, you need not ask

-      me for the name. It will only be made public when Willoughby formally

-      claims his liberty.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I am so thankful,&rdquo; murmured Grace. &ldquo;But of course Dick&rsquo;s complete

-      exoneration was bound to come.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And I am the bearer of a special message to you, Mr. Munson. I have not

-      read it. But it was given to me as the one most likely to get it promptly

-      into your hands.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Speaking thus, he passed over to Munson the hasty scrawl that Dick had

-      written in the cavern and entrusted to Pierre Luzon for delivery.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Munson ripped open the envelope, first scanned the contents, then read

-      aloud:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;On Tuesday night next, about six o&rsquo;clock, meet me at Buck Ashley&rsquo;s old

-      store. I shall want you to ride over to Bakersfield with me next morning,

-      where my acquittal is assured. Give Merle the glad news. Yours, Dick.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That I have already been privileged to do,&rdquo; said Mr. Robles, as he smiled

-      down on the young girl by his side. Their eyes met, and a look of grave

-      earnestness came into Merle&rsquo;s.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And the second item of news, Mr. Robles?&rdquo; she asked, in a low tone. &ldquo;I

-      hope it is also gladsome tidings.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, it is of comparative unimportance,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;Simply that I am

-      going away on a long journey, and may not see all you happy young people

-      again for quite awhile.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Merle&rsquo;s face fell. &ldquo;I am so sorry,&rdquo; she murmured, a note of real feeling

-      in the softly-spoken words.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;As you grow older you will realize that the world is full of partings,

-      Merle,&rdquo; he answered.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But why should there be partings among us?&rdquo; she protested. &ldquo;Now that Dick

-      is free, there is not a shadow on all our happiness. And we do so wish you

-      to share it, Mr. Robles. It will not be just the same if you are gone.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It is very kind of you to think like that.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s just how we all think,&rdquo; interjected Grace. &ldquo;But when duty calls,

-      one must needs answer,&rdquo; replied Robles. &ldquo;Right there is an end to all

-      argument.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And where are you going this time, Mr. Robles?&rdquo; enquired Merle.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;On a long journey&mdash;as far as Europe, I hope. But my plans are not

-      quite certain, except that I start tonight. However, I shall be in

-      correspondence with Mrs. Darlington, and I trust that when you young

-      people come to make that contemplated foreign tour, your footsteps will be

-      turned in my direction. Meanwhile you have, all of you, as you already

-      know, my warmest congratulations and heartiest good wishes.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      As he spoke, Mr. Robles rose. His manner indicated that he wished no

-      further questioning. After a comprehensive glance around, he advanced,

-      first of all, to Munson and extended his hand.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Mr. Munson, you will receive a letter tomorrow that contains an offer for

-      you to continue your work in my library, which I hope will prove

-      acceptable, at least for the present. Grace, my dear, I take the liberty

-      of an old friend.&rdquo; And he kissed her brow. &ldquo;With your mother I already

-      have had a good long talk,&rdquo; he continued, as he pressed Mrs. Darlington&rsquo;s

-      hand and looked into her eyes. &ldquo;And now, Merle, dear, I am going to ask

-      you to gather me some roses in your garden. I want them for a particular

-      purpose, and, as you know, there are no roses like those of La Siesta.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Merle was standing eager and happy to do his bidding&mdash;privileged to

-      have the chance of conferring such a little service on her dear old

-      friend, her friend from the earliest childhood days of her remembrance.

-      With impulsive good-nature, Grace was ready to help as well. But a quiet

-      look from her mother restrained her, and Merle and Mr. Robles passed from

-      the verandah, hand in hand.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      For nearly an hour they wandered among the rose bushes, picking the

-      choicest blooms, talking a little on many things, silent at times, but

-      both happy in each other&rsquo;s companionship. At last Mr. Robles looked at his

-      watch. The hour of parting had come.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Merle had deftly tied the roses in a bunch, and now she placed them in his

-      hands.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;A bouquet from me&mdash;from your little friend Merle,&rdquo; she murmured,

-      with a wistful attempt at a smile.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;From my dear little friend, Merle,&rdquo; he replied, gravely repeating her

-      words as he looked down into her upraised face. It was a beautiful face,

-      in its fresh youthfulness, its eager joy of living, the sublime

-      unconsciousness of self that reveals the spotless soul. For an instant

-      their eyes met.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      During that brief spell Robles&rsquo; whole being trembled. His arms moved as if

-      to enfold the sweet girl to his breast. But with a mighty effort he

-      controlled himself, and he simply kissed her on the brow, just as he had

-      done to Grace in the cosy corner.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;God bless you, Merle, my dear,&rdquo; he murmured as he turned away with a

-      final wave of his hand.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      In a moment he was gone from her view. But the girl&rsquo;s gaze remained fixed&mdash;still

-      directed down the avenue of trees along which the figure of her life-long

-      friend had disappeared. There was a look of dazed wonderment in her eyes.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, can it be so&mdash;could it be so?&rdquo; she faltered, as she raised a

-      hand to hold back the tears.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      An hour later Robles was in the little Mexican churchyard, scattering the

-      rose blooms gathered by his daughter Merle on the graves of the dead

-      relatives whose names she would never know as such. Already there were the

-      flowers that Tia Teresa had that morning brought&mdash;a garland of white

-      arum lilies around the cross that marked the sleeping place of Rosetta,

-      wreaths of rich red carnations on the tombstone inscribed with the

-      father&rsquo;s and the mother&rsquo;s names.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      And now on the turf beneath the memorials Don Manuel, with lingering

-      fingers, dropped the roses here and there, as if to rest with their beauty

-      and their fragrance on the forms of his beloved dead. The last bloom

-      fluttered to the ground. Then, standing erect, hands upraised, no words

-      uttered, but with the unspoken words none the less reverberating through

-      his very soul, he vowed once again the vendetta which he had sworn on the

-      identical spot thirty long years before.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      When he turned to leave the tiny hamlet of the dead, a wonderful

-      transformation had come over his countenance. The placid calm was gone;

-      the fierce fire of implacable hatred and unswervable resolve burned in his

-      eyes. He had bidden adieu to all the softer things in this life. His sole

-      concern now was with the enemy whom he had marked down for death that

-      night.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0035" id="link2HCH0035"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XXXV&mdash;At Comanche Point

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">B</span>EN THURSTON,

-      during the afternoon, seated in his big armchair, had first nodded over a

-      newspaper and then dropped off to sleep. He was awakened by a touch on the

-      shoulder&mdash;rudely awakened, for he jumped to his feet, and in a dazed

-      way glared at the disturber.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Excuse me,&rdquo; apologized Leach Sharkey, &ldquo;but I want to remind you that this

-      is the afternoon when we are to meet that old Portugee I told you about.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I need no reminder,&rdquo; was the gruff reply. &ldquo;I am ready to start when you

-      are. By the way, what&rsquo;s the fellow&rsquo;s name?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;José, he said. He claims to know every nook and corner in the range. Has

-      lived in the mountains for many years; keeps goats and bees, and shoots a

-      mountain lion occasionally, earning the bounty as well as getting the

-      skin.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Shoots,&rdquo; echoed Thurston, somewhat nervously.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, that was in his younger days mostly, I fancy. Today he is a tottering

-      old man who couldn&rsquo;t hold a rifle straight if he tried. But he&rsquo;s well

-      acquainted with the mountains, that&rsquo;s the main thing. He tells me he has

-      known where Dick Willoughby is hiding since the very day after he broke

-      jail.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then why didn&rsquo;t he come to me?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Because he knew nothing about the reward. But at our very first chance

-      meeting among the hills I very soon made five thousand dollars look mighty

-      good to him. By gad, you should have seen his eyes pop and his hands

-      tremble.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It is a fortune for such a man.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s what got him. He has been supplying Willoughby with goats&rsquo; milk,

-      but is paid only two bits a quart. So he grabbed at my bait like a hungry

-      coyote. You have the money ready, I suppose? Treasury bills&mdash;that&rsquo;s

-      what he stipulated for, because he&rsquo;s too frail to hump a sack of gold

-      around.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The money is in that wallet on my desk. You had better carry it.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Sharkey stepped across the room and shoved a fat leather wallet into the

-      breast pocket of his coat.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;So frail, is he?&rdquo; Thurston went on, musingly. &ldquo;Well, I needn&rsquo;t take a

-      gun.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Sharkey smiled. He knew Ben Thurston&rsquo;s timidity in even handling a

-      revolver, and the man&rsquo;s abject reliance on his armed bodyguard.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Not the slightest necessity,&rdquo; assented the sleuth. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve always got my

-      brace of bulldogs ready;&rdquo; and the professional gunman, touching the broad

-      leather belt to which his holsters were attached, grinned complacently.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And no danger to be feared from Willoughby himself, you said?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;None whatever. In fact, he don&rsquo;t have a gun, José declares. So he only

-      sneaks out after dark for a constitutional. The old fellow will take us to

-      the spot where we can grab him by the neck.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That sounds like business,&rdquo; replied Thurston, rubbing his hands. &ldquo;And

-      shoot him down, Sharkey, if he runs.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He won&rsquo;t give us the slip this time&mdash;you can bet dollars to

-      doughnuts on that. But of course he&rsquo;s got to have the chance of hands-up

-      before I fire. Killing is killing, and I prefer the handcuffs. There is

-      really less trouble in the long run.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, perhaps I, too, would prefer to see him hanged,&rdquo; murmured Thurston,

-      with gloating satisfaction. &ldquo;But don&rsquo;t forget that we must get him this

-      afternoon, dead or alive. I&rsquo;m sick of this life of watching and waiting.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The end&rsquo;s in sight at last.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then we&rsquo;ll go back East&mdash;after I have had my revenge. It will be

-      sweeter to me after all the trouble we&rsquo;ve encountered. And by God, we&rsquo;ll

-      drag that Farnsworth girl, too, through the mire. Hell to all of them!

-      I&rsquo;ve never had anyone but enemies around me here.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      While speaking, Thurston reached for his overcoat thrown across the back

-      of a chair.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;All right, we&rsquo;ll start,&rdquo; said Sharkey. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll go and get the horses

-      ready.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      It was about half past three o&rsquo;clock when the riders reached the base of

-      the mountain barrier not far from the entrance to Tejon Pass.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ve got to make it on foot now,&rdquo; remarked Sharkey, as he swung himself

-      from the saddle. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll tether the horses to this manzanita.&rdquo; Thurston

-      dismounted, and while his companion led the animals under the trees, he

-      gazed aloft at the precipice beetling in front of them.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Damn it, I wish you had chosen any other place than Comanche Point,&rdquo; he

-      exclaimed irritably.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;We had to come to the spot where we can find our man,&rdquo; replied Sharkey

-      complacently. &ldquo;It is on the ridge above that Willoughby has his place of

-      hiding. Come along, we have a good stiff climb before us.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      He led the way up the first slope of the winding trail and Ben Thurston

-      followed, reluctantly now, half doubting the wisdom of his having left his

-      home for such an adventure.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Meanwhile there had been two other riders on the range that afternoon,

-      mounted on little hill ponies. The one man was blindfolded; the other rode

-      in advance and guided the second pony by a leading rein. It had been the

-      usual experience to which Dick Willoughby had now become accustomed&mdash;hour

-      after hour along winding, maze-like trails. At last the call had come to

-      dismount, and the bandage had been removed from Dick&rsquo;s eyes. He saw that

-      he was in a little box-like nook in the mountains.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You will remain here,&rdquo; said Pierre Luzon, &ldquo;until I whistle for you&mdash;you

-      know my signal. Zen you will lead ze ponies along zis path. When you come

-      to me, I will put you on ze road for home, and we will say good-bye.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I suppose I may smoke,&rdquo; laughed Dick, philosophically. The day of

-      surprises had left him dulled to any further wonderment.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Sure, smoke,&rdquo; replied Pierre. &ldquo;But remember ze forest regulations,&rdquo; he

-      added with a chuckle, &ldquo;and do not set ze brush on fire.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m no green tenderfoot,&rdquo; laughed

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Willoughby, as he drew his briar-root from his pocket. &ldquo;And it&rsquo;s quite a

-      balmy afternoon for October.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      He sat down and propped his back against a moss-grown rock.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You must not stir from here,&rdquo; continued Pierre. &ldquo;Remember I have to find

-      you again.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Guess I&rsquo;ve learned to obey orders. I&rsquo;m quite comfortable where I am.&rdquo; And

-      Dick started contentedly smoking.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Pierre, following the little path to which he had drawn Dick&rsquo;s attention,

-      pushed through the brushwood and disappeared.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Just ten minutes later Pierre Luzon stood on Comanche Point and gazed down

-      the trail leading up from the pass below.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Zey are coming, zey are coming!&rdquo; he exclaimed eagerly to himself, with

-      finger outpointed in the direction of the two climbers on foot half way up

-      the ascent. Then he slipped back into the shadow of a clump of stunted

-      pines that grew close to the cliff.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Fifteen minutes or so passed. Then the heads of Ben Thurston and Leach

-      Sharkey showed above the final steep ascent that led directly on to the

-      projecting spur known as Comanche Point. Thurston was breathing hard after

-      the difficult climb.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Here we are at last,&rdquo; remarked Sharkey cheerfully, as he glanced around.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Even as he spoke, a tottering figure came forth from among the pines. A

-      few minutes before, Pierre Luzon had been erect and vigorous and nimble on

-      his feet, but now he seemed to be indeed a frail and bowed old man.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I have come,&rdquo; he said, as he approached the figures on the cliff.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Hands up, then,&rdquo; cried the sleuth, half laughing. &ldquo;You remember, I said I

-      would search you for a gun.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I have no gun,&rdquo; Pierre answered, as he halted and elevated his arms.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Sharkey advanced and, without taking the trouble to draw either of his own

-      weapons, ran his fingers with the quick touch of experience over the old

-      man&rsquo;s clothes.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I knew you were on the square, José,&rdquo; said the bodyguard, quickly

-      satisfied. &ldquo;Well, I&rsquo;ve brought the mazuma.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      He drew from his pocket the fat wallet, opening it for a moment to display

-      the wads of greenbacks. Then he put it back again.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Now where is our man?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He is down here, just a little distance,&rdquo; replied Pierre, in a cautious

-      whisper. &ldquo;I am not strong enough to hold him. But you come. Ze boss, he

-      can remain here for ze present.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Ben Thurston had turned away and was looking down into the valley.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll be back in a short time,&rdquo; called out Sharkey.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      But Thurston, if he had heard, made no reply.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Now show the way, old fellow,&rdquo; continued the sleuth, addressing his

-      guide.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      A moment later Ben Thurston was alone.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Alone on Comanche Point&mdash;gazing over the broad sweep of lands that

-      had been his princely heritage, but which he had now lost forever! The

-      valley lay beneath him, bathed in the mellow evening sunshine. But his

-      eyes were riveted on a single spot. And what a transformation scene for

-      the erstwhile cattle king&mdash;this new city with its checkerboard of

-      streets and all around it new homes amid plots of young fruit trees and

-      meadows of alfalfa!

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The whole picture was one of fascinating beauty&mdash;the city itself the

-      finishing touch that gave it human interest. But in Ben Thurston&rsquo;s soul

-      there was nothing but bitterness and disgust. He had kept on complaining

-      that he had been unscrupulously plundered by the Los Angeles syndicate,

-      and with the realization now of what enterprise and enlightened progress

-      could achieve, he began to feel that he had been mercilessly stripped of

-      what was rightfully his. Greed and envy and vain regrets were all

-      commingled in his surge of envenomed thoughts. But avarice predominated.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Good God, to think I parted with the rancho at a beggarly acreage price,

-      when I might have been selling town lots today. There will be a dozen

-      other towns springing up to follow this one.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      In his agony he groaned aloud and covered his eyes with his hands to shut

-      out the hateful sight.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Just at that moment the sound of a twig crackling underfoot smote his ear.

-      He turned round; into his face stole an ashen look of terror as he watched

-      an approaching figure wrapped in a Spanish cloak and crowned by a

-      broad-brimmed sombrero. His haggard eyes asked: &ldquo;Is it man or ghost?&rdquo; He

-      would have screamed aloud, but found himself voiceless from fear.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      At last the figure stood before him with proudly folded arms.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The White Wolf!&rdquo; gasped Thurston, in a faint whisper.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, Don Manuel de Valencia&mdash;the White Wolf, as you choose to call

-      him. And now at last, Ben Thurston, we meet face to face, and alone&mdash;after

-      thirty long years, and without a woman&rsquo;s tears this time to save you!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Ben Thurston sank to the ground, a huddled heap, trembling in every limb.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0036" id="link2HCH0036"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XXXVI&mdash;-Outwitted

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">P</span>IERRE LUZON led

-      Leach Sharkey along the trail. Beyond Comanche Point it dipped again owing

-      to the contour of the mountain, then at a distance of about fifty yards,

-      took a sharp turn round an abrupt face of rock.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Where the hell are you taking me?&rdquo; asked the sleuth, as they approached

-      this bend.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Only a little further,&rdquo; replied the guide, in a feeble quavering voice as

-      he glanced over his shoulder.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The men were only a few paces apart. In the shadow cast by the cliff,

-      Pierre&rsquo;s pallid face with its stubbly white beard looked like that of a

-      veritable ancient, and his bent form and tottering steps completed the

-      picture. The sleuth smiled at his momentary discomposure.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Around the turn, however, Pierre grabbed at a revolver lying ready to his

-      hand on a ledge of rock, and when Sharkey followed, it was to find a hale

-      and stalwart man, erect, alert, with the flash of conscious power in his

-      eyes.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Hands up!&rdquo; cried Pierre, in a voice of stern command. Leach Sharkey was

-      standing three short steps away and was looking now into the muzzle of a

-      big automatic pistol. Over his countenance there stole a sickly smile. But

-      he knew the rules of the game too well to attempt any resistance. His

-      hands went slowly above his head until both arms were fully extended.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;ve got the drop on me all right, José,&rdquo; he murmured, in self-apology.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Face the rock,&rdquo; came the next curt order&mdash;the very tone was

-      reminiscent of old bandit days.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Sharkey obeyed in silence, and in a trice both his guns were withdrawn

-      from their holsters and flung among the brushwood.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You go ahead now,&rdquo; said Pierre, stepping aside to let the other pass.

-      &ldquo;You can drop your hands, but if you cry out or attempt to run, zen you

-      are one dead man.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The discomfited sleuth meekly complied, although there was now a black

-      scowl on his face as he stepped on ahead. In all his professional career,

-      Leach Sharkey had never before fallen so ignominiously into a trap like

-      this.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Not a word was spoken while a distance of some two hundred yards was being

-      traversed. Then Pierre called out the one word: &ldquo;Halt!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Sharkey did not dare even to look round. He stood still as a piece of

-      statuary.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You sit on zat stone over zere,&rdquo; continued Pierre, &ldquo;and do not rise until

-      I give you permission. Now we will proceed to business.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Sharkey sat down as ordered.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Hell, you can have your five thousand dollars right enough,&rdquo; he said,

-      pulling the wallet from his pocket.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No, my friend. I did not bring you here to rob you. I am out on parole,

-      and I never break my word. I am Pierre Luzon!&rdquo; He spoke the name with

-      triumphant pride.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Good God!&rdquo; exclaimed Sharkey, in dumfounded surprise. &ldquo;You belonged to

-      the White Wolf&rsquo;s gang?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I belong now to ze gang. Ze White Wolf is alive!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Leach Sharkey had looked sick before, but a ghastly grey pallor came into

-      his face now.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then he has got hold of Ben Thurston&mdash;at last?&rdquo; he faltered.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, at last,&rdquo; replied Pierre, with a grim smile of joy. &ldquo;Don Manuel and

-      Ben Thurston are alone on Comanche Point just now. Zey will settle old

-      scores&mdash;zat is zeir affair. Now, I attend to my affair.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Sharkey looked up enquiringly, but said no more.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Leach Sharkey,&rdquo; continued the old Frenchman, &ldquo;you are one strong man. You

-      will now take ze handcuffs from your pocket&mdash;I know you carry zem&mdash;and

-      drop zem over your shoulder. Zere, zat is right. I am glad you obey wizout

-      giving me any further trouble. Now, you will hold out your hands, behind

-      your back&mdash;you know exactly how.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Yes, Leach Sharkey knew exactly how. And he also knew what the business

-      end of a big revolver meant, with the forefinger of a daring bandit like

-      Pierre Luzon on the trigger. He was handcuffed and helpless right enough

-      in very short order. For the first time in his life the man who had so

-      often slipped the bracelets on others, found the bracelets around his own

-      wrists.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Next I want ze key of ze handcuffs,&rdquo; Pierre resumed. &ldquo;Which pocket,

-      please?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Sharkey, with a downward thrust of his chin, indicated the waistcoat

-      pocket.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Zank you,&rdquo; said Pierre, as he thrust in his fingers and produced the key.

-      &ldquo;Now, we will throw zis zing away&rdquo;&mdash;as he spoke it went whizzing

-      through the air&mdash;&ldquo;and when you get home to ze rancho, ze blacksmith

-      zere will set you free.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m going home, am I?&rdquo; said the sleuth, considerably reassured.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, Pierre Luzon no longer rob or kill or break ze law. He keep his word

-      of honor always. And I promised to bring Dick Willoughby to you tonight.

-      Now I shall be true to zat promise, too.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      And through his teeth he blew a shrill whistle.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      At the sound Dick Willoughby started up, and shook the ashes from his

-      pipe. Following Pierre&rsquo;s instructions, he led the two ponies along the

-      little trail through the chaparral. Within five minutes he emerged on a

-      broader trail, right at the spot where the Frenchman was standing.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Hello, Pierre!&rdquo; Then Dick&rsquo;s eyes fell on Leach Sharkey, and at the very

-      first glance he saw the shackled hands. &ldquo;But what&rsquo;s the meaning of all

-      this?&rdquo; he asked in bewildered surprise.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It means zat you will take zis man down ze mountains. He came to arrest

-      you, but you can tell him now zat you are one free man. You can show him

-      ze paper which proves it was not you, but Don Manuel, who is responsible

-      for ze death of young Thurston.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Great Caesar!&rdquo; muttered the sleuth, &ldquo;I thought that from the first, but

-      the old fool would not listen to me.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Mr. Sharkey,&rdquo; said Dick, &ldquo;you and I have no quarrel. What Pierre says is

-      true&mdash;I have a sworn affidavit in my pocket, fixing the

-      responsibility for that unhappy affair where it belongs.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I believe you, Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo; replied the sleuth. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m glad you are

-      innocent, but I was only doing my duty in trying to arrest the man charged

-      with the crime.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I understand all that. I bear you no ill will.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And I&rsquo;d shake hands if it were not for these damned bracelets,&rdquo; continued

-      Sharkey.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Pierre, there is no need of handcuffs,&rdquo; said Dick, turning to the

-      Frenchman. &ldquo;Set him free. We will go peaceably home together.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; replied Pierre, determinedly. &ldquo;Leach Sharkey, he is one giant in

-      strength. He will go home as he is. Besides, I have trown ze key away.&rdquo;

-       And he laughed aloud.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Sharkey nodded in helpless admission of his sorry plight.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Too bad,&rdquo; murmured Dick.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And now,&rdquo; continued Pierre, &ldquo;zere is no time to be lost. We will help zis

-      man onto your pony, and you will ride my pony and hold ze leading rein.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But he can&rsquo;t ride with his hands behind his back like that,&rdquo; objected

-      Dick.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, yes, he can,&rdquo; grinned Pierre. &ldquo;Ze good horseman ride wid his knees,

-      and most of ze road you can be by his side and hold him on. And it is ze

-      only way, for ze key, as I have said, is gone.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I suppose we&rsquo;ve got to accept the situation,&rdquo; said Dick, with a glance at

-      Sharkey&rsquo;s lugubrious countenance. The man of strength was obviously

-      crestfallen at his almost ridiculous plight of powerlessness.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Pierre resumed his instructions. &ldquo;You will not go back to Comanche Point,

-      but will take ze mule trail down into ze valley. You know it, Mr.

-      Willoughby&mdash;it is about one mile furzer on.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I know it,&rdquo; replied Dick.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You will leave Mr. Sharkey at the rancho and zen ride to ze place where

-      your friends are waiting for you. Now, zat is all. I must go. We have

-      already said our <i>adios</i>, my dear young friend.&rdquo; Dick grasped the

-      proffered hand and warmly pressed it.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Good-bye, Pierre. I can never thank you enough for all you have done for

-      me. Good-bye.&rdquo; Leach Sharkey was assisted into the saddle, and the

-      horsemen started on their way.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Good-bye,&rdquo; shouted back Dick Willoughby, yet once again.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;<i>Adios!</i>&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      And as the two figures disappeared around a bend, the Frenchman uttered a

-      deep sigh. &ldquo;A splendid young fellow! I wonder shall we ever meet again!&rdquo;&mdash;this

-      was the thought in his mind as for just a moment he stood in an attitude

-      of deep dejection.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Then swinging around, he started back at a run for Comanche Point.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0037" id="link2HCH0037"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XXXVII&mdash;The Dawn of Comprehension

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span>LL through the

-      afternoon at La Siesta, Merle was in a meditative mood. After luncheon

-      Mrs. Darlington had returned to her letter-writing and her book-keeping.

-      Munson and Grace had departed for a walk through the pine woods, after

-      vain but not too strenuous endeavors to get Merle to accompany them. Left

-      to her own resources she had retired to the drawing room, had tried to

-      interest herself at the piano, but after a little while had given up the

-      attempt; and, coiled in a big chair, had surrendered herself to a &ldquo;big

-      think,&rdquo; as she mentally termed it.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      In that momentary searching of the eyes between her and Mr. Robles just

-      before their parting in the rose garden, there had come a flash of

-      revelation to her soul. She had divined a yearning in his gaze that was

-      surely more than the affection of an old and devoted friend. There was

-      passionate tenderness that belied the gentle yet almost perfunctory kiss

-      on the brow that he had finally bestowed at parting. Nor had she failed to

-      notice the restraint which the strong man had imposed upon himself. And

-      strangely enough, her own momentary impulse had been to throw her arms

-      around his neck and kiss him, just as a fond daughter might have kissed a

-      father at such an emotional moment&mdash;on the eve of a long journey, the

-      whither unrevealed, the return all so uncertain.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      She recalled, too, their previous conversation while she was gathering the

-      roses&mdash;his words of kindly wisdom, his little bits of advice that now

-      seemed to be weighted by more than mere friendly interest in her future

-      happiness. Then her mind traveled back slowly, step by step, all the way

-      to childhood days&mdash;a long vista marked by his comings and his goings,

-      his prolonged absences, his unexpected but always welcome reappearances,

-      his numberless acts of thoughtful kindness. Once she had been seriously

-      ill, when a little girl, and the memory of that illness had ever been the

-      memory of his face hovering over her cot, night and day, till the crisis

-      had been passed and she had been on the way to assured convalescence.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      There had always been an air of mystery about Mr. Robles, but she had

-      never sought to penetrate it, instinctively recognizing that there had

-      been some great sorrow in his life, and almost unconsciously accepting the

-      affectionate regard he had lavished on Grace and herself as some sort of

-      consolation for him in his loneliness. She knew that Grace was only her

-      sister in name, but none the less Grace was to her a real sister, just as

-      Mrs. Darlington was a real mother&mdash;the only mother she had ever

-      known. Weaving together now the threads of memory, she became conscious of

-      the mystery in her own life. There was assuredly some fuller story than

-      the story she had been told in the past and had always tacitly accepted&mdash;that

-      her parents had been neighbors and dear friends of Mrs. Darlington in the

-      long ago, and when they had died, the baby girl left behind had been

-      bequeathed to her motherly care.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      At this stage in her ruminations Merle sat bolt upright in her chair. The

-      shadows of evening were beginning to close around her, but the dawn of

-      revelation was in her heart.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Would Mrs. Darlington still be alone in her boudoir? Merle answered the

-      unspoken thought by stealing from the room.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Yes, Mrs. Darlington was at her writing table, lighted now by candles on

-      each side which, covered by little red shades, only dimly illuminated the

-      apartment. Merle flitted in without her coming being observed.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Mrs. Darlington was no longer writing&mdash;her elbows were resting on the

-      table and both hands were covering her eyes in an attitude of deep

-      thought, perhaps of sleep, as Merle for a moment imagined when she had

-      noiselessly gained her side.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Mother dear,&rdquo; she said softly, laying a hand on her shoulder.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You here, my child?&rdquo; exclaimed Mrs. Darlington. There was no trace of

-      slumber in her eyes.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, and I want to have a little talk with you&mdash;all alone,&rdquo; said

-      Merle, as she dropped into a chair, the very chair which Mr. Robles had

-      previously occupied.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The look of vague sadness and anxiety in Mrs. Darlington&rsquo;s face deepened.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What about, dear?&rdquo; she asked.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Merle&rsquo;s mind had been made up, and she came to the issue with point-blank

-      abruptness.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Is Mr. Robles my father?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The startled look on the other&rsquo;s face was almost in itself an admission of

-      the truth&mdash;Mrs. Darlington had been caught off her guard. But she

-      made a desperate attempt to parry the question.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What makes you fancy such a thing?&rdquo; she faltered.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Because there is certainty in my heart,&rdquo; replied

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Merle bravely. &ldquo;It came to me first when he bade me good-bye in the

-      garden. And now I see it in your face.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The young girl dropped on her knees, and, an arm around her mother&rsquo;s

-      waist, gazed up imploringly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Eyes met eyes. Falsehood was impossible in either case. Mrs. Darlington

-      stooped and folded the kneeling girl in a fond embrace. Both were weeping

-      now. No word had been spoken, but Merle knew that she had correctly

-      divined.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      It was a few minutes before there was sufficient self-control for the

-      conversation to be resumed. But then, Merle still kneeling by her side,

-      Mrs. Darlington spoke:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I had promised to keep this secret, dear,&rdquo; she began, fondling the girl&rsquo;s

-      tresses. &ldquo;But you have gained your knowledge apart from me, so I cannot be

-      held to have betrayed my trust. Yes, Mr. Robles is your father&mdash;your

-      loving and devoted father. Your real name is his&mdash;Merle Robles you

-      should always have been called.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And why not?&rdquo; asked Merle. &ldquo;Oh, I am proud and overjoyed to think of him

-      as my father.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Because he has some important reason to have the world think otherwise. I

-      know you will believe me, dear Merle, when I say I do not know that

-      reason. He is too grand and honorable a man for me to have ever pressed

-      for an explanation. I just accepted you as a gift from his hands&mdash;his

-      child and the child of my girlhood chum, named Merle, as you know, like

-      yourself.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;So, if I have solved one mystery, there is still another mystery beyond,&rdquo;

-       murmured Merle.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      She rose, seated herself, and remained silent for a moment, her hands

-      locked across her knees, her brows knit in thought.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But why distress your heart over unknown things?&rdquo; said Mrs. Darlington.

-      &ldquo;As you have learned by your today&rsquo;s experience, mysteries solve

-      themselves in due time.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; replied Merle, &ldquo;but somehow I feel that this is the due time that I

-      should know everything&mdash;for my dear father&rsquo;s sake,&rdquo; she added, &ldquo;not

-      for my own. Oh, mother, you should have seen his face of anguish just

-      before he parted from me this afternoon. It was revealed to me only for an

-      instant. But now I feel sure that something terrible is going to happen&mdash;to

-      him.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      She was sobbing again, as she flung her arms impulsively around Mrs.

-      Darlington&rsquo;s neck and sat in her lap, just as if once again she had become

-      a little child.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, mother mine&mdash;I shall always call you mother mine, for you have

-      been a dear, sweet, kind mother to me ever since I can remember. But don&rsquo;t

-      you see that today I have also found a father whom I deeply love? Nothing

-      must happen to him.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Why should anything happen to him?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I do not know. Where is Tia Teresa?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The question came with startling suddenness as Merle started up with

-      another ray of illumination in her mind.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I haven&rsquo;t seen her since morning,&rdquo; replied Mrs. Darlington.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Nor have I,&rdquo; said Merle, standing erect, wiping away the traces of her

-      tears, and with a few pats adjusting her rumpled hair. &ldquo;That is very

-      strange.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No. I happen to know that this day, the eleventh of October, is always a

-      sad anniversary for Tia Teresa&mdash;the death of some dear friend who

-      lies buried in the little Mexican cemetery on the hill. She has always

-      refused to tell me the story. But early this morning she went, as usual,

-      to place flowers upon the grave.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Flowers&mdash;for a grave!&rdquo; exclaimed Merle. She was thinking of the

-      roses she had gathered that afternoon for Mr. Robles&mdash;for her father&mdash;because

-      he specially wanted the most beautiful blooms. But she did not give her

-      thought to Mrs. Darlington.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It is all so strange,&rdquo; continued Merle. Then her air of decisiveness

-      returned. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll go and see if Tia Teresa is in her room.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Mrs. Darlington was gravely perturbed at this persistency. Oh, if only the

-      mysteries of the past could be left alone, the joys of the present

-      accepted for themselves! Probing into trouble cannot but lead to further

-      trouble&mdash;that, for her, had been the secret of contentment. But she

-      was powerless to intervene. Merle had already departed on her mission of

-      enquiry.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0038" id="link2HCH0038"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XXXVIII&mdash;Exit Leach Sharkey

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>HE ponies were

-      jogging down the trail, Leach Sharkey uncomfortably lurching in his saddle

-      when some sudden bend or dip was encountered, Dick Willoughby

-      good-humoredly holding him on when such emergencies rendered the service

-      advisable if an ignominious fall were to be avoided. There was a song of

-      joy in Dick&rsquo;s heart&mdash;liberty was at hand; he was riding down from the

-      hills to join his loved one again. But there was sullen brooding in the

-      soul of the outwitted sleuth&mdash;growing more sullen with every mile

-      traversed, with every kindness rendered, with the very realization of his

-      own ridiculous predicament and the contrast of his companion&rsquo;s

-      light-hearted happiness.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      At last they reached the foot of the trail, leading on to the road that

-      crossed the plain. At the distance of a few miles the Rancho San Antonio

-      showed amid its clustering shade and orchard trees.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Let us dismount for a bit,&rdquo; suggested Sharkey. &ldquo;I feel all in&mdash;dead

-      beat and tired.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But how will I get you on to your horse again?&rdquo; replied Dick, a trifle

-      dubiously.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, we&rsquo;ll manage that. Please help me down.&rdquo; Dick sprang to the ground,

-      dropped the reins over his pony&rsquo;s head, and soon had Leach Sharkey on <i>terra

-      firma</i>.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;re no light weight to handle,&rdquo; he laughed. &ldquo;By the way, Sharkey, I

-      forgot to ask: Where&rsquo;s your boss this afternoon?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Sharkey eyed Dick curiously.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t know?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Why should I know? It&rsquo;s quite a time since I met the gentleman.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You are aware who Pierre Luzon is?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Certainly. Pierre has come to be quite a friend of mine. He&rsquo;s a good

-      fellow all right.&rdquo; There was a moment&rsquo;s pause. Dick was rolling a

-      cigarette, Sharkey furtively watching every expression on his face.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, the Frenchie played me a dirty trick when he threw that key away,&rdquo;

-       remarked the sleuth, rattling, the handcuffs behind his back.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I guess Pierre was resolved to take no chances,&rdquo; replied Dick, grinning

-      through the tobacco smoke as he surveyed the helpless bodyguard. &ldquo;He only

-      needed a pair of hobbles to complete the job.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      A muttered curse came from Sharkey&rsquo;s lips&mdash;but this was an aside. For

-      Dick he had an insinuating smile.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You might get these blamed handcuffs off all right, Willoughby. Look at

-      that big boulder there. If I set my hands across it, you might hammer

-      through the chain. Or if you have a pistol, that might do the trick.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No, I&rsquo;ve got no pistol,&rdquo; Dick replied.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      He did not notice the gleam of satisfaction in Sharkey&rsquo;s eyes&mdash;the

-      wolfish smile at the corners of his wolf-like teeth. At the moment he was

-      looking around for a convenient stone that might serve as a hammer.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But I think I might break that chain all right with this,&rdquo; he went on, as

-      he stooped and picked up a heavy, sharp-edged fragment of granite from the

-      rock-strewn ground. &ldquo;Come along, then. Set your wrists just here. At

-      least, we can try.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The trial succeeded&mdash;the slender steel strain stretched across the

-      boulder soon yielded to the succession of battering blows.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Sharkey flung his great big brawny arms aloft. He was still wearing the

-      bracelets, but his hands were free.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Feels better, don&rsquo;t it?&rdquo; said Dick, with a sympathetic smile.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;A damned sight better,&rdquo; roared the sleuth, as he turned quickly round.

-      &ldquo;Now, young man, you are my prisoner. I arrest you for jail-breaking.

-      There&rsquo;s my star. I don&rsquo;t say hands up, for I know you haven&rsquo;t a gun.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      As he spoke, Sharkey opened his coat so that the official badge might be

-      displayed.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick in his amazement stepped back, just one pace. Sharkey advanced, his

-      high hands outstretched.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Make no trouble, now. You know I am only doing my duty.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Duty be hanged,&rdquo; cried Dick, as with a swift uppercut he caught his

-      would-be captor on the jaw. Sharkey staggered, and Dick, with a right-arm

-      swing, banged him on the temple, bowling him over like a ninepin.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Sharkey was soon on his hands and knees; then dazed and tottering, he got

-      onto his feet again. But Dick was watchfully waiting, and with sharp jabs,

-      right and left, sent him down once more. The sleuth lay motionless now.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Like a flash Dick grabbed the riata hanging from the saddle-horn of his

-      pony, and without a moment&rsquo;s loss of time had its coils around the arms

-      and chest of the prostrate man, roping him like a thrown steer with all

-      the skill of the trained cowboy. In a brief minute the knots were tied,

-      and with the final clove-hitch the fallen Samson was turned over on his

-      back. Sharkey&rsquo;s eyes opened, glaring dully at his conqueror.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You contemptible hound!&rdquo; exclaimed Dick, as he tossed the loose end of

-      the lariat from him. &ldquo;By God, I&rsquo;ve seen a few low-down things done in my

-      lifetime, but this is certainly the limit. I suppose you would have

-      betrayed me for the sake of the reward, even though you know now for

-      certain that I was wrongfully arrested at the start. You damned Judas! You

-      deserve to be hanged like a horse-thief, Leach Sharkey&mdash;that&rsquo;s about

-      your proper finish.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      And Dick in his righteous indignation glanced around as if in search of a

-      convenient tree for the operation.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll give no further trouble,&rdquo; mumbled Sharkey.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It will be my particular care that you don&rsquo;t,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;Get up, you

-      hulking brute.&rdquo; And grabbing the coils of the riata, he fairly lifted

-      Sharkey to his feet.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Now, I wouldn&rsquo;t shame the pony by putting you on his back again. Follow

-      me.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Picking up the free end of the rope, and gathering the leading rein of

-      Sharkey&rsquo;s horse into the same hand, Willoughby vaulted into his saddle.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Come along,&rdquo; he called out, turning round as the riata came taut. And

-      thus, a dozen paces behind, the sleuth, discomfited again a second time

-      that day, and humiliated worse than ever, followed perforce in his

-      victor&rsquo;s trail.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Perhaps half a mile of the open road was thus traversed, Dick speaking not

-      another word, but looking round occasionally and giving an energetic yank

-      at the rope whenever there was evidence of laggard steps. Sharkey stumbled

-      along, his chin buried in his breast, his eyes half-closed to conceal

-      their dumb, vicious glare of concentrated but impotent fury.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      They had now reached a gate; Dick dismounted and threw it open, pointing

-      the way for Sharkey to take.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s about five miles to the rancho,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know how you&rsquo;ll

-      get through the other gates, but I reckon you can crawl under them, like

-      the snake you&rsquo;ve proved yourself to be. Now, off you go,&rdquo; and with the

-      words he looped the loose end of the riata around the victim&rsquo;s shoulders.

-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s a better necktie than you deserve, Leach Sharkey. If it was any

-      one but myself, you would be helped to a start by a few vigorous kicks

-      behind.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The sleuth shambled through the gateway, with shamed, averted face. With a

-      click the gate was closed. For just a few minutes Dick watched the figure

-      moving away through the now gathering dusk. Then he laid a hand on his

-      saddle-horn.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I hope it&rsquo;s the last I&rsquo;ll see of that animal,&rdquo; he murmured to himself, as

-      he sprang lightly into the saddle. And at a canter he started along the

-      road, the led pony, after a few heel-kicks as if in joy at being relieved

-      of its burden, soon dropping into the swinging stride.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0039" id="link2HCH0039"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XXXIX&mdash;The Fight on the Cliff

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">F</span>OR a few moments

-      Don Manuel contemplated the cowering figure of Ben Thurston in

-      contemptuous silence. His end was accomplished; his enemy was in his

-      power; like the cat with the mouse just a few inches from its paw, he

-      could strike at any moment. He spoke now with measured calm.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Do you remember what day this is? The eleventh of October.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      He paused for a reply. Thurston&rsquo;s lips were parted but remained dumb. Don

-      Manuel resumed:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Thirty years ago this very night&mdash;here at this very spot, you

-      brutally killed my poor little sister, Rosetta.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Thurston shrank back. His lips moved, but no sound came.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Oh, attempt no denial,&rdquo; continued Don Manuel, for the moment clenching a

-      menacing fist over him. &ldquo;You cannot forget the tell-tale button which you

-      snatched from my hand to hide the proof. Nor have I forgotten the lash of

-      your quirt that drew blood from my cheek&rdquo;&mdash;and he wiped his face with

-      the tips of his fingers as if to rub away the memory of the deadly insult&mdash;&ldquo;the

-      very day on which I buried my dear father and mother,&rdquo; he added, in a

-      voice vibrant with emotion.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      He bowed his head; there was another brief period of silence. Then he

-      recovered himself and went on:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The deaths of my beloved parents are just as much on your head, Ben

-      Thurston, as the death of the guileless, innocent, young girl whom you

-      betrayed, and then with coward hands pushed over this cliff, mangling her

-      body on the rocks below. My vengeance has been slow in coming, but after

-      all, I am glad of the delay. For all through these years you have not only

-      suffered the agony of constant fear, but I have lived to see you landless,

-      bereft of the broad rich acres which belonged to my father and were never

-      rightfully yours.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s not so&mdash;my claim was established in the law courts.&rdquo; Thurston

-      managed to articulate the words. The sound of his voice seemed to restore

-      some little measure of courage, for he sat up, and leaning an elbow on a

-      rock, adjusted himself in a more comfortable position. But he did not seek

-      to gain his feet&mdash;the bandit&rsquo;s figure still towered over him.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Law courts&mdash;your American law courts!&rdquo; exclaimed Don Manuel, with

-      ineffable scorn. &ldquo;You know you bribed the judge who gave the decision.

-      Dare you deny it?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Thurston ventured no denial&mdash;his dropped jaw proclaimed his

-      consciousness of guilt.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Nothing was too base for you,&rdquo; Don Manuel proceeded. &ldquo;You robbed,

-      despoiled, destroyed my home. But now at last your hour has come. I have

-      waited patiently for this hour. On many an occasion, Ben Thurston, I could

-      have shot you dead from a distance. But I have waited&mdash;waited&mdash;waited

-      for the time when you would know that it was I, the White Wolf, who was

-      sending you to your doom just as I have already sent your ruffian son to

-      his.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;So it was really you&mdash;who murdered my boy?&rdquo; stammered Thurston.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t call it murder&mdash;it was righteous retribution for both him and

-      you. Oh, I can tell you something tonight, for a secret does not pass from

-      a dead man&rsquo;s lips.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The victim so confidently doomed, shuddered. Don Manuel continued:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Merle Farnsworth is my daughter; your vile and debauched son dared to

-      insult her, and so he died&mdash;rightly died. Yes, at my hands&mdash;I

-      take full responsibility. And I am glad to tell you this before you follow

-      him out of the world. Tonight, Ben Thurston, you go over this cliff&mdash;you

-      die the death you gave to my sister.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      As he spoke, Don Manuel cast loose his Spanish cloak, and dropped both it

-      and his sombrero to the ground.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Thurston at last staggered to his feet.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;So get ready now to fight for your life,&rdquo; Don Manuel resumed, folding his

-      arms across his breast as he surveyed his victim.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But I am unarmed,&rdquo; cried Thurston, pointing to the revolver at the

-      other&rsquo;s belt. His outstretched hand trembled, his voice was a terrified

-      shriek.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then I, too, shall be unarmed,&rdquo; replied Don Manuel, as he unbuckled his

-      belt and tossed it lightly from him. &ldquo;Come along, then&mdash;it is man to

-      man with naked hands.&rdquo; His tone now was one of concentrated passion and

-      hate, and he advanced with arms extended for an enfolding embrace.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Now did Ben Thurston realize that his only chance for life lay in his

-      superior weight, possibly his superior strength. At the thought, craven

-      fear changed of a sudden to the courage of desperation, and like a wild

-      cat he leaped at the throat of his adversary.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Then began a terrible struggle&mdash;two strong men writhing in each

-      other&rsquo;s grip like savage beasts. Soon their clothes were torn, their

-      bodies begrimed with sweat and mud, their faces and naked arms bespattered

-      with blood, for Ben Thurston&rsquo;s nose had been broken in one of the first

-      falls. Thurston, besides his extra pounds, had also the advantage of being

-      younger by a few years. But Don Manuel was in better physical condition

-      and his muscles were like bands of steel. So it was pretty much of a level

-      match in this grim fight to the death.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0011" id="linkimage-0011"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">

-      <img src="images/0305.jpg" alt="0305 " width="100%" /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h5>

-      <a href="images/0305.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>

-    </h5>

-    <p>

-      As they tugged at each other, as each attempted to bear the other down or

-      trip and throw him, as at times, each tried in their locked embrace to

-      crush in his adversary&rsquo;s ribs and squeeze the last breath out of his body,

-      as they milled round and round, swayed and fell and rolled over and then

-      for a moment regained a kneeling or an upright position&mdash;both men

-      realized that it was the one who could last the longest with whom the

-      mastery would rest.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Pierre Luzon, running up the trail, came to the edge of the open space

-      where the desperate contest was in progress. But the onlooker did not

-      attempt to interfere&mdash;he had had his orders; he just crouched and

-      watched the swaying, writhing figures.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      For an hour or more the fight proceeded, at times fast and furious, with

-      breathing spells to follow, during which grips were tenaciously

-      maintained. Points of advantage alternated now to the one side, now to the

-      other, but after each succeeding tussle both combatants were exhausted

-      without victory being pronounced for either. Every vestige of clothing

-      above the belt line had long since been torn away, and they were sweating

-      like lathered horses.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The milling and wrestling had gradually grown weaker, and it was clear now

-      that the final test of endurance could not be much longer delayed. Yet

-      again Don Manuel renewed the attack, and had forced Thurston to his knees,

-      when the latter by a supreme effort raised himself again, and then by

-      sheer weight pressed his opponent back a pace or two. But just at this

-      moment Thurston&rsquo;s strength seemed to give out, for he dropped down

-      sideways, dragging his enemy after him.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Then Pierre Luzon saw the object of the manoeuvre. Thurston had gained the

-      spot where Don Manuel&rsquo;s discarded pistol belt was lying, and now he was

-      reaching out with a disengaged hand to grab the gun.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The Frenchman darted forward.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Keep out of this,&rdquo; cried Don Manuel, peremptorily, although he was

-      breathing hard.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Look out! Your gun!&rdquo; screamed Pierre, as he seized Thurston&rsquo;s wrist in a

-      vice-like grip.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Just an instant too late, however, for Thurston&rsquo;s fingers had already

-      closed round the weapon and it went off with a bang.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Pierre dropped to his knees. It was he who had received the bullet&mdash;through

-      one of his lungs. But he had wrested the pistol from the treacherous

-      villain&rsquo;s grasp and now it fell, still smoking, to the ground.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The wounded man coughed a great mouthful of crimson blood on to the slab

-      of rock. Then he recovered himself and raised his head. Thurston and Don

-      Manuel, even in their weakened state, were fighting more desperately than

-      ever, blinded by hate to every sense of danger, and Pierre was just in

-      time to see them slip on some loosened stones and then, still locked in

-      the death clench, go rolling over the edge of the precipice.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;<i>Mon Dieu! Mon Dieu!</i>&rdquo; murmured the Frenchman. He staggered to his

-      feet and without waiting turned and started down the steep trail,

-      stumbling like a drunken man.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      At the foot of the zig-zag pathway he gazed helplessly around. He would

-      have pushed his way through the brushwood to seek his beloved chief. Dead!

-      He must be dead. No one could have dropped that sheer three hundred feet

-      onto the cruel jagged rocks below and live. Yet, who knows? A tree might

-      have broken the fall&mdash;Don Manuel might still be alive.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Pierre, however, was incapable of further effort. His limbs trembled

-      beneath him, and again he was spitting blood.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      All of a sudden he spied the two horses tethered under the manzanita tree.

-      He tottered toward them, untied the first one he reached, and with

-      difficulty pulled himself up into the saddle.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      To reach Dick Willoughby and get help&mdash;that was the thought in the

-      reeling brain of Pierre Luzon as with a final effort, leaning forward over

-      the saddle, he turned his steed in the direction of Buck Ashley&rsquo;s old

-      store, and urged it to a canter.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0040" id="link2HCH0040"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XL&mdash;Revelation

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">M</span>ERLE paused at the

-      foot of the stairway leading up to one of the towers where Tia Teresa had

-      her room. She deliberated for a moment, consulted the tiny watch on her

-      wrist, then turned to retrace her footsteps.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;There will be plenty of time,&rdquo; she murmured to herself. &ldquo;I shall be best

-      able to manage Tia Teresa when I know still more than I do now.&rdquo; She

-      repaired to her own room and put on her automobile cloak, cap, and veil.

-      Without telling anyone of her plan, she left the house, went to the

-      garage, selected a runabout that was specially her own, and was soon

-      speeding along the highway in the direction of the cluster of hills amid

-      which the little Mexican cemetery was nestled.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      She had been there just once before, several years ago, and she knew that

-      her machine would have no difficulty in ascending the trail. Within less

-      than an hour, indeed, she was at her destination.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      In the grey evening twilight the place looked very dismal and desolate.

-      The tiny adobe chapel in one corner was falling into ruins because of

-      disuse and neglect. A tall rank growth of weeds overran most of the

-      graves. But there were two that showed marks of loving attention, and

-      toward these Merle advanced. Here she found the fresh wreaths around the

-      headstones, and her own roses scattered on the turf.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Hermana&rdquo;&mdash;she read the single word on the white marble cross adorned

-      with spotless arum lilies. &ldquo;Sister,&rdquo; Merle murmured, translating the word.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Then she turned to the big gravestone close at hand, and moved the wreaths

-      of red carnations so that she might read the words inscribed. From these

-      she soon knew that this was the family burial place of the de Valencias&mdash;that

-      here rested the former owners of the San Antonio Rancho, the beloved

-      parents of two children, Manuel and Rosetta.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Manuel,&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Rosetta&rdquo;&mdash;she repeated the names. The latter awakened no memory, but

-      when she filled out the former to &ldquo;Don Manuel de Valencia,&rdquo; she instantly

-      recalled the old-time bandit of whom she had heard many a tale.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;The White Wolf,&rdquo; she murmured eagerly.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, yes. His father once owned the rancho, and that was the cause of the

-      deadly feud&mdash;the Vendetta of the Hills. But I thought all that was

-      forgotten. Yet here are the beautiful fresh flowers.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Seating herself on a flat monument near by, Merle pondered, piecing things

-      together. &ldquo;Sister&rdquo;&mdash;the cross must mark the grave of the girl

-      Rosetta, and have been erected by her brother, Don Manuel. Then whose hand

-      had strewn the roses? Mr. Robles! In a flash she knew that Mr. Robles was

-      Don Manuel.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      And her father, too! The further thought came with such suddenness, with

-      such absolute conviction of certainty, that for a moment she felt

-      appalled. Her father the notorious robber chief, the desperado on whose

-      head a price had been set, the outlaw who had defied the whole state of

-      California to arrest him. Somehow she felt no shame&mdash;Don Manuel de

-      Valencia had been a sort of heroic knight-errant in all the stories she

-      had heard&mdash;his hand only against the rich, his heart always for the

-      poor and oppressed, his attitude toward the intrusive gringos quite

-      justified by the sharp practice whereby he had been robbed of his

-      patrimonial acres. It was this very story of wrong which had been one of

-      the reasons that had from the first predisposed the household at La Siesta

-      to despise the Thurston family at the Rancho San Antonio.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Then from thinking of Don Manuel, Merle&rsquo;s mind passed to Ricardo Robles&mdash;the

-      courteous, dignified, generous, lovable man she had known all her life,

-      the very man whom she had rejoiced that day to call her own father. Don

-      Manuel could be judged only by this standard, and her heart went out again

-      to Mr. Robles, whatever the name which he had formerly worn.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The shadows were closing around her, the night air bit sharply, and Merle

-      arose. Two or three of the rose blooms had fallen beyond the lines of

-      white stones that marked the graves. Merle advanced, and picking these up

-      gently, placed them on the breasts of the sleeping dead. Her own kith and

-      kin! Now she realized how she came to have brown eyes and raven tresses&mdash;the

-      blood of Spain was in her veins. With this thought throbbing in her heart,

-      she left the cemetery and hurried away for home.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Tia Teresa was the only Roman Catholic at La Siesta, a devout member of

-      the faith of her fathers and of her childhood days with which no one

-      around her had ever sought to interfere. Her room was her private chapel,

-      a curtained recess at one end being fitted up with a crucifix, a small

-      altar, and a <i>prie-dieu</i>.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Here Tia Teresa was kneeling and praying, the only light in the apartment

-      coming from the altar candles, when Merle softly tiptoed in, still wearing

-      her automobile cloak. She hesitated to advance, and momentarily turned to

-      withdraw. But Tia Teresa had seen her, and by a gesture had bidden her to

-      remain. For a few moments the old duenna&rsquo;s lips continued to move, then

-      she told another bead on her rosary, arose from her knees, crossed herself

-      devoutly, and with a final prostration before the crucifix, terminated her

-      devotional exercises.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What brought you here, my child?&rdquo; she asked, approaching Merle.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Why are you engaged in prayer tonight?&rdquo; asked Merle, answering question

-      with question.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You know I often pray,&rdquo; replied Tia Teresa. &ldquo;You have seen me many, many

-      times.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, but not at this hour, when you are always with my mother.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;She will be wondering where I am. I had better go to her now.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; rejoined Merle. &ldquo;I wish to speak to you. Come here, Tia Teresa; sit

-      down by my side, and treat me once again as the little girl of the long

-      ago whom you used to pet and fondle.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s very easily done,&rdquo; responded Tia Teresa, with a pleased smile,

-      seating herself on the low sofa close to Merle. &ldquo;Come to my heart, my

-      darling, as in the long ago.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      And the duenna drew the girl to her loving, protecting bosom. She noticed

-      now that Merle was trembling under the influence of some deep emotion.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What is wrong with you, my dear?&rdquo; she asked anxiously.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I have learned many things today, Tia Teresa,&rdquo; replied Merle, taking her

-      old nurse&rsquo;s hands and softly stroking them. &ldquo;First, that Mr. Robles is my

-      father&rdquo;&mdash;the duenna started, but Merle went quietly on&mdash;&ldquo;and

-      that he is really Don Manuel de Valencia, the famous outlaw.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Whoever told you that?&rdquo; fairly gasped Tia Teresa.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No one. I found everything out for myself. After I had looked into Mr.

-      Robles&rsquo; eyes at our parting this afternoon, I knew the truth. It was

-      impossible for mother to deny it, but it is not she who has told me

-      anything. I have just returned from the little Mexican cemetery on the

-      hillside where Mr. Robles, my father, had taken the flowers for which he

-      asked me.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And you saw his flowers&mdash;and my flowers, too?&rdquo; faltered the duenna,

-      realizing now how Merle had gleaned her knowledge.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes; I inferred that the wreaths were yours, and of course I knew that

-      the scattered roses were from my father. He is Don Manuel. But I want you

-      to tell me a little about Rosetta.&rdquo; It was Merle now who put her arms

-      around Tia Teresa and drew her affectionately to her.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You have always loved me, you know, my dear,&rdquo; the girl went on coaxingly.

-      &ldquo;Now I understand why you were so deeply attached to Mr. Robles, for you

-      told me once that you had nursed Don Manuel. And that is why I have been,

-      perhaps, just a little closer to you than Grace&rdquo;&mdash;the pressure of Tia

-      Teresa&rsquo;s arms told that Merle had correctly divined&mdash;&ldquo;because I was

-      of the blood of your old master. But why has there been all this secrecy

-      toward me?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Don Manuel&rsquo;s name could not be revealed&mdash;he had been outlawed.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And Rosetta&mdash;tell me about Rosetta?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;She was the real cause of the feud between Mr. Thurston and Don Manuel.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The duenna had spoken the words before she had realized how much they

-      told. With unfaltering intuition Merle guessed their meaning.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You mean to tell me that Thurston wronged Rosetta&mdash;betrayed her?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Tia Teresa nodded assent&mdash;she was too deeply agitated to speak

-      another word.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And this day&mdash;the eleventh of October&mdash;the day when you

-      decorate her grave?&rdquo; enquired Merle, in a tone and with a look that

-      compelled an answer.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Is the day she was found dead on the rocks below Comanche Point,&rdquo; replied

-      Tia Teresa.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      At the same moment the duenna started to her feet. A wonderful and

-      terrible transition came over her usually placid countenance. Her eyes

-      fairly blazed with mingled fury and hatred. Her fists were clenched by her

-      side. Her whole frame trembled.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Murdered by Ben Thurston!&rdquo; she added, the words hissing like hot lava

-      from her lips.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Murdered?&rdquo; cried Merle, incredulously. She too, had risen.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, pushed over the cliff by his coward hands. His torn coat, one of the

-      buttons between her dead fingers, proclaimed his guilt before God and man.

-      But there was no justice in the land in those days&mdash;the days when the

-      gringos broke up our Spanish homes. Now you know everything&mdash;that was

-      the real reason of the Vendetta of the Hills.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Tia Teresa was calm again&mdash;it was Merle who was deeply agitated, too

-      deeply agitated for a moment to speak.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      The duenna went on triumphantly. &ldquo;But the vendetta once sworn will always

-      be fulfilled. Tonight at Comanche Point&mdash;&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Then she stopped short, as she saw the look of terror and horror on

-      Merle&rsquo;s pale face.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Tonight?&rdquo; queried the young girl tremulously. &ldquo;They meet tonight? Then

-      that is where Mr. Robles is going&mdash;that is why he bade us all that

-      sad good-bye? My father, oh, my dear father!&rdquo; And dropping down again on

-      the sofa, she burst into a passion of weeping.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Tia Teresa sought to soothe her. But Merle was not to be comforted. Yet

-      while she sobbed she was thinking, for suddenly she rose again and dashed

-      away her tears.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;At what hour tonight?&rdquo; she asked.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I do not know,&rdquo; answered the duenna.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Then he is in danger&mdash;perhaps at this very moment he is in danger.

-      Don Manuel&rsquo;s life&mdash;my father&rsquo;s life is worth a hundred lives of such

-      a man as Ben Thurston. Quick, quick, Teresa. Get your mantilla and cloak.

-      My runabout is in readiness. There, let me help you.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Merle was speaking with swift insistence.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Where are you going?&rdquo; whispered Tia Teresa, as the girl&rsquo;s fingers were

-      buttoning her cloak.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;To Comanche Point. We may not be too late to save him.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      A minute later the two women had stolen down the narrow stairway of the

-      tower and were speeding through the gathering darkness of the night.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0041" id="link2HCH0041"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XLI&mdash;Beneath the Precipice

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">W</span>ILLOUGHBY had

-      found his friends Munson and Jack Rover at Buck Ashley&rsquo;s old store,

-      eagerly awaiting his coming, with a fine supper sizzling on the cook

-      stove, prepared in Jack&rsquo;s finest professional cowboy style.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ve got to feed you up a bit, I reckon,&rdquo; grinned Jack, as he slipped

-      the Gargantuan slab of beef-steak from the griller on to the big hot dish

-      waiting for its reception.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And some potatoes, too,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;not forgetting the fried onions

-      that beat all your newfangled sauces to a frazzle.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick was nothing loth to fall to. He had been too excited to do more than

-      taste the midday meal that Pierre Luzon had prepared for him in the

-      cavern. It had been a long hard day, and now he was hungry as a wolf. In

-      ordinary circumstances he had no objection to fried onions, but, with

-      delicate regard for possible contingencies, he left to the others a

-      monopoly over this item in the bill-of-fare.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      There were so many things to talk about that it was a difficult matter to

-      know where to begin. But at the close of the meal Jack Rover solved the

-      question by sweeping the supper things from the table, and emptying

-      thereon the contents of one of the bags of gold.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Good old Guadalupe!&rdquo; exclaimed the delighted cowboy, as he patted the

-      nuggets with a loving hand. &ldquo;I always told you that the ancient squaw had

-      a real gold mine. I guess we&rsquo;ll be able to stake out our claims tomorrow,

-      eh, Dick, my boy?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m afraid not,&rdquo; smiled Willoughby. &ldquo;The fact is that, although I helped

-      to wash out that gold, I have not the faintest idea where the riffle is up

-      among the hills.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Jack&rsquo;s face fell. There was a moment of disappointed silence, and just

-      then there came the sound of a faint tapping at the outer door.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What&rsquo;s that?&rdquo; asked Munson. The faces of all three showed that they had

-      heard simultaneously.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick rose, crossed over, and threw the door wide open.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;My God, who&rsquo;s this?&rdquo; he asked, as he stooped over the figure lying prone

-      across the steps. &ldquo;Pierre, Pierre!&rdquo; he added, as he turned over the face.

-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s Pierre Luzon, boys, and desperately wounded!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The others were pressed together in the doorway.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Looks as if he had crawled here on his hands and knees,&rdquo; remarked Munson.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;There&rsquo;s his horse out among the chaparral,&rdquo; exclaimed Jack, pointing to

-      the shadowy form of the animal from which the wounded man had obviously

-      tumbled.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Stand clear,&rdquo; cried Dick, gathering up Pierre in his arms. &ldquo;He has

-      fainted, but is still alive.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      And Dick, carrying the senseless form, passed into the bedroom beyond the

-      living room, and there laid poor old Pierre on the very cot which he had

-      occupied once before&mdash;on the eventful night when Tom Baker had

-      brought the paroled convict from San Quentin.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      A few drops of whisky brought the wounded man back to consciousness. Dick

-      leaned over him and caught the faintly whispered words. Piérre was

-      speaking in the French of his childhood days.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He is dead&mdash;he is dead! At last Rosetta is avenged!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick motioned his companions to silence. He bent down close to the dying

-      bandit.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Who is dead, Pierre? Ben Thurston?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, yes. Ben Thurston. Glory be to God! Don Manuel is avenged!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And how did you come to be shot, Pierre? Where is Don Manuel?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Dead&mdash;dead, too!&rdquo; The wounded man this time cried out the words and

-      struggled to sit up. His eyes opened wide, and fastened themselves on

-      Dick. His voice again dropped to a whisper; he was speaking lucidly now.

-      &ldquo;But perhaps he lives. Who knows? Go and save him, Dick&mdash;Don Manuel&mdash;go,

-      go.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Exhausted, Pierre sank back on the pillow. His eyes closed. The death

-      rattle was in his throat. &ldquo;Where is he&mdash;where shall I find Don

-      Manuel?&rdquo; Dick uttered the words close to Pierre&rsquo;s ear. He alone caught the

-      faint answer. Pierre Luzon was dead.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He&rsquo;s gone, Chester,&rdquo; said Dick, standing erect. Munson stooped, put his

-      ear to Pierre&rsquo;s breast, then pressed apart one pair of the eyelids.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, it&rsquo;s all over,&rdquo; he said solemnly, as he folded the coverlet over the

-      already marble-like face.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      In stricken silence the three men passed to the outer room, shutting the

-      door softly behind them.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What&rsquo;s happened?&rdquo; asked Jack Rover, &ldquo;I couldn&rsquo;t catch his bloomin&rsquo;

-      lingo.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Something terrible. There has evidently been a fight to the death on

-      Comanche Point between Ben Thurston and Don Manuel. Looks as if both of

-      them had gone over the cliff in the struggle.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Gee!&rdquo; muttered the cowboy.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick remained just a moment in deep thought. His plan of action was

-      promptly decided on.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Munson, old man, you saddle my pony, and ride to Tejon for help. Jack,

-      you remain here with the body.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;And with the nuggets,&rdquo; remarked the cowboy drily.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick paid no heed to the interruption. He continued:

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll take the horse outside, and ride back to Comanche Point. That&rsquo;s the

-      best we can do, and the main thing is to do it quickly. Pass me that flask

-      of whisky&mdash;it may come in handy. I&rsquo;m off now, boys. You&rsquo;ll find me at

-      the cliff. Bring a doctor, Ches. So long!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The moon had now risen, and while Dick was galloping toward Comanche Point

-      from the one direction, the runabout, with Merle at the wheel and Tia

-      Teresa by her side, was speeding from the other end of the valley toward

-      the same destination. The horseman was the first to arrive.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Willoughby had no need to search long beneath the precipice. A loud,

-      continuous cry of lamentation guided him to the spot. There, wailing over

-      the corpse of Don Manuel, was the old Indian squaw, Guadalupe. Even in

-      death the two bodies were locked in each other&rsquo;s embrace, and Dick noted

-      with horror that Ben Thurston&rsquo;s teeth were buried in the flesh of his

-      enemy&rsquo;s shoulder. Guadalupe was in the act of trying to separate the dead

-      men when Dick intervened.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Great heavens, what a withered, aged face was raised toward his own! It

-      was the first time he had ever seen Guadalupe unveiled and at close

-      quarters. Her cheeks were wrinkled into a hundred folds; her eyes were

-      sunken in deep cavernous hollows. When he touched her, she rose and,

-      jabbering furiously for all the world like an angry ape, reviled him with

-      curses, her meaning unmistakable, although she spoke in some strange

-      Indian tongue.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Just then Dick caught the distant chug-chug of the automobile. He looked

-      up the valley, wondering who might be passing at that hour of night. This

-      was not the main highway; nobody ever came to Comanche Point after dark.

-      Some intervening spur of the foothills dulled the sound; all was still and

-      silent.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      He became conscious that Guadalupe&rsquo;s fury had spent itself, and turned

-      round. The squaw was gone. His eyes searched the scrub; at one place he

-      saw the twigs bending, and he even fancied he could detect the outline of

-      the white wolf gliding away through the brushwood. But that was all.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Again the sound of the automobile smote his ears; louder now, and only a

-      few hundred yards away he beheld the headlights sweeping toward the spot

-      where he stood. He resolved to intercept the vehicle and stepped across

-      the belt of chaparral that intervened between him and the roadway. Gaining

-      the thoroughfare, he called aloud and the machine slowed down.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      But what was his utter amazement when Merle jumped&rsquo; from the runabout. To

-      her there could be no more surprises on this night of surprises.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Dick,&rdquo; she exclaimed, as she accepted his embrace almost as a matter of

-      course.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;How do you come to be here, Merle, my darling?&rdquo; he asked, holding her in

-      his arms.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Something terrible is going to happen. I have come to try to prevent it.

-      Have you seen Don Manuel?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Don Manuel!&rdquo; He repeated the name in great surprise.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Mr. Robles is Don Manuel,&rdquo; she gasped by way of explanation.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I am aware. He told me so today.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Well, where is he now? And his enemy, Mr. Thurston?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick still had an arm on her shoulder. She was gazing up into his face,

-      her voice trembling with emotion as she breathlessly plied him with her

-      questions.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;You have come too late, dearest,&rdquo; Willoughby gently replied.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Dead!&rdquo; she exclaimed.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Both are dead. They fought and rolled over the precipice. I have just

-      found their bodies lying in the chaparral back there.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Merle leaned forward, sobbing on his breast.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Take me to him, take me to him,&rdquo; she cried.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No, Merle, my dear. It is better not. You must go home. Tia Teresa,&rdquo; he

-      added, addressing the duenna who had drawn near, &ldquo;she must go home. Munson

-      has gone to Tejon for help. There will be people arriving here very soon

-      now.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;He is really dead&mdash;Don Manuel?&rdquo; asked Tia Teresa in a voice of awed

-      sadness.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;There can be nothing but the one answer,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;Don Manuel has

-      passed on.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Take me to him,&rdquo; moaned Merle.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;No, no, Merle. This is no sight for you.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;But, Dick, Dick, don&rsquo;t you know one other thing?&rdquo; she pleaded, raising

-      her tearful eyes.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;What other thing?&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Don Manuel&mdash;was my father&mdash;my dear, dear father.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Again Willoughby was overwhelmed with amazement.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Your father?&rdquo; he murmured.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Yes, I only came to know it today. So, Dick, dear, even though he is

-      dead, let me kiss him now, let me kneel by his side and tell him that I

-      loved him, and will always love and revere his memory. Let me watch by him

-      until the others come.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Dick drew the sobbing girl close to him. His eyes sought those of Tia

-      Teresa. He shook his head, telling the duenna in an unmistakable way that

-      Merle must be taken home&mdash;that she must not be shocked by the

-      gruesome spectacle hidden in the chaparral.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Even as their eyes met, the faint throb of an automobile was heard, and

-      glancing across the plain Dick saw the far-away headlights twinkling like

-      twin stars. With a gesture he directed Tia Teresa&rsquo;s attention to the

-      coming help.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;I shall watch by our beloved dead one,&rdquo; said the duenna. &ldquo;My place is by

-      his side. Come, dearie,&rdquo; she went on, placing an arm around Merle&rsquo;s waist.

-      &ldquo;Mr. Willoughby will drive you back to La Siesta, and I shall see that

-      your father&rsquo;s body is taken to his home. There we shall pay all honor to

-      the dead.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Together they led Merle, unresisting now, to the runabout. Dick got in

-      beside her, and took the wheel.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;They will be here very soon now,&rdquo; he said to Tia Teresa. &ldquo;Mr. Munson will

-      give you all the help you require. I&rsquo;ll look after Merle.&rdquo; He backed the

-      machine, turned, and the little red light swept up the roadway into the

-      distance. From across the valley the headlights of a big automobile were

-      now glaring like flashing suns in the soft moonlight.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      It was the hands of Tia Teresa that separated the bodies. That of Ben

-      Thurston she flung from her as if it had been carrion for the buzzards and

-      coyotes. Then she knelt down and stroked with loving hand the brow of Don

-      Manuel. On the dead face was a look of ineffable calm.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      &ldquo;Manuel, my Manuel, the little child I nursed! My beautiful, brave

-      Manuel!&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      Thus lamenting, she awaited the coming of Munson and his friends.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br />

-    </p>

-    <hr />

-    <p>

-      <a name="link2HCH0042" id="link2HCH0042"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div style="height: 4em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h2>

-      CHAPTER XLII&mdash;Wedding Bells

-    </h2>

-    <p class="pfirst">

-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span> FULL year had

-      passed, and the good people of Tejon had at last ceased to speak daily

-      about Dick Willoughby&rsquo;s exciting adventures, Ben Thurston&rsquo;s inglorious

-      death, and the romantic and now indubitable ending of the famous outlaw,

-      Don Manuel.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Both the victims of the desperate fight on Comanche Point had been laid to

-      rest&mdash;Don Manuel, in the little Mission churchyard above the hill,

-      side by side with the beloved sister of his youthful days, whose betrayal

-      and death he had at last avenged, although at the cost of his own life;

-      Ben Thurston, in the modern cemetery beside his son, the poor weak youth

-      in whom the once sturdy family of pioneers had sunk to final decadency.

-      Pierre Luzon, the brave and chivalrous old Frenchman, slept near the grave

-      of the chief he had served so loyally, and, according to the old-time

-      bandit code of ethics, so nobly and so well. In the God&rsquo;s acres where all

-      feuds pass to oblivion there was perfect peace.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Sing Ling had unobtrusively departed for China, a wealthy man, as the bank

-      manager at Bakersfield could have told, no doubt destined to become a

-      leading magnate in the Flowery Land. Guadalupe was never seen again; the

-      aged squaw had probably died in her secret cave. The white wolf, too, had

-      perished; a cowboy riding the range had been attracted by some buzzards

-      flying and circling round and round far up on the mountain side, and on

-      making his way to the indicated spot, had found the animal&rsquo;s carcass

-      picked almost to the bones. The old days were forever gone.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      But in the beautiful city of Tejon a glorious era of happiness was in

-      progress. Christmas-tide had come round again, and had been made gay with

-      a tournament of roses, and then with the dawning of the New Year had

-      followed a round of festivities in honor of the double wedding of Dick

-      Willoughby and Merle Farnsworth, Chester Munson and Grace Darlington.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      In no place was there more sincere and hilarious rejoicing than in the

-      back parlor of Buck Ashley&rsquo;s fine new store, where the mystery keg,

-      sacredly reserved for this great occasion, was once more on tap and the

-      postmaster, assisted by Tom Baker and Jack Rover, dispensed hospitality to

-      a few chosen friends. But all good things come to an end, and it was with

-      a regretful sigh that the sheriff squeezed out the last few drops from the

-      tilted keg and sipped for the last time &ldquo;the blessed nectar&rdquo; that had

-      served to keep green the memory of &ldquo;dear old Pierre.&rdquo;

-     </p>

-    <p>

-      The marriage ceremonies had been performed in a fine little church that

-      sheltered all denominations in the new town, and amidst a shower of rice

-      and old shoes the happy couples had departed for the wedding breakfast at

-      La Siesta.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      To Merle the day was one of blissful joy, but of tender regrets as well.

-      During the quiet afternoon hours she and Dick had conversed about their

-      dear old friend, Mr. Robles&mdash;the gallant and chivalrous Don Manuel&mdash;the

-      beloved father whose identity as such was known only to their own two

-      selves besides Mrs. Darlington and Tia Teresa.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      And now the hour of departure on the honeymoon trail had come. The idea of

-      a trip to Europe had been abandoned for the present. The young couples

-      were going up among the Canadian Rockies, by divergent routes which would

-      meet a little later on, and all were full of enthusiasm at the thought of

-      seeing the mighty mountains in their wintry grandeur.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      Mrs. Darlington accompanied the young people to the railway station, but

-      Tia Teresa was too deeply affected to trust herself away from home. Merle

-      had kissed her a tender good-bye in the apartment in the tower, and,

-      despite the joyful promise that they would soon meet again, had left the

-      old duenna in prayerful tears before her little altar.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      At last they were pulling out from the depot, where the church crowd of

-      the morning had reassembled in full force, with fresh supplies of

-      good-luck munitions.

-    </p>

-    <p>

-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0012" id="linkimage-0012"> </a>

-    </p>

-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">

-      <img src="images/0371.jpg" alt="0371 " width="100%" /><br />

-    </div>

-    <h5>

-      <a href="images/0371.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>

-    </h5>

-    <p>

-      Thus, like a disbanding company of players, the actors in this tale of

-      California, pass into history. The olden days of bandits are no more,

-      while the hatred of the gringo is only a tradition. The broad acres of the

-      San Antonio Rancho no longer lie comparatively fallow in Nature&rsquo;s pasture,

-      but are tilled by the thrifty plowman as he labors afield with fullest

-      confidence of a bountiful reward. Meanwhile, the mountains that look down

-      upon the beauteous valley guard their secret well. But searching eyes will

-      yet, undoubtedly, sometime, somewhere, rediscover the mysterious cavern

-      with its hoarded millions of loot, stored by the rapacious hands of

-      Joaquin Murietta, the White Wolf, and their brigand bands, its lake of oil

-      from which outlaws fed their lamps, and its subterranean river from whose

-      shallow riffles Guadalupe, and Dick Willoughby also, gathered a wealth of

-      golden spoil.

-    </p>

-    <h3>

-      THE END

-    </h3>

-    <div style="height: 6em;">

-      <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />

-    </div>

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-<pre>

-

-

-

-

-

-End of Project Gutenberg&rsquo;s A Vendetta of the Hills, by Willis George Emerson

-

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diff --git a/old/old/old-2024-04-09/52289-0.txt b/old/old/old-2024-04-09/52289-0.txt
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-
-
-Project Gutenberg's A Vendetta of the Hills, by Willis George Emerson
-
-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
-most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
-whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
-of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at
-www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll
-have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using
-this ebook.
-
-
-Title: A Vendetta of the Hills
-
-Author: Willis George Emerson
-
-Illustrator: A. Hutchins
-
-Release Date: June 9, 2016 [EBook #52289] Last Updated: August 2, 2016
-
-Language: English
-
-Character set encoding: UTF-8
-
-*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A VENDETTA OF THE HILLS ***
-
-
-
-
-Produced by David Widger from page images generously provided by the
-Internet Archive
-
-
-
-
-A VENDETTA OF THE HILLS
-
-By Willis George Emerson
-
-Author of “The Treasure of Hidden Valley,” “Buell Hampton,” “The
-Builders,” etc.
-
-Illustrated by A. Hutchins
-
-Boston: The Chappie Publishing Company, Ltd.
-
-1917
-
-
-
-TO MY WIFE BONNIE O’NEAL EMERSON
-
-
-Our enchanting years of pleasure, dear, are speeding all too fast,
-
-As our ever-fleeting joys become blest mem’ries of the past.
-
-Heaven’s blessings, glad and golden, strew with bliss the paths of life
-
-When a sweetheart, fond and cheery,
-
-Has her “hubby” for her dearie,
-
-And her “hubby” has a sweetheart for his wife.
-
-—The Author.
-
-January 18, 1917.
-
-
-
-
-
-CONTENTS
-
-CHAPTER I—Guadalupe
-
-CHAPTER II—Charmed Lives
-
-CHAPTER III—Feminine Attractions
-
-CHAPTER IV—Back to the Soil
-
-CHAPTER V—At La Siesta
-
-CHAPTER VI—The Quarrel
-
-CHAPTER VII—Old Bandit Days
-
-CHAPTER VIII—A Letter from San Quentin
-
-CHAPTER IX—Tia Teresa
-
-CHAPTER X—The Home of the Recluse
-
-CHAPTER XI—A Rejected Suitor
-
-CHAPTER XII—The Sped Bullet
-
-CHAPTER XIII—Accused
-
-CHAPTER XIV—Entanglements
-
-CHAPTER XV—Behind the Bars
-
-CHAPTER XVI—Pierre Luzon Returns
-
-CHAPTER XVII—The Bitter Bit
-
-CHAPTER XVIII—Elusive Riches
-
-CHAPTER XIX—The Jail Delivery
-
-CHAPTER XX—In the Cavern
-
-CHAPTER XXI—A Debt of Honor
-
-CHAPTER XXII—Underqround Wonders
-
-CHAPTER XXIII—The Unexpected Visitor
-
-CHAPTER XXIV—In a Tight Corner
-
-CHAPTER XXV—Love and Revenge
-
-CHAPTER XXVI—A Date is Fixed
-
-CHAPTER XXVII—Among the Old Oaks
-
-CHAPTER XXVIII—The Prize Winner
-
-CHAPTER XXIX—-The Rendezvous
-
-CHAPTER XXX—Don Manuel Appears
-
-CHAPTER XXXI—Shadows of the Past
-
-CHAPTER XXXII—Forebodings
-
-CHAPTER XXXIII—Old Friends
-
-CHAPTER XXXIV—Heart Searchings
-
-CHAPTER XXXV—At Comanche Point
-
-CHAPTER XXXVI—-Outwitted
-
-CHAPTER XXXVII—The Dawn of Comprehension
-
-CHAPTER XXXVIII—Exit Leach Sharkey
-
-CHAPTER XXXIX—The Fight on the Cliff
-
-CHAPTER XL—Revelation
-
-CHAPTER XLI—Beneath the Precipice
-
-CHAPTER XLII—Wedding Bells
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER I—Guadalupe
-
-IT was a June morning in mid-California. The sun was just rising over
-the rim of the horizon, dissipating the purple haze of dawn and bathing
-in golden sunshine a great valley spread out like a parchment scroll. It
-was a rural scene of magnificent grandeur—encircling mountains, rolling
-foothills, and then the vast expanse of plain dotted here and there with
-clumps of trees and clothed with luxuriant grasses.
-
-Thousands of cattle were bestirring themselves from their slumbers—some
-sniffing the air and bellowing lowly, others paving the earth in an
-indifferent way, and all moving slowly toward one or other of the
-mountain streams that wound serpent-like through the valley, as if they
-deemed it proper to begin the day with a morning libation.
-
-To the south, commanding a narrow pass that pierced the Tehachapi
-mountain range, stood old Fort Tejon, dismantled now and partly in
-ruins, picturesque if no longer formidable—a romantic relic of old
-frontier fighting days. In the foreground of the crumbling adobe walls,
-sheltered under giant oaks, was a trading store and postoffice combined.
-
-Within this building half a dozen men were in earnest conversation,
-swapping yarns even at that early hour. Perhaps they, too, like the
-cattle, had felt the call for their “morning’s morning.”
-
-A young army officer, Lieutenant Chester Munson, was telling of a rough
-experience he had had a few days before with a mountain lion in one of
-the near-by rugged canyons.
-
-The story was interrupted by a sound of galloping hoofs.
-
-“Here’s Dick Willoughby,” someone announced.
-
-The rider brought his mustang to a panting stop, threw the bridle rein
-over its head, and, leaping lightly from his saddle, entered the store.
-
-Dick Willoughby was a tall, athletic, square-jawed, grey-eyed young
-fellow who looked determinedly purposeful. He was originally an
-architect from New York City, but during the last five years had become
-an adopted son of the West—had made the sacrifice, or rather gone
-through the improving metamorphosis, of assimilation.
-
-“Good morning, Ches, old boy,” he shouted to the lieutenant.
-
-The latter returned the salutation with a friendly nod.
-
-“The camp was lonely without you last night, Dick,” he said. “Who is the
-fair senorita that keeps you away?”
-
-“That’s all right,” replied Willoughby, smiling. “I will tell you
-later.” Then after a genial allround greeting for the others present, he
-eagerly exclaimed: “Boys, she is coming.”
-
-“What! Guadalupe?” shouted everyone in chorus of surprise.
-
-“Yes, Guadalupe is headed this way. I spied her on the mountain trail
-an hour ago, and thanks to my field glasses, was able to determine the
-moving speck was none other than the old squaw herself. She is just
-beyond yon clump of trees and will be here shortly.”
-
-“I am wonderin’ if she’s got her apron filled again with them there gold
-nuggets,” remarked Tom Baker inquiringly, while a smile flitted over
-his grey-bearded countenance. “That squaw is a regular free-gold placer
-proposition.”
-
-“She would have been held up before now in the old days, eh, sheriff?”
-laughed one of the cowboys. Tom Baker had been sheriff for a long term
-of years in early times, and, although no longer in office, the title
-had still clung to him.
-
-“By gad!” exclaimed Jack Rover, another cowboy, and a gentlemanly young
-fellow in manner and appearance. “She’s not going to get back to her
-hiding-place this time, nor to that will-o’-the-wisp placer gold mine of
-hers unless she shows me.”
-
-“That will do for you,” said Dick Willoughby with an admonishing look.
-“Don’t you forget that Guadalupe, although an old Indian squaw, is also
-a human being. There is going to be no violence if I can prevent it.”
-
-“Well,” laughed Jack, pushing his hat back as if to acknowledge that he
-had been checkmated, “you’re my boss on the cattle ranch, and I’ll have
-to take your tip, I guess.”
-
-“I say, Dick,” asked the other cowboy, “did you see anything of the
-white wolf?”
-
-“Do you mean the real wolf?” interjected Jack Rover, “or the bandit, Don
-Manuel?”
-
-Willoughby was looking along the road and took no notice.
-
-“I guess both are real,” mused Tom Baker, grimly smiling, and a general
-laugh followed.
-
-“Well, I for one will subscribe to that,” exclaimed Buck Ashley,
-storekeeper, postmaster, bartender, and all-round generalissimo of the
-trading establishment. “If Don Manuel is not a wolf in human form, and
-a bigger outlaw than Joaquin Murietta ever thought of being, why you may
-take my head for a football.”
-
-“But he’s dead, ain’t he?” asked the cowboy who had introduced the
-subject of the white wolf.
-
-“Just one thing that I want to emphasize good and plenty to you
-fellers,” said Tom Baker, “and that is—”
-
-“Here she comes!” interrupted Dick Willoughby.
-
-A hush fell over the group as the bent, aged figure of an Indian woman
-was seen approaching the store. Her features were hidden by a shawl that
-closely muffled her head and shoulders.
-
-Buck Ashley saluted Guadalupe with a “How?” The squaw answered with the
-same abrupt salutation, shuffled up to the counter and said brokenly,
-“Coffee—sugar—tea—rice.” With her left hand she had gathered up the
-lower portion of her calico apron and held it pouch fashion. She thrust
-her right hand into the pocket so formed, and bringing forth a handful
-of gold nuggets, laid them on the counter. Some were the size of peas,
-and others as large as hulled hickory nuts. Not a word was spoken by the
-onlookers, who were wild-eyed in their astonishment. Soon interest rose
-to high tension.
-
-Buck Ashley tied up a large package of sugar and pushed it toward the
-bent form of his customer; then resting his hand on the counter, he
-looked fixedly at the squaw and said, “More gold.”
-
-Again she thrust her hand into the apron pocket and brought out another
-handful of nuggets, whereupon Ashley proceeded to tie up a large
-package of coffee. This done, he repeated the request for more gold.
-Old Guadalupe added another handful of nuggets to those already on the
-counter, and Ashley tied up a package of rice.
-
-The squaw looked up at the storekeeper for a moment and then said,
-“Tea.”
-
-Buck Ashley’s laconic response was “More gold,” and immediately another
-handful of nuggets was brought forth, whereupon a fourth package was
-deposited on the counter.
-
-Old Guadalupe stowed the parcels in her apron on top of any remaining
-gold nuggets she might have brought. Then she turned and walked
-limpingly away, through the low brushwood toward a little grove of
-gnarled and twisted sycamores close to the ruined fort.
-
-When she had gone Buck Ashley observed, “No use following her—not a
-damn bit of use in the world! She’ll make camp out there under the trees
-until some time tonight, and then vanish like a shadow into the dark.”
-
-While speaking, Ashley had been gathering up the gold.
-
-“I say, Buck,” observed Dick Willoughby, winking at his friend
-Lieutenant Munson, “it is my private opinion that that bandit, the White
-Wolf, has nothing on you.”
-
-Tom Baker laughingly chimed in: “If I am any judge, and I allow as how
-I am, Buck here would make that pound-of-flesh Shylock feller look like
-thirty cents Mex.”
-
-Ashley smiled greedily, but in a satisfied way, as he said with
-unruffled calm: “Guess I’d better weigh them nuggets and see how much
-the old squaw’s groceries cost her.”
-
-“The treacherous Indian and the honest paleface,” laughed Dick
-Willoughby in a half-rebuking tone.
-
-Buck Ashley bridled up. His voice rang with deep feeling.
-
-“Boys,” he said, “you think I’m a Shylock, a robber, a devil I expect,
-and everything that’s bad. I don’t talk much about myself, but just
-so you’ll not think too blamed hard of me, I’ll ask you a question.
-Supposen when you was only about fifteen years old, you stood by, tied
-hand and foot, and saw a lot of redskins scalp and kill your father and
-mother and two little sisters, and then rob your dead father of over
-ten thousand dollars in gold, run off the family stock, and take you to
-their camp to burn at the stake as a sort of incidental diversion at one
-of their pow-wow dances; and supposen you performed a miracle and got
-away and took an oath to kill and rob every derned Indian you might see
-throughout the remaining days of your life—what, then, if I reformed and
-gave up the kilin’ and stuck to robbin’, would you blame me?”
-
-During this tragic recital of his wrongs the old storekeeper had become
-noticeably excited.
-
-Dick Willoughby got up from the cracker-box where he had been resting,
-and advancing with hand extended, said: “Buck, what you have told us
-presents the whole matter in a new light. Shake!”
-
-“Thanks,” replied the storekeeper as he turned away to wipe a mist from
-his eyes.
-
-Then quickly facing about, he called out in his usual gruff, hale and
-hearty manner: “Say, boys, what’ll you all have? This round is on the
-house.” They drank in silence. A fragment of Buck Ashley’s history had
-cleared away a good deal of previous misunderstanding.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER II—Charmed Lives
-
-THE spell of restraint that resulted from Buck Ashley’s story was at
-last broken by the cowboy, Jack Rover.
-
-“Look here, Dick,” he exclaimed, “I’ll give a month’s salary if you will
-let me take a chance and follow old Guadalupe. I’ve simply got to find
-out and locate that sand-bar in some mountain stream from which she
-brings in all this gold. This is the third time I’ve seen our friend
-Buck Ashley collect a grocery bill from the old squaw, and the whole
-business, gold nuggets and all, is getting on my nerves. Why, I dreamed
-about it for a week last time I saw her forking out whole handfuls of
-gold.”
-
-“Very well,” replied Willoughby, “if you want to take the chance, Jack,
-go ahead. But it is a mad project which will end in my expressing your
-remains back East or else planting you in the cemetery on the hill. It’s
-up to you to make your choice before you tackle the job. You certainly
-know what happened to four or five others who attempted to follow the
-old squaw. Each mother’s son of them was buried the next day.”
-
-“Oh, that’s ancient history,” Jack retorted.
-
-“Not such very ancient hist’ry,” remarked Tom Baker. “I myself saw young
-Bill McNab drilled through the heart with a bullet that seemed to come
-from nowhere. After that I’ll allow I wasn’t filled up with too much
-curiosity as to where Guadalupe hiked over the mountains.”
-
-“There was a regular sharp-shootin’ outfit,” concurred Buck Ashley.
-
-“And there wasn’t a sheriff in the country would have led a posse into
-that damned ambush,” Tom went on. “There wasn’t a sportin’ chance along
-that narrow ledge round which Guadalupe always disappeared. And with all
-them outlaws in the mountains!”
-
-“But the outlaws have been wiped out years ago,” persisted Jack Rover.
-
-“Mebbe,” said Tom Baker, sententiously.
-
-“You forget the White Wolf,” added Buck Ashley.
-
-“Which white wolf?” asked Jack. “I put that question before but got no
-answer.”
-
-“Both,” replied Tom. “To begin with I don’t believe that Don Manuel is
-dead at all. That was only a newspaper story. You may take it from me
-that the bandit won’t pass in his checks till he gets old Ben Thurston.
-I’m allowin’ as how Ben Thurston would quick enough give a thousand head
-of his fattest beeves just to rest easy in his mind on that score. He’ll
-find out, sure enough, some day.”
-
-“Yes, when the White Wolf finds him,” interjected the storekeeper with a
-terse emphasis.
-
-“What’s that old feud anyway?” queried Lieutenant Munson. “Tell me,
-Tom.”
-
-“Oh, it is an old story,” the sheriff answered. “I thought everybody
-knew about it, but of course you’re a newcomer. Well, you see,”
-he continued, clearing his throat and expectorating a copious and
-accurately aimed pit-tew of tobacco juice toward a knot-hole in the
-floor, “the White Wolf’s father, Don Antonio de Valencia, a reg’lar
-high-toned grandee from Spain, had settled in these here parts away
-back longer than anyone could remember. He claimed this whole stretch of
-country from horizon to horizon. Then came the Americans, among them
-a government surveyor named Thurston. He had a pull at Washington and
-managed to get a legal grant to the San Antonio property. Of course the
-old Spaniard had no real title—his was just a sort of squatter’s claim.
-But they do say as how he had lived in this here valley more than half a
-century, so it was mighty hard luck to lose the land. And the boy Manuel
-never would admit the Thurstons had any right to call it theirs.”
-
-“Don Manuel had a younger sister,” interposed Buck Ashley. “Rosetta,
-a beautiful girl—looked like a morning-glory. Gad! but she sure had a
-purty face. You remember, Tom, don’t you?”
-
-“Oh, yes,” replied Tom Baker, “it’s not likely I should forget the poor
-girl. It was ‘cause of her the quarrel became a bitter blood feud—the
-Vendetta of the Hills, as we got to calling it. You see,” he went on,
-resuming the thread of his story, “old man Thurston’s son, Ben, the
-present owner of the rancho, was in his younger days a gay Lothario
-scamp, and he came from the East to his new home in California loaded
-down with a college education and a mighty intimate knowledge of
-the ways of the world that decent folks don’t talk about, much less
-practice. He had not been here a month until he commenced makin’ love
-to little Senorita Rosetta. Before the second sheep-shearin’ time came
-around, she was—well, in a delicate condition. To save himself and,
-as he thought, cover up the disgrace—you see he was engaged to a rich
-Eastern girl of prominent family—why, the young scoundrel conceived the
-hellish plot of lurin’ little Rosetta to Comanche Point one dark night.
-And when he got her there he threw her over the cliff—at least that’s
-the way the story goes. Guess Don Manuel was about twenty-five years old
-at that time, and Ben Thurston two or three years his junior. Well,
-the disgrace killed Rosetta’s father and mother. They died of grief
-and shame soon after the affair, almost on the same day, and Don Manuel
-buried them together in the old churchyard on the hill by the side of
-his murdered sister. And it was there and then, they say, that he took
-an oath to kill Ben Thurston. That was mor’n thirty years ago and the
-feud has been on ever since, and all us old-timers know hell will be
-poppin’ ‘round here one of these days.”
-
-“But nobody ever sees the White Wolf, Don Manuel,” added Buck Ashley.
-“That’s the ex-tr’ornery part of it.”
-
-“Oh, you yourself are likely to see him one of these dark nights, Buck,”
-laughed Jack Rover, as he winked at the other boys. “A storekeeper
-that’ll work night and day stacking up money year in and year out is
-liable to have a call sooner or later from the bandit and his friends.”
-
-“Oh, hell!” was the laconic response of Buck Ashley. “Guess I sure can
-take care of myself.”
-
-“But Don Manuel may not be alive,” suggested the young lieutenant.
-
-“He’s alive right enough, make no mistake,” said Tom Baker, “although
-I’ll allow I don’t know a single soul who has actually seen him
-personally for more’n twenty years. He is a kind o’ shadowy cuss.
-Everybody knows him by his old-time deeds of high-way robbin’ and
-all-round murderin’ for golden loot. I heard of a feller last year who
-claims to have seen the White Wolf when he was makin’ that last big
-stage delivery over by Tulare Lake. He was masked, and had all the
-passengers out on the roadside with their hands thrown up over their
-heads while he was takin’ their valuables away from them.”
-
-“It’s a dead cinch,” Buck Ashley observed, “that whenever there was a
-hold-up or a robbery, or a murder in cold blood for money, why everybody
-knew that the White Wolf was again in the hills and playin’ his
-cut-throat game for pelf and plunder, or mebbe just for revenge against
-the gringos, whom he hated like hell. Sometimes he was not heard of
-in these parts for two or three years, and then he showed up more
-blood-thirsty than ever. His hand was agin every man, and it looked like
-as every man’s hand was agin him.”
-
-“I’ve been told,” said Dick Willoughby, “that when the White Wolf was a
-boy he saved the life of the old highwayman, Joaquin Murietta.”
-
-“Yes, them are facts,” replied Tom Baker. “Leastways I’ve heard say so.
-They claim that he saved Murietta’s life from a posse of deputies one
-night, and altho’ the White Wolf was only a boy at that time, yet a heap
-of people think he’s the only livin’ soul who knows the whereabouts and
-location of the secret cavern where Joaquin Murietta planted his loot,
-amountin’, they say, to millions of dollars in gold and jewels and
-valuables of all kinds. The retreat always proved a safe one for the
-murderin’ gang, and now they’re gone no one even to this day can find
-the place. It’s somewhere on San Antonio Rancho, but where? The White
-Wolf kept his secret well.”
-
-“If old Pierre Luzon ever gets out of San Quentin,” remarked the
-storekeeper, “I guess he could tell, but he’s up for life. He was nabbed
-in that same Tulare Lake affair ‘bout which Tom had been talkin’.”
-
-“Yes,” said the sheriff, “two others were shot dead before they got back
-to the mountains. The White Wolf and Pierre were ridin’ alone when the
-Frenchie’s horse stumbled. They picked him up insensible, a broken leg
-and concussion of the brain, and he was the only one of the gang who
-ever went to jail.”
-
-“God ‘lmighty,” exclaimed Buck, “old Pierre used to sit around in this
-here store day after day, smokin’ an old foreign-lookin’ pipe, and
-hardly speakin’ a word. He used to pretend he knew no English. We never
-once suspected that he was one of Don Manuel’s bunch—always thought
-of him as an old sheepherder, a bit off his nut, who had saved a few
-dollars and was takin’ things easy. And hell, all the time he was the
-White Wolf’s look-out man, makin’ note of everything and passin’ the
-word o’ warnin’ when there was talk of the sheriff gettin’ busy.”
-
-“I’ll allow Pierre Luzon fooled me proper,” concurred Tom Baker.
-“However, he got what was cornin’ to him all right, a life sentence,
-though he ought to have been hanged. Well, perhaps it is only the White
-Wolf and Pierre Luzon who now know the cave where Joaquin Murietta
-cached his treasure.”
-
-“And Guadalupe perhaps as well,” remarked Buck Ashley.
-
-“Yes, perhaps Guadalupe also,” assented the sheriff. “But the White Wolf
-keeps guard over her.”
-
-“That’s the real White Wolf this time,” laughed
-
-Dick Willoughby, with a nod toward the young lieutenant, who had been
-listening intently to the tale of weird romance.
-
-“The real White Wolf?” replied Munson, enquiringly. “You’ve got me all
-tangled up. What do you mean?”
-
-“Don’t you know how Don Manuel came by his name of the White Wolf?”
-asked the sheriff.
-
-“No, all this folk lore is new to me.”
-
-“Why, gosh all hemlock! He is named because of a darn big white wolf
-that has been seen at different times in this here country for a hundred
-years.”
-
-“Wolves don’t live so long,” protested the lieutenant incredulously.
-
-“Well, this one does,” retorted Tom, curtly. “Leastwise he’s been seen
-from time to time since ever I can remember. In the old days they named
-the White Wolf Rancho after this monster animal. It has a charmed life.
-No one can kill this big fellow, altho’ lots of shots have been fired
-at him. And the same was true of Don Manuel de Valencia. He escaped so
-often that folks believed his life a charmed one. And so they called him
-the White Wolf.”
-
-“I saw the white wolf once myself,” said Buck Ashley, “the real white
-wolf that even now, as Tom says, guards old Guadalupe and makes it best
-for young fellows like you, Jack Rover, to leave the squaw alone when
-she makes back for her hidin’ place in the mountains. I’ll never forget
-that morning, although it’s more or less twenty years ago. The great
-shaggy brute was following Guadalupe along the trail like a Newfoundland
-dog. In those days I was out on the hills roundin’ up some mavericks.
-One of the calves broke from the herd and scampered along a trail that
-led directly in front of the old squaw. And say, boys, would you believe
-it? From less than half a mile away I saw with my own eyes that monster
-devil of a white wolf—white as the driven snow—make one terrific mad
-leap and grab that yearlin’ by the neck. Guadalupe spotted me and
-disappeared, and the white wolf trotted after her round the bend,
-carryin’ the dead calf in its jaws as a cat carries a mouse.”
-
-“Did you not shoot at the wolf?” excitedly asked Lieutenant Munson.
-
-“Shoot, hell! What would have been the use? Didn’t you hear what Tom
-Baker said? White wolves have charmed lives whether they go on two legs
-or four.”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER III—Feminine Attractions
-
-TOM BAKER, the sheriff, cleared his throat. “You fellers, I’m assoomin’,
-are all boys. I have been loafin’ ‘round in this man’s land for forty
-years. I was here the day Don Manuel had been buryin’ his old father
-and mother from the little Mission Church, less than a quarter of a mile
-from where we are settin’. He was standin’ right in front of this store
-when young Ben Thurston and two of his ranch hands rode up. If ever I
-saw real bravery it was that mornin’. Don’t take much bravery to do some
-things heroic when you have your artillery handy, but it requires the
-real stuff when you’re gunless.
-
-“Young Thurston spoke to his companions and they drew their guns and
-kept them leveled at Don Manuel as their boss dismounted.
-
-“Don Manuel was one of the handsomest young fellers I ever laid my two
-eyes on. He walked straight up to Thurston, and notwithstandin’ the two
-loaded pieces of artillery was pintin’ straight at him said:
-
-“‘Ben Thurston, you are the man who killed my sister.’
-
-“‘You are a damned liar!’ retorted Thurston.
-
-“‘Yes, you killed her,’ went on Don Manuel. I found this button in her
-dead hand, and right there, by God! is where it came from. Look at your
-coat. Your life shall pay for this dastardly murder. If I had my gun
-I would settle the matter now, notwithstandin’ that today I have been
-burying my beloved father and mother.’
-
-“When young Thurston heard about there bein’ no gun, he snatched the
-tell-tale button from his accuser’s hand, swung himself into his saddle,
-laughed mockingly, and with his quirt struck Don Manuel across the face;
-then he wheeled round his pony and rode away with his bodyguards in a
-cloud of dust.
-
-“God! I will never forget it. Don Manuel stood there, as white as a
-piece of paper, and never moved for a whole minute. The quirt had drawn
-the blood from his face in one long streak. At last he turned away with
-a resolve in his eyes—one of them there terrible resolves that change
-the life of a man, and went back to the little church to finish the
-last sad rites to his people. It’s my opinion Don Manuel, from that very
-hour, turned bandit in his heart and took oath to murder all the gringos
-in California.
-
-“As I said before, that was thirty years back, and mebbe a little
-more, and I have never seen him since. But we all heard of him good and
-plenty. He certainly left a red trail.”
-
-A silence followed. Presently Buck Ashley in the way of explanation,
-said:
-
-“That tombstone on his sister’s grave was put up one night. Nobody saw
-it done, but everyone knows, of course, it was the work of Don Manuel.
-It has just one word—’Hermana’—chiseled on the cross of white marble.
-That’s the Mexican for ‘sister,’ guess you all know. So the name Rosetta
-is only remembered by old-stagers here, like Tom Baker and me. And we
-ain’t forgotten her pretty face either. Poor little girl!”
-
-“A doggoned shame,” muttered the sheriff, meditatively, his eyes cast
-down.
-
-“How about the law?” asked Lieutenant Munson. “The law!” exclaimed
-Baker, raising his eyes and flashing a look of withering contempt.
-“What kind o’ law was there in those days and in these parts? A gun
-was usually both judge and jury. Besides, with the only bit of evidence
-gone, how could Don Manuel prove anything agin a rich young feller like
-Ben Thurston?”
-
-“But if he was laying for him all the time, how is it that the White
-Wolf never got his man all through those thirty years?”
-
-“Because Ben Thurston lit out—he was too demed scared to live on the
-rancho any longer. But that’s another story.”
-
-“Let’s have it, sheriff.”
-
-“Well, it’s a longish yarn, and p’raps you fellers are about tired of
-hearing me.”
-
-No one protested; there was rather a movement of settling down in
-pleased expectancy of something worth listening to. So Tom Baker
-continued:
-
-“Ben Thurston had one warnin’, good and plenty, and he didn’t wait
-around for a second one. After Don Manuel’s threat, he seldom left his
-home, and a little later went back East again. It wasn’t till more’n a
-year that he showed up agin at the rancho. This time he brought with him
-his Eastern bride, a fine slap-dash young woman who could ride a horse
-and handle a team in good shape. But we could all see that she wasn’t
-too happy, for Ben Thurston started in to drink heavily, and she was
-ashamed of him and showed it.”
-
-“Guess it was to drown his conscience and keep from thinkin’ about
-Rosetta,” interjected Buck Ashley.
-
-“Like as not,” assented Tom. “Well, anyhow, he hadn’t been here very
-long afore Don Manuel got him—yes, got him fair and square, although he
-managed to save his neck at the last moment. There was card-playin’ and
-drinkin’ one night at the rancho—Thurston had got a bunch o’ gay young
-dogs down from San Francisco. Mrs. Thurston had left the room, and was
-sittin’ out alone in the moonlight on the verandah. Suddenly she heard
-a sound that made her sit up and listen—the clatter o’ twenty pairs
-o’ gallopin’ hoofs a-comin’ straight for the house. She must ha’ known
-something about the vendetta, for she rushed in terror to her husband
-and gave him warnin’. He escaped by a back door, and a minute later the
-place was surrounded. The shootin’ came first from some of the ranch
-hands, who had tumbled out of the bunk house and were spyin’ around
-corners. They said later that the hold-up party numbered more’n twenty,
-some of them masked with handkerchiefs tied around their faces, but
-others bold as brass and not carin’ a dang who saw ‘em. Among these last
-was Don Manuel. But Pierre Luzon was a downy duck, for no one spotted
-him, although later on we came to know that he played the principal part
-that night, next to the leader of the gang.
-
-“Well, after the shootin’-scrap became general, there was a pretty scare
-in the ranch house—one of the card-players dropped, and the others
-were hiding under tables, when Don Manuel appeared and asked for Ben
-Thurston. His wife, mighty brave, denied that he was there—he had left
-that afternoon for Visalia to buy some cattle, she boldly declared. Don
-Manuel, always the true gentleman, mark ye, was for believin’ her when
-Pierre, his face masked, came in from the verandah and in a low voice
-passed some words to his chief. Mrs. Thurston knew in a moment that her
-bluff was goin’ to be called, and, while the outlaws were confabbin’,
-darted from the room.
-
-“But Pierre was just as quick out by the verandah, and before she got to
-the door o’ the woolshed beyond the horse corral, he was there to block
-her passage. It was Pierre who had caught a glimpse of the fugitive
-sneakin’ into this outbuilding, and now he knew for certain that
-Thurston was hiding among the bags o’ wool inside. But a cornered man is
-a dangerous animal, and it might mean a good few lives if the door was
-opened and any attempt made to rush the place.
-
-“The gang was soon buzzin’ all around; the woman, now almost in
-hysterics, was hustled aside, and a few bundles of loose hay was being
-dumped into the shed through an open window. A match did the rest.
-Within three minutes the door opened and Thurston came staggerin’ out
-through thick clouds of smoke. Pierre grabbed him and had a noose around
-his neck in doublequick time.
-
-“The shootin’ was over before this, and some of the ranch hands were
-lookin’ on from a little distance, for now everyone knew that it was
-only the boss that the night-riders were after. So more’n one was able
-afterwards to tell the story—how the young wife threw herself at Don
-Manuel’s feet, and with sobs and tears pleaded for mercy. And by the
-living God she won out even after the rope, with her husband at the end
-of it, had been swung over the limb of a near-by sycamore.
-
-“The White Wolf stood stock-still for perhaps a minute, weighin’ things
-like, his arms folded across his breast. Then he raised the weepin’
-woman, and, turnin’ to Thurston, now half-dead with fear, laid hold of
-him by the shoulder and shook him as a terrier shakes a rat. Then with
-his other hand he flung the noose from around his neck. ‘Take your
-miserable life, then, this time’—that’s what Don Manuel said. ‘Take
-it, but the day will come when we shall meet again, man to man, with no
-woman’s tears to save you.’ And he pushed Thurston away contemptuously,
-topplin’ him over like a ninepin, and a minute later rode off at the
-head of his men.”
-
-The narrator paused, and there was a general murmur of repressed
-excitement.
-
-“My word, that’s a peach of a story,” exclaimed Jack Rover.
-
-“He certainly was a chivalrous fellow, this oldtime Don Manuel,”
-remarked the lieutenant.
-
-“And don’t you see,” said the sheriff, “that, when a man acted like that
-and spoke like that, his words must come true? Don’t tell me that Don
-Manuel today is dead while Ben Thurston is still alive. But he has taken
-mighty good care of himself ever since that day. He an’ his wife skipped
-East the very next morning, and I’m told they never stopped till they
-got to Europe. Nobody knows where exactly they lived during the time
-that followed, but news came through years later that the wife had died,
-somewhere in the south of England, leaving a son behind. That’s young
-Marshall who has come West with his dad now—the young man’s first visit
-and his father’s last one, I reckon, if he sells the ranch, as I’m told
-he’s trying to do.”
-
-“But I say, boys,” observed Jack Rover, “what do you suppose the White
-Wolf did with all the gold he took away from the people? It’s said that
-in one stage robbery he got over fifty thousand dollars of the yellow
-stuff.”
-
-“Hid it,” replied Buck Ashley, “with Joaquin Murietta’s hoarded gold.
-For it’s sure as sure can be that Don Manuel came to know the secret o’
-the bandits’ cave where Murietta used to store his loot. The only thing
-anybody else knows is that it is around here somewheres.”
-
-“But they do say,” observed one of the cowboys, “whatever Sheriff Baker
-may think, and you, too, Buck, that Don Manuel is sure ‘nuff dead. Most
-folks herabouts believe that the White Wolf has gone to his long restin’
-place, sort a j’ined forces with old Joaquin Murietta. The Tulare Lake
-affair was, I guess, his last raid.”
-
-“He ain’t dead,” muttered Tom, determinedly, while Buck Ashley also
-shook his head in repudiation of the cowboy’s theory.
-
-“Well, I happen to know,” observed Dick Willoughby, “that Mr. Thurston
-has run down the story of the White Wolf’s death in that Seattle saloon
-brawl pretty thoroughly, and he is of the opinion that the big-featured
-articles in the San Francisco and Los Angeles papers were correct—that
-the dead man’s identity was absolutely established.”
-
-“That’s how he’d wish it to be, at all events,” said Buck Ashley. “But
-even now, when Ben Thurston ventures to come home to the rancho, he
-brings with him a great big hulking bodyguard—Leach Sharkey, I’m told is
-the fellow’s name. That don’t look much like believin’ the White Wolf
-to be dead and the vendetta played out, does it? You can see it in his
-hang-dog face that it isn’t any real pleasure for him to be around in
-these parts. He ain’t once paid me a visit at the store. Guess he thinks
-his hide’ll last longer by stickin’ close to home. You owe your job o’
-runnin’ his cattle, Dick Willoughby, to the fact that he’s still plumb
-scared.”
-
-“Oh, well, I am in his employ,” said Dick loyally, “and I’m inclined to
-give him the benefit of the doubt as regards these ugly rumors and idle
-stories. He has always been on the square with me. But perhaps he’ll
-stick to the rancho, now he believes the White Wolf to be dead.”
-
-“He may believe it, but, as Buck says, why then the bodyguard?”
-commented the sheriff as he relighted his pipe.
-
-“Yes.” replied Dick Willoughby, “but I believe he is thinking of letting
-Leach Sharkey go. Personally I would be willing to wager that Don
-Manuel, whom no one has seen since that last raid on the stage coach, is
-dead and sleeping with his sires.”
-
-“Well, dead or alive,” exclaimed Jack Rover, “I don’t care a hang for
-the White Wolf and his-buried treasure. But what I would like to know
-is the exact location of that rippling mountain stream, the identical
-sandbar where the old squaw Guadalupe gathers up her pocket change with
-which to buy groceries. That would be a heap better than any blooming
-cave. Them’s my sentiments.”
-
-As he said this he threw some silver on the bar and invited everybody to
-lubricate.
-
-“Just nominate your poison, boys, and let’s drink to my finding old
-Guadalupe’s gold mine.”
-
-They all laughed good-naturedly, and Lieutenant Munson declared that he
-thought he would put in the balance of his furlough days prospecting.
-“You know,” he explained in an aside to the storekeeper while the latter
-was preparing the drinks, “I am only here to visit my old college pal,
-Dick Willoughby, and incidentally see the place where my father was a
-soldier in the early California days. He was stationed several years in
-Fort Tejon.”
-
-“That was before my time,” said Buck Ashley.
-
-“The soldiers had abandoned the old fort when I came first into these
-parts.”
-
-Meanwhile Dick Willoughby was clinking glasses with Jack Hover.
-
-“There are some mighty pretty little senoritas hereabouts,” said Dick,
-“good American blood mixed with Spanish blood, you know, and all that.
-If a fellow could only find the right one—understand, I say the right
-one, Jack—he wouldn’t be losing any time in chasing after the old
-squaw’s secret gold mine or the White Wolf’s buried millions.”
-
-Jack Rover laughed outright.
-
-“I say, Dick, what are you reddening up about? Gee, if I had as fine a
-lead as you have staked out, I’d feel the same way. Ain’t that right,
-Buck?” Buck Ashley winked at Jack Rover and said: “If you mean who I
-think you mean, you sure are righter than right. I speak wide open and
-unrestrained when I give it as my opinion that Miss Merle Farnsworth is
-the finest specimen of young womanhood that I ever set eyes on, and I
-have seen some girls East as well as West. Take it from me, she is a
-jewel, she is a regular beauty rose. Yes,” he went on, “and too damned
-good for that young Thurston whelp, who hangs around tryin’ to act smart
-whenever she and that old duenna chaperon of hers comes here to trade.
-I’ll simply boot him out of the store one of these days.”
-
-Dick Willoughby smiled in a satisfied way as he moved toward the door.
-
-“Well, hold on, Dick,” called out Jack Rover, “don’t be in such a
-dangnation hurry. I’ll ride with you in a minute. I’ve just got this
-to say to you, Buck Ashley, that I like you better than ever for what
-you’ve said about Marshall Thurston. Even though I’m working for the
-Thurston outfit, I’m free to express my opinion that that young feller
-is about the meanest specimen of low-down humanity I’ve ever struck.”
-
-“It’s a case of the second decadency, I suppose,” remarked Munson. “The
-worthless profligate, spawn of the rich old roué, Ben Thurston.”
-
-“Such a drunken pup,” continued Rover, “aint’ good enough for a
-half-breed Indian, much less for the likes of the young ladies of La
-Siesta. Gee, if I thought there was one chance in a thousand for me with
-either of them, why goodbye to that placer gold mine ambition that’s
-eating my vitals, or to the planted millions of the White Wolf.”
-
-As he spoke the last words, he followed Dick Willoughby into the open.
-Dick was standing by his pony.
-
-“You’re superlatively in earnest, aren’t you?” he said as he laughed
-good-naturedly at the cowboy.
-
-“You bet your life I’m in earnest,” replied Jack. “And if you don’t
-get busy with that love affair of yours, well, take it from me, you had
-better look out, for somebody will be picking the peach right from under
-your very nose. Well, so long, Dick; I’ve changed my mind; I’ll not ride
-with you. I’ll see to that bit of fence repairing up on the range. And
-who knows but I may find a sand-bar and a riffle sparkling with yellow
-gold?” He laughed like a big overgrown boy as he touched the rowel to
-his pony and galloped away across the valley.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER IV—Back to the Soil
-
-JACK ROVER is a great boy,” said Dick Willoughby to Lieutenant Munson as
-the two rode off at a leisurely pace toward the group of ranch buildings
-peeping through a clump of trees at the edge of the foothills.
-
-“A type of Western character,” replied Munson, “that in a way is quite
-new to me. And yet, do you know, I rather like this Western atmosphere.”
-
-“Like it!” exclaimed Dick. “Why, man, it is the atmosphere in which to
-live, move and have one’s being.”
-
-They both laughed at his enthusiasm.
-
-“Really,” continued Dick, soberly, “I would not live another year in New
-York City for all the property fronting on the Circle, the coming centre
-of old Gotham. Out here a man is a man for what he is worth. You grow
-bigger, you think broader thoughts, you are not confined to following
-precedents or taking orders from the man higher up.”
-
-“Oh, I know,” replied Munson, “or at least I am beginning to understand
-something of what you mean. I have only been here ten days and I am
-already feeling loath to return to my post.”
-
-“Ches,” exclaimed Dick, turning abruptly and facing his companion,
-“give it all up, old fellow, and come and live in this glorious
-country—California! There’s music in the very name. It is the land of
-sunshine, of fruits and flowers, and of pretty girls into the bargain.”
-
-“You keep telling me of the pretty girls, but when am I to see them?”
-questioned Munson. “If you have any real senoritas who will cause a
-fellow to forsake his Eastern home and send in his resignation to army
-headquarters, let me get a peep at them.”
-
-Again they both laughed, this time at the challenge in Munson’s words.
-
-“All right,” said Dick, “you shall see them. And, by the way, don’t
-you remember that this is the very day we have arranged to call on Mrs.
-Darlington at the Rancho La Siesta? It is a beautiful place, this little
-rancho, and Mrs. Darlington you will find to be a most admirable woman.
-But just wait until you see Grace Darlington.”
-
-“How about Miss Farnsworth?”
-
-“Not for you, old man,” replied the other quickly, reddening at the
-temples. “Not as long as my name is Dick Willoughby—providing, you
-understand, always providing that I shall prove successful in my
-wooing.”
-
-“Is it as bad as that, Dick?”
-
-“Well,”—his laughing tone was only a mask to deeper feelings—“I cannot
-deny that I am pretty hard hit.”
-
-“My, but you do whet my impatience,” said the lieutenant. “And I am
-about as anxious to be paying that afternoon call as I am to have my
-breakfast. I don’t know how you feel, Dick, but I’m as hungry as a lean
-coyote.” He paused a moment, then asked in a musing tone: “How far away
-is this wonderful La Siesta Rancho?”
-
-“Oh, only about twenty miles.”
-
-“Twenty miles! You speak of miles out here in the same way as we speak
-of city blocks back in New York. Surely it must be quite a farm.”
-
-“Quite a farm? I should say! You musn’t confound our Californian ranchos
-with Eastern farms, old man. Why, this rancho of San Antonio covers over
-four hundred square miles of territory.”
-
-“You astonish me.”
-
-“La Siesta Rancho adjoins the great San Antonio possession and contains
-comparatively few acres, just under three thousand. But it surely is
-a beautiful little place, fixed up like a nobleman’s park in the old
-world. And then the ladies—”
-
-“Aha, the ladies,” repeated Munson, doffing his hat in courtly fashion
-and smiling audaciously.
-
-Dick touched the flank of his pony with his spur, and for a few
-miles they rode on at a quicker pace and in silence. Soon they were
-approaching the ranch buildings. On the outer edge was a little cottage,
-covered with vines and surrounded by fruit trees, the place which Dick
-Willoughby, the cattle foreman, had called “home” for the past five
-years.
-
-After turning their horses into a corral, they passed by way of a broad
-verandah into a big room, roughly but comfortably furnished. Some logs
-were smouldering in the fireplace, and quickly started into a bright
-blaze when Dick kicked them together. The warmth was grateful, for while
-out of doors everything was now bathed in genial sunshine, here the
-morning air was still keen.
-
-A Chinaman appeared from the back quarters, and smiled expectantly.
-
-“Breakfast, Sing Ling,” called out Dick, “and just as quick as you can
-serve it.”
-
-Sing Ling departed as noiselessly as he had come.
-
-“These are certainly great quarters,” observed Munson, settling himself
-in a big Old Mission rocker and glancing around.
-
-The walls, curiously enough, were pretty well covered with pen-and-ink
-sketches and designs of buildings that might have adorned an architect’s
-office, while there was a partly completed landscape painting in oils
-standing on a rudely fashioned easel.
-
-“And you’ve certainly stuck to the old line of work, Dick,” the
-lieutenant went on.
-
-“Of course one must have something to think about when he is all alone
-in a new country,” replied Willoughby. “But most of that stuff I did
-in my first year here,” he added, following the other’s survey of the
-walls.
-
-“You still paint, however,” remarked Munson, his eyes resting on the
-unfinished canvas.
-
-“Or try to,” was the laughing response.
-
-“Oh, that’s a modest way of putting it. Do you know, old man,” Munson
-went on, “since I came here I have often thought what a marvelous change
-has been wrought in you—what a transplanting has taken place? You were
-a chronic New Yorker, except for that one year you spent in the Latin
-Quarter of gay Paree. You thought then you were going to make a great
-painter. And, by gad, I almost believe so myself,” he added, bending
-forward to make a more critical scrutiny of the work on the easel. “By
-jove, that’s really fine, Dick.”
-
-“I’m afraid that’s flattery, Chester, my boy,” responded Willoughby.
-“However, it sounds good to hear you say so. A word of appreciation
-is what all hearts hunger for. Personally I even believe in a moderate
-amount of flattery. Its psychic influence is more potent in arousing and
-causing the heart to throb with ambition than all the stimulants, drugs
-or reasoning in the world. Indeed, without a certain amount of flattery
-one becomes ambitionless, languid, and perishes; whereas the unexpected
-caress or kindly words of praise from loved ones, just or unjust, adds
-more strength to the good right arm of the breadwinner than all the beef
-in Christendom, and makes the sunshine seem brighter and earth’s every
-breeze a south wind blowing across beds of violets.”
-
-“A bit of a poet, too, I see,” smiled Munson.
-
-Willoughby made no reply. He had crossed over to the open door and was
-looking out on the valley that stretched away for miles—great oak trees
-in the foreground, with cattle-dotted pasture lands beyond. Waving his
-hand toward the vast expanse, he said:
-
-“Just look at that for a picture, and see how tame a man-made gallery is
-as compared with this great art gallery of Nature. Do you know, Ches, I
-despise New York? There was a time, when I first came here, that I felt
-I should die of ennui, yearning for the Great White Way once again. But
-I have outgrown all that. I know now, thank God, there’s nothing to it.
-Here a man can fill his lungs with pure air, and at the same time feast
-his soul all day long with beautiful things.”
-
-There followed a brief interval of silence. Munson had risen and joined
-his comrade at the door. Both were gazing over the glorious sunlit sweep
-of territory rimmed by the distant, pine-clad hills. In the heart of
-Dick Willoughby was supreme contentment, in that of Chester Munson a
-vague longing to get away from red-tape army routine and breathe the
-exhilarating and inspiring freedom of life in the open.
-
-“Blakeflast,” bleated a soft voice behind them, and turning round they
-found the suave, smiling Chinaman with hand outstretched toward the
-smoking viands upon the table. Sentiment was instantly forgotten in
-favor of lamb chops grilled to a turn, a great fluffled omelette with
-fine herbs that would have done credit to a Parisian chef, and coffee
-that was veritable nectar.
-
-At last appetite was satisfied. The lieutenant had produced his cigar
-case, Dick was filling his briar-root pipe with tobacco from the
-humidor. The latter spoke:
-
-“Say, Ches, we were talking about New York. Do you want me to give you a
-toast on that modern Babylon?”
-
-“Sure, old man, go ahead! You know I haven’t lost my interest in old
-Gotham, by any manner of means. It may the a modern Babylon. But to me
-it is none the less the greatest of American cities.”
-
-“That’s just the trouble,” said Dick, seriously. “It is too great. There
-identities are swallowed up. Individualism cannot survive. It is all one
-great composite.”
-
-“Well, let us hear the toast.”
-
-Dick raised his cup of coffee and said: “Very well, here it is; here is
-my opinion of New York:
-
-
-‘Vulgar in manners; overfed,
-
-Over-dressed and under-bred;
-
-Heartless, godless, hell’s delight,
-
-Rude by day and lewd by night.
-
-Bedwarfed the man, enlarged the brute;
-
-Ruled by boss and prostitute.
-
-Purple robed and pauper clad;
-
-Raving, rotten, money mad;
-
-A squirming herd in Mammon’s mesh;
-
-A wilderness of human flesh;
-
-Crazed by avarice, lust and rum—
-
-New York! thy name’s delirium.’.rdquo;
-
-
-“Great Heavens, old man,” exclaimed Munson, when Dick had finished, “you
-are severe, to say the least.”
-
-Willoughby laughed good-naturedly as he passed the match box to his
-friend.
-
-“Not severe, only truthful,” he said. “You see, in New York no man
-dares think for himself. Everything is controlled by a machine-appointed
-chairman, secretary and committee, and you must hear the resolutions
-read before you know the doctrine you are perforce to advocate.”
-
-Then he lit his pipe and rose from the table.
-
-“Now, I have a lot of things to attend to, old fellow,” he resumed.
-“Make yourself comfortable. Here’s a bunch of Eastern newspapers—oh, I
-read them regularly, haven’t got rid of that bad habit yet. I’ll tell
-Sing Ling to have lunch ready on the stroke of noon. Then we’ll be in
-good time to start out for the Rancho La Siesta. So long!”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER V—At La Siesta
-
-SOON after one o’clock Dick Willoughby and Chester Munson were again in
-the saddle. They galloped along the foothills for some time in silence.
-But coming to the boulder-strewn wash of a mountain stream, they had
-perforce to rein their horses to a walk. Conversation was now possible.
-
-“Dick, will you give me a job as a cowboy if I quit the army?” asked
-Munson abruptly.
-
-“Surest thing you know,” replied Dick. “But why try to kid me like
-that?”
-
-“Oh,” laughed the other, “I am not jesting.”
-
-“Well, by gad, if you feel that way already, the chances are you will
-write out your resignation when you get back to the shack tonight.”
-
-“You mean by that—”
-
-“I mean,” said Dick, smiling benignly at his friend, “that when you have
-once seen Grace Darlington you will feel like browsing on the California
-range until you have learned to throw a riata.”
-
-“Oh, it is not the thought of any mere girl that will influence my
-decision. I feel like getting back to Nature—back to the soil—back to a
-life of untrammeled freedom.”
-
-“Back to unspoiled womanhood,” added Dick sententiously.
-
-“Well, you’ve certainly got my curiosity aroused over these young ladies
-at La Siesta. How much farther do we have to go?”
-
-“Within an hour, sir, within the hour, my lord, shall you see the lady
-fair. But remember,” Dick went on banteringly, “that you are not to
-practise any riata-throwing on Miss Merle Farnsworth.”
-
-“I understand. But we won’t fall out over her. You may have your
-beautiful brunette. I have always been partial to blondes.”
-
-“In the plural number,” grinned Dick. “But Grace Darlington will dim the
-light of all your previous flames. She is the most perfect blonde you
-have ever yet encountered.”
-
-“You are certainly enthusiastic—for a disinterested party.”
-
-“Well, you’ll say the same thing, Ches, my boy, when you see her.”
-
-It was not yet four o’clock when they approached the Rancho La Siesta.
-The house was of a style quite unusual in California—a miniature castle
-that might have been planned by some European architect of renown. It
-stood amid noble oak trees, old and gnarled and of gigantic size, but
-not too numerous to hide the architectural features of the building. To
-the rear the trees grew more thickly till they finally merged into one
-great forest that covered the lower ridge of the mountain beyond. Far
-up, just within the timber line, could be seen the red-tiled roof of a
-house which Dick told his friend was the home of a Mr. Ricardo Robles.
-Beneath the forest, the gently undulating lands sloped away to a
-considerable stream that dashed down from one of the mountain canyons
-and debouched into the great valley.
-
-“Whew!” exclaimed Munson admiringly, as they rode up and turned their
-horses over to an attendant. “Some swell architecture around here! Is
-this your work, Dick?”
-
-
-
-0055
-
-“Oh, no!” replied Willoughby. “I had nothing to do with it. But I do
-like the architectural lines of Mrs. Darlington’s home. She’s English
-and has English tastes, and transplanted ideas are not always successful
-in a new country. But in this case the building just seems to fit the
-scenery. It has always delighted me.”
-
-“It is certainly beautiful,” concurred Munson as they walked along a
-winding graveled pathway that climbed the gentle slope and led to the
-portico of the mansion.
-
-Around them were gay beds of flowers dotting the greensward. Almost
-hiding the columns of the portico were climbing roses, one bush of the
-purest white, the other of deep crimson.
-
-As they passed under the porch roof, a handsome and well-preserved lady
-of middle age appeared at the top of the steps with a welcoming smile.
-She descended to give them gracious greeting.
-
-“How glad I am to see you, Mr. Willoughby. No one could be more welcome
-at La Siesta.”
-
-“Thank you,” said Dick with marked chivalry.
-
-“Mrs. Darlington, permit me to present my friend, Lieutenant Munson.”
-
-The introduction over, they ascended the steps together, and passed
-into a spacious courtyard, with broad verandahs running all around and a
-fountain playing in the centre. The hostess conducted her visitors to
-a cosy corner, screened by glass panels from the open air and furnished
-with rich Persian rugs, divans, cushions, tapestries, carved ebony
-tabarets, all in oriental fashion. When they were comfortably settled,
-she opened the conversation.
-
-“Lieutenant, the young ladies of La Siesta are most impatient to meet
-you. Mr. Willoughby has told us so much about you and yet has been so
-very dilatory—yes, really you have, Mr. Willoughby—in bringing you over,
-that we have put down several black marks against his name.”
-
-“Oh, thank you,” stammered the young officer, reddening. “I quite agree
-with you about Willoughby, for I have been pleading with him to present
-me from the very first day of my arrival.” Turning to Mrs. Darlington,
-Dick laughingly protested: “My dear Mrs. Darlington, that is the first
-whopper you have heard from my esteemed friend. You have yet to learn
-that he always speaks in the superlative degree.”
-
-At this moment Grace Darlington stepped through one of the French
-windows. As she stood hesitating for a moment, Chester Munson there
-and then agreed with all the preliminary praise Dick Willoughby had
-bestowed. She was certainly a vision of loveliness, with a wealth of
-golden hair and eyes of sapphire blue; petite, her figure plump but
-beautifully molded, her cheeks aglow with the red roses of health and
-youth and happiness.
-
-“My daughter Grace,” announced Mrs. Darlington, rising and formally
-introducing the lieutenant to her as she joined the group.
-
-Again Munson blushed and stammered. Dick was chuckling; he saw that
-the gallant son of battle, with a penchant for blonde beauties, had
-succumbed to the first glance from Grace Darlington’s eyes.
-
-“Delighted to meet you, Lieutenant Munson,” she declared with frank
-friendliness as they shook hands.
-
-“Where’s Merle?” asked Dick almost before Grace had time to turn to him.
-
-“There now, Mr. Impatience,” she replied, shaking her finger teasingly
-at, him, “Merle will be here in her own good time. She’s busy with Bob
-just now.”
-
-“Who the dickens is Bob?” asked Dick, visibly disconcerted.
-
-“Oh, her new Irish terrier,” laughed Grace, her voice ringing with
-mischievous merriment. “And such a beauty!”
-
-Dick breathed again. The lieutenant had recovered his composure; it was
-his turn now to bestow a sardonic smile upon his comrade.
-
-“We’ll have afternoon tea,” suggested Mrs. Darlington. “And of course
-you two young men will stay for dinner.”
-
-Both uttered a simultaneous protest—they were only in riding clothes.
-But Mrs. Darlington made short work of the argument, and touched a
-pushbutton by her side. A maid responded, the extra covers for dinner
-were ordered, and meanwhile tea was to be sent on to the verandah.
-Pleasant small talk succeeded, the lieutenant being called upon for his
-first impressions of California.
-
-Of a sudden Grace exclaimed in a voice, half of joy, half of surprise:
-
-“Why, here comes Mr. Robles!”
-
-Advancing along the verandah, hat in hand, was a man of striking
-presence and dignity, perhaps fifty years of age. His jet black hair was
-streaked with gray, the full beard almost verging on whiteness. Olive
-complexion and brown eyes, together with the courtly manner of his
-salutation, indicated the thoroughbred Castilian.
-
-He bowed and raised to his lips the hand of his hostess. To Grace he
-paid the same deference. Next he turned to Dick Willoughby and extended
-his hand.
-
-“I have met Mr. Willoughby. I am pleased, sir, to see you again.”
-
-Then his eyes rested on Lieutenant Munson, and Mrs. Darlington presented
-the young army officer.
-
-“And where, I pray, is Miss Merle?” Mr. Robles finally asked, glancing
-around.
-
-“That’s what I want to know,” blurted out Dick. Then he reddened just a
-little.
-
-The older man looked kindly at Dick, and smilingly said: “The audacity
-of youth.”
-
-“Yes,” put in Grace, “the audacity and the impatience as well.”
-
-But just at that moment there floated from the recesses of the home the
-fragment of a song: “I dreamt I dwelt in marble halls, with vassals and
-serfs at my side.”
-
-“Ah, here comes the recreant now,” exclaimed Mrs. Darlington.
-
-The song stopped abruptly, and a moment later Merle Farnsworth appeared.
-She went first of all to Mr. Robles and greeted him warmly, giving him
-both her hands, which he kissed in his princely fashion. For Willoughby
-she had a pleasant smile, and for his friend, the lieutenant, a kindly
-welcome to California.
-
-The tea tray had meanwhile arrived, and soon both the young ladies
-were busy attending to their guests. While he sipped his tea, Munson
-completed his inspection of Merle Farnsworth—dispassionately, for the
-brunette type of beauty had never yet made his pulses beat faster. But
-he could none the less admire. She was a stately girl, taller than Grace
-Darlington, with fine, regular features and brown eyes that matched the
-dark heavy braids of her hair. Her manner was alert and vivacious, yet
-there was the quiet dignity of gentle breeding even in her smile.
-
-After half an hour of general conversation, Mr. Robles arose to take
-his leave, notwithstanding Mrs. Darlington’s pressing invitation that he
-should remain and join the dinner party.
-
-“My home is not far away,” he said when shaking hands with Munson, “up
-in the woods yonder. Perhaps you may have seen it as you came along the
-road.”
-
-“Yes,” observed Dick, “I pointed it out to the lieutenant.”
-
-“Well, both you gentlemen are cordially invited to pay me a visit any
-time you are riding through this part of the country. Although I live
-far away from the busy world, and am a recluse by choice, I have some
-things that may interest you—pictures, old manuscripts and books of the
-Spanish days.”
-
-“Pictures?” interposed Dick, inquiringly.
-
-“Yes, a few that I picked up during several visits to Europe.”
-
-“If people only knew it,” remarked Mrs. Darlington, “Mr. Robles has
-perhaps one of the finest private picture galleries in America.”
-
-“Then I’m certainly coming to see you,” said Dick, eagerly.
-
-“Me or my pictures?” asked Mr. Robles with a quizzical smile.
-
-“Both,” and the young fellow showed he meant it by a cordial hand grip.
-
-“You will pass our door, Mr. Willoughby?” exclaimed Merle in
-half-laughing reproachfulness. “You will dare to give the go-by to La
-Siesta?”
-
-“Well, art is art,” replied Dick sturdily, although he did not trust
-himself to look at Merle while he answered.
-
-“But perhaps the young ladies will show you the way through the oak
-forest,” suggested Mr. Robles.
-
-“That would be great,” said Lieutenant Munson, with his eyes fixed on
-Grace Darlington.
-
-“Delightful,” she blushingly assented.
-
-“Well, arrange it among yourselves. For the present, adios.” And with a
-sweeping bow the senor took his departure.
-
-A stroll through the gardens and orchards, dinner and sprightly
-conversation, an hour of piano-playing and singing to follow—altogether
-a delightful evening was spent. The nearly full moon had risen before
-the young men found themselves on the homeward trail.
-
-As side by side they rode down into the valley, Munson said:
-
-“Dick, boy, there’s no use talking. You have introduced me to some
-perfectly charming people today—they’re wonderful.”
-
-“What did I tell you?” asked Dick.
-
-“You surely did not tell me the half,” replied the other. “I think Grace
-Darlington is the prettiest girl I have ever seen.”
-
-“Guess you’ll be writing out your resignation and sending it to army
-headquarters,” laughed Dick. “Quien sabe?”
-
-The lieutenant made no reply, and quickening their pace, they pushed on
-in silence.
-
-At last they were nearing home—passing round the last spur of the
-mountain. The moon was now riding high overhead, bathing the whole
-landscape in bright effulgence. Willoughby brought his pony to a walk,
-and Munson, coming up behind, soon joined him.
-
-“How do you like riding by the light of the California moon?” asked
-Willoughby.
-
-“Really, Dick, you call even the moon a California moon, as if the same
-moon didn’t shine in New York City or in Paris.”
-
-“Not in the same way,” said Dick soberly. “The truth is, the moon really
-looks larger and brighter here, and the stars, too, are more brilliant.
-Haven’t you noticed it?”
-
-“I have noticed that the atmosphere is exceedingly clear,” replied
-Munson, and, as if to verify his observation, he cast a glance up to the
-rock-ribbed flank of the mountain above the belt of timber.
-
-“Good God, what’s that?” he added breathlessly grasping the arm of his
-friend.
-
-Instinctively both halted their horses as they continued to gaze.
-
-
-
-0105
-
-The bent form of the old Indian squaw Guadalupe was unmistakable as she
-toiled slowly along a narrow ledge on the face of the precipice. But
-following close behind her was a vague, shadowy figure—the figure of
-some four-footed beast, bigger than a big dog.
-
-“The white wolf!” gasped Dick.
-
-“Is it real, or is it a spectre?” whispered Munson.
-
-Just then a scudding cloud momentarily obscured the moon, and when the
-full light again shone forth, both woman and wolf had vanished.
-
-The young men looked into each other’s eyes in awe and wonderment.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VI—The Quarrel
-
-THE following days were busy ones on San Antonio Rancho. Dick Willoughby
-was constantly in the saddle, looking after his subordinates, watching
-the line fences, and generally keeping track of the vast herds.
-Lieutenant Munson was becoming acclimated. He not only accompanied
-Willoughby on many of his rides, but had also paid several visits to
-La Siesta, and one afternoon in particular had enjoyed immensely a
-successful trout fishing expedition with the young ladies along the
-mountain stream that flowed through the property.
-
-One morning there was great excitement at San Antonio headquarters. Ben
-Thurston returned from a visit he had been paying to Los Angeles, and
-with him floated in a circumstantial story that the rancho had been
-really sold. As usual, he was attended by the plain-clothes detective
-whom he retained as bodyguard. Leach Sharkey was a big, hulking fellow,
-more than six feet in height, with a tousled shock of reddish hair, a
-stubby red mustache, and teeth that showed even when his face was in
-repose. Bulging hip pockets indicated the brace of heavy revolvers which
-he invariably carried.
-
-Within an hour of Mr. Thurston’s coming, Dick Willoughby, as foreman,
-was summoned to an interview at the ranch house. The owner received him
-alone in his office.
-
-Ben Thurston was a squat, solidly built man, and despite his life
-of idle luxury, carried his fifty odd years well. He was sullen and
-taciturn in manner, but brusque and imperious when he did choose to
-speak. Two features were markedly characteristic—the chin was weak and
-the eyes had the restless, alert look of one who constantly lived in an
-atmosphere of fear and suspicion.
-
-Thurston opened the conversation without any preliminaries.
-
-“Willoughby, I want an accurate count of all the cattle and horses on
-the ranch; and especially I require a fair idea as to the number of
-fatted beeves—those ready for the market, you understand.”
-
-“Very well,” replied Dick, “your orders shall be carried out as
-expeditiously as possible, but it will require a few days to complete
-the work.”
-
-“How many days?”
-
-“If I make use of all the force it may take a week—perhaps a little
-longer.”
-
-“All right, use all the help you can get. I must have these figures
-promptly. There is a Los Angeles syndicate who are after an option on
-the rancho. They are counting on buying me out—lock, stock and barrel.”
-Ben Thurston smiled, squinted his shifty eyes and blew his nose
-vigorously.
-
-“It always makes me laugh,” he added pompously, “to have these fellows
-come around this great principality of mine and try to buy me out.”
-
-Just then someone outside flitted past the window, and, quick as
-lightning, Thurston turned and exclaimed in a startled tone: “Who was
-that?”
-
-“That was Jack Rover,” replied Dick, “one of our cowboys.”
-
-“Oh,” and the frightened look in the eyes subsided.
-
-“Tomorrow then,” Dick went on, returning to their former topic of
-conversation, “we’ll begin a round-up of the stock at this end of the
-range. I’ll put the boys on the job right now.”
-
-“I’ll join you tomorrow myself.”
-
-“All right, Mr. Thurston.”
-
-“What time?”
-
-“At any time agreeable to you.”
-
-“Well, say eight o’clock in the morning. You see,” he continued, “I want
-to get through with this damned business in a hurry and start back East.
-I have friends who are waiting for me. Of course I will have to stay
-here until the representatives of this syndicate come up from Los
-Angeles, but I will make short work of them, believe me.”
-
-This time Ben Thurston laughed outright and rubbed his hands together in
-a satisfied way. For once he seemed inclined to be communicative, and,
-turning to Willoughby, resumed:
-
-“Do you know, I have collected over three hundred thousand dollars,
-first and last, selling options on this San Antonio Rancho? It is quite
-a joke. They all fall down. They make a first payment of twenty-five
-or fifty thousand dollars, and then,” throwing up both his hands and
-shrugging his shoulders, “their payments cease and I am just that much
-ahead of the game.” Willoughby listened in frigid silence; there was not
-even the flicker of a responsive smile on his face.
-
-Thurston, eyeing him for a moment, looked disconcerted. He drew himself
-up stiffly in his chair. His voice assumed its usual gruff tone.
-
-“That’s all; get to work then,” he said curtly as he lifted some papers
-to show that the interview was at an end.
-
-The first round-up was held some twenty miles southwest of the ranch
-house, at the base of the foothills across the valley from La Siesta.
-Ben Thurston, attended closely by his bodyguard, was there, his shifting
-eyes scanning each new face. Not fewer than ten thousand head of cattle
-were milling about, pawing the earth and bellowing in low tones of
-irritation at being herded together and held away from their accustomed
-haunts of juicy grasses.
-
-From a knoll at a little distance Lieutenant Munson, seated on a fine
-riding pony, watched the great performance, which to him was more
-wonderful than any hippodrome show or military parade. He was so
-engrossed with the spectacle that he did not hear the patter of
-approaching hoofs.
-
-“Good morning, Senor Lieutenant,” came a lady’s voice in cheery
-greeting.
-
-Turning quickly in his saddle he saw Grace Darlington and Merle
-Farnsworth on their ponies, which had been brought to a sudden halt
-close behind him.
-
-“Really, Mr. Munson,” said Grace Darlington, “one would think you were
-so completely lost in contemplation of a mob of cattle that you had no
-eyes for your friends.”
-
-Chester bowed and raised his hat as he replied with a bright smile:
-
-“It is certainly a great scene, isn’t it? But you are none the less
-welcome. Indeed when one is witnessing something unusual, it always adds
-to the interest to have the companionship of friends.”
-
-“Very prettily put,” observed Merle Farnsworth. “Fortunately the place
-selected for the round-up this year isn’t very far from La Siesta, so we
-rode across the valley.”
-
-“Have you anything in New York,” asked Grace, “to compare with this?”
-
-“Indeed we have not,” replied the lieutenant with conviction. “I am
-beginning to think that the West is a pretty good place in which to
-live. By the way,” he went on, taking a newspaper clipping from his
-pocket, “here is something that our mutual friend, Dick, gave me, and
-said I should read once a day for a month, and then—well, then, he says
-I will never go East again, but remain in this great picture country.
-Shall I read it?”
-
-“Oh, do, by all means,” said the girls in unison. “Well, here goes!
-‘Every idea we have in the East is run with a convention. We cannot
-think without a chairman. Our whims have secretaries; our fads have
-by-laws. Literature is a club. Philosophy is a society. Our reforms
-are mass meetings. We cannot mourn our mighty dead without some great
-chairman and a half hundred vice-presidents. We remember our novelists
-and poets with trustees, while the immortality of a dead genius is
-looked after by a standing committee. Charity is an association, and
-theology at best only a set of resolutions.’.rdquo;
-
-“What do you think of that?” he asked, laughing. “Isn’t that an awful
-slam on the East?”
-
-“It is rather severe,” smiled Merle. “But you know, Mr. Willoughby has
-become a thorough Westerner. The lure of the hills and the valleys has
-taken complete possession of him.”
-
-“And yet he remains unspoiled.” exclaimed the lieutenant. “But are you
-aware he is trying to tamper with my old allegiance to the East?”
-
-“Indeed,” asked Grace, “in what way?”
-
-“He wants me to resign my commission and take pot luck with him, as he
-terms it.”
-
-“You couldn’t do better,” exclaimed Grace enthusiastically.
-
-While this conversation was going on, an exciting incident was taking
-place only a short distance away. Young Marshall Thurston had come
-with his father to the round-up, and was riding about watching the
-operations. Chancing to pass near, Dick Willoughby overheard him use
-an insulting epithet in regard to Miss Farnsworth—the young man was
-evidently peeved that the ladies had not sought him out instead of
-Munson, and it was obvious, too, that he had been drinking even at that
-early hour in the morning.
-
-Swiftly wheeling, Dick rode up to him with a look of anger so intense
-that even the cowboys who knew him were taken aback.
-
-“You foul-mouthed beast!” he hissed, as he pushed his quirt into the
-slanderer’s face. “Just let me overhear you make a rude remark again
-about Miss Farnsworth and I will hammer the life out of you. You are
-nothing better than a drunken hobo, not fit to associate with ladies.”
-
-The outburst was so sudden that young Thurston was cowed and attempted
-no reply. But as Willoughby rode off he sent after him a look of sullen
-and resentful hatred. Two or three of the cowboys, who really were good
-friends of Dick Willoughby, but were nevertheless not above fawning for
-the favor of the heir to the great rancho, indicated that they were on
-Marshall’s side.
-
-“Guess two can play at the hammering game,” remarked one.
-
-“He don’t come any of his rough-house business over you, Marshall, while
-I’m around,” affirmed another, pugnaciously.
-
-But the young man, still without uttering a word, turned gloomily away
-and started his pony in the direction of home.
-
-“Guess he feels like another drink,” grinned an irreverent youth.
-
-“Hell,” exclaimed an elderly man, the blacksmith at the rancho, “if the
-Thurston family don’t beat the band for quarrels and bloody feuds!”
-
-But just then a bunch of cattle broke from the main herd and the group
-of cowboys dispersed in a galloping scamper.
-
-Munson and the young ladies, engrossed in their light conversation, knew
-nothing of this unpleasant episode. They were now discussing the date
-of the projected visit to the home of Mr. Ricardo Robles among the oaks
-above La Siesta. It was decided to fix it for the first Sunday after the
-cattle muster was completed, when Dick Willoughby would be free to make
-one of the party.
-
-“But hold a moment,” exclaimed the lieutenant suddenly, “unless I’m to
-be court-martialled for absence without leave, I must take the train
-East next Saturday, or—or—”
-
-His eyes fixed on Grace, he hesitated to complete the alternative.
-
-“Or what?” she inquired.
-
-“Follow Dick’s advice and send in my resignation.” As he spoke he thrust
-a hand into his breast pocket and drew forth a letter, sealed, addressed
-and stamped, all ready for the mail. “I really can’t quite make up my
-mind,” he added, dubiously.
-
-
-
-0155
-
-“Let me help you,” said Grace with a gay smile as she extended her hand
-for the letter.
-
-“How?” he asked.
-
-“I’ll mail your resignation for you. We shall be riding home by La
-Siesta postoffice.”
-
-“Oh, Grace!” murmured Merle in timid protest. “Think of the
-responsibility you are taking.”
-
-“A woman’s mission in life is to encourage men to do the proper thing,”
-replied Grace with roguish defiance. “Our friend here is enamored of
-the West, and the West is the very best place for him. I’ll post your
-letter, lieutenant.”
-
-He placed it between her fingers, doffed his hat, and bowed gallantly.
-
-“Be it so. Let the gods—or should I say, a fair goddess?—decide.”
-
-“Thanks for the compliment,” cried Grace, with a pretty flush on her
-face. “Good-bye, then, for the present. Get ready for Sunday’s picnic
-among the oaks. Come along, Merle, my dear.”
-
-And with a touch of the quirt she started her pony into a canter.
-
-“Great guns, but she’s worth while,” exclaimed Munson as he gazed after
-the retreating figures.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VII—Old Bandit Days
-
-ON the evening of the day that followed the big round-up of cattle, Dick
-Willoughby and Chester Munson rode over to the store. As they cantered
-along, both men were pre-occupied with their thoughts.
-
-Dick was not worrying over his sharp passage of words with his
-employer’s son, for he knew that his services at the present time were
-quite indispensable, more especially if the rancho was to be sold to the
-best advantage. The owner had spoken lightly of the negotiations, and
-had chuckled in a sinister way about the money he had frequently made
-over unexercised options. But this time it was a Los Angeles syndicate
-that was seeking the property, composed of men whose financial
-reputation and keen business ability Willoughby knew well. For he had
-learned their names after his interview with Ben Thurston, and he felt
-certain that this particular group of capitalists would have entered
-into no serious negotiations without having both the cash and the
-intention to put the deal through. Therefore he scented a change of
-ownership in the rancho, and consequently, perhaps, the necessity for
-his looking around to find employment elsewhere. He hated to think of
-leaving a place that he had come to look on as home and parting from
-all the friends he had made throughout the countryside. Unconsciously to
-himself, the greatest tie of all was proximity to La Siesta and to Merle
-Farnsworth. But Dick was not thinking of Merle just then—he was merely
-turning things over generally in his mind as he rode across the valley.
-
-Munson also was cogitating the change in his own outlook that had
-been brought about by the mailing of the letter of resignation to army
-headquarters. He was recalling the many years he had striven to reach
-the lieutenancy now voluntarily surrendered—of his youthful zeal and
-ambition for an army career which had been powerless to withstand
-the witching call of the West. And although Grace Darlington’s act of
-putting the letter in the post had been only the last feather to tip an
-evenly balanced scale, he could not but feel that thereby this beautiful
-girl of the West had entered into his life and into all his future
-plans, hopes, and aspirations. The thought gave him joy; he was more
-pleased than ever that the decisive step had at last been taken.
-
-Arriving at the store, they found old Tom Baker seated on a dry goods
-box, while Buck Ashley leaned against the counter, waiting for the
-stage coach and the mails. Already two or three others were beginning to
-congregate under the trees, in readiness for the distribution of letters
-and newspapers.
-
-“Hello, Dick,” called out the sheriff, “I heard of your scrap yesterday
-morning with that young ne’er-do-well, Marshall Thurston. My God, I’m
-glad you gave him hell.”
-
-“Please don’t speak about it,” replied Willoughby quietly. “That was my
-affair and mine alone. I guess we can find some more agreeable topic.”
-
-“Wal,” drawled Buck Ashley, “Tom here was just a-tellin’ me a yarn
-that’ll interest both you boys a heap, or the lieutenant at all events,
-for he’s new to these parts and don’t know the local hist’ry yet. Of
-course I’ve heard the story before, but not all the pertic’lars the way
-Tom can tell ‘em. And its a dangnation good story. So start from the
-beginnin’ again, Tom.”
-
-Thus addressed, the sheriff, after taking a bite from his tobacco plug,
-began:
-
-“The yarn has to do with the old-time bandit Joaquin Murietta, about
-whom we were speakin’ the other morn in’. Well, the way it all happened
-was this: On a neighboring ranch, over Ventura way, beyond the Lagunita
-Rancho, owned at that time by Senor Olivas, a rich cattle dealer comes
-down from ‘Frisco to buy a bunch of beeves. The stock had all been
-driven up on a mesa near the Olivas ranch house, and for several days
-the herders had been cuttin’ out the cows and the young calves from the
-steers, ‘cause this feller was only goin’ to buy the steers.
-
-“The great herd was bellerin’ and pawin’ in a big cloud of dust, through
-which the vaqueros—cowboys, you know, lieutenant—could be seen ridin’
-round and round. Of course roundin’ up cattle is always more or less
-excitin’ work, but this rich chap had come down from ‘Frisco with his
-saddle bags bulgin’ out with gold, and this sorta added a mighty sight
-to the interest of the doin’s. Part of the bargain was that the deal
-was to be for spot cash, all in gold, too, mind you, and it was arranged
-that the buyer and Senor Olivas were to take their stations at one side
-of the narrow gate, and every time a steer was driven through that gate
-a twenty-dollar gold piece was to be tossed into a big bag which Senor
-Olivas was holdin’.
-
-“They do say as how the work continued all day, from early mornin’ until
-dark, afore the last blamed steer passed that ‘ere gate, and they claim
-that there was eighty thousand dollars in the Senor’s bag as pay for the
-day’s drive. They say, too, that Joaquin Murietta, disguised, was one
-of the vaqueros doin’ the drivin’. Anyway that very night old Olivas was
-waked up mighty abruptly by feelin’ the cold nose of a revolver shoved
-against his own nose.
-
-“Well, the long and short of it all was that Senor Olivas and his wife
-were both gagged and bound hand and foot, while Murietta ransacked the
-house, found the strong box and carried away every blamed gold coin that
-Olivas had received for the sale of his steers. The outlaw succeeded in
-makin’ his escape into the Tehachapi mountains with his cut-throat gang,
-and they found a hidin’ place in the robbers’ cave that is somewhere
-hereabouts on the San Antonio Rancho. It sure was as slick a piece of
-rascality as was ever pulled off in the old lawless days.”
-
-“Well,” observed Buck Ashley, as he shook his head reflectively, “I’m
-assoomin’ some of the cowboy fellers around here will find that cave one
-of these days. I’ve put in a good many Sundays huntin’ for it myself.”
-
-Just then there was the sound of horses’ hoofs outside, and a moment
-later Jack Rover strolled into the store. Over his shoulder was slung
-the big leather bag for the rancho mails.
-
-“Hallo, everybody,” was his greeting. “I’m ahead of time Buck, but the
-stage will be here in five minutes. I saw its dust above the ridge. I
-hear, lieutenant,” he went on, “you’re going to stick to the West and be
-one of us.”
-
-“Quit the army?” exclaimed Tom Baker in surprise.
-
-“That is so,” replied Munson. “California has fairly got hold of me, and
-I intend to make my home in the West.”
-
-“Then you just stick here, young man,” said the sheriff, rising to his
-feet and extending his hand. “California is the pick of the States, and
-our valley the pick of California. Don’t you forget it. We’re proud to
-welcome you as a new resident.”
-
-“That’s what I say, too,” concurred Buck Ashley, cordially.
-
-Munson smiled. “Well, I don’t know if you can put me in the resident
-class all at once,” he observed, diffidently. “Guess I’ve got to join
-the cowboy brigade first, if Dick and Jack here will break me in.”
-
-“Sure thing,” assented Jack Hover. “You’re a good rider now—for an army
-man.”
-
-“An ex-army man,” corrected Willoughby, laughing.
-
-“It strikes me we should put you in as postmaster, Munson,” suggested
-the sheriff, a sly gleam of mischief in his eye. “Buck Ashley here is
-growin’ old.”
-
-“Yes, but not too old to hold down his job till your tombstone’s in the
-cemetery, Tom Baker,” retorted the storekeeper, with a grin. “No man
-takes the Tejon postmastership while I’m alive,” he added defiantly.
-
-“I’m forewarned and won’t apply for your job, Buck,” laughed Munson.
-“But here comes the stage, so show your spryness, old fellow, by getting
-us our mail.”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VIII—A Letter from San Quentin
-
-BUCK ASHLEY had retired into the partitioned-off section of the store
-that formed the postoffice, and was busy stamping and sorting out
-the mail. The scattered loiterers outside crowded into the building
-expectantly, and the local parliament was in session. Amid the buzz
-of conversation Willoughby could not but hear his own name mentioned,
-coupled with that of Marshall Thurston. He understood quite well that
-all manner of gossip was flying around in regard to the quarrel at the
-round-up. But he remained stoically indifferent, shut his ears, and
-leaning against the counter busied himself with an old Saturday Evening
-Post that had been lying there.
-
-At last the wicket was shoved up with a bang, and those present began to
-move toward the little aperture through which Buck Ashley proceeded to
-hand out correspondence and newspapers. One by one the throng melted
-away. Jack Rover was examining the big bunch of mail for San Antonio
-Rancho as he stowed it into the letter bag. Munson was opening and
-gleaning the contents of two or three letters that had come to him from
-New York. Dick Willoughby continued his reading, unconcerned; Jack would
-pass over any correspondence for him. Old Tom Baker had not risen from
-his accustomed seat on an empty box; he had few correspondents, and
-the mail did not worry him, although he invariably assisted with his
-presence at its distribution.
-
-These four were now the only ones in the store besides Buck Ashley, who
-still remained behind the partition. At last the postmaster appeared,
-holding in his hand an open letter. His face showed great agitation as
-he glanced around to take stock of those who might be present.
-
-“Say, boys,” he whispered in a mysterious manner, as he held up the
-letter, “this is the most dangnation extr’ornery thing that has ever
-happened to me. You’re just the bunch of fellers I’d like to consult.
-Close the door, Tom.”
-
-“What’s up, Buck?” asked the sheriff as he rose to comply. “You look as
-if you had the ague shakes.”
-
-“No ague in this here land of California,” laughed Jack Rover. “Is it a
-proposal of marriage you’ve been getting, Buck?”
-
-“A derned heap better’n that. God ‘lmighty, boys, this may mean millions
-for all of us. Shoot the bolt, Tom; I’ll hand out no more groceries
-tonight. Come close together, all of you. You read the letter aloud,
-Dick. My hand’s a-tremb-lin’, and I can’t get the Frenchie’s lingo just
-right.”
-
-“The Frenchie?” echoed Tom Baker in puzzled surprise.
-
-“It’s a letter from Pierre Luzon,” explained Buck.
-
-“Good God!” The sheriff was now as deeply stirred as his old crony.
-
-“The bandit scout you were telling us about the other morning?”
-exclaimed Jack Rover, also fired with excitement.
-
-“I thought that fellow was in San Quentin for life.” remarked Munson,
-composedly.
-
-“Wal, and ain’t this letter from San Quentin?” retorted Buck. “See the
-headin’. But Dick’ll read it aloud. I feel clean knocked out.” And the
-old man sank back on his chair behind the counter.
-
-The four others were now clustered around Dick Willoughby. The latter,
-deputized to do the reading, had nonchalantly taken the epistle from
-Buck Ashley’s trembling hand. While the others were speaking he had
-bestowed a preliminary glance, and from his lips there escaped a murmur
-of surprise.
-
-“Great Caesar!” As he uttered the ejaculation Dick sat up, keenly alert.
-
-“Well, what’s it all about?” inquired Munson, by this time the only cool
-man in the bunch.
-
-“Read, read!” cried the storekeeper hoarsely.
-
-Dick Willoughby began:
-
-“Mr. Buck Ashley, Storekeeper, Tejon, California.
-
-“If God in His goodness permits this letter to come to your hands,
-remember it is from old Pierre, the Frenchman, who used to be about your
-store sometimes a half a day at a time, smoking his pipe. You never knew
-much about me or where I lived. But I will tell you.
-
-“I am an old man now—very old. I was born in the South of France, came
-to this country in the ‘40’. and entered into the service of Joaquin
-Murietta, who was one great man, but a big bandit. Peace to his soul!
-Well, he was good to me, and I was faithful to him, taking care of the
-cave, the big grotto, the cavern among the Tehachapi mountains where he
-many times hid from the sheriff’s posse, and also, where he brought all
-his gold to stack up and keep from everybody.
-
-“You also know Don Manuel, him whom the people call White Wolf. Well,
-once when a boy, Don Manuel he save Marietta’s life from the sheriff by
-helping him to escape from one close place. Murietta was very grateful,
-and one day he bring the boy to the grotto cave, and there I see him and
-like him very much. That was while Murietta still lived.
-
-“Afterward when the little boy grow up and was one man, and turned
-bitter against the gringos because they wrong his sister, Senorita
-Rosetta, and his old father and mother die of grief, he say to me, ‘I
-will become a bandit like Joaquin Murietta.’ He came to the cavern one
-night and tell me and say, ‘You be my servant.’ So I say, ‘All right,’
-because Don Manuel one brave man.
-
-“So that night of the great stage robbery over near Lake of Tulare,
-I hold horses. That’s all I do, but all the same they put me in this
-horrid prison, and here I am. The other two men, Felix Vasquez and Fox
-Cassidy, were shot by the posse and I have been told by a Portugee in
-the jail here about the White Wolf being killed away north in Seattle,
-and he is no more.
-
-“Don Manuel de Valencia, he was one great man. Peace to his soul!
-
-“I am alone. I want to get away from this terrible prison. I have
-promised one of my guards—a good Frenchman who comes from my town in
-France—$5,000 in gold if he can secretly get this letter into postoffice
-to you and get me away from this living hell. You do this and I show you
-the cavern. Nobody knows where it is but me.
-
-“Come and get me, please, my good Mr. Ashley, come, and may the spirit
-of the Virgin Mary reward you. All I say here is truth. You come get me
-and I show you the secret grotto. I show you the great stacks of gold
-hidden by Joaquin Murietta and Don Manuel. Also the sand-bar in the
-hidden stream where Guadalupe gathered up much gold.
-
-“I beg and pray you to keep what I say in this letter secret. I am old
-and weak and sick. Come and get me.
-
-“Obedient servant,
-
-“Pierre Luzon.”
-
-“Ain’t that just one hell of a letter, boys?” exclaimed Buck Ashley.
-
-“Gospel truth, every word,” cried Tom Baker, emphatically.
-
-“It certainly reads like the truth,” concurred Munson.
-
-“Then what are we going to do about it?” asked Jack Rover.
-
-Dick Willoughby spoke now with the quiet and quick decision that marks
-the leader of men:
-
-“What we will do is this. We five are partners in this secret, and, if
-Buck is willing, we’ll play the game together for all it is worth. To
-begin with, we’ll put up one hundred dollars apiece to send Tom Baker to
-Sacramento. He will try to get a pardon or a parole for Pierre Luzon.”
-
-“That can be managed,” assented the sheriff. “I’ve got a political pull,
-you know, boys.”
-
-“Well,” continued Dick, “we’ll bring old Pierre here and we’ll get from
-him the information he promises about the secret grotto.”
-
-“Not forgetting Guadalupe’s placer mine,” interjected Jack Rover.
-
-“Everything will be attended to in its turn,” replied Dick. “One thing
-at a time, and the first thing to be done is to get the Frenchman out of
-San Quentin. When can you start, Tom?”
-
-“The day after tomorrow.”
-
-“Well, we’ll have the cash ready for you by tomorrow night. You must
-bring Pierre Luzon here without anyone else besides ourselves knowing
-his name or getting next to him.”
-
-“I’ll fix up a cot for him in my own room behind the store,” suggested
-Buck Ashley.
-
-“That’s a good plan,” assented Dick. “When the Frenchman’s here, it
-will be time then to discuss our next move. Meanwhile, it’s an honorable
-promise of secrecy all round, and to begin with I give my word.”
-
-While speaking the last words, Dick solemnly raised his hand, and each
-man in turn followed his example as he gave the pledge required.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER IX—Tia Teresa
-
-TEN days had passed and the count of the stock on San Antonio Rancho had
-been completed, every canyon searched, the last wandering maverick
-roped and branded, the number of fat beeves accurately estimated. Three
-members of the Los Angeles syndicate had arrived in a big automobile and
-remained over night at the ranch house. Most of the time they had been
-closeted with Ben Thurston in his office, and had finally taken their
-departure without exchanging a word with anyone else on the rancho.
-Nobody knew whether the deal had gone through or not, but rumor said
-that, after some disagreement on the first day, terms had been arranged
-next morning.
-
-Dick Willoughby, although he discussed the question with no one, made
-his own inferences. The very fact that the visitors had not made any
-inspection of the property proved that they already knew it thoroughly
-well. The counting of the cattle and horses had been the final factor
-in the negotiations, and the figures had enabled the deal to advance a
-further stage toward completion. Ben Thurston might fool himself about
-easy option money put up only to be forfeited, but Dick Willoughby was
-not fooled. The days of closer settlement in California had come, and
-these Los Angeles men were the most enterprising and skilful subdividers
-in the West. They dealt only in big propositions, and after mopping
-up all the available tracts in the southern end of the State, were
-extending their operations northward. This vast so-called “Spanish
-grant,” an empire in itself, had no doubt for several years been in
-their eye, and now they were prepared to handle the San Antonio Rancho
-with the lavish expenditure it deserved and required to transform the
-great sweep of cattle range—rich agricultural land, as the luxuriant
-native grasses showed—into smiling orchards and alfalfa farms, each
-provided with the irrigation water which intelligent conservation would
-ensure in abundance.
-
-Dick knew in his heart that the era of transformation had at last come,
-that the roaming herds were to be pushed back into regions more remote,
-that homes and schoolhouses and garden cities would soon be dotting the
-landscape, that the passing of Ben Thurston, the cattle king, and of his
-hard-riding, devil-may-care vaqueros was at hand.
-
-Yet Thurston spoke no word—in fact, he seemed to be more grouchy and
-taciturn than ever. Not even his son Marshall was in his confidence, for
-the young man was seldom with his father, preferring to spend his
-time in the drinking saloons and dance halls of Bakersfield, where the
-activity of oil-developing operations attracted all sorts and conditions
-of men, among whom the dissipated decadent had readily found friends to
-his liking.
-
-Ben Thurston who had gone the pace himself in his early days, did not
-seek to interfere with his son’s pursuit of pleasures, but he had very
-promptly squelched any interference from Marshall with his own business
-operations. On the evening of the quarrel with Dick Willoughby at the
-round-up, Marshall had attempted to tell his father about the affair and
-suggest Dick’s dismissal. But the old man had at once silenced him
-by saying: “Why, damn you! I brought you out to this country to enjoy
-yourself and not to get into trouble. So far as Willoughby is concerned,
-I can’t afford to quarrel with him. He is my foreman, and I am right
-in the midst of a big business transaction. So just you mind your own
-business, my boy, and leave him alone.”
-
-Accordingly, Marshall Thurston, a coward at heart, had not sought to
-pursue the feud singlehanded, and Dick had seen but little of him during
-the rest of the mustering work. When they did happen to meet, it was a
-case of a black scowl of hate from the one and a contemptuous smile of
-indifference from the other. And so the days had passed until the task
-was finished.
-
-It was the Sunday morning that had been fixed for the visit to the
-home of Mr. Ricardo Robles, when the cattle foreman could at last
-conscientiously take a day of recreation. With the first break of dawn
-he and Munson were in the saddle, for they had been invited to breakfast
-at La Siesta before starting with the young ladies on the ride through
-the oak forest.
-
-The visitors arrived early, but not too early for their hostesses. Grace
-and Merle were waiting to welcome them in the portico, looking more
-charming than ever in their neat riding suits of khaki.
-
-“We saw you cross the bridge,” declared Grace, “and mother has gone in
-to order breakfast to be served. You must be hungry after your early
-start.”
-
-“Oh, Sing Ling didn’t let us go without a cup of coffee,” laughed Dick.
-“But I fancy we’ll do full justice, all right, to the bountiful fare of
-La Siesta.”
-
-It proved to be a delightful meal in every way, the viands seasoned with
-gay repartee and laughter. A full hour had sped before Dick recalled the
-real object of the day’s excursion.
-
-“We usually walk to Mr. Robles’ place,” remarked Merle. “It is only a
-mile or so by the short cuts up the hill, but by the winding road it is
-very much longer. So we ordered our ponies.”
-
-“I see,” smiled Munson, “to prolong the pleasure of our foursome among
-the oaks.”
-
-“Not at all, sir,” retorted Grace. “The climb on foot is a stiff one,
-and we knew that you must be out of condition from the lazy life you are
-living.”
-
-“I am only waiting for Willoughby to give me a cowboy’s job,” replied
-the ex-lieutenant.
-
-“I don’t know if there will be any cowboy jobs going,” observed
-Willoughby. “It’s my belief that San Antonio Rancho is sold and is going
-to be broken up into small holdings.”
-
-“Oh, what a pity!” exclaimed Merle.
-
-“From one point of view, perhaps,” answered Dick. “But from a hundred
-other points of view, what a blessing! There will be a dozen happy homes
-for every steer the range now feeds!”
-
-“But La Siesta will remain just as it is,” cried Grace.
-
-“That will be all right,” replied Dick, gallantly, “It’s already a happy
-home.”
-
-The ladies smiled pleasantly.
-
-“Then this will mean the elimination of Mr. Ben Thurston,” observed Mrs.
-Darlington.
-
-“The greatest blessing of all,” declared Merle, clapping her hands. “You
-see, I am already converted to the change, Mr. Willoughby,” she added
-merrily.
-
-“But what about my job?” asked Munson in mock dolefulness.
-
-“Consult Mr. Robles,” laughed Grace. “He may take pity on you, and find
-you a place as handy man on his estate.”
-
-In merry mood they all sallied forth. The saddle horses were waiting,
-and standing beside them was an elderly Spanish woman.
-
-“Tia Teresa, Mr. Munson,” said Mrs. Darlington by way of introduction.
-
-Munson had often enough heard the name, and in answer to an inquiry,
-Willoughby had told him that the old dame had been the personal
-attendant of the two young ladies ever since they could remember. Tia
-or Aunt Teresa was now more a friend of the family than a servant of the
-house, and, taking her hand in salutation, Munson treated her with the
-affable courtesy that was her due.
-
-“I am glad to make your acquaintance,” he said, raising his hat.
-
-Tia Teresa looked pleased. Despite her seventy years, she was a buxom
-and splendidly preserved woman, and there was still the flash of
-youthfulness in her big dark eyes.
-
-“You will look after my little girls,” she said, as she gathered
-together the folds of her black lace mantilla. “By rights I should
-be coming with you, too,” she added, in the manner of a true Spanish
-duenna.
-
-“You forget that we are home again—in free America,” laughed Merle as
-she settled herself in the saddle.
-
-“Too free, I sometimes think,” rejoined Tia Teresa. “But there is safety
-in four,” she added, turning with a smile to Mrs. Darlington.
-
-And as the young folks rode away she waved them a pleasant adios.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER X—The Home of the Recluse
-
-AT a gentle pace they wound their way through the forest of magnificent
-old oaks.
-
-As for Munson, riding by Grace Darlington’s side, the miles were the
-shortest he had ever before traversed. It seemed only a few minutes
-before the red tiled roof and towers of a house built in the California
-Mission style were gleaming through the trees only a short distance
-ahead.
-
-Great oaken doors closed the arched gateway, but at the clatter of hoofs
-and the sound of voices, a little peep-hole wicket was withdrawn. The
-inspection by unseen eyes apparently was satisfactory, for a moment
-later a postern was opened, and two men, Mexicans obviously by their
-garb and deferential manner, emerged to take and lead away the horses.
-Within the patio stood Senor Robles, his usually grave face lighted by a
-smile of cordial welcome.
-
-“Let me tell you, young men,” he said while shaking hands, “that while
-Grace and Merle are quite at home here, you are the very first strangers
-who have passed through my portals.”
-
-“Strangers no longer then,” said Dick, good-naturedly.
-
-“Precisely,” replied Mr. Robles, “or you would not be here. But I
-foresee that all of us are going to be very close friends. Isn’t that
-so, Grace, my dear?”
-
-“I’m sure I cannot say,” replied Grace, with a smile of demure innocence
-toward Mr. Munson. Then she turned to Mr. Robles with a roguish twinkle
-in her eye. “But I’ve news for you. Mr. Munson has resigned from the
-army and is looking for a job.”
-
-“Both facts are already known to me,” answered Robles, smiling.
-
-“Oh,” exclaimed Grace, “one can never surprise you, Mr. Robles. Although
-you live the life of a hermit, you seem to be always the first to learn
-everything that is going on.”
-
-“A hermit, my dear, need not necessarily be out of touch with the
-world,” replied Robles, playfully pinching her ear. “And now, Mr.
-Willoughby, you came specially to see my pictures. Lead the way, Merle.
-Gentlemen, I say again—welcome to my mountain home.”
-
-They lingered awhile in the patio to admire the marble columns of the
-cloister that ran all around, the playing fountains at each of the four
-comers, with groups of symbolical statuary, the wealth of beautiful
-shrubs and flowers. On the side opposite to the gateway rose a tall
-tower, fashioned like the campanile of an Old Mission and crowned with
-bright red tiles.
-
-“We shall ascend there later on,” remarked Mr. Robles, following Dick’s
-upward glance.
-
-Then they passed through the wide-opened French window into the living
-rooms.
-
-The first was a great apartment that occupied one entire side of the
-building. In the centre was a large globe of the world. Here and there
-were glass cases displaying manuscripts and illuminated missals. Along
-the walls were finely-carved bookcases filled with several thousands of
-volumes.
-
-“When you have the leisure you can come and browse here,” said the
-host, addressing both young men. “Meanwhile you may care to look at the
-bronzes and statuary”—this with a sweep of the hand that indicated the
-art treasures distributed about the apartment.
-
-On the side of the house beneath the tower were the dining room and the
-billiard and smoking room. Passing through these, the visitors came to
-the picture gallery, a room corresponding in size to the library. Here
-were hung treasures of the painter’s art, masterpieces signed by names
-that are immortal. These, as their owner again explained, had been
-acquired by him during several prolonged visits to Europe.
-
-“Count this just as a preliminary survey, Mr. Willoughby,” he said
-finally. “Then come again. There are guest chambers on either side of
-the gateway, and one of these will always be at your disposal when I am
-at home. I extend the same invitation to you, Mr. Munson.”
-
-“My word, but you may feel honored,” exclaimed Grace, in unconcealed
-amazement.
-
-“When I open my gates, I open my heart as well,” said Mr. Robles, with a
-courtly little bow to his new friends.
-
-Next they ascended the tower. Its first floor, above the living rooms,
-was a delightful den filled with curios of all kinds. From this sprang a
-winding iron staircase, up which Mr. Robles led the way.
-
-The upper chamber, extending on all sides some distance beyond the
-supporting tower, proved larger than might have been expected. Its one
-conspicuous article of furniture was a great terrestrial telescope. The
-sliding panels of glass which formed a complete window all around the
-room showed that the instrument could be used without obstruction in any
-direction.
-
-Here a Mexican boy was on duty. When the visitors entered, his hand was
-resting on the telescope. A bright red sash around his waist imparted a
-touch of picturesqueness to his costume. He was perhaps only twelve or
-thirteen years of age, but wonderfully keen and alert-looking for his
-years. At a glance from his master, the youngster took his departure,
-closing the door behind him.
-
-“Gentlemen,” remarked Mr. Robles, when they were again alone, “perhaps
-before I brought you here I should have exacted the promise I am now
-going to ask you to make. Grace and Merle know that I am a recluse and
-wish to live undisturbed by curiosity-mongers or tittle-tattlers. I want
-nobody but the friends I deliberately choose to know about my habits
-of living or the contents of my home. Only in this way can I hope to
-be left alone. Therefore, please give me your word, Mr. Willoughby and
-Lieutenant Munson, that you will not speak with any outsider about the
-things I am showing you today.”
-
-The promise was instantly given and sealed by a hearty hand clasp.
-
-“Now,” resumed the host in lighter tone, “perhaps you would like to view
-the landscape. I may explain that I had this observatory, as I call it,
-specially built and equipped so that I could sweep the valley from end
-to end. For example, I saw you two young men riding along the road this
-morning,” he went on, with a smile. “I saw one of you alight, about
-twelve miles from here—it was you, lieutenant—and tighten the girths of
-your saddle.”
-
-“Great Scott!” murmured Munson, in half-incredulous surprise.
-
-“Test the glass for yourself,” continued Robles, as, placing one eye
-at the lens, he adjusted the instrument. “Look”—and he stepped back,
-motioning Munson to approach.
-
-Munson peeped through the long tube and there came from his lips a cry
-of mingled delight and amazement.
-
-“Dick, Dick, there’s the store as large as life—Buck Ashley standing
-at the door and lighting a cigar. Geewhizz, and it must be twenty miles
-away.”
-
-He rose erect and made room for Dick. The latter gazed in silence for a
-few moments. When he turned to Mr. Robles he said:
-
-“It’s really wonderful—it is the most wonderful glass I ever looked
-through.”
-
-There was the glimmer of an exultant smile on the face of Ricardo
-Robles.
-
-“I saw you at the round-up across the valley the other day,” he
-remarked. “You were much nearer to me than is the store. And while I do
-not invite any confidence, Mr. Willoughby, you certainly engaged in
-a very spirited conversation, to say the least, with young Marshall
-Thurston. Indeed, I half expected to see you come to blows.”
-
-“What was that?” asked Merle in some trepidation.
-
-Willoughby had reddened.
-
-“Nothing of consequence,” he responded, almost curtly. “I had to tell
-the young cub to mind his own business. That was all.”
-
-“You certainly have the whole valley under observation,” remarked
-Munson, considerately diverting the conversation.
-
-“Yes,” assented Mr. Robles, with an almost grim smile of satisfaction.
-“The telescope teaches one not merely to observe, but to reason from the
-facts observed. Tia Teresa evidently thought that she should have come
-along today to play duenna, eh, Merle?”
-
-“You don’t say you guessed that?” exclaimed Merle in great astonishment.
-
-“Guessed it! I knew it when she raised her protesting finger.”
-
-“You are a magician, Mr. Robles,” cried Grace.
-
-“No, only a logician,” was the sententious rejoinder.
-
-“Please let me peep at our garden,” asked Merle. “I wonder if mother is
-among her roses.”
-
-Without a word Robles swung round the instrument on its pivot and
-changed the focus.
-
-“That’s about right,” he said, stepping back. “There is no one out
-of doors at present. Move the glass slightly and you can see over the
-entire garden.”
-
-Each girl in turn made a prolonged scrutiny; they were enchanted with
-the clearness and marvellous detail of the picture.
-
-“Henceforth we’ll have to be on our best behavior, Dick,” laughed
-Munson, as they turned toward the winding stairway. “We’ve got to
-remember Mr. Robles has a constant eye on us.”
-
-“Perhaps I’ve had you under observation quite a while,” laughed the
-senor, tapping the young fellow on the shoulder.
-
-Then he threw open the door, and, with a slight bow and extended hand,
-motioned to his visitors to descend. At the foot of the narrow, winding
-staircase they found the Mexican youth standing on guard. He bowed low
-as the ladies passed, and when Mr. Robles followed last of all, saluted,
-and then immediately returned to the chamber above, again without
-a single word of instruction from his master. Munson and Willoughby
-exchanged meaning looks; obviously a well-disciplined outlook was kept
-from the observatory all the time, as if from the conning-tower of a
-battleship.
-
-Again the party was in the patio. Mr. Robles turned to Willoughby.
-
-“I hope Grace and Merle have explained to you that at present I do not
-entertain. My own fare is of the simplest.”
-
-“Mother is to have luncheon ready at one,” interposed Grace. “I caught
-the broiled trout myself this morning.”
-
-“You caught them ready broiled, eh?” laughed Munson.
-
-“Oh, you know what I mean,” rejoined Grace, with a pretty little moue.
-
-“Broiled trout!” exclaimed Dick, appreciatively. “Then I think we’ll
-be hurrying down the hill, senor.” He had recognized with intuitive
-courtesy that the interview was at an end.
-
-“Is he not delightful?” asked Merle, as their horses started off at a
-walk. “And you would never guess how sweet and kind he can be.”
-
-“I don’t doubt it,” assented Willoughby. “A polished gentleman, but a
-man of mystery, isn’t he?”
-
-“Not when you come to know him. A recluse always has his little
-idiosyncrasies.” As she spoke, she set her pony at a canter down the
-gentle incline.
-
-After luncheon, Dick found himself tête-à -tête with Mrs. Darlington
-in the music room. The mystery attaching to the personality of the
-recluse was still uppermost in his mind. But for the present the music
-claimed his attention.
-
-Merle had seated herself at the grand piano and was softly fingering the
-keys, striking a chord here and there, until finally she drifted into
-Chopin’s Fifth Nocturne. There was something almost divine in her
-interpretation. The music fairly rippled from her deft fingers, as they
-glided on from one beautiful cadence to another until at last, note by
-note, as if sobbing a reluctant adieu, the melody died away.
-
-Both the visitors were generous in their tributes of congratulation.
-
-“Thank you,” said Merle, as she arose from the piano and proceeded to
-unfasten the clasps of a violin case.
-
-“What now?” exclaimed Munson.
-
-“Oh, I am not the performer; I am merely the accompanist,” and she
-held out a beautiful old violin to Grace. As Merle sounded a key on the
-piano, Grace touched the strings of the Stradivarius. When all was ready
-she tenderly caressed the violin with her chin, and, her bow sweeping
-across the instrument, Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata trembled from the
-strings, in soft and plaintive melody, filling the room with echoing
-and re-echoing notes of sweetness, while Merle’s accompanying notes lent
-support, in blending harmony, to the rich cadences.
-
-“Splendid! magnificent!” exclaimed the young men in unison.
-
-Munson was now called upon to sing, and Dick felt himself at full
-liberty to converse with Mrs. Darlington. He broached the subject that
-had been occupying his thoughts.
-
-“What is known of Senor Ricardo Robles?” he enquired. “Have you been
-long acquainted?”
-
-“Oh, I have known him for many, many years,” replied Mrs. Darlington.
-“We used to be next door neighbors in Los Angeles. That was twenty years
-ago. Then we returned to England—Mr. Darlington had fallen heir to the
-family estates. Mr. Robles used to visit us off and on. He is, as you
-have seen, very fond of Grace”—she paused a moment, then went on—“and of
-my adopted daughter Merle as well. Merle, you know, was the child of my
-dearest girl friend who died a year after her baby was born.”
-
-“Yes, Merle has told me this.”
-
-“Well, six years ago my dear husband died, and it was Mr. Robles who
-persuaded me to return to California. He selected this beautiful ranch
-for us, near to his own home. And we have all been so happy here at La
-Siesta.”
-
-“Mr. Robles is certainly a wonderful man, with all those art treasures
-around him.”
-
-“He has princely tastes and princely wealth as well—this you will have
-seen for yourself today. He travels a great deal abroad, sometimes for a
-whole year at a time, and then returns quietly to his hermitage. He has
-taken a great fancy to you, Mr. Willoughby. You are lucky in gaining the
-friendship of such a man.”
-
-“I think I’ll like him, too—when I know him better,” replied Willoughby,
-with cautious reserve.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XI—A Rejected Suitor
-
-IN Dick Willoughby’s presence Marshall Thurston contented himself with
-sullen looks. But beyond his sight and hearing he spoke truculently of
-what he was going to do some day to get level with “the hired hand who
-had had the infernal insolence to call him down in public.” So all the
-little world on the rancho knew, or at least believed, that a bitter
-feud was in progress.
-
-Two or three of the cowboys fostered young Marshall’s feelings of
-animosity, partly out of sheer devilment, partly because they deemed
-it good policy to keep in the good graces of the heir to the rancho.
-Moreover, so long as old Ben Thurston knew nothing about it, they were
-always willing to break a bottle with the dissipated spendthrift, not
-only because good liquor was not to be despised at any time, but also
-for the sake of the amusement afforded by Marshall, in his cups, with
-his stories of fast life in New York and his apparently inexhaustible
-fund of highly spiced anecdotes. Even his braggart threats against
-Willoughby had an element of fun.
-
-“Why don’t you cut him out with the girl?” one of his boon companions
-had suggested on an occasion of this kind.
-
-“By gad, I will,” Marshall had responded with vehemence. “You just watch
-me.”
-
-Thenceforward this thought was uppermost in his alcohol-sodden brain.
-
-Marshall Thurston had met Mrs. Darlington and her daughter on several
-occasions, but, although he had been formally introduced, he had never
-been invited to call at La Siesta. Nor up to the present had he felt any
-inducement to take the initiative. Like clings to like, and these people
-were not of his kind—in the presence of pure and refined womanhood the
-human toad becomes uncomfortably conscious of his own loathsomeness.
-
-But now there was a valid reason to egg him on. He would show Dick
-Willoughby who was who on the San Antonio Rancho. If the heir to all
-those broad acres chose to pay court to Merle Farnsworth, the girl would
-only be too glad to jump at him and his millions. He would tell her,
-too, that Willoughby was going to be fired and that the fellow was not
-worth a moment’s consideration.
-
-Such was his mood one afternoon when, his motor car being in the repair
-shop, he had not made his usual trip to Bakersfield. “Yes, he would
-ride over that very day to La Siesta;” and he proceeded to fortify the
-resolve by opening a bottle of champagne in the solitary seclusion of
-his den. After gulping down the wine he felt brave enough to face
-the devil himself. Yet, when mounted on his horse, he still evinced
-sufficient discretion to make a wide detour lest Willoughby should catch
-sight of him and divine his intentions.
-
-As he rode along young Thurston nursed his wrath to keep it warm. At
-the same time the desire to possess the girl for her own sake began to
-inflame his imagination. Unscrupulous passion had been bred in the very
-bone of this worthless degenerate. Just as his father, Ben Thurston, had
-thirty years before trampled on the virtue of the young Spanish beauty,
-Senorita Rosetta, the sister of Don Manuel, so now was the son hatching
-in his brain a foul plot of spoliation.
-
-“I’ll get even with Willoughby, by God, in the very way that will
-hurt his pride the most. Women!—pshaw, they’re all alike. And she’s a
-peacherino all right—those flashing dark eyes—she sure looks good to
-me.” This was now the tenor of his musing as his pony cantered up the
-slope to La Siesta.
-
-He advanced on foot to the portico with a swagger and a smile, and
-there, as luck would have it, he found Merle seated in a rocker,
-reading, and alone. She rose with quiet courtesy and returned his
-greeting.
-
-“I am sorry,” she said, “mother is not at home. She and my sister Grace
-have driven over to the dairy. We have a model dairy, you know, on La
-Siesta,” she went on, anxious to make conversation that would not prove
-embarrassing. For already she divined some particular object in the
-young man’s visit, knowing as she did that he and Willoughby had
-recently exchanged angry words.
-
-“Won’t you show me your famous rose gardens?” asked Thurston, boldly.
-
-“With pleasure,” she replied, assenting with a sweet smile of
-politeness, although there was sore reluctance in her heart, as she
-stepped from under the portico.
-
-But, unknown to herself, she did not go unattended, for as Merle and her
-visitor passed round the house and through the shrubberies there glided
-after them the figure of a woman, clothed in black, wearing over her
-head and shoulders a Spanish mantilla. It was Tia Teresa, the ever
-watchful duenna.
-
-The roses of La Siesta, as Marshall Thurston had said, were indeed
-famous. Here were all the finest varieties, growing in the perfection
-to which only care and scientific skill applied under ideal climatic
-conditions can attain. Merle was glad to point out the different blooms
-and give them their names—the topic was certainly an innocuous one,
-and she smiled at the thought as they strolled along. She was vaguely
-wondering, too, whether Dick Willoughby would approve even this slight
-measure of courtesy toward the visitor to her home. Although she had
-as yet not the remotest conception that the quarrel at the round-up had
-been in any way connected with her name, she knew that the two young men
-were at daggers drawn, and toward Dick there was the instinctive loyalty
-in her heart that prompted her to count his enemies as her enemies, his
-friends as her friends.
-
-The young girl was too unversed in the ways of the world to notice
-that Marshall Thurston was under the influence of wine. He was too
-experienced a toper to show any signs of unsteadiness on his feet, but
-all the same there was undoubted tipsiness in his leering side-glances
-and occasional slurring of his words. Of this Merle in her maidenly
-innocence was supremely unconscious, nor did she dream that the very
-sparkle of her eyes was completing the intoxication of wine fumes.
-
-Once she cast a look up the hill and asked herself whether the wizard
-of the red-tiled tower had his spy-glass on La Siesta and was even
-then quietly surveying the scene in the gardens. The thought made her
-uncomfortable; she felt sure that her kind friend, Mr. Robles, would
-not look with favor on her condescending to show even the slightest
-attention to one whose evil ways of living were notorious.
-
-Suddenly she came to a halt, close beside a little clump of oleander
-trees laden with rich blossoms.
-
-“I am sorry I must leave you now,” she said, quite abruptly.
-
-“Leave me?” stammered Thurston. “What for?”
-
-“I have other things to attend to,” she replied.
-
-“Oh, I say, Miss Farnsworth”—the inebriate as he spoke made a gesture of
-appeal—“I hope you are not angry with me. If that scalawag of a fellow
-Willoughby told you I said anything disrespectful of you the other
-day, he is a demed liar—that’s what he is, a derned liar, and a poor
-penniless beggar as well, whom my father’s going to fire off the ranch.”
-
-Merle stood speechless. She stepped back when Thurston advanced with
-outstretched hands.
-
-“The truth of the whole matter is,” he rambled on, with growing
-incoherence, “I am madly in love with you myself. That’s what I am, and
-I’m going to have you, too.” And he grabbed her fiercely and attempted
-to draw her to him.
-
-Merle screamed both in fear and in repulsion as she tried to push him
-away.
-
-Just then, from among the oleanders, rushed Tia Teresa. The old duenna
-came like a cyclone. Her eyes blazed with anger. Grasping the young
-libertine by the collar of his coat, she pulled him madly from the now
-half-fainting girl. Then, whirling him around, she rushed him, with
-the strength and ferocity of a tigress defending her whelps, down the
-gravelled path and flung him bodily over the low retaining wall along
-the embankment that separated the rose gardens from the public road. She
-spat upon his prostrate figure below and rained down on him a torrent of
-imprecations in the Spanish tongue.
-
-It was all over in one brief minute. When young Thurston picked himself
-up, it was to see the aged fury half-leading, half-carrying Merle away
-in the direction of the house.
-
-“The hell cat,” he murmured.
-
-Then he brushed the dirt from his coat and straightened out his tumbled
-appearance as best he could. His horse was tied to the gate post a
-hundred yards along the road. He slunk toward it, climbed into the
-saddle, and rode slowly away in the falling twilight. He had been
-thoroughly sobered by the incident, yet continued somewhat dazed, for
-his horse was headed toward the woods and hills and not in the direction
-of home.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XII—The Sped Bullet
-
-MEANWHILE events had been happening in the conning tower high up
-among the hills. The Mexican boy on duty had observed the lone rider
-approaching the gateway at La Siesta, and for a brief few moments had
-put the figure under observation by the telescope. He had then sprung
-alertly erect and pressed a button on the wall. Mr. Robles had quickly
-responded to the summons, and it was he who had had his eye to the
-lens during the scene in the rose garden which had terminated in the
-ignominious expulsion of young Thurston at the hands of the infuriated
-duenna.
-
-When the recluse at last withdrew his gaze, his hands were clenched and
-he stood absolutely rigid in the tenseness of his indignation. He had
-seen Merle’s insultor ride toward the hills and Merle herself taken
-indoors under Tia Teresa’s protecting care. For almost a minute the
-storm of rage held him, then he relaxed and his look changed to one of
-terrible determination. He seized a rifle that was hanging on one of the
-walls and swiftly departed.
-
-At the arched gateway he spoke a few words to the two retainers on
-guard, and when he passed through the postern one of them, also equipped
-with a rifle, followed. Taking a cross-cut from the high road, together
-they descended the wooded hillside.
-
-In a little canyon just below the forest Dick Willoughby was rounding
-up a bunch of vagrant steers. He was alone, riding at a walking pace,
-driving a dozen or more beasts in front of him, and keeping an eye among
-the brushwood searching for more.
-
-On the roadway through the woods Marshall Thurston ambled along. He was
-a poor and awkward rider at all times, the discreetly-veiled jest of
-the nimble cowboys, to whom reins, saddle, and spurs were all as second
-nature. Now, when he imagined himself free from observation, he did not
-take pains to display even a semblance of horsemanship and, with bridle
-dropped, steadied himself by a grip on the saddle horn.
-
-In her bedroom Merle had soon recovered from her distress of mind.
-Dashing the tears from her eyes, she had enjoined Tia Teresa to say
-nothing to anyone about the unpleasant incident. Mrs. Darlington would
-be angered and would certainly tell Mr. Robles, while if the story ever
-reached Dick’s ears there could be no saying what further trouble might
-not ensue—a horse-whipping at least, with jeopardy to Dick’s position
-at the rancho and embitterment of an already dangerous quarrel. So Tia
-Teresa, to complete the comforting process, had assented to secrecy.
-
-On the pathway down through the forest the Mexican, now in advance,
-uttered a low “hist,” halted, and held out a warning hand toward his
-master. The gaze of both was now fixed in the same direction. Below them
-could be seen the figure of the horseman coming around a bend in the
-roadway. The Mexican raised his rifle to the shoulder, but the hand of
-Robles detained him. The time was not yet—the distance was too great in
-view of the obstructing timber.
-
-Robles turned away and rested an arm against a tree trunk. His eyes were
-downcast; for the moment his mind was far away. He saw once again the
-little cemetery on the hill, with the marble cross inscribed “Hermana,”
-and the other gravestone at the head of the twin mounds that marked the
-resting place of his parents whose hearts had been broken by Rosetta’s
-tragic end. The fingers of the man who had long years ago sworn the
-vendetta worked nervously, closing and unclosing themselves.
-
-The rider was nearer now, in a higher loop of the road where the trees
-were more scattered than below. Merle, drowsy from the reaction of her
-emotions, had dropped off asleep on her sofa. Tia Teresa had returned to
-the portico, to make sure that the interloper had taken himself off
-for good and would not return. In the little canyon Dick Willoughby was
-quietly riding behind his accumulating drove of cattle.
-
-Suddenly a shot from among the woods rang through the air. Tia Teresa
-heard it, and after the start of first surprise, into her eyes came the
-light of swift comprehension and her whole face was illumed by fierce
-vindictive joy. “At last, at last,” she murmured, “vengeance begins.”
-And in the fervor of her triumph she threw up her extended arms, as if
-to give benediction to a righteous deed.
-
-Dick also heard the sharp detonation which his experienced ear knew at
-once to be from a rifle, not from the shot-gun that some sportsman
-after quail or rabbits might have been using. He betrayed no great
-surprise—just the unspoken word “curious” hovered on his lips as,
-halting his horse, he turned in his saddle to glance upward in the
-direction whence the sound had come. Then after a moment he wheeled the
-pony round, and, abandoning his drove for the present, ascended at a
-leisurely pace the narrow pathway which he knew communicated with the
-winding highroad above.
-
-When the bullet had reached its fated billet, Marshall Thurston’s
-fingers were still gripping the saddle horn. And right there the missile
-of death struck, glancing upward from the metal crown and piercing
-the victim right through the heart. Not a cry—just an outflung arm, a
-swaying figure slipping down onto the roadway, and a terrified riderless
-horse pivoting quickly round on its haunches, then galloping madly for
-home.
-
-Dick, glancing upward through the timber, caught a glimpse of the
-fleeing steed, and he touched his own pony with the spur so that it,
-too, darted forward.
-
-Farther along the road Tia Teresa heard the clatter of the hoofs and saw
-the animal in its swift stride disappear in the direction of the rancho.
-She knew now for certain that her surmise was correct, and the first
-flush of triumph on her fact settled down into an expression of grim
-satisfaction. “It served him right in any case.” she muttered. “It was
-just what the young villain deserved.” Then she re-entered the house and
-passed upstairs. Her young mistress was placidly asleep, smiling in her
-dreams. The duenna nodded her head in a satisfied sort of way; Merle
-would learn the news at the proper time, and would not meanwhile be
-agitated by wild conjectures. So she tiptoed from the room, and was soon
-busied with domestic duties as if nothing had happened.
-
-Dick, emerging on foot from the last steep ascent of the canyon,
-promptly swung himself again into the saddle and started at a loping
-canter up the winding roadway through the woods. After rounding the
-first comer he spied the huddled figure on the ground. Before he turned
-the body over he knew that the man was dead. But when the dead face
-looked up at his, it was with a terrible shock of surprise that he
-recognized Marshall Thurston.
-
-Dick stood for a few moments, gazing around in utter bewilderment. One
-hand of the dead man was shattered and bloody, while a big splurge
-of red on the shirt showed where the bullet had completed its work.
-Murder—palpable murder! But who could have done this deed? Who had any
-valid motive to rid the world of this stray piece of humanity—and in
-such coldblooded manner, not in the heat of some angry quarrel, but by a
-deliberate act of assassination in a place so lonely as these pine-clad
-hills? Dick sat him down by the roadside and pondered these questions.
-
-There was no real pity in his heart. Young Thurston had been utterly
-bad—not big-brained enough to belong to the social dregs, but just
-equally worthless scum, the more repellent because it made itself
-visible all the time. He would pass almost without a tear except from
-the father whose own record had been so foully besmeared that there
-could be scant sympathy even for him in the hour of his bereavement.
-
-Dick just wondered and wondered. For the time being he had quite
-forgotten that old legend—the Vendetta of the Hills.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XIII—Accused
-
-AROUND the horse corral at the San Antonio Rancho some half-dozen
-cowboys were squatted on their heels, cowboy-fashion, swapping the news
-of the day. They had ridden in from various points of the compass, and
-two or three of their horses, those of the latest comers, still stood
-saddled outside the enclosure, the reins dropped loosely over their
-heads, which for the trained cow-pony is just as effective an anchorage
-as any stake and rope.
-
-Two or three cigarettes were a-light, and the “makings” were passing
-from hand to hand among those not yet engaged in the leisurely blowing
-of smoke rings. The topic of conversation was the rumored sale of the
-ranch, which some declared to be assuredly impending, while others
-dismissed the possibility of such a big deal going through as the merest
-moonshine.
-
-Jack Rover was among those who had no illusions as to the future.
-
-“Believe me, fellers,” he was remarking, “it’s no false alarm this time.
-The old rancho is as good as sold, the stock is a-going to be shipped
-out, the farmers is a-coming in, and in a few months’ time we’ll all be
-hunting jobs if there’s any more cow-punching jobs left in this blamed
-new topsy-turvy world. And that’s the straight goods—hell!”
-
-Just as this terse and vigorous summation of the whole dispute found
-utterance, all eyes were turned in a particular direction. It was young
-Thurston’s riderless steed that had attracted attention as it swept
-toward its accustomed quarters in the corral.
-
-“It’s Marshall’s horse,” observed one of the boys.
-
-“Off again, on again, gone again, Flannigan,” laughed another—an
-adaptation of a popular story that evoked a general grin.
-
-But one youth had sprung to his feet, and skilfully caught the bridle of
-the panting animal as it passed him.
-
-“Whoa, beauty!”
-
-The others had not stirred. The involuntary dismounting of the young
-boss was too familiar an episode to provoke anything more than a laugh
-tinctured with mild satisfaction—
-
-“No Easterner can ride a Western broncho, anyhow.”
-
-“Pass your baccy, Bob,” came a voice from the ring. But the cowboy
-holding the riderless horse now brought them all to instant attention.
-
-“By God, he’s been shot! There’s blood on the horn, and here’s the rip
-of the bullet.”
-
-Everyone was on their feet now, and the situation was being eagerly
-discussed while the saddle was undergoing confirmatory inspection.
-
-“Something’s happened, boys,” exclaimed the big husky fellow addressed
-as Bob, conclusively, if somewhat obviously. “And I guess we’d better
-investigate.”
-
-As he spoke he swung himself into his saddle—he had been one of the late
-arrivals and his horse was all ready for the road or the range.
-
-“Up toward the hills then,” remarked another, indicating the direction
-whence the riderless horse had come. And a moment later he, too, was
-astride his broncho.
-
-“I’ll borrow your pony, Ted,” cried out Jack Rover as he jumped astride
-a third mustang.
-
-And a moment later all three riders were pelting along the road leading
-to La Siesta. There was no difficulty whatever in picking up the long
-galloping strides on the dusty highway, and the speed of the trackers
-depended only on the swiftness and endurance of their mounts.
-
-Meanwhile the boy who had caught Marshall’s horse had disencumbered it
-of saddle and bridle, and turned it into the corral with a kindly pat on
-its heaving flank.
-
-“Guess I’ll report to the boss,” he called out, as he picked up the
-saddle and moved away toward the ranch home.
-
-“Look out for yourself,” shouted one of the group. “Old Thurston will be
-madder than hell.”
-
-But it was terror, selfish terror, not anger nor grief, that came into
-Ben Thurston’s eyes when he saw the saddle horn smeared with fresh blood
-and scarred by a bullet.
-
-“My God, and I believed Don Manuel was dead,” he whispered in a hoarse
-voice to Leach Sharkey.
-
-The two had been, as usual, in close companionship; Sharkey reading a
-weekly newspaper, while the employer he was paid to protect, restlessly,
-as was his wont, paced the room.
-
-“Disappeared and dead ain’t exactly the same thing,” replied the
-sleuth as he critically examined the saddle. “And there may be another
-explanation to this. What about Dick Willoughby?”
-
-“Yes, yes, Dick Willoughby,” eagerly assented the trembling man.
-
-“You saw them quarreling the other day—they hate each other like
-poison,” continued Sharkey. “Where’s Dick Willoughby now?” he enquired,
-with a swift glance at the cowboy.
-
-“Good Lord, that’s just where he is—searching the canyons below the
-forest for mavericks,” was the reply.
-
-Sharkey smiled blandly; the informant looked disappointed, yet
-confident.
-
-“I couldn’t have believed that of Dick,” he added, regretfully.
-
-“Well, clear out now,” said Sharkey. “Mr. Thurston and I will want to be
-alone. You say Jack Rover and two others have gone out to search? Well,
-we can’t do more till they bring us in some news. Let us know at once
-when they return.”
-
-Ben Thurston had collapsed onto a chair, then raised himself, and was
-leaning eagerly forward now. He met Sharkey’s glance of hardly concealed
-contempt.
-
-“That’s right,” he murmured, “It has been Dick Willoughby’s work. I knew
-Don Manuel was dead.”
-
-“And what about your boy?” asked the sleuth curtly.
-
-“Oh, yes, poor Marshall! I forgot about him. But perhaps he’s only
-wounded. We’ll send to Bakersfield for a doctor.” And he half rose from
-his seat.
-
-“You’ll just wait patiently here,” replied Sharkey, as he pushed
-Thurston back into his chair. “All that is possible for the present is
-being done.”
-
-And the rôles were now reversed—it was the bodyguard who slowly and
-meditatively paced the room.
-
-Meanwhile Dick Willoughby had ceased from his ruminations, and was
-beginning to take practical steps for getting Marshall’s body home. He
-had no thought of coroner’s regulations that a corpse should be left
-undisturbed till the proper official investigation had been made. He
-had got his riata ready, and was just going to sling the body across
-his saddle and tie it there, when the rhythmic thud of clattering hoofs
-smote upon his ear. Thank God! Help was coming. There would be others
-to assist him in his gruesome task. So Dick patiently waited while the
-sound grew nearer and nearer, until at last the three cowboys dashed
-round the bend.
-
-“I heard the rifle shot,” Dick explained, “and rode up from the canyon
-below to have a look. I found him here, huddled up just as you see him
-by the side of the road.”
-
-“Who the devil did this?” asked Jack Rover, contemplating the corpse.
-
-“God only knows,” replied Dick. “You take him on your saddle, Bob,” he
-added, addressing the big cowboy, whose horse was a full hand taller
-than the other ponies and more stalwart in proportion.
-
-And so the cortege was formed, Jack Rover leading the way, with Bob and
-the body following and Dick Willoughby bringing up the rear.
-
-The sun was low when at last they gained the rancho. They made their way
-quietly round to the bunk house and quite tenderly swathed the mortal
-remains of the young boss in a blanket, before carrying it to his
-father’s home.
-
-At the sound of approaching footsteps old Ben Thurston, with Leach
-Sharkey close on his heels, emerged onto the verandah. There was no need
-to announce the death of his son—the ominous bundle told its own sad
-tale. The ranch owner stared at it, horrified, inarticulate from a
-conflict of emotions, the hunted look of terror again in his eyes. Leach
-Sharkey took up the work of interrogation.
-
-“How did it happen?” He was addressing Jack Rover, who chanced to stand
-next to him after helping to deposit the body on a bench that stood
-conveniently against the wall.
-
-“Dick Willoughby heard the shot up among the woods, and found him lying
-dead on the road.”
-
-Sharkey advanced a pace or two and confronted Dick.
-
-“Who fired the shot?”
-
-“How should I know?” retorted Dick, reddening slightly from the
-brusqueness of the enquiry.
-
-“I reckon I can tell,” cried Sharkey. And with a swift, experienced
-movement he grabbed Dick by both arms and clicked a pair of handcuffs on
-his wrists before anyone, Dick least of all, had fathomed his intention.
-
-Dick Willoughby was a square-shouldered, powerful fellow, but the great
-husky bodyguard, Leach Sharkey, towered above him. In the first flush of
-anger and surprise Dick struggled to break the shackles of ignominy. But
-the sleuth grabbed him by both shoulders with a grip that rendered its
-recipient absolutely powerless.
-
-“Go easy, young man.”
-
-Dick’s muscles relaxed, and Sharkey was content to release his hold.
-
-“Go easy. If you have any answer to make to the charge of murdering that
-boy, you’ll have the chance all in good time.”
-
-“What right have you to arrest me?” demanded Dick, somewhat recovering
-his poise.
-
-“Oh, I’ve a special constable’s star all right,” replied Sharkey,
-throwing open his coat and displaying, close to his armpit, the badge of
-the office he had claimed.
-
-“Guess that’s good enough for you and all others here. And now take my
-advice, Willoughby. You’ll come quietly with me to Bakersfield. I’ve
-no special grudge against you, but have my obvious duty to perform. You
-threatened young Marshall more than once in all our hearing, and it will
-be up to you to prove yourself guiltless of his death. You bring round
-Mr. Thurston’s automobile, Rover. We start right now.”
-
-Everything had happened so rapidly that none of the cowboys, had they
-so desired, could have protested or interfered. Meanwhile the news had
-spread, for others among the ranch hands were coming up and crowding
-toward the verandah rails. General sympathy was obviously with Dick
-Several of the onlookers advanced and shook his manacled hands. “All
-right, Mr. Willoughby.” “You’ll be home again tomorrow,” “Buck up,
-it’s a ridiculous charge”—these were among their expressions of
-encouragement. Dick just smiled his thanks—a wan, wistful smile. He now
-had himself under perfect control—even his resentment toward Sharkey had
-been allowed to evaporate.
-
-“Very well,” he said quietly, addressing the sleuth. “I’ll give you no
-trouble, Sharkey. Let us get away from here as quickly as possible.”
-
-Just then Lieutenant Munson came hurriedly onto the scene. For a moment
-he looked thunderstruck when he saw the handcuffs around Dick’s wrists.
-
-“Great Scott, Dick! What’s the meaning of this?” Then without waiting
-for a reply he turned to the sleuth.
-
-“I’ve just heard about young Thurston’s death, but you’re surely not
-going to mix up Dick Willoughby’s name with it, Mr. Sharkey? You must
-know that he would have nothing to do with such a cowardly crime.”
-
-“He can prove all that at the proper time and place,” was the cool,
-determined rejoinder.
-
-“Don’t interfere, Munson,” interposed Dick. “Mr. Sharkey considers
-that he is doing his duty. That’s an end to all argument. I’ll have no
-difficulty in obtaining my release once we get to Bakersfield.”
-
-“And the lieutenant can come along with us if he likes,” observed the
-sleuth, conciliated by his prisoner’s sensible view of things. “As Mr.
-Willoughby’s best friend, you can see that everything’s done right, Mr.
-Munson.”
-
-“But why these handcuffs?”
-
-“I know my own business,” replied the sleuth, with returning severity,
-as he touched the constable’s star on his breast. “And as a soldier you
-should know the wisdom of letting it go at that, sir.”
-
-Munson turned to Mr. Thurston. All through the colloquy the ranch-owner
-had spoken not a word. He had dropped onto the bench beside the still
-swathed body of his son, and was sitting there with bowed head and
-stolidly fixed eyes.
-
-“You are no party to this accusation, Mr. Thurston?” the lieutenant
-enquired. “I am sorry for the blow that has fallen on you. But you can’t
-seriously believe that Dick Willoughby’s the man who fired that shot.”
-As he spoke he pointed at the dead rigid form.
-
-Thurston raised his eyes. There was a dull glare of fury in them, a
-savage snarl on his parted lips.
-
-“Mind your own business, young man. He killed my boy, and by God he’ll
-hang for it.” While speaking he rose to his feet, holding forth a
-denouncing arm toward Willoughby, “Yes, he’ll hang for it,” he growled
-again with savage determination, turning round to the open door.
-
-With a gesture to the cowboys standing nearest, he bade them carry the
-body within. He stood aside to let them pass with their burden, then
-followed and slammed the door behind him with an angry bang.
-
-Despite the tragedy of it all, a little smile went round the group
-of onlookers. It meant to say that that was just Ben Thurston all
-over—irascible and vindictive. But some faces looked grave.
-
-“May go mighty hard with Willoughby,” murmured one voice, that of the
-old grey-headed man, the blacksmith at the rancho for twenty years or
-more. “I wouldn’t like to feel the weight of the old devil’s hand.”
-
-But just then the automobile came round the house, piloted by Jack
-Rover. Sharkey began to make his dispositions for the journey.
-
-“Do you want to take anything with you, Willoughby?” he asked in a
-considerate manner.
-
-“Nothing,” was the prompt reply.
-
-“Well then, you’ll ride with me on the front seat. Lieutenant, you can
-share the tonneau with Mr. Thurston.” There was a slight grin on the
-sleuth’s face as he signified the arrangement.
-
-“Mr. Thurston?” queried Munson, taken somewhat aback. “Does he come,
-too?”
-
-“Sure,” replied Sharkey. “Who’s going to make the charge, I’d like to
-know? Willoughby, I just need your promise that you won’t move from this
-verandah till I return.”
-
-Dick nodded assent. “You have my word,” he said with quiet dignity.
-
-“Then I’ll be back in a minute,” added the sleuth, his hand on the door
-knob.
-
-Ben Thurston was standing alone in the centre of the living room, the
-body with its bearers having passed to an inner apartment. His arms were
-folded across his breast in an attitude of deep dejection. But it was
-with the scared look of a hunted beast that he started away at the touch
-of Leach Sharkey’s hand upon his shoulder.
-
-The sleuth smiled understandingly.
-
-“You don’t want to be left here all alone, do you?”
-
-“No, no. For God’s sake, no. I had forgotten that.”
-
-“Then you’ve got to come with me to Bakersfield. In any case you will be
-wanted to swear the information. And you can also make arrangements for
-the funeral. So get your hat and overcoat. We are all ready outside.”
-
-“Yes, yes, I’m coming,” faltered Thurston. “Wait for me, Sharkey,” he
-added, as with nervous fingers he detached his overcoat from a rack on
-the wall.
-
-And a few minutes later the automobile, with Sharkey at the wheel, the
-handcuffed prisoner by his side, and Thurston and the lieutenant seated
-frigidly apart in opposite comers of the tonneau, was spinning
-through the gathering dusk of evening on its way to the county town of
-Bakersfield.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XIV—Entanglements
-
-FROM the observatory high up among the hills, Mr. Robles had witnessed
-the arrest and the departure of the prisoner. He had understood every
-move just as if he had been present on the verandah down below and had
-heard each spoken word.
-
-As he stood erect, his hand still rested on the telescope. For a few
-moments he pondered, then murmured to himself as he turned to leave the
-room: “A bad complication! I must break the news tonight to Merle. Poor
-little girl!”
-
-But it was two hours later before he wended his way down through the
-moonlit forest in the direction of La Siesta.
-
-There dinner was over. No word of untoward happenings had as yet
-come from the outside world to disturb the tranquillity of the little
-household. In the drawing room Merle was at the piano, while Grace,
-close by, was curled on a sofa reading the latest novel. At
-some distance from the young girls was Mrs. Darlington, occupied
-intermittently over a piece of embroidery.
-
-She was seated in semi-darkness, only her hands and her work illumed by
-the soft pink radiance of a shaded lamp resting on a little table by
-her side. In the evening costume of the chatelaine of La Siesta was the
-suggestion of old lace and old-time lavender—the old lace at her bosom
-and around her neck, the subtle fragrance of lavender exhaled from her
-garments that gave to her a sort of personal atmosphere. And as she sat
-musingly, with the skeins of silk passing through her fingers, she might
-have formed a picture of some Penelope seated at the loom of pensive
-memory.
-
-The music from the piano was in harmony with both her mood and her
-attitude—the soft dreamy melodies of Mendelssohn’s “Songs without Words”
-to which she was vaguely listening while busy with her thoughts and her
-stitches.
-
-Downstairs amid the oriental luxuriousness of the cosy corner sat Tia
-Teresa, waiting in the dark to intercept the visitor of whose coming
-she had been apprized by a secret messenger. And at last Ricardo Robles
-came, with the noiseless footfall that was characteristic of the man and
-imparted to him an air of mystery. He was standing by the old duenna’s
-side before she had realized his presence.
-
-“I wanted a few words with you first of all, Tia Teresa,” he murmured,
-as she grasped his hand in both her own and affectionately kissed it.
-“Something has happened.”
-
-“I know what has happened, Don Manuel,” she whispered. “The young man
-deserved his fate, for I am sure you saw what occurred in the rose
-garden during the afternoon. For one of his breed to have dared even to
-touch my little girl!” She hissed the words venomously, then added in
-calmer tone: “So all is well. He brought down his doom upon his own
-head, and vengeance for Rosetta begins.”
-
-Robles pressed her hand as he disengaged his own from her almost
-fiercely caressing touch.
-
-“I nursed you both,” continued the duenna in a low impassioned voice.
-“Your people were my people, you children were my very life, and your
-revenge has come to be my own. So I rejoice that the young ruffian
-died.”
-
-He had seated himself by her side on the divan. “We shall say no more
-then about that,” he responded. “In some ways I am sorry over the day’s
-work. At times I find it difficult to reconcile my firmness with my
-softness.”
-
-“But you cannot forget that you are no longer the owner of your father’s
-lands and flocks, and are virtually childless besides.” She breathed the
-words with intense repressed fury, intensified as she added: “And all
-through the accursed gringo who wrecked our happy lives—Rosetta’s,
-yours, your beloved parents’ as well. While that abominable wretch
-lives, the vendetta can never end.”
-
-For a moment Robles remained silent. Then he spoke resolutely:
-
-“I know it, Tia Teresa. Today my work only begins. Rest assured that it
-will be carried to the bitter finish. For this I have waited all through
-those long years. But I wanted to tell you of another matter—to warn you
-of a very serious complication. Dick Willoughby has been arrested
-for the slaying of Marshall Thurston.” The duenna sat bolt upright in
-shocked surprise. “Oh, my! What will this mean?” she murmured.
-
-“Terrible grief for my little girl—possibly much suffering for him until
-I choose to take the responsibility upon myself.”
-
-“You must not do that.”
-
-“No. Not yet, at all events. Or the victory will be his—my enemy’s.”
-
-He mused again. She, too, remained silent. At last he broke the spell.
-
-“But I have already devised measures for his safety. Now I must go
-upstairs. They have heard nothing yet?”
-
-“Not a word.”
-
-“Then I must tell them of the mysterious shooting in the woods, and at
-the same time reassure Merle that her lover is in no real danger.”
-
-“And Mrs. Darlington?” asked Tia Teresa. “How much is she to know?”
-
-“Nothing! The vendetta is for us Spaniards. It is ours and ours alone.
-No one knows of my vow but you and I. Let it remain so. Adios, my dear
-friend.”
-
-In the darkness he stooped and kissed her on both cheeks. For a moment
-she clung to him, but he gently liberated himself from her embrace. He
-moved toward the stairway, and Tia Teresa followed him cautiously up to
-the drawing room door, outside of which she remained. Knowing that she
-was there, he left the door ajar. The soft music was still playing, but
-suddenly ceased when Robles advanced into the apartment.
-
-“My word, but this is an unexpected pleasure,” exclaimed Merle, as she
-came from the piano with outstretched hands.
-
-He took them both in his own, and bestowed on her a grave but kindly
-smile. He also nodded to Grace, who had dropped her book and risen in
-courteous greeting.
-
-“But you look sad and serious,” Merle went on, with quick intuition that
-his coming at this late hour meant something more than a mere neighborly
-visit.
-
-“Something sad and serious has happened,” he replied.
-
-Mrs. Darlington had advanced from her lamp-lit table.
-
-“What?” she enquired eagerly. “Somehow I had a sense of impending
-trouble all day long.”
-
-“Young Thurston of the rancho has met with an accident.”
-
-“Dead?” gasped Merle, her hands clasped against her bosom.
-
-“Yes, dead, I am afraid. He was mysteriously shot this afternoon when
-riding through the pine woods.”
-
-Merle was stricken dumb. Grace glided to her side and listened in silent
-expectancy.
-
-“Shot! By whom?” asked Mrs. Darlington.
-
-“That I cannot tell,” gravely replied Robles. Then he smiled faintly.
-“But an amazingly stupid blunder has been made. By some combination
-of circumstances suspicion is being fastened on our dear friend Dick
-Willoughby.”
-
-“Dick!” exclaimed Merle. “Who dares to suggest such a thing?” she added
-indignantly.
-
-“I infer that Mr. Thurston is his accuser,” replied Robles.
-
-“The two young men quarreled,” murmured Mrs. Darlington, in a voice of
-deep agitation.
-
-“Mother!” cried Merle reprovingly. “Even to think for one moment that
-Dick, whatever the provocation, could have done such a thing! He is
-absolutely innocent, Mr. Robles,” she went on decisively, again turning
-to their visitor.
-
-“Of course he is innocent—absolutely innocent. No one knows that better
-than myself.” And he gave an enigmatic smile as he spoke the words of
-reassuring confidence.
-
-“Where is Mr. Willoughby now?” queried Grace.
-
-“He has been compelled to go to Bakersfield.”
-
-“To Bakersfield?” exclaimed Merle, half wonderingly.
-
-“There to prove his innocence,” replied Robles.
-
-But Mrs. Darlington had probed the real significance of his words.
-
-“You don’t mean to say that they have—arrested him?”
-
-Robles nodded gravely. “That’s how the law acts. A man under suspicion
-must be taken into custody—he must be charged so that he can refute the
-shameful calumny.”
-
-Merle had dropped into a settee—white and speechless. Her lips trembled.
-Then she burst into a passion of weeping, burying her face against an
-arm flung across the upholstery.
-
-Mrs. Darlington moved forward quickly to comfort the sobbing girl.
-
-“Oh, don’t take on like this, my dear child. The arrest was a mere
-formality. He will be immediately set at liberty.”
-
-Merle raised her tear-stained face. She spoke in gulping sobs.
-
-“But, mother, I never told you—I shrank from telling any of you. While
-you and Grace were away this afternoon, Marshall Thurston called and
-wanted to make love to me—he even dared to try to kiss me. Tia Teresa
-flung him out of the rose garden. It was I who made Tia Teresa promise
-to say nothing about it to anyone. I feared trouble. And, oh, trouble,
-terrible trouble, has already come.” Again she bowed her head and
-continued weeping, but quietly weeping now. Grace was bending over her,
-patting her shoulder in soothing sympathy.
-
-Mrs. Darlington’s eyes met those of Robles.
-
-“This may prove serious,” she said softly, that Merle might not
-overhear.
-
-“It is decidedly unfortunate,” replied Robles; “an unfortunate
-complication that may, of course, strengthen the suspicion against
-Willoughby and so render it more difficult for us to help him.”
-
-Merle sprang to her feet, and with a hand dashed away her tears.
-
-“Suspicion!” she exclaimed. “There can be not one moment’s suspicion.”
-And she gazed up into Robles’ face in ardent appeal.
-
-“Of course not, my dear, among us—among all those who know Dick
-Willoughby. But there is the harshly judging world to reckon with
-besides. They may say that this discloses a motive for the crime.”
-
-“However, Merle has just told us,” commented Mrs. Darlington, “that only
-she and Tia Teresa know anything about this unhappy episode in the rose
-garden. Mr. Willoughby has not been here at all today.”
-
-“But I happen to know that he was not far away this afternoon—that he
-was rounding up some cattle in the near-by canyons. Malice may suggest
-that he was a witness of Thurston’s insolent behavior.”
-
-“Then we should all keep silent on the subject.”
-
-“Which might be compromising in the long run, my dear Mrs. Darlington.
-Altogether it is a difficult situation.”
-
-Merle had been hardly listening to this conversation. She had been
-thinking, and with thinking had regained her composure. Her mind was
-quickly made up as to the line of prompt action that must be taken. She
-spoke quite calmly now.
-
-“He is in prison. You have not spoken the word, Mr. Robles, but I know
-the truth all the same. We shall go to him tonight.”
-
-“Not tonight, my dear,” replied Robles, with gentle firmness. “But
-tomorrow morning, certainly, I would suggest that you drive over to
-Bakersfield. He will appreciate your kindness in paying him this prompt
-visit, and you can at the same time convey to him my message of absolute
-belief in his innocence.”
-
-“You will not come, too?”
-
-“I can do more for him, Merle, by not going to Bakersfield for the
-present. Do not forget that for reasons of my own I live in seclusion.
-My name must be mentioned to no one but Mr. Willoughby. Trust me, all
-three of you, and leave me to work quietly alone and by my own methods.
-There, I give my promise. The captive will be set free within a short
-time. My hand on that, and you know that I never break my word.”
-
-There was a joyous smile of confidence on his face as he spoke the
-words. Merle took the extended hand gratefully, trustfully, and pressed
-it to her lips. Robles went on:
-
-“My advice is—try to sleep tonight. Tomorrow, or within a few brief
-tomorrows, all will be well. Good night.”
-
-Tia Teresa followed him from the open door down into the outer hall.
-
-“You heard everything,” he said as he paused to speak a final word of
-parting. “Comfort her, but at the same time guard our secret closer than
-ever. Not one hair of Willoughby’s head will be touched—make her know
-that for certain. And everything will come right in a very little time.”
-
-“My poor little girl,” he murmured to himself as he strode down the
-silent tree-shadowed avenue.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XV—Behind the Bars
-
-Dick Willoughby had been lodged in the county jail at Bakersfield, duly
-charged by Ben Thurston as the murderer of his son. To his surprise, and
-indeed to his dismay, the prisoner was informed that, the crime alleged
-being a capital one, no bail could be accepted. This was first of all
-a blow to Willoughby’s pride. Here he was under the stigma of
-imprisonment, but with no possibility of redress. It was not the loss of
-comforts, the deprivation of personal liberty, the hardships to body and
-to soul, inseparable from such restraint, that he resented, so much as
-the semiconviction of guilt implied by the durance vile to which he was
-to be subjected, although absolutely innocent of the deed of which he
-was accused.
-
-However, after first chagrin came manly philosophy. The law might be
-right or wrong, wise or unwise, necessary or superfluous. But all the
-same it was the law of the state and had therefore to be obeyed. So,
-when the situation was finally reviewed, it was Lieutenant Munson who,
-when bidding his friend good-night, had been the angry man, fretting
-and fuming over such an abominable act of injustice, while the prisoner
-himself was tranquilly resigned to the ordeal through which he must
-pass and to which unkind fate was subjecting him for reasons that he was
-powerless to fathom.
-
-“Good night, Ches, old man. You’ll see me again in the morning. It’s
-mighty kind of you to stay in town all night. But we can decide on the
-best lawyer to employ, and then you must hasten back to break the bad
-news at La Siesta.”
-
-Such had been Dick’s quiet words when their colloquy had been broken up,
-and he had been ordered to the retirement of his prison cell. To enter
-that place was for Dick a horrible experience. But he accepted the
-experience calmly, bade the turnkey a cheerful good-night, and laid him
-down to sleep on the narrow mattress resting upon the hard bench, at
-peace with himself and the world, even with the bitter enemy who had all
-so unexpectedly appeared on his path.
-
-Although Munson was back in the jail betimes next morning, he found Dick
-already conferring with a lawyer—the best and most honored in the town,
-as Munson knew the moment his name was mentioned.
-
-“Let me introduce you to Mr. Bradley,” said Dick, presenting him. “Some
-kind friend whose name he declines to reveal for the present, sent him a
-special message last night retaining his services for my defence.”
-
-“Mrs. Darlington, I bet,” interjected the lieutenant.
-
-“No, not Mrs. Darlington, let me assure you,” rejoined the lawyer,
-“although undoubtedly she would be willing to do the same thing. But I
-am not permitted to say any more.”
-
-“And he has carte blanche for all expenses,” smiled Dick. “Although I
-should not think there will be much money required to clear an innocent
-man,” he added.
-
-“Wait till you see,” said the lawyer crisply. “We have to reckon with a
-malignant persecutor, I am already informed.”
-
-“Well, I’ve got a bit to my bank credit,” Dick replied. “And we’ll draw
-on that first before I accept the generosity of an unknown friend. It
-will be quite a saving here,” he went on with a humorous twinkle in his
-eye as he glanced around. “Free board and lodging at the state’s expense
-for a week at all events.”
-
-“Much longer than that, I am afraid,” gravely remarked the lawyer.
-“You see, Mr. Munson, just before you arrived we were discussing
-the decidedly unfortunate coincidence that at the time the shooting
-occurred, Mr. Willoughby, by his own admission, was in the little canyon
-below the scene of the tragedy.”
-
-“Rounding up some cattle,” observed Dick. “Of course. But all the same,
-open to suspicion as being on the ground, and indeed being the first to
-reach the dead man’s side.”
-
-“That should be proof of innocence,” observed Munson.
-
-“Or may be taken as evidence of well-reasoned audacity to throw accusers
-off the trail,” retorted the attorney. “You see we have to look at
-everything, not from our own point of view, but from the other side. Now
-I want to learn something more about that quarrel between you and young
-Thurston at the cattle muster.”
-
-“He made an insulting remark about one of the young ladies from La
-Siesta,” replied Dick. “I told him I would tan his hide if he ever did
-it again. That’s all. But the last thing I want is that these ladies’
-names should be dragged into the case.”
-
-“But his remark and your reproof were overheard by others,” commented
-the attorney.
-
-“Oh, yes, by a bunch of ranch hands.”
-
-“Whose evidence will undoubtedly be called for the prosecution,
-necessitating, perhaps, the evidence of the young ladies on our side.”
-
-“By God, I won’t stand for that,” exclaimed Dick hotly. “I can defend
-myself without their being called to the witness stand. Think, Munson,
-of subjecting Merle or Grace to any such thing”—and his indignant face
-appealed to the lieutenant’s.
-
-“I saw nothing of the quarrel,” observed Munson, addressing the lawyer,
-“although, of course, I heard something about it later on—not from
-Willoughby, however, for he has never once referred to the matter in
-conversation with me. But I say, Dick, old fellow, you know that Merle
-Farnsworth and Grace Darlington, too, will be only too proud and happy
-to stand up for you in a law court or anywhere else.”
-
-“That may be,” replied Dick gloomily, “but I don’t propose that they
-shall be made the objects of vulgar curiosity in a crowded court-room,
-or that their ears should ever hear the vile words that fell from that
-miserable degenerate who has at last met the fate he properly deserved.”
-
-“Well, it is a point that we shall have to consider carefully,” spoke
-the lawyer as he rose to take his departure. “I have all the main facts
-of the case now, Mr. Willoughby. Of course I shall apply formally to
-the court for bail, but I know it is bound to be refused. I’ll make all
-arrangements outside for your comfort here—meals, etc., and no
-doubt your friend, Mr. Munson, will bring you over clothing, toilet
-requisites, and the other little things you will require. I’ll see you
-again later on today.”
-
-The lawyer was gone, and the two comrades were alone in the little room,
-stone-walled and bare of furniture except for a few chairs, where the
-consultation had been held. Beyond the open door stood a constable, just
-out of earshot. But he now took his stand within the room.
-
-“Well, Munson, old chap,” said Dick with cheerful alacrity, “you get
-back to the rancho in double-quick time. Then go on to La Siesta and
-tell Merle not to worry on my account. Tell her that I’m bright and
-happy, and just enjoying a good rest, and will be set at liberty within
-a week or so. But remember, she is not to come here. Good Lord, I
-never want her to see me in a place like this.” And he glanced around
-forlornly, and in a measure ashamed.
-
-But at the very moment there was a flutter along the corridor—the sound
-of voices, and women’s voices, too. A moment later the superintendent of
-the jail appeared, bringing with him Mrs. Darlington and Merle. At the
-doorway he spoke to the officer on guard; the man withdrew.
-
-“Mr. Willoughby, here are some more friends,” said the superintendent
-as he ushered in the ladies. “I am going to interpret the regulations as
-leniently as possible—that’s a matter which can rest between ourselves.
-I’ll come back for you, Mrs. Darlington, in half an hour.”
-
-Merle advanced toward Dick with outstretched hand. In her other hand was
-a fine bouquet of roses.
-
-“What a shame that you should be here,” she exclaimed. “But I realize
-that the only thing to do is to submit as cheerfully as possible to the
-inevitable. Mother and I came over to give you our sympathy and proffer
-our help in every possible way. Grace also sends her very kindest
-regards, and I was bidden by Mr. Robles, whom we saw last night, to
-assure you of his complete belief in your innocence.”
-
-“Oh, I’m not afraid of any real friend thinking me capable of a cowardly
-deed like that,” replied Willoughby. “But it is nice to have these kind
-messages, although I could have wished, Miss Farnsworth, that you had
-not seen me amid such surroundings.”
-
-“Do you think that we would desert you in such a time of trouble as
-this?” replied Merle, as she sat down. “But seeing that our visit is
-to be restricted to half an hour, it is well that we should get to
-the important points without delay. I have been talking over a certain
-matter both with mother and Mr. Robles, and although I shrink from
-telling it, they have decided that you must know about the affair.”
-
-She then proceeded, in a low voice and with lips that trembled, to tell
-how young Thurston had forced his attentions on her just a little time
-before the shooting occurred and how Tia Teresa had rescued her from his
-clutches.
-
-This was the first that Dick had heard of the incident and his face
-flushed with anger. But Merle quieted him at once. “You need not be
-angry now, Mr. Willoughby. It is all over. But your lawyer will want to
-consider what bearing this may possibly have upon the case.”
-
-“It can have no bearing at all,” maintained Dick. “In the first place I
-didn’t even know till now that Marshall had been visiting at La Siesta.
-And in the second place, just as I was saying to Munson a few minutes
-ago, I am determined that the names of you ladies shall not be dragged
-into this miserable affair. Isn’t that right, Mrs. Darlington?”
-
-“In a measure. But all the same we are ready to stand by you so as to
-establish your innocence with the least possible delay. I heard this
-morning that Mr. Thurston is very bitter against you, keeps vowing
-vengeance, and announces that no money will be spared to bring the
-slayer of his son to retribution.”
-
-“Well, I hope he’ll find him without loss of time,” smiled Dick. “That
-will be the quickest and easiest way to get me out of confinement.
-But at this moment I have not the faintest idea on whom to fasten the
-charge. Lots of the cowboys despised young Thurston, but none were
-really his enemies, and I don’t know any one among the bunch who would
-have shot him in that dastardly, cold-blooded manner.”
-
-“Which makes the situation for you all the more disagreeable,” commented
-Munson. “You had been known to threaten him, and if there is no one else
-to whom suspicion can point, you may be kept here, Dick, for quite a
-time—for months, perhaps, until the case goes to trial.”
-
-Dick’s face fell. “For months!” he exclaimed. “Surely that would be an
-outrage.”
-
-“Oh, I wouldn’t be too despondent,” protested Merle. “Besides, Mr.
-Robles has pledged his word to me that you will be free in a very brief
-time.”
-
-“Then he may know who the culprit is,” remarked Dick eagerly.
-
-“No,” interposed Mrs. Darlington. “He is like ourselves—quite in the
-dark. But you may rest assured that Mr. Robles will leave no stone
-unturned to solve the mystery and restore you to liberty, Mr.
-Willoughby, for I happen to know that he holds you in highest esteem.”
-
-“I’m glad of that,” replied Dick. “Well, I want you to tell him from me
-how keen I am that you ladies shall be spared from all association
-with this case. You know that I am exercising great self-denial, Miss
-Farnsworth, when I say that you are never to come here again. This is no
-place for you.”
-
-“Pardon me,” laughed Merle, “but we are interested in you and will
-excuse the hotel you have chosen to patronize. We brought these
-roses for you from La Siesta”—as she spoke she presented him with the
-beautiful blooms—“and if Lieutenant Munson will be kind enough to come
-out to our automobile he will find there some books, also a box of fruit
-and a few delicacies which we hope will help to make your stay here just
-a little more tolerable.”
-
-“You’re kind indeed,” murmured Dick gratefully. “Don’t worry about me,”
-he added cheerfully, “I’ll have a fine rest here, and will be able to
-catch up with my arrears of reading.”
-
-And in this philosophic frame of mind the prisoner was left to begin his
-holiday.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XVI—Pierre Luzon Returns
-
-IN the outside world the question on everybody’s lips was—who had
-fired the fatal shot among the pine woods? The young reprobate had been
-thoroughly despised, but he had no known enemies except Willoughby. So
-while Willoughby’s staunch friends could only reiterate the question
-in vain perplexity, most people were inclined to answer it with Dick’s
-name. The angry quarrel between the two young men was universally
-known and had been subjected to sundry embellishments—for example, the
-threatened horse-whipping had become an actual recorded event, and so
-on. And even there were whispers about rivalry in some love affair—that
-Marshall had had his eye on one of the young ladies at La Siesta where
-Dick for some time had been a constant caller.
-
-So among the cowboys on the ranch, the oil drillers who frequented
-the Bakersfield saloons and had often enough stood around while young
-Thurston had set up the drinks, the newspaper reading public generally
-for whom all the facts had been set forth in elaborate detail—the
-universal concensus of opinion seemed to be that Dick Willoughby was the
-man. Not that this verdict of popular opinion carried with it any real
-reprobation. Everyone agreed that the worthless degenerate had met even
-a kindlier fate than he merited. Had he lived, not all his father’s
-millions could have long saved him either from the penitentiary or an
-asylum for the insane.
-
-A week passed. Thurston brooded in solitude, but at his bidding Leach
-Sharkey kept up active investigations with a view to nose out every bit
-of evidence that could tell against the accused man. Sharkey worked,
-not from any special animosity against Willoughby, but from keen
-professional pride.
-
-Dick accepted his confinement with manly fortitude. It. was one of those
-untoward happenings that come into some people’s lives for no obvious
-reason, but he was calm in the confidence that everything would be made
-clear in a very short time.
-
-Moreover he was clear to his own conscience, which was the main thing.
-Next in importance was that Merle, Grace and Mrs. Darlington, Robles and
-Munson, all the friends whom he held in highest esteem, had never for
-one moment doubted him. In their unshaken friendship was sufficient
-reward for all the tribulations through which he was passing.
-
-Meanwhile word had reached Buck Ashley that old Tom Baker was on his way
-home in company with Pierre Luzon, to whom the Governor of the State
-had at last granted parole. In view of Dick’s imprisonment Munson had
-well-nigh lost all interest in the romance of the buried treasure. But
-it had been Dick himself who had insisted that his friend must attend to
-their joint interests during his period of enforced sequestration.
-
-Thus it had come about that Munson found himself one evening at the
-store, awaiting with Jack Rover and Buck Ashley the arrival of the
-automobile in which the sheriff was bringing the liberated convict
-from San Quentin. In a brief letter Tom Baker had explained that he had
-decided on this manner of transportation both because of its ensuring
-privacy and also because Pierre Luzon was so enfeebled by age, sickness
-and prolonged confinement that he could not travel by train. “I’ve
-rigged up a stretcher,” wrote Tom, “but the poor old Frenchie is as weak
-as a kitten, and we’ll have to run slow.”
-
-Nine o’clock that night was the scheduled hour around which the
-automobile might be expected. Buck Ashley had the extra cot for the
-invalid all ready in his own bedroom at the rear of the store.
-
-It was close on ten o’clock, however, before the headlight of the
-automobile showed across the valley on the high-road. Buck piled another
-big log on the fire in the sitting room. He saw that the doors were all
-carefully closed and the shades pulled down. Then he brought in from the
-bar a tray with glasses and a bottle of whisky.
-
-“Kentucky bourbon—that was old Pierre Luzon’s favorite lotion,” he said
-as he set down the tray. “And I guess he’ll be glad of a good stiff
-drink on a cold night like this.”
-
-At last the automobile entered the yard, and the invalid was carried in
-on the stretcher and propped up comfortably in a rocking chair near the
-cheerful blaze. His teeth were chattering from cold, and he gratefully
-gulped down the stiff glass of bourbon which Buck lost no time in
-proffering him.
-
-“You see,” explained Tom Baker, as he bustled around, “the Governor just
-grants paroles; he can’t grant pardons. Some sort of a board has to pass
-on the pardons. But I got him out all right, and that’s the main thing.
-Eh, Pierre, old man?”
-
-The sheriff nodded with great friendliness to his protégé. Luzon
-responded with a wan smile that silently spoke his thankfulness. His
-face was deathly pale, but there was wonderful snap and vitality in
-the black bead-like eyes that roamed around the room and searched each
-countenance.
-
-Buck was now standing by the rocker. He laid a hand familiarly on the
-Frenchman’s shoulder.
-
-“You see, Pierre, old scout, I don’t forget you”—he pointed to the
-bottle on the table. “Kentucky bourbon, the best I’ve got in the house,
-and the very label you used to call for. Now we’ve got to drink to your
-speedy recovery. Fill up all round, boys. The drinks are on me tonight.”
-
-“Hip, hip, hooray!” shouted Tom, as the glasses tinkled.
-
-“Hush!” exclaimed Buck, warningly. “We don’t want to bring any booze
-fighters prowlin’ around here tonight. You see, Pierre, we four are in
-cahoots and understand each other. You know Tom and myself—we ain’t in
-need of any guarantee. And you can trust Mr. Chester Munson and Jack
-Rover here to the limit.”
-
-Luzon bowed acknowledgment of the informal introduction.
-
-“It was we who put up the cash to get you out of San Quentin,” continued
-Buck, as he dropped into a chair close beside Tom Baker.
-
-“Together with Dick Willoughby,” interjected Munson.
-
-“Oh, yes, not forgettin’ Dick,” resumed the storekeeper, “as fine a
-young feller as ever walked on shoe leather. But, by God, he’s in jail
-just now.”
-
-“Eh?” ejaculated the ex-convict, with a look of awakening, almost
-fraternal, interest.
-
-Buck turned to the sheriff.
-
-“Of course, Tom, you’ll have read all about that terrible affair in the
-newspapers?”
-
-The sheriff surreptitiously grabbed Buck’s arm. He spoke in a
-confidential whisper.
-
-“Drop that subject for the present. I’ve said nothin’ about it to old
-Pierre in case it might upset him. I ain’t dared to mention the name
-Thurston to him, for he shared the White Wolf’s hatred of the breed.”
-Then Tom gave a little cough and glanced across the fireplace at the
-Frenchman. “Just a little cowboy shootin’ scrap, Pierre, in which our
-chum Dick Willoughby has got himself temporarily involved. But say,
-boys,” he went on, casting his eyes toward Munson and Rover, “I just
-thanked the Lord it wasn’t me as had to arrest Dick. Of course if I had
-still been sheriff I’d a done it—when I was a sworn-in officer, duty was
-duty all the time with me, as every damned horse-thief within a hundred
-miles knows. But to take an honest man into custody for shootin’ a
-miserable human coyote like that young—”
-
-“Well, we’re not a-goin’ to speak about him just now,” interrupted Buck,
-bestowing a cautioning kick on the sheriff’s shins.
-
-Tom took the timely reminder.
-
-“That would have gone sore against the grain,” he said emphatically, as
-he reached for the whisky bottle and replenished his tumbler.
-
-“Glad to be back?” asked Buck, beaming pleasantly on old Pierre.
-
-The Frenchman lifted one thin hand and smiled.
-
-“Here I will become once more strong,” he murmured. “No place in ze
-world like ze dear old Tehachapi mountains.”
-
-“Wal, I see you’ve begun to let your beard grow again,” continued Buck,
-pointing to the gray stubbled chin. “And when your hair comes along,
-too, you’ll just be lookin’ fine and dandy. The same old Pierre that
-used to sit for hours at a time in the store.”
-
-He paused a moment, surveying the visitor.
-
-“A leetle more whisky, please,” murmured Pierre, as he watched the
-sheriff lay down his glass.
-
-“All the whisky you want, old fellow,” exclaimed Buck, with effusive
-hospitality. “By gunnies, you’re entitled to a good few nips after all
-the long years you’ve been locked up. Ain’t that so, boys?”
-
-“I should say,” declared Tom, fervently, wiping his lips with the back
-of his hand.
-
-The Frenchman drank gratefully, and as he felt the warm alcoholic glow
-in his vitals, uttered a deep-drawn “Ah!” of appreciation.
-
-“Tastes good, don’t it?” observed Buck. “You never turned down a drink
-of good whisky in the old days, did you, Pierre? Great times then! And
-gosh almighty, don’t it beat hell, I never suspected who you were all
-those years you used to sit around the store smokin’ that big-bowled
-pipe of yourn? And you knew about the cave then?”
-
-“Oh, Pierre Luzon, he know how to keep one secret,” responded the
-Frenchman, smiling.
-
-“Yes, and good for us all you kept it, old man,” exclaimed the sheriff.
-“He’s a-goin’ to show us the cave tomorrow, Buck. There will be six in
-the divvy-up now, boys, for of course Pierre Luzon stands in. That’s
-agreeable all round, fellers?”
-
-“Sure, sure,” responded the others in unison. Tom turned to the
-Frenchman.
-
-“I told you, Pierre, we’d play the game fair and square with you. Ain’t
-that right?”
-
-“I trust you all,” replied Luzon. “I show ze cave tomorrow to my friend,
-Tom Baker, and you gentlemen who have been so kind to make up one purse
-to bring me back here from zat horrid prison.”
-
-“Guess you’re about the only feller that knows where it is?” enquired
-Buck, cautiously.
-
-Luzon looked at his questioner and spoke just one word: “Guadalupe.”
-
-“Does Gaudalupe know?” exclaimed Jack Rover. “I thought her long suit
-was the riffle where she gets her placer gold.”
-
-“Guadalupe,” answered Pierre, speaking slowly, “she know ze cave, but
-she not know where ze treasure is buried. Ze cave her home. She live
-zere. Lots and lots of times she come out, and nobody ever track her
-when she go back. Ze outlaws they sharp-shoot from places in ze hills
-nobody could see. But I show you,” he continued, nodding his head at
-Jack Rover, “I, Pierre, show you where zat riffle is. I know both where
-Guadalupe wash out placer gold and ze secret chamber in ze big cave
-where Joaquin Murietta bury him money and where ze White Wolf, Don
-Manuel—peace to his soul!”—Pierre Luzon crossed himself—“hide sacks and
-sacks of ze yellow gold. Oh, yes!”
-
-This long speech had exhausted the old man. He dropped his head wearily.
-
-“What you need now is a good long sleep,” exclaimed Tom Baker. “Another
-jolt of bourbon Pierre, and then you get in between the blankets, old
-fellow.”
-
-“I’ve got your bed all ready in the next room,” observed Buck.
-
-“I guess I go to bed zen,” assented Luzon.
-
-He gulped down with relish a nightcap of the old whisky. Then Buck and
-Tom helped him from his chair.
-
-“It is good to be here,” murmured the Frenchman. “I grow strong again
-among ze mountains. I never go back—never go back to San Quentin, that
-one horrid prison.”
-
-“We’ll nurse you like a baby,” said Buck assuringly, as he led the
-feeble old man into the adjoining room.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XVII—The Bitter Bit
-
-ON the very night of Pierre Luzon’s return, Ben Thurston was in close
-colloquy with his attorney, summoned specially from New York. It was not
-only the murder of his son that had brought about this consultation.
-The owner of San Antonio Rancho, while filled with fury against Dick
-Willoughby, was also gravely perturbed over other things. Immediately
-after dinner the two men shut themselves up in Thurston’s office.
-
-Thurston opened the safe and produced a little bundle of neatly-folded,
-legal-looking documents.
-
-“These are the option papers,” he said gruffly, as he tossed them across
-the table to the lawyer. “Look them over, Mr. Hawkins.”
-
-The attorney glanced through the documents in a preliminary way.
-
-“I see the first big payment falls due on April 1st,” he remarked.
-
-“Yes, April 1st,” responded Thurston, “and I was a damned fool, too,
-to let that Trust Company fellow inveigle me into making the date April
-1st, instead of March 1st. You see,” he went on, “the taxes come due
-on March 1st, and on this principality they amount to quite a pretty
-figure, I can tell you.”
-
-“How much?”
-
-“Oh, about $18,000.”
-
-The lawyer again read the papers through, this time more carefully.
-
-“Well, Mr. Thurston,” he said, as he lighted a cigar and sat back in his
-chair, “I left some very important matters to come to you in answer to
-your imperative message. What’s the work in hand?”
-
-“Why, this option for one thing; and then, too, I want you to help me
-put the noose around the neck of that scoundrel who killed my son.”
-
-“We’ll take one thing at a time, please,” replied the attorney, speaking
-slowly and quietly. “So far as this option on the rancho is concerned,
-it seems to be quite regular. Nevertheless, five million dollars is a
-whole lot of money. Is there any danger of their forfeiting their option
-payment of $100,000?”
-
-“Danger? Forfeiting?” ejaculated Ben Thurston. “Well, I’m not at all
-afraid of that. My fear now is that they may take up the option.”
-
-“Why, didn’t you wish to make the sale?”
-
-“Yes, but I am not getting money enough. The ranch is really worth
-ten million dollars today, in cold cash. I have recently had some San
-Francisco capitalists down here appraising it for me, but I had already
-given the option.”
-
-“I see that the agreement provides for your cattle and horses going in
-at the stipulated price.”
-
-“Yes, I don’t know why I should have been so infernally stupid. But you
-see those Los Angeles fellows came over here one day in an automobile
-and stayed all night. We had a sort of a tiff—didn’t agree very well—and
-I let them start away the next morning without their breakfast—rather
-uncivil, I’ll admit. After they had gone I got to thinking matters over,
-and I sent a telephone message along the road to stop them and ask them
-to come back. They returned all right. There was one of their number,
-this fellow from some Title and Trust Company, who was pretty warm under
-the collar, and, if I do say it myself, was as peeved as hell at me.
-Well, he was the one who drew up the agreement, sitting here at this
-table. The paper looked all right to me, and so I just went ahead and
-signed. I know now they caught me for the $18,000 of taxes because I
-didn’t just insist on having the option expire March 1st, instead of
-April 1st. But, to be frank with you, I really didn’t much mind, for at
-that time I was only keen to get their $100,000 for the option,
-never believing for a moment that they would come across with the
-million-dollar first payment due April 1st. You see the cattle and
-horses and all the stock on the ranch was a sort of sheaf of oats that I
-hung out in order to get them to put up their option money—just so much
-bait.”
-
-Mr. Hawkins shrugged his shoulders and said: “Well, Mr. Thurston,
-judging from this inventory before me, you certainly hung up a most
-generous bait.”
-
-“I didn’t stop to think—that’s all there is to be said. All these
-details hadn’t been worked out into cold figures at the time I gave the
-option. When these men were here I just wanted to wheedle them into a
-bargain which would leave a cool $100,000 in my hands. I never for one
-moment believed they could make the million-dollar payment, although, by
-God, I begin to realize the danger of their doing so now.”
-
-The lawyer looked up in silent surprise. Thurston continued:
-
-“Of course I should have had this detailed valuation made before I went
-into the deal. Up to the time I read that inventory I had no real idea
-of the increased value of the property and what was on it. Oh, you may
-shake your head; I’m not a good business man—never cared a damn for
-business—and I know quite well I haven’t given enough attention to the
-ranch. You see I have been living mostly in the East, for good reasons.
-I don’t like it here at all—I’ve never felt safe in California,” and
-he glanced nervously at the window of the room, as if some enemy were
-lurking there.
-
-Mr. Hawkins once more reached for the inventory, and carefully examined
-the figures. Finally he said: “Pardon me, Mr. Thurston, for the
-observation. But you should have sent for me before the option was
-signed, if you did not really intend to carry out its terms. I find that
-you have twenty-six thousand head of cattle, and you say that the price
-of cattle is very high just now—that the whole herd ought to average
-forty dollars a head. This item alone makes one million and forty
-thousand dollars, or, in other words, if they exercise the option and
-pay you the first million dollars, they will have forty thousand
-dollars more than the payment which they make at that time.” The lawyer
-pencilled down the figures while he spoke.
-
-Ben Thurston had been listening with a gloomy look on his brow. But when
-he saw the figures translated into dollars he fairly bounced from his
-chair, walked rapidly up and down the room, and then, coming to a sudden
-halt, shouted: “By God, that’s where they got me again. I see it all
-now; these fellows were a damned sight too smart for me. Well, Hawkins,
-you are my attorney. I don’t want to go on with this deal, even if they
-are able to dig up the money.”
-
-The lawyer puffed at his cigar, wholly undisturbed, and then replied:
-“Mr. Thurston, you have already made a sale.”
-
-“No, by God, I haven’t; nothing of the kind,” replied Thurston. “The
-truth is that I should get ten million dollars for this ranch, and keep
-all my horses and cattle, too. I don’t propose to be fleeced by that
-Los Angeles outfit either,” he continued, running his hands through his
-hair. “I have it; we’ll break the contract. I’ll bet that option is so
-faulty that you can drive a load of hay right through it. Hunt up a
-flaw and we will send them back their option money. I don’t want their
-$100,000 now.”
-
-“I have already carefully studied the paper,” replied Hawkins, “and can
-find no flaw in it. It was evidently drawn by a master hand.”
-
-“Master hand be damned,” thundered Thurston. “Why, the stiff wasn’t even
-a lawyer. He was just one of the syndicate—the one I told you about a
-while back. He knows so cussed much about titles that the other fellows
-let him write the option.”
-
-“I see,” replied the attorney, as a half-smile flitted over his face;
-“about all you seemingly had to do was to sign the option papers and
-count the option money. The sole hope you have now, Mr. Thurston, in my
-opinion, is for those Los Angeles gentlemen to let this valuable option
-lapse. You have only a few days to wait.”
-
-“But I haven’t told you the worst yet,” said Thurston sullenly, dropping
-again into his chair.
-
-“What do you mean?”
-
-“I had a long-distance telephone this morning from the First National
-Bank at Los Angeles saying that the million dollars due April 1st has
-been already paid in to my credit. But I won’t touch the money—I’ll be
-damned if I do.”
-
-“You have no choice but to accept it,” said the lawyer. “It would be
-foolish to deceive yourself; San Antonio Rancho is sold, and with the
-payment just made, you, by the terms of your contract, are compelled to
-give immediate possession. I can only advise you to take your medicine
-like a man, but don’t let those Los Angeles gentlemen know that you
-are swallowing a bitter dose.” He refolded the papers, and pushed them
-across the table. “Now, Mr. Thurston, if there is anything I can do to
-assist you in the prosecution of your son’s murderer, I stand ready to
-do so.” Ben Thurston arose.
-
-“We’ll talk about that tomorrow. I’ll hang Dick Willoughby right enough
-in good time. Meanwhile you tell me the rancho is sold—that I have lost
-my great estate for less than half its value? Hell! Isn’t that enough
-for one night?” And he stalked wrathfully out of the room, slamming the
-door behind him.
-
-“He sold at the wrong price,” mused the lawyer with a quiet smile.
-“Perhaps he’ll be trying next to hang the wrong man.”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XVIII—Elusive Riches
-
-IN the meantime the quartet at the store were making a night of it. With
-old Pierre Luzon peacefully asleep in the adjoining room, there were
-many things to speak about. Tom Baker recounted in elaborate detail his
-story of interviews with the governor and state officials at Sacramento,
-the weary and harassing delays before parole was finally granted, his
-own dogged determination, together with the artful pulling of political
-strings that had finally brought about the results desired. Then there
-was the trip to San Quentin, the breaking of the joyful news to Pierre
-Luzon in his cell, the delivery of the paroled convict into Tom’s
-hands, and the clever solution of all further difficulties by hiring
-an automobile for the journey south. The narrative was all very
-interesting, each listener eagerly followed every word, and at the close
-Tom Baker’s chest had expanded several inches.
-
-“I tell you boys, there’s no man alive could have done what I did. The
-business was in the right hands. If it hadn’t been for me, you wouldn’t
-have Pierre Luzon here tonight.”
-
-“But if Pierre Luzon hadn’t written that letter,” growled Buck Ashley,
-“you would never have started for Sacramento and San Quentin.”
-
-“Well, all’s well that ends well,” discreetly interposed Munson, as he
-raked the smouldering wood ashes together. “Gee, but its cold tonight.”
-Jack Rover rose and tossed another log onto the fire. In a moment a
-bright flame sprang up.
-
-“The bottle’s empty,” observed the sheriff. “The next one’s on me,
-Buck.”
-
-“Guess we’ll charge it to syndicate account,” grinned the storekeeper,
-whose momentary grouch seemed to have been dissipated by the cheerful
-blaze. “We’ll have to open books, boys, and go about things in a reg’lar
-way,” he added, as he drew the bolt of the door that communicated with
-the store and groped his way into the darkness beyond.
-
-Buck needed no candle, and was soon back with another bottle of the
-Kentucky bourbon. Glasses were filled and clinked and pledges of
-brotherhood renewed.
-
-“It’s champagne we’ll be drinkin’ tomorrow night, Buck, old sport,”
-exclaimed Tom, slapping his old crony on the shoulder.
-
-“I’ll long-distance Bakersfield for a case in the morning,” responded
-Buck, genially. “By gosh, we’ll be swimmin’ in wine afore long, boys.
-First thing I’ve got to do is to sell out this ‘ere store.”
-
-“Sell it!” cried the sheriff, contemptuously. “You can afford to give it
-away, Buck. We ain’t a-goin’ to be pikers in our old age, are we now?”
-
-“I ain’t old by a danged sight,” snapped back the storekeeper, for Tom
-had touched a sore spot once again. “Besides, when I’ve got a barrel of
-Joaquin Murietta’s gold safe in the bank, you’ll see me friskin’ around
-like a two-year-old colt,” he added, his momentary surliness changing to
-a smile.
-
-“And it ain’t only gold, boys,” said Tom Baker. “That ‘ere story old
-Pierre told me about the grotto cavern havin’ a lake of oil in it as big
-as a city block, sure ‘nuff got me goin’. Why, we’ll be able to blossom
-out into oil kings.”
-
-“What’s that?” asked Munson.
-
-“Why, the Frenchie told me, you know, confidential like, comin’ along on
-our motor car that since fifty years back those bandit fellers skimmed
-oil from the surface of that lake and burned it in lamps down in that
-cavern.”
-
-“By Jove, that’s interesting,” replied Munson.
-
-“We know there is oil to the west, oil to the north, and oil to the
-south, and it stands to reason there must be oil here as well.”
-
-“Yes,” interposed Buck, “but old Ben Thurston would never allow any
-drillin’ on his place.”
-
-“Who the hell wants oil anyhow?” exclaimed Jack Rover. “We’ll have all
-the money we need with the buried gold and Guadalupe’s placer mine.”
-
-“Yes, but oil is oil,” replied the storekeeper, with a shrewd nod of his
-head. “They say Rockefeller has only to raise the price a quarter of a
-cent a gallon whenever he wants to give away another million or so to a
-university or a hospital.”
-
-“Well, we ain’t interested in universities or hospitals,” said Tom
-Baker. “But I agree with Buck that oil’s oil, and I, for one, intend to
-take everything that’s comin’ to me. My God, we can afford to buy Ben
-Thurston out and do some drillin’ for ourselves on San Antonio Rancho.
-It’ll help to pass the time anyways.” As he finished, he began to pour
-out another round of drinks.
-
-“Help to keep you from the booze,” muttered Buck, in an inaudible aside.
-But he drained his own glass and smacked his lips with satisfaction.
-“Guess I’ll be gettin’ another bottle, boys,” he said aloud, genially.
-
-“Oh, we’ve had enough,” mildly protested Munson.
-
-“Not by a jugful,” replied Buck. “You and Jack ain’t goin’ to ride home
-till mornin’, and there’s lots of things to be talked over yet.”
-
-“Great Scott, it’s already two o’clock,” remarked Munson, consulting his
-watch.
-
-“Then the night’s still young, boys,” exclaimed Tom Baker, hilariously.
-“Get the brew, Buck. The empty bottles will keep the tally. Come on,
-lieutenant, drain your glass. No heel taps in this crowd.”
-
-They had started their conversation in low tones so as not to disturb
-the slumbers of Pierre Luzon. But this precaution, or act of delicate
-consideration, had been long since forgotten. They were talking loud
-now, and often all together, and when Buck Ashley had returned from yet
-another pilgrimage to the store, none heard or noticed the door of the
-bedroom being cautiously pushed open by just the fraction of an inch.
-
-All four chairs had been again drawn around the cheerful log fire.
-
-“You were talking, Tom, of buying out Ben Thurston,” remarked Jack
-Rover. “Then you haven’t heard there’s an option been given to a Los
-Angeles syndicate? Guess mebbe Ben Thurston won’t be the owner of the
-big rancho very much longer.”
-
-“And a good job, too,” replied the sheriff, as he helped himself to yet
-another drink.
-
-Buck Ashley shook his head incredulously. “Oh, lots of fellers have paid
-down money for an option, as they call it, on the Thurston property, and
-finally when the rub came they didn’t come across and live up to their
-bargain, and so they just naturally lost their option money.”
-
-“I was talking to a geologist,” intervened Munson, in whose mind the
-oil question seemed to be still uppermost, “and he says there is every
-indication that the Midway Oil fields, a few miles north, are not one
-whit better than wells that can be opened up right here.”
-
-“But what’s the use,” said Tom Baker, “of all the oil fields in
-California to us fellers if we are about to be let into the secret
-door of a big cavern where they’ve got twelve or fifteen millions of
-twenty-dollar gold pieces stacked up, jest awaitin’ for us to take ‘em.”
-The whisky was beginning to do its work; he had already forgotten his
-aspirations of being an oil king.
-
-“That’s right,” said Jack Rover, “and don’t forget, while you’re
-counting them twenty-dollar gold pieces, that Pierre Luzon has promised
-to show us the shallow riffle in the mountain stream where Guadalupe
-gets all that placer gold.” In the cowboy’s case the alcohol was making
-only still more fixed the one fixed idea in his brain.
-
-“Damn this store business anyway,” said Buck Ashley, inconsequentially
-returning to the theme that appealed to him most directly. “Do you
-‘spose I’m goin’ to work my fingers off tying up groceries after we find
-old Murietta’s money and the White Wolf’s treasure? Not by one hell of
-a sight, if I know myself, and I ‘low as how I do.” And at the slightly
-opened bedroom door old Pierre, Luzon whom they all thought to be fast
-asleep, was listening to every word!
-
-“But there is one thing,” cried Tom Baker, striking the table fiercely
-as he set down his glass, “I want you fellers to get next to yourselves
-now and make up your mind to.”
-
-“Wa’al, don’t stop, Tom,” said Rover. “Go on and tell us what you’re
-thinking about. Get it off your chest, old man.”
-
-“It’s just this way. By God, you fellers are not entitled to as much of
-this ‘ere twelve or fifteen million dollars as I am, for I’m the feller
-that went to the governor and got his parole and brought Pierre back
-here to Tejon. Do you get me?” Buck Ashley had straightened up and
-looked at Tom Baker with an ugly scowl on his face. “It was me,” he
-said, “got that letter from Pierre Luzon and we all throwed in, share
-and share alike, all five of us. And we’ll cut what we find, too,
-whether it’s one million or fifteen million, into five equal parts, or
-there’ll be blood flowin good and plenty.”
-
-Baker staggered to his feet, steadied himself for a moment and began to
-roll up his sleeves.
-
-“There be some things,” he ejaculated, “that you jest can’t let wait and
-settle up when the deal is all closed. I know what my rights are and you
-fellers can’t bluff me, not by a derned sight.”
-
-“Hold on, hold on, gentlemen,” interposed Munson. “Let’s not commence
-quarreling about something we are not even sure we shall ever see. Of
-course we hope to be escorted into the cavern by old Pierre Luzon, and
-we likewise hope that he’ll find a hidden treasure. And by the way,
-Buck, this reminds me—the cut has to be into six equal parts, not five,
-for we owe Luzon the squarest of square deals.”
-
-“Oh, I’m not agin’ that,” muttered Buck. “I just didn’t remember him.”
-
-“Well,” resumed Munson, “why quarrel about something that is as yet
-nothing but a myth? It occurs to me that we should rather, individually
-and collectively, be exceedingly thankful that Pierre Luzon is alive,
-and that the White Wolf is dead, and that the one man who holds the
-secret has promised to show us this treasure.”
-
-“I’ve never believed one cussed word about the White Wolf being dead,”
-growled Buck Ashley.
-
-“Well, it sure was in the newspapers,” said Tom Baker, turning down his
-sleeves and resuming his seat.
-
-“Yes, it sure was in the newspapers,” replied Buck, “and they jest
-seemed to settle the fact, leastways to their own satisfaction. But I’ve
-been a-thinkin’ about Dick Willoughby. I don’t believe he ever killed
-Marshall Thurston, I don’t.”
-
-“Whoever did kill him,” put in Jack Rover, “did it good and plenty. Put
-the shot right square through his heart.”
-
-“Well,” said Tom Baker, reaching for more whisky, “I ain’t got much to
-say, but what I says I stands to on this ‘ere subject, and that is—”
-Almost with one accord all turned at the creaking of the bedroom door,
-and there was Pierre Luzon, looking as if he had seen a ghost. His short
-prison-cropped hair seemed to be standing on end like bristles, and his
-eyes stared wildly at the four men. At last he cried out in a shrill
-voice that was almost a scream:
-
-“Ze son of Ben Thurston killed! Ah, ha!” he laughed, hysterically. “Shot
-through ze heart!—vengeance at last begins! Ze White Wolf is not dead!
-He is one live man!”
-
-
-
-0205
-
-The door was hastily closed with a loud bang, and the weird figure
-vanished like an apparition.
-
-For a few moments the revellers sat in stupefied silence. Finally Buck
-Ashley said in a low voice: “Damn that whisky anyhow. It has made us
-talk too loud.”
-
-“Yes,” remarked Tom Baker, “and also too dangnation much, I’m
-a-thinkin’.”
-
-Both were sober men now.
-
-“Believe I’ll have a snooze,” said Jack rover, seating himself on an old
-lounge in a corner of the room. But he did not lie down.
-
-Nothing more was said for perhaps a full half hour; all were nodding or
-busy with their brooding thoughts.
-
-At last Buck Ashley rose and tiptoed toward the bedroom.
-
-“Guess I’ll see if poor Pierre has gone to sleep again,” he murmured.
-
-A moment later he shouted out from the inner chamber:
-
-“Hell, boys!—he’s gone! He’s given us the slip—the damned old
-jail-bird!”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XIX—The Jail Delivery
-
-AROUND Dick Willoughby there had been woven a web of circumstantial
-evidence that even before his trial had convinced most people of his
-guilt. Only a few tried friends who absolutely refused to believe him
-capable of shooting down an unarmed man from ambush clung to their
-faith that he had had nothing to do with the slaying of young Marshall
-Thurston. Among the general public the only question in discussion was
-whether the jury were likely to find extenuating circumstances and,
-should the life of the prisoner come to be spared, how long would be his
-sentence.
-
-Ben Thurston had lavished money with a free hand toward securing every
-possible piece of testimony in support of the prosecution, and before
-his return home even the cautious New York lawyer, Mr. Hawkins, had
-admitted that the case against Willoughby appeared to be conclusive. It
-was only a matter of a few weeks now when Thurston would be leaving the
-district.
-
-Already San Antonio Rancho was in possession of the syndicate; their
-foreman was in charge, the stock under their control, and it was only
-out of consideration that the former owner was being permitted to linger
-a little longer in residence. But for the gloomy and morose man there
-seemed to be gloating satisfaction in the grim thought that before
-shaking off forever the dust of his old home he would first of all
-ensure the hanging of his son’s murderer.
-
-Among the most regular visitors at the jail were the ladies of La
-Siesta, and rumor now began to run around that Miss Merle Farnsworth,
-despite Willoughby’s pleading that she should not mix her name up in
-the case, would offer some surprising evidence in favor of the accused
-man—evidence that might not exonerate Willoughby from responsibility for
-the deed, but perhaps would fully justify his act to the minds of the
-jurymen.
-
-It was now only three days from the trial, and the whole county was agog
-with expectation.
-
-That night in the small hours five masked men rode very quietly through
-the streets to the vicinity of the jail. All were heavily armed, and one
-of them was leading an extra saddle horse. The party dismounted under
-the shadow of some trees. One man held the horses, while his four
-companions, with drawn revolvers, advanced to the gateway. Whether it
-was a simple case of cowardly yielding to threats, or whether there had
-been preliminary financial greasing of locks and bolts, aided perhaps
-by sympathy for the prisoner, the fact remains that within a very few
-minutes Dick Willoughby had been brought from his cell.
-
-“You are a free man, Mr. Willoughby,” said the leader of the masked band
-in a low voice. “You will come with us.”
-
-“Who are you?” asked Dick.
-
-“We are friends—that is enough.”
-
-“I have no wish to go,” protested Dick in the hearing of the jailers.
-“The jury must acquit me—I am ready to remain here until they do acquit
-me.”
-
-“Take care. The man with the money can put the rope round your neck.”
-
-“I am not afraid.”
-
-“There is another reason. The name of a certain young lady must not be
-introduced into this case.”
-
-“I have begged her not to testify.”
-
-“But she will testify if this trial goes on—that you know well. Now you
-will come with us, for her sake if not for your own.”
-
-“Be it so then,” replied Dick. “Lead the way.” Just as quietly as they
-had come the little band of riders rode through the silent and deserted
-streets. They took the southern road, and for the first few miles kept
-to the thoroughfare. Then, reaching a stretch of unreclaimed land, they
-started across country. The night was moonless and dark, but Dick knew
-instinctively that they were making for the mountainous country to the
-north of the Tejon Pass.
-
-The leader rode a short distance ahead. Not a word was spoken. In about
-two hours they were among the foothills. The pace slackened, and then,
-as they reached a clump of oaks, a halt was called. From under the
-shadow of the trees a man appeared, leading two sturdy little mountain
-ponies. The newcomer wore no mask.
-
-“This man will be your guide from now on,” announced the leader, whose
-features were still concealed by the strip of black cloth tied around
-the lower part of his face. “I am sorry we must ask you to wear a
-blindfold, Mr. Willoughby. But you are among friends, and I feel sure
-you will help us all by your ready assent.”
-
-“I am in your hands,” replied Dick, quietly. A few minutes later he was
-seated on one of the ponies, his eyes securely bandaged. The saddle was
-a big comfortable Mexican one, and he rested his hands on the horn; for
-there was no bridle, only a leading rein held by the man mounted on the
-other pony.
-
-“Adios!”
-
-It was the leader’s voice again, and now once more Dick was on the move,
-the nimble little pony cantering gently over the turf. 0006
-
-Hour succeeded hour. The sun had risen, as the blindfolded rider could
-tell from the warmth of the atmosphere. The canter had long since
-changed to a walk, and Dick knew that they had been climbing steadily,
-with many a turn and sometimes up precipitous slopes.
-
-At last a strange chilliness came into the air. Dick imagined that he
-heard a growl, as of some savage animal. Then there came a stop, and
-he caught some whispered words—a woman’s voice he could have sworn,
-speaking in some strange tongue. After a few minutes his pony started
-again.
-
-But they had not gone more than a hundred yards further when his guide
-called out.
-
-“Here we are, sir. I will help you to descend. Zen I take ze bandage
-away. You see again.”
-
-The voice had a quaint foreign accent. For a little time Willoughby
-remained blind. Then he began to see things, and involuntarily rubbed
-his eyes in amazement.
-
-He was in a vast vaulted cavern with no visible entrance revealed by
-the dim light of several lanterns suspended from the roof. In the far
-distance a log fire was burning, and silhouetted against its ruddy
-glow was the figure of the aged Indian squaw, Guadalupe, with a great
-dog-like creature standing by her side.
-
-“Guadalupe!” exclaimed Dick in profound surprise, turning to his guide.
-
-This man he now saw was old, with short gray hair and a short gray
-beard. His face was pale, but there was a pleasant gleam in his eyes.
-
-“Yes, Guadalupe,” the guide replied. “Guadalupe, she guard ze entrance
-to our cave—she and ze white wolf. No one can get past ze white wolf
-unless Guadalupe speaks ze word.”
-
-“And who are you?”
-
-“Oh, call me Pierre. I am Mr. Willoughby’s servant. Here are fine
-beefsteaks ready for breakfast. Come.”
-
-“Pierre!” murmured Dick. “Pierre Luzon?”
-
-“Zat is my name. I am Pierre Luzon.”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XX—In the Cavern
-
-WHEN Dick proceeded to follow Pierre Luzon he found that the ponies had
-already trotted away through the semidarkness, evidently quite capable
-on their own account of finding their accustomed stable. Leading the
-way across the cavern, Pierre entered a corridor at the far end of which
-bright lights were burning. Soon, Dick, to his great wonderment, found
-himself in a comfortably, almost luxuriously furnished apartment.
-
-There were big thick rugs on the floor, and the rock walls were
-completely hidden by tapestries. The dining table in the centre was set
-with napery, china, glass, cutlery and silverware that would have done
-credit to a first-class hotel. Above swung a bronze lamp of antique
-pattern. Another table was laden with books, newspapers and magazines.
-In one corner gleamed the snow-white counterpane of a massive bedstead
-built of oak in Old Mission style. Here and there portable oil stoves
-were burning, diffusing a genial warmth throughout the grotto.
-
-Pierre watched the guest’s look of bewilderment as he gazed around him.
-
-“You will be very comfortable here,” said the Frenchman. “I have orders
-to attend to all your wants.”
-
-“Orders, from whom?” asked Dick abruptly. “After breakfast you will
-know. I have one letter for you in my pocket.”
-
-With characteristic philosophy Dick accepted the situation. The very
-mention of breakfast gave a keener edge to an already sharply whetted
-appetite. Pierre departed and presently returned with a superb sirloin
-steak sizzling on a hot platter. Under his arm was tucked a bottle
-of wine. As he set down the latter, Dick noted that it was dusty and
-cobwebby, as if it had emerged from some ancient cellar.
-
-“Zis is not ze vintage of California,” remarked Pierre, as he drew the
-cork. “It is rare old Burgundy—all ze way from my beloved France.”
-
-“La belle France,” murmured Dick. “I spent a year there, Pierre, most of
-the time in Paris.”
-
-“Ah, monsieur knows France and Paris,” exclaimed the old man in great
-delight. “Zen you speak French, too?”
-
-“Un peu,” laughed Dick. “Mais je fais beaucoup de fautes, mon ami.”
-
-“Non, non, monsieur,” cried Pierre, breaking into voluble French. “Your
-accent is perfect—it is delightful to hear my native language again.
-We shall be great friends, Mr. Willoughby. Already I am your devoted
-servant.” He bowed deferentially, as he held Dick’s chair ready for him
-to be seated.
-
-“You will breakfast with me, Pierre?” asked Dick, still in his best
-French.
-
-“No, no. I wait on monsieur. I shall breakfast in good time.”
-
-Pierre was not to be persuaded to take a place at the table, so Dick sat
-down in solitary state and was served in lordly fashion.
-
-With the demi-tasse of black coffee at the close of the meal came a box
-of cigars—cigars fit for a prince, as Dick knew from the first fragrant
-whiff.
-
-The table was now cleared and Pierre ready to withdraw. He had taken a
-letter from his pocket and was holding it in his hand. But Dick, warmed
-and fed and supremely contented, was watching the ascending rings of
-tobacco smoke.
-
-“Do you know, Pierre,” he said between complacent puffs, “that I was one
-of the bunch that helped to get you out of San Quentin?” He had lapsed
-into English.
-
-“Oh, yes, I know,” replied Pierre, also dropping his French. “Ze five
-men who made up ze purse—I am very grateful to you all.”
-
-“Then what about the hidden treasure?”
-
-“Ah, I was to show ze hidden treasure. But one great change come about.
-I made one big mistake.”
-
-“Then the story of all this gold was a frame-up, was it?” laughed
-Willoughby.
-
-“No, no,” protested Pierre earnestly. “Ze cave—you are here in ze cave,
-although you do not know ze secret hiding place. Ze treasure, it is
-here, too. But I can no longer show ze gold, for ze man to whom it all
-belong he is not dead—he is alive.”
-
-“Whom do you mean?”
-
-“Don Manuel de Valencia—him you call ze White Wolf.”
-
-“Great guns! So he has appeared again. The newspaper stories were all
-wrong?”
-
-“Zat is how I made my mistake. But I did not know until I came back to
-Tehachapi. Ze White Wolf is alive. It is he who has brought you here
-as his guest. Now you will read zis letter, and zen all things you will
-comprehend.”
-
-Pierre laid the missive on the damask table cloth in front of Dick.
-The latter fastened his eyes on it in speechless surprise. Before
-he recovered himself Pierre, lifting the tray of empty dishes, had
-noiselessly disappeared.
-
-“Mystery upon mystery,” murmured Dick as he broke the seal. The letter
-was a brief one, and began without any of the usual forms of personal
-address:
-
-“You are in safe and honorable keeping. Have no care. Nor need you worry
-about your friends—they will be informed of your safety.
-
-“Just as soon as possible the real slayer of Marshall Thurston will be
-revealed. You will be completely exonerated and can then return to the
-world, a free man. By this means a certain young lady will be spared
-from the gossip and the publicity which, although she has been brave
-enough to say it does not matter, would bring for her annoyance and
-pain.
-
-“If she is dear to you, as the writer of this letter believes, you will
-help to shield her from vulgar curiosity by remaining quietly where
-you are until the proper hour for your deliverance comes. It is only
-necessary for you to give your word of honor to Pierre Luzon that
-you will make no attempt to escape or reveal your whereabouts. Your
-trustfulness will be rewarded—this is the solemn promise of
-
-“Don Manuel de Valencia,
-
-“Your friend.”
-
-Dick read and re-read the strange message. All at once he became
-conscious that Pierre Luzon was again standing by his chair. Their eyes
-met.
-
-“Does Mr. Willoughby give ze promise required?” asked Pierre.
-
-Dick rose to his feet and extended his hand.
-
-“I promise, Pierre. You have my word of honor. The letter says that is
-enough.”
-
-“I have read ze letter before it was sealed. We all know Mr.
-Willoughby’s word is enough—it is as good as one gold bond.”
-
-“I’d do anything for Merle Farnsworth,” continued Dick, carried away by
-his fervid emotion. “I would die for her, if need be, to save her from
-one moment’s pain.”
-
-“Don Manuel he know that,” replied Pierre. Dick paused and his look
-changed.
-
-“How the devil does he know I love the girl?”
-
-“Ah!” The Frenchman shrugged his shoulders and smiled. “Ah! Don Manuel
-he know everything. But now, I am under orders not to speak. Over there
-you will find ze latest newspapers, sir,” he went on, pointing to the
-table laden with literature, “and every few days more will be brought
-for you—not only ze newspapers of Los Angeles and San Francisco, but
-also, ze newspapers of New York and London and Paris, all of which
-monsieur is accustomed to read.”
-
-“Great Scott, you seem to know,” exclaimed Dick in a low voice.
-
-Pierre continued placidly:
-
-“And you play chess. There is a box of chess—échecs we call it in
-France, you will remember. I too play ze game. Don Manuel and I used to
-spend many hours over ze board. After I have had my breakfast, I, Pierre
-Luzon, challenge you to one game of chess.”
-
-“Be it so,” laughed Dick. “But you must be hungry, man. For heaven’s
-sake go and eat. We’ll yarn later on. Meanwhile, I’ll have a glance
-through the newspapers.”
-
-Dick handled the newspapers with renewed surprise—the very New York
-papers he was accustomed to receive regularly, also the old familiar.
-Times Weekly from London and the Paris Figaro to which he had subscribed
-ever since the old Quartier Latin days! The same with the magazines—all
-his favorites were on the table.
-
-“Well, I’ll be blowed! Is it the guileless Sing Ling whom Don Manuel has
-been tapping for information? This certainly looks like home,” and again
-he glanced over the table. He looked at the titles of the books—several
-of the latest novels, a volume on socialism, another on the history of
-architecture.
-
-“Seems to know my book tastes, too. I won’t be lonesome, that’s certain.
-Well, I can’t do better than make a start with the newspapers. I’ve
-fallen quite behind the times.”
-
-He stretched himself out on a long rattan chair, and started with a Los
-Angeles daily. He had read lazily on for nearly an hour, when there came
-from his lips a little cry of surprise.
-
-Starting up into a sitting posture, Dick again perused the paragraph
-that had excited his special interest.
-
-It was an announcement stating that an ideal city was about to be built
-in the Tehachapi valley, and that a prize of ten thousand dollars was to
-be awarded to the designer of the best plans for laying out such a
-town. Reference was made to an advertisement on another page giving the
-details and the rules of the competition. To this Dick eagerly turned.
-
-The advertisement set forth that the model city was to be located
-somewhere near the centre of San Antonio Rancho, that the land was
-traversed by the state highway, by two railroads, by two electric power
-lines and two oil-carrying pipe lines, also the great Owen’s River
-aqueduct that supplied Los Angeles, some two hundred miles away, with
-water from the high Sierras. It was further stated that the entire ranch
-was to be subdivided into small tracts, and that already hundreds of
-applicants were waiting to make choice of home sites just so soon as the
-survey work was completed and the land thrown open to selection.
-
-The plans required, and for which the prize of ten thousand dollars was
-offered, were to show the finest landscape effects, the most impressive
-and convenient location of public buildings, the most attractive ideas
-for bringing into being a veritable ideal city provided with all the
-most modern conveniences and sanitary equipment.
-
-“By gad, I’d like to have a shot at that,” murmured Willoughby as he lay
-back in his chair and meditated.
-
-After a time he picked up the London journal, and the very first thing
-that met his eye was the identical advertisement on the back of the
-cover. He rose and began to search through the week’s file of the
-Figaro, and there again he found the announcement of the contest. He was
-too keenly excited now for more reading. He began to pace the chamber.
-What a clever head had planned all this world-wide publicity!
-
-“That Los Angeles bunch of fellows are certainly great. They are
-evidently going into this thing right. Doubtless they are determined to
-build the ideal—the model—city of California. They want the best brains
-of all lands to help beautify the place. Gee! but I’d like to be in this
-contest game. But perhaps it would be presumption on my part. Yet, who
-knows the country better than I do? When it comes to landscape effects,
-I’m Johnny-on-the-spot all right. And they’re in a hurry—only sixty days
-for the drawings. Unusual, such a short time. But I guess they’re
-going to make the dust fly without a week’s unnecessary delay. They are
-certainly live wires—they began by getting old Ben Thurston on the run.”
-
-He was chuckling to himself at the thought when Pierre reappeared.
-
-“Pierre, old fellow,” cried Dick, “would you be able to get me a drawing
-board, a box of instruments, india ink, water-colors, drawing paper, and
-so on?”
-
-“What are you going to do?” asked the old man with a smile. “Do you
-think you are again in ze Quartier Latin, Mr. Willoughby?”
-
-“No. But while I’m here I’m going back to the old Quartier Latin life,
-that’s a cinch. Can you buy me that stuff?” he added, diving into his
-hip pocket.
-
-But he had forgotten—he had come out of jail, and his personal
-possessions had been left behind.
-
-Pierre Luzon, however, had interpreted both the gesture and the thought
-that had prompted it.
-
-“You need no money here, Mr. Willoughby,” he said. “My orders are to get
-you everything you call for. Write all you need on a piece of paper. I
-send a trusty messenger, and we have ze drawing paper, ze instruments,
-ze ink and ze paints here very soon—yes, very soon.”
-
-“Then, by thunder, I’m going to win that ten-thousand-dollar prize.”
-
-“But she is worth millions of dollars.”
-
-“What do you mean?”
-
-“Ze young lady—she very rich young lady, Miss Merle.”
-
-Dick laughed.
-
-“Oh, that’s quite another prize, Pierre,” he replied. “And if she is so
-very rich, as you say, why that puts her further out of my reach than
-ever.”
-
-Pierre nodded his head determinedly.
-
-“If I was you, Mr. Willoughby, ze prize I would try to win is ze
-beautiful young lady.”
-
-When Pierre had gone, Dick again lay back in the long chair. But he was
-day-dreaming and love-dreaming now, wondering whether Merle Farnsworth
-really cared for him, whether he might dare whisper to her the story of
-his passionate love.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXI—A Debt of Honor
-
-PUBLIC excitement had been running high over the approaching trial of
-Dick Willoughby, but his delivery from jail by the masked night-riders
-came as the culminating climax. Mystery and romance were piling up.
-Despite the strength of the circumstantial evidence, the sudden fate
-that had overtaken the young heir to San Antonio rancho had been
-shrouded with uncertainty; no witness had seen the actual doing of
-the murderous deed. The sensational arrest of Dick Willoughby had been
-followed by his still more sensational disappearance; for he seemed to
-have vanished from the face of the earth—he had been spirited to some
-place of concealment to which there was not the slightest clue, while
-also the identity of his rescuers remained a profound enigma.
-
-All sorts of speculations were rife, and it was small wonder that the
-name of the famous bandit, Don Manuel, came to be revived. This was just
-the sort of audacious work the White Wolf would have gloried in—breaking
-into a prison, defying the authorities, leaving behind him a trail of
-mystery and vague terror. But shrewd old-timers pointed out that Don
-Manuel had never in his whole career helped a gringo—that his hand had
-been against every American, and that in his earlier days at all events
-he had killed ruthlessly, out of sheer lust for vengeance against the
-race of newcomers who had despoiled him of his ancestral acres. What
-reason, therefore, could he have had to help Dick Willoughby to liberty?
-Even if it had been the outlaw’s hand that had pulled the trigger
-against the son of his hated enemy, Ben Thurston, little would he have
-cared if a score of gringos had come to their end, justly or unjustly,
-as an aftermath of the tragedy.
-
-Old Ben Thurston had discussed this very question with himself. The
-slaying of his only son, the clever business deal that had called his
-own tricky and dishonest bluff and lost him his principality, the
-sight of his herds being driven away, the approaching eviction from his
-home—all these events crowding one upon the other had exasperated
-him beyond measure and completed the change of the already grouchy,
-disgruntled man into a veritable wild beast snapping and snarling at
-everyone. Yet his mind was completely obsessed by the idea that it was
-Dick Willoughby, and Dick Willoughby alone, who had shot his son, so
-there was no room in his small and obfuscated brain for any seriously
-renewed apprehension that his old enemy, the White Wolf, had come to
-life again.
-
-Dick’s escape from jail almost gave Ben Thurston a fit of apoplexy. It
-was the sleuth, Leach Sharkey, who alone of those around him ventured
-to break the news. After his first paroxysm of wrath, Thurston paced the
-room like a caged animal. He had begun to make a confidant of this man,
-his constant attendant, the protector with the handy guns in his hip
-pockets on whom he had come to rely night and day, the one associate who
-phlegmatically endured his irritable moods and abusive language.
-
-So, in Leach Sharkey’s presence, Thurston, as he walked to and fro,
-spoke his thoughts aloud.
-
-“Damn all pretty faces, anyhow. First and last they have cost me a fine
-sum. And now it is a pretty face that has cost me my boy’s life. It’s
-hell, that’s what it is. But I will have my revenge. I’ll hang Dick
-Willoughby with my own hands if necessary—even if it is the last act of
-my life I’ll have his neck stretched for him.”
-
-He was glaring down at the sleuth, and the pause seemed to call for some
-reply.
-
-“Well, he’s given us the slip for the present,” Sharkey ventured. Then
-he caught the gathering fury in the other’s eyes, and hurriedly went on:
-“But there is no question in the world we’ll run the scoundrel down. I
-myself will shoot him like the dog he is the moment I lay my two eyes on
-him.”
-
-“Well, don’t waste your breath telling me you are going to do it,”
-growled Thurston. “Hunt him down. Take all the money you need. Get all
-the men you can. Search every canyon. Guard every road out of the hill
-country. And don’t be misled by that damn fool talk about the White Wolf
-of which you’ve been telling me. That cursed outlaw is dead—dead as a
-herring. I ran the story of his death to earth—stood on his very grave
-in the potters’ field at Seattle. Dick Willoughby’s the outlaw now. Get
-him at any cost. Get him, or, by God, lose your own job, Leach Sharkey.
-Do you follow me?”
-
-“Oh, I follow you,” replied the sleuth, a sardonic smile still further
-exposing the teeth that were the most prominent feature of his face and
-at all times gave him a hyena-like appearance. “I’ll get him, make no
-mistake, Mr. Thurston. Just draw me that check, and I’ll have twenty
-more men out on the range before morning.”
-
-At the store, Dick Willoughby’s disappearance was for days the sole
-topic of conversation. One morning Tom Baker and Buck Ashley were
-gossiping together.
-
-“What beats me,” remarked the storekeeper, “is that Chester Munson wears
-such a spry look. He was Dick’s closest chum, yet he don’t seem to be
-one bit anxious.”
-
-“Oh, he’s got the word, make no mistake,” replied Tom. “Although the
-lieutenant is as close as wax, he knows Dick’s all right, for sure.
-And I’m told that up at La Siesta, where Dick has his girl, you know,
-they’re still a-playin’ the pianner and the fiddle all the time. Mark my
-words—there’s been some wireless telephone at work. Munson don’t worry,
-his lady friends don’t worry, so I begin to think we’re a couple of
-derned old fools to fret ourselves on Dick’s account.”
-
-“It’s about Pierre Luzon I’m frettin’ most,” Buck Ashley rejoined. “To
-think that that damned Frenchman should have done us in the eye, got
-clean away and robbed us of our share of the buried treasure—that’s what
-worries me, Tom Baker. And you’ll allow now you made a mess of things by
-not havin’ the old convict shackled to the bedpost.”
-
-“A mess of things!” cried the sheriff, rising anger in his voice and
-eyes. “You won’t keep your mouth shut till I teach you—”
-
-But just then there was the clatter of hoofs outside, and Tom stopped in
-the middle of his sentence. A moment later Munson and Jack Rover entered
-in a state of visible excitement. Munson carried in his arms a rotund
-canvas sack tied at the neck. The package was not very big, but clearly
-of considerable weight.
-
-“Great Caesar,” exclaimed the lieutenant, without pausing to give any
-greeting. “A most surprising thing has happened. When I awoke this
-morning I found this bag lying on my table. And what do you think it
-contains?” As he asked the question he dumped the sack on the counter
-with a heavy thud.
-
-“You’ve got us guessin’,” drawled Tom.
-
-“Ten thousand, five hundred dollars in gold!” announced Munson.
-
-“Good Lord!” ejaculated the sheriff in great surprise.
-
-Munson went on:
-
-“Five thousand dollars are for the French warder at San Quentin who
-smuggled Pierre Luzon’s letter out of the prison, and the balance is for
-the syndicate.”
-
-“What syndicate?” gasped Buck, for the moment quite bewildered.
-
-“The Hidden Treasure Syndicate, of course,” exclaimed Jack Rover.
-“Pierre Luzon has sent each man back the hundred dollars he put up to
-get him out of the pen, and five thousand dollars extra to divide among
-us.”
-
-Buck and Tom sprang simultaneously to their feet.
-
-“Hooroosh!” shouted the sheriff. “I always knew there was no yellow
-streak in old Pierre Luzon.”
-
-“And I always said I liked him, too,” observed Buck. “But come into the
-parlor, boys,” he went on, with a cautious look around. “Let’s count the
-money.”
-
-“And divvy it up,” added Tom eagerly. “Gosh ‘lmighty, boys! I’ve never
-yet seen a thousand dollars in gold at one time outside a bank cashier’s
-window. And to think there’s that amount cornin’ to me right now!”
-
-“One thousand, one hundred, pal, to be exact,” laughed Jack Rover,
-lifting the package and following the storekeeper into the sanctum
-beyond the counter.
-
-The gold was in United States twenty-dollar pieces, bearing dates which
-showed they had been minted more than twenty years ago.
-
-“Some of Joaquin Murietta’s loot,” remarked Jack Rover, when attention
-had been drawn to this detail.
-
-“No,” observed Tom Baker, holding up the coin he had been examining,
-“Murietta wasn’t alive when this ‘ere gold piece came from the mint.
-This is some of Don Manuel’s stuff.”
-
-“The White Wolf!” exclaimed Munson.
-
-“Yes, the White Wolf,” continued the sheriff. “So if the White Wolf
-ain’t dead, as Pierre declared that night—” Tom gazed at the bedroom
-door as if the spectral figure might reappear—“he’s honorin’ the
-Frenchie’s sight draft, that’s sure.”
-
-“I see,” said Munson. “He is paying the five thousand dollars old Pierre
-promised in his letter if he was helped to freedom and five thousand
-dollars besides.”
-
-“Precisely,” Tom Baker replied. “But if the White Wolf is dead, as most
-folks say, then the Frenchie’s got the key to the treasure vault, all
-right.”
-
-“So we’ve got to get him back here again, boys,” murmured Buck, rubbing
-his hands while his eyes feasted upon the heap of gold. “I don’t mind
-boardin’ Pierre Luzon for a spell, and he can have all the bourbon he
-wants.”
-
-“Till he tells us where Guadalupe gets her nuggets,” grinned Jack. “But
-you’ve forgotten to show ‘em, Munson, the card that came with the coin.”
-
-“Oh, yes,” rejoined Munson, drawing a small piece of pasteboard from his
-pocket. “It is brief enough. Luzon gives his countryman’s family address
-in Marseilles where the first five thousand dollars is to be mailed.
-Then he writes down our five names, Dick Willoughby’s first, and says
-the five of us are to share equally.” He passed the card to Tom Baker
-for inspection, and went on: “Jack and I are going to ride over to
-Bakersfield, get the French bank draft and put Dick’s money in the bank
-along with our own.”
-
-“Where’s Dick?” asked Buck, with a quick uplift of his eyes into
-Munson’s face.
-
-But the latter was not to be betrayed into divulging any information
-that might be in his possession.
-
-“I have not the slightest idea,” he replied airily. “But I feel sure
-Dick’s all right. He is the sort of fellow well able to look after
-himself. Meanwhile, Jack and I will attend to his financial interests,”
-he added with a laugh, as he began to count the gold.
-
-In silence the task proceeded, five thousand dollars first being set
-aside, and then the balance divided into five separate heaps. When all
-were satisfied as to the correctness of the distribution, Munson swept
-the gold back into the sack, except for the two little piles allotted to
-Ashley and Baker. Then he securely tied the package, ready for the ride
-to Bakersfield.
-
-“Buck will lock mine in his safe, boys,” exclaimed Tom Baker. “Gosh me,
-but I’ll want to look at it two or three times a day.”
-
-“Oh, I’m drivin’ over to the bank myself tomorrer,” declared Buck. “I’ve
-got a bit more to add to this pile.”
-
-“A few handfuls of nuggets, I suppose,” laughed Rover.
-
-“Well, I’ll allow Guadalupe always pays her grocery bills. But this ‘ere
-store ain’t goin’ to be a safe deposit vault, not on your demed life,
-with bandits around again. So you’d better arrange to come with me to
-town tomorrer, Tom.”
-
-“You’ll need me to help you home, perhaps,” grinned the sheriff. “But, I
-say, Munson, you ain’t told us yet how this sack came to be delivered at
-your place.”
-
-“There’s a proper mystery for you!” cried Munson. “As I said before, I
-found the bag this morning, lying on my dressing table. Sing Ling was
-the only one besides myself in the shack, and he never heard a sound all
-night.”
-
-“You’re still in Dick’s old home?” asked Buck. “Yes, but I leave
-tomorrow—have notice to quit, for some surveyor chaps are coming in. I’m
-moving up to Mr. Robles’ place. He wants me to catalog the books in his
-library.”
-
-“And Sing Ling?” queried Tom.
-
-“He goes, too. You see, Mr. Robles needs a crackerjack cook, now I’ll be
-boarding with him,” Munson laughed, gaily. “You don’t happen to have a
-porterhouse steak about the place, Buck?”
-
-“I can heat you up a can of pork and beans.”
-
-“Nothing doing! Jack and I wouldn’t spoil our appetites with such truck
-as that. We’re going to set up a chicken dinner in Bakersfield.”
-
-“Chicken and champagne,” chimed in Jack, as he swung the sack over his
-shoulder.
-
-“You’re beginning to get big bugs these days,” called out the
-storekeeper as the young men left the room. “Guess, Tom,” he went on,
-turning to the sheriff, “we could do with a jolt of Kentucky.”
-
-“Make it a bottle of bourbon,” gurgled Tom, “to remind us of our absent
-friend.”
-
-“Dear old Pierre,” murmured Buck, as he fumbled in his pocket for the
-key of the safe, his eyes glued all the time on the two little heaps of
-gold.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXII—Underqround Wonders
-
-Dick Willoughby was in a way happy in his retreat. At first he had been
-inclined to regret the jail delivery—it might have been the manlier part
-to have faced the music and cleared his name before the whole world. But
-then he reflected on the uncertainties of a trial, the cases of innocent
-men having suffered because of damning circumstantial evidence piled up
-against them, the vindictiveness of Ben Thurston and the undoubted power
-of his money to press the criminal charge by every unscrupulous means.
-So Dick soon came round to the belief that he might be safer for the
-time being in the guardianship of the White Wolf than at the mercy of a
-fallible jury.
-
-Then there was Merle Farnsworth to consider. Yes; to have brought her
-into a public court, to have allowed her to plead for him by telling the
-story of Marshall Thurston’s loathsome advances—that was a thing that
-could never have been tolerated. The leader of the jail-breaking gang
-had been right; Dick owed it to Merle to save her from such a cruel
-ordeal.
-
-Finally Dick’s contentment over his change of quarters was completed
-when Pierre Luzon appeared with a superb equipment of drawing
-instruments and materials. There was no time to worry now over surmises
-as to the wisdom of this course or the other course. Work lay to his
-hand—work of the most absorbing and delightful kind; and with all the
-ambitious enthusiasm of his temperament he tackled it whole-heartedly
-there and then. Hour after hour, day after day, Pierre watched in
-contemplative silence the methodical advancement of the task to which
-the young architect had applied himself.
-
-But there were frequent intervals for conversation, sometimes in French,
-sometimes in English, as the mood prompted. Occasionally Pierre drifted
-into semi-confidential reminiscences, and Willoughby soon came to know
-in close detail the story of Don Manuel’s life—the tragedy of his sister
-Rosetta’s death, the vow of vengeance against Ben Thurston, the early
-bandit days when the White Wolf counted every gringo in the land his
-natural enemy, the often hairbreadth escapes of the outlaw, his sublime
-courage and nerve in the direst emergencies.
-
-“Don Manuel was one great man,” remarked Pierre at the close of one of
-these confidences—the phrase was a favorite one with the old Frenchman.
-“Many and many a time he could have shot his enemy from a distance
-and got away. But Don Manuel had vowed zat he would kill him hand to
-hand—zat ze villain must die with a last malediction in his ear, and
-knowing zat it was he, ze White Wolf, who in ze end had revenged his
-sister’s shame.”
-
-“He felt, too, didn’t he, that his father had been wronged in being
-driven from San Antonio Rancho?”
-
-“Sure—zat was another great wrong—zat was why Don Manuel was so bitter
-against all ze Americans. But he made zem pay for ze land many and many
-times over.” Then Pierre, as was now his custom in Dick’s presence when
-speaking at any length, lapsed into French as he continued: “But the
-White Wolf was a man of high honor. He never used any of the proceeds of
-his robberies for himself. True, he spent the money to pay his band, to
-pay the numerous scouts and spies whose services he secretly retained,
-to plan and accomplish further hold-ups, to defy and outwit the
-authorities. But on his own needs—never—not one dollar!”
-
-Pierre went on to explain that after Ben Thurston had fled from
-California and kept away in hiding, Don Manuel had visited Spain, to
-claim the family estates in Valencia to which his father’s death had
-left him the sole heir. These he had sold for many millions of dollars,
-and most of that money he kept in banks in London and Paris. So he was
-a very rich man, and had no need to rob anyone except to gratify his
-vengeance. Even the hoarded gold of Joaquin Murietta he had never
-touched. It remained intact today in the treasure vault of the cave,
-boxes and sacks of gold and jewels.
-
-“Won’t I be allowed to see this wonderful treasure?” asked Dick, half
-jesting.
-
-“Perhaps, some day, if the White Wolf chooses to show you. But it is not
-for me to do that—I swore an oath of secrecy when the White Wolf trusted
-me—me and Felix Vasquez, who was also his confidant. But Vasquez was
-killed at Tulare Lake. So now only we two know the secret, and until the
-White Wolf himself dies my lips are sealed by the solemn oath I swore to
-the Virgin Mary.” The old man crossed himself devoutly.
-
-“Then where does the White Wolf live now?”
-
-“Ah, that is another secret. Again I would break my oath if I spoke one
-word.”
-
-“And Guadalupe—does she know these things?” asked Dick in English.
-
-“Guadalupe? Oh, no,” responded Pierre, politely adopting the change of
-language, “she is just one servant, our cook—one very excellent cook, as
-monsieur knows—and ze guardian of ze cave. For ze real white wolf guards
-Guadalupe—ze big animal is just like one tame dog to ze old squaw, but
-with his fierce jaws he would kill anyone who dared to approach her or
-come near ze hidden entrance to zis cavern. No man can ever find zat
-while ze white wolf is alive. In ze old days he killed several men when
-zey dared to follow Guadalupe.”
-
-“Then the white wolf must be very old?”
-
-“As old as Guadalupe—as old as the Tehachapi mountains,” exclaimed
-Pierre, again crossing himself and thereby revealing the superstitious
-dread in which he held the savage animal.
-
-“But you can pass the white wolf, can’t you?’ asked Dick.
-
-“Never—except when Guadalupe give permission. Then ze wolf lies down and
-I can come out of ze cave or enter. Ah! ze white wolf is one terrible
-beast. But he never shows his teeth to Don Manuel. Only Don Manuel can
-pass when Guadalupe is not there.”
-
-“Then where is Guadalupe’s riffle of gold—where is the lake of oil about
-which you told Tom Baker?”
-
-“Come, I will show you zese,” replied Pierre. As he rose he picked up
-the lantern he usually carried.
-
-Dick jumped to his feet with alacrity and followed his guide.
-
-They crossed the main cavern, then entered another side gallery. This
-had many windings and from it ran several diverging rock corridors. But
-Pierre led the way unfalteringly.
-
-Fully half a mile must have been traversed when at last the Frenchman
-halted and swung his lantern aloft.
-
-“Zere!” was all he said.
-
-Dick followed the flash of the lantern, and there before him was a dark
-pool stretching away indefinitely into the blackness beyond. He bent
-down and scooped up a little of the fluid in his palm. It was a brown
-oil, as thin as water, and therefore capable of use without any refining
-process.
-
-“Great Scott, this is wonderful!” exclaimed Dick in profound amazement.
-
-“Very wonderful,” concurred Pierre. “In zis cavern are oil and water,
-also gold—Guadalupe’s gold. Ze gold is close to here. Come.”
-
-Pierre turned and again led the way through dark and winding corridors.
-At a little distance Dick became conscious of the purling of a running
-stream. Pierre stopped once more, but this time held the lantern close
-to the ground.
-
-“Here Guadalupe come to wash out ze nuggets of gold, and since I have
-been in prison she buy with zem, so Mr. Baker say to me, groceries at
-ze store. Don Manuel, when I tell him, he very angry—she never do zat
-again.”
-
-“Poor old Buck Ashley!” laughed Dick. “He lost you, Pierre, and now
-he’ll be losing his best paying customer, too.”
-
-While speaking, he knelt and dipped his hands into the stream, bringing
-up some gravel into the lantern rays. But Pierre shook his head.
-
-“You no find ze gold. Guadalupe wash many hours to get, perhaps, just
-one nugget. But there is heaps and heaps, if ze miners came with spades
-and cradles.”
-
-“Great guns, there must be the reef, too, from which the nuggets have
-come!” exclaimed Dick, rising erect and dropping the handful of pebbles.
-
-“Now, we must go back,” said Pierre, “for zis evening you are to be
-allowed to come for a ride with me down ze mountains.”
-
-“You don’t say?” Dick cried, surprised and delighted.
-
-“Yes; Don manuel he send word today that he give permission. But you
-must wear ze bandage round your eyes, and you must promise to return
-when I give ze word.”
-
-“Don’t for one moment think, old fellow, that I would leave my drawings.
-But where are we going tonight?”
-
-“To La Siesta,” replied Pierre.
-
-“Hurrah!” shouted Dick. “Hurry up, Pierre! I’m mighty glad you got
-me those ties and things from Los Angeles. You say you can give me a
-hair-cut?”
-
-“Ze old-time bandit learned to trim ze hair of his friends as well as ze
-pocket-books of his enemies,” was the laughing answer.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXIII—The Unexpected Visitor
-
-MOST of the cattle had been driven off the land. The vaqueros had
-dispersed to the four points of the compass. Chester Munson had vacated
-his room in Dick Willoughby’s old home, and had taken up his residence
-and library duties at Mr. Robles’ mansion on the hill. Sing Ling had
-folded his tent like the Arab and silently stolen away in the same
-direction. A small army of surveyors had appeared on the scene and were
-quartered in the rancho buildings.
-
-The only one of the old-timers who still lingered on was Ben Thurston,
-more gloomy and morose than ever, seldom stirring out of doors now, but
-conducting all his business by telephone or through the agency of the
-sleuth, Leach Sharkey, his only companion.
-
-Jack Rover had pitched his camp temporarily at the store. Buck Ashley
-had assigned him Pierre’s cot, but the cowboy had fixed it under a
-wide-spreading sycamore, preferring to sleep in the open rather than
-share the grocery-perfumed atmosphere of the store building.
-
-Tom Baker was around most of the time. The three men clung together with
-a vague sense that they had a common interest in the vast treasure which
-had so far eluded them, but which might any day come again within reach
-of their eager claws. It afforded an endless theme of conversation,
-varied by talk about the passing of the rancho and all the train of
-changes which were bound to follow the close settlement of the valley.
-
-One morning Jack Rover found Buck at the door of the store, with a pair
-of antiquated-looking field glasses at his eyes.
-
-“Where did you get the goggles, Buck?” asked Jack.
-
-“Oh, I rummaged ‘em out of a trunk—had almost forgot I had the blamed
-things. But we used to keep a sharp lookout in the old bandit days—got
-kinda ready for any suspicious lookin’ riders on the road.” He had
-spoken while still peering through the binoculars, but now he turned to
-Jack and proffered him the glasses. “I do wonder what ‘n hell we’re all
-cornin’ to anyway. This here ranch that we’ve bragged up as bein’
-the biggest in all California! Ugh!” The grunt was one of unspeakable
-disgust. “Take a look for yourself.”
-
-Jack turned the glasses in the direction Buck had been gazing, and began
-to adjust the focus.
-
-“What’s the matter now?” he asked.
-
-“Matter ‘nough,” growled the storekeeper. “San Antonio Rancho is goin’
-to the dogs. Do you see them specks away out yonder in the valley?
-That’s another band of surveyors. One feller’s peekin’ through a
-spy-glass set on a tripod; another feller goes ahead and puts up tall
-stakes with big figgers on ‘em, and the other fellers are chainin’ off
-the distances. This ‘ere ranch ‘ll surely look like a checker-board
-blamed soon.”
-
-“Progress,” said Jack, laconically.
-
-“Progress, hell!” snapped Ashley. “These new fellers that bought the
-ranch have sure ‘nuff driv’ off all the cattle and now they’re dividin’
-up the land. I bet they’ll take the postoffice away from me—not that
-it pays much, for the Lord knows it don’t—but it brings customers to my
-store.”
-
-“Well, Buck,” said the cowboy, consolingly, “there are lots worse things
-than moving a postoffice. What’s to prevent your setting up the finest
-grocery store in the new model city the advertisements speak about?”
-
-“That would suit me fine, wouldn’t it?” cried the old storekeeper,
-with scathing contempt. “Goin’ around in a biled shirt, and handin’ out
-pencils and chewin’ gum to the little school gals that’ll be swarmin’
-all over the place. Not on your life, Jack! I’ll be losin’ both my
-postoffice and my store in these new-fangled times.” He paused a moment,
-then his tone changed to one of aggressiveness. “However, they ain’t
-built their doggoned new town yet, and it’s my belief all this boom talk
-is just so much hot air.”
-
-“In any case you won’t need to worry, Buck, after we get on the tracks
-of Pierre Luzon again. I intend to find the old squaw’s sand-bar, or my
-name isn’t Jack Rover.”
-
-“And I betche I’m a-goin’ to find Joaquin Murietta’s cache,” concurred
-the old man with equal determination.
-
-Just then Tom Baker slouched out of the store, where he had overheard
-the conversation.
-
-“Oh, things are a-goin’ to turn out all right in the end, boys, don’t
-fret over that. And there’s one thing gol-dern certain, there’ll be some
-great things doin’ in this ‘ere valley once they get started on buildin’
-the town. The new place will just spring up like Oklahomy City, or
-Liberal, Kansas, or some of them big towns that had twenty thousand
-people livin’ in ‘em inside o’ thirty days from the time they were
-surveyed and laid out.”
-
-“That seems quite impossible,” commented Jack.
-
-“Not impossible by a derned sight. My brother was at Liberal, Kansas,
-down there on the Rock Island, near No Man’s Land, you know. The new
-town had been talked of and talked of for mebbe three or four months,
-just as this new town is bein’ talked about today. Then finally the
-mornin’ came when the new town of Liberal was to be opened up. There
-was to be a regular town openin’, so to speak, and a sale of lots.
-Why, great guns, when the management of that town company rode into the
-station, on the early train, they found more’n ten thousand people right
-there campin’ in covered wagons, tents and all that sorta business, just
-awaitin’ for the auctioneerin’ to start.”
-
-Tom paused to take a fresh chew of tobacco and then rambled on:
-
-“I tell you, boys, that within thirty days there was twenty thousand
-people livin’ in that ‘ere town. Two banks were established, and one of
-them had one hundred and eighty-five thousand dollars in deposits, too.
-Oh, there’s lots of people who remember the rush to Liberal, and the
-boomin’ of Oklahomy City also. And history’s fixin’ to repeat itself
-right here on this ‘ere ranch. Things will be sizzlin’ when the town
-site is finally located and the rush starts pourin’ in from Portland,
-Oregon, on the north, to San Diego on the south, with a few thousands
-from Texas and other states this side o’ the Rocky Mountains. They’ll
-sure be great doin’s when the Los Angeles syndicate announce they’ve
-awarded to some feller that ten-thousand-dollar prize for the best plans
-for their ideal city, as they keep on callin’ it.”
-
-“Munson and I were speaking about the contest and the prize,” remarked
-Jack, “and were saying that if Dick Willoughby were only here, he’d
-about win, hands down. You know he was an architect once, before he came
-West.”
-
-“Dick Willoughby,” snorted Ashley, “How can he compete when he don’t
-know anything about the blamed business? He’s hid away, right enough.”
-
-“Munson knows a thing or two,” remarked Tom Baker. “If he’d only apeak,
-he could tell us where Dick is. That’s my opinion.”
-
-“And there once again you’re dead wrong,” retorted Jack, warmly. “If
-Munson only knew where Dick is hiding, he would have got that very prize
-competition advertisement into his hands long before now. He’s sore
-because he can’t send Dick the word. Where is Dick Willoughby? By gad,
-it’s a mystery.”
-
-“I guess you’re right,” said the sheriff. “That sort o’ exonerates
-Munson from keepin’ things from his partners. I think I owe it to
-Chester Munson to drink his health—just for ever doubtin’ him. What
-shall it be, boys?”
-
-And the open-air meeting adjourned.
-
-It was the very evening of the day on which this conversation had been
-held in Buck Ashley’s store that Dick Willoughby rode forth from the
-cavern blindfolded and under the guidance of Pierre Luzon. For the first
-hour progress was slow—round many turnings, down steep declivities, with
-just here and there a few miles of easier trail. But then there had been
-a swift canter for another hour over grass land, and now at last the
-riders were upon a well-made road. Dick divined that this must be the
-highway leading to La Siesta, but from what point of the compass they
-had come he had not the remotest conception.
-
-Very soon Pierre Luzon, still riding ahead with the leading rein, came
-to a halt.
-
-“Here we are. Dismount, please,” he said. “You are free to remove ze
-bandage.”
-
-Dick looked; they were right below the knoll on which the Darlington
-home stood. Lights were gleaming from the windows. Dick could even hear
-the faint tinkle of the piano.
-
-“I hide ze ponies here in zis little grove of trees,” Pierre continued,
-pointing to a coppice not fifty yards from the main road. “In two
-hours’ time, at eleven o’clock”—Pierre looked at his watch in the bright
-moonlight—“monsieur will return. I have your word?”
-
-“My word as a gentleman, Pierre,” exclaimed Dick, extending his hand.
-“So long then, old fellow. I’ve got to make the best use of my time.”
-
-The piano playing stopped abruptly when Willoughby, unannounced,
-appeared at the door of the music room.
-
-“Dick!” exclaimed Merle delightedly, leaving the instrument and rushing
-toward him. If they had been alone Dick felt that right then she would
-have jumped into his arms. But at the distance of a few paces she halted
-and clasped her hands.
-
-“How ever did you get here, Mr. Willoughby?” she asked intensely.
-
-“I rode here,” he answered, as they shook hands. “But it is only a brief
-visit. Hallo, Miss Grace! I’m delighted to see you again. And you, Ches,
-old sport—why this is great luck to find you here! Mrs. Darlington, I’m
-mighty glad to see you all once more.”
-
-The whole bevy were crowding around him, shaking hands and expressing
-their joyful surprise.
-
-“We knew you were safe, that was all,” explained Munson.
-
-“So you were having just the same jolly good times,” laughed Dick,
-glancing at the piano. “I’m simply dying for some music.”
-
-“But wait a minute,” exclaimed Munson, drawing a fat wad of newspaper
-cuttings from his pocket. “I’ve got to tell you about a competition you
-must get into—new plans for an ideal city here—”
-
-“In the heart of the old rancho,” smiled Dick, as he completed the
-sentence. While he spoke, he placed his arm affectionately across his
-chum’s shoulders. “I know all about it, old man. I’m working hard on my
-plans—they are already more than half done.”
-
-“Bravo!” shouted Munson. “That’s great news.”
-
-“But here, too, is Mr. Robles,” exclaimed Dick, breaking from the group
-and stepping across the room. “Excuse me, senor, but I did not notice
-you were here till this moment.”
-
-“No excuse needed, my friend. You were better engaged”—this with a
-humorous side-glance at the young ladies. “But I am glad to see you
-looking so well.”
-
-“Where have you been, Mr. Willoughby?” asked Grace.
-
-“That I cannot tell you,” replied Dick gravely. “I have pledged my
-solemn word. I must leave you at eleven o’clock, returning whence I
-came. And meanwhile nobody must ask me a single question about my place
-of hiding. There now—that’s all. What shall it be first, Miss Merle, a
-piano solo or a duet with the violin?”
-
-“Supper, I should say,” exclaimed Mrs. Darlington, as she left the room.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXIV—In a Tight Corner
-
-DICK’S after-dark visit to La Siesta was only the first of several that
-followed at intervals of a few days. He came and departed mysteriously,
-and during his brief stay every precaution was taken that no one except
-his few trusted friends should know of his presence. But by some means
-or other a whisper had reached the ear of the sleuth, Leach Sharkey,
-that the fugitive had been seen at the home of Mrs. Darlington.
-
-When the news was imparted to Ben Thurston, the old man quivered from
-excitement.
-
-“At La Siesta, do you tell me? Let us ride over there at once, and
-search the place from basement to attic.”
-
-“No, no,” replied Sharkey. “I’ve got my scouts out. Don’t you worry. We
-must wait till the night bird comes back. Then we’ll trap him like a fat
-quail.”
-
-“All right. Have my automobile ready, and a bunch of well-armed fellows
-right here, so that we can make a rush over at a moment’s notice. By
-God, I’ve been disappointed in everything else—lost my son, lost my
-ranch, lost my home. But I’m not going to lose that man. I’m going to
-get him, even if we shoot him down on sight as an outlawed fugitive from
-justice with a price on his head.”
-
-“We’ll get him,” answered Sharkey, with a grim smile. “You may count him
-a dead bird. I guessed he wouldn’t keep away from his girl very long.”
-
-“His girl! Curse her—it was she who lured my son to his death. But I’ll
-be avenged. If she has been harboring an outlaw, she, too, has broken
-the law and shall go to jail.”
-
-“Well, she no doubt thinks him innocent,” suggested the sleuth.
-
-“Innocent! All women are alike—treacherous devils at heart. I would give
-them the vote—yes, but the rope at the same time,” he went on, growling
-in savage incoherence.
-
-And Sharkey, knowing that discussion or contradiction only added fresh
-fuel to his vile temper, left him alone.
-
-At last, a few nights later, a rider dashed up to Ben Thurston’s house
-with the news that Dick Willoughby had been seen entering La Siesta, and
-that, following Sharkey’s instructions, every avenue of escape was now
-guarded.
-
-“Hurry, hurry! I’ve got to be in at the death,” fairly screamed the old
-man.
-
-Five minutes later the big seven-passenger automobile, carrying three or
-four armed men besides its owner and his personal guard, Leach Sharkey,
-was devouring the twenty miles of road that lay between the two ranch
-homes.
-
-That evening the four young people were quietly chatting in the cosy
-corner on the interior verandah—the comfortable little nook fixed up
-with rugs and tapestries and oriental divans. It was summer now, and
-after a sultry day the night air was sweet and balmy. Willoughby was
-smoking a cigar in languid contentment with his surroundings, when all
-at once he sprang to his feet.
-
-Tia Teresa had rushed in, frantic with excitement.
-
-“A great big automobile is coming along the road,” she cried, “and
-there are men watching outside the portico. Come with me,” she went on,
-addressing Dick. “I know where your horses are hid. I can take you by a
-secret path through the oleanders.”
-
-Dick vaguely wondered why the duenna should know anything about his mode
-of coming. But there was no time to question, for just then there came
-the sound of voices outside.
-
-Mrs. Darlington, pale and agitated, emerged from the drawing room.
-
-“What has happened?” she asked breathlessly.
-
-“I guess I’m trapped,” replied Dick quietly. “No doubt it’s old
-Thurston. There will be shooting if I resist. So there is nothing for it
-but to surrender.”
-
-“No, no,” exclaimed Merle. “I dread that vindictive man. He must never
-get you in his power again. We must gain time to smuggle you out of
-the house. I have it. Tia Teresa—give me your mantilla and your cloak.
-Quick, quick!”
-
-A first loud knocking had come on the door at the head of the portico
-steps. The duenna in a moment had divested herself of her loose black
-robe and heavy lace veil.
-
-“Get something else to wear and meet us at the oleanders,” continued
-Merle, taking the garments from Tia Teresa. “Put these on, Dick, and
-sit right there in that corner. Mr. Munson, turn off two or three of the
-lights. Mother, dear, control yourself. Take this book and be reading.
-Now, that will do. They will be here in a moment.”
-
-A second knock had been heard, and now they knew that the door was being
-opened without further ceremony, for at placid La Siesta there were no
-bolts or bars against unwelcome visitors.
-
-In that brief minute a wonderful transformation scene had taken place in
-the cosy corner. Tia Teresa had disappeared. Munson was stretched on
-a sofa, puffing his cigar. Merle and Grace had been playing patience
-during the afternoon and had left the cards in scattered confusion. Mrs.
-Darlington, beneath the single incandescent aglow, was quietly reading.
-From the darksome corner the pretended duenna surveyed this peaceful
-scene of domesticity.
-
-It was Ben Thurston himself who led the way for his swarm of myrmidons.
-
-He began without formality; his tone was coarse and rude.
-
-“We want the outlaw, Dick Willoughby. We know he is here. So make no
-fuss. Deliver him over.”
-
-Mrs. Darlington had risen to her feet, and Munson, too, had sprung
-erect.
-
-“What do you mean?” asked the lady with quiet dignity.
-
-“You know darned well what I mean.”
-
-Munson stepped forward, but he played the game best by keeping himself
-under perfect control.
-
-“You will speak civilly, Mr. Thurston, or leave this house. What is
-wanted?” he added, turning to Leach Sharkey.
-
-“We want Dick Willoughby, of course,” the sleuth replied, politely
-enough. “We have reason to believe he is here.”
-
-“Well, you can see for yourself whether he is here or not,” said Munson,
-glancing around. “But if you wish to look through the house, I don’t
-suppose Mrs. Darlington will refuse you permission.”
-
-The lady bowed her acquiescence.
-
-“With your consent, Mrs. Darlington,” Munson went on, “I’ll show these
-gentlemen round and save you the annoyance. Come along then.”
-
-Ben Thurston had been fairly silenced by the army man’s suave courtesy.
-He was glowering at him, dully conscious of having been suppressed.
-
-Munson turned from the sleuth.
-
-“Perhaps Mr. Thurston would prefer to remain with the ladies?” he asked,
-with a touch of smiling irony.
-
-“I don’t leave my man Sharkey,” replied Thurston gruffly. “Sharkey, keep
-close watch on me. We’ll search the place, but you stay near me all
-the time.” Once again there was the old hunted look in his eyes as he
-glanced apprehensively into the courtyard.
-
-“Then follow me,” said Munson quietly.
-
-“You have left a guard at the door of course?” asked Thurston of
-Sharkey.
-
-“Oh, you just allow me to know my business,” replied the detective
-sharply. He bowed to Mrs. Darlington and her daughters. “I am really
-sorry to disturb you, ladies.”
-
-“Then get the business over as soon as possible,” said Munson. “Come
-along.”
-
-The moment the coast was clear, Merle jumped up.
-
-“Quick! Mr. Willoughby. Follow me downstairs. I’ll take you through the
-kitchen to the rose gardens.”
-
-It was a strange looking duenna that stalked after Merle, with a robe
-reaching only to the knees. But at the head of the kitchen stairway Dick
-discarded the now useless garments, flinging them across the balustrade.
-
-“We must trust to our good luck now, Merle,” he said.
-
-“Never fear. It won’t desert us. Hurry on.”
-
-At the clump of oleanders they found Tia Teresa, provided with another
-shawl. Not a moment was to be wasted in words. Merle just pressed Dick’s
-hand by way of farewell. As he hastened away down the dark path, she,
-too, sped from the spot.
-
-Perhaps fifteen minutes later Ben Thurston, going the round of the
-house, came to the head of the kitchen stairs. He saw the black cloak
-and mantilla on the balustrade.
-
-“By God!” he cried with swift inspiration of what had happened. “We’ve
-been properly fooled! Where is that old hag of a duenna?”
-
-Gathering the vestments in his hands he rushed through the house to the
-verandah. Merle was quietly seated with her mother and Grace. But there
-was no sign now of Tia Teresa.
-
-Sharkey had followed close on his employer’s heels. Munson came a few
-paces behind.
-
-Ben Thurston glared for a moment at the vacant place where the
-black-robed figure had been seated. Then he turned round and, addressing
-Mrs. Darlington, fairly shouted:
-
-“Where is Dick Willoughby? It was he who was wearing these damned
-clothes.” And he flung the garments on the rug before her.
-
-“No swearing, please,” said Munson, tapping him on the shoulder.
-
-“To hell! Who wouldn’t swear? Where is the man I’m after?”
-
-“An innocent man,” exclaimed Merle, rising to her feet and proudly
-folding her arms.
-
-“Looks like it—breaking jail and hiding in the hills,” sneered Thurston.
-“He is nothing but a murderer and an outlaw. And I’m going to get him,
-dead or alive.”
-
-“Then catch him if you can,” cried Merle, pointing toward the door that
-opened on the portico.
-
-Under the girl’s fearless gaze Ben Thurston wilted. Baffled, humiliated,
-speechless in his impotent rage, he allowed the sleuth to take him by
-the arm and hustle him from the scene.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXV—Love and Revenge
-
-BEYOND the oleanders a tall thick hedge of cypress favored the flight
-of the fugitive. At the end of the gardens Tia Teresa took a little path
-that dipped into the river bed, and when they ascended again out of the
-hollow, Dick found himself quite close to the grove where Pierre was in
-hiding with the ponies.
-
-By this time the young fellow was angry with himself for having fled
-so precipitately. He was full of solicitude for Merle. Why had not he
-remained to defend her from the brutality of that ruffian, Ben Thurston?
-This was the question that was now making him both ashamed and anxious.
-
-“Hush!”
-
-The caution came from Pierre, and showed that the Frenchman was alive to
-what had happened.
-
-“I saw ze automobile rush by,” he whispered. “We will ride across
-country, so zat it cannot follow us.” He pointed in the direction he
-would go.
-
-“Not yet,” replied Dick, determinedly. “I’m off back to the house to see
-that they are all safe there.”
-
-“No, no, Mr. Willoughby,” protested the duenna earnestly. “You heard
-what Miss Merle said—she is afraid of that raging old man. Besides I
-know. He has vowed that he and his hired gunmen will shoot you on sight.
-For my little girl’s sake you must not go back,” she implored.
-
-“Besides your word of honor is pledged to me,” added Luzon. “You must
-return wiz me. I have your parole.”
-
-“Parole be hanged,” muttered Dick between his teeth.
-
-The old Frenchman laid a kindly hand on the young man’s shoulder.
-
-“No, no. Monsieur is a man of honor. And honor comes before
-love—always.”
-
-“If you love her,” insisted Tia Teresa, “you will save yourself tonight.
-We will look after her. You need not worry on her account.”
-
-Dick for the moment was silenced, but unconvinced.
-
-“Well, at all events we’ll wait a bit. I don’t leave this spot till I’m
-sure that Ben Thurston himself has cleared.”
-
-“All right,” assented Pierre. “Stay where you are, Tia Teresa. You must
-not be seen. Zey may be searching in ze gardens.”
-
-Even as he spoke there was the flash of a lantern among the rose bushes.
-
-In tense silence they waited and watched. The leaden-winged minutes
-stole on. For a time lights flitted about, then vanished. At last came
-the “honk-honk” of the automobile, and a minute later the great machine
-with its flaring headlights swept down the roadway. They could just see
-that it was crowded with men. Then in a few seconds it had disappeared
-around the bend.
-
-“Now we go,” said Pierre.
-
-“Just a minute longer, please,” replied Dick in a firm tone. “Tia
-Teresa, you slip back to the house. I will stay here till you bring me
-word from Merle that she is safe and that all is well.”
-
-“I will soon return,” said the duenna as she hurried away on her
-mission.
-
-Again an interval of high-tensioned waiting. Neither Dick nor Pierre
-spoke a word. At last there came a rustle of the bushes from the
-direction of the river bed, and a moment later Tia Teresa was again by
-their side.
-
-“Mr. Willoughby,” she said, breathless from the speed she had made,
-“Miss Merle begs you to make good your escape. She is well, and happy
-because you are safe. She sends this rose and”—the old lady hesitated a
-moment—“her love.”
-
-“She said that?” murmured Dick, tremblingly, as he took the white
-blossom and breathed its fragrance.
-
-“Well, does not the flower speak her love?” replied the duenna. “Now go,
-go.”
-
-“Come,” said Pierre, as he raised himself into the saddle. “We shall fix
-the blindfold later on.” Dick furtively kissed the rose before he placed
-it in the breast pocket of his coat. Then he mounted, and, bringing his
-pony alongside of Pierre’s, started off at a canter across the starlit
-plain.
-
-Ben Thurston did not feel inclined to sleep that night. He paced his
-sitting room like an angry bear, and kept Leach Sharkey out of bed to
-listen to his growls and threatenings.
-
-“By God, I’ll have that girl shoved into jail. Harboring an outlaw! It’s
-a criminal offence.”
-
-“You can’t do it,” objected the sleuth.
-
-“Can’t do it?” shouted Thurston, halting and glowering down upon the man
-who had dared to contradict him. “You’ll see damned quick if I can’t.”
-
-“Not one of us could swear that Willoughby was there. Neither you nor I
-could. We never saw him.”
-
-“He wore that disguise,” thundered Thurston. “So you think. But thinking
-ain’t proof—not by a long chalk.”
-
-Thurston was now almost speechless from rage. Half articulate words of
-blasphemy were upon his stuttering lips. But Sharkey went coolly on.
-
-“Besides the sympathy of everyone would be with the girl. You can’t
-succeed that way. You yourself would be covered with ridicule.”
-
-At last the torrent of curses broke forth. “Damn you, Leach Sharkey!
-That’s what I pay you for, is it? To let that scoundrel slip through our
-very fingers? And you had the nerve to ask me for another big check this
-evening. It’s all a confounded plot. You’re bleeding me. Leach is your
-name, and leech is your nature.” Leach Sharkey rose to his feet. His
-white teeth gleamed as his short upper lip curled in a contemptuous
-smile. He raised a threatening finger. It was his turn now to give free
-vent to profanity.
-
-“Stop right there, you doggoned old fool. I bleed you, do I? Well, take
-my resignation. All your pay ain’t worth another five minutes of your
-infernal temper. No man ever dared to browbeat me and insult me as you
-have done. And now you may go to hell—where you belong.”
-
-The sleuth turned on his heel, and strode to the doorway. But Thurston
-was after him in an instant, penitent, trembling, ashen pale. He grabbed
-Sharkey by the coat sleeve.
-
-“No, no, don’t go, I beg of you,” he whined, “I was wrong. I spoke in
-anger. I apologize. Good God, some one or other will get me within an
-hour if you leave me unprotected. I haven’t a single friend—no one to
-stand by me.” There was craven fear in his eyes as he looked timidly
-around. “I hear the prowling footsteps of my enemies in the night. You
-alone can save me, Mr. Sharkey.”
-
-“Your damned civility comes too late,” replied the sleuth, as he shook
-the clutching hands from his shoulder.
-
-“No, no. Don’t say that. Sit down again. See, here is my check book.
-I’ll pay you that money now—I’ll double the amount—I’ll never haggle
-with you again. Stay with me till we go East together.”
-
-Sharkey showed himself somewhat mollified. He had played his game well,
-for after all, cash with him was the main consideration. So smiling over
-the success of his bluff, he watched the unnerved coward as he tottered
-to his desk, dropped into a chair and drew the check with slow and
-painful effort, and then returned with it between his still trembling
-fingers.
-
-“You’ll stand by me, Mr. Sharkey, won’t you?”
-
-“Well, no more of that nonsense,” was the curt reply, as the sleuth
-glanced at the slip of paper, then thrust it in his waistcoat pocket.
-
-To Thurston the reconciliation brought instant relief. He drew himself
-up; he rubbed his hands; he even attempted a smile.
-
-“That’s a good fellow, Sharkey. You know I’ve always held you in high
-esteem. And we’ll get that man yet”—the glare of vindictiveness was
-again in his eyes, the rasp of accustomed irritability was returning to
-his voice. “We’ll get him, I say, even if it costs double the money I’ve
-already spent. And that devil of a girl, too—I hate her more than ever
-now. She’ll pay for her insults tonight with her lover’s life. Remember,
-Sharkey, no more chances. When you get the scoundrel within gunshot,
-it’s up to you to shoot. That will be best in any case. It will save the
-cost of a judge and jury. You understand me?”
-
-“I understand,” nodded Sharkey. “Then, as you’re speaking about
-doubling. Mr. Thurston, I suppose that ten-thousand-dollar reward coming
-to me goes up to twenty thousand.”
-
-“Yes; twenty thousand if you shoot him like a dog, and let me get away
-from this damned place. I have come to loathe the very name of it. Well,
-spread your cot now across my door. I’ll try to get an hour’s sleep.
-Good night.”
-
-And Ben Thurston disappeared into the inner room.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXVI—A Date is Fixed
-
-ON the morning after the exciting episode at La Siesta, Chester Munson
-was in the library of Mr. Robles’ home ready for his day’s duties. But
-he was in no mood for the routine work of cataloging and classifying the
-volumes on the bookshelves. Up to now the task had been one of absorbing
-interest, for Munson, although not a scholar, had always been fond of
-reading, and it was a treat to dip at times into the contents of the
-rare and curious works which wealth and the educated taste of a true
-bibliophile had accumulated.
-
-But today the amateur librarian was thinking of other things. He was
-feverishly awaiting the usual morning visit of his employer, so that he
-might tell him the story of the previous night’s happenings. At last Mr.
-Robles made his appearance, and gave his usual quiet greetings.
-
-“I see you are making great progress with your work,” he remarked,
-glancing at the pile of classified volumes resting temporarily on the
-library table.
-
-“Oh, I’m getting along,” replied Munson. “But I have most surprising
-news for you, Mr. Robles.”
-
-“Indeed?” The recluse arched his eyebrows in expectant curiosity as he
-took a chair beside the desk at which Munson had been seated. “Sit down,
-please. Let me hear the story.”
-
-“You know that I was at La Siesta yesterday evening?”
-
-“I know that you are very often there,” replied Mr. Robles, smiling.
-“I understand the attraction and congratulate you on your good fortune.
-Grace Darlington is certainly a charming young lady.”
-
-Munson flushed and bowed his acquiescence in the compliment as he said:
-
-“It was not of her, however, that I was going to speak. I want to say
-to you, Mr. Robles, that Miss Farnsworth did one of the bravest and
-cleverest things imaginable last evening.”
-
-“Tell me about it. I am all attention.” Munson then proceeded to relate
-in full detail the events of the preceding evening—the surprise visit
-of Ben Thurston, the brutality of the man, the quick wit of Merle, the
-escape of Dick Willoughby, and his final message by Tia Teresa that he
-was safe and, in obedience to Merle’s injunction, was returning to his
-place of hiding. During the narrative only once did the listener betray
-emotion; when Thurston’s rude insults were repeated there came a
-flash into Robles’ eyes, and he clenched his hands to restrain his
-indignation. But he interrupted with no word, and at the end spoke no
-comment.
-
-Munson was a little taken aback at this silence and impassivity.
-
-“My story does not seem to surprise you?” he remarked, with a note of
-interrogation.
-
-“No,” was the quiet reply, “I already knew it.”
-
-“How?” exclaimed Munson, wonderingly.
-
-“You have forgotten, young man, that there is a private telephone
-between my home here and La Siesta. Mrs. Darlington has already told me
-about the matter. But I am pleased to have your version, and
-delighted more than I can tell to know that Merle proved equal to the
-emergency—that it was she who may be truly said to have saved Dick
-Willoughby.” There was a ring of pride and admiration in his voice as he
-spoke the words.
-
-“She’s the real stuff,” cried Munson, enthusiastically.
-
-“It was well done,” continued Mr. Robles, his tone taking a graver note.
-“For I want to warn you, Munson, as Willoughby’s closest friend, that
-Ben Thurston or one of his hired assassins will certainly shoot on sight
-the instant they get the chance to do so. But by the Lord, if anything
-like that happens, I will hang that villain Thurston to the highest tree
-in Tejon for the buzzards to pick his bones.” And the upraised hand,
-the voice vibrating with passionate determination, showed that Ricardo
-Robles meant just what he said.
-
-Mr. Robles had risen to his feet. For a moment he turned his face away.
-Then he again spoke, but now in his customary, sedate manner.
-
-“This morning, Mr. Munson, I leave home for a few days. Go on with your
-work, of course, but remember that it is quite a minor consideration.
-During my absence I shall rely on you to see that Ben Thurston, on any
-pretence of searching for Willoughby, does not cross my door.”
-
-“He shall never do that, so long as I’m here,” declared the young army
-man, with quiet confidence.
-
-“I don’t think he will, either,” replied Robles. “I have given orders
-for him to be shot down,” he added grimly, “if he should dare to
-approach my gates. But I’ll count on you all the same as a second guard
-to the sanctity of my home.”
-
-“You may count on me to the death,” responded Munson, extending his
-hand.
-
-“I know it, and therefore I go away on a necessary duty with an easy
-mind. But I have good news for you, Munson. I have instructed Sing Ling
-to prepare luncheon for the ladies of La Siesta every day they choose
-to come. So, while I prefer you to remain here on guard while I am
-gone, you need not be lonely. Perhaps you’ll hardly wish me to come back
-again,” he added with a smile.
-
-“Oh, don’t say that. But you’re mighty kind thinking of such things at
-all.”
-
-“Well, you may expect our friends today about one o’clock. Now,
-goodbye—but not for long.”
-
-The library work proceeded but slowly during the hours that followed.
-Munson was all impatience now for Grace and Merle to arrive. Books were
-of little account, for there was none ever printed that could rival
-for him the charm of a certain pair of laughing blue eyes. And it was a
-self-confessed pseudo man-of-letters who at last rushed to the gateway
-to greet the fair visitors.
-
-“Mother couldn’t come,” cried Grace, as she jumped from her horse and
-flung the bridle to a Mexican groom. “She’s putting up fruit with Tia
-Teresa, and I think she really believes everything would go wrong if she
-didn’t superintend.”
-
-Munson, as he led the girls through the arched gateway, was inclined to
-bless both the fruit and the fallacy.
-
-Sing Ling came across the patio with a welcoming smile.
-
-“Dinnel all leady,” he announced in tinkling syllables.
-
-“And we’re all ready, too, Sing Ling,” laughed Merle, as she went up and
-shook the Chinaman’s hand.
-
-“Me vely glad to see you again, missie.”
-
-“I didn’t know you were old friends,” exclaimed Munson, in some
-surprise.
-
-“Oh, didn’t you? Sing Ling has been Mr. Robles’ cook off and on for
-nearly twenty years. When Mr. Robles is abroad of course he works
-elsewhere. That’s why you found him at San Antonio Rancho.”
-
-“But Dick told me he was his cook—had been for several years.”
-
-“With Mr. Robles’ tacit consent, then,” replied Merle.
-
-The Chinaman was grinning in a vacuous sort of way, as if all the
-conversation was so much Greek to him.
-
-“Sing Ling, you scamp,” cried Munson, “I begin to understand now how Mr.
-Robles comes to know so much about Dick and myself. You’ve been telling
-tales out of school.”
-
-“Oh, no; me cookee allee time; me no go school,” replied the Celestial,
-in guileless incomprehension.
-
-After the dainty luncheon, Merle proposed that they should visit the
-watch tower. There they found the Mexican lad on duty. He had been
-strumming a guitar to pass the time, but at the sound of voices
-had sprung erect and alert. Munson noticed at a glance that the big
-telescope was ready trained on San Antonio Rancho.
-
-“Como estas, Francisco?” asked Merle, addressing the boy in Spanish.
-
-“Bien, gracias, senorita,” he replied, with a deferential bow. But he
-averted his glance instantly, and gazed out on the landscape.
-
-Merle turned to Munson: “We are not allowed to converse with the
-servants here,” she explained. “Just a word of greeting—that is all.”
-
-“I’m under similar orders,” replied Munson. “Not that it much matters
-in my case, for I haven’t your accomplishment of knowing the Spanish
-language.”
-
-“Oh, Grace and I speak Spanish almost as well as English. You see, Mr.
-Robles, who has always been interested in us two girls, insisted that we
-should be taught his native tongue.”
-
-“And we’ve been all over Spain, too,” interposed Grace. “Lived there
-a whole year. That’s where I fell in love with the violin and took my
-first lessons.”
-
-“An inspiring country obviously,” remarked Munson with a flattering
-gesture.
-
-“Thank you for the subtle compliment,” laughed Grace, tossing the
-vagrant, wind-blown curls from her face.
-
-“I never come here but I love to gaze at the view,” observed Merle. “Is
-it not glorious—this valley of Tehachapi?”
-
-It was indeed a glorious scene—that noble sweep of verdured plain,
-stretching north far as the eye could reach, on the south guarded by the
-rugged pass, east and west embosoming hills twenty miles apart etching
-the sky with peaks and domes and lines of beauty. For a few moments all
-three visitors to the tower remained silent and enraptured.
-
-Grace was the one to break the spell.
-
-“I’m going down now to the library to inspect your work, lieutenant,”
-she announced with a roguish smile.
-
-“Spare me,” protested Munson. “But perhaps you would help me with some
-of those Spanish books,” he added as an afterthought.
-
-“Delighted! Come along.” And she led the way down the winding iron
-staircase.
-
-In the library the three were for the first time during the visit quite
-alone. Munson carefully closed the door.
-
-“Now I’ve got the chance, Miss Merle,” he began, “I want to compliment
-you on your splendid bravery last night.”
-
-“Bravery!” she laughed. “Why I was so scared I could hardly stand.”
-
-“Well, you deceived us all finely, then.”
-
-“And that Ben Thurston—what an old ruffian!” cried Grace. “But I agree
-with you, Mr. Munson; Merle was a hero.”
-
-“A heroine,” suggested the lieutenant.
-
-“Oh, in these days we don’t make such fine sex distinctions,” laughed
-Grace. “A real hero, that’s what I call her.”
-
-“Rubbish,” protested Merle. “I just did what anyone else would have done
-in the circumstances.”
-
-“I’m afraid men are not so ready of wit in an emergency as are women,”
-remarked Munson.
-
-“Just listen to that, Merle,” exclaimed Grace. “I verily believe the
-lieutenant is a suffragette.”
-
-“A suffragist,” corrected Munson, emphatically this time. “I’m hanged
-if I’m going to wear a petticoat even if the women are determined to
-don—the other things.”
-
-They all laughed merrily.
-
-Grace turned and began examining the carefully written library cards.
-
-“Any more news from Mr. Willoughby?” asked Merle, with a look of
-solicitude in her eyes.
-
-“Nothing,” replied Munson. “But I’m beginning to put two and two
-together,” he continued. “Early every morning a horseman comes down here
-from the mountains and evidently brings a report of some kind to Mr.
-Robles. And when he rides off again Sing Ling has always ready a basket
-of grub, all sorts of nice things, fried chicken, spiced beef—”
-
-“Sounds quite epicurean,” interrupted Grace, tossing away the card she
-had been pretending to examine.
-
-“Yes, hang it all—just the little delicacies Dick used to like.”
-
-“I never knew you fared so bountifully at San Antonio Rancho,” remarked
-Merle with a smile.
-
-“Oh, Dick’s no candy kid, as you know well,” replied Munson. “It was
-mostly rough and ready fare all right, but Sing Ling had a knack of
-adding a few dainty trifles to our meals, and it strikes me that for the
-purposes of this mysterious and capacious lunch basket he is trying to
-excel himself.”
-
-“No doubt it goes to Mr. Willoughby,” said Merle. “Well, I’m real glad
-to know that they are making him comfortable.”
-
-“I guess, though, he’ll miss his occasional visits to La Siesta. Mr.
-Robles says you were quite right, Miss Merle. Dick is in real danger.
-Those gunmen of old Thurston have orders to shoot him on sight.”
-
-“I knew it,” exclaimed Merle. “Oh, I’m so thankful he got away. Even
-though we miss seeing him, he must never run such a risk again.”
-
-“It is all very mysterious,” said Munson, in a musing tone. “And I had
-no idea, too, that this was such a lovely place. Mr. Robles has taken
-me around several times. He has the choicest dairy cattle, the finest
-blooded horses, rare trees and plants from every corner of the world.”
-
-“These are his hobbies,” commented Merle.
-
-“He says he wants to give me some practical lessons in estate
-management.”
-
-“Why?” asked Grace.
-
-“Well,” laughed Munson, “he thinks I may some day own a rancho of my
-own. But that will be a mighty long time.”
-
-“Who can tell?” said Merle, glancing mischievously from the lieutenant
-to Grace. “Even in these humdrum days soldiers have been known to come
-in and conquer.”
-
-Grace blushed crimson.
-
-“Merle, how dare you?” she exclaimed, half angry, half laughing. “Next
-time we visit you, Mr. Munson, I’ll have to bring along Tia Teresa.”
-
-“Oh, dear Aunt Teresa has a soft side for the lieutenant,” retorted
-Merle, with merry audacity.
-
-But Grace had recovered from her momentary confusion.
-
-“Then I’ll help you all I can, Mr. Munson, with dear Aunt Teresa,”
-she laughingly said. “We’ll send her along tomorrow instead of coming
-ourselves.”
-
-“Heaven forbid!” murmured the lieutenant, with pious fervor. He, too,
-had been looking and feeling awkward.
-
-“So we’ll say goodbye for the present,” continued Grace, frankly
-extending her hand.
-
-“I hope I haven’t said anything to offend you,” stammered Munson.
-
-“It is perhaps what you haven’t said that is the cause of trouble,”
-laughed the irrepressible Merle.
-
-But Grace had fled from the room, and as the others followed, Merle went
-on:
-
-“I said when we left home that two would be company but three—a
-complication. Wasn’t I right, lieutenant?”
-
-“You are always right,” murmured Munson, too bewildered to think of
-anything else but the obvious gallant reply.
-
-He stood at the gateway watching the two young ladies as they cantered
-away. At the bend of the road Merle turned round in the saddle and waved
-her hand. But Grace rode steadily on.
-
-“By jove, that’s as good as telling me that I can sail in and win,” he
-said to himself. “Thank you, Merle, little girl. Next time Grace and I
-are alone, my fate will be sealed.”
-
-But no one called again during Mr. Robles’ absence—not even Tia Teresa.
-
-It was toward evening a few days later when the recluse strolled into
-the library. Munson did not know that he had returned, and rose from his
-seat in some surprise.
-
-“Still hard at work?” said Mr. Robles, as he nodded and shook hands.
-
-“When did you get back, sir?”
-
-“Last night. And today I have been busy with some important letters.”
-
-“Any word of Dick?”
-
-“There is nothing new so far as I am aware.”
-
-“Mr. Robles, excuse me,” said Munson earnestly. “But I’m anxious on
-Dick’s account. You know of his whereabouts, of course?”
-
-“I have indicated as much, although for the present I prefer to say
-nothing.”
-
-“Well, when is he to be restored to liberty?”
-
-“In due time. At latest he will be free on the eleventh of October.”
-
-“Oh, that’s months ahead yet. But why the eleventh of October? You
-excite my curiosity.”
-
-“The date is not of my choosing—it was fixed many years ago, by another
-than myself.”
-
-The enigmatic reply puzzled Chester Munson—not only the words
-themselves, but the tremor of deep emotion in the voice of Ricardo
-Robles as he gave them utterance.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXVII—Among the Old Oaks
-
-PIERRE, now my sketches and plans are finished, how am I going to pass
-the time?” It was some ten days after the affair at La Siesta, and
-Dick had spent the interval in close and absorbed work over his drawing
-board. Happy in his occupation, he had not felt the restraints of
-confinement.
-
-But now that the task was completed, and the big cardboard cylinder
-containing the set of drawings rested on the ledge of the easel all
-ready to be sent away on its mission, a feeling of chafing restlessness
-had ensued.
-
-“Good Lord, a fellow can’t read all day,” Dick went on, half in
-soliloquy, half addressing his companion.
-
-“Monsieur is comfortable here?” asked the latter solicitously.
-
-“I should say, old fellow. I was never in better quarters in all my
-life.”
-
-“And zere is nothing more I could get for ze table?”
-
-“For goodness sake, don’t talk like that, Pierre! In any ease I don’t
-worry about what I eat. But this is a regular Delmonico’s. Guadalupe
-is certainly a crackerjack cook. She is even better than Sing Ling.
-Wherever did she learn to turn out all these little delicacies? And just
-my favorite dishes, too.”
-
-Pierre smiled enigmatically.
-
-“Guadalupe very clever old squaw,” he remarked.
-
-“I would like to know her better. But she keeps out of my sight all the
-time.”
-
-“Guadalupe is very old. She has her fixed ideas.”
-
-“I suppose that means she does not love the Americans.”
-
-“No doubt. She prefer to be alone—alone with ze white wolf all ze time.
-And where the white wolf is, monsieur dare not go.”
-
-“I understand that all right,” laughed Willoughby. “I strolled only
-once toward the log fire, and the brute showed me a set of teeth which I
-never wish to see again.”
-
-“Ze white wolf guard ze cave well,” remarked Pierre, sententiously.
-
-“Oh, I’m not thinking of trying to run away. You know I would never
-break my word. But what the dickens am I to do all day long?”
-
-“What do you say? Suppose we go to ze riffle and wash out some gold.”
-
-“Great Scott!” exclaimed Dick eagerly. “That’s not a bad suggestion. But
-Don Manuel won’t mind?”
-
-“He will be very pleased—he has no use for ze gold.”
-
-“And Guadalupe?”
-
-“Long ago she would have killed you if you had gone zere. But not now.
-She very old, and all her people are dead.”
-
-“And the white wolf? That confounded beast won’t interfere?”
-
-“No, no. Ze white wolf stay near Guadalupe all ze time.”
-
-“Then, by jove, it’s a bully idea,” cried Dick. “It gets me all right.
-We’ll turn miners, Pierre, and we’ll have a rare old sack of nuggets to
-divide when the time comes for me to go free. I’ll be better off in the
-end than if I were holding down my old job at the rancho,” he laughed
-gaily.
-
-“I will find ze spades and ze pans to wash ze gravel. When shall we
-begin?”
-
-“Well, wait now,” replied Dick, glancing reflectively at the roll of
-drawings. “I’ve got to send these plans away. I want you to get them
-at once into the hands of my friend, Lieutenant Chester Munson. He will
-know how to forward them to their proper destination.”
-
-“May I suggest one zing?”
-
-“Go ahead, Pierre. What’s in your mind?”
-
-“I venture to make one little suggestion. Why not ask ze young lady to
-take ze plans to your friend?”
-
-“Miss Merle Farnsworth?” asked Dick in surprise. “But how am I to do
-that?”
-
-“I will promise to arrange a meeting—zat is, if you are not afraid of
-Mr. Thurston and his men.”
-
-“Afraid!” shouted Dick. “You give me the chance to see Merle again, and
-old Ben Thurston and all his sleuths may go to blazes.”
-
-“Zen I will arrange, and I zink it will please ze young lady very much
-to have ze honor of taking care of ze plans.”
-
-“You mean it will be a mighty honor for the plans to be in her care,
-Pierre. But I know she will gladly do me this service. How and when can
-I see her?”
-
-“Be ready tomorrow morning by ten o’clock. I will take you to a quiet
-place among ze old oak trees.”
-
-“Pierre, you’re a regular brick,” cried Dick, as he slapped the old
-Frenchman on the shoulder in the exuberance of his delight.
-
-The following morning they started out for the trysting place. Dick
-without demur submitted to the usual precautions. He was blindfolded
-before mounting his pony in the great central domed cavern and it was
-not until a couple of hours later, after a veritable switchback ride up
-and down and round about in a bewildering maze, that he was permitted
-to remove the bandage. Dismounting, he found himself in the heart of a
-great oak forest, in what precise locality he could not tell, for there
-was nothing in sight but endless vistas of tree trunks under their thick
-canopy of green leaves.
-
-Pierre touched him on the shoulder, and he followed the direction of
-the Frenchman’s eyes. There, advancing through the sylvan twilight, was
-Merle Farnsworth, her hands eagerly extended, her face lighted with joy.
-Following at a little distance came Tia Teresa.
-
-Dick, hastening to meet Merle, took both her hands into his, and gazed
-deep into her eyes.
-
-“Oh, it’s great to meet you again,” he exclaimed. “And this is my first
-chance to thank you for having saved me the other night. My word, but
-you were quick to think and to act. You cannot know how I admired your
-courage and coolness.”
-
-“Nonsense, nonsense,” protested Merle, in sweet blushing confusion. “You
-make far too much of the little I did.”
-
-“You saved my life,” said Dick, determinedly. “You can call that a
-little thing if you choose.”
-
-“No, no,” she replied, earnestly. “If I really did that, then it was
-truly a big thing.”
-
-“For me.”
-
-“And for all of us,” she added, with face half-averted.
-
-“And you, too?” pressed Dick.
-
-“Yes, for me, too,” answered Merle, turning round and frankly meeting
-his gaze. “I should never have been happy again had any harm come to you
-there—that night—in my very home—without a proper effort to get you away
-to a place of safety.”
-
-“God bless you, Merle, dear,” exclaimed Dick, as again he pressed her
-hands. He had been carried away by his fervent emotions, but she did not
-resent the familiar and endearing manner of his address.
-
-He would have taken her in his arms there and then, but Merle drew back
-and gave a little glance aside. Then Dick remembered Tia Teresa. To his
-astonishment he found her chatting with Pierre Luzon as if they were old
-friends.
-
-Dick left Merle for the moment to greet the duenna.
-
-“And I have to thank you, too, for helping me,” he said. Then he added
-with a laugh: “When am I to be privileged to wear that mantilla again?”
-
-“You are not to be allowed to endanger yourself again,” replied Tia
-Teresa. “And I warn you now. We remain here only half an hour—these are
-our orders.”
-
-“Whose orders?”
-
-“Never mind. Just one half hour, that is all.”
-
-“Then I’ll make the best of my time,” exclaimed Dick, turning toward
-Merle. “I see you won’t be lonely with my gallant friend, Pierre Luzon,”
-he added with a smile.
-
-“Oh, I knew Pierre when he was just as handsome a young fellow as
-yourself,” retorted Tia Teresa. “But we’ll excuse you, and Pierre will
-keep the time.”
-
-Dick led Merle down a glade of the forest, but before doing so he had
-unstrapped the roll of drawings from the horn of his saddle.
-
-“What are you carrying so very carefully?” asked Merle.
-
-“My plans for the ideal city. I told you I was going to have a try in
-that competition.”
-
-“I hope you’ll have good luck.”
-
-“Well, I want you to help me. Will you take this package, please, to
-Chester Munson and ask him to send it to the proper address?”
-
-“With the greatest of pleasure, Mr. Willoughby,”—and she put forth her
-hands for the roll.
-
-“No—we’ll lay it down here for the present. This log will serve as a
-seat. See, this twisted, limb makes quite a comfortable nook for you.”
-He had halted at a fallen tree, had dropped the drawing on the turf, and
-was now dusting away the twigs and leaves from the seat he had chosen.
-
-“Cannot I look at the drawings?” she asked, after settling herself
-cosily.
-
-“Before handing them to Munson, if you like. But there are other things
-to talk about now.” As he spoke he tossed his hat on the ground at her
-feet.
-
-“Are you growing impatient over your confinement?” she asked.
-
-“Impatient—it is hardly the word. I long to be out in the world again.
-I could never have endured the long seclusion but for my work over these
-drawings and my thoughts of you.”
-
-“Why me?”
-
-“I have felt that I am doing the best for your sake as well as my own.
-I would not have had you subjected to the vulgar gaze of a crowded court
-room—not for worlds. The very thought that I have saved you from that
-has made me contented with my enforced idleness.”
-
-“Not idleness,” she said, tapping the roll of drawings with the toe of
-her shoe.
-
-“Well, no, not idleness exactly.”
-
-“And I do hope you’ll win the prize,” she added, looking up into his
-eyes.
-
-“So do I. But perhaps you don’t know what I count to be the real prize.”
-
-
-
-0255
-
-“Pray, what is that?”
-
-Dick thrust a hand into the breast of his coat and brought forth a
-pocket book. From this he produced a little package, and opening the
-folds of paper disclosed the white rose which she had sent him on the
-night of his escape from La Siesta.
-
-“Where did you get that?” she asked demurely.
-
-“It is your rose—the rose you sent me.”
-
-“I did not know you were so partial to roses as to keep them after they
-are withered.” Her voice trembled; she bravely tried to keep up the
-pretence of not understanding.
-
-“It is not the gift I treasure—it is the thought of who was the giver.”
-
-A blush stole over her beautiful face, while the long drooping eyelashes
-half concealed her brown eyes. Dick’s arms slipped around the girl’s
-slender waist.
-
-“Merle, my dear, I love you. For months past I have known that there is
-no woman on earth for me but you. I would have spoken before, but I have
-always been afraid that you could not love me, and that talk of such a
-thing might terminate a friendship that had become my greatest pleasure
-in life.”
-
-For reply, placing one hand on his shoulder, she just buried her face in
-his breast and gave way to tears—tears of joy, he knew, as he kissed her
-hair again and again, and then at last her lips when she allowed him to
-raise her face toward his.
-
-“My darling,” he murmured, and the kiss she gave him back accepted and
-returned the words of fond endearment.
-
-A moment of restful bliss followed; then Merle gently disengaged herself
-and rose to her feet.
-
-“What will Tia Teresa say?” she asked, laughingly, as she glanced over
-her shoulder.
-
-“I think Tia Teresa knew all about my love long ago,” replied Dick.
-“Yes, both she and Pierre Luzon, too.”
-
-“Then you have been wearing your heart on your sleeve.”
-
-“Or we have been surrounded by very observant people. But, I say, Merle,
-this reminds me of a thing I had quite forgotten for the moment.” His
-face fell. “There is one great barrier that stands between us.”
-
-“What do you mean? You are surely too strong and purposeful a man to
-care for barriers.”
-
-“I never knew until the other day that you are so very rich.”
-
-“Rich!” laughed Merle. “Who ever told you such a foolish thing? While
-of course I have never felt poverty, don’t you know that I am absolutely
-dependent upon Mrs. Darlington’s kindness and generosity to me, her
-adopted daughter?”
-
-A smile of understanding broke over Dick’s face.
-
-“You tell me that? I am so delighted,” he exclaimed.
-
-“You surely know my story well enough,” continued Merle, “not to have
-mistaken me for an heiress. I lost both father and mother when I was
-a baby. Mrs. Darlington took me to her heart, and no mother could have
-been dearer and sweeter than she, no sister kinder and more loving than
-Grace. But I am proud to think they have loved me for my own sake, not
-for any wealth I might have owned.”
-
-“Then there is no barrier,” cried Dick, as once again he drew her to
-him. “Unless my poverty is a barrier,” he added. “But won’t I work hard
-all my life to give you every comfort you can desire!”
-
-“Well, we’ll have a good start at all events,” said Merle, with a merry
-little upglance.
-
-“How’s that?”
-
-“The ten-thousand-dollar prize for the best plans. Have you forgotten
-about that already?”
-
-“But it is not won yet.”
-
-“Oh, I have the firm presentiment that you are going to win, Dick, dear.
-I am sure of it—sure!” she repeated in a tone of conviction.
-
-Her face was aglow and Dick caught the spirit of her enthusiasm.
-
-“Then I’m sure, too. And, by jove, won’t we have one grand honeymoon
-trip, dearest?”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXVIII—The Prize Winner
-
-DICK WILLOUGHBY’S sensational escape from La Siesta had added another
-thrill to the mystery surrounding the murder of Marshall Thurston. But
-as week succeeded week without further incident, the affair gradually
-faded away as a topic of conversation. All the talk now was about the
-coming of the new town. The fever of speculation was in the air.
-
-“Say, boys,” remarked Jack Rover one evening to his two cronies at the
-store, “I’m sure getting crazy about the new town. I’ve got a thousand
-bones of my own savings besides the money from old Pierre Luzon, and I’m
-going to invest every dangnation cent of it in town lots on opening day.
-You bet I’ll be there mighty early in the morning when the sale starts.”
-
-“I’m sorta locoed myself,” said Baker, “about them lots in the new
-town. Guess I’ll grab off a few good corners. I look for an early
-rise—prices’ll go up like blazes,’ I’m ‘lowin’.”
-
-Buck Ashley snorted contemptuously. “Say, you fellers are two dippy
-ones. That new town talk is a lot o’ hot air, d’you hear? Jest the
-agitatin’ work of them pesky town boomers. Won’t ‘mount to nothin’.”
-
-Jack Rover started a defence, but was quickly motioned to silence by
-old Tom Baker, who, after clearing his throat, pushed his hat back and
-glared at Buck Ashley.
-
-“Buck,” said he, “you’re a thick-headed fool. The openin’ of that town
-will amount to one hell of a sight, don’t you fergit it. Why, that Los
-Angeles syndicate cuss who’s a-runnin’ the machine is sharper than a
-razor blade. Just think for one little puny moment,” Tom Baker went
-on, enthusiastically, “of that printed notice being in every blamed
-newspaper in the whole country—yes, and on the other side of the
-Atlantic pond—offerin’ ten thousand dollars for the best plans for an
-ideal city. Gosh all hemlock, they do say as how the mails were just
-chuck full of answers—architect fellers as well as them as ain’t
-architects, a-tryin’ to get their hooks on that ten-thousand-dollar
-prize. It was a mighty smart business notion, I’m a-tellin’ you, and has
-boomed the town to beat the band.”
-
-“But,” inquired Buck Ashley, in a sarcastic way, “who is confounded fool
-enough to buy lots in such a wild-cat scheme, no matter how much they
-advertise it? That’s what I’m askin’.”
-
-“I will, for one,” said Jack Rover. “As I said before, I’m going to put
-in my last dollar.”
-
-“As for me,” chimed in Tom Baker, “I will lay my money on this ‘ere
-proposed new town bein’ the biggest town in the whole dangnation State
-of California outside of sea-board towns.”
-
-Just then through the gathering darkness a lone horseman rode up to the
-store, dismounted and came hurriedly in. It was none other than Chester
-Munson, flushed and excited, as he sang out a good-natured salute:
-“Hallo, boys. I have news for you.”
-
-As he spoke he pulled a Bakersfield daily paper from his pocket. “The
-new town!” he fairly shouted. “All about it, right on the front
-page, pictures and all. And it is Dick Willoughby who wins the
-ten-thousand-dollar prize!”
-
-“That’s great news, sure,” cried Jack.
-
-“It’s a mighty pity Dick ain’t here to celebrate,” growled the sheriff.
-
-“What’s to be the name of the town?” asked Buck Ashley, in a
-disbelieving tone.
-
-“Tejon, after the old fort here,” replied Munson, as he pointed to the
-featured article with its big-type headlines and started to cull a few
-sentences.
-
-“It says that the new city of Tejon, right here in the heart of a rich
-horticultural valley, is bound to be one of the top-notch towns of
-California. And the opening day is going to be immense. Next Tuesday
-is the date fixed. Maps and plans of the new town will be ready for
-distribution from the land company’s office, corner Main Street and
-Broadway, at nine o’clock Monday morning. Let me see,” he went on,
-looking up from the paper, “this is Wednesday. Mighty few days to wait,
-boys. You just ought to see the excitement in Bakersfield.”
-
-“Well, I say there ain’t no such town,” snapped Buck Ashley, “nor no
-such a company’s office buildin’, ‘cause I was down there day before
-yesterday myself, right where them surveyin’ fellers have been foolin’
-‘round for weeks, peekin’ through spy-glasses at each other and
-measurin’ off so many feet this way and so many feet that way, like a
-bunch o’ kids playin’ some game. No, siree, there’s nothin’ but long
-rows of white stakes driv in the ground. Looks to me as if they was
-a-gettin’ ready to build a lot of henhouses. Of course the railroad’s
-there, and the only thing changed that I could see was a lot of
-side-tracks they’ve put in.”
-
-“Well, things have been humming the last two days,” laughed Munson.
-“This afternoon I found all the side-tracks filled with trains of
-lumber, carload after carload, and not less than two or three hundred
-workmen, all as busy as nailers. Looked to me as if a three-ring circus
-were getting ready for a big show. They are already running up electric
-light poles and stringing the wires. Some of the men are unloading cars,
-some stacking up lumber, others are putting up tents, and the entire
-business reminded me of a hive of extremely busy bees. Go down and look
-for yourself, Buck, and you’ll be convinced at last that the new town
-has arrived.”
-
-The old storekeeper had come from behind the counter, and stood leaning
-against a stack of boxes.
-
-“I’ve been here for more’n a quarter of a century, boys,” he said, in
-a tone of seriousness that approached to sadness, “and this old store
-seems like home to me. I’m some fighter and I’m some stayer. But, hell,
-I reckon I know when I’m licked. I guess this new town puts a crimp in
-me and my business, and—”
-
-“Honk-honk; honk-honk”—it was the distant warning of an automobile that
-interrupted Buck’s speech, and drew all four present to the doorway.
-There was the glare of twin headlights on the southern road.
-
-“Some of the Los Angeles buyers, most likely,” suggested the sheriff.
-
-And so the travellers proved to be. The automobile halted at the
-store, but only one of the party of four or five descended.. He was a
-bright-faced, clean-shaven man, of dapper build and faultlessly attired.
-In his hand was a bunch of papers.
-
-“Mr. Buck Ashley?” he inquired.
-
-“I’m your man,” replied Buck, stepping from the doorway.
-
-“Well, we can’t stop tonight. But we wanted to say ‘how-do.’ I represent
-the Los Angeles Trust Syndicate, and these documents just arrived
-yesterday from Washington, D. C.”
-
-“Can’t be for me, then,” replied Buck, hesitating to take the proffered
-papers.
-
-“But they are,” replied the stranger with a laugh. “Oh, we haven’t
-forgotten the interests of the old identities. We’ve had your name in
-mind all the time, and this is a removal order from the Government to
-change your postoffice over to the new town of Tejon.”
-
-Buck was speechless as his fingers closed on the documents.
-
-“We’ll hope to see you over on Tuesday morning, Mr. Ashley, so that you
-can secure a good site for your new store. Now I must be going. We have
-got to be in Bakersfield by eleven o’clock.”
-
-“Honk-honk,” and the automobile was gone.
-
-“Hell, Buck, have you lost your tongue?” cried Tom Baker, slipping the
-storekeeper on the shoulder. “Don’t you see what it all means? You’re
-goin’ to shift camp, old man; you’re goin’ into the new town.”
-
-“Gosh ‘lmighty!” murmured Buck, at last recovering the power of
-articulation. “I think the first thing to do is to lubricate.”
-
-“A taste from the mystery keg,” suggested the sheriff, as they all
-crowded back into the store.
-
-“The mystery keg? What’s that?” asked Munson.
-
-Buck laid his hand on a small barrel at the end of the counter.
-
-“We call it the mystery keg,” he replied, “because we just found it
-yesterday mornin’ settin’ at my back door. It has come to us sorta like
-manna from heaven.”
-
-“And tastes like manna, too,” interjected Baker.
-
-“It means free drinks for all this pertic’lar bunch,” continued Buck,
-“for there is no question as to where the keg came from. Look at the
-date on the top—1853. This ‘ere barrel came out of Joaquin Murietta’s
-wine cellar.”
-
-“You don’t say?” exclaimed Munson, pressing forward eagerly to examine
-the little brass-hooped keg, looking bright and sound despite its
-antiquity.
-
-“This whisky is sixty years old at least,” Buck went on, turning the tap
-and filling a small pitcher.
-
-“Tastes like it might be a hundred years older,” remarked the sheriff.
-“Mellow as fresh drawn milk.”
-
-Buck handed Munson a pony glass of the rare old beverage.
-
-“By jove, it is fine,” said the lieutenant, judicially smacking his
-lips.
-
-“Just makes my internals feel as soft and roly-poly as a ripe
-pomegranate,” murmured Tom, as he set down his empty glass and rubbed
-his belt-line in a complacent way.
-
-“Well, we’ll fill up again, boys,” cried Buck. “Here’s to dear old
-Pierre Luzon, for it was sure him who sent us the mystery keg.”
-
-“And to Dick Willoughby who won the prize,” cried Jack Rover.
-
-“And to our host,” added Munson in a courtly way. “To Buck Ashley, boys,
-the postmaster of the new city of Tejon.”
-
-“Hip, hip, hurrah!”—all four voices shouted the triple toast as the
-upraised glasses clinked merrily.
-
-Buck resumed his former position, with his back against the cracker
-boxes.
-
-“As I was sayin’, boys, when that automobile interrupted us, I know when
-I’m licked. But I know, too, that the fightin’ blood is still left in
-me, and I was a-goin’ to remark that this new town sure ‘nuff looks a
-winner. I’ve got plenty of lumber right in my back yard, and tomorrer
-mornin’ I begin to have the scantlin’s cut, for, by jingoes, I’ll be the
-chap who will build the first buildin’ in the new town.”
-
-“Bully for you,” cried Munson.
-
-“I say what I mean,” continued Buck, his face aglow with enthusiasm,
-“and on Tuesday mornin’ I’ll buy the first town lot if I have to stand
-in line for forty-eight hours to get it.”
-
-“Life in the old dog yet,” laughed Jack Rover. “It’s wonderful the
-effect of Pierre Luzon’s brew,” smiled the sheriff. “I think we’ll just
-have four more spoonfuls, Buck, of that distilled nectar of sunshine.
-Success to the new store, old man!”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXIX—-The Rendezvous
-
-SUMMER had come and gone and it was now the early days of October. The
-mystery of Dick Willoughby’s disappearance had remained unsolved, yet it
-was on his plans that the new city of Tejon had been laid out, and, like
-the fabled palace in the Arabian Nights’ tale, had sprung into being
-with such rapidity that men rubbed their eyes to satisfy themselves
-whether the transformation scene were an actuality or the baseless
-fabric of a dream. Within three months of the opening day auction of
-lots Tejon was a thriving, hustling centre of population, with whole
-avenues of beautiful homes, several blocks of stores on the main street,
-schoolhouse and other public buildings well on the way to completion.
-
-Electricity had helped to the accomplishment of the miracle, for it had
-been only necessary to tap the great power cables running across the old
-rancho from the Kern River canyon to secure the supplies of “juice” both
-for lighting and traction purposes. So there was already an interurban
-tramway service connecting with the county seat, Bakersfield, while at
-night the new town was a blaze of electricity. All around country homes
-were going up, and ten and twenty acre holdings were being planted to
-fruit trees or ploughed for alfalfa.
-
-Ben Thurston still clung to the ranch house, although it was definitely
-understood now between him and the new owners that Thanksgiving Day was
-to be the extreme limit of his occupancy. The hue and cry after Dick
-Willoughby had in a measure subsided, but, if the authorities
-had relaxed their efforts, Thurston still sought relentlessly and
-indefatigably for the man accused of the slaying of his son.
-
-One night at a lonely road-house on the outskirts of Bakersfield, the
-sleuth, Leach Sharkey, was in close and secret conference with a bent
-and bowed old man. This was none other than Pierre Luzon, although his
-physical condition seemed to have greatly changed and he answered now to
-the name of José.
-
-The two men had met a few days before on the range; Pierre had spoken of
-the scant living he was making from a herd of goats he pastured on the
-mountains, and in the course of conversation had thrown out a hint for
-information as to the amount of the reward that Mr. Thurston would be
-willing to pay if Dick Willoughby were handed over to him. Sharkey had
-eagerly followed the lead thus given. Hence this midnight meeting in the
-road-house parlor for the discussion of terms and conditions over the
-bottle of whisky that helps so efficaciously to dispel distrust and
-unloosen tongues.
-
-More than an hour had been spent in skirmishing preliminaries, but now
-Leach Sharkey was congratulating himself that he had got his man fixed
-just right. He was running over the final arrangements so as to make
-sure that everything was clearly understood.
-
-“Then Mr. Thurston and myself are to come to Comanche Point. You will
-take us from there to the place where we’ll find Willoughby. That’s the
-understanding, José?”
-
-Pierre nodded in acquiescence.
-
-“And you will bring wiz you ze reward of five tousand dollars—not gold
-or silver, remember, but treasury bills, for I am not strong enough now
-to carry a very heavy weight. Zen when you have paid me ze money, I will
-lead you to Mr. Willoughby.”
-
-“All right. I’m going to trust you and take my chances. But bear in
-mind that you don’t get away with the cash until I have actually put the
-handcuffs on the man I’m after.”
-
-“Oh, I will not run away, Mr. Sharkey.”
-
-“By God, if you try any monkey tricks on me, I’ll shoot you in your
-tracks. Make no mistake about that, José. And it will be hands up first
-to prove to me you have no gun.”
-
-“As I have promised,” replied Pierre with some dignity, “I shall come
-unarmed. But remember, Mr. Thurston and you must be alone. If zere are
-any ozers I will not show myself—I will give no sign.”
-
-“Don’t worry about that. We’ll be alone. I need no other protection than
-the two guns I always carry.” As he spoke, the sleuth slipped a hand to
-one of his hip pockets, and with a grim smile, laid a vicious-looking
-revolver on the table.
-
-Luzon evinced no disquietude; he merely smiled.
-
-“Mr. Sharkey he is ze famous man wiz ze two guns. I would take no risk
-wiz him. But I wish to win ze reward.”
-
-“Well, then, the reward is yours if you play the game straight. Thurston
-and I will be there, and you will be there unarmed. The hour?”
-
-“Four o’clock. I will watch you come to Comanche Point all alone along
-ze road.”
-
-“You’re certainly a cautious old duck,” laughed Sharkey. “However,
-that’s all right. Four o’clock, then. And you said Tuesday next week,
-didn’t you?”
-
-“Yes, Tuesday.”
-
-Sharkey glanced at a big advertisement calendar on the wall.
-
-“That will be the eleventh of the month. Then I think everything is
-understood. Now I want to be off. I can just catch the last car to
-Tejon. Shake. You can finish that drop of whisky by yourself, old man.”
-
-They shook hands and Sharkey was gone.
-
-The other waited for a few moments, cautiously and cunningly listening
-to the retreating footsteps. Then he sprang erect, transformed in an
-instant into a hale and vigorous man. Into his eyes there leapt a flash
-of joy, in his heart was a song of triumph.
-
-“So the villain Ben Thurston will be there at Comanche Point on the very
-anniversary of the night, just thirty years ago, when he committed that
-foul crime—at the very spot where the poor little Senorita Rosetta and
-her unborn babe perished at his hands. Glory be to God! At last the hour
-of vengeance comes!”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXX—Don Manuel Appears
-
-A GOODLY little sack of water-worn nuggets of gold had been washed out
-of the subterranean stream by Pierre Luzon and Dick Willoughby. The
-captive had found in the work both an exciting pastime and the ease
-of mind that comes from the thought that his time was being spent to
-profitable account. So week after week he had toiled on cheerfully,
-setting for himself each day a full day’s task. In this way also,
-although the want of sunshine had paled his cheeks, he had maintained
-his health by the regular physical exercise.
-
-But as the appointed date of his release drew near, Dick’s mining
-enthusiasm suffered an eclipse. The gold no longer tempted him,
-the eight-hour day became a burden to his soul, his whole being was
-possessed with feverish restlessness. He was not only filled with eager
-excitement at the thought of again folding Merle in his arms, but he was
-fired with curiosity to know what events were happening outside
-which would enable him to step forth a free man, exculpated from all
-connection with the crime of which he had been suspected, restored to an
-honorable place among his fellow men.
-
-But Pierre remained obstinately deaf to all hints for information.
-
-“I can say nozing,” was his invariable reply. Then, to divert Dick’s
-mind, he would challenge him at chess, a game in which they had proved
-to be pretty equally matched, or he would produce the latest batch of
-newspapers.
-
-The young fellow had read with great delight the announcement that his
-plans for the ideal city had been awarded the prize of ten thousand
-dollars. Still more welcome had been the warmly congratulatory note
-received from Merle at the hands of Pierre; for this letter, while it
-made no reference to the point, virtually sealed the pact between the
-two lovers that the money would provide for a glorious honeymoon trip to
-Europe. Dick had sent instructions to Munson to notify the Los Angeles
-syndicate in his name that the reward was to remain to the credit of
-the winner until he would come personally to Tejon to claim it, probably
-about the middle of October.
-
-It wanted now only two days of the fateful date, the eleventh of that
-month. Dick had already gathered together his personal belongings ready
-for removal. He was pacing the grotto, when his eye chanced to fall upon
-the sack of gold.
-
-“I forgot about that, Pierre, old fellow,” he remarked. “We have to
-divide this spoil.”
-
-“No,” replied Pierre, with quiet determination, “it is all yours, Mr.
-Willoughby, honestly earned, too. I have no need for any of ze gold. I
-have all ze money I can ever spend during ze rest of my life.”
-
-No amount of argument could shake the old Frenchman’s resolution.
-
-“Then what is to be done with the sack? By jove, I’ll share it with our
-Hidden Treasure Syndicate. By the way, where is Jack Rover now, Pierre?”
-
-“He is living in Buck Ashley’s old store. Buck, you know, is ze
-postmaster at Tejon, and has a splendid store in ze new city. But Jack
-Rover, he just hang about ze old place.”
-
-“Well, Pierre, I’ve got a plan. You say it will not be until Tuesday
-afternoon that I leave these quarters?”
-
-“Zat is so, and I am sorry you must still wear ze blindfold, but it will
-be for ze last time now.”
-
-“Oh, I’m not kicking about that. I know the conditions under which I
-came here. But it will be evening when we get clear of the hills, and I
-won’t have any particular place to go to. Next morning it will be best
-for me to ride right over to Bakersfield, to surrender myself and
-secure my formal discharge. When, did you say, am I to get the necessary
-documents for all this?”
-
-“Before you depart from ze cave.”
-
-“Well, everything will fit in fine. Tomorrow you have kindly promised
-to take out my things. Just carry the nuggets along with you also, and
-leave everything in Jack’s charge. But tell him that nothing must be
-opened or disturbed until I arrive. I’m going to give Jack Rover the
-surprise of his life when he sees that gold. The sack is too heavy
-to handle, but I guess we can make it into several packages. Jack was
-always crazy to find Guadalupe’s sand-bar.”
-
-“So were lots of ozers,” grinned Pierre. “But they have never found it
-yet. Even you will not be able to find it again when you are led out of
-zese hills wearing ze blindfold.”
-
-“I am fully aware of that, old man,” laughed Dick in reply. “I suppose
-I couldn’t discover the place again in a hundred years. But Jack’s eyes
-will fairly pop when he sees that bunch of gold marbles. He will be
-mighty pleased to show the nuggets around to some of the boys who have
-laughed over his enthusiasm, always declaring that Guadalupe’s gold
-simply came from some old-timer’s sack of dust that had been part of
-Joaquin Murietta’s plunder.”
-
-“Oh, no. All ze bandits get out much gold from ze riffle in zose
-days—Don Manuel himself had plenty.”
-
-“Well, Pierre, you just pack all my belongings to Buck Ashley’s old
-store. And you tell Jack Rover to expect me about six o’clock the night
-after tomorrow—that’s Tuesday. And I wish Munson to be there, too—I’ll
-want him to accompany me to Bakersfield.”
-
-“If you write a leetle note to ze lieutenant,” suggested Pierre, “I will
-see zat it reaches his hands. But you must say very leetle—just a few
-words. For nozing must be told to anyone outside until you are free.”
-
-“All right, Pierre. Here goes.” And Dick seated himself at the writing
-table. In a very few moments he had completed his task.
-
-“See,” he said, returning to Pierre’s side. “I wish you to know exactly
-what I have written—just a hurried scrawl.” And he read aloud while the
-old Frenchman’s eyes rested on the paper:
-
-“On Tuesday night next, about six o’clock, meet me at Buck Ashley’s
-old store. I shall want you to ride over to Bakersfield with me next
-morning, where my acquittal is assured. Give Merle the glad news. Yours,
-Dick.”
-
-“Guess that’s all right?” he added, as he folded the note and placed it
-in an envelope on which he had already inscribed the name of Lieutenant
-Munson.
-
-Pierre had signified his approval with a nod, and now he carefully
-bestowed the letter in the pocket of his shirt.
-
-“He will get ze letter—he will surely be zere.”
-
-“Then you say I cannot write to Merle—Miss Farnsworth, I mean?”
-
-“I have ze strictest orders,” replied Pierre. “Nozing must be told just
-yet. Bah! It is only two days more.”
-
-“Two mighty long days for me, old sport,” said Dick, half in jest and
-half in sober earnest, as he sat down and began cutting at a plug of
-tobacco.
-
-Most of next day Willoughby was alone. But at the regular dinner hour
-Pierre appeared, and announced that he had safely packed the valise and
-the gold in four bags to the old store, and Jack Rover had been apprised
-of Dick’s coming on the following night.
-
-“He knew what was in ze sacks,” laughed Pierre. “Zey were so very heavy,
-oh my! But I told him I would come back and shoot him like a jack-rabbit
-if he opened zem before you came.”
-
-“Guess it needed an old bandit like you to scare Jack Rover,” replied
-Dick, jocularly. But he was very happy—everything was going along
-well—only another four-and-twenty hours now and his captivity would be
-at an end.
-
-That night Dick could hardly sleep a wink, and next morning he was too
-restless and impatient for his approaching liberation to keep within the
-confines of the little grotto. In the darkness of the big central cavern
-he walked up and down, casting occasional glances at the distant glow of
-the log fire where, as he could see, both the aged squaw and the white
-wolf were on vigilant and ceaseless guard.
-
-Suddenly his steps were arrested. With great surprise he gazed toward
-the log fire. There, with Guadalupe and the white wolf, stood the figure
-of a strange man, cloaked and wearing a big sombrero. All their shapes
-were outlined against the ruddy glow, and the monstrous beast was
-actually fawning at the newcomer’s feet. A moment later the stranger,
-with a parting wave of his hand to Guadalupe, advanced toward the spot
-where Dick was standing. Close by was an oil lantern set in a socket of
-the rock wall to mark the entrance to the inner grotto.
-
-For a minute the approaching figure had been swallowed up in the
-darkness, but now came the sound of his footsteps crunching on the sandy
-floor, and a few seconds later he appeared in the flickering radiance.
-Dick Willoughby had already made his inference as to the identity of
-the newcomer—he had been so often told that no living man but the bandit
-chief, Don Manuel, could pass the white wolf with impunity.
-
-But the name Dick pronounced was quite a different one.
-
-“Senor Ricardo Robles—it is you—you?”
-
-“It is I,” replied the Spaniard, quietly, as he extended his hand.
-
-“Then you are—Don Manuel—the—”
-
-Dick faltered and paused.
-
-“Yes, I am Don Manuel de Valencia, the outlaw, the bandit of Tehachapi,
-the White Wolf, as he is commonly called. Come within, my friend. I have
-matters of importance to communicate.” And the visitor led the way
-with an ease that showed his perfect familiarity with every opening and
-turning in the great subterranean series of chambers.
-
-“I cannot remain with you very long,” said Mr. Robles, when they were
-seated in the inner grotto, “for I have a number of things to attend to
-during the few hours that still remain at my disposal.”
-
-“I must not ask questions,” remarked Dick, although his words belied the
-questioning look in his eyes.
-
-“Oh, although I speak in confidence,” Mr. Robles replied, “having
-learned to trust you, I shall make no secret of my contemplated
-movements. Tonight I hope to settle my last score”—he paused, then
-corrected himself—“my last piece of business in California. If all goes
-well, within twenty-four hours I shall be on the high seas. Never
-mind my exact route, but my final destination is Spain, the land of my
-fathers. There, perhaps, you and I may meet again.”
-
-“I hope so. I have come to be deeply interested in you, Mr. Robles.”
-
-“And I in you, young man, all the more because you are now engaged
-to one I hold very dear. Since her birth, Merle Farnsworth has been
-a—little protégée of mine.” Again he had hesitated, and his voice had
-vibrated from emotion. But he was smiling now as he went on: “I have
-watched with sympathetic interest and approval the progress of your love
-affair.”
-
-“Through your spy-glass on the tower?” laughed Dick.
-
-“Well, partly in that way, perhaps,” replied Mr. Robles, with eyebrows
-humorously upraised. “You have had my quiet support from beginning to
-end, and now that you have won the young lady’s heart, you have my most
-sincere congratulations. May you have long years together, and every
-happiness.”
-
-He had clasped Dick’s hand, and placed his disengaged hand
-affectionately on the young man’s shoulder.
-
-“You are really very kind,” said Dick, cordially responding to the hand
-clasp.
-
-“Because I have counted you worthy of your great good fortune in winning
-such a girl as Merle. And I have taken much the same liking to your
-friend, Chester Munson. Have you heard the news:
-
-“No, but I can guess it.”
-
-“Yes, he and Grace Darlington are engaged. And to them I give my
-heartiest blessing just as I have given it to you and Merle. For Grace,
-like her adopted sister, has been always very dear to me. I have loved
-them both very dearly indeed all through their young lives.”
-
-“And both are devoted to you, as I happen to know,” affirmed Dick with
-warm conviction.
-
-“I believe it,” replied Mr. Robles. His hand sought an inner pocket and
-drew forth a legal-looking document. “I came here not only to bid you
-good-bye, but more important still to place this in your possession.”
-
-“My release?” exclaimed Dick eagerly, as his fingers closed on the
-paper.
-
-“Well, not exactly—but it will lead to that, never fear. It is an
-affidavit which has been properly sworn to before a San Francisco notary
-public. It briefly sets out my confession. It was I, Don Manuel de
-Valencia, who killed Marshall Thurston, or at least was responsible for
-his killing.”
-
-As he spoke the words, the outlaw drew himself proudly erect. Dick was
-too overwhelmed with amazement to reply.
-
-“The young ruffian was shot partly because he deserved his fate for
-insulting Merle, partly because, as you cannot but know, Don Manuel, the
-White Wolf, had sworn a vendetta against the whole Thurston brood.”
-
-“Then Ben Thurston—is he dead, too?” gasped the listener.
-
-“Not yet,” was the grim reply. Then he paused and changed his tone.
-
-“But I want to speak not another word about this. What happens to Ben
-Thurston is nothing of your concern—must be nothing of your concern. For
-this document here frees you from all legal entanglements, and I have no
-wish that you should by any chance become enmeshed again. So we dismiss
-Ben Thurston from our talk and from our minds. When you lodge this paper
-with the authorities at Bakersfield, it will be a matter only of a few
-formalities to secure dismissal of the charge against you. For I even
-put it on sworn record that your jail delivery that night was against
-your will.”
-
-“I have forgotten to thank you for that same delivery. I never dreamed
-you were my liberator, Mr. Robles.”
-
-“Because that night I was Don Manuel de Valencia. But at present I
-am Ricardo Robles, and in that capacity it is for me to thank you for
-having so chivalrously protected our dear Merle from the necessity of
-associating her name in any way with the death of that worthless young
-scoundrel. I appreciate the cheerful manner in which you have, for her
-sake, and let me add, for my sake, too, borne your long imprisonment
-here.”
-
-“I’ve been mighty comfortable,” laughed Dick, with a glance around his
-luxurious quarters. “And Pierre Luzon has been a treasure—a good comrade
-all the time.”
-
-“Ah, yes, Pierre,” exclaimed the outlaw, musingly. “Pierre is a very
-good fellow. He has been faithful to me for thirty long years.”
-
-“And where does he go after tonight?” asked Dick. “He cannot stay here,
-all alone except for Guadalupe.”
-
-“Everything is arranged. Guadalupe is accustomed to live alone. But
-tonight Pierre accompanies me on my long journey.”
-
-“So we may all meet again?”
-
-“Yes, we may all meet again,” responded Robles, slowly and gravely,
-“far, far away from the Tehachapi mountains. But now I must go,” he went
-on in a brisk tone, “for I have to make some final preparations. You
-have the affidavit; see that you do not lose it on your ride down the
-mountains.”
-
-“You just bet I won’t,” replied Dick, as he held tightly to the precious
-document with both hands.
-
-“Pierre will come for you here early in the afternoon. Be prepared to go
-with him then. As for myself, Willoughby, there is for the present only
-one word more to be spoken. Adios!” Again they clasped hands, and a
-moment later Don Manuel was gone.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXI—Shadows of the Past
-
-IN a little summer-house at the edge of the rose garden of La Siesta,
-Tia Teresa was seated all alone. She was awaiting the coming of Mr.
-Robles to a rendezvous which he had arranged by a confidential message
-sent on the previous evening. It wanted some time yet of the appointed
-hour, but in her state of deep emotion and repressed excitement she had
-gladly sought the solitude of this secluded corner. Deep in thought, her
-mind was divided between the faraway past and the near-impending future.
-
-Each recurring year this day to her had always been a sad and tragic
-anniversary. In the early hours of the morning she had been to the old
-Mexican cemetery on the hillside, and had bedecked with flowers the
-grave marked by the marble cross bearing the single word “Hermana,”
-also the graves close by of the parents of Don Manuel and Rosetta, the
-children she had nursed and tended and fondled from infancy to early
-manhood and womanhood, through twenty years of unalloyed happiness until
-the gringo had come, the ancestral acres had been filched away, and
-dishonor and death been brought to the slumbrously peaceful home.
-
-And from that slumbrous peace what a sudden and terrible change! On this
-day thirty years ago poor little Rosetta had been found done to death
-beneath the precipice at Comanche Point. No less done to death by the
-shock and shame of the pitiful story thus revealed, the aged parents of
-the beautiful young girl were, within a few days, sleeping their long
-last sleep by her side in the churchyard on the hill. A whole family
-blighted and withered as by the blast of some death-laden sirocco.
-
-Then had followed the years of terror during which Don Manuel, the White
-Wolf, the dreaded outlaw, had wreaked his vengeance on the whole race
-of gringos. She had never seen him all through that time, although at
-intervals money had reached her by Pierre Luzon’s trusted hand, enabling
-her to maintain herself in the little Mexican village near the old fort
-of Tejon. At last had come the fight when the band of outlaws had been
-finally dispersed, Pierre Luzon wounded and dragged away to serve the
-rest of his days in prison, Don Manuel vanished like a wraith in the
-mist, gone where no man could tell.
-
-But through the years that succeeded, Tia Teresa had known that he
-lived—had known in her heart of hearts that he would live until the
-vendetta he had sworn against Ben Thurston would be accomplished. The
-remittances that arrived from time to time, first from Spain, then
-from England, needed no signature to show that they were from her young
-master of former years and that he still held his faithful old nurse in
-affectionate remembrance. And at last had come the crowning surprise of
-all.
-
-Tia Teresa had been bidden to come to Los Angeles by a letter which bore
-a strange signature, but the handwriting of which she had immediately
-recognized. And there, in a fine home beneath the foothills that skirt
-the city to the north, she had found Don Manuel again, much older in
-manner than by lapse of years—quiet, reserved, tinged with a sadness
-of which she knew the cause, but happy withal, for he was married to a
-beautiful English girl and had a little baby daughter. And as nurse to
-this child Tia Teresa, to her great joy, was promptly installed.
-
-Thus again she had become the trusted servant in Don Manuel’s home,
-the only one around him possessing his full confidence and knowing the
-secret story of his past. For, amid these changed surroundings, his
-name was Ricardo Robles, his standing that of a Spaniard or Mexican of
-wealth, of scholarly tastes, and devoted to the seclusion of his home
-with its spacious surrounding gardens.
-
-Their next door neighbors were an English family named Darlington, Mrs.
-Darlington and Mrs. Robles having been life-long friends. And here, too,
-was another tiny child in the home, likewise a daughter.
-
-Seated in the summer-house, Tia Teresa was going over in her mind the
-whole chain of happenings—the new era that had dawned and had brought
-the hope of restored and abiding happiness for Don Manuel. But it had
-been fated not so to be. Within a year his young wife had died, his
-child was motherless, he himself, if not alone in the world, was
-broken-hearted. For a spell he had fits of brooding, then all of a
-sudden he had sold the home that could only henceforth be for him a
-place of saddening memories.
-
-His daughter Merle, taking her English mother’s maiden name of
-Farnsworth, was transferred to the loving care of Mrs. Darlington. Thus
-had it come about that Grace Darlington and Merle Farnsworth had been
-brought up as sisters, with Tia Teresa their nurse, and in later years
-their devoted attendant.
-
-Ricardo Robles had resolved to travel, but Tia Teresa had quickly
-divined that the vendetta was again in his heart. For no other reason
-could he have decided on masking the paternity of his infant daughter
-by giving her the maternal name. And from Tia Teresa Don Manuel had
-no secret to conceal. “Yes.” He had sworn he would hunt Ben Thurston
-through Europe, and it was to protect the future life of his child from
-any association with future consequences of the blood feud that he had
-handed her over to his friends under their solemn promise that, as Merle
-grew up, she should never know anything more than that both her parents
-had died.
-
-So once again Don Manuel had gone his way and disappeared. Some years
-later the Darlington home had been transferred to England, where Mr.
-Darlington had fallen heir to some ancestral estates. Again, after a
-lapse of years, another change had occurred—Mr. Darlington dying, and
-Mrs. Darlington being left a widow in the big, now gloomy, English
-country-house, with Grace and Merle approaching young womanhood, and
-all of them, Tia Teresa included, longing again for the sunshine of
-California.
-
-Intermittently during those years in England, Ricardo Robles had visited
-his friends, but the secret about his real relationship to Merle had
-always been preserved. Both daughters in the home had been brought up
-alike to regard him simply as a dear and valued friend, whose comings
-brought much happiness to their lives in the shape of gifts which
-preserved fond memories during his prolonged spells of absence.
-
-And while the little family was still plunged in deep sorrow for the
-death of Mr. Darlington, Mr. Robles had reappeared as the messenger
-of great joy. For he brought the news that the beautiful rancho of
-La Siesta, lying in mid-California, among the foothills of the Tejon
-Valley, had been purchased for the express purpose that the widow and
-children should make it their future place of abode. In this way had
-come about the return to the land which each and all already loved best
-and regarded as truly “home.”
-
-“Five years ago!” murmured Tia Teresa pensively. And they had been all
-so happy here, the young girls growing up with every accomplishment
-money and the best governesses could bestow, Don Manuel not far away
-watching the progress and developing beauty of his daughter, always
-hovering near for acts of helpful kindness.
-
-Five years of placid enjoyment, of unbroken tranquility, till all of a
-sudden the old enemy had returned and all the rankling wounds of the old
-vendetta had been reopened!
-
-In the Spanish soul of Tia Teresa there was bitter hate still, and
-fierce joy even now that the hour of retribution was approaching—that at
-last after all those years her little Rosetta would be avenged. Yet
-time had had some mellowing influences, for in her musings now she
-experienced a vague sense of uneasiness for possible consequences that
-in former times had never for a moment been tolerated. The true spirit
-of the vendetta had always been in her very blood—strike when you can,
-without thought of what may happen next.
-
-But now she was thinking of coming happenings—of sorrow perhaps for
-Merle, of the undoubted danger for Don Manuel himself.
-
-And while thus she conned the chances, her head bent in deep meditation,
-her eyes half closed, Ricardo Robles, approaching with noiseless step,
-stood by her side and laid an affectionate hand upon her shoulder.
-
-“I have come, Tia Teresa,” he said simply, as he sat down at the edge of
-the little rustic table.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXII—Forebodings
-
-FOR this last hour, Don Manuel,” she said, placing a hand on his, “I
-have been going over all the long story of the past, from the days when
-you were a little boy and Rosetta was suckled at my bosom. Why should I
-not have loved her?” asked the old duenna almost fiercely. “Why should
-I not love her still?” she added, in a lower tone, as she bowed her head
-and covered her eyes with her disengaged hand. “There is love that can
-never die, Don Manuel.”
-
-“Nor should we wish it otherwise,” he said gently, caressing the hand
-extended toward him. “And this very night our undying love for dear
-little Rosetta will be proved—tonight at last she will be avenged.”
-
-With a start Tia Teresa sat erect.
-
-“Then it is all arranged?” she asked breathlessly.
-
-“Yes, all finally arranged,” was his quiet rejoinder. “We meet this
-evening on Comanche Point—the place where I have always vowed he should
-answer for his crime. And you remember what day this is?”
-
-“I remember—can I ever forget?—the very day we found her dead beneath
-the cliff.”
-
-“The very day, Tia Teresa. So my vengeance will be complete. Before now
-I could have shot him a dozen times. But he would never have known that
-his death was by my hand. Tonight, however, he will know. And he will
-realize that the vendetta is the law of God—an eye for an eye, a tooth
-for a tooth; his life, so precious to himself, for hers so dear to us in
-the happy old-time days.”
-
-“But you, Don Manuel?” she asked fearfully.
-
-“It does not matter much about me,” he answered. “But all the same I
-have come to speak a little in regard to myself. Tonight Ben Thurston
-assuredly will die, and should I perish with him, the story of the
-vendetta cannot fail to be revived and the identity of the recluse,
-Ricardo Robles, with Don Manuel, the outlaw, will be established. This
-will come as a great shock to all my dear friends at La Siesta—to Mrs.
-Darlington as well as to Grace and Merle. But this counts for little—the
-name of Don Manuel is just as honorable a name as that of Robles. And
-you can tell them further that all the loot I ever took from the gringos
-lies today untouched in Joaquin Murietta’s cave. I sullied my hands
-with none of it. I was made rich by the sale of, my ancestral estates in
-Spain. And that wealth the law cannot confiscate, for I have been only
-its trustee during all those years. Everything I possess has been vested
-from the first in the names of Merle Farnsworth and Grace Darlington.”
-
-“Grace as well?” murmured Tia Teresa, enquiringly.
-
-“Certainly, for I love both the girls dearly; there is ample to divide
-between them, and by ranking them together I guard Merle from the
-thought that I was anything more to her than to Grace. To both alike I
-was just a deeply attached friend.” He paused a moment, then regarded
-Tia Teresa fixedly. “For my little girl must never know that her father
-was an outlaw, with a price on his head; yes, with blood on his hands,
-if it is only the blood of the worthless Thurston breed.”
-
-“That is no stain—it is an honor—it is a duty that you owed,” exclaimed
-the duenna with fervency, her hands clenched against her bosom as she
-spoke.
-
-“You understand—we understand the vendetta, you and I, Tia Teresa. But
-the Americanos do not understand. And I have brought up my little girl
-as an American, for her own happiness I long ago realized. So she would
-never understand. When she comes to know that her old friend Ricardo
-Robles was Don Manuel de Valencia as well, she will breathe a gentle
-prayer of rest for his soul. But she will not be distressed by the
-knowledge that her father was the bandit and outlaw—she will not have to
-face the cruel world with that stigma attached to her name. For that I
-have contrived, for that I have suffered the dumb agony of childlessness
-all these years.”
-
-“And that, in God’s name,” exclaimed Tia Teresa, “is part of the price
-Ben Thurston, thrice accursed, has to pay.”
-
-“And tonight will pay,” responded Don Manuel, determinedly. “But I speak
-of all this just to put you on your guard. It will be necessary for me
-to say something to Mrs. Darlington as well. I have brought for her the
-papers that will establish the rights of Merle and Grace to all I leave
-behind.” As he spoke he touched his coat where the shape of a packet in
-an inner pocket showed.
-
-“Your will?”
-
-“No. As I have explained, I require no will. The property is theirs
-already. And I do not need to tell you, my dear Tia Teresa, my beloved
-friend, that you, too, have not been forgotten.” As he spoke he raised
-her hand and pressed it reverently to his lips.
-
-“Don’t speak like that, Don Manuel,” she protested.
-
-“I know that all I owe to you can never be repaid,” he continued,
-humbly, gratefully—“the devoted life-service for me and for Rosetta and
-our beloved parents as well.”
-
-Again he kissed her hand, and this time she accepted the seal of his
-high-souled and chivalrous regard. There were tears in her eyes now.
-
-“But, Don Manuel, you need not die tonight. Death for him—that is right.
-But why for you?”
-
-“Perhaps not for me—most certainly,” he replied with a little,
-reassuring smile. “Oh, do not imagine that I deliberately court death
-for tonight. On the contrary, I have all my plans carefully laid. An
-automobile is ready for the road, and I have a yacht waiting for me at
-a quiet spot on the coast, and if all is well, by tomorrow’s dawn Pierre
-and I will be on the ocean. No one around here except at La Siesta will
-miss Ricardo Robles, and if the name of Don Manuel is associated with
-the death of Ben Thurston, only once more will the White Wolf have
-strangely disappeared just as he used to do in the old times.”
-
-He was laughing, not loudly, but just with carefree, almost joyous
-triumph, as he rose to say good-bye.
-
-“Then, Tia Teresa, if events work out just as I have planned, we may all
-meet again, somewhere, somehow—I cannot say more at present. For I shall
-be happy to see my little girl happy in her married love, and later on
-I shall close my eyes contentedly when I can feel assured that nothing
-from the past will ever emerge to spoil her life or bring to her
-distress of mind.”
-
-Tia Teresa, too, had arisen.
-
-“God grant it may be so,” she fervently exclaimed. “But somehow my mind
-misgives me. Today I am softened as I have never been before. Even for
-the sake of our dear Rosetta in Heaven I feel inclined to plead with you
-to let Thurston go his way and the vendetta be forgotten.” And she clung
-to his arm imploringly.
-
-“Never!” cried Don Manuel, putting her gently but resolutely aside.
-“That can never be, Tia Teresa. You know it. A vow sworn over my wronged
-and murdered sister’s grave, over the graves of my parents as well, must
-be fulfilled. To break it at the very moment when it is in my power to
-give it fulfillment would be the act of a coward—a sacrilege that could
-never be atoned. No more words like that. I must not even listen.”
-
-She was sobbing as she dropped back into her chair. Her silence was the
-confession that she was powerless to argue against the unwritten law of
-the vendetta.
-
-“So I kiss you good-bye for the present, Tia Teresa.” He suited the
-action to the word, and, stooping, saluted her first on one cheek, then
-on the other. “Be your old brave and resolute self again. Where shall I
-find Mrs. Darlington?”
-
-“Alone in her boudoir. This is her day for correspondence,” replied the
-duenna, resolutely striving to repress her tears.
-
-“Then I’ll leave you here. Let your best wishes go with me.”
-
-Almost lightly he touched her hand and was gone, disappearing among the
-roses.
-
-Tia Teresa bowed her head across her folded arms. She was thinking not
-of the past now, but solely of the future.
-
-“How would it all end?”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXIII—Old Friends
-
-AM glad to find you alone,” spoke Mr. Robles, as he advanced into the
-subdued light of Mrs. Darlington’s boudoir.
-
-She was seated at her escritoire. Around her were letters lying open
-for answer, others sealed and ready for the mail, also sundry books of
-account which indicated that the chatelaine of La Siesta was a business
-woman who paid attention to the running of her household and the
-management of her estate.
-
-“Always so pleased to see you,” she replied, as she rose to give her
-visitor welcome.
-
-“Pray, keep your seat, Mrs. Darlington. You form an attractive
-picture—the lady who is not too much of a lady to neglect her
-correspondence and her business affairs. And it is about some business
-matters that I have come to talk with you this evening.”
-
-She smiled pleasedly over the compliment paid in the old-fashioned
-courtly style of the true Spanish grandee. She herself always suggested
-the old-time, old-world lady of fashion—one belonging to the old lace
-and sweet lavender era that has so nearly passed away.
-
-“Business matters?” echoed Mrs. Darlington. “That sounds quite serious.
-We have had no cause to talk business for years and years. La Siesta has
-certainly justified its name.”
-
-“But even the most pleasant siesta must in time come to an end,” he
-replied with a grave smile. “There are things in this world that must be
-accomplished—calls of duty that interfere sadly with continuous repose.
-I am leaving tonight on a journey—perhaps a long journey,” he added
-slowly and thoughtfully.
-
-“Oh, going abroad? The wanderlust again? That’s too bad. We shall all
-miss you so much.” She spoke the words with real concern in her tone and
-in her eyes.
-
-“Not exactly the wanderlust,” he responded. “But there is a certain task
-I must perform. And it takes me away—far away from your delightful La
-Siesta.”
-
-“And for a long time?”
-
-“That will be decided by events. I shall write you a long letter when
-once I am on the ocean. Meanwhile there are certain documents I wish to
-leave in your charge, my good kind friend.”
-
-He drew the packet from the breast pocket of his coat. “They are
-important papers, and I wish them to be locked in your safe.”
-
-“Under seal, I see,” she remarked, indicating the big circle of wax that
-closed the cover.
-
-“Yes, sealed with my signet,” he answered, touching the ring on his
-finger. “But all the same I wish you to know the nature of their
-contents. That is why I have sought this little private talk.”
-
-Silently she settled herself to listen, and he went on:
-
-“You are aware that many years ago I sold out all my interests in
-Spain—lands and flocks and mines. Well, except for the money I used in
-building and furnishing my home, I invested the whole amount so realized
-in British Government bonds. But not in my own name. They stand in the
-names of Merle Farnsworth and Grace Darlington.”
-
-Mrs. Darlington showed some surprise.
-
-“Merle, of course. But why Grace, Mr. Robles? I need not tell you that
-she is already well provided for.”
-
-“That I fully understand. But I preferred it so. To me both children
-were very dear, and have always continued to be very dear. There was
-more than a sufficiency to divide. I wished them to share my patrimony,
-even though the one might have a greater claim on me than the other. But
-it was precisely, to guard against such a thought occurring to the mind
-of any outsider that I have treated Merle and Grace exactly alike. The
-secret that Merle is my daughter is known only to you and Tia Teresa and
-me, and, as I have always wished, it must be kept from Merle herself and
-from all others—now, more than ever,” he added after a little pause.
-
-“I have never sought to pry into this mystery,” replied Mrs. Darlington.
-“You had valid reasons for it, I well understood. But I was glad for the
-wee baby’s sake to take her to my heart—the child of the dearest friend
-of my girlhood days. And it was nice, too, for her to have her mother’s
-maiden name—Merle Farnsworth. So, from the very first, I loved her just
-as much as my own baby, Grace.”
-
-“That I know,” said Robles, gratefully touching her hand. “I can never
-adequately thank you for the mother love you have so generously bestowed
-on my child. And I have always been grateful, too, for the chivalrous
-manner in which you have never sought to have me explain my actions in
-this matter—my virtual separation from the daughter whom, while
-hiding our relationship, I have loved all through her young life with
-passionate devotion.”
-
-Mr. Robles was deeply moved. He bowed his head and covered his eyes with
-his hand. In sympathy, Mrs. Darlington also was greatly affected.
-
-“You have been the best of fathers to Merle,” she said in a trembling
-voice, “even though Merle little dreams of what she really means to your
-life. But oh, Mr. Robles, how often have I not pitied you when I have
-seen you restraining in her presence the natural impulses of your
-heart!”
-
-“It was my duty,” he replied, regaining his composure by stern
-self-command and sitting erect again. “My bounden duty to her,” he
-added, resolutely. “So, as you have so kindly done before, we shall
-leave that subject alone. You call it a mystery. Be it so. Just let
-it abide a mystery to the end. Now, Mrs. Darlington,” he went on in a
-changed tone, “please lock up these papers. If I ever want them again I
-shall come to you. But if anything should happen to me, the seal is to
-be broken. You are my trustee. But there is no troublesome will to
-prove and execute. As I have already indicated, all the property I die
-possessed of, all the property that is inalienably and rightfully mine,
-including my home on the hill—everything is already apportioned between
-Merle and Grace, and stands in their names by a deed that dates back
-almost to their days of infancy.”
-
-“It is unheard-of generosity,” protested Mrs. Darlington. “I mean so far
-as Grace is concerned.”
-
-“Not another word, I beg of you. I have already given valid reasons
-besides those of affection and gratitude. Now, Mrs. Darlington, let me
-see you lock up these documents, and my mind will be at rest.”
-
-Without further speech she took the packet of papers from his hand,
-crossed the room, and, standing before a safe inset into the wall and
-already open, deposited the papers in a little drawer. Then she swung
-back the safe door, and the click of the combination as she turned the
-knob told that her visitor’s wishes had been fully complied with. Slowly
-she returned to her seat at the desk.
-
-“Thank you,” said Mr. Robles, pressing her hand.
-
-“Then I am not to ask why you are leaving us tonight?” enquired Mrs.
-Darlington.
-
-“Please not. I just came to you, as I have many times done before, to
-speak the little word—Adios. And it has always been spoken brightly
-between us, my dear friend. For have I not returned again and again like
-the proverbial bad penny?” he continued with a smile.
-
-“And so it will be yet again, I hope,” she replied. “Bad pennies of your
-kind, Mr. Robles, are better than minted gold. And you must think of the
-young people. Engagements should not be too long. Everything is settled
-so far as Dick and Merle are concerned—with your full approval?”
-
-“With my fullest approval, and to my great joy and peace of mind.”
-
-“Well, and you know, too, that it is just the same old story as regards
-Chester Munson and my little girl.”
-
-“Munson has so informed me. He wanted my congratulations on his good
-fortune. Chester Munson is certainly a fine fellow, and Grace could have
-made no better choice for the bestowal of her love. Again I am filled
-with happiness at the turn events have taken.”
-
-“But if there are to be wedding bells for four, their peal will not be
-so joyous if you are absent, my dear Mr. Robles.”
-
-“I shall try to be present,” he replied, with a little wistful smile.
-“Who knows? Wouldn’t it be fine if the wedding bells were to ring in
-Spain?”
-
-“No, no, my friend. You forget that all four are young Americans.
-The honeymoons in Spain, if you like. But the weddings in California,
-please.”
-
-“So be it,” he answered. “Then if I cannot get back for the wedding
-bells, we may have a family reunion during the honeymoons.” He laughed
-almost gaily as he rose. “Now, where are our young Americans? I wish to
-say good-bye to them, too.”
-
-“Where Dick Willoughby is, I cannot say. But he is safe—you still assure
-me of his safety, Mr. Robles?”
-
-“Assuredly. And I have good news for our dear Merle. Tomorrow Willoughby
-will be free, with every suspicion removed from his name.”
-
-“Oh, that will be glad tidings indeed for Merle—for both the girls.”
-
-“Then let us take the news to them. Where shall we find them?”
-
-“As usual, I fancy, in their favorite cosy corner. And Mr. Munson is
-here, too. He is to have luncheon with us. He said you had given him a
-day off from his onerous library duties.”
-
-“Quite correct. I told him I would meet him here, for I have a message
-for him as well. Come then, let us join the young people.”
-
-Again, like the courtly hidalgo, he presented a hand to his hostess and
-led her from the room.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXIV—Heart Searchings
-
-AS Mrs. Darlington had anticipated, the trio of young Americans were
-discovered in the cosy corner. Grace and Munson were engaged in a
-tête-à -tête that was obviously very delightful to themselves, while
-Merle at a discreet distance was busily engaged in watering the pot
-plants and flowers. She was the first to sound a note of warning.
-
-“Here comes mother, and Mr. Robles, also, I do declare.”
-
-The young lovers started a little apart, and Grace in a moment was
-demurely busy over a bit of sewing that had been resting undisturbed in
-her lap during the previous half hour.
-
-Merle advanced toward Mr. Robles.
-
-“This is delightful,” she exclaimed, as she warmly shook hands. “You
-will stay to luncheon, of course.”
-
-“No, my dear. This is to be only a brief visit, I am sorry to say.”
-
-Grace had also come forward, and he saluted her in his usual quiet,
-kindly manner. But for Munson he had a word of sly banter.
-
-“Better than drilling a squad or cataloguing musty old books,” he
-remarked, bestowing a significant side glance in Grace’s direction.
-
-“Infinitely better,” replied the ex-soldier and amateur librarian, with
-frank and unabashed satisfaction.
-
-Mr. Robles took a seat close to Merle.
-
-“I came to bring you two pieces of news,” he said, taking her hand,
-yet addressing his words to all the company. “First and foremost, by
-tomorrow the charge against Dick Willoughby will be withdrawn, and he
-will be a free man.”
-
-“Oh, that is good news indeed,” cried Merle, fairly hugging its bearer.
-
-“Then they have at last discovered the murderer of young Thurston?”
-enquired Munson in a tone of eager satisfaction.
-
-“Yes, or rather he has discovered himself, I believe. Oh, you need
-not ask me for the name. It will only be made public when Willoughby
-formally claims his liberty.”
-
-“I am so thankful,” murmured Grace. “But of course Dick’s complete
-exoneration was bound to come.”
-
-“And I am the bearer of a special message to you, Mr. Munson. I have
-not read it. But it was given to me as the one most likely to get it
-promptly into your hands.”
-
-Speaking thus, he passed over to Munson the hasty scrawl that Dick had
-written in the cavern and entrusted to Pierre Luzon for delivery.
-
-Munson ripped open the envelope, first scanned the contents, then read
-aloud:
-
-“On Tuesday night next, about six o’clock, meet me at Buck Ashley’s
-old store. I shall want you to ride over to Bakersfield with me next
-morning, where my acquittal is assured. Give Merle the glad news. Yours,
-Dick.”
-
-“That I have already been privileged to do,” said Mr. Robles, as he
-smiled down on the young girl by his side. Their eyes met, and a look of
-grave earnestness came into Merle’s.
-
-“And the second item of news, Mr. Robles?” she asked, in a low tone. “I
-hope it is also gladsome tidings.”
-
-“Oh, it is of comparative unimportance,” he answered. “Simply that I am
-going away on a long journey, and may not see all you happy young people
-again for quite awhile.”
-
-Merle’s face fell. “I am so sorry,” she murmured, a note of real feeling
-in the softly-spoken words.
-
-“As you grow older you will realize that the world is full of partings,
-Merle,” he answered.
-
-“But why should there be partings among us?” she protested. “Now that
-Dick is free, there is not a shadow on all our happiness. And we do so
-wish you to share it, Mr. Robles. It will not be just the same if you
-are gone.”
-
-“It is very kind of you to think like that.”
-
-“That’s just how we all think,” interjected Grace. “But when duty calls,
-one must needs answer,” replied Robles. “Right there is an end to all
-argument.”
-
-“And where are you going this time, Mr. Robles?” enquired Merle.
-
-“On a long journey—as far as Europe, I hope. But my plans are not
-quite certain, except that I start tonight. However, I shall be in
-correspondence with Mrs. Darlington, and I trust that when you young
-people come to make that contemplated foreign tour, your footsteps
-will be turned in my direction. Meanwhile you have, all of you, as you
-already know, my warmest congratulations and heartiest good wishes.”
-
-As he spoke, Mr. Robles rose. His manner indicated that he wished no
-further questioning. After a comprehensive glance around, he advanced,
-first of all, to Munson and extended his hand.
-
-“Mr. Munson, you will receive a letter tomorrow that contains an offer
-for you to continue your work in my library, which I hope will prove
-acceptable, at least for the present. Grace, my dear, I take the liberty
-of an old friend.” And he kissed her brow. “With your mother I
-already have had a good long talk,” he continued, as he pressed Mrs.
-Darlington’s hand and looked into her eyes. “And now, Merle, dear, I am
-going to ask you to gather me some roses in your garden. I want them for
-a particular purpose, and, as you know, there are no roses like those of
-La Siesta.”
-
-Merle was standing eager and happy to do his bidding—privileged to have
-the chance of conferring such a little service on her dear old friend,
-her friend from the earliest childhood days of her remembrance. With
-impulsive good-nature, Grace was ready to help as well. But a quiet look
-from her mother restrained her, and Merle and Mr. Robles passed from the
-verandah, hand in hand.
-
-For nearly an hour they wandered among the rose bushes, picking the
-choicest blooms, talking a little on many things, silent at times, but
-both happy in each other’s companionship. At last Mr. Robles looked at
-his watch. The hour of parting had come.
-
-Merle had deftly tied the roses in a bunch, and now she placed them in
-his hands.
-
-“A bouquet from me—from your little friend Merle,” she murmured, with a
-wistful attempt at a smile.
-
-“From my dear little friend, Merle,” he replied, gravely repeating her
-words as he looked down into her upraised face. It was a beautiful
-face, in its fresh youthfulness, its eager joy of living, the sublime
-unconsciousness of self that reveals the spotless soul. For an instant
-their eyes met.
-
-During that brief spell Robles’ whole being trembled. His arms moved as
-if to enfold the sweet girl to his breast. But with a mighty effort he
-controlled himself, and he simply kissed her on the brow, just as he had
-done to Grace in the cosy corner.
-
-“God bless you, Merle, my dear,” he murmured as he turned away with a
-final wave of his hand.
-
-In a moment he was gone from her view. But the girl’s gaze remained
-fixed—still directed down the avenue of trees along which the figure
-of her life-long friend had disappeared. There was a look of dazed
-wonderment in her eyes.
-
-“Oh, can it be so—could it be so?” she faltered, as she raised a hand to
-hold back the tears.
-
-An hour later Robles was in the little Mexican churchyard, scattering
-the rose blooms gathered by his daughter Merle on the graves of the dead
-relatives whose names she would never know as such. Already there were
-the flowers that Tia Teresa had that morning brought—a garland of white
-arum lilies around the cross that marked the sleeping place of Rosetta,
-wreaths of rich red carnations on the tombstone inscribed with the
-father’s and the mother’s names.
-
-And now on the turf beneath the memorials Don Manuel, with lingering
-fingers, dropped the roses here and there, as if to rest with their
-beauty and their fragrance on the forms of his beloved dead. The last
-bloom fluttered to the ground. Then, standing erect, hands upraised, no
-words uttered, but with the unspoken words none the less reverberating
-through his very soul, he vowed once again the vendetta which he had
-sworn on the identical spot thirty long years before.
-
-When he turned to leave the tiny hamlet of the dead, a wonderful
-transformation had come over his countenance. The placid calm was gone;
-the fierce fire of implacable hatred and unswervable resolve burned in
-his eyes. He had bidden adieu to all the softer things in this life. His
-sole concern now was with the enemy whom he had marked down for death
-that night.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXV—At Comanche Point
-
-BEN THURSTON, during the afternoon, seated in his big armchair, had
-first nodded over a newspaper and then dropped off to sleep. He was
-awakened by a touch on the shoulder—rudely awakened, for he jumped to
-his feet, and in a dazed way glared at the disturber.
-
-“Excuse me,” apologized Leach Sharkey, “but I want to remind you that
-this is the afternoon when we are to meet that old Portugee I told you
-about.”
-
-“I need no reminder,” was the gruff reply. “I am ready to start when you
-are. By the way, what’s the fellow’s name?”
-
-“José, he said. He claims to know every nook and corner in the range.
-Has lived in the mountains for many years; keeps goats and bees, and
-shoots a mountain lion occasionally, earning the bounty as well as
-getting the skin.”
-
-“Shoots,” echoed Thurston, somewhat nervously.
-
-“Oh, that was in his younger days mostly, I fancy. Today he is a
-tottering old man who couldn’t hold a rifle straight if he tried. But
-he’s well acquainted with the mountains, that’s the main thing. He tells
-me he has known where Dick Willoughby is hiding since the very day after
-he broke jail.”
-
-“Then why didn’t he come to me?”
-
-“Because he knew nothing about the reward. But at our very first chance
-meeting among the hills I very soon made five thousand dollars look
-mighty good to him. By gad, you should have seen his eyes pop and his
-hands tremble.”
-
-“It is a fortune for such a man.”
-
-“That’s what got him. He has been supplying Willoughby with goats’
-milk, but is paid only two bits a quart. So he grabbed at my bait like
-a hungry coyote. You have the money ready, I suppose? Treasury
-bills—that’s what he stipulated for, because he’s too frail to hump a
-sack of gold around.”
-
-“The money is in that wallet on my desk. You had better carry it.”
-
-Sharkey stepped across the room and shoved a fat leather wallet into the
-breast pocket of his coat.
-
-“So frail, is he?” Thurston went on, musingly. “Well, I needn’t take a
-gun.”
-
-Sharkey smiled. He knew Ben Thurston’s timidity in even handling a
-revolver, and the man’s abject reliance on his armed bodyguard.
-
-“Not the slightest necessity,” assented the sleuth. “I’ve always got
-my brace of bulldogs ready;” and the professional gunman, touching
-the broad leather belt to which his holsters were attached, grinned
-complacently.
-
-“And no danger to be feared from Willoughby himself, you said?”
-
-“None whatever. In fact, he don’t have a gun, José declares. So he only
-sneaks out after dark for a constitutional. The old fellow will take us
-to the spot where we can grab him by the neck.”
-
-“That sounds like business,” replied Thurston, rubbing his hands. “And
-shoot him down, Sharkey, if he runs.”
-
-“He won’t give us the slip this time—you can bet dollars to doughnuts
-on that. But of course he’s got to have the chance of hands-up before
-I fire. Killing is killing, and I prefer the handcuffs. There is really
-less trouble in the long run.”
-
-“Well, perhaps I, too, would prefer to see him hanged,” murmured
-Thurston, with gloating satisfaction. “But don’t forget that we must get
-him this afternoon, dead or alive. I’m sick of this life of watching and
-waiting.”
-
-“The end’s in sight at last.”
-
-“Then we’ll go back East—after I have had my revenge. It will be sweeter
-to me after all the trouble we’ve encountered. And by God, we’ll drag
-that Farnsworth girl, too, through the mire. Hell to all of them! I’ve
-never had anyone but enemies around me here.”
-
-While speaking, Thurston reached for his overcoat thrown across the back
-of a chair.
-
-“All right, we’ll start,” said Sharkey. “I’ll go and get the horses
-ready.”
-
-It was about half past three o’clock when the riders reached the base of
-the mountain barrier not far from the entrance to Tejon Pass.
-
-“We’ve got to make it on foot now,” remarked Sharkey, as he swung
-himself from the saddle. “I’ll tether the horses to this manzanita.”
-Thurston dismounted, and while his companion led the animals under the
-trees, he gazed aloft at the precipice beetling in front of them.
-
-“Damn it, I wish you had chosen any other place than Comanche Point,” he
-exclaimed irritably.
-
-“We had to come to the spot where we can find our man,” replied Sharkey
-complacently. “It is on the ridge above that Willoughby has his place of
-hiding. Come along, we have a good stiff climb before us.”
-
-He led the way up the first slope of the winding trail and Ben Thurston
-followed, reluctantly now, half doubting the wisdom of his having left
-his home for such an adventure.
-
-Meanwhile there had been two other riders on the range that afternoon,
-mounted on little hill ponies. The one man was blindfolded; the other
-rode in advance and guided the second pony by a leading rein. It had
-been the usual experience to which Dick Willoughby had now become
-accustomed—hour after hour along winding, maze-like trails. At last the
-call had come to dismount, and the bandage had been removed from Dick’s
-eyes. He saw that he was in a little box-like nook in the mountains.
-
-“You will remain here,” said Pierre Luzon, “until I whistle for you—you
-know my signal. Zen you will lead ze ponies along zis path. When
-you come to me, I will put you on ze road for home, and we will say
-good-bye.”
-
-“I suppose I may smoke,” laughed Dick, philosophically. The day of
-surprises had left him dulled to any further wonderment.
-
-“Sure, smoke,” replied Pierre. “But remember ze forest regulations,” he
-added with a chuckle, “and do not set ze brush on fire.”
-
-“Oh, I’m no green tenderfoot,” laughed
-
-Willoughby, as he drew his briar-root from his pocket. “And it’s quite a
-balmy afternoon for October.”
-
-He sat down and propped his back against a moss-grown rock.
-
-“You must not stir from here,” continued Pierre. “Remember I have to
-find you again.”
-
-“Guess I’ve learned to obey orders. I’m quite comfortable where I am.”
-And Dick started contentedly smoking.
-
-Pierre, following the little path to which he had drawn Dick’s
-attention, pushed through the brushwood and disappeared.
-
-Just ten minutes later Pierre Luzon stood on Comanche Point and gazed
-down the trail leading up from the pass below.
-
-“Zey are coming, zey are coming!” he exclaimed eagerly to himself, with
-finger outpointed in the direction of the two climbers on foot half
-way up the ascent. Then he slipped back into the shadow of a clump of
-stunted pines that grew close to the cliff.
-
-Fifteen minutes or so passed. Then the heads of Ben Thurston and Leach
-Sharkey showed above the final steep ascent that led directly on to the
-projecting spur known as Comanche Point. Thurston was breathing hard
-after the difficult climb.
-
-“Here we are at last,” remarked Sharkey cheerfully, as he glanced
-around.
-
-Even as he spoke, a tottering figure came forth from among the pines. A
-few minutes before, Pierre Luzon had been erect and vigorous and nimble
-on his feet, but now he seemed to be indeed a frail and bowed old man.
-
-“I have come,” he said, as he approached the figures on the cliff.
-
-“Hands up, then,” cried the sleuth, half laughing. “You remember, I said
-I would search you for a gun.”
-
-“I have no gun,” Pierre answered, as he halted and elevated his arms.
-
-Sharkey advanced and, without taking the trouble to draw either of his
-own weapons, ran his fingers with the quick touch of experience over the
-old man’s clothes.
-
-“I knew you were on the square, José,” said the bodyguard, quickly
-satisfied. “Well, I’ve brought the mazuma.”
-
-He drew from his pocket the fat wallet, opening it for a moment to
-display the wads of greenbacks. Then he put it back again.
-
-“Now where is our man?”
-
-“He is down here, just a little distance,” replied Pierre, in a cautious
-whisper. “I am not strong enough to hold him. But you come. Ze boss, he
-can remain here for ze present.”
-
-Ben Thurston had turned away and was looking down into the valley.
-
-“We’ll be back in a short time,” called out Sharkey.
-
-But Thurston, if he had heard, made no reply.
-
-“Now show the way, old fellow,” continued the sleuth, addressing his
-guide.
-
-A moment later Ben Thurston was alone.
-
-Alone on Comanche Point—gazing over the broad sweep of lands that had
-been his princely heritage, but which he had now lost forever! The
-valley lay beneath him, bathed in the mellow evening sunshine. But his
-eyes were riveted on a single spot. And what a transformation scene for
-the erstwhile cattle king—this new city with its checkerboard of streets
-and all around it new homes amid plots of young fruit trees and meadows
-of alfalfa!
-
-The whole picture was one of fascinating beauty—the city itself the
-finishing touch that gave it human interest. But in Ben Thurston’s soul
-there was nothing but bitterness and disgust. He had kept on complaining
-that he had been unscrupulously plundered by the Los Angeles syndicate,
-and with the realization now of what enterprise and enlightened progress
-could achieve, he began to feel that he had been mercilessly stripped
-of what was rightfully his. Greed and envy and vain regrets were all
-commingled in his surge of envenomed thoughts. But avarice predominated.
-
-“Good God, to think I parted with the rancho at a beggarly acreage
-price, when I might have been selling town lots today. There will be a
-dozen other towns springing up to follow this one.”
-
-In his agony he groaned aloud and covered his eyes with his hands to
-shut out the hateful sight.
-
-Just at that moment the sound of a twig crackling underfoot smote his
-ear. He turned round; into his face stole an ashen look of terror as he
-watched an approaching figure wrapped in a Spanish cloak and crowned by
-a broad-brimmed sombrero. His haggard eyes asked: “Is it man or ghost?”
-He would have screamed aloud, but found himself voiceless from fear.
-
-At last the figure stood before him with proudly folded arms.
-
-“The White Wolf!” gasped Thurston, in a faint whisper.
-
-“Yes, Don Manuel de Valencia—the White Wolf, as you choose to call him.
-And now at last, Ben Thurston, we meet face to face, and alone—after
-thirty long years, and without a woman’s tears this time to save you!”
-
-Ben Thurston sank to the ground, a huddled heap, trembling in every
-limb.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXVI—-Outwitted
-
-PIERRE LUZON led Leach Sharkey along the trail. Beyond Comanche Point it
-dipped again owing to the contour of the mountain, then at a distance of
-about fifty yards, took a sharp turn round an abrupt face of rock.
-
-“Where the hell are you taking me?” asked the sleuth, as they approached
-this bend.
-
-“Only a little further,” replied the guide, in a feeble quavering voice
-as he glanced over his shoulder.
-
-The men were only a few paces apart. In the shadow cast by the cliff,
-Pierre’s pallid face with its stubbly white beard looked like that of a
-veritable ancient, and his bent form and tottering steps completed the
-picture. The sleuth smiled at his momentary discomposure.
-
-Around the turn, however, Pierre grabbed at a revolver lying ready to
-his hand on a ledge of rock, and when Sharkey followed, it was to find
-a hale and stalwart man, erect, alert, with the flash of conscious power
-in his eyes.
-
-“Hands up!” cried Pierre, in a voice of stern command. Leach Sharkey was
-standing three short steps away and was looking now into the muzzle of
-a big automatic pistol. Over his countenance there stole a sickly smile.
-But he knew the rules of the game too well to attempt any resistance.
-His hands went slowly above his head until both arms were fully
-extended.
-
-“You’ve got the drop on me all right, José,” he murmured, in
-self-apology.
-
-“Face the rock,” came the next curt order—the very tone was reminiscent
-of old bandit days.
-
-Sharkey obeyed in silence, and in a trice both his guns were withdrawn
-from their holsters and flung among the brushwood.
-
-“You go ahead now,” said Pierre, stepping aside to let the other pass.
-“You can drop your hands, but if you cry out or attempt to run, zen you
-are one dead man.”
-
-The discomfited sleuth meekly complied, although there was now a black
-scowl on his face as he stepped on ahead. In all his professional
-career, Leach Sharkey had never before fallen so ignominiously into a
-trap like this.
-
-Not a word was spoken while a distance of some two hundred yards was
-being traversed. Then Pierre called out the one word: “Halt!”
-
-Sharkey did not dare even to look round. He stood still as a piece of
-statuary.
-
-“You sit on zat stone over zere,” continued Pierre, “and do not rise
-until I give you permission. Now we will proceed to business.”
-
-Sharkey sat down as ordered.
-
-“Hell, you can have your five thousand dollars right enough,” he said,
-pulling the wallet from his pocket.
-
-“No, my friend. I did not bring you here to rob you. I am out on parole,
-and I never break my word. I am Pierre Luzon!” He spoke the name with
-triumphant pride.
-
-“Good God!” exclaimed Sharkey, in dumfounded surprise. “You belonged to
-the White Wolf’s gang?”
-
-“I belong now to ze gang. Ze White Wolf is alive!”
-
-Leach Sharkey had looked sick before, but a ghastly grey pallor came
-into his face now.
-
-“Then he has got hold of Ben Thurston—at last?” he faltered.
-
-“Yes, at last,” replied Pierre, with a grim smile of joy. “Don Manuel
-and Ben Thurston are alone on Comanche Point just now. Zey will settle
-old scores—zat is zeir affair. Now, I attend to my affair.”
-
-Sharkey looked up enquiringly, but said no more.
-
-“Leach Sharkey,” continued the old Frenchman, “you are one strong man.
-You will now take ze handcuffs from your pocket—I know you carry zem—and
-drop zem over your shoulder. Zere, zat is right. I am glad you obey
-wizout giving me any further trouble. Now, you will hold out your hands,
-behind your back—you know exactly how.”
-
-Yes, Leach Sharkey knew exactly how. And he also knew what the business
-end of a big revolver meant, with the forefinger of a daring bandit like
-Pierre Luzon on the trigger. He was handcuffed and helpless right enough
-in very short order. For the first time in his life the man who had so
-often slipped the bracelets on others, found the bracelets around his
-own wrists.
-
-“Next I want ze key of ze handcuffs,” Pierre resumed. “Which pocket,
-please?”
-
-Sharkey, with a downward thrust of his chin, indicated the waistcoat
-pocket.
-
-“Zank you,” said Pierre, as he thrust in his fingers and produced the
-key. “Now, we will throw zis zing away”—as he spoke it went whizzing
-through the air—“and when you get home to ze rancho, ze blacksmith zere
-will set you free.”
-
-“Oh, I’m going home, am I?” said the sleuth, considerably reassured.
-
-“Yes, Pierre Luzon no longer rob or kill or break ze law. He keep his
-word of honor always. And I promised to bring Dick Willoughby to you
-tonight. Now I shall be true to zat promise, too.”
-
-And through his teeth he blew a shrill whistle.
-
-At the sound Dick Willoughby started up, and shook the ashes from his
-pipe. Following Pierre’s instructions, he led the two ponies along the
-little trail through the chaparral. Within five minutes he emerged on a
-broader trail, right at the spot where the Frenchman was standing.
-
-“Hello, Pierre!” Then Dick’s eyes fell on Leach Sharkey, and at the very
-first glance he saw the shackled hands. “But what’s the meaning of all
-this?” he asked in bewildered surprise.
-
-“It means zat you will take zis man down ze mountains. He came to arrest
-you, but you can tell him now zat you are one free man. You can show him
-ze paper which proves it was not you, but Don Manuel, who is responsible
-for ze death of young Thurston.”
-
-“Great Caesar!” muttered the sleuth, “I thought that from the first, but
-the old fool would not listen to me.”
-
-“Mr. Sharkey,” said Dick, “you and I have no quarrel. What Pierre says
-is true—I have a sworn affidavit in my pocket, fixing the responsibility
-for that unhappy affair where it belongs.”
-
-“I believe you, Mr. Willoughby,” replied the sleuth. “I’m glad you
-are innocent, but I was only doing my duty in trying to arrest the man
-charged with the crime.”
-
-“I understand all that. I bear you no ill will.”
-
-“And I’d shake hands if it were not for these damned bracelets,”
-continued Sharkey.
-
-“Pierre, there is no need of handcuffs,” said Dick, turning to the
-Frenchman. “Set him free. We will go peaceably home together.”
-
-“No, no,” replied Pierre, determinedly. “Leach Sharkey, he is one giant
-in strength. He will go home as he is. Besides, I have trown ze key
-away.” And he laughed aloud.
-
-Sharkey nodded in helpless admission of his sorry plight.
-
-“Too bad,” murmured Dick.
-
-“And now,” continued Pierre, “zere is no time to be lost. We will help
-zis man onto your pony, and you will ride my pony and hold ze leading
-rein.”
-
-“But he can’t ride with his hands behind his back like that,” objected
-Dick.
-
-“Oh, yes, he can,” grinned Pierre. “Ze good horseman ride wid his knees,
-and most of ze road you can be by his side and hold him on. And it is ze
-only way, for ze key, as I have said, is gone.”
-
-“I suppose we’ve got to accept the situation,” said Dick, with a glance
-at Sharkey’s lugubrious countenance. The man of strength was obviously
-crestfallen at his almost ridiculous plight of powerlessness.
-
-Pierre resumed his instructions. “You will not go back to Comanche
-Point, but will take ze mule trail down into ze valley. You know it, Mr.
-Willoughby—it is about one mile furzer on.”
-
-“I know it,” replied Dick.
-
-“You will leave Mr. Sharkey at the rancho and zen ride to ze place where
-your friends are waiting for you. Now, zat is all. I must go. We
-have already said our adios, my dear young friend.” Dick grasped the
-proffered hand and warmly pressed it.
-
-“Good-bye, Pierre. I can never thank you enough for all you have done
-for me. Good-bye.” Leach Sharkey was assisted into the saddle, and the
-horsemen started on their way.
-
-“Good-bye,” shouted back Dick Willoughby, yet once again.
-
-“Adios!”
-
-And as the two figures disappeared around a bend, the Frenchman uttered
-a deep sigh. “A splendid young fellow! I wonder shall we ever meet
-again!”—this was the thought in his mind as for just a moment he stood
-in an attitude of deep dejection.
-
-Then swinging around, he started back at a run for Comanche Point.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXVII—The Dawn of Comprehension
-
-ALL through the afternoon at La Siesta, Merle was in a meditative mood.
-After luncheon Mrs. Darlington had returned to her letter-writing and
-her book-keeping. Munson and Grace had departed for a walk through the
-pine woods, after vain but not too strenuous endeavors to get Merle to
-accompany them. Left to her own resources she had retired to the drawing
-room, had tried to interest herself at the piano, but after a little
-while had given up the attempt; and, coiled in a big chair, had
-surrendered herself to a “big think,” as she mentally termed it.
-
-In that momentary searching of the eyes between her and Mr. Robles
-just before their parting in the rose garden, there had come a flash of
-revelation to her soul. She had divined a yearning in his gaze that was
-surely more than the affection of an old and devoted friend. There was
-passionate tenderness that belied the gentle yet almost perfunctory kiss
-on the brow that he had finally bestowed at parting. Nor had she failed
-to notice the restraint which the strong man had imposed upon himself.
-And strangely enough, her own momentary impulse had been to throw her
-arms around his neck and kiss him, just as a fond daughter might
-have kissed a father at such an emotional moment—on the eve of a long
-journey, the whither unrevealed, the return all so uncertain.
-
-She recalled, too, their previous conversation while she was gathering
-the roses—his words of kindly wisdom, his little bits of advice that now
-seemed to be weighted by more than mere friendly interest in her future
-happiness. Then her mind traveled back slowly, step by step, all the way
-to childhood days—a long vista marked by his comings and his goings, his
-prolonged absences, his unexpected but always welcome reappearances, his
-numberless acts of thoughtful kindness. Once she had been seriously ill,
-when a little girl, and the memory of that illness had ever been the
-memory of his face hovering over her cot, night and day, till the crisis
-had been passed and she had been on the way to assured convalescence.
-
-There had always been an air of mystery about Mr. Robles, but she had
-never sought to penetrate it, instinctively recognizing that there had
-been some great sorrow in his life, and almost unconsciously accepting
-the affectionate regard he had lavished on Grace and herself as some
-sort of consolation for him in his loneliness. She knew that Grace
-was only her sister in name, but none the less Grace was to her a real
-sister, just as Mrs. Darlington was a real mother—the only mother she
-had ever known. Weaving together now the threads of memory, she became
-conscious of the mystery in her own life. There was assuredly some
-fuller story than the story she had been told in the past and had always
-tacitly accepted—that her parents had been neighbors and dear friends of
-Mrs. Darlington in the long ago, and when they had died, the baby girl
-left behind had been bequeathed to her motherly care.
-
-At this stage in her ruminations Merle sat bolt upright in her chair.
-The shadows of evening were beginning to close around her, but the dawn
-of revelation was in her heart.
-
-Would Mrs. Darlington still be alone in her boudoir? Merle answered the
-unspoken thought by stealing from the room.
-
-Yes, Mrs. Darlington was at her writing table, lighted now by candles
-on each side which, covered by little red shades, only dimly illuminated
-the apartment. Merle flitted in without her coming being observed.
-
-Mrs. Darlington was no longer writing—her elbows were resting on the
-table and both hands were covering her eyes in an attitude of deep
-thought, perhaps of sleep, as Merle for a moment imagined when she had
-noiselessly gained her side.
-
-“Mother dear,” she said softly, laying a hand on her shoulder.
-
-“You here, my child?” exclaimed Mrs. Darlington. There was no trace of
-slumber in her eyes.
-
-“Yes, and I want to have a little talk with you—all alone,” said
-Merle, as she dropped into a chair, the very chair which Mr. Robles had
-previously occupied.
-
-The look of vague sadness and anxiety in Mrs. Darlington’s face
-deepened.
-
-“What about, dear?” she asked.
-
-Merle’s mind had been made up, and she came to the issue with
-point-blank abruptness.
-
-“Is Mr. Robles my father?”
-
-The startled look on the other’s face was almost in itself an admission
-of the truth—Mrs. Darlington had been caught off her guard. But she made
-a desperate attempt to parry the question.
-
-“What makes you fancy such a thing?” she faltered.
-
-“Because there is certainty in my heart,” replied
-
-Merle bravely. “It came to me first when he bade me good-bye in the
-garden. And now I see it in your face.”
-
-The young girl dropped on her knees, and, an arm around her mother’s
-waist, gazed up imploringly.
-
-Eyes met eyes. Falsehood was impossible in either case. Mrs. Darlington
-stooped and folded the kneeling girl in a fond embrace. Both were
-weeping now. No word had been spoken, but Merle knew that she had
-correctly divined.
-
-It was a few minutes before there was sufficient self-control for the
-conversation to be resumed. But then, Merle still kneeling by her side,
-Mrs. Darlington spoke:
-
-“I had promised to keep this secret, dear,” she began, fondling the
-girl’s tresses. “But you have gained your knowledge apart from me, so
-I cannot be held to have betrayed my trust. Yes, Mr. Robles is your
-father—your loving and devoted father. Your real name is his—Merle
-Robles you should always have been called.”
-
-“And why not?” asked Merle. “Oh, I am proud and overjoyed to think of
-him as my father.”
-
-“Because he has some important reason to have the world think otherwise.
-I know you will believe me, dear Merle, when I say I do not know that
-reason. He is too grand and honorable a man for me to have ever pressed
-for an explanation. I just accepted you as a gift from his hands—his
-child and the child of my girlhood chum, named Merle, as you know, like
-yourself.”
-
-“So, if I have solved one mystery, there is still another mystery
-beyond,” murmured Merle.
-
-She rose, seated herself, and remained silent for a moment, her hands
-locked across her knees, her brows knit in thought.
-
-“But why distress your heart over unknown things?” said Mrs. Darlington.
-“As you have learned by your today’s experience, mysteries solve
-themselves in due time.”
-
-“Yes,” replied Merle, “but somehow I feel that this is the due time that
-I should know everything—for my dear father’s sake,” she added, “not for
-my own. Oh, mother, you should have seen his face of anguish just before
-he parted from me this afternoon. It was revealed to me only for
-an instant. But now I feel sure that something terrible is going to
-happen—to him.”
-
-She was sobbing again, as she flung her arms impulsively around Mrs.
-Darlington’s neck and sat in her lap, just as if once again she had
-become a little child.
-
-“Oh, mother mine—I shall always call you mother mine, for you have been
-a dear, sweet, kind mother to me ever since I can remember. But don’t
-you see that today I have also found a father whom I deeply love?
-Nothing must happen to him.”
-
-“Why should anything happen to him?”
-
-“I do not know. Where is Tia Teresa?”
-
-The question came with startling suddenness as Merle started up with
-another ray of illumination in her mind.
-
-“I haven’t seen her since morning,” replied Mrs. Darlington.
-
-“Nor have I,” said Merle, standing erect, wiping away the traces of her
-tears, and with a few pats adjusting her rumpled hair. “That is very
-strange.”
-
-“No. I happen to know that this day, the eleventh of October, is always
-a sad anniversary for Tia Teresa—the death of some dear friend who
-lies buried in the little Mexican cemetery on the hill. She has always
-refused to tell me the story. But early this morning she went, as usual,
-to place flowers upon the grave.”
-
-“Flowers—for a grave!” exclaimed Merle. She was thinking of the roses
-she had gathered that afternoon for Mr. Robles—for her father—because
-he specially wanted the most beautiful blooms. But she did not give her
-thought to Mrs. Darlington.
-
-“It is all so strange,” continued Merle. Then her air of decisiveness
-returned. “I’ll go and see if Tia Teresa is in her room.”
-
-Mrs. Darlington was gravely perturbed at this persistency. Oh, if only
-the mysteries of the past could be left alone, the joys of the present
-accepted for themselves! Probing into trouble cannot but lead to further
-trouble—that, for her, had been the secret of contentment. But she was
-powerless to intervene. Merle had already departed on her mission of
-enquiry.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXVIII—Exit Leach Sharkey
-
-THE ponies were jogging down the trail, Leach Sharkey uncomfortably
-lurching in his saddle when some sudden bend or dip was encountered,
-Dick Willoughby good-humoredly holding him on when such emergencies
-rendered the service advisable if an ignominious fall were to be
-avoided. There was a song of joy in Dick’s heart—liberty was at hand;
-he was riding down from the hills to join his loved one again. But there
-was sullen brooding in the soul of the outwitted sleuth—growing more
-sullen with every mile traversed, with every kindness rendered, with the
-very realization of his own ridiculous predicament and the contrast of
-his companion’s light-hearted happiness.
-
-At last they reached the foot of the trail, leading on to the road that
-crossed the plain. At the distance of a few miles the Rancho San Antonio
-showed amid its clustering shade and orchard trees.
-
-“Let us dismount for a bit,” suggested Sharkey. “I feel all in—dead beat
-and tired.”
-
-“But how will I get you on to your horse again?” replied Dick, a trifle
-dubiously.
-
-“Oh, we’ll manage that. Please help me down.” Dick sprang to the ground,
-dropped the reins over his pony’s head, and soon had Leach Sharkey on
-terra firma.
-
-“You’re no light weight to handle,” he laughed. “By the way, Sharkey, I
-forgot to ask: Where’s your boss this afternoon?”
-
-Sharkey eyed Dick curiously.
-
-“You don’t know?”
-
-“Why should I know? It’s quite a time since I met the gentleman.”
-
-“You are aware who Pierre Luzon is?”
-
-“Certainly. Pierre has come to be quite a friend of mine. He’s a good
-fellow all right.” There was a moment’s pause. Dick was rolling a
-cigarette, Sharkey furtively watching every expression on his face.
-
-“Well, the Frenchie played me a dirty trick when he threw that key
-away,” remarked the sleuth, rattling, the handcuffs behind his back.
-
-“I guess Pierre was resolved to take no chances,” replied Dick, grinning
-through the tobacco smoke as he surveyed the helpless bodyguard. “He
-only needed a pair of hobbles to complete the job.”
-
-A muttered curse came from Sharkey’s lips—but this was an aside. For
-Dick he had an insinuating smile.
-
-“You might get these blamed handcuffs off all right, Willoughby. Look
-at that big boulder there. If I set my hands across it, you might hammer
-through the chain. Or if you have a pistol, that might do the trick.”
-
-“No, I’ve got no pistol,” Dick replied.
-
-He did not notice the gleam of satisfaction in Sharkey’s eyes—the
-wolfish smile at the corners of his wolf-like teeth. At the moment he
-was looking around for a convenient stone that might serve as a hammer.
-
-“But I think I might break that chain all right with this,” he went on,
-as he stooped and picked up a heavy, sharp-edged fragment of granite
-from the rock-strewn ground. “Come along, then. Set your wrists just
-here. At least, we can try.”
-
-The trial succeeded—the slender steel strain stretched across the
-boulder soon yielded to the succession of battering blows.
-
-Sharkey flung his great big brawny arms aloft. He was still wearing the
-bracelets, but his hands were free.
-
-“Feels better, don’t it?” said Dick, with a sympathetic smile.
-
-“A damned sight better,” roared the sleuth, as he turned quickly round.
-“Now, young man, you are my prisoner. I arrest you for jail-breaking.
-There’s my star. I don’t say hands up, for I know you haven’t a gun.”
-
-As he spoke, Sharkey opened his coat so that the official badge might be
-displayed.
-
-Dick in his amazement stepped back, just one pace. Sharkey advanced, his
-high hands outstretched.
-
-“Make no trouble, now. You know I am only doing my duty.”
-
-“Duty be hanged,” cried Dick, as with a swift uppercut he caught
-his would-be captor on the jaw. Sharkey staggered, and Dick, with a
-right-arm swing, banged him on the temple, bowling him over like a
-ninepin.
-
-Sharkey was soon on his hands and knees; then dazed and tottering, he
-got onto his feet again. But Dick was watchfully waiting, and with sharp
-jabs, right and left, sent him down once more. The sleuth lay motionless
-now.
-
-Like a flash Dick grabbed the riata hanging from the saddle-horn of his
-pony, and without a moment’s loss of time had its coils around the arms
-and chest of the prostrate man, roping him like a thrown steer with all
-the skill of the trained cowboy. In a brief minute the knots were tied,
-and with the final clove-hitch the fallen Samson was turned over on his
-back. Sharkey’s eyes opened, glaring dully at his conqueror.
-
-“You contemptible hound!” exclaimed Dick, as he tossed the loose end of
-the lariat from him. “By God, I’ve seen a few low-down things done in
-my lifetime, but this is certainly the limit. I suppose you would have
-betrayed me for the sake of the reward, even though you know now for
-certain that I was wrongfully arrested at the start. You damned Judas!
-You deserve to be hanged like a horse-thief, Leach Sharkey—that’s about
-your proper finish.”
-
-And Dick in his righteous indignation glanced around as if in search of
-a convenient tree for the operation.
-
-“I’ll give no further trouble,” mumbled Sharkey.
-
-“It will be my particular care that you don’t,” replied Dick. “Get
-up, you hulking brute.” And grabbing the coils of the riata, he fairly
-lifted Sharkey to his feet.
-
-“Now, I wouldn’t shame the pony by putting you on his back again. Follow
-me.”
-
-Picking up the free end of the rope, and gathering the leading rein of
-Sharkey’s horse into the same hand, Willoughby vaulted into his saddle.
-
-“Come along,” he called out, turning round as the riata came taut. And
-thus, a dozen paces behind, the sleuth, discomfited again a second
-time that day, and humiliated worse than ever, followed perforce in his
-victor’s trail.
-
-Perhaps half a mile of the open road was thus traversed, Dick speaking
-not another word, but looking round occasionally and giving an energetic
-yank at the rope whenever there was evidence of laggard steps. Sharkey
-stumbled along, his chin buried in his breast, his eyes half-closed to
-conceal their dumb, vicious glare of concentrated but impotent fury.
-
-They had now reached a gate; Dick dismounted and threw it open, pointing
-the way for Sharkey to take.
-
-“It’s about five miles to the rancho,” he said. “I don’t know how you’ll
-get through the other gates, but I reckon you can crawl under them, like
-the snake you’ve proved yourself to be. Now, off you go,” and with
-the words he looped the loose end of the riata around the victim’s
-shoulders. “That’s a better necktie than you deserve, Leach Sharkey.
-If it was any one but myself, you would be helped to a start by a few
-vigorous kicks behind.”
-
-The sleuth shambled through the gateway, with shamed, averted face. With
-a click the gate was closed. For just a few minutes Dick watched the
-figure moving away through the now gathering dusk. Then he laid a hand
-on his saddle-horn.
-
-“I hope it’s the last I’ll see of that animal,” he murmured to himself,
-as he sprang lightly into the saddle. And at a canter he started along
-the road, the led pony, after a few heel-kicks as if in joy at being
-relieved of its burden, soon dropping into the swinging stride.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXIX—The Fight on the Cliff
-
-FOR a few moments Don Manuel contemplated the cowering figure of Ben
-Thurston in contemptuous silence. His end was accomplished; his enemy
-was in his power; like the cat with the mouse just a few inches from its
-paw, he could strike at any moment. He spoke now with measured calm.
-
-“Do you remember what day this is? The eleventh of October.”
-
-He paused for a reply. Thurston’s lips were parted but remained dumb.
-Don Manuel resumed:
-
-“Thirty years ago this very night—here at this very spot, you brutally
-killed my poor little sister, Rosetta.”
-
-Thurston shrank back. His lips moved, but no sound came.
-
-“Oh, attempt no denial,” continued Don Manuel, for the moment clenching
-a menacing fist over him. “You cannot forget the tell-tale button which
-you snatched from my hand to hide the proof. Nor have I forgotten the
-lash of your quirt that drew blood from my cheek”—and he wiped his face
-with the tips of his fingers as if to rub away the memory of the deadly
-insult—“the very day on which I buried my dear father and mother,” he
-added, in a voice vibrant with emotion.
-
-He bowed his head; there was another brief period of silence. Then he
-recovered himself and went on:
-
-“The deaths of my beloved parents are just as much on your head, Ben
-Thurston, as the death of the guileless, innocent, young girl whom you
-betrayed, and then with coward hands pushed over this cliff, mangling
-her body on the rocks below. My vengeance has been slow in coming, but
-after all, I am glad of the delay. For all through these years you have
-not only suffered the agony of constant fear, but I have lived to see
-you landless, bereft of the broad rich acres which belonged to my father
-and were never rightfully yours.”
-
-“That’s not so—my claim was established in the law courts.” Thurston
-managed to articulate the words. The sound of his voice seemed to
-restore some little measure of courage, for he sat up, and leaning an
-elbow on a rock, adjusted himself in a more comfortable position. But
-he did not seek to gain his feet—the bandit’s figure still towered over
-him.
-
-“Law courts—your American law courts!” exclaimed Don Manuel, with
-ineffable scorn. “You know you bribed the judge who gave the decision.
-Dare you deny it?”
-
-Thurston ventured no denial—his dropped jaw proclaimed his consciousness
-of guilt.
-
-“Nothing was too base for you,” Don Manuel proceeded. “You robbed,
-despoiled, destroyed my home. But now at last your hour has come. I have
-waited patiently for this hour. On many an occasion, Ben Thurston,
-I could have shot you dead from a distance. But I have
-waited—waited—waited for the time when you would know that it was I, the
-White Wolf, who was sending you to your doom just as I have already sent
-your ruffian son to his.”
-
-“So it was really you—who murdered my boy?” stammered Thurston.
-
-“Don’t call it murder—it was righteous retribution for both him and you.
-Oh, I can tell you something tonight, for a secret does not pass from a
-dead man’s lips.”
-
-The victim so confidently doomed, shuddered. Don Manuel continued:
-
-“Merle Farnsworth is my daughter; your vile and debauched son dared to
-insult her, and so he died—rightly died. Yes, at my hands—I take full
-responsibility. And I am glad to tell you this before you follow him out
-of the world. Tonight, Ben Thurston, you go over this cliff—you die the
-death you gave to my sister.”
-
-As he spoke, Don Manuel cast loose his Spanish cloak, and dropped both
-it and his sombrero to the ground.
-
-Thurston at last staggered to his feet.
-
-“So get ready now to fight for your life,” Don Manuel resumed, folding
-his arms across his breast as he surveyed his victim.
-
-“But I am unarmed,” cried Thurston, pointing to the revolver at the
-other’s belt. His outstretched hand trembled, his voice was a terrified
-shriek.
-
-“Then I, too, shall be unarmed,” replied Don Manuel, as he unbuckled his
-belt and tossed it lightly from him. “Come along, then—it is man to
-man with naked hands.” His tone now was one of concentrated passion and
-hate, and he advanced with arms extended for an enfolding embrace.
-
-Now did Ben Thurston realize that his only chance for life lay in his
-superior weight, possibly his superior strength. At the thought, craven
-fear changed of a sudden to the courage of desperation, and like a wild
-cat he leaped at the throat of his adversary.
-
-Then began a terrible struggle—two strong men writhing in each other’s
-grip like savage beasts. Soon their clothes were torn, their bodies
-begrimed with sweat and mud, their faces and naked arms bespattered
-with blood, for Ben Thurston’s nose had been broken in one of the first
-falls. Thurston, besides his extra pounds, had also the advantage of
-being younger by a few years. But Don Manuel was in better physical
-condition and his muscles were like bands of steel. So it was pretty
-much of a level match in this grim fight to the death.
-
-
-
-0305
-
-As they tugged at each other, as each attempted to bear the other down
-or trip and throw him, as at times, each tried in their locked embrace
-to crush in his adversary’s ribs and squeeze the last breath out of his
-body, as they milled round and round, swayed and fell and rolled over
-and then for a moment regained a kneeling or an upright position—both
-men realized that it was the one who could last the longest with whom
-the mastery would rest.
-
-Pierre Luzon, running up the trail, came to the edge of the open space
-where the desperate contest was in progress. But the onlooker did not
-attempt to interfere—he had had his orders; he just crouched and watched
-the swaying, writhing figures.
-
-For an hour or more the fight proceeded, at times fast and furious,
-with breathing spells to follow, during which grips were tenaciously
-maintained. Points of advantage alternated now to the one side, now
-to the other, but after each succeeding tussle both combatants were
-exhausted without victory being pronounced for either. Every vestige
-of clothing above the belt line had long since been torn away, and they
-were sweating like lathered horses.
-
-The milling and wrestling had gradually grown weaker, and it was clear
-now that the final test of endurance could not be much longer delayed.
-Yet again Don Manuel renewed the attack, and had forced Thurston to his
-knees, when the latter by a supreme effort raised himself again, and
-then by sheer weight pressed his opponent back a pace or two. But just
-at this moment Thurston’s strength seemed to give out, for he dropped
-down sideways, dragging his enemy after him.
-
-Then Pierre Luzon saw the object of the manoeuvre. Thurston had gained
-the spot where Don Manuel’s discarded pistol belt was lying, and now he
-was reaching out with a disengaged hand to grab the gun.
-
-The Frenchman darted forward.
-
-“Keep out of this,” cried Don Manuel, peremptorily, although he was
-breathing hard.
-
-“Look out! Your gun!” screamed Pierre, as he seized Thurston’s wrist in
-a vice-like grip.
-
-Just an instant too late, however, for Thurston’s fingers had already
-closed round the weapon and it went off with a bang.
-
-Pierre dropped to his knees. It was he who had received the
-bullet—through one of his lungs. But he had wrested the pistol from
-the treacherous villain’s grasp and now it fell, still smoking, to the
-ground.
-
-The wounded man coughed a great mouthful of crimson blood on to the slab
-of rock. Then he recovered himself and raised his head. Thurston and
-Don Manuel, even in their weakened state, were fighting more desperately
-than ever, blinded by hate to every sense of danger, and Pierre was just
-in time to see them slip on some loosened stones and then, still locked
-in the death clench, go rolling over the edge of the precipice.
-
-“Mon Dieu! Mon Dieu!” murmured the Frenchman. He staggered to his feet
-and without waiting turned and started down the steep trail, stumbling
-like a drunken man.
-
-At the foot of the zig-zag pathway he gazed helplessly around. He would
-have pushed his way through the brushwood to seek his beloved chief.
-Dead! He must be dead. No one could have dropped that sheer three
-hundred feet onto the cruel jagged rocks below and live. Yet, who knows?
-A tree might have broken the fall—Don Manuel might still be alive.
-
-Pierre, however, was incapable of further effort. His limbs trembled
-beneath him, and again he was spitting blood.
-
-All of a sudden he spied the two horses tethered under the manzanita
-tree. He tottered toward them, untied the first one he reached, and with
-difficulty pulled himself up into the saddle.
-
-To reach Dick Willoughby and get help—that was the thought in the
-reeling brain of Pierre Luzon as with a final effort, leaning forward
-over the saddle, he turned his steed in the direction of Buck Ashley’s
-old store, and urged it to a canter.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XL—Revelation
-
-MERLE paused at the foot of the stairway leading up to one of the towers
-where Tia Teresa had her room. She deliberated for a moment, consulted
-the tiny watch on her wrist, then turned to retrace her footsteps.
-
-“There will be plenty of time,” she murmured to herself. “I shall be
-best able to manage Tia Teresa when I know still more than I do now.”
-She repaired to her own room and put on her automobile cloak, cap, and
-veil. Without telling anyone of her plan, she left the house, went to
-the garage, selected a runabout that was specially her own, and was soon
-speeding along the highway in the direction of the cluster of hills amid
-which the little Mexican cemetery was nestled.
-
-She had been there just once before, several years ago, and she knew
-that her machine would have no difficulty in ascending the trail. Within
-less than an hour, indeed, she was at her destination.
-
-In the grey evening twilight the place looked very dismal and desolate.
-The tiny adobe chapel in one corner was falling into ruins because of
-disuse and neglect. A tall rank growth of weeds overran most of the
-graves. But there were two that showed marks of loving attention, and
-toward these Merle advanced. Here she found the fresh wreaths around the
-headstones, and her own roses scattered on the turf.
-
-“Hermana”—she read the single word on the white marble cross adorned
-with spotless arum lilies. “Sister,” Merle murmured, translating the
-word.
-
-Then she turned to the big gravestone close at hand, and moved the
-wreaths of red carnations so that she might read the words inscribed.
-From these she soon knew that this was the family burial place of the de
-Valencias—that here rested the former owners of the San Antonio Rancho,
-the beloved parents of two children, Manuel and Rosetta.
-
-“Manuel,”
-
-“Rosetta”—she repeated the names. The latter awakened no memory,
-but when she filled out the former to “Don Manuel de Valencia,” she
-instantly recalled the old-time bandit of whom she had heard many a
-tale.
-
-“The White Wolf,” she murmured eagerly.
-
-“Yes, yes. His father once owned the rancho, and that was the cause of
-the deadly feud—the Vendetta of the Hills. But I thought all that was
-forgotten. Yet here are the beautiful fresh flowers.”
-
-Seating herself on a flat monument near by, Merle pondered, piecing
-things together. “Sister”—the cross must mark the grave of the girl
-Rosetta, and have been erected by her brother, Don Manuel. Then whose
-hand had strewn the roses? Mr. Robles! In a flash she knew that Mr.
-Robles was Don Manuel.
-
-And her father, too! The further thought came with such suddenness,
-with such absolute conviction of certainty, that for a moment she felt
-appalled. Her father the notorious robber chief, the desperado on whose
-head a price had been set, the outlaw who had defied the whole state
-of California to arrest him. Somehow she felt no shame—Don Manuel de
-Valencia had been a sort of heroic knight-errant in all the stories she
-had heard—his hand only against the rich, his heart always for the poor
-and oppressed, his attitude toward the intrusive gringos quite justified
-by the sharp practice whereby he had been robbed of his patrimonial
-acres. It was this very story of wrong which had been one of the reasons
-that had from the first predisposed the household at La Siesta to
-despise the Thurston family at the Rancho San Antonio.
-
-Then from thinking of Don Manuel, Merle’s mind passed to Ricardo
-Robles—the courteous, dignified, generous, lovable man she had known all
-her life, the very man whom she had rejoiced that day to call her own
-father. Don Manuel could be judged only by this standard, and her heart
-went out again to Mr. Robles, whatever the name which he had formerly
-worn.
-
-The shadows were closing around her, the night air bit sharply, and
-Merle arose. Two or three of the rose blooms had fallen beyond the lines
-of white stones that marked the graves. Merle advanced, and picking
-these up gently, placed them on the breasts of the sleeping dead. Her
-own kith and kin! Now she realized how she came to have brown eyes and
-raven tresses—the blood of Spain was in her veins. With this thought
-throbbing in her heart, she left the cemetery and hurried away for home.
-
-Tia Teresa was the only Roman Catholic at La Siesta, a devout member
-of the faith of her fathers and of her childhood days with which no
-one around her had ever sought to interfere. Her room was her private
-chapel, a curtained recess at one end being fitted up with a crucifix, a
-small altar, and a prie-dieu.
-
-Here Tia Teresa was kneeling and praying, the only light in the
-apartment coming from the altar candles, when Merle softly tiptoed
-in, still wearing her automobile cloak. She hesitated to advance, and
-momentarily turned to withdraw. But Tia Teresa had seen her, and by a
-gesture had bidden her to remain. For a few moments the old duenna’s
-lips continued to move, then she told another bead on her rosary, arose
-from her knees, crossed herself devoutly, and with a final prostration
-before the crucifix, terminated her devotional exercises.
-
-“What brought you here, my child?” she asked, approaching Merle.
-
-“Why are you engaged in prayer tonight?” asked Merle, answering question
-with question.
-
-“You know I often pray,” replied Tia Teresa. “You have seen me many,
-many times.”
-
-“Yes, but not at this hour, when you are always with my mother.”
-
-“She will be wondering where I am. I had better go to her now.”
-
-“No,” rejoined Merle. “I wish to speak to you. Come here, Tia Teresa;
-sit down by my side, and treat me once again as the little girl of the
-long ago whom you used to pet and fondle.”
-
-“That’s very easily done,” responded Tia Teresa, with a pleased smile,
-seating herself on the low sofa close to Merle. “Come to my heart, my
-darling, as in the long ago.”
-
-And the duenna drew the girl to her loving, protecting bosom. She
-noticed now that Merle was trembling under the influence of some deep
-emotion.
-
-“What is wrong with you, my dear?” she asked anxiously.
-
-“I have learned many things today, Tia Teresa,” replied Merle, taking
-her old nurse’s hands and softly stroking them. “First, that Mr. Robles
-is my father”—the duenna started, but Merle went quietly on—“and that he
-is really Don Manuel de Valencia, the famous outlaw.”
-
-“Whoever told you that?” fairly gasped Tia Teresa.
-
-“No one. I found everything out for myself. After I had looked into Mr.
-Robles’ eyes at our parting this afternoon, I knew the truth. It was
-impossible for mother to deny it, but it is not she who has told me
-anything. I have just returned from the little Mexican cemetery on the
-hillside where Mr. Robles, my father, had taken the flowers for which he
-asked me.”
-
-“And you saw his flowers—and my flowers, too?” faltered the duenna,
-realizing now how Merle had gleaned her knowledge.
-
-“Yes; I inferred that the wreaths were yours, and of course I knew that
-the scattered roses were from my father. He is Don Manuel. But I want
-you to tell me a little about Rosetta.” It was Merle now who put her
-arms around Tia Teresa and drew her affectionately to her.
-
-“You have always loved me, you know, my dear,” the girl went on
-coaxingly. “Now I understand why you were so deeply attached to Mr.
-Robles, for you told me once that you had nursed Don Manuel. And that
-is why I have been, perhaps, just a little closer to you than
-Grace”—the pressure of Tia Teresa’s arms told that Merle had correctly
-divined—“because I was of the blood of your old master. But why has
-there been all this secrecy toward me?”
-
-“Don Manuel’s name could not be revealed—he had been outlawed.”
-
-“And Rosetta—tell me about Rosetta?”
-
-“She was the real cause of the feud between Mr. Thurston and Don
-Manuel.”
-
-The duenna had spoken the words before she had realized how much they
-told. With unfaltering intuition Merle guessed their meaning.
-
-“You mean to tell me that Thurston wronged Rosetta—betrayed her?”
-
-Tia Teresa nodded assent—she was too deeply agitated to speak another
-word.
-
-“And this day—the eleventh of October—the day when you decorate her
-grave?” enquired Merle, in a tone and with a look that compelled an
-answer.
-
-“Is the day she was found dead on the rocks below Comanche Point,”
-replied Tia Teresa.
-
-At the same moment the duenna started to her feet. A wonderful and
-terrible transition came over her usually placid countenance. Her eyes
-fairly blazed with mingled fury and hatred. Her fists were clenched by
-her side. Her whole frame trembled.
-
-“Murdered by Ben Thurston!” she added, the words hissing like hot lava
-from her lips.
-
-“Murdered?” cried Merle, incredulously. She too, had risen.
-
-“Yes, pushed over the cliff by his coward hands. His torn coat, one of
-the buttons between her dead fingers, proclaimed his guilt before God
-and man. But there was no justice in the land in those days—the
-days when the gringos broke up our Spanish homes. Now you know
-everything—that was the real reason of the Vendetta of the Hills.”
-
-Tia Teresa was calm again—it was Merle who was deeply agitated, too
-deeply agitated for a moment to speak.
-
-The duenna went on triumphantly. “But the vendetta once sworn will
-always be fulfilled. Tonight at Comanche Point—”
-
-Then she stopped short, as she saw the look of terror and horror on
-Merle’s pale face.
-
-“Tonight?” queried the young girl tremulously. “They meet tonight? Then
-that is where Mr. Robles is going—that is why he bade us all that sad
-good-bye? My father, oh, my dear father!” And dropping down again on the
-sofa, she burst into a passion of weeping.
-
-Tia Teresa sought to soothe her. But Merle was not to be comforted.
-Yet while she sobbed she was thinking, for suddenly she rose again and
-dashed away her tears.
-
-“At what hour tonight?” she asked.
-
-“I do not know,” answered the duenna.
-
-“Then he is in danger—perhaps at this very moment he is in danger. Don
-Manuel’s life—my father’s life is worth a hundred lives of such a man
-as Ben Thurston. Quick, quick, Teresa. Get your mantilla and cloak. My
-runabout is in readiness. There, let me help you.”
-
-Merle was speaking with swift insistence.
-
-“Where are you going?” whispered Tia Teresa, as the girl’s fingers were
-buttoning her cloak.
-
-“To Comanche Point. We may not be too late to save him.”
-
-A minute later the two women had stolen down the narrow stairway of the
-tower and were speeding through the gathering darkness of the night.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XLI—Beneath the Precipice
-
-WILLOUGHBY had found his friends Munson and Jack Rover at Buck Ashley’s
-old store, eagerly awaiting his coming, with a fine supper sizzling on
-the cook stove, prepared in Jack’s finest professional cowboy style.
-
-“We’ve got to feed you up a bit, I reckon,” grinned Jack, as he slipped
-the Gargantuan slab of beef-steak from the griller on to the big hot
-dish waiting for its reception.
-
-“And some potatoes, too,” he went on, “not forgetting the fried onions
-that beat all your newfangled sauces to a frazzle.”
-
-Dick was nothing loth to fall to. He had been too excited to do more
-than taste the midday meal that Pierre Luzon had prepared for him in the
-cavern. It had been a long hard day, and now he was hungry as a wolf.
-In ordinary circumstances he had no objection to fried onions, but,
-with delicate regard for possible contingencies, he left to the others a
-monopoly over this item in the bill-of-fare.
-
-There were so many things to talk about that it was a difficult matter
-to know where to begin. But at the close of the meal Jack Rover solved
-the question by sweeping the supper things from the table, and emptying
-thereon the contents of one of the bags of gold.
-
-“Good old Guadalupe!” exclaimed the delighted cowboy, as he patted the
-nuggets with a loving hand. “I always told you that the ancient squaw
-had a real gold mine. I guess we’ll be able to stake out our claims
-tomorrow, eh, Dick, my boy?”
-
-“I’m afraid not,” smiled Willoughby. “The fact is that, although I
-helped to wash out that gold, I have not the faintest idea where the
-riffle is up among the hills.”
-
-Jack’s face fell. There was a moment of disappointed silence, and just
-then there came the sound of a faint tapping at the outer door.
-
-“What’s that?” asked Munson. The faces of all three showed that they had
-heard simultaneously.
-
-Dick rose, crossed over, and threw the door wide open.
-
-“My God, who’s this?” he asked, as he stooped over the figure lying
-prone across the steps. “Pierre, Pierre!” he added, as he turned over
-the face. “It’s Pierre Luzon, boys, and desperately wounded!”
-
-The others were pressed together in the doorway.
-
-“Looks as if he had crawled here on his hands and knees,” remarked
-Munson.
-
-“There’s his horse out among the chaparral,” exclaimed Jack, pointing to
-the shadowy form of the animal from which the wounded man had obviously
-tumbled.
-
-“Stand clear,” cried Dick, gathering up Pierre in his arms. “He has
-fainted, but is still alive.”
-
-And Dick, carrying the senseless form, passed into the bedroom beyond
-the living room, and there laid poor old Pierre on the very cot which
-he had occupied once before—on the eventful night when Tom Baker had
-brought the paroled convict from San Quentin.
-
-A few drops of whisky brought the wounded man back to consciousness.
-Dick leaned over him and caught the faintly whispered words. Piérre was
-speaking in the French of his childhood days.
-
-“He is dead—he is dead! At last Rosetta is avenged!”
-
-Dick motioned his companions to silence. He bent down close to the dying
-bandit.
-
-“Who is dead, Pierre? Ben Thurston?”
-
-“Yes, yes. Ben Thurston. Glory be to God! Don Manuel is avenged!”
-
-“And how did you come to be shot, Pierre? Where is Don Manuel?”
-
-“Dead—dead, too!” The wounded man this time cried out the words and
-struggled to sit up. His eyes opened wide, and fastened themselves on
-Dick. His voice again dropped to a whisper; he was speaking lucidly now.
-“But perhaps he lives. Who knows? Go and save him, Dick—Don Manuel—go,
-go.”
-
-Exhausted, Pierre sank back on the pillow. His eyes closed. The death
-rattle was in his throat. “Where is he—where shall I find Don Manuel?”
-Dick uttered the words close to Pierre’s ear. He alone caught the faint
-answer. Pierre Luzon was dead.
-
-“He’s gone, Chester,” said Dick, standing erect. Munson stooped, put his
-ear to Pierre’s breast, then pressed apart one pair of the eyelids.
-
-“Yes, it’s all over,” he said solemnly, as he folded the coverlet over
-the already marble-like face.
-
-In stricken silence the three men passed to the outer room, shutting the
-door softly behind them.
-
-“What’s happened?” asked Jack Rover, “I couldn’t catch his bloomin’
-lingo.”
-
-“Something terrible. There has evidently been a fight to the death on
-Comanche Point between Ben Thurston and Don Manuel. Looks as if both of
-them had gone over the cliff in the struggle.”
-
-“Gee!” muttered the cowboy.
-
-Dick remained just a moment in deep thought. His plan of action was
-promptly decided on.
-
-“Munson, old man, you saddle my pony, and ride to Tejon for help. Jack,
-you remain here with the body.”
-
-“And with the nuggets,” remarked the cowboy drily.
-
-Dick paid no heed to the interruption. He continued:
-
-“I’ll take the horse outside, and ride back to Comanche Point. That’s
-the best we can do, and the main thing is to do it quickly. Pass me that
-flask of whisky—it may come in handy. I’m off now, boys. You’ll find me
-at the cliff. Bring a doctor, Ches. So long!”
-
-The moon had now risen, and while Dick was galloping toward Comanche
-Point from the one direction, the runabout, with Merle at the wheel and
-Tia Teresa by her side, was speeding from the other end of the valley
-toward the same destination. The horseman was the first to arrive.
-
-Willoughby had no need to search long beneath the precipice. A loud,
-continuous cry of lamentation guided him to the spot. There, wailing
-over the corpse of Don Manuel, was the old Indian squaw, Guadalupe. Even
-in death the two bodies were locked in each other’s embrace, and Dick
-noted with horror that Ben Thurston’s teeth were buried in the flesh of
-his enemy’s shoulder. Guadalupe was in the act of trying to separate the
-dead men when Dick intervened.
-
-Great heavens, what a withered, aged face was raised toward his own!
-It was the first time he had ever seen Guadalupe unveiled and at close
-quarters. Her cheeks were wrinkled into a hundred folds; her eyes were
-sunken in deep cavernous hollows. When he touched her, she rose and,
-jabbering furiously for all the world like an angry ape, reviled him
-with curses, her meaning unmistakable, although she spoke in some
-strange Indian tongue.
-
-Just then Dick caught the distant chug-chug of the automobile. He looked
-up the valley, wondering who might be passing at that hour of night.
-This was not the main highway; nobody ever came to Comanche Point after
-dark. Some intervening spur of the foothills dulled the sound; all was
-still and silent.
-
-He became conscious that Guadalupe’s fury had spent itself, and turned
-round. The squaw was gone. His eyes searched the scrub; at one place he
-saw the twigs bending, and he even fancied he could detect the outline
-of the white wolf gliding away through the brushwood. But that was all.
-
-Again the sound of the automobile smote his ears; louder now, and only a
-few hundred yards away he beheld the headlights sweeping toward the spot
-where he stood. He resolved to intercept the vehicle and stepped across
-the belt of chaparral that intervened between him and the roadway.
-Gaining the thoroughfare, he called aloud and the machine slowed down.
-
-But what was his utter amazement when Merle jumped’ from the runabout.
-To her there could be no more surprises on this night of surprises.
-
-“Dick,” she exclaimed, as she accepted his embrace almost as a matter of
-course.
-
-“How do you come to be here, Merle, my darling?” he asked, holding her
-in his arms.
-
-“Something terrible is going to happen. I have come to try to prevent
-it. Have you seen Don Manuel?”
-
-“Don Manuel!” He repeated the name in great surprise.
-
-“Mr. Robles is Don Manuel,” she gasped by way of explanation.
-
-“I am aware. He told me so today.”
-
-“Well, where is he now? And his enemy, Mr. Thurston?”
-
-Dick still had an arm on her shoulder. She was gazing up into his face,
-her voice trembling with emotion as she breathlessly plied him with her
-questions.
-
-“You have come too late, dearest,” Willoughby gently replied.
-
-“Dead!” she exclaimed.
-
-“Both are dead. They fought and rolled over the precipice. I have just
-found their bodies lying in the chaparral back there.”
-
-Merle leaned forward, sobbing on his breast.
-
-“Take me to him, take me to him,” she cried.
-
-“No, Merle, my dear. It is better not. You must go home. Tia Teresa,”
-he added, addressing the duenna who had drawn near, “she must go home.
-Munson has gone to Tejon for help. There will be people arriving here
-very soon now.”
-
-“He is really dead—Don Manuel?” asked Tia Teresa in a voice of awed
-sadness.
-
-“There can be nothing but the one answer,” replied Dick. “Don Manuel has
-passed on.”
-
-“Take me to him,” moaned Merle.
-
-“No, no, Merle. This is no sight for you.”
-
-“But, Dick, Dick, don’t you know one other thing?” she pleaded, raising
-her tearful eyes.
-
-“What other thing?”
-
-“Don Manuel—was my father—my dear, dear father.”
-
-Again Willoughby was overwhelmed with amazement.
-
-“Your father?” he murmured.
-
-“Yes, I only came to know it today. So, Dick, dear, even though he is
-dead, let me kiss him now, let me kneel by his side and tell him that I
-loved him, and will always love and revere his memory. Let me watch by
-him until the others come.”
-
-Dick drew the sobbing girl close to him. His eyes sought those of Tia
-Teresa. He shook his head, telling the duenna in an unmistakable way
-that Merle must be taken home—that she must not be shocked by the
-gruesome spectacle hidden in the chaparral.
-
-Even as their eyes met, the faint throb of an automobile was heard, and
-glancing across the plain Dick saw the far-away headlights twinkling
-like twin stars. With a gesture he directed Tia Teresa’s attention to
-the coming help.
-
-“I shall watch by our beloved dead one,” said the duenna. “My place is
-by his side. Come, dearie,” she went on, placing an arm around Merle’s
-waist. “Mr. Willoughby will drive you back to La Siesta, and I shall
-see that your father’s body is taken to his home. There we shall pay all
-honor to the dead.”
-
-Together they led Merle, unresisting now, to the runabout. Dick got in
-beside her, and took the wheel.
-
-“They will be here very soon now,” he said to Tia Teresa. “Mr. Munson
-will give you all the help you require. I’ll look after Merle.” He
-backed the machine, turned, and the little red light swept up the
-roadway into the distance. From across the valley the headlights of
-a big automobile were now glaring like flashing suns in the soft
-moonlight.
-
-It was the hands of Tia Teresa that separated the bodies. That of Ben
-Thurston she flung from her as if it had been carrion for the buzzards
-and coyotes. Then she knelt down and stroked with loving hand the brow
-of Don Manuel. On the dead face was a look of ineffable calm.
-
-“Manuel, my Manuel, the little child I nursed! My beautiful, brave
-Manuel!”
-
-Thus lamenting, she awaited the coming of Munson and his friends.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XLII—Wedding Bells
-
-A FULL year had passed, and the good people of Tejon had at last
-ceased to speak daily about Dick Willoughby’s exciting adventures, Ben
-Thurston’s inglorious death, and the romantic and now indubitable ending
-of the famous outlaw, Don Manuel.
-
-Both the victims of the desperate fight on Comanche Point had been laid
-to rest—Don Manuel, in the little Mission churchyard above the hill,
-side by side with the beloved sister of his youthful days, whose
-betrayal and death he had at last avenged, although at the cost of his
-own life; Ben Thurston, in the modern cemetery beside his son, the poor
-weak youth in whom the once sturdy family of pioneers had sunk to final
-decadency. Pierre Luzon, the brave and chivalrous old Frenchman, slept
-near the grave of the chief he had served so loyally, and, according to
-the old-time bandit code of ethics, so nobly and so well. In the God’s
-acres where all feuds pass to oblivion there was perfect peace.
-
-Sing Ling had unobtrusively departed for China, a wealthy man, as the
-bank manager at Bakersfield could have told, no doubt destined to become
-a leading magnate in the Flowery Land. Guadalupe was never seen again;
-the aged squaw had probably died in her secret cave. The white wolf,
-too, had perished; a cowboy riding the range had been attracted by some
-buzzards flying and circling round and round far up on the mountain
-side, and on making his way to the indicated spot, had found the
-animal’s carcass picked almost to the bones. The old days were forever
-gone.
-
-But in the beautiful city of Tejon a glorious era of happiness was in
-progress. Christmas-tide had come round again, and had been made gay
-with a tournament of roses, and then with the dawning of the New Year
-had followed a round of festivities in honor of the double wedding
-of Dick Willoughby and Merle Farnsworth, Chester Munson and Grace
-Darlington.
-
-In no place was there more sincere and hilarious rejoicing than in the
-back parlor of Buck Ashley’s fine new store, where the mystery keg,
-sacredly reserved for this great occasion, was once more on tap and the
-postmaster, assisted by Tom Baker and Jack Rover, dispensed hospitality
-to a few chosen friends. But all good things come to an end, and it was
-with a regretful sigh that the sheriff squeezed out the last few drops
-from the tilted keg and sipped for the last time “the blessed nectar”
-that had served to keep green the memory of “dear old Pierre.”
-
-The marriage ceremonies had been performed in a fine little church that
-sheltered all denominations in the new town, and amidst a shower of rice
-and old shoes the happy couples had departed for the wedding breakfast
-at La Siesta.
-
-To Merle the day was one of blissful joy, but of tender regrets as well.
-During the quiet afternoon hours she and Dick had conversed about their
-dear old friend, Mr. Robles—the gallant and chivalrous Don Manuel—the
-beloved father whose identity as such was known only to their own two
-selves besides Mrs. Darlington and Tia Teresa.
-
-And now the hour of departure on the honeymoon trail had come. The
-idea of a trip to Europe had been abandoned for the present. The young
-couples were going up among the Canadian Rockies, by divergent routes
-which would meet a little later on, and all were full of enthusiasm at
-the thought of seeing the mighty mountains in their wintry grandeur.
-
-Mrs. Darlington accompanied the young people to the railway station,
-but Tia Teresa was too deeply affected to trust herself away from home.
-Merle had kissed her a tender good-bye in the apartment in the tower,
-and, despite the joyful promise that they would soon meet again, had
-left the old duenna in prayerful tears before her little altar.
-
-At last they were pulling out from the depot, where the church crowd
-of the morning had reassembled in full force, with fresh supplies of
-good-luck munitions.
-
-
-
-0371
-
-Thus, like a disbanding company of players, the actors in this tale of
-California, pass into history. The olden days of bandits are no more,
-while the hatred of the gringo is only a tradition. The broad acres of
-the San Antonio Rancho no longer lie comparatively fallow in Nature’s
-pasture, but are tilled by the thrifty plowman as he labors afield with
-fullest confidence of a bountiful reward. Meanwhile, the mountains
-that look down upon the beauteous valley guard their secret well. But
-searching eyes will yet, undoubtedly, sometime, somewhere, rediscover
-the mysterious cavern with its hoarded millions of loot, stored by the
-rapacious hands of Joaquin Murietta, the White Wolf, and their brigand
-bands, its lake of oil from which outlaws fed their lamps, and its
-subterranean river from whose shallow riffles Guadalupe, and Dick
-Willoughby also, gathered a wealth of golden spoil.
-
-THE END
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-End of Project Gutenberg’s A Vendetta of the Hills, by Willis George
-Emerson
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-Project Gutenberg's A Vendetta of the Hills, by Willis George Emerson
-
-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most
-other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
-whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of
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-www.gutenberg.org.  If you are not located in the United States, you'll have
-to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook.
-
-
-
-Title: A Vendetta of the Hills
-
-Author: Willis George Emerson
-
-Illustrator: A. Hutchins
-
-Release Date: June 9, 2016 [EBook #52289]
-
-Language: English
-
-Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
-
-*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A VENDETTA OF THE HILLS ***
-
-
-
-
-Produced by David Widger from page images generously
-provided by the Internet Archive
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-A VENDETTA OF THE HILLS
-
-By Willis George Emerson
-
-Author of "The Treasure of Hidden Valley," "Buell Hampton," "The Builders,"
-etc.
-
-Illustrated by A. Hutchins
-
-Boston: The Chappie Publishing Company, Ltd.
-
-1917
-
-[Illustration: 0001]
-
-[Illustration: 0006]
-
-[Illustration: 0007]
-
-
-TO MY WIFE
-
-BONNIE O'NEAL EMERSON
-
-
-Our enchanting years of pleasure, dear, are speeding all too fast,
-
-As our ever-fleeting joys become blest mem'ries of the past.
-
-Heaven's blessings, glad and golden, strew with bliss the paths of life
-
-When a sweetheart, fond and cheery,
-
-Has her "hubby" for her dearie,
-
-And her "hubby" has a sweetheart for his wife.
-
---The Author.
-
-January 18, 1917.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER I--Guadalupe
-
-|IT was a June morning in mid-California. The sun was just rising over
-the rim of the horizon, dissipating the purple haze of dawn and bathing
-in golden sunshine a great valley spread out like a parchment scroll. It
-was a rural scene of magnificent grandeur--encircling mountains, rolling
-foothills, and then the vast expanse of plain dotted here and there with
-clumps of trees and clothed with luxuriant grasses.
-
-Thousands of cattle were bestirring themselves from their slumbers--some
-sniffing the air and bellowing lowly, others paving the earth in an
-indifferent way, and all moving slowly toward one or other of the
-mountain streams that wound serpent-like through the valley, as if they
-deemed it proper to begin the day with a morning libation.
-
-To the south, commanding a narrow pass that pierced the Tehachapi
-mountain range, stood old Fort Tejon, dismantled now and partly in
-ruins, picturesque if no longer formidable--a romantic relic of old
-frontier fighting days. In the foreground of the crumbling adobe walls,
-sheltered under giant oaks, was a trading store and postoffice combined.
-
-Within this building half a dozen men were in earnest conversation,
-swapping yarns even at that early hour. Perhaps they, too, like the
-cattle, had felt the call for their "morning's morning."
-
-A young army officer, Lieutenant Chester Munson, was telling of a rough
-experience he had had a few days before with a mountain lion in one of
-the near-by rugged canyons.
-
-The story was interrupted by a sound of galloping hoofs.
-
-"Here's Dick Willoughby," someone announced.
-
-The rider brought his mustang to a panting stop, threw the bridle rein
-over its head, and, leaping lightly from his saddle, entered the store.
-
-Dick Willoughby was a tall, athletic, square-jawed, grey-eyed young
-fellow who looked determinedly purposeful. He was originally an
-architect from New York City, but during the last five years had become
-an adopted son of the West--had made the sacrifice, or rather gone
-through the improving metamorphosis, of assimilation.
-
-"Good morning, Ches, old boy," he shouted to the lieutenant.
-
-The latter returned the salutation with a friendly nod.
-
-"The camp was lonely without you last night, Dick," he said. "Who is the
-fair senorita that keeps you away?"
-
-"That's all right," replied Willoughby, smiling. "I will tell you
-later." Then after a genial allround greeting for the others present, he
-eagerly exclaimed: "Boys, she is coming."
-
-"What! Guadalupe?" shouted everyone in chorus of surprise.
-
-"Yes, Guadalupe is headed this way. I spied her on the mountain trail
-an hour ago, and thanks to my field glasses, was able to determine the
-moving speck was none other than the old squaw herself. She is just
-beyond yon clump of trees and will be here shortly."
-
-"I am wonderin' if she's got her apron filled again with them there gold
-nuggets," remarked Tom Baker inquiringly, while a smile flitted over
-his grey-bearded countenance. "That squaw is a regular free-gold placer
-proposition."
-
-"She would have been held up before now in the old days, eh, sheriff?"
-laughed one of the cowboys. Tom Baker had been sheriff for a long term
-of years in early times, and, although no longer in office, the title
-had still clung to him.
-
-"By gad!" exclaimed Jack Rover, another cowboy, and a gentlemanly young
-fellow in manner and appearance. "She's not going to get back to her
-hiding-place this time, nor to that will-o'-the-wisp placer gold mine of
-hers unless she shows me."
-
-"That will do for you," said Dick Willoughby with an admonishing look.
-"Don't you forget that Guadalupe, although an old Indian squaw, is also
-a human being. There is going to be no violence if I can prevent it."
-
-"Well," laughed Jack, pushing his hat back as if to acknowledge that he
-had been checkmated, "you're my boss on the cattle ranch, and I'll have
-to take your tip, I guess."
-
-"I say, Dick," asked the other cowboy, "did you see anything of the
-white wolf?"
-
-"Do you mean the real wolf?" interjected Jack Rover, "or the bandit, Don
-Manuel?"
-
-Willoughby was looking along the road and took no notice.
-
-"I guess both are real," mused Tom Baker, grimly smiling, and a general
-laugh followed.
-
-"Well, I for one will subscribe to that," exclaimed Buck Ashley,
-storekeeper, postmaster, bartender, and all-round _generalissimo_ of the
-trading establishment. "If Don Manuel is not a wolf in human form, and
-a bigger outlaw than Joaquin Murietta ever thought of being, why you may
-take my head for a football."
-
-"But he's dead, ain't he?" asked the cowboy who had introduced the
-subject of the white wolf.
-
-"Just one thing that I want to emphasize good and plenty to you
-fellers," said Tom Baker, "and that is--"
-
-"Here she comes!" interrupted Dick Willoughby.
-
-A hush fell over the group as the bent, aged figure of an Indian woman
-was seen approaching the store. Her features were hidden by a shawl that
-closely muffled her head and shoulders.
-
-Buck Ashley saluted Guadalupe with a "How?" The squaw answered with the
-same abrupt salutation, shuffled up to the counter and said brokenly,
-"Coffee--sugar--tea--rice." With her left hand she had gathered up the
-lower portion of her calico apron and held it pouch fashion. She thrust
-her right hand into the pocket so formed, and bringing forth a handful
-of gold nuggets, laid them on the counter. Some were the size of peas,
-and others as large as hulled hickory nuts. Not a word was spoken by the
-onlookers, who were wild-eyed in their astonishment. Soon interest rose
-to high tension.
-
-Buck Ashley tied up a large package of sugar and pushed it toward the
-bent form of his customer; then resting his hand on the counter, he
-looked fixedly at the squaw and said, "More gold."
-
-Again she thrust her hand into the apron pocket and brought out another
-handful of nuggets, whereupon Ashley proceeded to tie up a large
-package of coffee. This done, he repeated the request for more gold.
-Old Guadalupe added another handful of nuggets to those already on the
-counter, and Ashley tied up a package of rice.
-
-The squaw looked up at the storekeeper for a moment and then said,
-"Tea."
-
-Buck Ashley's laconic response was "More gold," and immediately another
-handful of nuggets was brought forth, whereupon a fourth package was
-deposited on the counter.
-
-Old Guadalupe stowed the parcels in her apron on top of any remaining
-gold nuggets she might have brought. Then she turned and walked
-limpingly away, through the low brushwood toward a little grove of
-gnarled and twisted sycamores close to the ruined fort.
-
-When she had gone Buck Ashley observed, "No use following her--not a
-damn bit of use in the world! She'll make camp out there under the trees
-until some time tonight, and then vanish like a shadow into the dark."
-
-While speaking, Ashley had been gathering up the gold.
-
-"I say, Buck," observed Dick Willoughby, winking at his friend
-Lieutenant Munson, "it is my private opinion that that bandit, the White
-Wolf, has nothing on you."
-
-Tom Baker laughingly chimed in: "If I am any judge, and I allow as how
-I am, Buck here would make that pound-of-flesh Shylock feller look like
-thirty cents Mex."
-
-Ashley smiled greedily, but in a satisfied way, as he said with
-unruffled calm: "Guess I'd better weigh them nuggets and see how much
-the old squaw's groceries cost her."
-
-"The treacherous Indian and the honest paleface," laughed Dick
-Willoughby in a half-rebuking tone.
-
-Buck Ashley bridled up. His voice rang with deep feeling.
-
-"Boys," he said, "you think I'm a Shylock, a robber, a devil I expect,
-and everything that's bad. I don't talk much about myself, but just
-so you'll not think too blamed hard of me, I'll ask you a question.
-Supposen when you was only about fifteen years old, you stood by, tied
-hand and foot, and saw a lot of redskins scalp and kill your father and
-mother and two little sisters, and then rob your dead father of over
-ten thousand dollars in gold, run off the family stock, and take you to
-their camp to burn at the stake as a sort of incidental diversion at one
-of their pow-wow dances; and supposen you performed a miracle and got
-away and took an oath to kill and rob every derned Indian you might see
-throughout the remaining days of your life--what, then, if I reformed
-and gave up the kilin' and stuck to robbin', would you blame me?"
-
-During this tragic recital of his wrongs the old storekeeper had become
-noticeably excited.
-
-Dick Willoughby got up from the cracker-box where he had been resting,
-and advancing with hand extended, said: "Buck, what you have told us
-presents the whole matter in a new light. Shake!"
-
-"Thanks," replied the storekeeper as he turned away to wipe a mist from
-his eyes.
-
-Then quickly facing about, he called out in his usual gruff, hale and
-hearty manner: "Say, boys, what'll you all have? This round is on the
-house." They drank in silence. A fragment of Buck Ashley's history had
-cleared away a good deal of previous misunderstanding.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER II--Charmed Lives
-
-|THE spell of restraint that resulted from Buck Ashley's story was at
-last broken by the cowboy, Jack Rover.
-
-"Look here, Dick," he exclaimed, "I'll give a month's salary if you will
-let me take a chance and follow old Guadalupe. I've simply got to find
-out and locate that sand-bar in some mountain stream from which she
-brings in all this gold. This is the third time I've seen our friend
-Buck Ashley collect a grocery bill from the old squaw, and the whole
-business, gold nuggets and all, is getting on my nerves. Why, I dreamed
-about it for a week last time I saw her forking out whole handfuls of
-gold."
-
-"Very well," replied Willoughby, "if you want to take the chance, Jack,
-go ahead. But it is a mad project which will end in my expressing your
-remains back East or else planting you in the cemetery on the hill. It's
-up to you to make your choice before you tackle the job. You certainly
-know what happened to four or five others who attempted to follow the
-old squaw. Each mother's son of them was buried the next day."
-
-"Oh, that's ancient history," Jack retorted.
-
-"Not such very ancient hist'ry," remarked Tom Baker. "I myself saw young
-Bill McNab drilled through the heart with a bullet that seemed to come
-from nowhere. After that I'll allow I wasn't filled up with too much
-curiosity as to where Guadalupe hiked over the mountains."
-
-"There was a regular sharp-shootin' outfit," concurred Buck Ashley.
-
-"And there wasn't a sheriff in the country would have led a posse into
-that damned ambush," Tom went on. "There wasn't a sportin' chance along
-that narrow ledge round which Guadalupe always disappeared. And with all
-them outlaws in the mountains!"
-
-"But the outlaws have been wiped out years ago," persisted Jack Rover.
-
-"Mebbe," said Tom Baker, sententiously.
-
-"You forget the White Wolf," added Buck Ashley.
-
-"Which white wolf?" asked Jack. "I put that question before but got no
-answer."
-
-"Both," replied Tom. "To begin with I don't believe that Don Manuel is
-dead at all. That was only a newspaper story. You may take it from me
-that the bandit won't pass in his checks till he gets old Ben Thurston.
-I'm allowin' as how Ben Thurston would quick enough give a thousand head
-of his fattest beeves just to rest easy in his mind on that score. He'll
-find out, sure enough, some day."
-
-"Yes, when the White Wolf finds him," interjected the storekeeper with a
-terse emphasis.
-
-"What's that old feud anyway?" queried Lieutenant Munson. "Tell me,
-Tom."
-
-"Oh, it is an old story," the sheriff answered. "I thought everybody
-knew about it, but of course you're a newcomer. Well, you see,"
-he continued, clearing his throat and expectorating a copious and
-accurately aimed pit-tew of tobacco juice toward a knot-hole in the
-floor, "the White Wolf's father, Don Antonio de Valencia, a reg'lar
-high-toned grandee from Spain, had settled in these here parts away
-back longer than anyone could remember. He claimed this whole stretch of
-country from horizon to horizon. Then came the Americans, among them
-a government surveyor named Thurston. He had a pull at Washington and
-managed to get a legal grant to the San Antonio property. Of course the
-old Spaniard had no real title--his was just a sort of squatter's claim.
-But they do say as how he had lived in this here valley more than half a
-century, so it was mighty hard luck to lose the land. And the boy Manuel
-never would admit the Thurstons had any right to call it theirs."
-
-"Don Manuel had a younger sister," interposed Buck Ashley. "Rosetta,
-a beautiful girl--looked like a morning-glory. Gad! but she sure had a
-purty face. You remember, Tom, don't you?"
-
-"Oh, yes," replied Tom Baker, "it's not likely I should forget the poor
-girl. It was 'cause of her the quarrel became a bitter blood feud--the
-Vendetta of the Hills, as we got to calling it. You see," he went on,
-resuming the thread of his story, "old man Thurston's son, Ben, the
-present owner of the rancho, was in his younger days a gay Lothario
-scamp, and he came from the East to his new home in California loaded
-down with a college education and a mighty intimate knowledge of
-the ways of the world that decent folks don't talk about, much less
-practice. He had not been here a month until he commenced makin' love
-to little Senorita Rosetta. Before the second sheep-shearin' time came
-around, she was--well, in a delicate condition. To save himself and,
-as he thought, cover up the disgrace--you see he was engaged to a rich
-Eastern girl of prominent family--why, the young scoundrel conceived the
-hellish plot of lurin' little Rosetta to Comanche Point one dark night.
-And when he got her there he threw her over the cliff--at least that's
-the way the story goes. Guess Don Manuel was about twenty-five years old
-at that time, and Ben Thurston two or three years his junior. Well,
-the disgrace killed Rosetta's father and mother. They died of grief
-and shame soon after the affair, almost on the same day, and Don Manuel
-buried them together in the old churchyard on the hill by the side of
-his murdered sister. And it was there and then, they say, that he took
-an oath to kill Ben Thurston. That was mor'n thirty years ago and the
-feud has been on ever since, and all us old-timers know hell will be
-poppin' 'round here one of these days."
-
-"But nobody ever sees the White Wolf, Don Manuel," added Buck Ashley.
-"That's the ex-tr'ornery part of it."
-
-"Oh, you yourself are likely to see him one of these dark nights, Buck,"
-laughed Jack Rover, as he winked at the other boys. "A storekeeper
-that'll work night and day stacking up money year in and year out is
-liable to have a call sooner or later from the bandit and his friends."
-
-"Oh, hell!" was the laconic response of Buck Ashley. "Guess I sure can
-take care of myself."
-
-"But Don Manuel may not be alive," suggested the young lieutenant.
-
-"He's alive right enough, make no mistake," said Tom Baker, "although
-I'll allow I don't know a single soul who has actually seen him
-personally for more'n twenty years. He is a kind o' shadowy cuss.
-Everybody knows him by his old-time deeds of high-way robbin' and
-all-round murderin' for golden loot. I heard of a feller last year who
-claims to have seen the White Wolf when he was makin' that last big
-stage delivery over by Tulare Lake. He was masked, and had all the
-passengers out on the roadside with their hands thrown up over their
-heads while he was takin' their valuables away from them."
-
-"It's a dead cinch," Buck Ashley observed, "that whenever there was a
-hold-up or a robbery, or a murder in cold blood for money, why everybody
-knew that the White Wolf was again in the hills and playin' his
-cut-throat game for pelf and plunder, or mebbe just for revenge against
-the gringos, whom he hated like hell. Sometimes he was not heard of
-in these parts for two or three years, and then he showed up more
-blood-thirsty than ever. His hand was agin every man, and it looked like
-as every man's hand was agin him."
-
-"I've been told," said Dick Willoughby, "that when the White Wolf was a
-boy he saved the life of the old highwayman, Joaquin Murietta."
-
-"Yes, them are facts," replied Tom Baker. "Leastways I've heard say so.
-They claim that he saved Murietta's life from a posse of deputies one
-night, and altho' the White Wolf was only a boy at that time, yet a heap
-of people think he's the only livin' soul who knows the whereabouts and
-location of the secret cavern where Joaquin Murietta planted his loot,
-amountin', they say, to millions of dollars in gold and jewels and
-valuables of all kinds. The retreat always proved a safe one for the
-murderin' gang, and now they're gone no one even to this day can find
-the place. It's somewhere on San Antonio Rancho, but where? The White
-Wolf kept his secret well."
-
-"If old Pierre Luzon ever gets out of San Quentin," remarked the
-storekeeper, "I guess he could tell, but he's up for life. He was nabbed
-in that same Tulare Lake affair 'bout which Tom had been talkin'."
-
-"Yes," said the sheriff, "two others were shot dead before they got back
-to the mountains. The White Wolf and Pierre were ridin' alone when the
-Frenchie's horse stumbled. They picked him up insensible, a broken leg
-and concussion of the brain, and he was the only one of the gang who
-ever went to jail."
-
-"God 'lmighty," exclaimed Buck, "old Pierre used to sit around in this
-here store day after day, smokin' an old foreign-lookin' pipe, and
-hardly speakin' a word. He used to pretend he knew no English. We never
-once suspected that he was one of Don Manuel's bunch--always thought
-of him as an old sheepherder, a bit off his nut, who had saved a few
-dollars and was takin' things easy. And hell, all the time he was the
-White Wolf's look-out man, makin' note of everything and passin' the
-word o' warnin' when there was talk of the sheriff gettin' busy."
-
-"I'll allow Pierre Luzon fooled me proper," concurred Tom Baker.
-"However, he got what was cornin' to him all right, a life sentence,
-though he ought to have been hanged. Well, perhaps it is only the White
-Wolf and Pierre Luzon who now know the cave where Joaquin Murietta
-cached his treasure."
-
-"And Guadalupe perhaps as well," remarked Buck Ashley.
-
-"Yes, perhaps Guadalupe also," assented the sheriff. "But the White Wolf
-keeps guard over her."
-
-"That's the real White Wolf this time," laughed
-
-Dick Willoughby, with a nod toward the young lieutenant, who had been
-listening intently to the tale of weird romance.
-
-"The real White Wolf?" replied Munson, enquiringly. "You've got me all
-tangled up. What do you mean?"
-
-"Don't you know how Don Manuel came by his name of the White Wolf?"
-asked the sheriff.
-
-"No, all this folk lore is new to me."
-
-"Why, gosh all hemlock! He is named because of a darn big white wolf
-that has been seen at different times in this here country for a hundred
-years."
-
-"Wolves don't live so long," protested the lieutenant incredulously.
-
-"Well, this one does," retorted Tom, curtly. "Leastwise he's been seen
-from time to time since ever I can remember. In the old days they named
-the White Wolf Rancho after this monster animal. It has a charmed life.
-No one can kill this big fellow, altho' lots of shots have been fired
-at him. And the same was true of Don Manuel de Valencia. He escaped so
-often that folks believed his life a charmed one. And so they called him
-the White Wolf."
-
-"I saw the white wolf once myself," said Buck Ashley, "the real white
-wolf that even now, as Tom says, guards old Guadalupe and makes it best
-for young fellows like you, Jack Rover, to leave the squaw alone when
-she makes back for her hidin' place in the mountains. I'll never forget
-that morning, although it's more or less twenty years ago. The great
-shaggy brute was following Guadalupe along the trail like a Newfoundland
-dog. In those days I was out on the hills roundin' up some mavericks.
-One of the calves broke from the herd and scampered along a trail that
-led directly in front of the old squaw. And say, boys, would you believe
-it? From less than half a mile away I saw with my own eyes that monster
-devil of a white wolf--white as the driven snow--make one terrific
-mad leap and grab that yearlin' by the neck. Guadalupe spotted me
-and disappeared, and the white wolf trotted after her round the bend,
-carryin' the dead calf in its jaws as a cat carries a mouse."
-
-"Did you not shoot at the wolf?" excitedly asked Lieutenant Munson.
-
-"Shoot, hell! What would have been the use? Didn't you hear what Tom
-Baker said? White wolves have charmed lives whether they go on two legs
-or four."
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER III--Feminine Attractions
-
-|TOM BAKER, the sheriff, cleared his throat. "You fellers, I'm
-assoomin', are all boys. I have been loafin' 'round in this man's land
-for forty years. I was here the day Don Manuel had been buryin' his old
-father and mother from the little Mission Church, less than a quarter of
-a mile from where we are settin'. He was standin' right in front of this
-store when young Ben Thurston and two of his ranch hands rode up. If
-ever I saw real bravery it was that mornin'. Don't take much bravery
-to do some things heroic when you have your artillery handy, but it
-requires the real stuff when you're gunless.
-
-"Young Thurston spoke to his companions and they drew their guns and
-kept them leveled at Don Manuel as their boss dismounted.
-
-"Don Manuel was one of the handsomest young fellers I ever laid my two
-eyes on. He walked straight up to Thurston, and notwithstandin' the two
-loaded pieces of artillery was pintin' straight at him said:
-
-"'Ben Thurston, you are the man who killed my sister.'
-
-"'You are a damned liar!' retorted Thurston.
-
-"'Yes, you killed her,' went on Don Manuel. I found this button in her
-dead hand, and right there, by God! is where it came from. Look at your
-coat. Your life shall pay for this dastardly murder. If I had my gun
-I would settle the matter now, notwithstandin' that today I have been
-burying my beloved father and mother.'
-
-"When young Thurston heard about there bein' no gun, he snatched the
-tell-tale button from his accuser's hand, swung himself into his saddle,
-laughed mockingly, and with his quirt struck Don Manuel across the face;
-then he wheeled round his pony and rode away with his bodyguards in a
-cloud of dust.
-
-"God! I will never forget it. Don Manuel stood there, as white as a
-piece of paper, and never moved for a whole minute. The quirt had drawn
-the blood from his face in one long streak. At last he turned away with
-a resolve in his eyes--one of them there terrible resolves that change
-the life of a man, and went back to the little church to finish the
-last sad rites to his people. It's my opinion Don Manuel, from that very
-hour, turned bandit in his heart and took oath to murder all the gringos
-in California.
-
-"As I said before, that was thirty years back, and mebbe a little
-more, and I have never seen him since. But we all heard of him good and
-plenty. He certainly left a red trail."
-
-A silence followed. Presently Buck Ashley in the way of explanation,
-said:
-
-"That tombstone on his sister's grave was put up one night. Nobody saw
-it done, but everyone knows, of course, it was the work of Don Manuel.
-It has just one word--'Hermana'--chiseled on the cross of white marble.
-That's the Mexican for 'sister,' guess you all know. So the name Rosetta
-is only remembered by old-stagers here, like Tom Baker and me. And we
-ain't forgotten her pretty face either. Poor little girl!"
-
-"A doggoned shame," muttered the sheriff, meditatively, his eyes cast
-down.
-
-"How about the law?" asked Lieutenant Munson. "The law!" exclaimed
-Baker, raising his eyes and flashing a look of withering contempt.
-"What kind o' law was there in those days and in these parts? A gun
-was usually both judge and jury. Besides, with the only bit of evidence
-gone, how could Don Manuel prove anything agin a rich young feller like
-Ben Thurston?"
-
-"But if he was laying for him all the time, how is it that the White
-Wolf never got his man all through those thirty years?"
-
-"Because Ben Thurston lit out--he was too demed scared to live on the
-rancho any longer. But that's another story."
-
-"Let's have it, sheriff."
-
-"Well, it's a longish yarn, and p'raps you fellers are about tired of
-hearing me."
-
-No one protested; there was rather a movement of settling down in
-pleased expectancy of something worth listening to. So Tom Baker
-continued:
-
-"Ben Thurston had one warnin', good and plenty, and he didn't wait
-around for a second one. After Don Manuel's threat, he seldom left his
-home, and a little later went back East again. It wasn't till more'n a
-year that he showed up agin at the rancho. This time he brought with him
-his Eastern bride, a fine slap-dash young woman who could ride a horse
-and handle a team in good shape. But we could all see that she wasn't
-too happy, for Ben Thurston started in to drink heavily, and she was
-ashamed of him and showed it."
-
-"Guess it was to drown his conscience and keep from thinkin' about
-Rosetta," interjected Buck Ashley.
-
-"Like as not," assented Tom. "Well, anyhow, he hadn't been here very
-long afore Don Manuel got him--yes, got him fair and square, although he
-managed to save his neck at the last moment. There was card-playin' and
-drinkin' one night at the rancho--Thurston had got a bunch o' gay young
-dogs down from San Francisco. Mrs. Thurston had left the room, and was
-sittin' out alone in the moonlight on the verandah. Suddenly she heard
-a sound that made her sit up and listen--the clatter o' twenty pairs
-o' gallopin' hoofs a-comin' straight for the house. She must ha' known
-something about the vendetta, for she rushed in terror to her husband
-and gave him warnin'. He escaped by a back door, and a minute later the
-place was surrounded. The shootin' came first from some of the ranch
-hands, who had tumbled out of the bunk house and were spyin' around
-corners. They said later that the hold-up party numbered more'n twenty,
-some of them masked with handkerchiefs tied around their faces, but
-others bold as brass and not carin' a dang who saw 'em. Among these last
-was Don Manuel. But Pierre Luzon was a downy duck, for no one spotted
-him, although later on we came to know that he played the principal part
-that night, next to the leader of the gang.
-
-"Well, after the shootin'-scrap became general, there was a pretty scare
-in the ranch house--one of the card-players dropped, and the others
-were hiding under tables, when Don Manuel appeared and asked for Ben
-Thurston. His wife, mighty brave, denied that he was there--he had left
-that afternoon for Visalia to buy some cattle, she boldly declared. Don
-Manuel, always the true gentleman, mark ye, was for believin' her when
-Pierre, his face masked, came in from the verandah and in a low voice
-passed some words to his chief. Mrs. Thurston knew in a moment that her
-bluff was goin' to be called, and, while the outlaws were confabbin',
-darted from the room.
-
-"But Pierre was just as quick out by the verandah, and before she got to
-the door o' the woolshed beyond the horse corral, he was there to block
-her passage. It was Pierre who had caught a glimpse of the fugitive
-sneakin' into this outbuilding, and now he knew for certain that
-Thurston was hiding among the bags o' wool inside. But a cornered man is
-a dangerous animal, and it might mean a good few lives if the door was
-opened and any attempt made to rush the place.
-
-"The gang was soon buzzin' all around; the woman, now almost in
-hysterics, was hustled aside, and a few bundles of loose hay was being
-dumped into the shed through an open window. A match did the rest.
-Within three minutes the door opened and Thurston came staggerin' out
-through thick clouds of smoke. Pierre grabbed him and had a noose around
-his neck in doublequick time.
-
-"The shootin' was over before this, and some of the ranch hands were
-lookin' on from a little distance, for now everyone knew that it was
-only the boss that the night-riders were after. So more'n one was able
-afterwards to tell the story--how the young wife threw herself at Don
-Manuel's feet, and with sobs and tears pleaded for mercy. And by the
-living God she won out even after the rope, with her husband at the end
-of it, had been swung over the limb of a near-by sycamore.
-
-"The White Wolf stood stock-still for perhaps a minute, weighin' things
-like, his arms folded across his breast. Then he raised the weepin'
-woman, and, turnin' to Thurston, now half-dead with fear, laid hold of
-him by the shoulder and shook him as a terrier shakes a rat. Then with
-his other hand he flung the noose from around his neck. 'Take your
-miserable life, then, this time'--that's what Don Manuel said. 'Take
-it, but the day will come when we shall meet again, man to man, with no
-woman's tears to save you.' And he pushed Thurston away contemptuously,
-topplin' him over like a ninepin, and a minute later rode off at the
-head of his men."
-
-The narrator paused, and there was a general murmur of repressed
-excitement.
-
-"My word, that's a peach of a story," exclaimed Jack Rover.
-
-"He certainly was a chivalrous fellow, this oldtime Don Manuel,"
-remarked the lieutenant.
-
-"And don't you see," said the sheriff, "that, when a man acted like that
-and spoke like that, his words must come true? Don't tell me that Don
-Manuel today is dead while Ben Thurston is still alive. But he has taken
-mighty good care of himself ever since that day. He an' his wife skipped
-East the very next morning, and I'm told they never stopped till they
-got to Europe. Nobody knows where exactly they lived during the time
-that followed, but news came through years later that the wife had died,
-somewhere in the south of England, leaving a son behind. That's young
-Marshall who has come West with his dad now--the young man's first visit
-and his father's last one, I reckon, if he sells the ranch, as I'm told
-he's trying to do."
-
-"But I say, boys," observed Jack Rover, "what do you suppose the White
-Wolf did with all the gold he took away from the people? It's said that
-in one stage robbery he got over fifty thousand dollars of the yellow
-stuff."
-
-"Hid it," replied Buck Ashley, "with Joaquin Murietta's hoarded gold.
-For it's sure as sure can be that Don Manuel came to know the secret o'
-the bandits' cave where Murietta used to store his loot. The only thing
-anybody else knows is that it is around here somewheres."
-
-"But they do say," observed one of the cowboys, "whatever Sheriff Baker
-may think, and you, too, Buck, that Don Manuel is sure 'nuff dead. Most
-folks herabouts believe that the White Wolf has gone to his long restin'
-place, sort a j'ined forces with old Joaquin Murietta. The Tulare Lake
-affair was, I guess, his last raid."
-
-"He ain't dead," muttered Tom, determinedly, while Buck Ashley also
-shook his head in repudiation of the cowboy's theory.
-
-"Well, I happen to know," observed Dick Willoughby, "that Mr. Thurston
-has run down the story of the White Wolf's death in that Seattle saloon
-brawl pretty thoroughly, and he is of the opinion that the big-featured
-articles in the San Francisco and Los Angeles papers were correct--that
-the dead man's identity was absolutely established."
-
-"That's how he'd wish it to be, at all events," said Buck Ashley. "But
-even now, when Ben Thurston ventures to come home to the rancho, he
-brings with him a great big hulking bodyguard--Leach Sharkey, I'm told
-is the fellow's name. That don't look much like believin' the White Wolf
-to be dead and the vendetta played out, does it? You can see it in his
-hang-dog face that it isn't any real pleasure for him to be around in
-these parts. He ain't once paid me a visit at the store. Guess he thinks
-his hide'll last longer by stickin' close to home. You owe your job o'
-runnin' his cattle, Dick Willoughby, to the fact that he's still plumb
-scared."
-
-"Oh, well, I am in his employ," said Dick loyally, "and I'm inclined to
-give him the benefit of the doubt as regards these ugly rumors and idle
-stories. He has always been on the square with me. But perhaps he'll
-stick to the rancho, now he believes the White Wolf to be dead."
-
-"He may believe it, but, as Buck says, why then the bodyguard?"
-commented the sheriff as he relighted his pipe.
-
-"Yes." replied Dick Willoughby, "but I believe he is thinking of letting
-Leach Sharkey go. Personally I would be willing to wager that Don
-Manuel, whom no one has seen since that last raid on the stage coach, is
-dead and sleeping with his sires."
-
-"Well, dead or alive," exclaimed Jack Rover, "I don't care a hang for
-the White Wolf and his-buried treasure. But what I would like to know
-is the exact location of that rippling mountain stream, the identical
-sandbar where the old squaw Guadalupe gathers up her pocket change with
-which to buy groceries. That would be a heap better than any blooming
-cave. Them's my sentiments."
-
-As he said this he threw some silver on the bar and invited everybody to
-lubricate.
-
-"Just nominate your poison, boys, and let's drink to my finding old
-Guadalupe's gold mine."
-
-They all laughed good-naturedly, and Lieutenant Munson declared that he
-thought he would put in the balance of his furlough days prospecting.
-"You know," he explained in an aside to the storekeeper while the latter
-was preparing the drinks, "I am only here to visit my old college pal,
-Dick Willoughby, and incidentally see the place where my father was a
-soldier in the early California days. He was stationed several years in
-Fort Tejon."
-
-"That was before my time," said Buck Ashley.
-
-"The soldiers had abandoned the old fort when I came first into these
-parts."
-
-Meanwhile Dick Willoughby was clinking glasses with Jack Hover.
-
-"There are some mighty pretty little senoritas hereabouts," said Dick,
-"good American blood mixed with Spanish blood, you know, and all that.
-If a fellow could only find the right one--understand, I say the right
-one, Jack--he wouldn't be losing any time in chasing after the old
-squaw's secret gold mine or the White Wolf's buried millions."
-
-Jack Rover laughed outright.
-
-"I say, Dick, what are you reddening up about? Gee, if I had as fine a
-lead as you have staked out, I'd feel the same way. Ain't that right,
-Buck?" Buck Ashley winked at Jack Rover and said: "If you mean who I
-think you mean, you sure are righter than right. I speak wide open and
-unrestrained when I give it as my opinion that Miss Merle Farnsworth is
-the finest specimen of young womanhood that I ever set eyes on, and I
-have seen some girls East as well as West. Take it from me, she is a
-jewel, she is a regular beauty rose. Yes," he went on, "and too damned
-good for that young Thurston whelp, who hangs around tryin' to act smart
-whenever she and that old duenna chaperon of hers comes here to trade.
-I'll simply boot him out of the store one of these days."
-
-Dick Willoughby smiled in a satisfied way as he moved toward the door.
-
-"Well, hold on, Dick," called out Jack Rover, "don't be in such a
-dangnation hurry. I'll ride with you in a minute. I've just got this
-to say to you, Buck Ashley, that I like you better than ever for what
-you've said about Marshall Thurston. Even though I'm working for the
-Thurston outfit, I'm free to express my opinion that that young feller
-is about the meanest specimen of low-down humanity I've ever struck."
-
-"It's a case of the second decadency, I suppose," remarked Munson. "The
-worthless profligate, spawn of the rich old rou�, Ben Thurston."
-
-"Such a drunken pup," continued Rover, "aint' good enough for a
-half-breed Indian, much less for the likes of the young ladies of La
-Siesta. Gee, if I thought there was one chance in a thousand for me with
-either of them, why goodbye to that placer gold mine ambition that's
-eating my vitals, or to the planted millions of the White Wolf."
-
-As he spoke the last words, he followed Dick Willoughby into the open.
-Dick was standing by his pony.
-
-"You're superlatively in earnest, aren't you?" he said as he laughed
-good-naturedly at the cowboy.
-
-"You bet your life I'm in earnest," replied Jack. "And if you don't
-get busy with that love affair of yours, well, take it from me, you had
-better look out, for somebody will be picking the peach right from under
-your very nose. Well, so long, Dick; I've changed my mind; I'll not ride
-with you. I'll see to that bit of fence repairing up on the range. And
-who knows but I may find a sand-bar and a riffle sparkling with yellow
-gold?" He laughed like a big overgrown boy as he touched the rowel to
-his pony and galloped away across the valley.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER IV--Back to the Soil
-
-|JACK ROVER is a great boy," said Dick Willoughby to Lieutenant Munson
-as the two rode off at a leisurely pace toward the group of ranch
-buildings peeping through a clump of trees at the edge of the foothills.
-
-"A type of Western character," replied Munson, "that in a way is quite
-new to me. And yet, do you know, I rather like this Western atmosphere."
-
-"Like it!" exclaimed Dick. "Why, man, it is _the_ atmosphere in which to
-live, move and have one's being."
-
-They both laughed at his enthusiasm.
-
-"Really," continued Dick, soberly, "I would not live another year in New
-York City for all the property fronting on the Circle, the coming centre
-of old Gotham. Out here a man is a man for what he is worth. You grow
-bigger, you think broader thoughts, you are not confined to following
-precedents or taking orders from the man higher up."
-
-"Oh, I know," replied Munson, "or at least I am beginning to understand
-something of what you mean. I have only been here ten days and I am
-already feeling loath to return to my post."
-
-"Ches," exclaimed Dick, turning abruptly and facing his companion,
-"give it all up, old fellow, and come and live in this glorious
-country--California! There's music in the very name. It is the land of
-sunshine, of fruits and flowers, and of pretty girls into the bargain."
-
-"You keep telling me of the pretty girls, but when am I to see them?"
-questioned Munson. "If you have any real senoritas who will cause a
-fellow to forsake his Eastern home and send in his resignation to army
-headquarters, let me get a peep at them."
-
-Again they both laughed, this time at the challenge in Munson's words.
-
-"All right," said Dick, "you shall see them. And, by the way, don't
-you remember that this is the very day we have arranged to call on Mrs.
-Darlington at the Rancho La Siesta? It is a beautiful place, this little
-rancho, and Mrs. Darlington you will find to be a most admirable woman.
-But just wait until you see Grace Darlington."
-
-"How about Miss Farnsworth?"
-
-"Not for you, old man," replied the other quickly, reddening at the
-temples. "Not as long as my name is Dick Willoughby--providing, you
-understand, always providing that I shall prove successful in my
-wooing."
-
-"Is it as bad as that, Dick?"
-
-"Well,"--his laughing tone was only a mask to deeper feelings--"I cannot
-deny that I am pretty hard hit."
-
-"My, but you do whet my impatience," said the lieutenant. "And I am
-about as anxious to be paying that afternoon call as I am to have my
-breakfast. I don't know how you feel, Dick, but I'm as hungry as a lean
-coyote." He paused a moment, then asked in a musing tone: "How far away
-is this wonderful La Siesta Rancho?"
-
-"Oh, only about twenty miles."
-
-"Twenty miles! You speak of miles out here in the same way as we speak
-of city blocks back in New York. Surely it must be quite a farm."
-
-"Quite a farm? I should say! You musn't confound our Californian ranchos
-with Eastern farms, old man. Why, this rancho of San Antonio covers over
-four hundred square miles of territory."
-
-"You astonish me."
-
-"La Siesta Rancho adjoins the great San Antonio possession and contains
-comparatively few acres, just under three thousand. But it surely is
-a beautiful little place, fixed up like a nobleman's park in the old
-world. And then the ladies--"
-
-"Aha, the ladies," repeated Munson, doffing his hat in courtly fashion
-and smiling audaciously.
-
-Dick touched the flank of his pony with his spur, and for a few
-miles they rode on at a quicker pace and in silence. Soon they were
-approaching the ranch buildings. On the outer edge was a little cottage,
-covered with vines and surrounded by fruit trees, the place which Dick
-Willoughby, the cattle foreman, had called "home" for the past five
-years.
-
-After turning their horses into a corral, they passed by way of a broad
-verandah into a big room, roughly but comfortably furnished. Some logs
-were smouldering in the fireplace, and quickly started into a bright
-blaze when Dick kicked them together. The warmth was grateful, for while
-out of doors everything was now bathed in genial sunshine, here the
-morning air was still keen.
-
-A Chinaman appeared from the back quarters, and smiled expectantly.
-
-"Breakfast, Sing Ling," called out Dick, "and just as quick as you can
-serve it."
-
-Sing Ling departed as noiselessly as he had come.
-
-"These are certainly great quarters," observed Munson, settling himself
-in a big Old Mission rocker and glancing around.
-
-The walls, curiously enough, were pretty well covered with pen-and-ink
-sketches and designs of buildings that might have adorned an architect's
-office, while there was a partly completed landscape painting in oils
-standing on a rudely fashioned easel.
-
-"And you've certainly stuck to the old line of work, Dick," the
-lieutenant went on.
-
-"Of course one must have something to think about when he is all alone
-in a new country," replied Willoughby. "But most of that stuff I did
-in my first year here," he added, following the other's survey of the
-walls.
-
-"You still paint, however," remarked Munson, his eyes resting on the
-unfinished canvas.
-
-"Or try to," was the laughing response.
-
-"Oh, that's a modest way of putting it. Do you know, old man," Munson
-went on, "since I came here I have often thought what a marvelous change
-has been wrought in you--what a transplanting has taken place? You were
-a chronic New Yorker, except for that one year you spent in the Latin
-Quarter of gay Paree. You thought then you were going to make a great
-painter. And, by gad, I almost believe so myself," he added, bending
-forward to make a more critical scrutiny of the work on the easel. "By
-jove, that's really fine, Dick."
-
-"I'm afraid that's flattery, Chester, my boy," responded Willoughby.
-"However, it sounds good to hear you say so. A word of appreciation
-is what all hearts hunger for. Personally I even believe in a moderate
-amount of flattery. Its psychic influence is more potent in arousing and
-causing the heart to throb with ambition than all the stimulants, drugs
-or reasoning in the world. Indeed, without a certain amount of flattery
-one becomes ambitionless, languid, and perishes; whereas the unexpected
-caress or kindly words of praise from loved ones, just or unjust, adds
-more strength to the good right arm of the breadwinner than all the beef
-in Christendom, and makes the sunshine seem brighter and earth's every
-breeze a south wind blowing across beds of violets."
-
-"A bit of a poet, too, I see," smiled Munson.
-
-Willoughby made no reply. He had crossed over to the open door and was
-looking out on the valley that stretched away for miles--great oak trees
-in the foreground, with cattle-dotted pasture lands beyond. Waving his
-hand toward the vast expanse, he said:
-
-"Just look at that for a picture, and see how tame a man-made gallery is
-as compared with this great art gallery of Nature. Do you know, Ches, I
-despise New York? There was a time, when I first came here, that I felt
-I should die of ennui, yearning for the Great White Way once again. But
-I have outgrown all that. I know now, thank God, there's nothing to it.
-Here a man can fill his lungs with pure air, and at the same time feast
-his soul all day long with beautiful things."
-
-There followed a brief interval of silence. Munson had risen and joined
-his comrade at the door. Both were gazing over the glorious sunlit sweep
-of territory rimmed by the distant, pine-clad hills. In the heart of
-Dick Willoughby was supreme contentment, in that of Chester Munson a
-vague longing to get away from red-tape army routine and breathe the
-exhilarating and inspiring freedom of life in the open.
-
-"Blakeflast," bleated a soft voice behind them, and turning round they
-found the suave, smiling Chinaman with hand outstretched toward the
-smoking viands upon the table. Sentiment was instantly forgotten in
-favor of lamb chops grilled to a turn, a great fluffled omelette with
-fine herbs that would have done credit to a Parisian chef, and coffee
-that was veritable nectar.
-
-At last appetite was satisfied. The lieutenant had produced his cigar
-case, Dick was filling his briar-root pipe with tobacco from the
-humidor. The latter spoke:
-
-"Say, Ches, we were talking about New York. Do you want me to give you a
-toast on that modern Babylon?"
-
-"Sure, old man, go ahead! You know I haven't lost my interest in old
-Gotham, by any manner of means. It may the a modern Babylon. But to me
-it is none the less the greatest of American cities."
-
-"That's just the trouble," said Dick, seriously. "It is too great. There
-identities are swallowed up. Individualism cannot survive. It is all one
-great composite."
-
-"Well, let us hear the toast."
-
-Dick raised his cup of coffee and said: "Very well, here it is; here is
-my opinion of New York:=
-
-```'Vulgar in manners; overfed,
-
-```Over-dressed and under-bred;
-
-```Heartless, godless, hell's delight,
-
-```Rude by day and lewd by night.
-
-```Bedwarfed the man, enlarged the brute;
-
-```Ruled by boss and prostitute.
-
-```Purple robed and pauper clad;
-
-```Raving, rotten, money mad;
-
-```A squirming herd in Mammon's mesh;
-
-```A wilderness of human flesh;
-
-```Crazed by avarice, lust and rum--
-
-```New York! thy name's delirium.'"=
-
-"Great Heavens, old man," exclaimed Munson, when Dick had finished, "you
-are severe, to say the least."
-
-Willoughby laughed good-naturedly as he passed the match box to his
-friend.
-
-"Not severe, only truthful," he said. "You see, in New York no man
-dares think for himself. Everything is controlled by a machine-appointed
-chairman, secretary and committee, and you must hear the resolutions
-read before you know the doctrine you are perforce to advocate."
-
-Then he lit his pipe and rose from the table.
-
-"Now, I have a lot of things to attend to, old fellow," he resumed.
-"Make yourself comfortable. Here's a bunch of Eastern newspapers--oh,
-I read them regularly, haven't got rid of that bad habit yet. I'll tell
-Sing Ling to have lunch ready on the stroke of noon. Then we'll be in
-good time to start out for the Rancho La Siesta. So long!"
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER V--At La Siesta
-
-|SOON after one o'clock Dick Willoughby and Chester Munson were again in
-the saddle. They galloped along the foothills for some time in silence.
-But coming to the boulder-strewn wash of a mountain stream, they had
-perforce to rein their horses to a walk. Conversation was now possible.
-
-"Dick, will you give me a job as a cowboy if I quit the army?" asked
-Munson abruptly.
-
-"Surest thing you know," replied Dick. "But why try to kid me like
-that?"
-
-"Oh," laughed the other, "I am not jesting."
-
-"Well, by gad, if you feel that way already, the chances are you will
-write out your resignation when you get back to the shack tonight."
-
-"You mean by that--"
-
-"I mean," said Dick, smiling benignly at his friend, "that when you have
-once seen Grace Darlington you will feel like browsing on the California
-range until you have learned to throw a riata."
-
-"Oh, it is not the thought of any mere girl that will influence my
-decision. I feel like getting back to Nature--back to the soil--back to
-a life of untrammeled freedom."
-
-"Back to unspoiled womanhood," added Dick sententiously.
-
-"Well, you've certainly got my curiosity aroused over these young ladies
-at La Siesta. How much farther do we have to go?"
-
-"Within an hour, sir, within the hour, my lord, shall you see the lady
-fair. But remember," Dick went on banteringly, "that you are not to
-practise any riata-throwing on Miss Merle Farnsworth."
-
-"I understand. But we won't fall out over her. You may have your
-beautiful brunette. I have always been partial to blondes."
-
-"In the plural number," grinned Dick. "But Grace Darlington will dim the
-light of all your previous flames. She is the most perfect blonde you
-have ever yet encountered."
-
-"You are certainly enthusiastic--for a disinterested party."
-
-"Well, you'll say the same thing, Ches, my boy, when you see her."
-
-It was not yet four o'clock when they approached the Rancho La Siesta.
-The house was of a style quite unusual in California--a miniature castle
-that might have been planned by some European architect of renown. It
-stood amid noble oak trees, old and gnarled and of gigantic size, but
-not too numerous to hide the architectural features of the building. To
-the rear the trees grew more thickly till they finally merged into one
-great forest that covered the lower ridge of the mountain beyond. Far
-up, just within the timber line, could be seen the red-tiled roof of a
-house which Dick told his friend was the home of a Mr. Ricardo Robles.
-Beneath the forest, the gently undulating lands sloped away to a
-considerable stream that dashed down from one of the mountain canyons
-and debouched into the great valley.
-
-"Whew!" exclaimed Munson admiringly, as they rode up and turned their
-horses over to an attendant. "Some swell architecture around here! Is
-this your work, Dick?"
-
-[Illustration: 0055]
-
-"Oh, no!" replied Willoughby. "I had nothing to do with it. But I do
-like the architectural lines of Mrs. Darlington's home. She's English
-and has English tastes, and transplanted ideas are not always successful
-in a new country. But in this case the building just seems to fit the
-scenery. It has always delighted me."
-
-"It is certainly beautiful," concurred Munson as they walked along a
-winding graveled pathway that climbed the gentle slope and led to the
-portico of the mansion.
-
-Around them were gay beds of flowers dotting the greensward. Almost
-hiding the columns of the portico were climbing roses, one bush of the
-purest white, the other of deep crimson.
-
-As they passed under the porch roof, a handsome and well-preserved lady
-of middle age appeared at the top of the steps with a welcoming smile.
-She descended to give them gracious greeting.
-
-"How glad I am to see you, Mr. Willoughby. No one could be more welcome
-at La Siesta."
-
-"Thank you," said Dick with marked chivalry.
-
-"Mrs. Darlington, permit me to present my friend, Lieutenant Munson."
-
-The introduction over, they ascended the steps together, and passed
-into a spacious courtyard, with broad verandahs running all around and a
-fountain playing in the centre. The hostess conducted her visitors to
-a cosy corner, screened by glass panels from the open air and furnished
-with rich Persian rugs, divans, cushions, tapestries, carved ebony
-tabarets, all in oriental fashion. When they were comfortably settled,
-she opened the conversation.
-
-"Lieutenant, the young ladies of La Siesta are most impatient to meet
-you. Mr. Willoughby has told us so much about you and yet has been so
-very dilatory--yes, really you have, Mr. Willoughby--in bringing you
-over, that we have put down several black marks against his name."
-
-"Oh, thank you," stammered the young officer, reddening. "I quite agree
-with you about Willoughby, for I have been pleading with him to present
-me from the very first day of my arrival." Turning to Mrs. Darlington,
-Dick laughingly protested: "My dear Mrs. Darlington, that is the first
-whopper you have heard from my esteemed friend. You have yet to learn
-that he always speaks in the superlative degree."
-
-At this moment Grace Darlington stepped through one of the French
-windows. As she stood hesitating for a moment, Chester Munson there
-and then agreed with all the preliminary praise Dick Willoughby had
-bestowed. She was certainly a vision of loveliness, with a wealth of
-golden hair and eyes of sapphire blue; petite, her figure plump but
-beautifully molded, her cheeks aglow with the red roses of health and
-youth and happiness.
-
-"My daughter Grace," announced Mrs. Darlington, rising and formally
-introducing the lieutenant to her as she joined the group.
-
-Again Munson blushed and stammered. Dick was chuckling; he saw that
-the gallant son of battle, with a penchant for blonde beauties, had
-succumbed to the first glance from Grace Darlington's eyes.
-
-"Delighted to meet you, Lieutenant Munson," she declared with frank
-friendliness as they shook hands.
-
-"Where's Merle?" asked Dick almost before Grace had time to turn to him.
-
-"There now, Mr. Impatience," she replied, shaking her finger teasingly
-at, him, "Merle will be here in her own good time. She's busy with Bob
-just now."
-
-"Who the dickens is Bob?" asked Dick, visibly disconcerted.
-
-"Oh, her new Irish terrier," laughed Grace, her voice ringing with
-mischievous merriment. "And such a beauty!"
-
-Dick breathed again. The lieutenant had recovered his composure; it was
-his turn now to bestow a sardonic smile upon his comrade.
-
-"We'll have afternoon tea," suggested Mrs. Darlington. "And of course
-you two young men will stay for dinner."
-
-Both uttered a simultaneous protest--they were only in riding clothes.
-But Mrs. Darlington made short work of the argument, and touched a
-pushbutton by her side. A maid responded, the extra covers for dinner
-were ordered, and meanwhile tea was to be sent on to the verandah.
-Pleasant small talk succeeded, the lieutenant being called upon for his
-first impressions of California.
-
-Of a sudden Grace exclaimed in a voice, half of joy, half of surprise:
-
-"Why, here comes Mr. Robles!"
-
-Advancing along the verandah, hat in hand, was a man of striking
-presence and dignity, perhaps fifty years of age. His jet black hair was
-streaked with gray, the full beard almost verging on whiteness. Olive
-complexion and brown eyes, together with the courtly manner of his
-salutation, indicated the thoroughbred Castilian.
-
-He bowed and raised to his lips the hand of his hostess. To Grace he
-paid the same deference. Next he turned to Dick Willoughby and extended
-his hand.
-
-"I have met Mr. Willoughby. I am pleased, sir, to see you again."
-
-Then his eyes rested on Lieutenant Munson, and Mrs. Darlington presented
-the young army officer.
-
-"And where, I pray, is Miss Merle?" Mr. Robles finally asked, glancing
-around.
-
-"That's what I want to know," blurted out Dick. Then he reddened just a
-little.
-
-The older man looked kindly at Dick, and smilingly said: "The audacity
-of youth."
-
-"Yes," put in Grace, "the audacity and the impatience as well."
-
-But just at that moment there floated from the recesses of the home the
-fragment of a song: "I dreamt I dwelt in marble halls, with vassals and
-serfs at my side."
-
-"Ah, here comes the recreant now," exclaimed Mrs. Darlington.
-
-The song stopped abruptly, and a moment later Merle Farnsworth appeared.
-She went first of all to Mr. Robles and greeted him warmly, giving him
-both her hands, which he kissed in his princely fashion. For Willoughby
-she had a pleasant smile, and for his friend, the lieutenant, a kindly
-welcome to California.
-
-The tea tray had meanwhile arrived, and soon both the young ladies
-were busy attending to their guests. While he sipped his tea, Munson
-completed his inspection of Merle Farnsworth--dispassionately, for the
-brunette type of beauty had never yet made his pulses beat faster. But
-he could none the less admire. She was a stately girl, taller than Grace
-Darlington, with fine, regular features and brown eyes that matched the
-dark heavy braids of her hair. Her manner was alert and vivacious, yet
-there was the quiet dignity of gentle breeding even in her smile.
-
-After half an hour of general conversation, Mr. Robles arose to take
-his leave, notwithstanding Mrs. Darlington's pressing invitation that he
-should remain and join the dinner party.
-
-"My home is not far away," he said when shaking hands with Munson, "up
-in the woods yonder. Perhaps you may have seen it as you came along the
-road."
-
-"Yes," observed Dick, "I pointed it out to the lieutenant."
-
-"Well, both you gentlemen are cordially invited to pay me a visit any
-time you are riding through this part of the country. Although I live
-far away from the busy world, and am a recluse by choice, I have some
-things that may interest you--pictures, old manuscripts and books of the
-Spanish days."
-
-"Pictures?" interposed Dick, inquiringly.
-
-"Yes, a few that I picked up during several visits to Europe."
-
-"If people only knew it," remarked Mrs. Darlington, "Mr. Robles has
-perhaps one of the finest private picture galleries in America."
-
-"Then I'm certainly coming to see you," said Dick, eagerly.
-
-"Me or my pictures?" asked Mr. Robles with a quizzical smile.
-
-"Both," and the young fellow showed he meant it by a cordial hand grip.
-
-"You will pass our door, Mr. Willoughby?" exclaimed Merle in
-half-laughing reproachfulness. "You will dare to give the go-by to La
-Siesta?"
-
-"Well, art is art," replied Dick sturdily, although he did not trust
-himself to look at Merle while he answered.
-
-"But perhaps the young ladies will show you the way through the oak
-forest," suggested Mr. Robles.
-
-"That would be great," said Lieutenant Munson, with his eyes fixed on
-Grace Darlington.
-
-"Delightful," she blushingly assented.
-
-"Well, arrange it among yourselves. For the present, _adios_." And with
-a sweeping bow the senor took his departure.
-
-A stroll through the gardens and orchards, dinner and sprightly
-conversation, an hour of piano-playing and singing to follow--altogether
-a delightful evening was spent. The nearly full moon had risen before
-the young men found themselves on the homeward trail.
-
-As side by side they rode down into the valley, Munson said:
-
-"Dick, boy, there's no use talking. You have introduced me to some
-perfectly charming people today--they're wonderful."
-
-"What did I tell you?" asked Dick.
-
-"You surely did not tell me the half," replied the other. "I think Grace
-Darlington is the prettiest girl I have ever seen."
-
-"Guess you'll be writing out your resignation and sending it to army
-headquarters," laughed Dick. "_Quien sabe?_"
-
-The lieutenant made no reply, and quickening their pace, they pushed on
-in silence.
-
-At last they were nearing home--passing round the last spur of the
-mountain. The moon was now riding high overhead, bathing the whole
-landscape in bright effulgence. Willoughby brought his pony to a walk,
-and Munson, coming up behind, soon joined him.
-
-"How do you like riding by the light of the California moon?" asked
-Willoughby.
-
-"Really, Dick, you call even the moon a California moon, as if the same
-moon didn't shine in New York City or in Paris."
-
-"Not in the same way," said Dick soberly. "The truth is, the moon really
-looks larger and brighter here, and the stars, too, are more brilliant.
-Haven't you noticed it?"
-
-"I have noticed that the atmosphere is exceedingly clear," replied
-Munson, and, as if to verify his observation, he cast a glance up to the
-rock-ribbed flank of the mountain above the belt of timber.
-
-"Good God, what's that?" he added breathlessly grasping the arm of his
-friend.
-
-Instinctively both halted their horses as they continued to gaze.
-
-[Illustration: 0105]
-
-The bent form of the old Indian squaw Guadalupe was unmistakable as she
-toiled slowly along a narrow ledge on the face of the precipice. But
-following close behind her was a vague, shadowy figure--the figure of
-some four-footed beast, bigger than a big dog.
-
-"The white wolf!" gasped Dick.
-
-"Is it real, or is it a spectre?" whispered Munson.
-
-Just then a scudding cloud momentarily obscured the moon, and when the
-full light again shone forth, both woman and wolf had vanished.
-
-The young men looked into each other's eyes in awe and wonderment.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VI--The Quarrel
-
-|THE following days were busy ones on San Antonio Rancho. Dick
-Willoughby was constantly in the saddle, looking after his subordinates,
-watching the line fences, and generally keeping track of the vast herds.
-Lieutenant Munson was becoming acclimated. He not only accompanied
-Willoughby on many of his rides, but had also paid several visits to
-La Siesta, and one afternoon in particular had enjoyed immensely a
-successful trout fishing expedition with the young ladies along the
-mountain stream that flowed through the property.
-
-One morning there was great excitement at San Antonio headquarters. Ben
-Thurston returned from a visit he had been paying to Los Angeles, and
-with him floated in a circumstantial story that the rancho had been
-really sold. As usual, he was attended by the plain-clothes detective
-whom he retained as bodyguard. Leach Sharkey was a big, hulking fellow,
-more than six feet in height, with a tousled shock of reddish hair, a
-stubby red mustache, and teeth that showed even when his face was in
-repose. Bulging hip pockets indicated the brace of heavy revolvers which
-he invariably carried.
-
-Within an hour of Mr. Thurston's coming, Dick Willoughby, as foreman,
-was summoned to an interview at the ranch house. The owner received him
-alone in his office.
-
-Ben Thurston was a squat, solidly built man, and despite his life
-of idle luxury, carried his fifty odd years well. He was sullen and
-taciturn in manner, but brusque and imperious when he did choose to
-speak. Two features were markedly characteristic--the chin was weak and
-the eyes had the restless, alert look of one who constantly lived in an
-atmosphere of fear and suspicion.
-
-Thurston opened the conversation without any preliminaries.
-
-"Willoughby, I want an accurate count of all the cattle and horses on
-the ranch; and especially I require a fair idea as to the number of
-fatted beeves--those ready for the market, you understand."
-
-"Very well," replied Dick, "your orders shall be carried out as
-expeditiously as possible, but it will require a few days to complete
-the work."
-
-"How many days?"
-
-"If I make use of all the force it may take a week--perhaps a little
-longer."
-
-"All right, use all the help you can get. I must have these figures
-promptly. There is a Los Angeles syndicate who are after an option on
-the rancho. They are counting on buying me out--lock, stock and
-barrel." Ben Thurston smiled, squinted his shifty eyes and blew his nose
-vigorously.
-
-"It always makes me laugh," he added pompously, "to have these fellows
-come around this great principality of mine and try to buy me out."
-
-Just then someone outside flitted past the window, and, quick as
-lightning, Thurston turned and exclaimed in a startled tone: "Who was
-that?"
-
-"That was Jack Rover," replied Dick, "one of our cowboys."
-
-"Oh," and the frightened look in the eyes subsided.
-
-"Tomorrow then," Dick went on, returning to their former topic of
-conversation, "we'll begin a round-up of the stock at this end of the
-range. I'll put the boys on the job right now."
-
-"I'll join you tomorrow myself."
-
-"All right, Mr. Thurston."
-
-"What time?"
-
-"At any time agreeable to you."
-
-"Well, say eight o'clock in the morning. You see," he continued, "I want
-to get through with this damned business in a hurry and start back East.
-I have friends who are waiting for me. Of course I will have to stay
-here until the representatives of this syndicate come up from Los
-Angeles, but I will make short work of them, believe me."
-
-This time Ben Thurston laughed outright and rubbed his hands together in
-a satisfied way. For once he seemed inclined to be communicative, and,
-turning to Willoughby, resumed:
-
-"Do you know, I have collected over three hundred thousand dollars,
-first and last, selling options on this San Antonio Rancho? It is quite
-a joke. They all fall down. They make a first payment of twenty-five
-or fifty thousand dollars, and then," throwing up both his hands and
-shrugging his shoulders, "their payments cease and I am just that much
-ahead of the game." Willoughby listened in frigid silence; there was not
-even the flicker of a responsive smile on his face.
-
-Thurston, eyeing him for a moment, looked disconcerted. He drew himself
-up stiffly in his chair. His voice assumed its usual gruff tone.
-
-"That's all; get to work then," he said curtly as he lifted some papers
-to show that the interview was at an end.
-
-The first round-up was held some twenty miles southwest of the ranch
-house, at the base of the foothills across the valley from La Siesta.
-Ben Thurston, attended closely by his bodyguard, was there, his shifting
-eyes scanning each new face. Not fewer than ten thousand head of cattle
-were milling about, pawing the earth and bellowing in low tones of
-irritation at being herded together and held away from their accustomed
-haunts of juicy grasses.
-
-From a knoll at a little distance Lieutenant Munson, seated on a fine
-riding pony, watched the great performance, which to him was more
-wonderful than any hippodrome show or military parade. He was so
-engrossed with the spectacle that he did not hear the patter of
-approaching hoofs.
-
-"Good morning, Senor Lieutenant," came a lady's voice in cheery
-greeting.
-
-Turning quickly in his saddle he saw Grace Darlington and Merle
-Farnsworth on their ponies, which had been brought to a sudden halt
-close behind him.
-
-"Really, Mr. Munson," said Grace Darlington, "one would think you were
-so completely lost in contemplation of a mob of cattle that you had no
-eyes for your friends."
-
-Chester bowed and raised his hat as he replied with a bright smile:
-
-"It is certainly a great scene, isn't it? But you are none the less
-welcome. Indeed when one is witnessing something unusual, it always adds
-to the interest to have the companionship of friends."
-
-"Very prettily put," observed Merle Farnsworth. "Fortunately the place
-selected for the round-up this year isn't very far from La Siesta, so we
-rode across the valley."
-
-"Have you anything in New York," asked Grace, "to compare with this?"
-
-"Indeed we have not," replied the lieutenant with conviction. "I am
-beginning to think that the West is a pretty good place in which to
-live. By the way," he went on, taking a newspaper clipping from his
-pocket, "here is something that our mutual friend, Dick, gave me, and
-said I should read once a day for a month, and then--well, then, he says
-I will never go East again, but remain in this great picture country.
-Shall I read it?"
-
-"Oh, do, by all means," said the girls in unison. "Well, here goes!
-'Every idea we have in the East is run with a convention. We cannot
-think without a chairman. Our whims have secretaries; our fads have
-by-laws. Literature is a club. Philosophy is a society. Our reforms
-are mass meetings. We cannot mourn our mighty dead without some great
-chairman and a half hundred vice-presidents. We remember our novelists
-and poets with trustees, while the immortality of a dead genius is
-looked after by a standing committee. Charity is an association, and
-theology at best only a set of resolutions.'"
-
-"What do you think of that?" he asked, laughing. "Isn't that an awful
-slam on the East?"
-
-"It is rather severe," smiled Merle. "But you know, Mr. Willoughby has
-become a thorough Westerner. The lure of the hills and the valleys has
-taken complete possession of him."
-
-"And yet he remains unspoiled." exclaimed the lieutenant. "But are you
-aware he is trying to tamper with my old allegiance to the East?"
-
-"Indeed," asked Grace, "in what way?"
-
-"He wants me to resign my commission and take pot luck with him, as he
-terms it."
-
-"You couldn't do better," exclaimed Grace enthusiastically.
-
-While this conversation was going on, an exciting incident was taking
-place only a short distance away. Young Marshall Thurston had come
-with his father to the round-up, and was riding about watching the
-operations. Chancing to pass near, Dick Willoughby overheard him use
-an insulting epithet in regard to Miss Farnsworth--the young man was
-evidently peeved that the ladies had not sought him out instead of
-Munson, and it was obvious, too, that he had been drinking even at that
-early hour in the morning.
-
-Swiftly wheeling, Dick rode up to him with a look of anger so intense
-that even the cowboys who knew him were taken aback.
-
-"You foul-mouthed beast!" he hissed, as he pushed his quirt into the
-slanderer's face. "Just let me overhear you make a rude remark again
-about Miss Farnsworth and I will hammer the life out of you. You are
-nothing better than a drunken hobo, not fit to associate with ladies."
-
-The outburst was so sudden that young Thurston was cowed and attempted
-no reply. But as Willoughby rode off he sent after him a look of sullen
-and resentful hatred. Two or three of the cowboys, who really were good
-friends of Dick Willoughby, but were nevertheless not above fawning for
-the favor of the heir to the great rancho, indicated that they were on
-Marshall's side.
-
-"Guess two can play at the hammering game," remarked one.
-
-"He don't come any of his rough-house business over you, Marshall, while
-I'm around," affirmed another, pugnaciously.
-
-But the young man, still without uttering a word, turned gloomily away
-and started his pony in the direction of home.
-
-"Guess he feels like another drink," grinned an irreverent youth.
-
-"Hell," exclaimed an elderly man, the blacksmith at the rancho, "if the
-Thurston family don't beat the band for quarrels and bloody feuds!"
-
-But just then a bunch of cattle broke from the main herd and the group
-of cowboys dispersed in a galloping scamper.
-
-Munson and the young ladies, engrossed in their light conversation, knew
-nothing of this unpleasant episode. They were now discussing the date
-of the projected visit to the home of Mr. Ricardo Robles among the oaks
-above La Siesta. It was decided to fix it for the first Sunday after the
-cattle muster was completed, when Dick Willoughby would be free to make
-one of the party.
-
-"But hold a moment," exclaimed the lieutenant suddenly, "unless I'm to
-be court-martialled for absence without leave, I must take the train
-East next Saturday, or--or--"
-
-His eyes fixed on Grace, he hesitated to complete the alternative.
-
-"Or what?" she inquired.
-
-"Follow Dick's advice and send in my resignation." As he spoke he thrust
-a hand into his breast pocket and drew forth a letter, sealed, addressed
-and stamped, all ready for the mail. "I really can't quite make up my
-mind," he added, dubiously.
-
-[Illustration: 0155]
-
-"Let me help you," said Grace with a gay smile as she extended her hand
-for the letter.
-
-"How?" he asked.
-
-"I'll mail your resignation for you. We shall be riding home by La
-Siesta postoffice."
-
-"Oh, Grace!" murmured Merle in timid protest. "Think of the
-responsibility you are taking."
-
-"A woman's mission in life is to encourage men to do the proper thing,"
-replied Grace with roguish defiance. "Our friend here is enamored of
-the West, and the West is the very best place for him. I'll post your
-letter, lieutenant."
-
-He placed it between her fingers, doffed his hat, and bowed gallantly.
-
-"Be it so. Let the gods--or should I say, a fair goddess?--decide."
-
-"Thanks for the compliment," cried Grace, with a pretty flush on her
-face. "Good-bye, then, for the present. Get ready for Sunday's picnic
-among the oaks. Come along, Merle, my dear."
-
-And with a touch of the quirt she started her pony into a canter.
-
-"Great guns, but she's worth while," exclaimed Munson as he gazed after
-the retreating figures.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VII--Old Bandit Days
-
-|ON the evening of the day that followed the big round-up of cattle,
-Dick Willoughby and Chester Munson rode over to the store. As they
-cantered along, both men were pre-occupied with their thoughts.
-
-Dick was not worrying over his sharp passage of words with his
-employer's son, for he knew that his services at the present time were
-quite indispensable, more especially if the rancho was to be sold to the
-best advantage. The owner had spoken lightly of the negotiations, and
-had chuckled in a sinister way about the money he had frequently made
-over unexercised options. But this time it was a Los Angeles syndicate
-that was seeking the property, composed of men whose financial
-reputation and keen business ability Willoughby knew well. For he had
-learned their names after his interview with Ben Thurston, and he felt
-certain that this particular group of capitalists would have entered
-into no serious negotiations without having both the cash and the
-intention to put the deal through. Therefore he scented a change of
-ownership in the rancho, and consequently, perhaps, the necessity for
-his looking around to find employment elsewhere. He hated to think of
-leaving a place that he had come to look on as home and parting from
-all the friends he had made throughout the countryside. Unconsciously to
-himself, the greatest tie of all was proximity to La Siesta and to Merle
-Farnsworth. But Dick was not thinking of Merle just then--he was merely
-turning things over generally in his mind as he rode across the valley.
-
-Munson also was cogitating the change in his own outlook that had
-been brought about by the mailing of the letter of resignation to army
-headquarters. He was recalling the many years he had striven to reach
-the lieutenancy now voluntarily surrendered--of his youthful zeal and
-ambition for an army career which had been powerless to withstand
-the witching call of the West. And although Grace Darlington's act of
-putting the letter in the post had been only the last feather to tip an
-evenly balanced scale, he could not but feel that thereby this beautiful
-girl of the West had entered into his life and into all his future
-plans, hopes, and aspirations. The thought gave him joy; he was more
-pleased than ever that the decisive step had at last been taken.
-
-Arriving at the store, they found old Tom Baker seated on a dry goods
-box, while Buck Ashley leaned against the counter, waiting for the
-stage coach and the mails. Already two or three others were beginning to
-congregate under the trees, in readiness for the distribution of letters
-and newspapers.
-
-"Hello, Dick," called out the sheriff, "I heard of your scrap yesterday
-morning with that young ne'er-do-well, Marshall Thurston. My God, I'm
-glad you gave him hell."
-
-"Please don't speak about it," replied Willoughby quietly. "That was my
-affair and mine alone. I guess we can find some more agreeable topic."
-
-"Wal," drawled Buck Ashley, "Tom here was just a-tellin' me a yarn
-that'll interest both you boys a heap, or the lieutenant at all events,
-for he's new to these parts and don't know the local hist'ry yet. Of
-course I've heard the story before, but not all the pertic'lars the way
-Tom can tell 'em. And its a dangnation good story. So start from the
-beginnin' again, Tom."
-
-Thus addressed, the sheriff, after taking a bite from his tobacco plug,
-began:
-
-"The yarn has to do with the old-time bandit Joaquin Murietta, about
-whom we were speakin' the other morn in'. Well, the way it all happened
-was this: On a neighboring ranch, over Ventura way, beyond the Lagunita
-Rancho, owned at that time by Senor Olivas, a rich cattle dealer comes
-down from 'Frisco to buy a bunch of beeves. The stock had all been
-driven up on a mesa near the Olivas ranch house, and for several days
-the herders had been cuttin' out the cows and the young calves from the
-steers, 'cause this feller was only goin' to buy the steers.
-
-"The great herd was bellerin' and pawin' in a big cloud of dust, through
-which the vaqueros--cowboys, you know, lieutenant--could be seen ridin'
-round and round. Of course roundin' up cattle is always more or less
-excitin' work, but this rich chap had come down from 'Frisco with his
-saddle bags bulgin' out with gold, and this sorta added a mighty sight
-to the interest of the doin's. Part of the bargain was that the deal
-was to be for spot cash, all in gold, too, mind you, and it was arranged
-that the buyer and Senor Olivas were to take their stations at one side
-of the narrow gate, and every time a steer was driven through that gate
-a twenty-dollar gold piece was to be tossed into a big bag which Senor
-Olivas was holdin'.
-
-"They do say as how the work continued all day, from early mornin' until
-dark, afore the last blamed steer passed that 'ere gate, and they claim
-that there was eighty thousand dollars in the Senor's bag as pay for the
-day's drive. They say, too, that Joaquin Murietta, disguised, was one
-of the vaqueros doin' the drivin'. Anyway that very night old Olivas was
-waked up mighty abruptly by feelin' the cold nose of a revolver shoved
-against his own nose.
-
-"Well, the long and short of it all was that Senor Olivas and his wife
-were both gagged and bound hand and foot, while Murietta ransacked the
-house, found the strong box and carried away every blamed gold coin that
-Olivas had received for the sale of his steers. The outlaw succeeded in
-makin' his escape into the Tehachapi mountains with his cut-throat gang,
-and they found a hidin' place in the robbers' cave that is somewhere
-hereabouts on the San Antonio Rancho. It sure was as slick a piece of
-rascality as was ever pulled off in the old lawless days."
-
-"Well," observed Buck Ashley, as he shook his head reflectively, "I'm
-assoomin' some of the cowboy fellers around here will find that cave one
-of these days. I've put in a good many Sundays huntin' for it myself."
-
-Just then there was the sound of horses' hoofs outside, and a moment
-later Jack Rover strolled into the store. Over his shoulder was slung
-the big leather bag for the rancho mails.
-
-"Hallo, everybody," was his greeting. "I'm ahead of time Buck, but the
-stage will be here in five minutes. I saw its dust above the ridge. I
-hear, lieutenant," he went on, "you're going to stick to the West and be
-one of us."
-
-"Quit the army?" exclaimed Tom Baker in surprise.
-
-"That is so," replied Munson. "California has fairly got hold of me, and
-I intend to make my home in the West."
-
-"Then you just stick here, young man," said the sheriff, rising to his
-feet and extending his hand. "California is the pick of the States, and
-our valley the pick of California. Don't you forget it. We're proud to
-welcome you as a new resident."
-
-"That's what I say, too," concurred Buck Ashley, cordially.
-
-Munson smiled. "Well, I don't know if you can put me in the resident
-class all at once," he observed, diffidently. "Guess I've got to join
-the cowboy brigade first, if Dick and Jack here will break me in."
-
-"Sure thing," assented Jack Hover. "You're a good rider now--for an army
-man."
-
-"An ex-army man," corrected Willoughby, laughing.
-
-"It strikes me we should put you in as postmaster, Munson," suggested
-the sheriff, a sly gleam of mischief in his eye. "Buck Ashley here is
-growin' old."
-
-"Yes, but not too old to hold down his job till your tombstone's in the
-cemetery, Tom Baker," retorted the storekeeper, with a grin. "No man
-takes the Tejon postmastership while I'm alive," he added defiantly.
-
-"I'm forewarned and won't apply for your job, Buck," laughed Munson.
-"But here comes the stage, so show your spryness, old fellow, by getting
-us our mail."
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VIII--A Letter from San Quentin
-
-|BUCK ASHLEY had retired into the partitioned-off section of the store
-that formed the postoffice, and was busy stamping and sorting out
-the mail. The scattered loiterers outside crowded into the building
-expectantly, and the local parliament was in session. Amid the buzz
-of conversation Willoughby could not but hear his own name mentioned,
-coupled with that of Marshall Thurston. He understood quite well that
-all manner of gossip was flying around in regard to the quarrel at the
-round-up. But he remained stoically indifferent, shut his ears, and
-leaning against the counter busied himself with an old _Saturday Evening
-Post_ that had been lying there.
-
-At last the wicket was shoved up with a bang, and those present began to
-move toward the little aperture through which Buck Ashley proceeded to
-hand out correspondence and newspapers. One by one the throng melted
-away. Jack Rover was examining the big bunch of mail for San Antonio
-Rancho as he stowed it into the letter bag. Munson was opening and
-gleaning the contents of two or three letters that had come to him from
-New York. Dick Willoughby continued his reading, unconcerned; Jack would
-pass over any correspondence for him. Old Tom Baker had not risen from
-his accustomed seat on an empty box; he had few correspondents, and
-the mail did not worry him, although he invariably assisted with his
-presence at its distribution.
-
-These four were now the only ones in the store besides Buck Ashley, who
-still remained behind the partition. At last the postmaster appeared,
-holding in his hand an open letter. His face showed great agitation as
-he glanced around to take stock of those who might be present.
-
-"Say, boys," he whispered in a mysterious manner, as he held up the
-letter, "this is the most dangnation extr'ornery thing that has ever
-happened to me. You're just the bunch of fellers I'd like to consult.
-Close the door, Tom."
-
-"What's up, Buck?" asked the sheriff as he rose to comply. "You look as
-if you had the ague shakes."
-
-"No ague in this here land of California," laughed Jack Rover. "Is it a
-proposal of marriage you've been getting, Buck?"
-
-"A derned heap better'n that. God 'lmighty, boys, this may mean millions
-for all of us. Shoot the bolt, Tom; I'll hand out no more groceries
-tonight. Come close together, all of you. You read the letter aloud,
-Dick. My hand's a-tremb-lin', and I can't get the Frenchie's lingo just
-right."
-
-"The Frenchie?" echoed Tom Baker in puzzled surprise.
-
-"It's a letter from Pierre Luzon," explained Buck.
-
-"Good God!" The sheriff was now as deeply stirred as his old crony.
-
-"The bandit scout you were telling us about the other morning?"
-exclaimed Jack Rover, also fired with excitement.
-
-"I thought that fellow was in San Quentin for life." remarked Munson,
-composedly.
-
-"Wal, and ain't this letter from San Quentin?" retorted Buck. "See the
-headin'! But Dick'll read it aloud. I feel clean knocked out." And the
-old man sank back on his chair behind the counter.
-
-The four others were now clustered around Dick Willoughby. The latter,
-deputized to do the reading, had nonchalantly taken the epistle from
-Buck Ashley's trembling hand. While the others were speaking he had
-bestowed a preliminary glance, and from his lips there escaped a murmur
-of surprise.
-
-"Great Caesar!" As he uttered the ejaculation Dick sat up, keenly alert.
-
-"Well, what's it all about?" inquired Munson, by this time the only cool
-man in the bunch.
-
-"Read, read!" cried the storekeeper hoarsely.
-
-Dick Willoughby began:
-
-"Mr. Buck Ashley, Storekeeper, Tejon, California.
-
-"If God in His goodness permits this letter to come to your hands,
-remember it is from old Pierre, the Frenchman, who used to be about your
-store sometimes a half a day at a time, smoking his pipe. You never knew
-much about me or where I lived. But I will tell you.
-
-"I am an old man now--very old. I was born in the South of France, came
-to this country in the '40's and entered into the service of Joaquin
-Murietta, who was one great man, but a big bandit. Peace to his soul!
-Well, he was good to me, and I was faithful to him, taking care of the
-cave, the big grotto, the cavern among the Tehachapi mountains where he
-many times hid from the sheriff's posse, and also, where he brought all
-his gold to stack up and keep from everybody.
-
-"You also know Don Manuel, him whom the people call White Wolf. Well,
-once when a boy, Don Manuel he save Marietta's life from the sheriff by
-helping him to escape from one close place. Murietta was very grateful,
-and one day he bring the boy to the grotto cave, and there I see him and
-like him very much. That was while Murietta still lived.
-
-"Afterward when the little boy grow up and was one man, and turned
-bitter against the gringos because they wrong his sister, Senorita
-Rosetta, and his old father and mother die of grief, he say to me, 'I
-will become a bandit like Joaquin Murietta.' He came to the cavern one
-night and tell me and say, 'You be my servant.' So I say, 'All right,'
-because Don Manuel one brave man.
-
-"So that night of the great stage robbery over near Lake of Tulare,
-I hold horses. That's all I do, but all the same they put me in this
-horrid prison, and here I am. The other two men, Felix Vasquez and Fox
-Cassidy, were shot by the posse and I have been told by a Portugee in
-the jail here about the White Wolf being killed away north in Seattle,
-and he is no more.
-
-"Don Manuel de Valencia, he was one great man. Peace to his soul!
-
-"I am alone. I want to get away from this terrible prison. I have
-promised one of my guards--a good Frenchman who comes from my town
-in France--$5,000 in gold if he can secretly get this letter into
-postoffice to you and get me away from this living hell. You do this and
-I show you the cavern. Nobody knows where it is but me.
-
-"Come and get me, please, my good Mr. Ashley, come, and may the spirit
-of the Virgin Mary reward you. All I say here is truth. You come get me
-and I show you the secret grotto. I show you the great stacks of gold
-hidden by Joaquin Murietta and Don Manuel. Also the sand-bar in the
-hidden stream where Guadalupe gathered up much gold.
-
-"I beg and pray you to keep what I say in this letter secret. I am old
-and weak and sick. Come and get me.
-
-"Obedient servant,
-
-"Pierre Luzon."
-
-"Ain't that just one hell of a letter, boys?" exclaimed Buck Ashley.
-
-"Gospel truth, every word," cried Tom Baker, emphatically.
-
-"It certainly reads like the truth," concurred Munson.
-
-"Then what are we going to do about it?" asked Jack Rover.
-
-Dick Willoughby spoke now with the quiet and quick decision that marks
-the leader of men:
-
-"What we will do is this. We five are partners in this secret, and, if
-Buck is willing, we'll play the game together for all it is worth. To
-begin with, we'll put up one hundred dollars apiece to send Tom Baker to
-Sacramento. He will try to get a pardon or a parole for Pierre Luzon."
-
-"That can be managed," assented the sheriff. "I've got a political pull,
-you know, boys."
-
-"Well," continued Dick, "we'll bring old Pierre here and we'll get from
-him the information he promises about the secret grotto."
-
-"Not forgetting Guadalupe's placer mine," interjected Jack Rover.
-
-"Everything will be attended to in its turn," replied Dick. "One thing
-at a time, and the first thing to be done is to get the Frenchman out of
-San Quentin. When can you start, Tom?"
-
-"The day after tomorrow."
-
-"Well, we'll have the cash ready for you by tomorrow night. You must
-bring Pierre Luzon here without anyone else besides ourselves knowing
-his name or getting next to him."
-
-"I'll fix up a cot for him in my own room behind the store," suggested
-Buck Ashley.
-
-"That's a good plan," assented Dick. "When the Frenchman's here, it
-will be time then to discuss our next move. Meanwhile, it's an honorable
-promise of secrecy all round, and to begin with I give my word."
-
-While speaking the last words, Dick solemnly raised his hand, and each
-man in turn followed his example as he gave the pledge required.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER IX--Tia Teresa
-
-|TEN days had passed and the count of the stock on San Antonio Rancho
-had been completed, every canyon searched, the last wandering maverick
-roped and branded, the number of fat beeves accurately estimated. Three
-members of the Los Angeles syndicate had arrived in a big automobile and
-remained over night at the ranch house. Most of the time they had been
-closeted with Ben Thurston in his office, and had finally taken their
-departure without exchanging a word with anyone else on the rancho.
-Nobody knew whether the deal had gone through or not, but rumor said
-that, after some disagreement on the first day, terms had been arranged
-next morning.
-
-Dick Willoughby, although he discussed the question with no one, made
-his own inferences. The very fact that the visitors had not made any
-inspection of the property proved that they already knew it thoroughly
-well. The counting of the cattle and horses had been the final factor
-in the negotiations, and the figures had enabled the deal to advance a
-further stage toward completion. Ben Thurston might fool himself about
-easy option money put up only to be forfeited, but Dick Willoughby was
-not fooled. The days of closer settlement in California had come, and
-these Los Angeles men were the most enterprising and skilful subdividers
-in the West. They dealt only in big propositions, and after mopping
-up all the available tracts in the southern end of the State, were
-extending their operations northward. This vast so-called "Spanish
-grant," an empire in itself, had no doubt for several years been in
-their eye, and now they were prepared to handle the San Antonio Rancho
-with the lavish expenditure it deserved and required to transform the
-great sweep of cattle range--rich agricultural land, as the luxuriant
-native grasses showed--into smiling orchards and alfalfa farms, each
-provided with the irrigation water which intelligent conservation would
-ensure in abundance.
-
-Dick knew in his heart that the era of transformation had at last come,
-that the roaming herds were to be pushed back into regions more remote,
-that homes and schoolhouses and garden cities would soon be dotting the
-landscape, that the passing of Ben Thurston, the cattle king, and of his
-hard-riding, devil-may-care vaqueros was at hand.
-
-Yet Thurston spoke no word--in fact, he seemed to be more grouchy and
-taciturn than ever. Not even his son Marshall was in his confidence, for
-the young man was seldom with his father, preferring to spend his
-time in the drinking saloons and dance halls of Bakersfield, where the
-activity of oil-developing operations attracted all sorts and conditions
-of men, among whom the dissipated decadent had readily found friends to
-his liking.
-
-Ben Thurston who had gone the pace himself in his early days, did not
-seek to interfere with his son's pursuit of pleasures, but he had very
-promptly squelched any interference from Marshall with his own business
-operations. On the evening of the quarrel with Dick Willoughby at the
-round-up, Marshall had attempted to tell his father about the affair and
-suggest Dick's dismissal. But the old man had at once silenced him
-by saying: "Why, damn you! I brought you out to this country to enjoy
-yourself and not to get into trouble. So far as Willoughby is concerned,
-I can't afford to quarrel with him. He is my foreman, and I am right
-in the midst of a big business transaction. So just you mind your own
-business, my boy, and leave him alone."
-
-Accordingly, Marshall Thurston, a coward at heart, had not sought to
-pursue the feud singlehanded, and Dick had seen but little of him during
-the rest of the mustering work. When they did happen to meet, it was a
-case of a black scowl of hate from the one and a contemptuous smile of
-indifference from the other. And so the days had passed until the task
-was finished.
-
-It was the Sunday morning that had been fixed for the visit to the
-home of Mr. Ricardo Robles, when the cattle foreman could at last
-conscientiously take a day of recreation. With the first break of dawn
-he and Munson were in the saddle, for they had been invited to breakfast
-at La Siesta before starting with the young ladies on the ride through
-the oak forest.
-
-The visitors arrived early, but not too early for their hostesses. Grace
-and Merle were waiting to welcome them in the portico, looking more
-charming than ever in their neat riding suits of khaki.
-
-"We saw you cross the bridge," declared Grace, "and mother has gone in
-to order breakfast to be served. You must be hungry after your early
-start."
-
-"Oh, Sing Ling didn't let us go without a cup of coffee," laughed Dick.
-"But I fancy we'll do full justice, all right, to the bountiful fare of
-La Siesta."
-
-It proved to be a delightful meal in every way, the viands seasoned with
-gay repartee and laughter. A full hour had sped before Dick recalled the
-real object of the day's excursion.
-
-"We usually walk to Mr. Robles' place," remarked Merle. "It is only a
-mile or so by the short cuts up the hill, but by the winding road it is
-very much longer. So we ordered our ponies."
-
-"I see," smiled Munson, "to prolong the pleasure of our foursome among
-the oaks."
-
-"Not at all, sir," retorted Grace. "The climb on foot is a stiff one,
-and we knew that you must be out of condition from the lazy life you are
-living."
-
-"I am only waiting for Willoughby to give me a cowboy's job," replied
-the ex-lieutenant.
-
-"I don't know if there will be any cowboy jobs going," observed
-Willoughby. "It's my belief that San Antonio Rancho is sold and is going
-to be broken up into small holdings."
-
-"Oh, what a pity!" exclaimed Merle.
-
-"From one point of view, perhaps," answered Dick. "But from a hundred
-other points of view, what a blessing! There will be a dozen happy homes
-for every steer the range now feeds!"
-
-"But La Siesta will remain just as it is," cried Grace.
-
-"That will be all right," replied Dick, gallantly, "It's already a happy
-home."
-
-The ladies smiled pleasantly.
-
-"Then this will mean the elimination of Mr. Ben Thurston," observed Mrs.
-Darlington.
-
-"The greatest blessing of all," declared Merle, clapping her hands. "You
-see, I am already converted to the change, Mr. Willoughby," she added
-merrily.
-
-"But what about my job?" asked Munson in mock dolefulness.
-
-"Consult Mr. Robles," laughed Grace. "He may take pity on you, and find
-you a place as handy man on his estate."
-
-In merry mood they all sallied forth. The saddle horses were waiting,
-and standing beside them was an elderly Spanish woman.
-
-"Tia Teresa, Mr. Munson," said Mrs. Darlington by way of introduction.
-
-Munson had often enough heard the name, and in answer to an inquiry,
-Willoughby had told him that the old dame had been the personal
-attendant of the two young ladies ever since they could remember. Tia
-or Aunt Teresa was now more a friend of the family than a servant of the
-house, and, taking her hand in salutation, Munson treated her with the
-affable courtesy that was her due.
-
-"I am glad to make your acquaintance," he said, raising his hat.
-
-Tia Teresa looked pleased. Despite her seventy years, she was a buxom
-and splendidly preserved woman, and there was still the flash of
-youthfulness in her big dark eyes.
-
-"You will look after my little girls," she said, as she gathered
-together the folds of her black lace mantilla. "By rights I should
-be coming with you, too," she added, in the manner of a true Spanish
-duenna.
-
-"You forget that we are home again--in free America," laughed Merle as
-she settled herself in the saddle.
-
-"Too free, I sometimes think," rejoined Tia Teresa. "But there is safety
-in four," she added, turning with a smile to Mrs. Darlington.
-
-And as the young folks rode away she waved them a pleasant _adios_.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER X--The Home of the Recluse
-
-|AT a gentle pace they wound their way through the forest of magnificent
-old oaks.
-
-As for Munson, riding by Grace Darlington's side, the miles were the
-shortest he had ever before traversed. It seemed only a few minutes
-before the red tiled roof and towers of a house built in the California
-Mission style were gleaming through the trees only a short distance
-ahead.
-
-Great oaken doors closed the arched gateway, but at the clatter of hoofs
-and the sound of voices, a little peep-hole wicket was withdrawn. The
-inspection by unseen eyes apparently was satisfactory, for a moment
-later a postern was opened, and two men, Mexicans obviously by their
-garb and deferential manner, emerged to take and lead away the horses.
-Within the patio stood Senor Robles, his usually grave face lighted by a
-smile of cordial welcome.
-
-"Let me tell you, young men," he said while shaking hands, "that while
-Grace and Merle are quite at home here, you are the very first strangers
-who have passed through my portals."
-
-"Strangers no longer then," said Dick, good-naturedly.
-
-"Precisely," replied Mr. Robles, "or you would not be here. But I
-foresee that all of us are going to be very close friends. Isn't that
-so, Grace, my dear?"
-
-"I'm sure I cannot say," replied Grace, with a smile of demure innocence
-toward Mr. Munson. Then she turned to Mr. Robles with a roguish twinkle
-in her eye. "But I've news for you. Mr. Munson has resigned from the
-army and is looking for a job."
-
-"Both facts are already known to me," answered Robles, smiling.
-
-"Oh," exclaimed Grace, "one can never surprise you, Mr. Robles. Although
-you live the life of a hermit, you seem to be always the first to learn
-everything that is going on."
-
-"A hermit, my dear, need not necessarily be out of touch with the
-world," replied Robles, playfully pinching her ear. "And now, Mr.
-Willoughby, you came specially to see my pictures. Lead the way, Merle.
-Gentlemen, I say again--welcome to my mountain home."
-
-They lingered awhile in the patio to admire the marble columns of the
-cloister that ran all around, the playing fountains at each of the four
-comers, with groups of symbolical statuary, the wealth of beautiful
-shrubs and flowers. On the side opposite to the gateway rose a tall
-tower, fashioned like the campanile of an Old Mission and crowned with
-bright red tiles.
-
-"We shall ascend there later on," remarked Mr. Robles, following Dick's
-upward glance.
-
-Then they passed through the wide-opened French window into the living
-rooms.
-
-The first was a great apartment that occupied one entire side of the
-building. In the centre was a large globe of the world. Here and there
-were glass cases displaying manuscripts and illuminated missals. Along
-the walls were finely-carved bookcases filled with several thousands of
-volumes.
-
-"When you have the leisure you can come and browse here," said the
-host, addressing both young men. "Meanwhile you may care to look at the
-bronzes and statuary"--this with a sweep of the hand that indicated the
-art treasures distributed about the apartment.
-
-On the side of the house beneath the tower were the dining room and the
-billiard and smoking room. Passing through these, the visitors came to
-the picture gallery, a room corresponding in size to the library. Here
-were hung treasures of the painter's art, masterpieces signed by names
-that are immortal. These, as their owner again explained, had been
-acquired by him during several prolonged visits to Europe.
-
-"Count this just as a preliminary survey, Mr. Willoughby," he said
-finally. "Then come again. There are guest chambers on either side of
-the gateway, and one of these will always be at your disposal when I am
-at home. I extend the same invitation to you, Mr. Munson."
-
-"My word, but you may feel honored," exclaimed Grace, in unconcealed
-amazement.
-
-"When I open my gates, I open my heart as well," said Mr. Robles, with a
-courtly little bow to his new friends.
-
-Next they ascended the tower. Its first floor, above the living rooms,
-was a delightful den filled with curios of all kinds. From this sprang a
-winding iron staircase, up which Mr. Robles led the way.
-
-The upper chamber, extending on all sides some distance beyond the
-supporting tower, proved larger than might have been expected. Its one
-conspicuous article of furniture was a great terrestrial telescope. The
-sliding panels of glass which formed a complete window all around the
-room showed that the instrument could be used without obstruction in any
-direction.
-
-Here a Mexican boy was on duty. When the visitors entered, his hand was
-resting on the telescope. A bright red sash around his waist imparted a
-touch of picturesqueness to his costume. He was perhaps only twelve or
-thirteen years of age, but wonderfully keen and alert-looking for his
-years. At a glance from his master, the youngster took his departure,
-closing the door behind him.
-
-"Gentlemen," remarked Mr. Robles, when they were again alone, "perhaps
-before I brought you here I should have exacted the promise I am now
-going to ask you to make. Grace and Merle know that I am a recluse and
-wish to live undisturbed by curiosity-mongers or tittle-tattlers. I want
-nobody but the friends I deliberately choose to know about my habits
-of living or the contents of my home. Only in this way can I hope to
-be left alone. Therefore, please give me your word, Mr. Willoughby and
-Lieutenant Munson, that you will not speak with any outsider about the
-things I am showing you today."
-
-The promise was instantly given and sealed by a hearty hand clasp.
-
-"Now," resumed the host in lighter tone, "perhaps you would like to view
-the landscape. I may explain that I had this observatory, as I call it,
-specially built and equipped so that I could sweep the valley from end
-to end. For example, I saw you two young men riding along the road this
-morning," he went on, with a smile. "I saw one of you alight, about
-twelve miles from here--it was you, lieutenant--and tighten the girths
-of your saddle."
-
-"Great Scott!" murmured Munson, in half-incredulous surprise.
-
-"Test the glass for yourself," continued Robles, as, placing one eye
-at the lens, he adjusted the instrument. "Look"--and he stepped back,
-motioning Munson to approach.
-
-Munson peeped through the long tube and there came from his lips a cry
-of mingled delight and amazement.
-
-"Dick, Dick, there's the store as large as life--Buck Ashley standing
-at the door and lighting a cigar. Geewhizz, and it must be twenty miles
-away."
-
-He rose erect and made room for Dick. The latter gazed in silence for a
-few moments. When he turned to Mr. Robles he said:
-
-"It's really wonderful--it is the most wonderful glass I ever looked
-through."
-
-There was the glimmer of an exultant smile on the face of Ricardo
-Robles.
-
-"I saw you at the round-up across the valley the other day," he
-remarked. "You were much nearer to me than is the store. And while I do
-not invite any confidence, Mr. Willoughby, you certainly engaged in
-a very spirited conversation, to say the least, with young Marshall
-Thurston. Indeed, I half expected to see you come to blows."
-
-"What was that?" asked Merle in some trepidation.
-
-Willoughby had reddened.
-
-"Nothing of consequence," he responded, almost curtly. "I had to tell
-the young cub to mind his own business. That was all."
-
-"You certainly have the whole valley under observation," remarked
-Munson, considerately diverting the conversation.
-
-"Yes," assented Mr. Robles, with an almost grim smile of satisfaction.
-"The telescope teaches one not merely to observe, but to reason from the
-facts observed. Tia Teresa evidently thought that she should have come
-along today to play duenna, eh, Merle?"
-
-"You don't say you guessed that?" exclaimed Merle in great astonishment.
-
-"Guessed it! I knew it when she raised her protesting finger."
-
-"You are a magician, Mr. Robles," cried Grace.
-
-"No, only a logician," was the sententious rejoinder.
-
-"Please let me peep at our garden," asked Merle. "I wonder if mother is
-among her roses."
-
-Without a word Robles swung round the instrument on its pivot and
-changed the focus.
-
-"That's about right," he said, stepping back. "There is no one out
-of doors at present. Move the glass slightly and you can see over the
-entire garden."
-
-Each girl in turn made a prolonged scrutiny; they were enchanted with
-the clearness and marvellous detail of the picture.
-
-"Henceforth we'll have to be on our best behavior, Dick," laughed
-Munson, as they turned toward the winding stairway. "We've got to
-remember Mr. Robles has a constant eye on us."
-
-"Perhaps I've had you under observation quite a while," laughed the
-senor, tapping the young fellow on the shoulder.
-
-Then he threw open the door, and, with a slight bow and extended hand,
-motioned to his visitors to descend. At the foot of the narrow, winding
-staircase they found the Mexican youth standing on guard. He bowed low
-as the ladies passed, and when Mr. Robles followed last of all, saluted,
-and then immediately returned to the chamber above, again without
-a single word of instruction from his master. Munson and Willoughby
-exchanged meaning looks; obviously a well-disciplined outlook was kept
-from the observatory all the time, as if from the conning-tower of a
-battleship.
-
-Again the party was in the patio. Mr. Robles turned to Willoughby.
-
-"I hope Grace and Merle have explained to you that at present I do not
-entertain. My own fare is of the simplest."
-
-"Mother is to have luncheon ready at one," interposed Grace. "I caught
-the broiled trout myself this morning."
-
-"You caught them ready broiled, eh?" laughed Munson.
-
-"Oh, you know what I mean," rejoined Grace, with a pretty little _moue_.
-
-"Broiled trout!" exclaimed Dick, appreciatively. "Then I think we'll
-be hurrying down the hill, senor." He had recognized with intuitive
-courtesy that the interview was at an end.
-
-"Is he not delightful?" asked Merle, as their horses started off at a
-walk. "And you would never guess how sweet and kind he can be."
-
-"I don't doubt it," assented Willoughby. "A polished gentleman, but a
-man of mystery, isn't he?"
-
-"Not when you come to know him. A recluse always has his little
-idiosyncrasies." As she spoke, she set her pony at a canter down the
-gentle incline.
-
-After luncheon, Dick found himself t�te-�-t�te with Mrs. Darlington in
-the music room. The mystery attaching to the personality of the recluse
-was still uppermost in his mind. But for the present the music claimed
-his attention.
-
-Merle had seated herself at the grand piano and was softly fingering the
-keys, striking a chord here and there, until finally she drifted into
-Chopin's Fifth Nocturne. There was something almost divine in her
-interpretation. The music fairly rippled from her deft fingers, as they
-glided on from one beautiful cadence to another until at last, note by
-note, as if sobbing a reluctant adieu, the melody died away.
-
-Both the visitors were generous in their tributes of congratulation.
-
-"Thank you," said Merle, as she arose from the piano and proceeded to
-unfasten the clasps of a violin case.
-
-"What now?" exclaimed Munson.
-
-"Oh, I am not the performer; I am merely the accompanist," and she
-held out a beautiful old violin to Grace. As Merle sounded a key on the
-piano, Grace touched the strings of the Stradivarius. When all was ready
-she tenderly caressed the violin with her chin, and, her bow sweeping
-across the instrument, Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata trembled from the
-strings, in soft and plaintive melody, filling the room with echoing
-and re-echoing notes of sweetness, while Merle's accompanying notes lent
-support, in blending harmony, to the rich cadences.
-
-"Splendid! magnificent!" exclaimed the young men in unison.
-
-Munson was now called upon to sing, and Dick felt himself at full
-liberty to converse with Mrs. Darlington. He broached the subject that
-had been occupying his thoughts.
-
-"What is known of Senor Ricardo Robles?" he enquired. "Have you been
-long acquainted?"
-
-"Oh, I have known him for many, many years," replied Mrs. Darlington.
-"We used to be next door neighbors in Los Angeles. That was twenty years
-ago. Then we returned to England--Mr. Darlington had fallen heir to the
-family estates. Mr. Robles used to visit us off and on. He is, as you
-have seen, very fond of Grace"--she paused a moment, then went on--"and
-of my adopted daughter Merle as well. Merle, you know, was the child of
-my dearest girl friend who died a year after her baby was born."
-
-"Yes, Merle has told me this."
-
-"Well, six years ago my dear husband died, and it was Mr. Robles who
-persuaded me to return to California. He selected this beautiful ranch
-for us, near to his own home. And we have all been so happy here at La
-Siesta."
-
-"Mr. Robles is certainly a wonderful man, with all those art treasures
-around him."
-
-"He has princely tastes and princely wealth as well--this you will have
-seen for yourself today. He travels a great deal abroad, sometimes for a
-whole year at a time, and then returns quietly to his hermitage. He has
-taken a great fancy to you, Mr. Willoughby. You are lucky in gaining the
-friendship of such a man."
-
-"I think I'll like him, too--when I know him better," replied
-Willoughby, with cautious reserve.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XI--A Rejected Suitor
-
-|IN Dick Willoughby's presence Marshall Thurston contented himself with
-sullen looks. But beyond his sight and hearing he spoke truculently of
-what he was going to do some day to get level with "the hired hand who
-had had the infernal insolence to call him down in public." So all the
-little world on the rancho knew, or at least believed, that a bitter
-feud was in progress.
-
-Two or three of the cowboys fostered young Marshall's feelings of
-animosity, partly out of sheer devilment, partly because they deemed
-it good policy to keep in the good graces of the heir to the rancho.
-Moreover, so long as old Ben Thurston knew nothing about it, they were
-always willing to break a bottle with the dissipated spendthrift, not
-only because good liquor was not to be despised at any time, but also
-for the sake of the amusement afforded by Marshall, in his cups, with
-his stories of fast life in New York and his apparently inexhaustible
-fund of highly spiced anecdotes. Even his braggart threats against
-Willoughby had an element of fun.
-
-"Why don't you cut him out with the girl?" one of his boon companions
-had suggested on an occasion of this kind.
-
-"By gad, I will," Marshall had responded with vehemence. "You just watch
-me."
-
-Thenceforward this thought was uppermost in his alcohol-sodden brain.
-
-Marshall Thurston had met Mrs. Darlington and her daughter on several
-occasions, but, although he had been formally introduced, he had never
-been invited to call at La Siesta. Nor up to the present had he felt any
-inducement to take the initiative. Like clings to like, and these people
-were not of his kind--in the presence of pure and refined womanhood the
-human toad becomes uncomfortably conscious of his own loathsomeness.
-
-But now there was a valid reason to egg him on. He would show Dick
-Willoughby who was who on the San Antonio Rancho. If the heir to all
-those broad acres chose to pay court to Merle Farnsworth, the girl would
-only be too glad to jump at him and his millions. He would tell her,
-too, that Willoughby was going to be fired and that the fellow was not
-worth a moment's consideration.
-
-Such was his mood one afternoon when, his motor car being in the repair
-shop, he had not made his usual trip to Bakersfield. "Yes, he would
-ride over that very day to La Siesta;" and he proceeded to fortify the
-resolve by opening a bottle of champagne in the solitary seclusion of
-his den. After gulping down the wine he felt brave enough to face
-the devil himself. Yet, when mounted on his horse, he still evinced
-sufficient discretion to make a wide detour lest Willoughby should catch
-sight of him and divine his intentions.
-
-As he rode along young Thurston nursed his wrath to keep it warm. At
-the same time the desire to possess the girl for her own sake began to
-inflame his imagination. Unscrupulous passion had been bred in the very
-bone of this worthless degenerate. Just as his father, Ben Thurston, had
-thirty years before trampled on the virtue of the young Spanish beauty,
-Senorita Rosetta, the sister of Don Manuel, so now was the son hatching
-in his brain a foul plot of spoliation.
-
-"I'll get even with Willoughby, by God, in the very way that will
-hurt his pride the most. Women!--pshaw, they're all alike. And she's a
-peacherino all right--those flashing dark eyes--she sure looks good to
-me." This was now the tenor of his musing as his pony cantered up the
-slope to La Siesta.
-
-He advanced on foot to the portico with a swagger and a smile, and
-there, as luck would have it, he found Merle seated in a rocker,
-reading, and alone. She rose with quiet courtesy and returned his
-greeting.
-
-"I am sorry," she said, "mother is not at home. She and my sister Grace
-have driven over to the dairy. We have a model dairy, you know, on La
-Siesta," she went on, anxious to make conversation that would not prove
-embarrassing. For already she divined some particular object in the
-young man's visit, knowing as she did that he and Willoughby had
-recently exchanged angry words.
-
-"Won't you show me your famous rose gardens?" asked Thurston, boldly.
-
-"With pleasure," she replied, assenting with a sweet smile of
-politeness, although there was sore reluctance in her heart, as she
-stepped from under the portico.
-
-But, unknown to herself, she did not go unattended, for as Merle and her
-visitor passed round the house and through the shrubberies there glided
-after them the figure of a woman, clothed in black, wearing over her
-head and shoulders a Spanish mantilla. It was Tia Teresa, the ever
-watchful duenna.
-
-The roses of La Siesta, as Marshall Thurston had said, were indeed
-famous. Here were all the finest varieties, growing in the perfection
-to which only care and scientific skill applied under ideal climatic
-conditions can attain. Merle was glad to point out the different blooms
-and give them their names--the topic was certainly an innocuous one,
-and she smiled at the thought as they strolled along. She was vaguely
-wondering, too, whether Dick Willoughby would approve even this slight
-measure of courtesy toward the visitor to her home. Although she had
-as yet not the remotest conception that the quarrel at the round-up had
-been in any way connected with her name, she knew that the two young men
-were at daggers drawn, and toward Dick there was the instinctive loyalty
-in her heart that prompted her to count his enemies as her enemies, his
-friends as her friends.
-
-The young girl was too unversed in the ways of the world to notice
-that Marshall Thurston was under the influence of wine. He was too
-experienced a toper to show any signs of unsteadiness on his feet, but
-all the same there was undoubted tipsiness in his leering side-glances
-and occasional slurring of his words. Of this Merle in her maidenly
-innocence was supremely unconscious, nor did she dream that the very
-sparkle of her eyes was completing the intoxication of wine fumes.
-
-Once she cast a look up the hill and asked herself whether the wizard
-of the red-tiled tower had his spy-glass on La Siesta and was even
-then quietly surveying the scene in the gardens. The thought made her
-uncomfortable; she felt sure that her kind friend, Mr. Robles, would
-not look with favor on her condescending to show even the slightest
-attention to one whose evil ways of living were notorious.
-
-Suddenly she came to a halt, close beside a little clump of oleander
-trees laden with rich blossoms.
-
-"I am sorry I must leave you now," she said, quite abruptly.
-
-"Leave me?" stammered Thurston. "What for?"
-
-"I have other things to attend to," she replied.
-
-"Oh, I say, Miss Farnsworth"--the inebriate as he spoke made a gesture
-of appeal--"I hope you are not angry with me. If that scalawag of a
-fellow Willoughby told you I said anything disrespectful of you the
-other day, he is a demed liar--that's what he is, a derned liar, and a
-poor penniless beggar as well, whom my father's going to fire off the
-ranch."
-
-Merle stood speechless. She stepped back when Thurston advanced with
-outstretched hands.
-
-"The truth of the whole matter is," he rambled on, with growing
-incoherence, "I am madly in love with you myself. That's what I am, and
-I'm going to have you, too." And he grabbed her fiercely and attempted
-to draw her to him.
-
-Merle screamed both in fear and in repulsion as she tried to push him
-away.
-
-Just then, from among the oleanders, rushed Tia Teresa. The old duenna
-came like a cyclone. Her eyes blazed with anger. Grasping the young
-libertine by the collar of his coat, she pulled him madly from the now
-half-fainting girl. Then, whirling him around, she rushed him, with
-the strength and ferocity of a tigress defending her whelps, down the
-gravelled path and flung him bodily over the low retaining wall along
-the embankment that separated the rose gardens from the public road. She
-spat upon his prostrate figure below and rained down on him a torrent of
-imprecations in the Spanish tongue.
-
-It was all over in one brief minute. When young Thurston picked himself
-up, it was to see the aged fury half-leading, half-carrying Merle away
-in the direction of the house.
-
-"The hell cat," he murmured.
-
-Then he brushed the dirt from his coat and straightened out his tumbled
-appearance as best he could. His horse was tied to the gate post a
-hundred yards along the road. He slunk toward it, climbed into the
-saddle, and rode slowly away in the falling twilight. He had been
-thoroughly sobered by the incident, yet continued somewhat dazed, for
-his horse was headed toward the woods and hills and not in the direction
-of home.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XII--The Sped Bullet
-
-|MEANWHILE events had been happening in the conning tower high up
-among the hills. The Mexican boy on duty had observed the lone rider
-approaching the gateway at La Siesta, and for a brief few moments had
-put the figure under observation by the telescope. He had then sprung
-alertly erect and pressed a button on the wall. Mr. Robles had quickly
-responded to the summons, and it was he who had had his eye to the
-lens during the scene in the rose garden which had terminated in the
-ignominious expulsion of young Thurston at the hands of the infuriated
-duenna.
-
-When the recluse at last withdrew his gaze, his hands were clenched and
-he stood absolutely rigid in the tenseness of his indignation. He had
-seen Merle's insultor ride toward the hills and Merle herself taken
-indoors under Tia Teresa's protecting care. For almost a minute the
-storm of rage held him, then he relaxed and his look changed to one of
-terrible determination. He seized a rifle that was hanging on one of the
-walls and swiftly departed.
-
-At the arched gateway he spoke a few words to the two retainers on
-guard, and when he passed through the postern one of them, also equipped
-with a rifle, followed. Taking a cross-cut from the high road, together
-they descended the wooded hillside.
-
-In a little canyon just below the forest Dick Willoughby was rounding
-up a bunch of vagrant steers. He was alone, riding at a walking pace,
-driving a dozen or more beasts in front of him, and keeping an eye among
-the brushwood searching for more.
-
-On the roadway through the woods Marshall Thurston ambled along. He was
-a poor and awkward rider at all times, the discreetly-veiled jest of
-the nimble cowboys, to whom reins, saddle, and spurs were all as second
-nature. Now, when he imagined himself free from observation, he did not
-take pains to display even a semblance of horsemanship and, with bridle
-dropped, steadied himself by a grip on the saddle horn.
-
-In her bedroom Merle had soon recovered from her distress of mind.
-Dashing the tears from her eyes, she had enjoined Tia Teresa to say
-nothing to anyone about the unpleasant incident. Mrs. Darlington would
-be angered and would certainly tell Mr. Robles, while if the story ever
-reached Dick's ears there could be no saying what further trouble might
-not ensue--a horse-whipping at least, with jeopardy to Dick's position
-at the rancho and embitterment of an already dangerous quarrel. So Tia
-Teresa, to complete the comforting process, had assented to secrecy.
-
-On the pathway down through the forest the Mexican, now in advance,
-uttered a low "hist," halted, and held out a warning hand toward his
-master. The gaze of both was now fixed in the same direction. Below them
-could be seen the figure of the horseman coming around a bend in the
-roadway. The Mexican raised his rifle to the shoulder, but the hand of
-Robles detained him. The time was not yet--the distance was too great in
-view of the obstructing timber.
-
-Robles turned away and rested an arm against a tree trunk. His eyes were
-downcast; for the moment his mind was far away. He saw once again the
-little cemetery on the hill, with the marble cross inscribed "Hermana,"
-and the other gravestone at the head of the twin mounds that marked the
-resting place of his parents whose hearts had been broken by Rosetta's
-tragic end. The fingers of the man who had long years ago sworn the
-vendetta worked nervously, closing and unclosing themselves.
-
-The rider was nearer now, in a higher loop of the road where the trees
-were more scattered than below. Merle, drowsy from the reaction of her
-emotions, had dropped off asleep on her sofa. Tia Teresa had returned to
-the portico, to make sure that the interloper had taken himself off
-for good and would not return. In the little canyon Dick Willoughby was
-quietly riding behind his accumulating drove of cattle.
-
-Suddenly a shot from among the woods rang through the air. Tia Teresa
-heard it, and after the start of first surprise, into her eyes came the
-light of swift comprehension and her whole face was illumed by fierce
-vindictive joy. "At last, at last," she murmured, "vengeance begins."
-And in the fervor of her triumph she threw up her extended arms, as if
-to give benediction to a righteous deed.
-
-Dick also heard the sharp detonation which his experienced ear knew at
-once to be from a rifle, not from the shot-gun that some sportsman
-after quail or rabbits might have been using. He betrayed no great
-surprise--just the unspoken word "curious" hovered on his lips as,
-halting his horse, he turned in his saddle to glance upward in the
-direction whence the sound had come. Then after a moment he wheeled the
-pony round, and, abandoning his drove for the present, ascended at a
-leisurely pace the narrow pathway which he knew communicated with the
-winding highroad above.
-
-When the bullet had reached its fated billet, Marshall Thurston's
-fingers were still gripping the saddle horn. And right there the missile
-of death struck, glancing upward from the metal crown and piercing
-the victim right through the heart. Not a cry--just an outflung arm, a
-swaying figure slipping down onto the roadway, and a terrified riderless
-horse pivoting quickly round on its haunches, then galloping madly for
-home.
-
-Dick, glancing upward through the timber, caught a glimpse of the
-fleeing steed, and he touched his own pony with the spur so that it,
-too, darted forward.
-
-Farther along the road Tia Teresa heard the clatter of the hoofs and saw
-the animal in its swift stride disappear in the direction of the rancho.
-She knew now for certain that her surmise was correct, and the first
-flush of triumph on her fact settled down into an expression of grim
-satisfaction. "It served him right in any case." she muttered. "It was
-just what the young villain deserved." Then she re-entered the house and
-passed upstairs. Her young mistress was placidly asleep, smiling in her
-dreams. The duenna nodded her head in a satisfied sort of way; Merle
-would learn the news at the proper time, and would not meanwhile be
-agitated by wild conjectures. So she tiptoed from the room, and was soon
-busied with domestic duties as if nothing had happened.
-
-Dick, emerging on foot from the last steep ascent of the canyon,
-promptly swung himself again into the saddle and started at a loping
-canter up the winding roadway through the woods. After rounding the
-first comer he spied the huddled figure on the ground. Before he turned
-the body over he knew that the man was dead. But when the dead face
-looked up at his, it was with a terrible shock of surprise that he
-recognized Marshall Thurston.
-
-Dick stood for a few moments, gazing around in utter bewilderment. One
-hand of the dead man was shattered and bloody, while a big splurge
-of red on the shirt showed where the bullet had completed its work.
-Murder--palpable murder! But who could have done this deed? Who had any
-valid motive to rid the world of this stray piece of humanity--and in
-such coldblooded manner, not in the heat of some angry quarrel, but by a
-deliberate act of assassination in a place so lonely as these pine-clad
-hills? Dick sat him down by the roadside and pondered these questions.
-
-There was no real pity in his heart. Young Thurston had been utterly
-bad--not big-brained enough to belong to the social dregs, but just
-equally worthless scum, the more repellent because it made itself
-visible all the time. He would pass almost without a tear except from
-the father whose own record had been so foully besmeared that there
-could be scant sympathy even for him in the hour of his bereavement.
-
-Dick just wondered and wondered. For the time being he had quite
-forgotten that old legend--the Vendetta of the Hills.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XIII--Accused
-
-|AROUND the horse corral at the San Antonio Rancho some half-dozen
-cowboys were squatted on their heels, cowboy-fashion, swapping the news
-of the day. They had ridden in from various points of the compass, and
-two or three of their horses, those of the latest comers, still stood
-saddled outside the enclosure, the reins dropped loosely over their
-heads, which for the trained cow-pony is just as effective an anchorage
-as any stake and rope.
-
-Two or three cigarettes were a-light, and the "makings" were passing
-from hand to hand among those not yet engaged in the leisurely blowing
-of smoke rings. The topic of conversation was the rumored sale of the
-ranch, which some declared to be assuredly impending, while others
-dismissed the possibility of such a big deal going through as the merest
-moonshine.
-
-Jack Rover was among those who had no illusions as to the future.
-
-"Believe me, fellers," he was remarking, "it's no false alarm this time.
-The old rancho is as good as sold, the stock is a-going to be shipped
-out, the farmers is a-coming in, and in a few months' time we'll all be
-hunting jobs if there's any more cow-punching jobs left in this blamed
-new topsy-turvy world. And that's the straight goods--hell!"
-
-Just as this terse and vigorous summation of the whole dispute found
-utterance, all eyes were turned in a particular direction. It was young
-Thurston's riderless steed that had attracted attention as it swept
-toward its accustomed quarters in the corral.
-
-"It's Marshall's horse," observed one of the boys.
-
-"Off again, on again, gone again, Flannigan," laughed another--an
-adaptation of a popular story that evoked a general grin.
-
-But one youth had sprung to his feet, and skilfully caught the bridle of
-the panting animal as it passed him.
-
-"Whoa, beauty!"
-
-The others had not stirred. The involuntary dismounting of the young
-boss was too familiar an episode to provoke anything more than a laugh
-tinctured with mild satisfaction--
-
-"No Easterner can ride a Western broncho, anyhow."
-
-"Pass your baccy, Bob," came a voice from the ring. But the cowboy
-holding the riderless horse now brought them all to instant attention.
-
-"By God, he's been shot! There's blood on the horn, and here's the rip
-of the bullet."
-
-Everyone was on their feet now, and the situation was being eagerly
-discussed while the saddle was undergoing confirmatory inspection.
-
-"Something's happened, boys," exclaimed the big husky fellow addressed
-as Bob, conclusively, if somewhat obviously. "And I guess we'd better
-investigate."
-
-As he spoke he swung himself into his saddle--he had been one of the
-late arrivals and his horse was all ready for the road or the range.
-
-"Up toward the hills then," remarked another, indicating the direction
-whence the riderless horse had come. And a moment later he, too, was
-astride his broncho.
-
-"I'll borrow your pony, Ted," cried out Jack Rover as he jumped astride
-a third mustang.
-
-And a moment later all three riders were pelting along the road leading
-to La Siesta. There was no difficulty whatever in picking up the long
-galloping strides on the dusty highway, and the speed of the trackers
-depended only on the swiftness and endurance of their mounts.
-
-Meanwhile the boy who had caught Marshall's horse had disencumbered it
-of saddle and bridle, and turned it into the corral with a kindly pat on
-its heaving flank.
-
-"Guess I'll report to the boss," he called out, as he picked up the
-saddle and moved away toward the ranch home.
-
-"Look out for yourself," shouted one of the group. "Old Thurston will be
-madder than hell."
-
-But it was terror, selfish terror, not anger nor grief, that came into
-Ben Thurston's eyes when he saw the saddle horn smeared with fresh blood
-and scarred by a bullet.
-
-"My God, and I believed Don Manuel was dead," he whispered in a hoarse
-voice to Leach Sharkey.
-
-The two had been, as usual, in close companionship; Sharkey reading a
-weekly newspaper, while the employer he was paid to protect, restlessly,
-as was his wont, paced the room.
-
-"Disappeared and dead ain't exactly the same thing," replied the
-sleuth as he critically examined the saddle. "And there may be another
-explanation to this. What about Dick Willoughby?"
-
-"Yes, yes, Dick Willoughby," eagerly assented the trembling man.
-
-"You saw them quarreling the other day--they hate each other like
-poison," continued Sharkey. "Where's Dick Willoughby now?" he enquired,
-with a swift glance at the cowboy.
-
-"Good Lord, that's just where he is--searching the canyons below the
-forest for mavericks," was the reply.
-
-Sharkey smiled blandly; the informant looked disappointed, yet
-confident.
-
-"I couldn't have believed that of Dick," he added, regretfully.
-
-"Well, clear out now," said Sharkey. "Mr. Thurston and I will want to be
-alone. You say Jack Rover and two others have gone out to search? Well,
-we can't do more till they bring us in some news. Let us know at once
-when they return."
-
-Ben Thurston had collapsed onto a chair, then raised himself, and was
-leaning eagerly forward now. He met Sharkey's glance of hardly concealed
-contempt.
-
-"That's right," he murmured, "It has been Dick Willoughby's work. I knew
-Don Manuel was dead."
-
-"And what about your boy?" asked the sleuth curtly.
-
-"Oh, yes, poor Marshall! I forgot about him. But perhaps he's only
-wounded. We'll send to Bakersfield for a doctor." And he half rose from
-his seat.
-
-"You'll just wait patiently here," replied Sharkey, as he pushed
-Thurston back into his chair. "All that is possible for the present is
-being done."
-
-And the r�les were now reversed--it was the bodyguard who slowly and
-meditatively paced the room.
-
-Meanwhile Dick Willoughby had ceased from his ruminations, and was
-beginning to take practical steps for getting Marshall's body home. He
-had no thought of coroner's regulations that a corpse should be left
-undisturbed till the proper official investigation had been made. He
-had got his riata ready, and was just going to sling the body across
-his saddle and tie it there, when the rhythmic thud of clattering hoofs
-smote upon his ear. Thank God! Help was coming. There would be others
-to assist him in his gruesome task. So Dick patiently waited while the
-sound grew nearer and nearer, until at last the three cowboys dashed
-round the bend.
-
-"I heard the rifle shot," Dick explained, "and rode up from the canyon
-below to have a look. I found him here, huddled up just as you see him
-by the side of the road."
-
-"Who the devil did this?" asked Jack Rover, contemplating the corpse.
-
-"God only knows," replied Dick. "You take him on your saddle, Bob," he
-added, addressing the big cowboy, whose horse was a full hand taller
-than the other ponies and more stalwart in proportion.
-
-And so the cortege was formed, Jack Rover leading the way, with Bob and
-the body following and Dick Willoughby bringing up the rear.
-
-The sun was low when at last they gained the rancho. They made their way
-quietly round to the bunk house and quite tenderly swathed the mortal
-remains of the young boss in a blanket, before carrying it to his
-father's home.
-
-At the sound of approaching footsteps old Ben Thurston, with Leach
-Sharkey close on his heels, emerged onto the verandah. There was no need
-to announce the death of his son--the ominous bundle told its own sad
-tale. The ranch owner stared at it, horrified, inarticulate from a
-conflict of emotions, the hunted look of terror again in his eyes. Leach
-Sharkey took up the work of interrogation.
-
-"How did it happen?" He was addressing Jack Rover, who chanced to stand
-next to him after helping to deposit the body on a bench that stood
-conveniently against the wall.
-
-"Dick Willoughby heard the shot up among the woods, and found him lying
-dead on the road."
-
-Sharkey advanced a pace or two and confronted Dick.
-
-"Who fired the shot?"
-
-"How should I know?" retorted Dick, reddening slightly from the
-brusqueness of the enquiry.
-
-"I reckon I can tell," cried Sharkey. And with a swift, experienced
-movement he grabbed Dick by both arms and clicked a pair of handcuffs on
-his wrists before anyone, Dick least of all, had fathomed his intention.
-
-Dick Willoughby was a square-shouldered, powerful fellow, but the great
-husky bodyguard, Leach Sharkey, towered above him. In the first flush of
-anger and surprise Dick struggled to break the shackles of ignominy. But
-the sleuth grabbed him by both shoulders with a grip that rendered its
-recipient absolutely powerless.
-
-"Go easy, young man."
-
-Dick's muscles relaxed, and Sharkey was content to release his hold.
-
-"Go easy. If you have any answer to make to the charge of murdering that
-boy, you'll have the chance all in good time."
-
-"What right have you to arrest me?" demanded Dick, somewhat recovering
-his poise.
-
-"Oh, I've a special constable's star all right," replied Sharkey,
-throwing open his coat and displaying, close to his armpit, the badge of
-the office he had claimed.
-
-"Guess that's good enough for you and all others here. And now take my
-advice, Willoughby. You'll come quietly with me to Bakersfield. I've
-no special grudge against you, but have my obvious duty to perform. You
-threatened young Marshall more than once in all our hearing, and it will
-be up to you to prove yourself guiltless of his death. You bring round
-Mr. Thurston's automobile, Rover. We start right now."
-
-Everything had happened so rapidly that none of the cowboys, had they
-so desired, could have protested or interfered. Meanwhile the news had
-spread, for others among the ranch hands were coming up and crowding
-toward the verandah rails. General sympathy was obviously with Dick
-Several of the onlookers advanced and shook his manacled hands. "All
-right, Mr. Willoughby." "You'll be home again tomorrow," "Buck up, it's
-a ridiculous charge"--these were among their expressions of
-encouragement. Dick just smiled his thanks--a wan, wistful smile. He now
-had himself under perfect control--even his resentment toward Sharkey
-had been allowed to evaporate.
-
-"Very well," he said quietly, addressing the sleuth. "I'll give you no
-trouble, Sharkey. Let us get away from here as quickly as possible."
-
-Just then Lieutenant Munson came hurriedly onto the scene. For a moment
-he looked thunderstruck when he saw the handcuffs around Dick's wrists.
-
-"Great Scott, Dick! What's the meaning of this?" Then without waiting
-for a reply he turned to the sleuth.
-
-"I've just heard about young Thurston's death, but you're surely not
-going to mix up Dick Willoughby's name with it, Mr. Sharkey? You must
-know that he would have nothing to do with such a cowardly crime."
-
-"He can prove all that at the proper time and place," was the cool,
-determined rejoinder.
-
-"Don't interfere, Munson," interposed Dick. "Mr. Sharkey considers
-that he is doing his duty. That's an end to all argument. I'll have no
-difficulty in obtaining my release once we get to Bakersfield."
-
-"And the lieutenant can come along with us if he likes," observed the
-sleuth, conciliated by his prisoner's sensible view of things. "As Mr.
-Willoughby's best friend, you can see that everything's done right, Mr.
-Munson."
-
-"But why these handcuffs?"
-
-"I know my own business," replied the sleuth, with returning severity,
-as he touched the constable's star on his breast. "And as a soldier you
-should know the wisdom of letting it go at that, sir."
-
-Munson turned to Mr. Thurston. All through the colloquy the ranch-owner
-had spoken not a word. He had dropped onto the bench beside the still
-swathed body of his son, and was sitting there with bowed head and
-stolidly fixed eyes.
-
-"You are no party to this accusation, Mr. Thurston?" the lieutenant
-enquired. "I am sorry for the blow that has fallen on you. But you can't
-seriously believe that Dick Willoughby's the man who fired that shot."
-As he spoke he pointed at the dead rigid form.
-
-Thurston raised his eyes. There was a dull glare of fury in them, a
-savage snarl on his parted lips.
-
-"Mind your own business, young man. He killed my boy, and by God he'll
-hang for it." While speaking he rose to his feet, holding forth a
-denouncing arm toward Willoughby, "Yes, he'll hang for it," he growled
-again with savage determination, turning round to the open door.
-
-With a gesture to the cowboys standing nearest, he bade them carry the
-body within. He stood aside to let them pass with their burden, then
-followed and slammed the door behind him with an angry bang.
-
-Despite the tragedy of it all, a little smile went round the group
-of onlookers. It meant to say that that was just Ben Thurston all
-over--irascible and vindictive. But some faces looked grave.
-
-"May go mighty hard with Willoughby," murmured one voice, that of the
-old grey-headed man, the blacksmith at the rancho for twenty years or
-more. "I wouldn't like to feel the weight of the old devil's hand."
-
-But just then the automobile came round the house, piloted by Jack
-Rover. Sharkey began to make his dispositions for the journey.
-
-"Do you want to take anything with you, Willoughby?" he asked in a
-considerate manner.
-
-"Nothing," was the prompt reply.
-
-"Well then, you'll ride with me on the front seat. Lieutenant, you can
-share the tonneau with Mr. Thurston." There was a slight grin on the
-sleuth's face as he signified the arrangement.
-
-"Mr. Thurston?" queried Munson, taken somewhat aback. "Does he come,
-too?"
-
-"Sure," replied Sharkey. "Who's going to make the charge, I'd like to
-know? Willoughby, I just need your promise that you won't move from this
-verandah till I return."
-
-Dick nodded assent. "You have my word," he said with quiet dignity.
-
-"Then I'll be back in a minute," added the sleuth, his hand on the door
-knob.
-
-Ben Thurston was standing alone in the centre of the living room, the
-body with its bearers having passed to an inner apartment. His arms were
-folded across his breast in an attitude of deep dejection. But it was
-with the scared look of a hunted beast that he started away at the touch
-of Leach Sharkey's hand upon his shoulder.
-
-The sleuth smiled understandingly.
-
-"You don't want to be left here all alone, do you?"
-
-"No, no. For God's sake, no. I had forgotten that."
-
-"Then you've got to come with me to Bakersfield. In any case you will be
-wanted to swear the information. And you can also make arrangements for
-the funeral. So get your hat and overcoat. We are all ready outside."
-
-"Yes, yes, I'm coming," faltered Thurston. "Wait for me, Sharkey," he
-added, as with nervous fingers he detached his overcoat from a rack on
-the wall.
-
-And a few minutes later the automobile, with Sharkey at the wheel, the
-handcuffed prisoner by his side, and Thurston and the lieutenant seated
-frigidly apart in opposite comers of the tonneau, was spinning
-through the gathering dusk of evening on its way to the county town of
-Bakersfield.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XIV--Entanglements
-
-|FROM the observatory high up among the hills, Mr. Robles had witnessed
-the arrest and the departure of the prisoner. He had understood every
-move just as if he had been present on the verandah down below and had
-heard each spoken word.
-
-As he stood erect, his hand still rested on the telescope. For a few
-moments he pondered, then murmured to himself as he turned to leave the
-room: "A bad complication! I must break the news tonight to Merle. Poor
-little girl!"
-
-But it was two hours later before he wended his way down through the
-moonlit forest in the direction of La Siesta.
-
-There dinner was over. No word of untoward happenings had as yet come
-from the outside world to disturb the tranquillity of the little
-household. In the drawing room Merle was at the piano, while Grace,
-close by, was curled on a sofa reading the latest novel. At
-some distance from the young girls was Mrs. Darlington, occupied
-intermittently over a piece of embroidery.
-
-She was seated in semi-darkness, only her hands and her work illumed by
-the soft pink radiance of a shaded lamp resting on a little table by
-her side. In the evening costume of the chatelaine of La Siesta was the
-suggestion of old lace and old-time lavender--the old lace at her bosom
-and around her neck, the subtle fragrance of lavender exhaled from her
-garments that gave to her a sort of personal atmosphere. And as she sat
-musingly, with the skeins of silk passing through her fingers, she might
-have formed a picture of some Penelope seated at the loom of pensive
-memory.
-
-The music from the piano was in harmony with both her mood and her
-attitude--the soft dreamy melodies of Mendelssohn's "Songs without
-Words" to which she was vaguely listening while busy with her thoughts
-and her stitches.
-
-Downstairs amid the oriental luxuriousness of the cosy corner sat Tia
-Teresa, waiting in the dark to intercept the visitor of whose coming
-she had been apprized by a secret messenger. And at last Ricardo Robles
-came, with the noiseless footfall that was characteristic of the man and
-imparted to him an air of mystery. He was standing by the old duenna's
-side before she had realized his presence.
-
-"I wanted a few words with you first of all, Tia Teresa," he murmured,
-as she grasped his hand in both her own and affectionately kissed it.
-"Something has happened."
-
-"I know what has happened, Don Manuel," she whispered. "The young man
-deserved his fate, for I am sure you saw what occurred in the rose
-garden during the afternoon. For one of his breed to have dared even to
-touch my little girl!" She hissed the words venomously, then added in
-calmer tone: "So all is well. He brought down his doom upon his own
-head, and vengeance for Rosetta begins."
-
-Robles pressed her hand as he disengaged his own from her almost
-fiercely caressing touch.
-
-"I nursed you both," continued the duenna in a low impassioned voice.
-"Your people were my people, you children were my very life, and your
-revenge has come to be my own. So I rejoice that the young ruffian
-died."
-
-He had seated himself by her side on the divan. "We shall say no more
-then about that," he responded. "In some ways I am sorry over the day's
-work. At times I find it difficult to reconcile my firmness with my
-softness."
-
-"But you cannot forget that you are no longer the owner of your father's
-lands and flocks, and are virtually childless besides." She breathed the
-words with intense repressed fury, intensified as she added: "And all
-through the accursed gringo who wrecked our happy lives--Rosetta's,
-yours, your beloved parents' as well. While that abominable wretch
-lives, the vendetta can never end."
-
-For a moment Robles remained silent. Then he spoke resolutely:
-
-"I know it, Tia Teresa. Today my work only begins. Rest assured that it
-will be carried to the bitter finish. For this I have waited all through
-those long years. But I wanted to tell you of another matter--to warn
-you of a very serious complication. Dick Willoughby has been arrested
-for the slaying of Marshall Thurston." The duenna sat bolt upright in
-shocked surprise. "Oh, my! What will this mean?" she murmured.
-
-"Terrible grief for my little girl--possibly much suffering for him
-until I choose to take the responsibility upon myself."
-
-"You must not do that."
-
-"No. Not yet, at all events. Or the victory will be his--my enemy's."
-
-He mused again. She, too, remained silent. At last he broke the spell.
-
-"But I have already devised measures for his safety. Now I must go
-upstairs. They have heard nothing yet?"
-
-"Not a word."
-
-"Then I must tell them of the mysterious shooting in the woods, and at
-the same time reassure Merle that her lover is in no real danger."
-
-"And Mrs. Darlington?" asked Tia Teresa. "How much is she to know?"
-
-"Nothing! The vendetta is for us Spaniards. It is ours and ours alone.
-No one knows of my vow but you and I. Let it remain so. _Adios_, my dear
-friend."
-
-In the darkness he stooped and kissed her on both cheeks. For a moment
-she clung to him, but he gently liberated himself from her embrace. He
-moved toward the stairway, and Tia Teresa followed him cautiously up to
-the drawing room door, outside of which she remained. Knowing that she
-was there, he left the door ajar. The soft music was still playing, but
-suddenly ceased when Robles advanced into the apartment.
-
-"My word, but this is an unexpected pleasure," exclaimed Merle, as she
-came from the piano with outstretched hands.
-
-He took them both in his own, and bestowed on her a grave but kindly
-smile. He also nodded to Grace, who had dropped her book and risen in
-courteous greeting.
-
-"But you look sad and serious," Merle went on, with quick intuition that
-his coming at this late hour meant something more than a mere neighborly
-visit.
-
-"Something sad and serious has happened," he replied.
-
-Mrs. Darlington had advanced from her lamp-lit table.
-
-"What?" she enquired eagerly. "Somehow I had a sense of impending
-trouble all day long."
-
-"Young Thurston of the rancho has met with an accident."
-
-"Dead?" gasped Merle, her hands clasped against her bosom.
-
-"Yes, dead, I am afraid. He was mysteriously shot this afternoon when
-riding through the pine woods."
-
-Merle was stricken dumb. Grace glided to her side and listened in silent
-expectancy.
-
-"Shot! By whom?" asked Mrs. Darlington.
-
-"That I cannot tell," gravely replied Robles. Then he smiled faintly.
-"But an amazingly stupid blunder has been made. By some combination
-of circumstances suspicion is being fastened on our dear friend Dick
-Willoughby."
-
-"Dick!" exclaimed Merle. "Who dares to suggest such a thing?" she added
-indignantly.
-
-"I infer that Mr. Thurston is his accuser," replied Robles.
-
-"The two young men quarreled," murmured Mrs. Darlington, in a voice of
-deep agitation.
-
-"Mother!" cried Merle reprovingly. "Even to think for one moment that
-Dick, whatever the provocation, could have done such a thing! He is
-absolutely innocent, Mr. Robles," she went on decisively, again turning
-to their visitor.
-
-"Of course he is innocent--absolutely innocent. No one knows that better
-than myself." And he gave an enigmatic smile as he spoke the words of
-reassuring confidence.
-
-"Where is Mr. Willoughby now?" queried Grace.
-
-"He has been compelled to go to Bakersfield."
-
-"To Bakersfield?" exclaimed Merle, half wonderingly.
-
-"There to prove his innocence," replied Robles.
-
-But Mrs. Darlington had probed the real significance of his words.
-
-"You don't mean to say that they have--arrested him?"
-
-Robles nodded gravely. "That's how the law acts. A man under suspicion
-must be taken into custody--he must be charged so that he can refute the
-shameful calumny."
-
-Merle had dropped into a settee--white and speechless. Her lips
-trembled. Then she burst into a passion of weeping, burying her face
-against an arm flung across the upholstery.
-
-Mrs. Darlington moved forward quickly to comfort the sobbing girl.
-
-"Oh, don't take on like this, my dear child. The arrest was a mere
-formality. He will be immediately set at liberty."
-
-Merle raised her tear-stained face. She spoke in gulping sobs.
-
-"But, mother, I never told you--I shrank from telling any of you. While
-you and Grace were away this afternoon, Marshall Thurston called and
-wanted to make love to me--he even dared to try to kiss me. Tia Teresa
-flung him out of the rose garden. It was I who made Tia Teresa promise
-to say nothing about it to anyone. I feared trouble. And, oh, trouble,
-terrible trouble, has already come." Again she bowed her head and
-continued weeping, but quietly weeping now. Grace was bending over her,
-patting her shoulder in soothing sympathy.
-
-Mrs. Darlington's eyes met those of Robles.
-
-"This may prove serious," she said softly, that Merle might not
-overhear.
-
-"It is decidedly unfortunate," replied Robles; "an unfortunate
-complication that may, of course, strengthen the suspicion against
-Willoughby and so render it more difficult for us to help him."
-
-Merle sprang to her feet, and with a hand dashed away her tears.
-
-"Suspicion!" she exclaimed. "There can be not one moment's suspicion."
-And she gazed up into Robles' face in ardent appeal.
-
-"Of course not, my dear, among us--among all those who know Dick
-Willoughby. But there is the harshly judging world to reckon with
-besides. They may say that this discloses a motive for the crime."
-
-"However, Merle has just told us," commented Mrs. Darlington, "that only
-she and Tia Teresa know anything about this unhappy episode in the rose
-garden. Mr. Willoughby has not been here at all today."
-
-"But I happen to know that he was not far away this afternoon--that he
-was rounding up some cattle in the near-by canyons. Malice may suggest
-that he was a witness of Thurston's insolent behavior."
-
-"Then we should all keep silent on the subject."
-
-"Which might be compromising in the long run, my dear Mrs. Darlington.
-Altogether it is a difficult situation."
-
-Merle had been hardly listening to this conversation. She had been
-thinking, and with thinking had regained her composure. Her mind was
-quickly made up as to the line of prompt action that must be taken. She
-spoke quite calmly now.
-
-"He is in prison. You have not spoken the word, Mr. Robles, but I know
-the truth all the same. We shall go to him tonight."
-
-"Not tonight, my dear," replied Robles, with gentle firmness. "But
-tomorrow morning, certainly, I would suggest that you drive over to
-Bakersfield. He will appreciate your kindness in paying him this prompt
-visit, and you can at the same time convey to him my message of absolute
-belief in his innocence."
-
-"You will not come, too?"
-
-"I can do more for him, Merle, by not going to Bakersfield for the
-present. Do not forget that for reasons of my own I live in seclusion.
-My name must be mentioned to no one but Mr. Willoughby. Trust me, all
-three of you, and leave me to work quietly alone and by my own methods.
-There, I give my promise. The captive will be set free within a short
-time. My hand on that, and you know that I never break my word."
-
-[Illustration: 0155]
-
-There was a joyous smile of confidence on his face as he spoke the
-words. Merle took the extended hand gratefully, trustfully, and pressed
-it to her lips. Robles went on:
-
-"My advice is--try to sleep tonight. Tomorrow, or within a few brief
-tomorrows, all will be well. Good night."
-
-Tia Teresa followed him from the open door down into the outer hall.
-
-"You heard everything," he said as he paused to speak a final word of
-parting. "Comfort her, but at the same time guard our secret closer than
-ever. Not one hair of Willoughby's head will be touched--make her know
-that for certain. And everything will come right in a very little time."
-
-"My poor little girl," he murmured to himself as he strode down the
-silent tree-shadowed avenue.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XV--Behind the Bars
-
-|Dick Willoughby had been lodged in the county jail at Bakersfield, duly
-charged by Ben Thurston as the murderer of his son. To his surprise, and
-indeed to his dismay, the prisoner was informed that, the crime alleged
-being a capital one, no bail could be accepted. This was first of all
-a blow to Willoughby's pride. Here he was under the stigma of
-imprisonment, but with no possibility of redress. It was not the loss of
-comforts, the deprivation of personal liberty, the hardships to body and
-to soul, inseparable from such restraint, that he resented, so much as
-the semiconviction of guilt implied by the durance vile to which he was
-to be subjected, although absolutely innocent of the deed of which he
-was accused.
-
-However, after first chagrin came manly philosophy. The law might be
-right or wrong, wise or unwise, necessary or superfluous. But all the
-same it was the law of the state and had therefore to be obeyed. So,
-when the situation was finally reviewed, it was Lieutenant Munson who,
-when bidding his friend good-night, had been the angry man, fretting
-and fuming over such an abominable act of injustice, while the prisoner
-himself was tranquilly resigned to the ordeal through which he must
-pass and to which unkind fate was subjecting him for reasons that he was
-powerless to fathom.
-
-"Good night, Ches, old man. You'll see me again in the morning. It's
-mighty kind of you to stay in town all night. But we can decide on the
-best lawyer to employ, and then you must hasten back to break the bad
-news at La Siesta."
-
-Such had been Dick's quiet words when their colloquy had been broken up,
-and he had been ordered to the retirement of his prison cell. To enter
-that place was for Dick a horrible experience. But he accepted the
-experience calmly, bade the turnkey a cheerful good-night, and laid him
-down to sleep on the narrow mattress resting upon the hard bench, at
-peace with himself and the world, even with the bitter enemy who had all
-so unexpectedly appeared on his path.
-
-Although Munson was back in the jail betimes next morning, he found Dick
-already conferring with a lawyer--the best and most honored in the town,
-as Munson knew the moment his name was mentioned.
-
-"Let me introduce you to Mr. Bradley," said Dick, presenting him. "Some
-kind friend whose name he declines to reveal for the present, sent him a
-special message last night retaining his services for my defence."
-
-"Mrs. Darlington, I bet," interjected the lieutenant.
-
-"No, not Mrs. Darlington, let me assure you," rejoined the lawyer,
-"although undoubtedly she would be willing to do the same thing. But I
-am not permitted to say any more."
-
-"And he has _carte blanche_ for all expenses," smiled Dick. "Although I
-should not think there will be much money required to clear an innocent
-man," he added.
-
-"Wait till you see," said the lawyer crisply. "We have to reckon with a
-malignant persecutor, I am already informed."
-
-"Well, I've got a bit to my bank credit," Dick replied. "And we'll draw
-on that first before I accept the generosity of an unknown friend. It
-will be quite a saving here," he went on with a humorous twinkle in his
-eye as he glanced around. "Free board and lodging at the state's expense
-for a week at all events."
-
-"Much longer than that, I am afraid," gravely remarked the lawyer.
-"You see, Mr. Munson, just before you arrived we were discussing
-the decidedly unfortunate coincidence that at the time the shooting
-occurred, Mr. Willoughby, by his own admission, was in the little canyon
-below the scene of the tragedy."
-
-"Rounding up some cattle," observed Dick. "Of course. But all the same,
-open to suspicion as being on the ground, and indeed being the first to
-reach the dead man's side."
-
-"That should be proof of innocence," observed Munson.
-
-"Or may be taken as evidence of well-reasoned audacity to throw accusers
-off the trail," retorted the attorney. "You see we have to look at
-everything, not from our own point of view, but from the other side. Now
-I want to learn something more about that quarrel between you and young
-Thurston at the cattle muster."
-
-"He made an insulting remark about one of the young ladies from La
-Siesta," replied Dick. "I told him I would tan his hide if he ever did
-it again. That's all. But the last thing I want is that these ladies'
-names should be dragged into the case."
-
-"But his remark and your reproof were overheard by others," commented
-the attorney.
-
-"Oh, yes, by a bunch of ranch hands."
-
-"Whose evidence will undoubtedly be called for the prosecution,
-necessitating, perhaps, the evidence of the young ladies on our side."
-
-"By God, I won't stand for that," exclaimed Dick hotly. "I can defend
-myself without their being called to the witness stand. Think, Munson,
-of subjecting Merle or Grace to any such thing"--and his indignant face
-appealed to the lieutenant's.
-
-"I saw nothing of the quarrel," observed Munson, addressing the lawyer,
-"although, of course, I heard something about it later on--not from
-Willoughby, however, for he has never once referred to the matter in
-conversation with me. But I say, Dick, old fellow, you know that Merle
-Farnsworth and Grace Darlington, too, will be only too proud and happy
-to stand up for you in a law court or anywhere else."
-
-"That may be," replied Dick gloomily, "but I don't propose that they
-shall be made the objects of vulgar curiosity in a crowded court-room,
-or that their ears should ever hear the vile words that fell from that
-miserable degenerate who has at last met the fate he properly deserved."
-
-"Well, it is a point that we shall have to consider carefully," spoke
-the lawyer as he rose to take his departure. "I have all the main facts
-of the case now, Mr. Willoughby. Of course I shall apply formally to
-the court for bail, but I know it is bound to be refused. I'll make all
-arrangements outside for your comfort here--meals, etc., and no
-doubt your friend, Mr. Munson, will bring you over clothing, toilet
-requisites, and the other little things you will require. I'll see you
-again later on today."
-
-The lawyer was gone, and the two comrades were alone in the little room,
-stone-walled and bare of furniture except for a few chairs, where the
-consultation had been held. Beyond the open door stood a constable, just
-out of earshot. But he now took his stand within the room.
-
-"Well, Munson, old chap," said Dick with cheerful alacrity, "you get
-back to the rancho in double-quick time. Then go on to La Siesta and
-tell Merle not to worry on my account. Tell her that I'm bright and
-happy, and just enjoying a good rest, and will be set at liberty within
-a week or so. But remember, she is not to come here. Good Lord, I
-never want her to see me in a place like this." And he glanced around
-forlornly, and in a measure ashamed.
-
-But at the very moment there was a flutter along the corridor--the sound
-of voices, and women's voices, too. A moment later the superintendent of
-the jail appeared, bringing with him Mrs. Darlington and Merle. At the
-doorway he spoke to the officer on guard; the man withdrew.
-
-"Mr. Willoughby, here are some more friends," said the superintendent
-as he ushered in the ladies. "I am going to interpret the regulations as
-leniently as possible--that's a matter which can rest between ourselves.
-I'll come back for you, Mrs. Darlington, in half an hour."
-
-Merle advanced toward Dick with outstretched hand. In her other hand was
-a fine bouquet of roses.
-
-"What a shame that you should be here," she exclaimed. "But I realize
-that the only thing to do is to submit as cheerfully as possible to the
-inevitable. Mother and I came over to give you our sympathy and proffer
-our help in every possible way. Grace also sends her very kindest
-regards, and I was bidden by Mr. Robles, whom we saw last night, to
-assure you of his complete belief in your innocence."
-
-"Oh, I'm not afraid of any real friend thinking me capable of a cowardly
-deed like that," replied Willoughby. "But it is nice to have these kind
-messages, although I could have wished, Miss Farnsworth, that you had
-not seen me amid such surroundings."
-
-"Do you think that we would desert you in such a time of trouble as
-this?" replied Merle, as she sat down. "But seeing that our visit is
-to be restricted to half an hour, it is well that we should get to
-the important points without delay. I have been talking over a certain
-matter both with mother and Mr. Robles, and although I shrink from
-telling it, they have decided that you must know about the affair."
-
-She then proceeded, in a low voice and with lips that trembled, to tell
-how young Thurston had forced his attentions on her just a little time
-before the shooting occurred and how Tia Teresa had rescued her from his
-clutches.
-
-This was the first that Dick had heard of the incident and his face
-flushed with anger. But Merle quieted him at once. "You need not be
-angry now, Mr. Willoughby. It is all over. But your lawyer will want to
-consider what bearing this may possibly have upon the case."
-
-"It can have no bearing at all," maintained Dick. "In the first place I
-didn't even know till now that Marshall had been visiting at La Siesta.
-And in the second place, just as I was saying to Munson a few minutes
-ago, I am determined that the names of you ladies shall not be dragged
-into this miserable affair. Isn't that right, Mrs. Darlington?"
-
-"In a measure. But all the same we are ready to stand by you so as to
-establish your innocence with the least possible delay. I heard this
-morning that Mr. Thurston is very bitter against you, keeps vowing
-vengeance, and announces that no money will be spared to bring the
-slayer of his son to retribution."
-
-"Well, I hope he'll find him without loss of time," smiled Dick. "That
-will be the quickest and easiest way to get me out of confinement.
-But at this moment I have not the faintest idea on whom to fasten the
-charge. Lots of the cowboys despised young Thurston, but none were
-really his enemies, and I don't know any one among the bunch who would
-have shot him in that dastardly, cold-blooded manner."
-
-"Which makes the situation for you all the more disagreeable," commented
-Munson. "You had been known to threaten him, and if there is no one else
-to whom suspicion can point, you may be kept here, Dick, for quite a
-time--for months, perhaps, until the case goes to trial."
-
-Dick's face fell. "For months!" he exclaimed. "Surely that would be an
-outrage."
-
-"Oh, I wouldn't be too despondent," protested Merle. "Besides, Mr.
-Robles has pledged his word to me that you will be free in a very brief
-time."
-
-"Then he may know who the culprit is," remarked Dick eagerly.
-
-"No," interposed Mrs. Darlington. "He is like ourselves--quite in the
-dark. But you may rest assured that Mr. Robles will leave no stone
-unturned to solve the mystery and restore you to liberty, Mr.
-Willoughby, for I happen to know that he holds you in highest esteem."
-
-"I'm glad of that," replied Dick. "Well, I want you to tell him from me
-how keen I am that you ladies shall be spared from all association
-with this case. You know that I am exercising great self-denial, Miss
-Farnsworth, when I say that you are never to come here again. This is no
-place for you."
-
-[Illustration: 0205]
-
-"Pardon me," laughed Merle, "but we are interested in you and will
-excuse the hotel you have chosen to patronize. We brought these roses
-for you from La Siesta"--as she spoke she presented him with the
-beautiful blooms--"and if Lieutenant Munson will be kind enough to come
-out to our automobile he will find there some books, also a box of fruit
-and a few delicacies which we hope will help to make your stay here just
-a little more tolerable."
-
-"You're kind indeed," murmured Dick gratefully. "Don't worry about me,"
-he added cheerfully, "I'll have a fine rest here, and will be able to
-catch up with my arrears of reading."
-
-And in this philosophic frame of mind the prisoner was left to begin his
-holiday.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XVI--Pierre Luzon Returns
-
-|IN the outside world the question on everybody's lips was--who had
-fired the fatal shot among the pine woods? The young reprobate had been
-thoroughly despised, but he had no known enemies except Willoughby. So
-while Willoughby's staunch friends could only reiterate the question
-in vain perplexity, most people were inclined to answer it with Dick's
-name. The angry quarrel between the two young men was universally
-known and had been subjected to sundry embellishments--for example, the
-threatened horse-whipping had become an actual recorded event, and so
-on. And even there were whispers about rivalry in some love affair--that
-Marshall had had his eye on one of the young ladies at La Siesta where
-Dick for some time had been a constant caller.
-
-So among the cowboys on the ranch, the oil drillers who frequented
-the Bakersfield saloons and had often enough stood around while young
-Thurston had set up the drinks, the newspaper reading public generally
-for whom all the facts had been set forth in elaborate detail--the
-universal concensus of opinion seemed to be that Dick Willoughby was the
-man. Not that this verdict of popular opinion carried with it any real
-reprobation. Everyone agreed that the worthless degenerate had met even
-a kindlier fate than he merited. Had he lived, not all his father's
-millions could have long saved him either from the penitentiary or an
-asylum for the insane.
-
-A week passed. Thurston brooded in solitude, but at his bidding Leach
-Sharkey kept up active investigations with a view to nose out every bit
-of evidence that could tell against the accused man. Sharkey worked,
-not from any special animosity against Willoughby, but from keen
-professional pride.
-
-Dick accepted his confinement with manly fortitude. It. was one of those
-untoward happenings that come into some people's lives for no obvious
-reason, but he was calm in the confidence that everything would be made
-clear in a very short time.
-
-Moreover he was clear to his own conscience, which was the main thing.
-Next in importance was that Merle, Grace and Mrs. Darlington, Robles and
-Munson, all the friends whom he held in highest esteem, had never for
-one moment doubted him. In their unshaken friendship was sufficient
-reward for all the tribulations through which he was passing.
-
-Meanwhile word had reached Buck Ashley that old Tom Baker was on his way
-home in company with Pierre Luzon, to whom the Governor of the State
-had at last granted parole. In view of Dick's imprisonment Munson had
-well-nigh lost all interest in the romance of the buried treasure. But
-it had been Dick himself who had insisted that his friend must attend to
-their joint interests during his period of enforced sequestration.
-
-Thus it had come about that Munson found himself one evening at the
-store, awaiting with Jack Rover and Buck Ashley the arrival of the
-automobile in which the sheriff was bringing the liberated convict
-from San Quentin. In a brief letter Tom Baker had explained that he had
-decided on this manner of transportation both because of its ensuring
-privacy and also because Pierre Luzon was so enfeebled by age, sickness
-and prolonged confinement that he could not travel by train. "I've
-rigged up a stretcher," wrote Tom, "but the poor old Frenchie is as weak
-as a kitten, and we'll have to run slow."
-
-Nine o'clock that night was the scheduled hour around which the
-automobile might be expected. Buck Ashley had the extra cot for the
-invalid all ready in his own bedroom at the rear of the store.
-
-It was close on ten o'clock, however, before the headlight of the
-automobile showed across the valley on the high-road. Buck piled another
-big log on the fire in the sitting room. He saw that the doors were all
-carefully closed and the shades pulled down. Then he brought in from the
-bar a tray with glasses and a bottle of whisky.
-
-"Kentucky bourbon--that was old Pierre Luzon's favorite lotion," he
-said as he set down the tray. "And I guess he'll be glad of a good stiff
-drink on a cold night like this."
-
-At last the automobile entered the yard, and the invalid was carried in
-on the stretcher and propped up comfortably in a rocking chair near the
-cheerful blaze. His teeth were chattering from cold, and he gratefully
-gulped down the stiff glass of bourbon which Buck lost no time in
-proffering him.
-
-"You see," explained Tom Baker, as he bustled around, "the Governor just
-grants paroles; he can't grant pardons. Some sort of a board has to pass
-on the pardons. But I got him out all right, and that's the main thing.
-Eh, Pierre, old man?"
-
-The sheriff nodded with great friendliness to his prot�g�. Luzon
-responded with a wan smile that silently spoke his thankfulness. His
-face was deathly pale, but there was wonderful snap and vitality in
-the black bead-like eyes that roamed around the room and searched each
-countenance.
-
-Buck was now standing by the rocker. He laid a hand familiarly on the
-Frenchman's shoulder.
-
-"You see, Pierre, old scout, I don't forget you"--he pointed to the
-bottle on the table. "Kentucky bourbon, the best I've got in the house,
-and the very label you used to call for. Now we've got to drink to your
-speedy recovery. Fill up all round, boys. The drinks are on me tonight."
-
-"Hip, hip, hooray!" shouted Tom, as the glasses tinkled.
-
-"Hush!" exclaimed Buck, warningly. "We don't want to bring any booze
-fighters prowlin' around here tonight. You see, Pierre, we four are in
-cahoots and understand each other. You know Tom and myself--we ain't
-in need of any guarantee. And you can trust Mr. Chester Munson and Jack
-Rover here to the limit."
-
-Luzon bowed acknowledgment of the informal introduction.
-
-"It was we who put up the cash to get you out of San Quentin," continued
-Buck, as he dropped into a chair close beside Tom Baker.
-
-"Together with Dick Willoughby," interjected Munson.
-
-"Oh, yes, not forgettin' Dick," resumed the storekeeper, "as fine a
-young feller as ever walked on shoe leather. But, by God, he's in jail
-just now."
-
-"Eh?" ejaculated the ex-convict, with a look of awakening, almost
-fraternal, interest.
-
-Buck turned to the sheriff.
-
-"Of course, Tom, you'll have read all about that terrible affair in the
-newspapers?"
-
-The sheriff surreptitiously grabbed Buck's arm. He spoke in a
-confidential whisper.
-
-"Drop that subject for the present. I've said nothin' about it to old
-Pierre in case it might upset him. I ain't dared to mention the name
-Thurston to him, for he shared the White Wolf's hatred of the breed."
-Then Tom gave a little cough and glanced across the fireplace at the
-Frenchman. "Just a little cowboy shootin' scrap, Pierre, in which our
-chum Dick Willoughby has got himself temporarily involved. But say,
-boys," he went on, casting his eyes toward Munson and Rover, "I just
-thanked the Lord it wasn't me as had to arrest Dick. Of course if I had
-still been sheriff I'd a done it--when I was a sworn-in officer, duty
-was duty all the time with me, as every damned horse-thief within a
-hundred miles knows. But to take an honest man into custody for shootin'
-a miserable human coyote like that young--"
-
-"Well, we're not a-goin' to speak about him just now," interrupted Buck,
-bestowing a cautioning kick on the sheriff's shins.
-
-Tom took the timely reminder.
-
-"That would have gone sore against the grain," he said emphatically, as
-he reached for the whisky bottle and replenished his tumbler.
-
-"Glad to be back?" asked Buck, beaming pleasantly on old Pierre.
-
-The Frenchman lifted one thin hand and smiled.
-
-"Here I will become once more strong," he murmured. "No place in ze
-world like ze dear old Tehachapi mountains."
-
-"Wal, I see you've begun to let your beard grow again," continued Buck,
-pointing to the gray stubbled chin. "And when your hair comes along,
-too, you'll just be lookin' fine and dandy. The same old Pierre that
-used to sit for hours at a time in the store."
-
-He paused a moment, surveying the visitor.
-
-"A leetle more whisky, please," murmured Pierre, as he watched the
-sheriff lay down his glass.
-
-"All the whisky you want, old fellow," exclaimed Buck, with effusive
-hospitality. "By gunnies, you're entitled to a good few nips after all
-the long years you've been locked up. Ain't that so, boys?"
-
-"I should say," declared Tom, fervently, wiping his lips with the back
-of his hand.
-
-The Frenchman drank gratefully, and as he felt the warm alcoholic glow
-in his vitals, uttered a deep-drawn "Ah!" of appreciation.
-
-"Tastes good, don't it?" observed Buck. "You never turned down a drink
-of good whisky in the old days, did you, Pierre? Great times then! And
-gosh almighty, don't it beat hell, I never suspected who you were all
-those years you used to sit around the store smokin' that big-bowled
-pipe of yourn? And you knew about the cave then?"
-
-"Oh, Pierre Luzon, he know how to keep one secret," responded the
-Frenchman, smiling.
-
-"Yes, and good for us all you kept it, old man," exclaimed the sheriff.
-"He's a-goin' to show us the cave tomorrow, Buck. There will be six in
-the divvy-up now, boys, for of course Pierre Luzon stands in. That's
-agreeable all round, fellers?"
-
-"Sure, sure," responded the others in unison. Tom turned to the
-Frenchman.
-
-"I told you, Pierre, we'd play the game fair and square with you. Ain't
-that right?"
-
-"I trust you all," replied Luzon. "I show ze cave tomorrow to my friend,
-Tom Baker, and you gentlemen who have been so kind to make up one purse
-to bring me back here from zat horrid prison."
-
-"Guess you're about the only feller that knows where it is?" enquired
-Buck, cautiously.
-
-Luzon looked at his questioner and spoke just one word: "Guadalupe."
-
-"Does Gaudalupe know?" exclaimed Jack Rover. "I thought her long suit
-was the riffle where she gets her placer gold."
-
-"Guadalupe," answered Pierre, speaking slowly, "she know ze cave, but
-she not know where ze treasure is buried. Ze cave her home. She live
-zere. Lots and lots of times she come out, and nobody ever track her
-when she go back. Ze outlaws they sharp-shoot from places in ze hills
-nobody could see. But I show you," he continued, nodding his head at
-Jack Rover, "I, Pierre, show you where zat riffle is. I know both where
-Guadalupe wash out placer gold and ze secret chamber in ze big cave
-where Joaquin Murietta bury him money and where ze White Wolf, Don
-Manuel--peace to his soul!"--Pierre Luzon crossed himself--"hide sacks
-and sacks of ze yellow gold. Oh, yes!"
-
-This long speech had exhausted the old man. He dropped his head wearily.
-
-"What you need now is a good long sleep," exclaimed Tom Baker. "Another
-jolt of bourbon Pierre, and then you get in between the blankets, old
-fellow."
-
-"I've got your bed all ready in the next room," observed Buck.
-
-"I guess I go to bed zen," assented Luzon.
-
-He gulped down with relish a nightcap of the old whisky. Then Buck and
-Tom helped him from his chair.
-
-"It is good to be here," murmured the Frenchman. "I grow strong again
-among ze mountains. I never go back--never go back to San Quentin, that
-one horrid prison."
-
-"We'll nurse you like a baby," said Buck assuringly, as he led the
-feeble old man into the adjoining room.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XVII--The Bitter Bit
-
-|ON the very night of Pierre Luzon's return, Ben Thurston was in close
-colloquy with his attorney, summoned specially from New York. It was not
-only the murder of his son that had brought about this consultation.
-The owner of San Antonio Rancho, while filled with fury against Dick
-Willoughby, was also gravely perturbed over other things. Immediately
-after dinner the two men shut themselves up in Thurston's office.
-
-Thurston opened the safe and produced a little bundle of neatly-folded,
-legal-looking documents.
-
-"These are the option papers," he said gruffly, as he tossed them across
-the table to the lawyer. "Look them over, Mr. Hawkins."
-
-The attorney glanced through the documents in a preliminary way.
-
-"I see the first big payment falls due on April 1st," he remarked.
-
-"Yes, April 1st," responded Thurston, "and I was a damned fool, too,
-to let that Trust Company fellow inveigle me into making the date April
-1st, instead of March 1st. You see," he went on, "the taxes come due
-on March 1st, and on this principality they amount to quite a pretty
-figure, I can tell you."
-
-"How much?"
-
-"Oh, about $18,000."
-
-The lawyer again read the papers through, this time more carefully.
-
-"Well, Mr. Thurston," he said, as he lighted a cigar and sat back in his
-chair, "I left some very important matters to come to you in answer to
-your imperative message. What's the work in hand?"
-
-"Why, this option for one thing; and then, too, I want you to help me
-put the noose around the neck of that scoundrel who killed my son."
-
-"We'll take one thing at a time, please," replied the attorney, speaking
-slowly and quietly. "So far as this option on the rancho is concerned,
-it seems to be quite regular. Nevertheless, five million dollars is a
-whole lot of money. Is there any danger of their forfeiting their option
-payment of $100,000?"
-
-"Danger? Forfeiting?" ejaculated Ben Thurston. "Well, I'm not at all
-afraid of that. My fear now is that they may take up the option."
-
-"Why, didn't you wish to make the sale?"
-
-"Yes, but I am not getting money enough. The ranch is really worth
-ten million dollars today, in cold cash. I have recently had some San
-Francisco capitalists down here appraising it for me, but I had already
-given the option."
-
-"I see that the agreement provides for your cattle and horses going in
-at the stipulated price."
-
-"Yes, I don't know why I should have been so infernally stupid. But you
-see those Los Angeles fellows came over here one day in an automobile
-and stayed all night. We had a sort of a tiff--didn't agree very
-well--and I let them start away the next morning without their
-breakfast--rather uncivil, I'll admit. After they had gone I got to
-thinking matters over, and I sent a telephone message along the road to
-stop them and ask them to come back. They returned all right. There was
-one of their number, this fellow from some Title and Trust Company, who
-was pretty warm under the collar, and, if I do say it myself, was as
-peeved as hell at me. Well, he was the one who drew up the agreement,
-sitting here at this table. The paper looked all right to me, and so I
-just went ahead and signed. I know now they caught me for the $18,000
-of taxes because I didn't just insist on having the option expire March
-1st, instead of April 1st. But, to be frank with you, I really didn't
-much mind, for at that time I was only keen to get their $100,000 for
-the option, never believing for a moment that they would come across
-with the million-dollar first payment due April 1st. You see the cattle
-and horses and all the stock on the ranch was a sort of sheaf of oats
-that I hung out in order to get them to put up their option money--just
-so much bait."
-
-Mr. Hawkins shrugged his shoulders and said: "Well, Mr. Thurston,
-judging from this inventory before me, you certainly hung up a most
-generous bait."
-
-"I didn't stop to think--that's all there is to be said. All these
-details hadn't been worked out into cold figures at the time I gave the
-option. When these men were here I just wanted to wheedle them into a
-bargain which would leave a cool $100,000 in my hands. I never for one
-moment believed they could make the million-dollar payment, although, by
-God, I begin to realize the danger of their doing so now."
-
-The lawyer looked up in silent surprise. Thurston continued:
-
-"Of course I should have had this detailed valuation made before I went
-into the deal. Up to the time I read that inventory I had no real idea
-of the increased value of the property and what was on it. Oh, you may
-shake your head; I'm not a good business man--never cared a damn for
-business--and I know quite well I haven't given enough attention to the
-ranch. You see I have been living mostly in the East, for good reasons.
-I don't like it here at all--I've never felt safe in California," and
-he glanced nervously at the window of the room, as if some enemy were
-lurking there.
-
-Mr. Hawkins once more reached for the inventory, and carefully examined
-the figures. Finally he said: "Pardon me, Mr. Thurston, for the
-observation. But you should have sent for me _before_ the option was
-signed, if you did not really intend to carry out its terms. I find that
-you have twenty-six thousand head of cattle, and you say that the price
-of cattle is very high just now--that the whole herd ought to average
-forty dollars a head. This item alone makes one million and forty
-thousand dollars, or, in other words, if they exercise the option and
-pay you the first million dollars, they will have forty thousand
-dollars more than the payment which they make at that time." The lawyer
-pencilled down the figures while he spoke.
-
-Ben Thurston had been listening with a gloomy look on his brow. But when
-he saw the figures translated into dollars he fairly bounced from his
-chair, walked rapidly up and down the room, and then, coming to a sudden
-halt, shouted: "By God, that's where they got me again. I see it all
-now; these fellows were a damned sight too smart for me. Well, Hawkins,
-you are my attorney. I don't want to go on with this deal, even if they
-are able to dig up the money."
-
-The lawyer puffed at his cigar, wholly undisturbed, and then replied:
-"Mr. Thurston, you have already made a sale."
-
-"No, by God, I haven't; nothing of the kind," replied Thurston. "The
-truth is that I should get ten million dollars for this ranch, and keep
-all my horses and cattle, too. I don't propose to be fleeced by that
-Los Angeles outfit either," he continued, running his hands through his
-hair. "I have it; we'll break the contract. I'll bet that option is so
-faulty that you can drive a load of hay right through it. Hunt up a
-flaw and we will send them back their option money. I don't want their
-$100,000 now."
-
-"I have already carefully studied the paper," replied Hawkins, "and can
-find no flaw in it. It was evidently drawn by a master hand."
-
-"Master hand be damned," thundered Thurston. "Why, the stiff wasn't even
-a lawyer. He was just one of the syndicate--the one I told you about a
-while back. He knows so cussed much about titles that the other fellows
-let him write the option."
-
-"I see," replied the attorney, as a half-smile flitted over his face;
-"about all you seemingly had to do was to sign the option papers and
-count the option money. The sole hope you have now, Mr. Thurston, in my
-opinion, is for those Los Angeles gentlemen to let this valuable option
-lapse. You have only a few days to wait."
-
-"But I haven't told you the worst yet," said Thurston sullenly, dropping
-again into his chair.
-
-"What do you mean?"
-
-"I had a long-distance telephone this morning from the First National
-Bank at Los Angeles saying that the million dollars due April 1st has
-been already paid in to my credit. But I won't touch the money--I'll be
-damned if I do."
-
-"You have no choice but to accept it," said the lawyer. "It would be
-foolish to deceive yourself; San Antonio Rancho is sold, and with the
-payment just made, you, by the terms of your contract, are compelled to
-give immediate possession. I can only advise you to take your medicine
-like a man, but don't let those Los Angeles gentlemen know that you
-are swallowing a bitter dose." He refolded the papers, and pushed them
-across the table. "Now, Mr. Thurston, if there is anything I can do to
-assist you in the prosecution of your son's murderer, I stand ready to
-do so." Ben Thurston arose.
-
-"We'll talk about that tomorrow. I'll hang Dick Willoughby right enough
-in good time. Meanwhile you tell me the rancho is sold--that I have lost
-my great estate for less than half its value? Hell! Isn't that enough
-for one night?" And he stalked wrathfully out of the room, slamming the
-door behind him.
-
-"He sold at the wrong price," mused the lawyer with a quiet smile.
-"Perhaps he'll be trying next to hang the wrong man."
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XVIII--Elusive Riches
-
-|IN the meantime the quartet at the store were making a night of it.
-With old Pierre Luzon peacefully asleep in the adjoining room, there
-were many things to speak about. Tom Baker recounted in elaborate
-detail his story of interviews with the governor and state officials
-at Sacramento, the weary and harassing delays before parole was finally
-granted, his own dogged determination, together with the artful pulling
-of political strings that had finally brought about the results desired.
-Then there was the trip to San Quentin, the breaking of the joyful news
-to Pierre Luzon in his cell, the delivery of the paroled convict into
-Tom's hands, and the clever solution of all further difficulties by
-hiring an automobile for the journey south. The narrative was all very
-interesting, each listener eagerly followed every word, and at the close
-Tom Baker's chest had expanded several inches.
-
-"I tell you boys, there's no man alive could have done what I did. The
-business was in the right hands. If it hadn't been for me, you wouldn't
-have Pierre Luzon here tonight."
-
-"But if Pierre Luzon hadn't written that letter," growled Buck Ashley,
-"you would never have started for Sacramento and San Quentin."
-
-"Well, all's well that ends well," discreetly interposed Munson, as he
-raked the smouldering wood ashes together. "Gee, but its cold tonight."
-Jack Rover rose and tossed another log onto the fire. In a moment a
-bright flame sprang up.
-
-"The bottle's empty," observed the sheriff. "The next one's on me,
-Buck."
-
-"Guess we'll charge it to syndicate account," grinned the storekeeper,
-whose momentary grouch seemed to have been dissipated by the cheerful
-blaze. "We'll have to open books, boys, and go about things in a reg'lar
-way," he added, as he drew the bolt of the door that communicated with
-the store and groped his way into the darkness beyond.
-
-Buck needed no candle, and was soon back with another bottle of the
-Kentucky bourbon. Glasses were filled and clinked and pledges of
-brotherhood renewed.
-
-"It's champagne we'll be drinkin' tomorrow night, Buck, old sport,"
-exclaimed Tom, slapping his old crony on the shoulder.
-
-"I'll long-distance Bakersfield for a case in the morning," responded
-Buck, genially. "By gosh, we'll be swimmin' in wine afore long, boys.
-First thing I've got to do is to sell out this 'ere store."
-
-"Sell it!" cried the sheriff, contemptuously. "You can afford to give it
-away, Buck. We ain't a-goin' to be pikers in our old age, are we now?"
-
-"I ain't old by a danged sight," snapped back the storekeeper, for Tom
-had touched a sore spot once again. "Besides, when I've got a barrel of
-Joaquin Murietta's gold safe in the bank, you'll see me friskin' around
-like a two-year-old colt," he added, his momentary surliness changing to
-a smile.
-
-"And it ain't only gold, boys," said Tom Baker. "That 'ere story old
-Pierre told me about the grotto cavern havin' a lake of oil in it as big
-as a city block, sure 'nuff got me goin'. Why, we'll be able to blossom
-out into oil kings."
-
-"What's that?" asked Munson.
-
-"Why, the Frenchie told me, you know, confidential like, comin' along on
-our motor car that since fifty years back those bandit fellers skimmed
-oil from the surface of that lake and burned it in lamps down in that
-cavern."
-
-"By Jove, that's interesting," replied Munson.
-
-"We know there is oil to the west, oil to the north, and oil to the
-south, and it stands to reason there must be oil here as well."
-
-"Yes," interposed Buck, "but old Ben Thurston would never allow any
-drillin' on his place."
-
-"Who the hell wants oil anyhow?" exclaimed Jack Rover. "We'll have all
-the money we need with the buried gold and Guadalupe's placer mine."
-
-"Yes, but oil is oil," replied the storekeeper, with a shrewd nod of his
-head. "They say Rockefeller has only to raise the price a quarter of a
-cent a gallon whenever he wants to give away another million or so to a
-university or a hospital."
-
-"Well, we ain't interested in universities or hospitals," said Tom
-Baker. "But I agree with Buck that oil's oil, and I, for one, intend to
-take everything that's comin' to me. My God, we can afford to buy Ben
-Thurston out and do some drillin' for ourselves on San Antonio Rancho.
-It'll help to pass the time anyways." As he finished, he began to pour
-out another round of drinks.
-
-"Help to keep you from the booze," muttered Buck, in an inaudible aside.
-But he drained his own glass and smacked his lips with satisfaction.
-"Guess I'll be gettin' another bottle, boys," he said aloud, genially.
-
-"Oh, we've had enough," mildly protested Munson.
-
-"Not by a jugful," replied Buck. "You and Jack ain't goin' to ride home
-till mornin', and there's lots of things to be talked over yet."
-
-"Great Scott, it's already two o'clock," remarked Munson, consulting his
-watch.
-
-"Then the night's still young, boys," exclaimed Tom Baker, hilariously.
-"Get the brew, Buck. The empty bottles will keep the tally. Come on,
-lieutenant, drain your glass. No heel taps in this crowd."
-
-They had started their conversation in low tones so as not to disturb
-the slumbers of Pierre Luzon. But this precaution, or act of delicate
-consideration, had been long since forgotten. They were talking loud
-now, and often all together, and when Buck Ashley had returned from yet
-another pilgrimage to the store, none heard or noticed the door of the
-bedroom being cautiously pushed open by just the fraction of an inch.
-
-All four chairs had been again drawn around the cheerful log fire.
-
-"You were talking, Tom, of buying out Ben Thurston," remarked Jack
-Rover. "Then you haven't heard there's an option been given to a Los
-Angeles syndicate? Guess mebbe Ben Thurston won't be the owner of the
-big rancho very much longer."
-
-"And a good job, too," replied the sheriff, as he helped himself to yet
-another drink.
-
-Buck Ashley shook his head incredulously. "Oh, lots of fellers have paid
-down money for an option, as they call it, on the Thurston property, and
-finally when the rub came they didn't come across and live up to their
-bargain, and so they just naturally lost their option money."
-
-"I was talking to a geologist," intervened Munson, in whose mind the
-oil question seemed to be still uppermost, "and he says there is every
-indication that the Midway Oil fields, a few miles north, are not one
-whit better than wells that can be opened up right here."
-
-"But what's the use," said Tom Baker, "of all the oil fields in
-California to us fellers if we are about to be let into the secret
-door of a big cavern where they've got twelve or fifteen millions of
-twenty-dollar gold pieces stacked up, jest awaitin' for us to take 'em."
-The whisky was beginning to do its work; he had already forgotten his
-aspirations of being an oil king.
-
-"That's right," said Jack Rover, "and don't forget, while you're
-counting them twenty-dollar gold pieces, that Pierre Luzon has promised
-to show us the shallow riffle in the mountain stream where Guadalupe
-gets all that placer gold." In the cowboy's case the alcohol was making
-only still more fixed the one fixed idea in his brain.
-
-"Damn this store business anyway," said Buck Ashley, inconsequentially
-returning to the theme that appealed to him most directly. "Do you
-'spose I'm goin' to work my fingers off tying up groceries after we find
-old Murietta's money and the White Wolf's treasure? Not by one hell of
-a sight, if I know myself, and I 'low as how I do." And at the slightly
-opened bedroom door old Pierre, Luzon whom they all thought to be fast
-asleep, was listening to every word!
-
-"But there is one thing," cried Tom Baker, striking the table fiercely
-as he set down his glass, "I want you fellers to get next to yourselves
-now and make up your mind to."
-
-"Wa'al, don't stop, Tom," said Rover. "Go on and tell us what you're
-thinking about. Get it off your chest, old man."
-
-"It's just this way. By God, you fellers are not entitled to as much of
-this 'ere twelve or fifteen million dollars as I am, for I'm the feller
-that went to the governor and got his parole and brought Pierre back
-here to Tejon. Do you get me?" Buck Ashley had straightened up and
-looked at Tom Baker with an ugly scowl on his face. "It was me," he
-said, "got that letter from Pierre Luzon and we all throwed in, share
-and share alike, all five of us. And we'll cut what we find, too,
-whether it's one million or fifteen million, into five equal parts, or
-there'll be blood flowin good and plenty."
-
-Baker staggered to his feet, steadied himself for a moment and began to
-roll up his sleeves.
-
-"There be some things," he ejaculated, "that you jest can't let wait and
-settle up when the deal is all closed. I know what my rights are and you
-fellers can't bluff me, not by a derned sight."
-
-"Hold on, hold on, gentlemen," interposed Munson. "Let's not commence
-quarreling about something we are not even sure we shall ever see. Of
-course we hope to be escorted into the cavern by old Pierre Luzon, and
-we likewise hope that he'll find a hidden treasure. And by the way,
-Buck, this reminds me--the cut has to be into six equal parts, not five,
-for we owe Luzon the squarest of square deals."
-
-"Oh, I'm not agin' that," muttered Buck. "I just didn't remember him."
-
-"Well," resumed Munson, "why quarrel about something that is as yet
-nothing but a myth? It occurs to me that we should rather, individually
-and collectively, be exceedingly thankful that Pierre Luzon is alive,
-and that the White Wolf is dead, and that the one man who holds the
-secret has promised to show us this treasure."
-
-"I've never believed one cussed word about the White Wolf being dead,"
-growled Buck Ashley.
-
-"Well, it sure was in the newspapers," said Tom Baker, turning down his
-sleeves and resuming his seat.
-
-"Yes, it sure was in the newspapers," replied Buck, "and they jest
-seemed to settle the fact, leastways to their own satisfaction. But I've
-been a-thinkin' about Dick Willoughby. I don't believe he ever killed
-Marshall Thurston, I don't."
-
-"Whoever did kill him," put in Jack Rover, "did it good and plenty. Put
-the shot right square through his heart."
-
-"Well," said Tom Baker, reaching for more whisky, "I ain't got much to
-say, but what I says I stands to on this 'ere subject, and that is--"
-Almost with one accord all turned at the creaking of the bedroom door,
-and _there_ was Pierre Luzon, looking as if he had seen a ghost. His
-short prison-cropped hair seemed to be standing on end like bristles,
-and his eyes stared wildly at the four men. At last he cried out in a
-shrill voice that was almost a scream:
-
-"Ze son of Ben Thurston killed! Ah, ha!" he laughed, hysterically. "Shot
-through ze heart!--vengeance at last begins! Ze White Wolf is not dead!
-He is one live man!"
-
-The door was hastily closed with a loud bang, and the weird figure
-vanished like an apparition.
-
-For a few moments the revellers sat in stupefied silence. Finally Buck
-Ashley said in a low voice: "Damn that whisky anyhow. It has made us
-talk too loud."
-
-"Yes," remarked Tom Baker, "and also too dangnation much, I'm
-a-thinkin'."
-
-Both were sober men now.
-
-"Believe I'll have a snooze," said Jack rover, seating himself on an old
-lounge in a corner of the room. But he did not lie down.
-
-Nothing more was said for perhaps a full half hour; all were nodding or
-busy with their brooding thoughts.
-
-At last Buck Ashley rose and tiptoed toward the bedroom.
-
-"Guess I'll see if poor Pierre has gone to sleep again," he murmured.
-
-A moment later he shouted out from the inner chamber:
-
-"Hell, boys!--he's gone! He's given us the slip--the damned old
-jail-bird!"
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XIX--The Jail Delivery
-
-|AROUND Dick Willoughby there had been woven a web of circumstantial
-evidence that even before his trial had convinced most people of his
-guilt. Only a few tried friends who absolutely refused to believe him
-capable of shooting down an unarmed man from ambush clung to their
-faith that he had had nothing to do with the slaying of young Marshall
-Thurston. Among the general public the only question in discussion was
-whether the jury were likely to find extenuating circumstances and,
-should the life of the prisoner come to be spared, how long would be his
-sentence.
-
-Ben Thurston had lavished money with a free hand toward securing every
-possible piece of testimony in support of the prosecution, and before
-his return home even the cautious New York lawyer, Mr. Hawkins, had
-admitted that the case against Willoughby appeared to be conclusive. It
-was only a matter of a few weeks now when Thurston would be leaving the
-district.
-
-Already San Antonio Rancho was in possession of the syndicate; their
-foreman was in charge, the stock under their control, and it was only
-out of consideration that the former owner was being permitted to linger
-a little longer in residence. But for the gloomy and morose man there
-seemed to be gloating satisfaction in the grim thought that before
-shaking off forever the dust of his old home he would first of all
-ensure the hanging of his son's murderer.
-
-Among the most regular visitors at the jail were the ladies of La
-Siesta, and rumor now began to run around that Miss Merle Farnsworth,
-despite Willoughby's pleading that she should not mix her name up in
-the case, would offer some surprising evidence in favor of the accused
-man--evidence that might not exonerate Willoughby from responsibility
-for the deed, but perhaps would fully justify his act to the minds of
-the jurymen.
-
-It was now only three days from the trial, and the whole county was agog
-with expectation.
-
-That night in the small hours five masked men rode very quietly through
-the streets to the vicinity of the jail. All were heavily armed, and one
-of them was leading an extra saddle horse. The party dismounted under
-the shadow of some trees. One man held the horses, while his four
-companions, with drawn revolvers, advanced to the gateway. Whether it
-was a simple case of cowardly yielding to threats, or whether there had
-been preliminary financial greasing of locks and bolts, aided perhaps
-by sympathy for the prisoner, the fact remains that within a very few
-minutes Dick Willoughby had been brought from his cell.
-
-"You are a free man, Mr. Willoughby," said the leader of the masked band
-in a low voice. "You will come with us."
-
-"Who are you?" asked Dick.
-
-"We are friends--that is enough."
-
-"I have no wish to go," protested Dick in the hearing of the jailers.
-"The jury must acquit me--I am ready to remain here until they do acquit
-me."
-
-"Take care. The man with the money can put the rope round your neck."
-
-"I am not afraid."
-
-"There is another reason. The name of a certain young lady must not be
-introduced into this case."
-
-"I have begged her not to testify."
-
-"But she will testify if this trial goes on--that you know well. Now you
-will come with us, for her sake if not for your own."
-
-"Be it so then," replied Dick. "Lead the way." Just as quietly as they
-had come the little band of riders rode through the silent and deserted
-streets. They took the southern road, and for the first few miles kept
-to the thoroughfare. Then, reaching a stretch of unreclaimed land, they
-started across country. The night was moonless and dark, but Dick knew
-instinctively that they were making for the mountainous country to the
-north of the Tejon Pass.
-
-The leader rode a short distance ahead. Not a word was spoken. In about
-two hours they were among the foothills. The pace slackened, and then,
-as they reached a clump of oaks, a halt was called. From under the
-shadow of the trees a man appeared, leading two sturdy little mountain
-ponies. The newcomer wore no mask.
-
-"This man will be your guide from now on," announced the leader, whose
-features were still concealed by the strip of black cloth tied around
-the lower part of his face. "I am sorry we must ask you to wear a
-blindfold, Mr. Willoughby. But you are among friends, and I feel sure
-you will help us all by your ready assent."
-
-"I am in your hands," replied Dick, quietly. A few minutes later he was
-seated on one of the ponies, his eyes securely bandaged. The saddle was
-a big comfortable Mexican one, and he rested his hands on the horn; for
-there was no bridle, only a leading rein held by the man mounted on the
-other pony.
-
-"_Adios!_"
-
-It was the leader's voice again, and now once more Dick was on the move,
-the nimble little pony cantering gently over the turf.
-
-Hour succeeded hour. The sun had risen, as the blindfolded rider could
-tell from the warmth of the atmosphere. The canter had long since
-changed to a walk, and Dick knew that they had been climbing steadily,
-with many a turn and sometimes up precipitous slopes.
-
-At last a strange chilliness came into the air. Dick imagined that he
-heard a growl, as of some savage animal. Then there came a stop, and
-he caught some whispered words--a woman's voice he could have sworn,
-speaking in some strange tongue. After a few minutes his pony started
-again.
-
-But they had not gone more than a hundred yards further when his guide
-called out.
-
-"Here we are, sir. I will help you to descend. Zen I take ze bandage
-away. You see again."
-
-The voice had a quaint foreign accent. For a little time Willoughby
-remained blind. Then he began to see things, and involuntarily rubbed
-his eyes in amazement.
-
-He was in a vast vaulted cavern with no visible entrance revealed by
-the dim light of several lanterns suspended from the roof. In the far
-distance a log fire was burning, and silhouetted against its ruddy
-glow was the figure of the aged Indian squaw, Guadalupe, with a great
-dog-like creature standing by her side.
-
-"Guadalupe!" exclaimed Dick in profound surprise, turning to his guide.
-
-This man he now saw was old, with short gray hair and a short gray
-beard. His face was pale, but there was a pleasant gleam in his eyes.
-
-"Yes, Guadalupe," the guide replied. "Guadalupe, she guard ze entrance
-to our cave--she and ze white wolf. No one can get past ze white wolf
-unless Guadalupe speaks ze word."
-
-"And who are you?"
-
-"Oh, call me Pierre. I am Mr. Willoughby's servant. Here are fine
-beefsteaks ready for breakfast. Come."
-
-"Pierre!" murmured Dick. "Pierre Luzon?"
-
-"Zat is my name. I am Pierre Luzon."
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XX--In the Cavern
-
-|WHEN Dick proceeded to follow Pierre Luzon he found that the ponies had
-already trotted away through the semidarkness, evidently quite capable
-on their own account of finding their accustomed stable. Leading the
-way across the cavern, Pierre entered a corridor at the far end of which
-bright lights were burning. Soon, Dick, to his great wonderment, found
-himself in a comfortably, almost luxuriously furnished apartment.
-
-There were big thick rugs on the floor, and the rock walls were
-completely hidden by tapestries. The dining table in the centre was set
-with napery, china, glass, cutlery and silverware that would have done
-credit to a first-class hotel. Above swung a bronze lamp of antique
-pattern. Another table was laden with books, newspapers and magazines.
-In one corner gleamed the snow-white counterpane of a massive bedstead
-built of oak in Old Mission style. Here and there portable oil stoves
-were burning, diffusing a genial warmth throughout the grotto.
-
-Pierre watched the guest's look of bewilderment as he gazed around him.
-
-"You will be very comfortable here," said the Frenchman. "I have orders
-to attend to all your wants."
-
-"Orders, from whom?" asked Dick abruptly. "After breakfast you will
-know. I have one letter for you in my pocket."
-
-With characteristic philosophy Dick accepted the situation. The very
-mention of breakfast gave a keener edge to an already sharply whetted
-appetite. Pierre departed and presently returned with a superb sirloin
-steak sizzling on a hot platter. Under his arm was tucked a bottle
-of wine. As he set down the latter, Dick noted that it was dusty and
-cobwebby, as if it had emerged from some ancient cellar.
-
-"Zis is not ze vintage of California," remarked Pierre, as he drew the
-cork. "It is rare old Burgundy--all ze way from my beloved France."
-
-"_La belle_ France," murmured Dick. "I spent a year there, Pierre, most
-of the time in Paris."
-
-"Ah, monsieur knows France and Paris," exclaimed the old man in great
-delight. "Zen you speak French, too?"
-
-"_Un peu_," laughed Dick. "_Mais je fais beaucoup de fautes, mon ami_."
-
-[Illustration: 0205]
-
-"_Non, non, monsieur_," cried Pierre, breaking into voluble French.
-"Your accent is perfect--it is delightful to hear my native language
-again. We shall be great friends, Mr. Willoughby. Already I am your
-devoted servant." He bowed deferentially, as he held Dick's chair ready
-for him to be seated.
-
-"You will breakfast with me, Pierre?" asked Dick, still in his best
-French.
-
-"No, no. I wait on monsieur. I shall breakfast in good time."
-
-Pierre was not to be persuaded to take a place at the table, so Dick sat
-down in solitary state and was served in lordly fashion.
-
-With the _demi-tasse_ of black coffee at the close of the meal came
-a box of cigars--cigars fit for a prince, as Dick knew from the first
-fragrant whiff.
-
-The table was now cleared and Pierre ready to withdraw. He had taken a
-letter from his pocket and was holding it in his hand. But Dick, warmed
-and fed and supremely contented, was watching the ascending rings of
-tobacco smoke.
-
-"Do you know, Pierre," he said between complacent puffs, "that I was one
-of the bunch that helped to get you out of San Quentin?" He had lapsed
-into English.
-
-"Oh, yes, I know," replied Pierre, also dropping his French. "Ze five
-men who made up ze purse--I am very grateful to you all."
-
-"Then what about the hidden treasure?"
-
-"Ah, I was to show ze hidden treasure. But one great change come about.
-I made one big mistake."
-
-"Then the story of all this gold was a frame-up, was it?" laughed
-Willoughby.
-
-"No, no," protested Pierre earnestly. "Ze cave--you are here in ze cave,
-although you do not know ze secret hiding place. Ze treasure, it is
-here, too. But I can no longer show ze gold, for ze man to whom it all
-belong he is not dead--he is alive."
-
-"Whom do you mean?"
-
-"Don Manuel de Valencia--him you call ze White Wolf."
-
-"Great guns! So he has appeared again. The newspaper stories were all
-wrong?"
-
-"Zat is how I made my mistake. But I did not know until I came back to
-Tehachapi. Ze White Wolf is alive. It is he who has brought you here
-as his guest. Now you will read zis letter, and zen all things you will
-comprehend."
-
-Pierre laid the missive on the damask table cloth in front of Dick.
-The latter fastened his eyes on it in speechless surprise. Before
-he recovered himself Pierre, lifting the tray of empty dishes, had
-noiselessly disappeared.
-
-"Mystery upon mystery," murmured Dick as he broke the seal. The letter
-was a brief one, and began without any of the usual forms of personal
-address:
-
-"You are in safe and honorable keeping. Have no care. Nor need you worry
-about your friends--they will be informed of your safety.
-
-"Just as soon as possible the real slayer of Marshall Thurston will be
-revealed. You will be completely exonerated and can then return to the
-world, a free man. By this means a certain young lady will be spared
-from the gossip and the publicity which, although she has been brave
-enough to say it does not matter, would bring for her annoyance and
-pain.
-
-"If she is dear to you, as the writer of this letter believes, you will
-help to shield her from vulgar curiosity by remaining quietly where
-you are until the proper hour for your deliverance comes. It is only
-necessary for you to give your word of honor to Pierre Luzon that
-you will make no attempt to escape or reveal your whereabouts. Your
-trustfulness will be rewarded--this is the solemn promise of
-
-"Don Manuel de Valencia,
-
-"Your friend."
-
-Dick read and re-read the strange message. All at once he became
-conscious that Pierre Luzon was again standing by his chair. Their eyes
-met.
-
-"Does Mr. Willoughby give ze promise required?" asked Pierre.
-
-Dick rose to his feet and extended his hand.
-
-"I promise, Pierre. You have my word of honor. The letter says that is
-enough."
-
-"I have read ze letter before it was sealed. We all know Mr.
-Willoughby's word is enough--it is as good as one gold bond."
-
-"I'd do anything for Merle Farnsworth," continued Dick, carried away by
-his fervid emotion. "I would die for her, if need be, to save her from
-one moment's pain."
-
-"Don Manuel he know that," replied Pierre. Dick paused and his look
-changed.
-
-"How the devil does he know I love the girl?"
-
-"Ah!" The Frenchman shrugged his shoulders and smiled. "Ah! Don Manuel
-he know everything. But now, I am under orders not to speak. Over there
-you will find ze latest newspapers, sir," he went on, pointing to the
-table laden with literature, "and every few days more will be brought
-for you--not only ze newspapers of Los Angeles and San Francisco, but
-also, ze newspapers of New York and London and Paris, all of which
-monsieur is accustomed to read."
-
-"Great Scott, you seem to know," exclaimed Dick in a low voice.
-
-Pierre continued placidly:
-
-"And you play chess. There is a box of chess--_�checs_ we call it in
-France, you will remember. I too play ze game. Don Manuel and I used to
-spend many hours over ze board. After I have had my breakfast, I, Pierre
-Luzon, challenge you to one game of chess."
-
-"Be it so," laughed Dick. "But you must be hungry, man. For heaven's
-sake go and eat. We'll yarn later on. Meanwhile, I'll have a glance
-through the newspapers."
-
-Dick handled the newspapers with renewed surprise--the very New York
-papers he was accustomed to receive regularly, also the old familiar.
-_Times Weekly_ from London and the Paris _Figaro_ to which he had
-subscribed ever since the old Quartier Latin days! The same with the
-magazines--all his favorites were on the table.
-
-"Well, I'll be blowed! Is it the guileless Sing Ling whom Don Manuel has
-been tapping for information? This certainly looks like home," and again
-he glanced over the table. He looked at the titles of the books--several
-of the latest novels, a volume on socialism, another on the history of
-architecture.
-
-"Seems to know my book tastes, too. I won't be lonesome, that's certain.
-Well, I can't do better than make a start with the newspapers. I've
-fallen quite behind the times."
-
-He stretched himself out on a long rattan chair, and started with a Los
-Angeles daily. He had read lazily on for nearly an hour, when there came
-from his lips a little cry of surprise.
-
-Starting up into a sitting posture, Dick again perused the paragraph
-that had excited his special interest.
-
-It was an announcement stating that an ideal city was about to be built
-in the Tehachapi valley, and that a prize of ten thousand dollars was to
-be awarded to the designer of the best plans for laying out such a
-town. Reference was made to an advertisement on another page giving the
-details and the rules of the competition. To this Dick eagerly turned.
-
-The advertisement set forth that the model city was to be located
-somewhere near the centre of San Antonio Rancho, that the land was
-traversed by the state highway, by two railroads, by two electric power
-lines and two oil-carrying pipe lines, also the great Owen's River
-aqueduct that supplied Los Angeles, some two hundred miles away, with
-water from the high Sierras. It was further stated that the entire ranch
-was to be subdivided into small tracts, and that already hundreds of
-applicants were waiting to make choice of home sites just so soon as the
-survey work was completed and the land thrown open to selection.
-
-The plans required, and for which the prize of ten thousand dollars was
-offered, were to show the finest landscape effects, the most impressive
-and convenient location of public buildings, the most attractive ideas
-for bringing into being a veritable ideal city provided with all the
-most modern conveniences and sanitary equipment.
-
-"By gad, I'd like to have a shot at that," murmured Willoughby as he lay
-back in his chair and meditated.
-
-After a time he picked up the London journal, and the very first thing
-that met his eye was the identical advertisement on the back of the
-cover. He rose and began to search through the week's file of the
-_Figaro_, and there again he found the announcement of the contest.
-He was too keenly excited now for more reading. He began to pace the
-chamber. What a clever head had planned all this world-wide publicity!
-
-"That Los Angeles bunch of fellows are certainly great. They are
-evidently going into this thing right. Doubtless they are determined
-to build the ideal--the model--city of California. They want the best
-brains of all lands to help beautify the place. Gee! but I'd like to be
-in this contest game. But perhaps it would be presumption on my part.
-Yet, who knows the country better than I do? When it comes to landscape
-effects, I'm Johnny-on-the-spot all right. And they're in a hurry--only
-sixty days for the drawings. Unusual, such a short time. But I guess
-they're going to make the dust fly without a week's unnecessary delay.
-They are certainly live wires--they began by getting old Ben Thurston on
-the run."
-
-He was chuckling to himself at the thought when Pierre reappeared.
-
-"Pierre, old fellow," cried Dick, "would you be able to get me a drawing
-board, a box of instruments, india ink, water-colors, drawing paper, and
-so on?"
-
-"What are you going to do?" asked the old man with a smile. "Do you
-think you are again in ze Quartier Latin, Mr. Willoughby?"
-
-"No. But while I'm here I'm going back to the old Quartier Latin life,
-that's a cinch. Can you buy me that stuff?" he added, diving into his
-hip pocket.
-
-But he had forgotten--he had come out of jail, and his personal
-possessions had been left behind.
-
-Pierre Luzon, however, had interpreted both the gesture and the thought
-that had prompted it.
-
-"You need no money here, Mr. Willoughby," he said. "My orders are to get
-you everything you call for. Write all you need on a piece of paper. I
-send a trusty messenger, and we have ze drawing paper, ze instruments,
-ze ink and ze paints here very soon--yes, very soon."
-
-"Then, by thunder, I'm going to win that ten-thousand-dollar prize."
-
-"But she is worth millions of dollars."
-
-"What do you mean?"
-
-"Ze young lady--she very rich young lady, Miss Merle."
-
-Dick laughed.
-
-"Oh, that's quite another prize, Pierre," he replied. "And if she is so
-very rich, as you say, why that puts her further out of my reach than
-ever."
-
-Pierre nodded his head determinedly.
-
-"If I was you, Mr. Willoughby, ze prize I would try to win is ze
-beautiful young lady."
-
-When Pierre had gone, Dick again lay back in the long chair. But he was
-day-dreaming and love-dreaming now, wondering whether Merle Farnsworth
-really cared for him, whether he might dare whisper to her the story of
-his passionate love.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXI--A Debt of Honor
-
-|PUBLIC excitement had been running high over the approaching trial of
-Dick Willoughby, but his delivery from jail by the masked night-riders
-came as the culminating climax. Mystery and romance were piling up.
-Despite the strength of the circumstantial evidence, the sudden fate
-that had overtaken the young heir to San Antonio rancho had been
-shrouded with uncertainty; no witness had seen the actual doing of
-the murderous deed. The sensational arrest of Dick Willoughby had been
-followed by his still more sensational disappearance; for he seemed to
-have vanished from the face of the earth--he had been spirited to some
-place of concealment to which there was not the slightest clue, while
-also the identity of his rescuers remained a profound enigma.
-
-All sorts of speculations were rife, and it was small wonder that the
-name of the famous bandit, Don Manuel, came to be revived. This was
-just the sort of audacious work the White Wolf would have gloried
-in--breaking into a prison, defying the authorities, leaving behind him
-a trail of mystery and vague terror. But shrewd old-timers pointed out
-that Don Manuel had never in his whole career helped a gringo--that his
-hand had been against every American, and that in his earlier days at
-all events he had killed ruthlessly, out of sheer lust for vengeance
-against the race of newcomers who had despoiled him of his ancestral
-acres. What reason, therefore, could he have had to help Dick Willoughby
-to liberty? Even if it had been the outlaw's hand that had pulled the
-trigger against the son of his hated enemy, Ben Thurston, little would
-he have cared if a score of gringos had come to their end, justly or
-unjustly, as an aftermath of the tragedy.
-
-Old Ben Thurston had discussed this very question with himself. The
-slaying of his only son, the clever business deal that had called his
-own tricky and dishonest bluff and lost him his principality, the
-sight of his herds being driven away, the approaching eviction from his
-home--all these events crowding one upon the other had exasperated
-him beyond measure and completed the change of the already grouchy,
-disgruntled man into a veritable wild beast snapping and snarling at
-everyone. Yet his mind was completely obsessed by the idea that it was
-Dick Willoughby, and Dick Willoughby alone, who had shot his son, so
-there was no room in his small and obfuscated brain for any seriously
-renewed apprehension that his old enemy, the White Wolf, had come to
-life again.
-
-Dick's escape from jail almost gave Ben Thurston a fit of apoplexy. It
-was the sleuth, Leach Sharkey, who alone of those around him ventured
-to break the news. After his first paroxysm of wrath, Thurston paced the
-room like a caged animal. He had begun to make a confidant of this man,
-his constant attendant, the protector with the handy guns in his hip
-pockets on whom he had come to rely night and day, the one associate who
-phlegmatically endured his irritable moods and abusive language.
-
-So, in Leach Sharkey's presence, Thurston, as he walked to and fro,
-spoke his thoughts aloud.
-
-"Damn all pretty faces, anyhow. First and last they have cost me a fine
-sum. And now it is a pretty face that has cost me my boy's life. It's
-hell, that's what it is. But I will have my revenge. I'll hang Dick
-Willoughby with my own hands if necessary--even if it is the last act of
-my life I'll have his neck stretched for him."
-
-He was glaring down at the sleuth, and the pause seemed to call for some
-reply.
-
-"Well, he's given us the slip for the present," Sharkey ventured. Then
-he caught the gathering fury in the other's eyes, and hurriedly went on:
-"But there is no question in the world we'll run the scoundrel down. I
-myself will shoot him like the dog he is the moment I lay my two eyes on
-him."
-
-"Well, don't waste your breath telling me you are going to do it,"
-growled Thurston. "Hunt him down. Take all the money you need. Get all
-the men you can. Search every canyon. Guard every road out of the hill
-country. And don't be misled by that damn fool talk about the White Wolf
-of which you've been telling me. That cursed outlaw is dead--dead as a
-herring. I ran the story of his death to earth--stood on his very grave
-in the potters' field at Seattle. Dick Willoughby's the outlaw now. Get
-him at any cost. Get him, or, by God, lose your own job, Leach Sharkey.
-Do you follow me?"
-
-"Oh, I follow you," replied the sleuth, a sardonic smile still further
-exposing the teeth that were the most prominent feature of his face and
-at all times gave him a hyena-like appearance. "I'll get him, make no
-mistake, Mr. Thurston. Just draw me that check, and I'll have twenty
-more men out on the range before morning."
-
-At the store, Dick Willoughby's disappearance was for days the sole
-topic of conversation. One morning Tom Baker and Buck Ashley were
-gossiping together.
-
-"What beats me," remarked the storekeeper, "is that Chester Munson wears
-such a spry look. He was Dick's closest chum, yet he don't seem to be
-one bit anxious."
-
-"Oh, he's got the word, make no mistake," replied Tom. "Although the
-lieutenant is as close as wax, he knows Dick's all right, for sure.
-And I'm told that up at La Siesta, where Dick has his girl, you know,
-they're still a-playin' the pianner and the fiddle all the time. Mark my
-words--there's been some wireless telephone at work. Munson don't worry,
-his lady friends don't worry, so I begin to think we're a couple of
-derned old fools to fret ourselves on Dick's account."
-
-"It's about Pierre Luzon I'm frettin' most," Buck Ashley rejoined. "To
-think that that damned Frenchman should have done us in the eye, got
-clean away and robbed us of our share of the buried treasure--that's
-what worries me, Tom Baker. And you'll allow now you made a mess of
-things by not havin' the old convict shackled to the bedpost."
-
-"A mess of things!" cried the sheriff, rising anger in his voice and
-eyes. "You won't keep your mouth shut till I teach you--"
-
-But just then there was the clatter of hoofs outside, and Tom stopped in
-the middle of his sentence. A moment later Munson and Jack Rover entered
-in a state of visible excitement. Munson carried in his arms a rotund
-canvas sack tied at the neck. The package was not very big, but clearly
-of considerable weight.
-
-"Great Caesar," exclaimed the lieutenant, without pausing to give any
-greeting. "A most surprising thing has happened. When I awoke this
-morning I found this bag lying on my table. And what do you think it
-contains?" As he asked the question he dumped the sack on the counter
-with a heavy thud.
-
-"You've got us guessin'," drawled Tom.
-
-"Ten thousand, five hundred dollars in gold!" announced Munson.
-
-"Good Lord!" ejaculated the sheriff in great surprise.
-
-Munson went on:
-
-"Five thousand dollars are for the French warder at San Quentin who
-smuggled Pierre Luzon's letter out of the prison, and the balance is for
-the syndicate."
-
-"What syndicate?" gasped Buck, for the moment quite bewildered.
-
-"The Hidden Treasure Syndicate, of course," exclaimed Jack Rover.
-"Pierre Luzon has sent each man back the hundred dollars he put up to
-get him out of the pen, and five thousand dollars extra to divide among
-us."
-
-Buck and Tom sprang simultaneously to their feet.
-
-"Hooroosh!" shouted the sheriff. "I always knew there was no yellow
-streak in old Pierre Luzon."
-
-"And I always said I liked him, too," observed Buck. "But come into the
-parlor, boys," he went on, with a cautious look around. "Let's count the
-money."
-
-"And divvy it up," added Tom eagerly. "Gosh 'lmighty, boys! I've never
-yet seen a thousand dollars in gold at one time outside a bank cashier's
-window. And to think there's that amount cornin' to me right now!"
-
-"One thousand, one hundred, pal, to be exact," laughed Jack Rover,
-lifting the package and following the storekeeper into the sanctum
-beyond the counter.
-
-The gold was in United States twenty-dollar pieces, bearing dates which
-showed they had been minted more than twenty years ago.
-
-"Some of Joaquin Murietta's loot," remarked Jack Rover, when attention
-had been drawn to this detail.
-
-"No," observed Tom Baker, holding up the coin he had been examining,
-"Murietta wasn't alive when this 'ere gold piece came from the mint.
-This is some of Don Manuel's stuff."
-
-"The White Wolf!" exclaimed Munson.
-
-"Yes, the White Wolf," continued the sheriff. "So if the White Wolf
-ain't dead, as Pierre declared that night--" Tom gazed at the bedroom
-door as if the spectral figure might reappear--"he's honorin' the
-Frenchie's sight draft, that's sure."
-
-"I see," said Munson. "He is paying the five thousand dollars old Pierre
-promised in his letter if he was helped to freedom and five thousand
-dollars besides."
-
-"Precisely," Tom Baker replied. "But if the White Wolf is dead, as most
-folks say, then the Frenchie's got the key to the treasure vault, all
-right."
-
-"So we've got to get him back here again, boys," murmured Buck, rubbing
-his hands while his eyes feasted upon the heap of gold. "I don't mind
-boardin' Pierre Luzon for a spell, and he can have all the bourbon he
-wants."
-
-"Till he tells us where Guadalupe gets her nuggets," grinned Jack. "But
-you've forgotten to show 'em, Munson, the card that came with the coin."
-
-"Oh, yes," rejoined Munson, drawing a small piece of pasteboard from his
-pocket. "It is brief enough. Luzon gives his countryman's family address
-in Marseilles where the first five thousand dollars is to be mailed.
-Then he writes down our five names, Dick Willoughby's first, and says
-the five of us are to share equally." He passed the card to Tom Baker
-for inspection, and went on: "Jack and I are going to ride over to
-Bakersfield, get the French bank draft and put Dick's money in the bank
-along with our own."
-
-"Where's Dick?" asked Buck, with a quick uplift of his eyes into
-Munson's face.
-
-But the latter was not to be betrayed into divulging any information
-that might be in his possession.
-
-"I have not the slightest idea," he replied airily. "But I feel sure
-Dick's all right. He is the sort of fellow well able to look after
-himself. Meanwhile, Jack and I will attend to his financial interests,"
-he added with a laugh, as he began to count the gold.
-
-In silence the task proceeded, five thousand dollars first being set
-aside, and then the balance divided into five separate heaps. When all
-were satisfied as to the correctness of the distribution, Munson swept
-the gold back into the sack, except for the two little piles allotted to
-Ashley and Baker. Then he securely tied the package, ready for the ride
-to Bakersfield.
-
-"Buck will lock mine in his safe, boys," exclaimed Tom Baker. "Gosh me,
-but I'll want to look at it two or three times a day."
-
-"Oh, I'm drivin' over to the bank myself tomorrer," declared Buck. "I've
-got a bit more to add to this pile."
-
-"A few handfuls of nuggets, I suppose," laughed Rover.
-
-"Well, I'll allow Guadalupe always pays her grocery bills. But this 'ere
-store ain't goin' to be a safe deposit vault, not on your demed life,
-with bandits around again. So you'd better arrange to come with me to
-town tomorrer, Tom."
-
-"You'll need me to help you home, perhaps," grinned the sheriff. "But, I
-say, Munson, you ain't told us yet how this sack came to be delivered at
-your place."
-
-"There's a proper mystery for you!" cried Munson. "As I said before, I
-found the bag this morning, lying on my dressing table. Sing Ling was
-the only one besides myself in the shack, and he never heard a sound all
-night."
-
-"You're still in Dick's old home?" asked Buck. "Yes, but I leave
-tomorrow--have notice to quit, for some surveyor chaps are coming in.
-I'm moving up to Mr. Robles' place. He wants me to catalog the books in
-his library."
-
-"And Sing Ling?" queried Tom.
-
-"He goes, too. You see, Mr. Robles needs a crackerjack cook, now I'll be
-boarding with him," Munson laughed, gaily. "You don't happen to have a
-porterhouse steak about the place, Buck?"
-
-"I can heat you up a can of pork and beans."
-
-"Nothing doing! Jack and I wouldn't spoil our appetites with such truck
-as that. We're going to set up a chicken dinner in Bakersfield."
-
-"Chicken and champagne," chimed in Jack, as he swung the sack over his
-shoulder.
-
-"You're beginning to get big bugs these days," called out the
-storekeeper as the young men left the room. "Guess, Tom," he went on,
-turning to the sheriff, "we could do with a jolt of Kentucky."
-
-"Make it a bottle of bourbon," gurgled Tom, "to remind us of our absent
-friend."
-
-"Dear old Pierre," murmured Buck, as he fumbled in his pocket for the
-key of the safe, his eyes glued all the time on the two little heaps of
-gold.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXII--Underqround Wonders
-
-|Dick Willoughby was in a way happy in his retreat. At first he had been
-inclined to regret the jail delivery--it might have been the manlier
-part to have faced the music and cleared his name before the whole
-world. But then he reflected on the uncertainties of a trial, the
-cases of innocent men having suffered because of damning circumstantial
-evidence piled up against them, the vindictiveness of Ben Thurston and
-the undoubted power of his money to press the criminal charge by every
-unscrupulous means. So Dick soon came round to the belief that he might
-be safer for the time being in the guardianship of the White Wolf than
-at the mercy of a fallible jury.
-
-Then there was Merle Farnsworth to consider. Yes; to have brought her
-into a public court, to have allowed her to plead for him by telling the
-story of Marshall Thurston's loathsome advances--that was a thing that
-could never have been tolerated. The leader of the jail-breaking gang
-had been right; Dick owed it to Merle to save her from such a cruel
-ordeal.
-
-Finally Dick's contentment over his change of quarters was completed
-when Pierre Luzon appeared with a superb equipment of drawing
-instruments and materials. There was no time to worry now over surmises
-as to the wisdom of this course or the other course. Work lay to his
-hand--work of the most absorbing and delightful kind; and with all the
-ambitious enthusiasm of his temperament he tackled it whole-heartedly
-there and then. Hour after hour, day after day, Pierre watched in
-contemplative silence the methodical advancement of the task to which
-the young architect had applied himself.
-
-But there were frequent intervals for conversation, sometimes in French,
-sometimes in English, as the mood prompted. Occasionally Pierre drifted
-into semi-confidential reminiscences, and Willoughby soon came to know
-in close detail the story of Don Manuel's life--the tragedy of his
-sister Rosetta's death, the vow of vengeance against Ben Thurston, the
-early bandit days when the White Wolf counted every gringo in the land
-his natural enemy, the often hairbreadth escapes of the outlaw, his
-sublime courage and nerve in the direst emergencies.
-
-"Don Manuel was one great man," remarked Pierre at the close of one of
-these confidences--the phrase was a favorite one with the old Frenchman.
-"Many and many a time he could have shot his enemy from a distance
-and got away. But Don Manuel had vowed zat he would kill him hand to
-hand--zat ze villain must die with a last malediction in his ear, and
-knowing zat it was he, ze White Wolf, who in ze end had revenged his
-sister's shame."
-
-"He felt, too, didn't he, that his father had been wronged in being
-driven from San Antonio Rancho?"
-
-"Sure--zat was another great wrong--zat was why Don Manuel was so bitter
-against all ze Americans. But he made zem pay for ze land many and many
-times over." Then Pierre, as was now his custom in Dick's presence when
-speaking at any length, lapsed into French as he continued: "But the
-White Wolf was a man of high honor. He never used any of the proceeds of
-his robberies for himself. True, he spent the money to pay his band, to
-pay the numerous scouts and spies whose services he secretly retained,
-to plan and accomplish further hold-ups, to defy and outwit the
-authorities. But on his own needs--never--not one dollar!"
-
-Pierre went on to explain that after Ben Thurston had fled from
-California and kept away in hiding, Don Manuel had visited Spain, to
-claim the family estates in Valencia to which his father's death had
-left him the sole heir. These he had sold for many millions of dollars,
-and most of that money he kept in banks in London and Paris. So he was
-a very rich man, and had no need to rob anyone except to gratify his
-vengeance. Even the hoarded gold of Joaquin Murietta he had never
-touched. It remained intact today in the treasure vault of the cave,
-boxes and sacks of gold and jewels.
-
-"Won't I be allowed to see this wonderful treasure?" asked Dick, half
-jesting.
-
-"Perhaps, some day, if the White Wolf chooses to show you. But it is
-not for me to do that--I swore an oath of secrecy when the White Wolf
-trusted me--me and Felix Vasquez, who was also his confidant. But
-Vasquez was killed at Tulare Lake. So now only we two know the secret,
-and until the White Wolf himself dies my lips are sealed by the solemn
-oath I swore to the Virgin Mary." The old man crossed himself devoutly.
-
-"Then where does the White Wolf live now?"
-
-"Ah, that is another secret. Again I would break my oath if I spoke one
-word."
-
-"And Guadalupe--does she know these things?" asked Dick in English.
-
-"Guadalupe? Oh, no," responded Pierre, politely adopting the change of
-language, "she is just one servant, our cook--one very excellent cook,
-as monsieur knows--and ze guardian of ze cave. For ze real white wolf
-guards Guadalupe--ze big animal is just like one tame dog to ze old
-squaw, but with his fierce jaws he would kill anyone who dared to
-approach her or come near ze hidden entrance to zis cavern. No man can
-ever find zat while ze white wolf is alive. In ze old days he killed
-several men when zey dared to follow Guadalupe."
-
-"Then the white wolf must be very old?"
-
-"As old as Guadalupe--as old as the Tehachapi mountains," exclaimed
-Pierre, again crossing himself and thereby revealing the superstitious
-dread in which he held the savage animal.
-
-"But you can pass the white wolf, can't you?' asked Dick.
-
-"Never--except when Guadalupe give permission. Then ze wolf lies
-down and I can come out of ze cave or enter. Ah! ze white wolf is one
-terrible beast. But he never shows his teeth to Don Manuel. Only Don
-Manuel can pass when Guadalupe is not there."
-
-"Then where is Guadalupe's riffle of gold--where is the lake of oil
-about which you told Tom Baker?"
-
-"Come, I will show you zese," replied Pierre. As he rose he picked up
-the lantern he usually carried.
-
-Dick jumped to his feet with alacrity and followed his guide.
-
-They crossed the main cavern, then entered another side gallery. This
-had many windings and from it ran several diverging rock corridors. But
-Pierre led the way unfalteringly.
-
-Fully half a mile must have been traversed when at last the Frenchman
-halted and swung his lantern aloft.
-
-"Zere!" was all he said.
-
-Dick followed the flash of the lantern, and there before him was a dark
-pool stretching away indefinitely into the blackness beyond. He bent
-down and scooped up a little of the fluid in his palm. It was a brown
-oil, as thin as water, and therefore capable of use without any refining
-process.
-
-"Great Scott, this is wonderful!" exclaimed Dick in profound amazement.
-
-"Very wonderful," concurred Pierre. "In zis cavern are oil and water,
-also gold--Guadalupe's gold. Ze gold is close to here. Come."
-
-Pierre turned and again led the way through dark and winding corridors.
-At a little distance Dick became conscious of the purling of a running
-stream. Pierre stopped once more, but this time held the lantern close
-to the ground.
-
-"Here Guadalupe come to wash out ze nuggets of gold, and since I have
-been in prison she buy with zem, so Mr. Baker say to me, groceries at
-ze store. Don Manuel, when I tell him, he very angry--she never do zat
-again."
-
-"Poor old Buck Ashley!" laughed Dick. "He lost you, Pierre, and now
-he'll be losing his best paying customer, too."
-
-While speaking, he knelt and dipped his hands into the stream, bringing
-up some gravel into the lantern rays. But Pierre shook his head.
-
-"You no find ze gold. Guadalupe wash many hours to get, perhaps, just
-one nugget. But there is heaps and heaps, if ze miners came with spades
-and cradles."
-
-"Great guns, there must be the reef, too, from which the nuggets have
-come!" exclaimed Dick, rising erect and dropping the handful of pebbles.
-
-"Now, we must go back," said Pierre, "for zis evening you are to be
-allowed to come for a ride with me down ze mountains."
-
-"You don't say?" Dick cried, surprised and delighted.
-
-"Yes; Don manuel he send word today that he give permission. But you
-must wear ze bandage round your eyes, and you must promise to return
-when I give ze word."
-
-"Don't for one moment think, old fellow, that I would leave my drawings.
-But where are we going tonight?"
-
-"To La Siesta," replied Pierre.
-
-"Hurrah!" shouted Dick. "Hurry up, Pierre! I'm mighty glad you got
-me those ties and things from Los Angeles. You say you can give me a
-hair-cut?"
-
-"Ze old-time bandit learned to trim ze hair of his friends as well as ze
-pocket-books of his enemies," was the laughing answer.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXIII--The Unexpected Visitor
-
-|MOST of the cattle had been driven off the land. The vaqueros had
-dispersed to the four points of the compass. Chester Munson had vacated
-his room in Dick Willoughby's old home, and had taken up his residence
-and library duties at Mr. Robles' mansion on the hill. Sing Ling had
-folded his tent like the Arab and silently stolen away in the same
-direction. A small army of surveyors had appeared on the scene and were
-quartered in the rancho buildings.
-
-The only one of the old-timers who still lingered on was Ben Thurston,
-more gloomy and morose than ever, seldom stirring out of doors now, but
-conducting all his business by telephone or through the agency of the
-sleuth, Leach Sharkey, his only companion.
-
-Jack Rover had pitched his camp temporarily at the store. Buck Ashley
-had assigned him Pierre's cot, but the cowboy had fixed it under a
-wide-spreading sycamore, preferring to sleep in the open rather than
-share the grocery-perfumed atmosphere of the store building.
-
-Tom Baker was around most of the time. The three men clung together with
-a vague sense that they had a common interest in the vast treasure which
-had so far eluded them, but which might any day come again within reach
-of their eager claws. It afforded an endless theme of conversation,
-varied by talk about the passing of the rancho and all the train of
-changes which were bound to follow the close settlement of the valley.
-
-One morning Jack Rover found Buck at the door of the store, with a pair
-of antiquated-looking field glasses at his eyes.
-
-"Where did you get the goggles, Buck?" asked Jack.
-
-"Oh, I rummaged 'em out of a trunk--had almost forgot I had the blamed
-things. But we used to keep a sharp lookout in the old bandit days--got
-kinda ready for any suspicious lookin' riders on the road." He had
-spoken while still peering through the binoculars, but now he turned to
-Jack and proffered him the glasses. "I do wonder what 'n hell we're all
-cornin' to anyway. This here ranch that we've bragged up as bein'
-the biggest in all California! Ugh!" The grunt was one of unspeakable
-disgust. "Take a look for yourself."
-
-Jack turned the glasses in the direction Buck had been gazing, and began
-to adjust the focus.
-
-"What's the matter now?" he asked.
-
-"Matter 'nough," growled the storekeeper. "San Antonio Rancho is goin'
-to the dogs. Do you see them specks away out yonder in the valley?
-That's another band of surveyors. One feller's peekin' through a
-spy-glass set on a tripod; another feller goes ahead and puts up tall
-stakes with big figgers on 'em, and the other fellers are chainin' off
-the distances. This 'ere ranch 'll surely look like a checker-board
-blamed soon."
-
-"Progress," said Jack, laconically.
-
-"Progress, hell!" snapped Ashley. "These new fellers that bought the
-ranch have sure 'nuff driv' off all the cattle and now they're dividin'
-up the land. I bet they'll take the postoffice away from me--not that
-it pays much, for the Lord knows it don't--but it brings customers to my
-store."
-
-"Well, Buck," said the cowboy, consolingly, "there are lots worse things
-than moving a postoffice. What's to prevent your setting up the finest
-grocery store in the new model city the advertisements speak about?"
-
-"That would suit me fine, wouldn't it?" cried the old storekeeper,
-with scathing contempt. "Goin' around in a biled shirt, and handin' out
-pencils and chewin' gum to the little school gals that'll be swarmin'
-all over the place. Not on your life, Jack! I'll be losin' both my
-postoffice and my store in these new-fangled times." He paused a moment,
-then his tone changed to one of aggressiveness. "However, they ain't
-built their doggoned new town yet, and it's my belief all this boom talk
-is just so much hot air."
-
-"In any case you won't need to worry, Buck, after we get on the tracks
-of Pierre Luzon again. I intend to find the old squaw's sand-bar, or my
-name isn't Jack Rover."
-
-"And I betche I'm a-goin' to find Joaquin Murietta's cache," concurred
-the old man with equal determination.
-
-Just then Tom Baker slouched out of the store, where he had overheard
-the conversation.
-
-"Oh, things are a-goin' to turn out all right in the end, boys, don't
-fret over that. And there's one thing gol-dern certain, there'll be some
-great things doin' in this 'ere valley once they get started on buildin'
-the town. The new place will just spring up like Oklahomy City, or
-Liberal, Kansas, or some of them big towns that had twenty thousand
-people livin' in 'em inside o' thirty days from the time they were
-surveyed and laid out."
-
-"That seems quite impossible," commented Jack.
-
-"Not impossible by a derned sight. My brother was at Liberal, Kansas,
-down there on the Rock Island, near No Man's Land, you know. The new
-town had been talked of and talked of for mebbe three or four months,
-just as this new town is bein' talked about today. Then finally the
-mornin' came when the new town of Liberal was to be opened up. There
-was to be a regular town openin', so to speak, and a sale of lots.
-Why, great guns, when the management of that town company rode into the
-station, on the early train, they found more'n ten thousand people right
-there campin' in covered wagons, tents and all that sorta business, just
-awaitin' for the auctioneerin' to start."
-
-Tom paused to take a fresh chew of tobacco and then rambled on:
-
-"I tell you, boys, that within thirty days there was twenty thousand
-people livin' in that 'ere town. Two banks were established, and one of
-them had one hundred and eighty-five thousand dollars in deposits, too.
-Oh, there's lots of people who remember the rush to Liberal, and the
-boomin' of Oklahomy City also. And history's fixin' to repeat itself
-right here on this 'ere ranch. Things will be sizzlin' when the town
-site is finally located and the rush starts pourin' in from Portland,
-Oregon, on the north, to San Diego on the south, with a few thousands
-from Texas and other states this side o' the Rocky Mountains. They'll
-sure be great doin's when the Los Angeles syndicate announce they've
-awarded to some feller that ten-thousand-dollar prize for the best plans
-for their ideal city, as they keep on callin' it."
-
-"Munson and I were speaking about the contest and the prize," remarked
-Jack, "and were saying that if Dick Willoughby were only here, he'd
-about win, hands down. You know he was an architect once, before he came
-West."
-
-"Dick Willoughby," snorted Ashley, "How can he compete when he don't
-know anything about the blamed business? He's hid away, right enough."
-
-"Munson knows a thing or two," remarked Tom Baker. "If he'd only apeak,
-he could tell us where Dick is. That's my opinion."
-
-"And there once again you're dead wrong," retorted Jack, warmly. "If
-Munson only knew where Dick is hiding, he would have got that very prize
-competition advertisement into his hands long before now. He's sore
-because he can't send Dick the word. Where is Dick Willoughby? By gad,
-it's a mystery."
-
-"I guess you're right," said the sheriff. "That sort o' exonerates
-Munson from keepin' things from his partners. I think I owe it to
-Chester Munson to drink his health--just for ever doubtin' him. What
-shall it be, boys?"
-
-And the open-air meeting adjourned.
-
-It was the very evening of the day on which this conversation had been
-held in Buck Ashley's store that Dick Willoughby rode forth from the
-cavern blindfolded and under the guidance of Pierre Luzon. For the first
-hour progress was slow--round many turnings, down steep declivities,
-with just here and there a few miles of easier trail. But then there had
-been a swift canter for another hour over grass land, and now at last
-the riders were upon a well-made road. Dick divined that this must be
-the highway leading to La Siesta, but from what point of the compass
-they had come he had not the remotest conception.
-
-Very soon Pierre Luzon, still riding ahead with the leading rein, came
-to a halt.
-
-"Here we are. Dismount, please," he said. "You are free to remove ze
-bandage."
-
-Dick looked; they were right below the knoll on which the Darlington
-home stood. Lights were gleaming from the windows. Dick could even hear
-the faint tinkle of the piano.
-
-"I hide ze ponies here in zis little grove of trees," Pierre continued,
-pointing to a coppice not fifty yards from the main road. "In two hours'
-time, at eleven o'clock"--Pierre looked at his watch in the bright
-moonlight--"monsieur will return. I have your word?"
-
-"My word as a gentleman, Pierre," exclaimed Dick, extending his hand.
-"So long then, old fellow. I've got to make the best use of my time."
-
-The piano playing stopped abruptly when Willoughby, unannounced,
-appeared at the door of the music room.
-
-"Dick!" exclaimed Merle delightedly, leaving the instrument and rushing
-toward him. If they had been alone Dick felt that right then she would
-have jumped into his arms. But at the distance of a few paces she halted
-and clasped her hands.
-
-"How ever did you get here, Mr. Willoughby?" she asked intensely.
-
-"I rode here," he answered, as they shook hands. "But it is only a brief
-visit. Hallo, Miss Grace! I'm delighted to see you again. And you, Ches,
-old sport--why this is great luck to find you here! Mrs. Darlington, I'm
-mighty glad to see you all once more."
-
-The whole bevy were crowding around him, shaking hands and expressing
-their joyful surprise.
-
-"We knew you were safe, that was all," explained Munson.
-
-"So you were having just the same jolly good times," laughed Dick,
-glancing at the piano. "I'm simply dying for some music."
-
-"But wait a minute," exclaimed Munson, drawing a fat wad of newspaper
-cuttings from his pocket. "I've got to tell you about a competition you
-must get into--new plans for an ideal city here--"
-
-"In the heart of the old rancho," smiled Dick, as he completed the
-sentence. While he spoke, he placed his arm affectionately across his
-chum's shoulders. "I know all about it, old man. I'm working hard on my
-plans--they are already more than half done."
-
-"Bravo!" shouted Munson. "That's great news."
-
-"But here, too, is Mr. Robles," exclaimed Dick, breaking from the group
-and stepping across the room. "Excuse me, senor, but I did not notice
-you were here till this moment."
-
-"No excuse needed, my friend. You were better engaged"--this with a
-humorous side-glance at the young ladies. "But I am glad to see you
-looking so well."
-
-"Where have you been, Mr. Willoughby?" asked Grace.
-
-"That I cannot tell you," replied Dick gravely. "I have pledged my
-solemn word. I must leave you at eleven o'clock, returning whence I
-came. And meanwhile nobody must ask me a single question about my place
-of hiding. There now--that's all. What shall it be first, Miss Merle, a
-piano solo or a duet with the violin?"
-
-"Supper, I should say," exclaimed Mrs. Darlington, as she left the room.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXIV--In a Tight Corner
-
-|DICK'S after-dark visit to La Siesta was only the first of several that
-followed at intervals of a few days. He came and departed mysteriously,
-and during his brief stay every precaution was taken that no one except
-his few trusted friends should know of his presence. But by some means
-or other a whisper had reached the ear of the sleuth, Leach Sharkey,
-that the fugitive had been seen at the home of Mrs. Darlington.
-
-When the news was imparted to Ben Thurston, the old man quivered from
-excitement.
-
-"At La Siesta, do you tell me? Let us ride over there at once, and
-search the place from basement to attic."
-
-"No, no," replied Sharkey. "I've got my scouts out. Don't you worry. We
-must wait till the night bird comes back. Then we'll trap him like a fat
-quail."
-
-"All right. Have my automobile ready, and a bunch of well-armed fellows
-right here, so that we can make a rush over at a moment's notice. By
-God, I've been disappointed in everything else--lost my son, lost my
-ranch, lost my home. But I'm not going to lose that man. I'm going to
-get him, even if we shoot him down on sight as an outlawed fugitive from
-justice with a price on his head."
-
-"We'll get him," answered Sharkey, with a grim smile. "You may count him
-a dead bird. I guessed he wouldn't keep away from his girl very long."
-
-"His girl! Curse her--it was she who lured my son to his death. But I'll
-be avenged. If she has been harboring an outlaw, she, too, has broken
-the law and shall go to jail."
-
-"Well, she no doubt thinks him innocent," suggested the sleuth.
-
-"Innocent! All women are alike--treacherous devils at heart. I would
-give them the vote--yes, but the rope at the same time," he went on,
-growling in savage incoherence.
-
-And Sharkey, knowing that discussion or contradiction only added fresh
-fuel to his vile temper, left him alone.
-
-At last, a few nights later, a rider dashed up to Ben Thurston's house
-with the news that Dick Willoughby had been seen entering La Siesta, and
-that, following Sharkey's instructions, every avenue of escape was now
-guarded.
-
-"Hurry, hurry! I've got to be in at the death," fairly screamed the old
-man.
-
-Five minutes later the big seven-passenger automobile, carrying three or
-four armed men besides its owner and his personal guard, Leach Sharkey,
-was devouring the twenty miles of road that lay between the two ranch
-homes.
-
-That evening the four young people were quietly chatting in the cosy
-corner on the interior verandah--the comfortable little nook fixed up
-with rugs and tapestries and oriental divans. It was summer now, and
-after a sultry day the night air was sweet and balmy. Willoughby was
-smoking a cigar in languid contentment with his surroundings, when all
-at once he sprang to his feet.
-
-Tia Teresa had rushed in, frantic with excitement.
-
-"A great big automobile is coming along the road," she cried, "and
-there are men watching outside the portico. Come with me," she went on,
-addressing Dick. "I know where your horses are hid. I can take you by a
-secret path through the oleanders."
-
-Dick vaguely wondered why the duenna should know anything about his mode
-of coming. But there was no time to question, for just then there came
-the sound of voices outside.
-
-Mrs. Darlington, pale and agitated, emerged from the drawing room.
-
-"What has happened?" she asked breathlessly.
-
-"I guess I'm trapped," replied Dick quietly. "No doubt it's old
-Thurston. There will be shooting if I resist. So there is nothing for it
-but to surrender."
-
-"No, no," exclaimed Merle. "I dread that vindictive man. He must never
-get you in his power again. We must gain time to smuggle you out of
-the house. I have it. Tia Teresa--give me your mantilla and your cloak.
-Quick, quick!"
-
-A first loud knocking had come on the door at the head of the portico
-steps. The duenna in a moment had divested herself of her loose black
-robe and heavy lace veil.
-
-"Get something else to wear and meet us at the oleanders," continued
-Merle, taking the garments from Tia Teresa. "Put these on, Dick, and
-sit right there in that corner. Mr. Munson, turn off two or three of the
-lights. Mother, dear, control yourself. Take this book and be reading.
-Now, that will do. They will be here in a moment."
-
-A second knock had been heard, and now they knew that the door was being
-opened without further ceremony, for at placid La Siesta there were no
-bolts or bars against unwelcome visitors.
-
-In that brief minute a wonderful transformation scene had taken place in
-the cosy corner. Tia Teresa had disappeared. Munson was stretched on
-a sofa, puffing his cigar. Merle and Grace had been playing patience
-during the afternoon and had left the cards in scattered confusion. Mrs.
-Darlington, beneath the single incandescent aglow, was quietly reading.
-From the darksome corner the pretended duenna surveyed this peaceful
-scene of domesticity.
-
-It was Ben Thurston himself who led the way for his swarm of myrmidons.
-
-He began without formality; his tone was coarse and rude.
-
-"We want the outlaw, Dick Willoughby. We know he is here. So make no
-fuss. Deliver him over."
-
-Mrs. Darlington had risen to her feet, and Munson, too, had sprung
-erect.
-
-"What do you mean?" asked the lady with quiet dignity.
-
-"You know darned well what I mean."
-
-Munson stepped forward, but he played the game best by keeping himself
-under perfect control.
-
-"You will speak civilly, Mr. Thurston, or leave this house. What is
-wanted?" he added, turning to Leach Sharkey.
-
-"We want Dick Willoughby, of course," the sleuth replied, politely
-enough. "We have reason to believe he is here."
-
-"Well, you can see for yourself whether he is here or not," said Munson,
-glancing around. "But if you wish to look through the house, I don't
-suppose Mrs. Darlington will refuse you permission."
-
-The lady bowed her acquiescence.
-
-"With your consent, Mrs. Darlington," Munson went on, "I'll show these
-gentlemen round and save you the annoyance. Come along then."
-
-Ben Thurston had been fairly silenced by the army man's suave courtesy.
-He was glowering at him, dully conscious of having been suppressed.
-
-Munson turned from the sleuth.
-
-"Perhaps Mr. Thurston would prefer to remain with the ladies?" he asked,
-with a touch of smiling irony.
-
-"I don't leave my man Sharkey," replied Thurston gruffly. "Sharkey, keep
-close watch on me. We'll search the place, but you stay near me all
-the time." Once again there was the old hunted look in his eyes as he
-glanced apprehensively into the courtyard.
-
-"Then follow me," said Munson quietly.
-
-"You have left a guard at the door of course?" asked Thurston of
-Sharkey.
-
-"Oh, you just allow me to know my business," replied the detective
-sharply. He bowed to Mrs. Darlington and her daughters. "I am really
-sorry to disturb you, ladies."
-
-"Then get the business over as soon as possible," said Munson. "Come
-along."
-
-The moment the coast was clear, Merle jumped up.
-
-"Quick! Mr. Willoughby. Follow me downstairs. I'll take you through the
-kitchen to the rose gardens."
-
-It was a strange looking duenna that stalked after Merle, with a robe
-reaching only to the knees. But at the head of the kitchen stairway Dick
-discarded the now useless garments, flinging them across the balustrade.
-
-"We must trust to our good luck now, Merle," he said.
-
-"Never fear. It won't desert us. Hurry on."
-
-At the clump of oleanders they found Tia Teresa, provided with another
-shawl. Not a moment was to be wasted in words. Merle just pressed Dick's
-hand by way of farewell. As he hastened away down the dark path, she,
-too, sped from the spot.
-
-Perhaps fifteen minutes later Ben Thurston, going the round of the
-house, came to the head of the kitchen stairs. He saw the black cloak
-and mantilla on the balustrade.
-
-"By God!" he cried with swift inspiration of what had happened. "We've
-been properly fooled! Where is that old hag of a duenna?"
-
-Gathering the vestments in his hands he rushed through the house to the
-verandah. Merle was quietly seated with her mother and Grace. But there
-was no sign now of Tia Teresa.
-
-Sharkey had followed close on his employer's heels. Munson came a few
-paces behind.
-
-Ben Thurston glared for a moment at the vacant place where the
-black-robed figure had been seated. Then he turned round and, addressing
-Mrs. Darlington, fairly shouted:
-
-"Where is Dick Willoughby? It was he who was wearing these damned
-clothes." And he flung the garments on the rug before her.
-
-"No swearing, please," said Munson, tapping him on the shoulder.
-
-"To hell! Who wouldn't swear? Where is the man I'm after?"
-
-"An innocent man," exclaimed Merle, rising to her feet and proudly
-folding her arms.
-
-"Looks like it--breaking jail and hiding in the hills," sneered
-Thurston. "He is nothing but a murderer and an outlaw. And I'm going to
-get him, dead or alive."
-
-"Then catch him if you can," cried Merle, pointing toward the door that
-opened on the portico.
-
-Under the girl's fearless gaze Ben Thurston wilted. Baffled, humiliated,
-speechless in his impotent rage, he allowed the sleuth to take him by
-the arm and hustle him from the scene.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXV--Love and Revenge
-
-|BEYOND the oleanders a tall thick hedge of cypress favored the flight
-of the fugitive. At the end of the gardens Tia Teresa took a little path
-that dipped into the river bed, and when they ascended again out of the
-hollow, Dick found himself quite close to the grove where Pierre was in
-hiding with the ponies.
-
-By this time the young fellow was angry with himself for having fled
-so precipitately. He was full of solicitude for Merle. Why had not he
-remained to defend her from the brutality of that ruffian, Ben Thurston?
-This was the question that was now making him both ashamed and anxious.
-
-"Hush!"
-
-The caution came from Pierre, and showed that the Frenchman was alive to
-what had happened.
-
-"I saw ze automobile rush by," he whispered. "We will ride across
-country, so zat it cannot follow us." He pointed in the direction he
-would go.
-
-"Not yet," replied Dick, determinedly. "I'm off back to the house to see
-that they are all safe there."
-
-"No, no, Mr. Willoughby," protested the duenna earnestly. "You heard
-what Miss Merle said--she is afraid of that raging old man. Besides I
-know. He has vowed that he and his hired gunmen will shoot you on sight.
-For my little girl's sake you must not go back," she implored.
-
-"Besides your word of honor is pledged to me," added Luzon. "You must
-return wiz me. I have your parole."
-
-"Parole be hanged," muttered Dick between his teeth.
-
-The old Frenchman laid a kindly hand on the young man's shoulder.
-
-"No, no. Monsieur is a man of honor. And honor comes before
-love--always."
-
-"If you love her," insisted Tia Teresa, "you will save yourself tonight.
-We will look after her. You need not worry on her account."
-
-Dick for the moment was silenced, but unconvinced.
-
-"Well, at all events we'll wait a bit. I don't leave this spot till I'm
-sure that Ben Thurston himself has cleared."
-
-"All right," assented Pierre. "Stay where you are, Tia Teresa. You must
-not be seen. Zey may be searching in ze gardens."
-
-Even as he spoke there was the flash of a lantern among the rose bushes.
-
-In tense silence they waited and watched. The leaden-winged minutes
-stole on. For a time lights flitted about, then vanished. At last came
-the "honk-honk" of the automobile, and a minute later the great machine
-with its flaring headlights swept down the roadway. They could just see
-that it was crowded with men. Then in a few seconds it had disappeared
-around the bend.
-
-"Now we go," said Pierre.
-
-"Just a minute longer, please," replied Dick in a firm tone. "Tia
-Teresa, you slip back to the house. I will stay here till you bring me
-word from Merle that she is safe and that all is well."
-
-"I will soon return," said the duenna as she hurried away on her
-mission.
-
-Again an interval of high-tensioned waiting. Neither Dick nor Pierre
-spoke a word. At last there came a rustle of the bushes from the
-direction of the river bed, and a moment later Tia Teresa was again by
-their side.
-
-"Mr. Willoughby," she said, breathless from the speed she had made,
-"Miss Merle begs you to make good your escape. She is well, and happy
-because you are safe. She sends this rose and"--the old lady hesitated a
-moment--"her love."
-
-"She said that?" murmured Dick, tremblingly, as he took the white
-blossom and breathed its fragrance.
-
-"Well, does not the flower speak her love?" replied the duenna. "Now go,
-go."
-
-"Come," said Pierre, as he raised himself into the saddle. "We shall fix
-the blindfold later on." Dick furtively kissed the rose before he placed
-it in the breast pocket of his coat. Then he mounted, and, bringing his
-pony alongside of Pierre's, started off at a canter across the starlit
-plain.
-
-Ben Thurston did not feel inclined to sleep that night. He paced his
-sitting room like an angry bear, and kept Leach Sharkey out of bed to
-listen to his growls and threatenings.
-
-"By God, I'll have that girl shoved into jail. Harboring an outlaw! It's
-a criminal offence."
-
-"You can't do it," objected the sleuth.
-
-"Can't do it?" shouted Thurston, halting and glowering down upon the man
-who had dared to contradict him. "You'll see damned quick if I can't."
-
-"Not one of us could swear that Willoughby was there. Neither you nor I
-could. We never saw him."
-
-"He wore that disguise," thundered Thurston. "So you think. But thinking
-ain't proof--not by a long chalk."
-
-Thurston was now almost speechless from rage. Half articulate words of
-blasphemy were upon his stuttering lips. But Sharkey went coolly on.
-
-"Besides the sympathy of everyone would be with the girl. You can't
-succeed that way. You yourself would be covered with ridicule."
-
-At last the torrent of curses broke forth. "Damn you, Leach Sharkey!
-That's what I pay you for, is it? To let that scoundrel slip through our
-very fingers? And you had the nerve to ask me for another big check this
-evening. It's all a confounded plot. You're bleeding me. Leach is your
-name, and leech is your nature." Leach Sharkey rose to his feet. His
-white teeth gleamed as his short upper lip curled in a contemptuous
-smile. He raised a threatening finger. It was his turn now to give free
-vent to profanity.
-
-"Stop right there, you doggoned old fool. I bleed you, do I? Well, take
-my resignation. All your pay ain't worth another five minutes of your
-infernal temper. No man ever dared to browbeat me and insult me as you
-have done. And now you may go to hell--where you belong."
-
-The sleuth turned on his heel, and strode to the doorway. But Thurston
-was after him in an instant, penitent, trembling, ashen pale. He grabbed
-Sharkey by the coat sleeve.
-
-"No, no, don't go, I beg of you," he whined, "I was wrong. I spoke in
-anger. I apologize. Good God, some one or other will get me within an
-hour if you leave me unprotected. I haven't a single friend--no one to
-stand by me." There was craven fear in his eyes as he looked timidly
-around. "I hear the prowling footsteps of my enemies in the night. You
-alone can save me, Mr. Sharkey."
-
-"Your damned civility comes too late," replied the sleuth, as he shook
-the clutching hands from his shoulder.
-
-"No, no. Don't say that. Sit down again. See, here is my check book.
-I'll pay you that money now--I'll double the amount--I'll never haggle
-with you again. Stay with me till we go East together."
-
-Sharkey showed himself somewhat mollified. He had played his game well,
-for after all, cash with him was the main consideration. So smiling over
-the success of his bluff, he watched the unnerved coward as he tottered
-to his desk, dropped into a chair and drew the check with slow and
-painful effort, and then returned with it between his still trembling
-fingers.
-
-"You'll stand by me, Mr. Sharkey, won't you?"
-
-"Well, no more of that nonsense," was the curt reply, as the sleuth
-glanced at the slip of paper, then thrust it in his waistcoat pocket.
-
-To Thurston the reconciliation brought instant relief. He drew himself
-up; he rubbed his hands; he even attempted a smile.
-
-"That's a good fellow, Sharkey. You know I've always held you in high
-esteem. And we'll get that man yet"--the glare of vindictiveness was
-again in his eyes, the rasp of accustomed irritability was returning to
-his voice. "We'll get him, I say, even if it costs double the money I've
-already spent. And that devil of a girl, too--I hate her more than ever
-now. She'll pay for her insults tonight with her lover's life. Remember,
-Sharkey, no more chances. When you get the scoundrel within gunshot,
-it's up to you to shoot. That will be best in any case. It will save the
-cost of a judge and jury. You understand me?"
-
-"I understand," nodded Sharkey. "Then, as you're speaking about
-doubling. Mr. Thurston, I suppose that ten-thousand-dollar reward coming
-to me goes up to twenty thousand."
-
-"Yes; twenty thousand if you shoot him like a dog, and let me get away
-from this damned place. I have come to loathe the very name of it. Well,
-spread your cot now across my door. I'll try to get an hour's sleep.
-Good night."
-
-And Ben Thurston disappeared into the inner room.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXVI--A Date is Fixed
-
-|ON the morning after the exciting episode at La Siesta, Chester Munson
-was in the library of Mr. Robles' home ready for his day's duties. But
-he was in no mood for the routine work of cataloging and classifying the
-volumes on the bookshelves. Up to now the task had been one of absorbing
-interest, for Munson, although not a scholar, had always been fond of
-reading, and it was a treat to dip at times into the contents of the
-rare and curious works which wealth and the educated taste of a true
-bibliophile had accumulated.
-
-But today the amateur librarian was thinking of other things. He was
-feverishly awaiting the usual morning visit of his employer, so that he
-might tell him the story of the previous night's happenings. At last Mr.
-Robles made his appearance, and gave his usual quiet greetings.
-
-"I see you are making great progress with your work," he remarked,
-glancing at the pile of classified volumes resting temporarily on the
-library table.
-
-"Oh, I'm getting along," replied Munson. "But I have most surprising
-news for you, Mr. Robles."
-
-"Indeed?" The recluse arched his eyebrows in expectant curiosity as he
-took a chair beside the desk at which Munson had been seated. "Sit down,
-please. Let me hear the story."
-
-"You know that I was at La Siesta yesterday evening?"
-
-"I know that you are very often there," replied Mr. Robles, smiling.
-"I understand the attraction and congratulate you on your good fortune.
-Grace Darlington is certainly a charming young lady."
-
-Munson flushed and bowed his acquiescence in the compliment as he said:
-
-"It was not of her, however, that I was going to speak. I want to say
-to you, Mr. Robles, that Miss Farnsworth did one of the bravest and
-cleverest things imaginable last evening."
-
-"Tell me about it. I am all attention." Munson then proceeded to relate
-in full detail the events of the preceding evening--the surprise visit
-of Ben Thurston, the brutality of the man, the quick wit of Merle, the
-escape of Dick Willoughby, and his final message by Tia Teresa that he
-was safe and, in obedience to Merle's injunction, was returning to his
-place of hiding. During the narrative only once did the listener betray
-emotion; when Thurston's rude insults were repeated there came a
-flash into Robles' eyes, and he clenched his hands to restrain his
-indignation. But he interrupted with no word, and at the end spoke no
-comment.
-
-Munson was a little taken aback at this silence and impassivity.
-
-"My story does not seem to surprise you?" he remarked, with a note of
-interrogation.
-
-"No," was the quiet reply, "I already knew it."
-
-"How?" exclaimed Munson, wonderingly.
-
-"You have forgotten, young man, that there is a private telephone
-between my home here and La Siesta. Mrs. Darlington has already told me
-about the matter. But I am pleased to have your version, and
-delighted more than I can tell to know that Merle proved equal to the
-emergency--that it was she who may be truly said to have saved Dick
-Willoughby." There was a ring of pride and admiration in his voice as he
-spoke the words.
-
-"She's the real stuff," cried Munson, enthusiastically.
-
-"It was well done," continued Mr. Robles, his tone taking a graver note.
-"For I want to warn you, Munson, as Willoughby's closest friend, that
-Ben Thurston or one of his hired assassins will certainly shoot on sight
-the instant they get the chance to do so. But by the Lord, if anything
-like that happens, I will hang that villain Thurston to the highest tree
-in Tejon for the buzzards to pick his bones." And the upraised hand,
-the voice vibrating with passionate determination, showed that Ricardo
-Robles meant just what he said.
-
-Mr. Robles had risen to his feet. For a moment he turned his face away.
-Then he again spoke, but now in his customary, sedate manner.
-
-"This morning, Mr. Munson, I leave home for a few days. Go on with your
-work, of course, but remember that it is quite a minor consideration.
-During my absence I shall rely on you to see that Ben Thurston, on any
-pretence of searching for Willoughby, does not cross my door."
-
-"He shall never do that, so long as I'm here," declared the young army
-man, with quiet confidence.
-
-"I don't think he will, either," replied Robles. "I have given orders
-for him to be shot down," he added grimly, "if he should dare to
-approach my gates. But I'll count on you all the same as a second guard
-to the sanctity of my home."
-
-"You may count on me to the death," responded Munson, extending his
-hand.
-
-"I know it, and therefore I go away on a necessary duty with an easy
-mind. But I have good news for you, Munson. I have instructed Sing Ling
-to prepare luncheon for the ladies of La Siesta every day they choose
-to come. So, while I prefer you to remain here on guard while I am
-gone, you need not be lonely. Perhaps you'll hardly wish me to come back
-again," he added with a smile.
-
-"Oh, don't say that. But you're mighty kind thinking of such things at
-all."
-
-"Well, you may expect our friends today about one o'clock. Now,
-goodbye--but not for long."
-
-The library work proceeded but slowly during the hours that followed.
-Munson was all impatience now for Grace and Merle to arrive. Books were
-of little account, for there was none ever printed that could rival
-for him the charm of a certain pair of laughing blue eyes. And it was a
-self-confessed pseudo man-of-letters who at last rushed to the gateway
-to greet the fair visitors.
-
-"Mother couldn't come," cried Grace, as she jumped from her horse and
-flung the bridle to a Mexican groom. "She's putting up fruit with Tia
-Teresa, and I think she really believes everything would go wrong if she
-didn't superintend."
-
-Munson, as he led the girls through the arched gateway, was inclined to
-bless both the fruit and the fallacy.
-
-Sing Ling came across the patio with a welcoming smile.
-
-"Dinnel all leady," he announced in tinkling syllables.
-
-"And we're all ready, too, Sing Ling," laughed Merle, as she went up and
-shook the Chinaman's hand.
-
-"Me vely glad to see you again, missie."
-
-"I didn't know you were old friends," exclaimed Munson, in some
-surprise.
-
-"Oh, didn't you? Sing Ling has been Mr. Robles' cook off and on for
-nearly twenty years. When Mr. Robles is abroad of course he works
-elsewhere. That's why you found him at San Antonio Rancho."
-
-"But Dick told me he was his cook--had been for several years."
-
-"With Mr. Robles' tacit consent, then," replied Merle.
-
-The Chinaman was grinning in a vacuous sort of way, as if all the
-conversation was so much Greek to him.
-
-"Sing Ling, you scamp," cried Munson, "I begin to understand now how Mr.
-Robles comes to know so much about Dick and myself. You've been telling
-tales out of school."
-
-"Oh, no; me cookee allee time; me no go school," replied the Celestial,
-in guileless incomprehension.
-
-After the dainty luncheon, Merle proposed that they should visit the
-watch tower. There they found the Mexican lad on duty. He had been
-strumming a guitar to pass the time, but at the sound of voices
-had sprung erect and alert. Munson noticed at a glance that the big
-telescope was ready trained on San Antonio Rancho.
-
-"_Como estas, Francisco?_" asked Merle, addressing the boy in Spanish.
-
-"_Bien, gracias, senorita_," he replied, with a deferential bow. But he
-averted his glance instantly, and gazed out on the landscape.
-
-Merle turned to Munson: "We are not allowed to converse with the
-servants here," she explained. "Just a word of greeting--that is all."
-
-"I'm under similar orders," replied Munson. "Not that it much matters
-in my case, for I haven't your accomplishment of knowing the Spanish
-language."
-
-"Oh, Grace and I speak Spanish almost as well as English. You see, Mr.
-Robles, who has always been interested in us two girls, insisted that we
-should be taught his native tongue."
-
-"And we've been all over Spain, too," interposed Grace. "Lived there
-a whole year. That's where I fell in love with the violin and took my
-first lessons."
-
-"An inspiring country obviously," remarked Munson with a flattering
-gesture.
-
-"Thank you for the subtle compliment," laughed Grace, tossing the
-vagrant, wind-blown curls from her face.
-
-"I never come here but I love to gaze at the view," observed Merle. "Is
-it not glorious--this valley of Tehachapi?"
-
-It was indeed a glorious scene--that noble sweep of verdured plain,
-stretching north far as the eye could reach, on the south guarded by the
-rugged pass, east and west embosoming hills twenty miles apart etching
-the sky with peaks and domes and lines of beauty. For a few moments all
-three visitors to the tower remained silent and enraptured.
-
-Grace was the one to break the spell.
-
-"I'm going down now to the library to inspect your work, lieutenant,"
-she announced with a roguish smile.
-
-"Spare me," protested Munson. "But perhaps you would help me with some
-of those Spanish books," he added as an afterthought.
-
-"Delighted! Come along." And she led the way down the winding iron
-staircase.
-
-In the library the three were for the first time during the visit quite
-alone. Munson carefully closed the door.
-
-"Now I've got the chance, Miss Merle," he began, "I want to compliment
-you on your splendid bravery last night."
-
-"Bravery!" she laughed. "Why I was so scared I could hardly stand."
-
-"Well, you deceived us all finely, then."
-
-"And that Ben Thurston--what an old ruffian!" cried Grace. "But I agree
-with you, Mr. Munson; Merle was a hero."
-
-"A heroine," suggested the lieutenant.
-
-"Oh, in these days we don't make such fine sex distinctions," laughed
-Grace. "A real hero, that's what I call her."
-
-"Rubbish," protested Merle. "I just did what anyone else would have done
-in the circumstances."
-
-"I'm afraid men are not so ready of wit in an emergency as are women,"
-remarked Munson.
-
-"Just listen to that, Merle," exclaimed Grace. "I verily believe the
-lieutenant is a suffragette."
-
-"A suffragist," corrected Munson, emphatically this time. "I'm hanged
-if I'm going to wear a petticoat even if the women are determined to
-don--the other things."
-
-They all laughed merrily.
-
-Grace turned and began examining the carefully written library cards.
-
-"Any more news from Mr. Willoughby?" asked Merle, with a look of
-solicitude in her eyes.
-
-"Nothing," replied Munson. "But I'm beginning to put two and two
-together," he continued. "Early every morning a horseman comes down here
-from the mountains and evidently brings a report of some kind to Mr.
-Robles. And when he rides off again Sing Ling has always ready a basket
-of grub, all sorts of nice things, fried chicken, spiced beef--"
-
-"Sounds quite epicurean," interrupted Grace, tossing away the card she
-had been pretending to examine.
-
-"Yes, hang it all--just the little delicacies Dick used to like."
-
-"I never knew you fared so bountifully at San Antonio Rancho," remarked
-Merle with a smile.
-
-"Oh, Dick's no candy kid, as you know well," replied Munson. "It was
-mostly rough and ready fare all right, but Sing Ling had a knack of
-adding a few dainty trifles to our meals, and it strikes me that for the
-purposes of this mysterious and capacious lunch basket he is trying to
-excel himself."
-
-"No doubt it goes to Mr. Willoughby," said Merle. "Well, I'm real glad
-to know that they are making him comfortable."
-
-"I guess, though, he'll miss his occasional visits to La Siesta. Mr.
-Robles says you were quite right, Miss Merle. Dick is in real danger.
-Those gunmen of old Thurston have orders to shoot him on sight."
-
-"I knew it," exclaimed Merle. "Oh, I'm so thankful he got away. Even
-though we miss seeing him, he must never run such a risk again."
-
-"It is all very mysterious," said Munson, in a musing tone. "And I had
-no idea, too, that this was such a lovely place. Mr. Robles has taken
-me around several times. He has the choicest dairy cattle, the finest
-blooded horses, rare trees and plants from every corner of the world."
-
-"These are his hobbies," commented Merle.
-
-"He says he wants to give me some practical lessons in estate
-management."
-
-"Why?" asked Grace.
-
-"Well," laughed Munson, "he thinks I may some day own a rancho of my
-own. But that will be a mighty long time."
-
-"Who can tell?" said Merle, glancing mischievously from the lieutenant
-to Grace. "Even in these humdrum days soldiers have been known to come
-in and conquer."
-
-Grace blushed crimson.
-
-"Merle, how dare you?" she exclaimed, half angry, half laughing. "Next
-time we visit you, Mr. Munson, I'll have to bring along Tia Teresa."
-
-"Oh, dear Aunt Teresa has a soft side for the lieutenant," retorted
-Merle, with merry audacity.
-
-But Grace had recovered from her momentary confusion.
-
-"Then I'll help you all I can, Mr. Munson, with dear Aunt Teresa,"
-she laughingly said. "We'll send her along tomorrow instead of coming
-ourselves."
-
-"Heaven forbid!" murmured the lieutenant, with pious fervor. He, too,
-had been looking and feeling awkward.
-
-"So we'll say goodbye for the present," continued Grace, frankly
-extending her hand.
-
-"I hope I haven't said anything to offend you," stammered Munson.
-
-"It is perhaps what you haven't said that is the cause of trouble,"
-laughed the irrepressible Merle.
-
-But Grace had fled from the room, and as the others followed, Merle went
-on:
-
-"I said when we left home that two would be company but three--a
-complication. Wasn't I right, lieutenant?"
-
-"You are always right," murmured Munson, too bewildered to think of
-anything else but the obvious gallant reply.
-
-He stood at the gateway watching the two young ladies as they cantered
-away. At the bend of the road Merle turned round in the saddle and waved
-her hand. But Grace rode steadily on.
-
-"By jove, that's as good as telling me that I can sail in and win," he
-said to himself. "Thank you, Merle, little girl. Next time Grace and I
-are alone, my fate will be sealed."
-
-But no one called again during Mr. Robles' absence--not even Tia Teresa.
-
-It was toward evening a few days later when the recluse strolled into
-the library. Munson did not know that he had returned, and rose from his
-seat in some surprise.
-
-"Still hard at work?" said Mr. Robles, as he nodded and shook hands.
-
-"When did you get back, sir?"
-
-"Last night. And today I have been busy with some important letters."
-
-"Any word of Dick?"
-
-"There is nothing new so far as I am aware."
-
-"Mr. Robles, excuse me," said Munson earnestly. "But I'm anxious on
-Dick's account. You know of his whereabouts, of course?"
-
-"I have indicated as much, although for the present I prefer to say
-nothing."
-
-"Well, when is he to be restored to liberty?"
-
-"In due time. At latest he will be free on the eleventh of October."
-
-"Oh, that's months ahead yet. But why the eleventh of October? You
-excite my curiosity."
-
-"The date is not of my choosing--it was fixed many years ago, by another
-than myself."
-
-The enigmatic reply puzzled Chester Munson--not only the words
-themselves, but the tremor of deep emotion in the voice of Ricardo
-Robles as he gave them utterance.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXVII--Among the Old Oaks
-
-|PIERRE, now my sketches and plans are finished, how am I going to pass
-the time?" It was some ten days after the affair at La Siesta, and
-Dick had spent the interval in close and absorbed work over his drawing
-board. Happy in his occupation, he had not felt the restraints of
-confinement.
-
-But now that the task was completed, and the big cardboard cylinder
-containing the set of drawings rested on the ledge of the easel all
-ready to be sent away on its mission, a feeling of chafing restlessness
-had ensued.
-
-"Good Lord, a fellow can't read all day," Dick went on, half in
-soliloquy, half addressing his companion.
-
-"Monsieur is comfortable here?" asked the latter solicitously.
-
-"I should say, old fellow. I was never in better quarters in all my
-life."
-
-"And zere is nothing more I could get for ze table?"
-
-"For goodness sake, don't talk like that, Pierre! In any ease I don't
-worry about what I eat. But this is a regular Delmonico's. Guadalupe
-is certainly a crackerjack cook. She is even better than Sing Ling.
-Wherever did she learn to turn out all these little delicacies? And just
-my favorite dishes, too."
-
-Pierre smiled enigmatically.
-
-"Guadalupe very clever old squaw," he remarked.
-
-"I would like to know her better. But she keeps out of my sight all the
-time."
-
-"Guadalupe is very old. She has her fixed ideas."
-
-"I suppose that means she does not love the Americans."
-
-"No doubt. She prefer to be alone--alone with ze white wolf all ze time.
-And where the white wolf is, monsieur dare not go."
-
-"I understand that all right," laughed Willoughby. "I strolled only
-once toward the log fire, and the brute showed me a set of teeth which I
-never wish to see again."
-
-"Ze white wolf guard ze cave well," remarked Pierre, sententiously.
-
-"Oh, I'm not thinking of trying to run away. You know I would never
-break my word. But what the dickens am I to do all day long?"
-
-"What do you say? Suppose we go to ze riffle and wash out some gold."
-
-"Great Scott!" exclaimed Dick eagerly. "That's not a bad suggestion. But
-Don Manuel won't mind?"
-
-"He will be very pleased--he has no use for ze gold."
-
-"And Guadalupe?"
-
-"Long ago she would have killed you if you had gone zere. But not now.
-She very old, and all her people are dead."
-
-"And the white wolf? That confounded beast won't interfere?"
-
-"No, no. Ze white wolf stay near Guadalupe all ze time."
-
-"Then, by jove, it's a bully idea," cried Dick. "It gets me all right.
-We'll turn miners, Pierre, and we'll have a rare old sack of nuggets to
-divide when the time comes for me to go free. I'll be better off in the
-end than if I were holding down my old job at the rancho," he laughed
-gaily.
-
-"I will find ze spades and ze pans to wash ze gravel. When shall we
-begin?"
-
-"Well, wait now," replied Dick, glancing reflectively at the roll of
-drawings. "I've got to send these plans away. I want you to get them
-at once into the hands of my friend, Lieutenant Chester Munson. He will
-know how to forward them to their proper destination."
-
-"May I suggest one zing?"
-
-"Go ahead, Pierre. What's in your mind?"
-
-"I venture to make one little suggestion. Why not ask ze young lady to
-take ze plans to your friend?"
-
-"Miss Merle Farnsworth?" asked Dick in surprise. "But how am I to do
-that?"
-
-"I will promise to arrange a meeting--zat is, if you are not afraid of
-Mr. Thurston and his men."
-
-"Afraid!" shouted Dick. "You give me the chance to see Merle again, and
-old Ben Thurston and all his sleuths may go to blazes."
-
-"Zen I will arrange, and I zink it will please ze young lady very much
-to have ze honor of taking care of ze plans."
-
-"You mean it will be a mighty honor for the plans to be in her care,
-Pierre. But I know she will gladly do me this service. How and when can
-I see her?"
-
-"Be ready tomorrow morning by ten o'clock. I will take you to a quiet
-place among ze old oak trees."
-
-"Pierre, you're a regular brick," cried Dick, as he slapped the old
-Frenchman on the shoulder in the exuberance of his delight.
-
-The following morning they started out for the trysting place. Dick
-without demur submitted to the usual precautions. He was blindfolded
-before mounting his pony in the great central domed cavern and it was
-not until a couple of hours later, after a veritable switchback ride up
-and down and round about in a bewildering maze, that he was permitted
-to remove the bandage. Dismounting, he found himself in the heart of a
-great oak forest, in what precise locality he could not tell, for there
-was nothing in sight but endless vistas of tree trunks under their thick
-canopy of green leaves.
-
-Pierre touched him on the shoulder, and he followed the direction of
-the Frenchman's eyes. There, advancing through the sylvan twilight, was
-Merle Farnsworth, her hands eagerly extended, her face lighted with joy.
-Following at a little distance came Tia Teresa.
-
-Dick, hastening to meet Merle, took both her hands into his, and gazed
-deep into her eyes.
-
-"Oh, it's great to meet you again," he exclaimed. "And this is my first
-chance to thank you for having saved me the other night. My word, but
-you were quick to think and to act. You cannot know how I admired your
-courage and coolness."
-
-"Nonsense, nonsense," protested Merle, in sweet blushing confusion. "You
-make far too much of the little I did."
-
-"You saved my life," said Dick, determinedly. "You can call that a
-little thing if you choose."
-
-"No, no," she replied, earnestly. "If I really did that, then it was
-truly a big thing."
-
-"For me."
-
-"And for all of us," she added, with face half-averted.
-
-"And you, too?" pressed Dick.
-
-"Yes, for me, too," answered Merle, turning round and frankly meeting
-his gaze. "I should never have been happy again had any harm come to you
-there--that night--in my very home--without a proper effort to get you
-away to a place of safety."
-
-"God bless you, Merle, dear," exclaimed Dick, as again he pressed her
-hands. He had been carried away by his fervent emotions, but she did not
-resent the familiar and endearing manner of his address.
-
-He would have taken her in his arms there and then, but Merle drew back
-and gave a little glance aside. Then Dick remembered Tia Teresa. To his
-astonishment he found her chatting with Pierre Luzon as if they were old
-friends.
-
-Dick left Merle for the moment to greet the duenna.
-
-"And I have to thank you, too, for helping me," he said. Then he added
-with a laugh: "When am I to be privileged to wear that mantilla again?"
-
-"You are not to be allowed to endanger yourself again," replied Tia
-Teresa. "And I warn you now. We remain here only half an hour--these are
-our orders."
-
-"Whose orders?"
-
-"Never mind. Just one half hour, that is all."
-
-"Then I'll make the best of my time," exclaimed Dick, turning toward
-Merle. "I see you won't be lonely with my gallant friend, Pierre Luzon,"
-he added with a smile.
-
-"Oh, I knew Pierre when he was just as handsome a young fellow as
-yourself," retorted Tia Teresa. "But we'll excuse you, and Pierre will
-keep the time."
-
-Dick led Merle down a glade of the forest, but before doing so he had
-unstrapped the roll of drawings from the horn of his saddle.
-
-"What are you carrying so very carefully?" asked Merle.
-
-"My plans for the ideal city. I told you I was going to have a try in
-that competition."
-
-"I hope you'll have good luck."
-
-"Well, I want you to help me. Will you take this package, please, to
-Chester Munson and ask him to send it to the proper address?"
-
-"With the greatest of pleasure, Mr. Willoughby,"--and she put forth her
-hands for the roll.
-
-"No--we'll lay it down here for the present. This log will serve as a
-seat. See, this twisted, limb makes quite a comfortable nook for you."
-He had halted at a fallen tree, had dropped the drawing on the turf, and
-was now dusting away the twigs and leaves from the seat he had chosen.
-
-"Cannot I look at the drawings?" she asked, after settling herself
-cosily.
-
-"Before handing them to Munson, if you like. But there are other things
-to talk about now." As he spoke he tossed his hat on the ground at her
-feet.
-
-"Are you growing impatient over your confinement?" she asked.
-
-"Impatient--it is hardly the word. I long to be out in the world again.
-I could never have endured the long seclusion but for my work over these
-drawings and my thoughts of you."
-
-"Why me?"
-
-"I have felt that I am doing the best for your sake as well as my own.
-I would not have had you subjected to the vulgar gaze of a crowded court
-room--not for worlds. The very thought that I have saved you from that
-has made me contented with my enforced idleness."
-
-"Not idleness," she said, tapping the roll of drawings with the toe of
-her shoe.
-
-"Well, no, not idleness exactly."
-
-"And I do hope you'll win the prize," she added, looking up into his
-eyes.
-
-"So do I. But perhaps you don't know what I count to be the real prize."
-
-[Illustration: 0255]
-
-"Pray, what is that?"
-
-Dick thrust a hand into the breast of his coat and brought forth a
-pocket book. From this he produced a little package, and opening the
-folds of paper disclosed the white rose which she had sent him on the
-night of his escape from La Siesta.
-
-"Where did you get that?" she asked demurely.
-
-"It is your rose--the rose you sent me."
-
-"I did not know you were so partial to roses as to keep them after they
-are withered." Her voice trembled; she bravely tried to keep up the
-pretence of not understanding.
-
-"It is not the gift I treasure--it is the thought of who was the giver."
-
-A blush stole over her beautiful face, while the long drooping eyelashes
-half concealed her brown eyes. Dick's arms slipped around the girl's
-slender waist.
-
-"Merle, my dear, I love you. For months past I have known that there is
-no woman on earth for me but you. I would have spoken before, but I have
-always been afraid that you could not love me, and that talk of such a
-thing might terminate a friendship that had become my greatest pleasure
-in life."
-
-For reply, placing one hand on his shoulder, she just buried her face
-in his breast and gave way to tears--tears of joy, he knew, as he kissed
-her hair again and again, and then at last her lips when she allowed him
-to raise her face toward his.
-
-"My darling," he murmured, and the kiss she gave him back accepted and
-returned the words of fond endearment.
-
-A moment of restful bliss followed; then Merle gently disengaged herself
-and rose to her feet.
-
-"What will Tia Teresa say?" she asked, laughingly, as she glanced over
-her shoulder.
-
-"I think Tia Teresa knew all about my love long ago," replied Dick.
-"Yes, both she and Pierre Luzon, too."
-
-"Then you have been wearing your heart on your sleeve."
-
-"Or we have been surrounded by very observant people. But, I say, Merle,
-this reminds me of a thing I had quite forgotten for the moment." His
-face fell. "There is one great barrier that stands between us."
-
-"What do you mean? You are surely too strong and purposeful a man to
-care for barriers."
-
-"I never knew until the other day that you are so very rich."
-
-"Rich!" laughed Merle. "Who ever told you such a foolish thing? While
-of course I have never felt poverty, don't you know that I am absolutely
-dependent upon Mrs. Darlington's kindness and generosity to me, her
-adopted daughter?"
-
-A smile of understanding broke over Dick's face.
-
-"You tell me that? I am so delighted," he exclaimed.
-
-"You surely know my story well enough," continued Merle, "not to have
-mistaken me for an heiress. I lost both father and mother when I was
-a baby. Mrs. Darlington took me to her heart, and no mother could have
-been dearer and sweeter than she, no sister kinder and more loving than
-Grace. But I am proud to think they have loved me for my own sake, not
-for any wealth I might have owned."
-
-"Then there is no barrier," cried Dick, as once again he drew her to
-him. "Unless my poverty is a barrier," he added. "But won't I work hard
-all my life to give you every comfort you can desire!"
-
-"Well, we'll have a good start at all events," said Merle, with a merry
-little upglance.
-
-"How's that?"
-
-"The ten-thousand-dollar prize for the best plans. Have you forgotten
-about that already?"
-
-"But it is not won yet."
-
-"Oh, I have the firm presentiment that you are going to win, Dick, dear.
-I am sure of it--sure!" she repeated in a tone of conviction.
-
-Her face was aglow and Dick caught the spirit of her enthusiasm.
-
-"Then I'm sure, too. And, by jove, won't we have one grand honeymoon
-trip, dearest?"
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXVIII--The Prize Winner
-
-|DICK WILLOUGHBY'S sensational escape from La Siesta had added another
-thrill to the mystery surrounding the murder of Marshall Thurston. But
-as week succeeded week without further incident, the affair gradually
-faded away as a topic of conversation. All the talk now was about the
-coming of the new town. The fever of speculation was in the air.
-
-"Say, boys," remarked Jack Rover one evening to his two cronies at the
-store, "I'm sure getting crazy about the new town. I've got a thousand
-bones of my own savings besides the money from old Pierre Luzon, and I'm
-going to invest every dangnation cent of it in town lots on opening day.
-You bet I'll be there mighty early in the morning when the sale starts."
-
-"I'm sorta locoed myself," said Baker, "about them lots in the new
-town. Guess I'll grab off a few good corners. I look for an early
-rise--prices'll go up like blazes,' I'm 'lowin'."
-
-Buck Ashley snorted contemptuously. "Say, you fellers are two dippy
-ones. That new town talk is a lot o' hot air, d'you hear? Jest the
-agitatin' work of them pesky town boomers. Won't 'mount to nothin'."
-
-Jack Rover started a defence, but was quickly motioned to silence by
-old Tom Baker, who, after clearing his throat, pushed his hat back and
-glared at Buck Ashley.
-
-"Buck," said he, "you're a thick-headed fool. The openin' of that town
-will amount to one hell of a sight, don't you fergit it. Why, that Los
-Angeles syndicate cuss who's a-runnin' the machine is sharper than a
-razor blade. Just think for one little puny moment," Tom Baker went
-on, enthusiastically, "of that printed notice being in every blamed
-newspaper in the whole country--yes, and on the other side of the
-Atlantic pond--offerin' ten thousand dollars for the best plans for an
-ideal city. Gosh all hemlock, they do say as how the mails were just
-chuck full of answers--architect fellers as well as them as ain't
-architects, a-tryin' to get their hooks on that ten-thousand-dollar
-prize. It was a mighty smart business notion, I'm a-tellin' you, and has
-boomed the town to beat the band."
-
-"But," inquired Buck Ashley, in a sarcastic way, "who is confounded fool
-enough to buy lots in such a wild-cat scheme, no matter how much they
-advertise it? That's what I'm askin'."
-
-"I will, for one," said Jack Rover. "As I said before, I'm going to put
-in my last dollar."
-
-"As for me," chimed in Tom Baker, "I will lay my money on this 'ere
-proposed new town bein' the biggest town in the whole dangnation State
-of California outside of sea-board towns."
-
-Just then through the gathering darkness a lone horseman rode up to the
-store, dismounted and came hurriedly in. It was none other than Chester
-Munson, flushed and excited, as he sang out a good-natured salute:
-"Hallo, boys. I have news for you."
-
-As he spoke he pulled a Bakersfield daily paper from his pocket. "The
-new town!" he fairly shouted. "All about it, right on the front
-page, pictures and all. And it is Dick Willoughby who wins the
-ten-thousand-dollar prize!"
-
-"That's great news, sure," cried Jack.
-
-"It's a mighty pity Dick ain't here to celebrate," growled the sheriff.
-
-"What's to be the name of the town?" asked Buck Ashley, in a
-disbelieving tone.
-
-"Tejon, after the old fort here," replied Munson, as he pointed to the
-featured article with its big-type headlines and started to cull a few
-sentences.
-
-"It says that the new city of Tejon, right here in the heart of a rich
-horticultural valley, is bound to be one of the top-notch towns of
-California. And the opening day is going to be immense. Next Tuesday
-is the date fixed. Maps and plans of the new town will be ready for
-distribution from the land company's office, corner Main Street and
-Broadway, at nine o'clock Monday morning. Let me see," he went on,
-looking up from the paper, "this is Wednesday. Mighty few days to wait,
-boys. You just ought to see the excitement in Bakersfield."
-
-"Well, I say there ain't no such town," snapped Buck Ashley, "nor no
-such a company's office buildin', 'cause I was down there day before
-yesterday myself, right where them surveyin' fellers have been foolin'
-'round for weeks, peekin' through spy-glasses at each other and
-measurin' off so many feet this way and so many feet that way, like a
-bunch o' kids playin' some game. No, siree, there's nothin' but long
-rows of white stakes driv in the ground. Looks to me as if they was
-a-gettin' ready to build a lot of henhouses. Of course the railroad's
-there, and the only thing changed that I could see was a lot of
-side-tracks they've put in."
-
-"Well, things have been humming the last two days," laughed Munson.
-"This afternoon I found all the side-tracks filled with trains of
-lumber, carload after carload, and not less than two or three hundred
-workmen, all as busy as nailers. Looked to me as if a three-ring circus
-were getting ready for a big show. They are already running up electric
-light poles and stringing the wires. Some of the men are unloading cars,
-some stacking up lumber, others are putting up tents, and the entire
-business reminded me of a hive of extremely busy bees. Go down and look
-for yourself, Buck, and you'll be convinced at last that the new town
-has arrived."
-
-The old storekeeper had come from behind the counter, and stood leaning
-against a stack of boxes.
-
-"I've been here for more'n a quarter of a century, boys," he said, in
-a tone of seriousness that approached to sadness, "and this old store
-seems like home to me. I'm some fighter and I'm some stayer. But, hell,
-I reckon I know when I'm licked. I guess this new town puts a crimp in
-me and my business, and--"
-
-"Honk-honk; honk-honk"--it was the distant warning of an automobile that
-interrupted Buck's speech, and drew all four present to the doorway.
-There was the glare of twin headlights on the southern road.
-
-"Some of the Los Angeles buyers, most likely," suggested the sheriff.
-
-And so the travellers proved to be. The automobile halted at the
-store, but only one of the party of four or five descended.. He was a
-bright-faced, clean-shaven man, of dapper build and faultlessly attired.
-In his hand was a bunch of papers.
-
-"Mr. Buck Ashley?" he inquired.
-
-"I'm your man," replied Buck, stepping from the doorway.
-
-"Well, we can't stop tonight. But we wanted to say 'how-do.' I represent
-the Los Angeles Trust Syndicate, and these documents just arrived
-yesterday from Washington, D. C."
-
-"Can't be for me, then," replied Buck, hesitating to take the proffered
-papers.
-
-"But they are," replied the stranger with a laugh. "Oh, we haven't
-forgotten the interests of the old identities. We've had your name in
-mind all the time, and this is a removal order from the Government to
-change your postoffice over to the new town of Tejon."
-
-Buck was speechless as his fingers closed on the documents.
-
-"We'll hope to see you over on Tuesday morning, Mr. Ashley, so that you
-can secure a good site for your new store. Now I must be going. We have
-got to be in Bakersfield by eleven o'clock."
-
-"Honk-honk," and the automobile was gone.
-
-"Hell, Buck, have you lost your tongue?" cried Tom Baker, slipping the
-storekeeper on the shoulder. "Don't you see what it all means? You're
-goin' to shift camp, old man; you're goin' into the new town."
-
-"Gosh 'lmighty!" murmured Buck, at last recovering the power of
-articulation. "I think the first thing to do is to lubricate."
-
-"A taste from the mystery keg," suggested the sheriff, as they all
-crowded back into the store.
-
-"The mystery keg? What's that?" asked Munson.
-
-Buck laid his hand on a small barrel at the end of the counter.
-
-"We call it the mystery keg," he replied, "because we just found it
-yesterday mornin' settin' at my back door. It has come to us sorta like
-manna from heaven."
-
-"And tastes like manna, too," interjected Baker.
-
-"It means free drinks for all this pertic'lar bunch," continued Buck,
-"for there is no question as to where the keg came from. Look at the
-date on the top--1853. This 'ere barrel came out of Joaquin Murietta's
-wine cellar."
-
-"You don't say?" exclaimed Munson, pressing forward eagerly to examine
-the little brass-hooped keg, looking bright and sound despite its
-antiquity.
-
-"This whisky is sixty years old at least," Buck went on, turning the tap
-and filling a small pitcher.
-
-"Tastes like it might be a hundred years older," remarked the sheriff.
-"Mellow as fresh drawn milk."
-
-Buck handed Munson a pony glass of the rare old beverage.
-
-"By jove, it is fine," said the lieutenant, judicially smacking his
-lips.
-
-"Just makes my internals feel as soft and roly-poly as a ripe
-pomegranate," murmured Tom, as he set down his empty glass and rubbed
-his belt-line in a complacent way.
-
-"Well, we'll fill up again, boys," cried Buck. "Here's to dear old
-Pierre Luzon, for it was sure him who sent us the mystery keg."
-
-"And to Dick Willoughby who won the prize," cried Jack Rover.
-
-"And to our host," added Munson in a courtly way. "To Buck Ashley, boys,
-the postmaster of the new city of Tejon."
-
-"Hip, hip, hurrah!"--all four voices shouted the triple toast as the
-upraised glasses clinked merrily.
-
-Buck resumed his former position, with his back against the cracker
-boxes.
-
-"As I was sayin', boys, when that automobile interrupted us, I know when
-I'm licked. But I know, too, that the fightin' blood is still left in
-me, and I was a-goin' to remark that this new town sure 'nuff looks a
-winner. I've got plenty of lumber right in my back yard, and tomorrer
-mornin' I begin to have the scantlin's cut, for, by jingoes, I'll be the
-chap who will build the first buildin' in the new town."
-
-"Bully for you," cried Munson.
-
-"I say what I mean," continued Buck, his face aglow with enthusiasm,
-"and on Tuesday mornin' I'll buy the first town lot if I have to stand
-in line for forty-eight hours to get it."
-
-"Life in the old dog yet," laughed Jack Rover. "It's wonderful the
-effect of Pierre Luzon's brew," smiled the sheriff. "I think we'll just
-have four more spoonfuls, Buck, of that distilled nectar of sunshine.
-Success to the new store, old man!"
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXIX---The Rendezvous
-
-|SUMMER had come and gone and it was now the early days of October. The
-mystery of Dick Willoughby's disappearance had remained unsolved, yet it
-was on his plans that the new city of Tejon had been laid out, and, like
-the fabled palace in the Arabian Nights' tale, had sprung into being
-with such rapidity that men rubbed their eyes to satisfy themselves
-whether the transformation scene were an actuality or the baseless
-fabric of a dream. Within three months of the opening day auction of
-lots Tejon was a thriving, hustling centre of population, with whole
-avenues of beautiful homes, several blocks of stores on the main street,
-schoolhouse and other public buildings well on the way to completion.
-
-Electricity had helped to the accomplishment of the miracle, for it had
-been only necessary to tap the great power cables running across the old
-rancho from the Kern River canyon to secure the supplies of "juice" both
-for lighting and traction purposes. So there was already an interurban
-tramway service connecting with the county seat, Bakersfield, while at
-night the new town was a blaze of electricity. All around country homes
-were going up, and ten and twenty acre holdings were being planted to
-fruit trees or ploughed for alfalfa.
-
-Ben Thurston still clung to the ranch house, although it was definitely
-understood now between him and the new owners that Thanksgiving Day was
-to be the extreme limit of his occupancy. The hue and cry after Dick
-Willoughby had in a measure subsided, but, if the authorities
-had relaxed their efforts, Thurston still sought relentlessly and
-indefatigably for the man accused of the slaying of his son.
-
-One night at a lonely road-house on the outskirts of Bakersfield, the
-sleuth, Leach Sharkey, was in close and secret conference with a bent
-and bowed old man. This was none other than Pierre Luzon, although his
-physical condition seemed to have greatly changed and he answered now to
-the name of Jos�.
-
-The two men had met a few days before on the range; Pierre had spoken of
-the scant living he was making from a herd of goats he pastured on the
-mountains, and in the course of conversation had thrown out a hint for
-information as to the amount of the reward that Mr. Thurston would be
-willing to pay if Dick Willoughby were handed over to him. Sharkey had
-eagerly followed the lead thus given. Hence this midnight meeting in the
-road-house parlor for the discussion of terms and conditions over the
-bottle of whisky that helps so efficaciously to dispel distrust and
-unloosen tongues.
-
-More than an hour had been spent in skirmishing preliminaries, but now
-Leach Sharkey was congratulating himself that he had got his man fixed
-just right. He was running over the final arrangements so as to make
-sure that everything was clearly understood.
-
-"Then Mr. Thurston and myself are to come to Comanche Point. You will
-take us from there to the place where we'll find Willoughby. That's the
-understanding, Jos�?"
-
-Pierre nodded in acquiescence.
-
-"And you will bring wiz you ze reward of five tousand dollars--not gold
-or silver, remember, but treasury bills, for I am not strong enough now
-to carry a very heavy weight. Zen when you have paid me ze money, I will
-lead you to Mr. Willoughby."
-
-"All right. I'm going to trust you and take my chances. But bear in
-mind that you don't get away with the cash until I have actually put the
-handcuffs on the man I'm after."
-
-"Oh, I will not run away, Mr. Sharkey."
-
-"By God, if you try any monkey tricks on me, I'll shoot you in your
-tracks. Make no mistake about that, Jos�. And it will be hands up first
-to prove to me you have no gun."
-
-"As I have promised," replied Pierre with some dignity, "I shall come
-unarmed. But remember, Mr. Thurston and you must be alone. If zere are
-any ozers I will not show myself--I will give no sign."
-
-"Don't worry about that. We'll be alone. I need no other protection than
-the two guns I always carry." As he spoke, the sleuth slipped a hand to
-one of his hip pockets, and with a grim smile, laid a vicious-looking
-revolver on the table.
-
-Luzon evinced no disquietude; he merely smiled.
-
-"Mr. Sharkey he is ze famous man wiz ze two guns. I would take no risk
-wiz him. But I wish to win ze reward."
-
-"Well, then, the reward is yours if you play the game straight. Thurston
-and I will be there, and you will be there unarmed. The hour?"
-
-"Four o'clock. I will watch you come to Comanche Point all alone along
-ze road."
-
-"You're certainly a cautious old duck," laughed Sharkey. "However,
-that's all right. Four o'clock, then. And you said Tuesday next week,
-didn't you?"
-
-"Yes, Tuesday."
-
-Sharkey glanced at a big advertisement calendar on the wall.
-
-"That will be the eleventh of the month. Then I think everything is
-understood. Now I want to be off. I can just catch the last car to
-Tejon. Shake. You can finish that drop of whisky by yourself, old man."
-
-They shook hands and Sharkey was gone.
-
-The other waited for a few moments, cautiously and cunningly listening
-to the retreating footsteps. Then he sprang erect, transformed in an
-instant into a hale and vigorous man. Into his eyes there leapt a flash
-of joy, in his heart was a song of triumph.
-
-"So the villain Ben Thurston will be there at Comanche Point on the very
-anniversary of the night, just thirty years ago, when he committed that
-foul crime--at the very spot where the poor little Senorita Rosetta and
-her unborn babe perished at his hands. Glory be to God! At last the hour
-of vengeance comes!"
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXX--Don Manuel Appears
-
-|A GOODLY little sack of water-worn nuggets of gold had been washed
-out of the subterranean stream by Pierre Luzon and Dick Willoughby. The
-captive had found in the work both an exciting pastime and the ease
-of mind that comes from the thought that his time was being spent to
-profitable account. So week after week he had toiled on cheerfully,
-setting for himself each day a full day's task. In this way also,
-although the want of sunshine had paled his cheeks, he had maintained
-his health by the regular physical exercise.
-
-But as the appointed date of his release drew near, Dick's mining
-enthusiasm suffered an eclipse. The gold no longer tempted him,
-the eight-hour day became a burden to his soul, his whole being was
-possessed with feverish restlessness. He was not only filled with eager
-excitement at the thought of again folding Merle in his arms, but he was
-fired with curiosity to know what events were happening outside
-which would enable him to step forth a free man, exculpated from all
-connection with the crime of which he had been suspected, restored to an
-honorable place among his fellow men.
-
-But Pierre remained obstinately deaf to all hints for information.
-
-"I can say nozing," was his invariable reply. Then, to divert Dick's
-mind, he would challenge him at chess, a game in which they had proved
-to be pretty equally matched, or he would produce the latest batch of
-newspapers.
-
-The young fellow had read with great delight the announcement that his
-plans for the ideal city had been awarded the prize of ten thousand
-dollars. Still more welcome had been the warmly congratulatory note
-received from Merle at the hands of Pierre; for this letter, while it
-made no reference to the point, virtually sealed the pact between the
-two lovers that the money would provide for a glorious honeymoon trip to
-Europe. Dick had sent instructions to Munson to notify the Los Angeles
-syndicate in his name that the reward was to remain to the credit of
-the winner until he would come personally to Tejon to claim it, probably
-about the middle of October.
-
-It wanted now only two days of the fateful date, the eleventh of that
-month. Dick had already gathered together his personal belongings ready
-for removal. He was pacing the grotto, when his eye chanced to fall upon
-the sack of gold.
-
-"I forgot about that, Pierre, old fellow," he remarked. "We have to
-divide this spoil."
-
-"No," replied Pierre, with quiet determination, "it is all yours, Mr.
-Willoughby, honestly earned, too. I have no need for any of ze gold. I
-have all ze money I can ever spend during ze rest of my life."
-
-No amount of argument could shake the old Frenchman's resolution.
-
-"Then what is to be done with the sack? By jove, I'll share it with our
-Hidden Treasure Syndicate. By the way, where is Jack Rover now, Pierre?"
-
-"He is living in Buck Ashley's old store. Buck, you know, is ze
-postmaster at Tejon, and has a splendid store in ze new city. But Jack
-Rover, he just hang about ze old place."
-
-"Well, Pierre, I've got a plan. You say it will not be until Tuesday
-afternoon that I leave these quarters?"
-
-"Zat is so, and I am sorry you must still wear ze blindfold, but it will
-be for ze last time now."
-
-"Oh, I'm not kicking about that. I know the conditions under which I
-came here. But it will be evening when we get clear of the hills, and I
-won't have any particular place to go to. Next morning it will be best
-for me to ride right over to Bakersfield, to surrender myself and
-secure my formal discharge. When, did you say, am I to get the necessary
-documents for all this?"
-
-"Before you depart from ze cave."
-
-"Well, everything will fit in fine. Tomorrow you have kindly promised
-to take out my things. Just carry the nuggets along with you also, and
-leave everything in Jack's charge. But tell him that nothing must be
-opened or disturbed until I arrive. I'm going to give Jack Rover the
-surprise of his life when he sees that gold. The sack is too heavy
-to handle, but I guess we can make it into several packages. Jack was
-always crazy to find Guadalupe's sand-bar."
-
-"So were lots of ozers," grinned Pierre. "But they have never found it
-yet. Even you will not be able to find it again when you are led out of
-zese hills wearing ze blindfold."
-
-"I am fully aware of that, old man," laughed Dick in reply. "I suppose
-I couldn't discover the place again in a hundred years. But Jack's eyes
-will fairly pop when he sees that bunch of gold marbles. He will be
-mighty pleased to show the nuggets around to some of the boys who have
-laughed over his enthusiasm, always declaring that Guadalupe's gold
-simply came from some old-timer's sack of dust that had been part of
-Joaquin Murietta's plunder."
-
-"Oh, no. All ze bandits get out much gold from ze riffle in zose
-days--Don Manuel himself had plenty."
-
-"Well, Pierre, you just pack all my belongings to Buck Ashley's old
-store. And you tell Jack Rover to expect me about six o'clock the night
-after tomorrow--that's Tuesday. And I wish Munson to be there, too--I'll
-want him to accompany me to Bakersfield."
-
-"If you write a leetle note to ze lieutenant," suggested Pierre, "I will
-see zat it reaches his hands. But you must say very leetle--just a few
-words. For nozing must be told to anyone outside until you are free."
-
-"All right, Pierre. Here goes." And Dick seated himself at the writing
-table. In a very few moments he had completed his task.
-
-"See," he said, returning to Pierre's side. "I wish you to know exactly
-what I have written--just a hurried scrawl." And he read aloud while the
-old Frenchman's eyes rested on the paper:
-
-"On Tuesday night next, about six o'clock, meet me at Buck Ashley's
-old store. I shall want you to ride over to Bakersfield with me next
-morning, where my acquittal is assured. Give Merle the glad news. Yours,
-Dick."
-
-"Guess that's all right?" he added, as he folded the note and placed it
-in an envelope on which he had already inscribed the name of Lieutenant
-Munson.
-
-Pierre had signified his approval with a nod, and now he carefully
-bestowed the letter in the pocket of his shirt.
-
-"He will get ze letter--he will surely be zere."
-
-"Then you say I cannot write to Merle--Miss Farnsworth, I mean?"
-
-"I have ze strictest orders," replied Pierre. "Nozing must be told just
-yet. Bah! It is only two days more."
-
-"Two mighty long days for me, old sport," said Dick, half in jest and
-half in sober earnest, as he sat down and began cutting at a plug of
-tobacco.
-
-Most of next day Willoughby was alone. But at the regular dinner hour
-Pierre appeared, and announced that he had safely packed the valise and
-the gold in four bags to the old store, and Jack Rover had been apprised
-of Dick's coming on the following night.
-
-"He knew what was in ze sacks," laughed Pierre. "Zey were so very heavy,
-oh my! But I told him I would come back and shoot him like a jack-rabbit
-if he opened zem before you came."
-
-"Guess it needed an old bandit like you to scare Jack Rover," replied
-Dick, jocularly. But he was very happy--everything was going along
-well--only another four-and-twenty hours now and his captivity would be
-at an end.
-
-That night Dick could hardly sleep a wink, and next morning he was too
-restless and impatient for his approaching liberation to keep within the
-confines of the little grotto. In the darkness of the big central cavern
-he walked up and down, casting occasional glances at the distant glow of
-the log fire where, as he could see, both the aged squaw and the white
-wolf were on vigilant and ceaseless guard.
-
-Suddenly his steps were arrested. With great surprise he gazed toward
-the log fire. There, with Guadalupe and the white wolf, stood the figure
-of a strange man, cloaked and wearing a big sombrero. All their shapes
-were outlined against the ruddy glow, and the monstrous beast was
-actually fawning at the newcomer's feet. A moment later the stranger,
-with a parting wave of his hand to Guadalupe, advanced toward the spot
-where Dick was standing. Close by was an oil lantern set in a socket of
-the rock wall to mark the entrance to the inner grotto.
-
-For a minute the approaching figure had been swallowed up in the
-darkness, but now came the sound of his footsteps crunching on the sandy
-floor, and a few seconds later he appeared in the flickering radiance.
-Dick Willoughby had already made his inference as to the identity of the
-newcomer--he had been so often told that no living man but the bandit
-chief, Don Manuel, could pass the white wolf with impunity.
-
-But the name Dick pronounced was quite a different one.
-
-"Senor Ricardo Robles--it is you--_you?_"
-
-"It is I," replied the Spaniard, quietly, as he extended his hand.
-
-"Then you are--Don Manuel--the--"
-
-Dick faltered and paused.
-
-"Yes, I am Don Manuel de Valencia, the outlaw, the bandit of Tehachapi,
-the White Wolf, as he is commonly called. Come within, my friend. I have
-matters of importance to communicate." And the visitor led the way
-with an ease that showed his perfect familiarity with every opening and
-turning in the great subterranean series of chambers.
-
-"I cannot remain with you very long," said Mr. Robles, when they were
-seated in the inner grotto, "for I have a number of things to attend to
-during the few hours that still remain at my disposal."
-
-"I must not ask questions," remarked Dick, although his words belied the
-questioning look in his eyes.
-
-"Oh, although I speak in confidence," Mr. Robles replied, "having
-learned to trust you, I shall make no secret of my contemplated
-movements. Tonight I hope to settle my last score"--he paused, then
-corrected himself--"my last piece of business in California. If all goes
-well, within twenty-four hours I shall be on the high seas. Never
-mind my exact route, but my final destination is Spain, the land of my
-fathers. There, perhaps, you and I may meet again."
-
-"I hope so. I have come to be deeply interested in you, Mr. Robles."
-
-"And I in you, young man, all the more because you are now engaged
-to one I hold very dear. Since her birth, Merle Farnsworth has been
-a--little prot�g�e of mine." Again he had hesitated, and his voice had
-vibrated from emotion. But he was smiling now as he went on: "I have
-watched with sympathetic interest and approval the progress of your love
-affair."
-
-"Through your spy-glass on the tower?" laughed Dick.
-
-"Well, partly in that way, perhaps," replied Mr. Robles, with eyebrows
-humorously upraised. "You have had my quiet support from beginning to
-end, and now that you have won the young lady's heart, you have my most
-sincere congratulations. May you have long years together, and every
-happiness."
-
-He had clasped Dick's hand, and placed his disengaged hand
-affectionately on the young man's shoulder.
-
-"You are really very kind," said Dick, cordially responding to the hand
-clasp.
-
-"Because I have counted you worthy of your great good fortune in winning
-such a girl as Merle. And I have taken much the same liking to your
-friend, Chester Munson. Have you heard the news:
-
-"No, but I can guess it."
-
-"Yes, he and Grace Darlington are engaged. And to them I give my
-heartiest blessing just as I have given it to you and Merle. For Grace,
-like her adopted sister, has been always very dear to me. I have loved
-them both very dearly indeed all through their young lives."
-
-"And both are devoted to you, as I happen to know," affirmed Dick with
-warm conviction.
-
-"I believe it," replied Mr. Robles. His hand sought an inner pocket and
-drew forth a legal-looking document. "I came here not only to bid you
-good-bye, but more important still to place this in your possession."
-
-"My release?" exclaimed Dick eagerly, as his fingers closed on the
-paper.
-
-"Well, not exactly--but it will lead to that, never fear. It is an
-affidavit which has been properly sworn to before a San Francisco notary
-public. It briefly sets out my confession. It was I, Don Manuel de
-Valencia, who killed Marshall Thurston, or at least was responsible for
-his killing."
-
-As he spoke the words, the outlaw drew himself proudly erect. Dick was
-too overwhelmed with amazement to reply.
-
-"The young ruffian was shot partly because he deserved his fate for
-insulting Merle, partly because, as you cannot but know, Don Manuel, the
-White Wolf, had sworn a vendetta against the whole Thurston brood."
-
-"Then Ben Thurston--is he dead, too?" gasped the listener.
-
-"Not yet," was the grim reply. Then he paused and changed his tone.
-
-"But I want to speak not another word about this. What happens to Ben
-Thurston is nothing of your concern--must be nothing of your concern.
-For this document here frees you from all legal entanglements, and I
-have no wish that you should by any chance become enmeshed again. So we
-dismiss Ben Thurston from our talk and from our minds. When you lodge
-this paper with the authorities at Bakersfield, it will be a matter only
-of a few formalities to secure dismissal of the charge against you. For
-I even put it on sworn record that your jail delivery that night was
-against your will."
-
-"I have forgotten to thank you for that same delivery. I never dreamed
-you were my liberator, Mr. Robles."
-
-"Because that night I was Don Manuel de Valencia. But at present I
-am Ricardo Robles, and in that capacity it is for me to thank you for
-having so chivalrously protected our dear Merle from the necessity of
-associating her name in any way with the death of that worthless young
-scoundrel. I appreciate the cheerful manner in which you have, for her
-sake, and let me add, for my sake, too, borne your long imprisonment
-here."
-
-"I've been mighty comfortable," laughed Dick, with a glance around
-his luxurious quarters. "And Pierre Luzon has been a treasure--a good
-comrade all the time."
-
-"Ah, yes, Pierre," exclaimed the outlaw, musingly. "Pierre is a very
-good fellow. He has been faithful to me for thirty long years."
-
-"And where does he go after tonight?" asked Dick. "He cannot stay here,
-all alone except for Guadalupe."
-
-"Everything is arranged. Guadalupe is accustomed to live alone. But
-tonight Pierre accompanies me on my long journey."
-
-"So we may all meet again?"
-
-"Yes, we may all meet again," responded Robles, slowly and gravely,
-"far, far away from the Tehachapi mountains. But now I must go," he went
-on in a brisk tone, "for I have to make some final preparations. You
-have the affidavit; see that you do not lose it on your ride down the
-mountains."
-
-"You just bet I won't," replied Dick, as he held tightly to the precious
-document with both hands.
-
-"Pierre will come for you here early in the afternoon. Be prepared to go
-with him then. As for myself, Willoughby, there is for the present only
-one word more to be spoken. Adios!" Again they clasped hands, and a
-moment later Don Manuel was gone.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXI--Shadows of the Past
-
-|IN a little summer-house at the edge of the rose garden of La Siesta,
-Tia Teresa was seated all alone. She was awaiting the coming of Mr.
-Robles to a rendezvous which he had arranged by a confidential message
-sent on the previous evening. It wanted some time yet of the appointed
-hour, but in her state of deep emotion and repressed excitement she had
-gladly sought the solitude of this secluded corner. Deep in thought, her
-mind was divided between the faraway past and the near-impending future.
-
-Each recurring year this day to her had always been a sad and tragic
-anniversary. In the early hours of the morning she had been to the old
-Mexican cemetery on the hillside, and had bedecked with flowers the
-grave marked by the marble cross bearing the single word "Hermana,"
-also the graves close by of the parents of Don Manuel and Rosetta, the
-children she had nursed and tended and fondled from infancy to early
-manhood and womanhood, through twenty years of unalloyed happiness until
-the gringo had come, the ancestral acres had been filched away, and
-dishonor and death been brought to the slumbrously peaceful home.
-
-And from that slumbrous peace what a sudden and terrible change! On this
-day thirty years ago poor little Rosetta had been found done to death
-beneath the precipice at Comanche Point. No less done to death by the
-shock and shame of the pitiful story thus revealed, the aged parents of
-the beautiful young girl were, within a few days, sleeping their long
-last sleep by her side in the churchyard on the hill. A whole family
-blighted and withered as by the blast of some death-laden sirocco.
-
-Then had followed the years of terror during which Don Manuel, the White
-Wolf, the dreaded outlaw, had wreaked his vengeance on the whole race
-of gringos. She had never seen him all through that time, although at
-intervals money had reached her by Pierre Luzon's trusted hand, enabling
-her to maintain herself in the little Mexican village near the old fort
-of Tejon. At last had come the fight when the band of outlaws had been
-finally dispersed, Pierre Luzon wounded and dragged away to serve the
-rest of his days in prison, Don Manuel vanished like a wraith in the
-mist, gone where no man could tell.
-
-But through the years that succeeded, Tia Teresa had known that he
-lived--had known in her heart of hearts that he would live until the
-vendetta he had sworn against Ben Thurston would be accomplished. The
-remittances that arrived from time to time, first from Spain, then
-from England, needed no signature to show that they were from her young
-master of former years and that he still held his faithful old nurse in
-affectionate remembrance. And at last had come the crowning surprise of
-all.
-
-Tia Teresa had been bidden to come to Los Angeles by a letter which bore
-a strange signature, but the handwriting of which she had immediately
-recognized. And there, in a fine home beneath the foothills that skirt
-the city to the north, she had found Don Manuel again, much older in
-manner than by lapse of years--quiet, reserved, tinged with a sadness
-of which she knew the cause, but happy withal, for he was married to a
-beautiful English girl and had a little baby daughter. And as nurse to
-this child Tia Teresa, to her great joy, was promptly installed.
-
-Thus again she had become the trusted servant in Don Manuel's home,
-the only one around him possessing his full confidence and knowing the
-secret story of his past. For, amid these changed surroundings, his
-name was Ricardo Robles, his standing that of a Spaniard or Mexican of
-wealth, of scholarly tastes, and devoted to the seclusion of his home
-with its spacious surrounding gardens.
-
-Their next door neighbors were an English family named Darlington, Mrs.
-Darlington and Mrs. Robles having been life-long friends. And here, too,
-was another tiny child in the home, likewise a daughter.
-
-Seated in the summer-house, Tia Teresa was going over in her mind the
-whole chain of happenings--the new era that had dawned and had brought
-the hope of restored and abiding happiness for Don Manuel. But it had
-been fated not so to be. Within a year his young wife had died, his
-child was motherless, he himself, if not alone in the world, was
-broken-hearted. For a spell he had fits of brooding, then all of a
-sudden he had sold the home that could only henceforth be for him a
-place of saddening memories.
-
-His daughter Merle, taking her English mother's maiden name of
-Farnsworth, was transferred to the loving care of Mrs. Darlington. Thus
-had it come about that Grace Darlington and Merle Farnsworth had been
-brought up as sisters, with Tia Teresa their nurse, and in later years
-their devoted attendant.
-
-Ricardo Robles had resolved to travel, but Tia Teresa had quickly
-divined that the vendetta was again in his heart. For no other reason
-could he have decided on masking the paternity of his infant daughter
-by giving her the maternal name. And from Tia Teresa Don Manuel had
-no secret to conceal. "Yes." He had sworn he would hunt Ben Thurston
-through Europe, and it was to protect the future life of his child from
-any association with future consequences of the blood feud that he had
-handed her over to his friends under their solemn promise that, as Merle
-grew up, she should never know anything more than that both her parents
-had died.
-
-So once again Don Manuel had gone his way and disappeared. Some years
-later the Darlington home had been transferred to England, where Mr.
-Darlington had fallen heir to some ancestral estates. Again, after a
-lapse of years, another change had occurred--Mr. Darlington dying,
-and Mrs. Darlington being left a widow in the big, now gloomy, English
-country-house, with Grace and Merle approaching young womanhood, and
-all of them, Tia Teresa included, longing again for the sunshine of
-California.
-
-Intermittently during those years in England, Ricardo Robles had visited
-his friends, but the secret about his real relationship to Merle had
-always been preserved. Both daughters in the home had been brought up
-alike to regard him simply as a dear and valued friend, whose comings
-brought much happiness to their lives in the shape of gifts which
-preserved fond memories during his prolonged spells of absence.
-
-And while the little family was still plunged in deep sorrow for the
-death of Mr. Darlington, Mr. Robles had reappeared as the messenger
-of great joy. For he brought the news that the beautiful rancho of
-La Siesta, lying in mid-California, among the foothills of the Tejon
-Valley, had been purchased for the express purpose that the widow and
-children should make it their future place of abode. In this way had
-come about the return to the land which each and all already loved best
-and regarded as truly "home."
-
-"Five years ago!" murmured Tia Teresa pensively. And they had been all
-so happy here, the young girls growing up with every accomplishment
-money and the best governesses could bestow, Don Manuel not far away
-watching the progress and developing beauty of his daughter, always
-hovering near for acts of helpful kindness.
-
-Five years of placid enjoyment, of unbroken tranquility, till all of a
-sudden the old enemy had returned and all the rankling wounds of the old
-vendetta had been reopened!
-
-In the Spanish soul of Tia Teresa there was bitter hate still, and
-fierce joy even now that the hour of retribution was approaching--that
-at last after all those years her little Rosetta would be avenged.
-Yet time had had some mellowing influences, for in her musings now she
-experienced a vague sense of uneasiness for possible consequences that
-in former times had never for a moment been tolerated. The true spirit
-of the vendetta had always been in her very blood--strike when you can,
-without thought of what may happen next.
-
-But now she was thinking of coming happenings--of sorrow perhaps for
-Merle, of the undoubted danger for Don Manuel himself.
-
-And while thus she conned the chances, her head bent in deep meditation,
-her eyes half closed, Ricardo Robles, approaching with noiseless step,
-stood by her side and laid an affectionate hand upon her shoulder.
-
-"I have come, Tia Teresa," he said simply, as he sat down at the edge of
-the little rustic table.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXII--Forebodings
-
-|FOR this last hour, Don Manuel," she said, placing a hand on his, "I
-have been going over all the long story of the past, from the days when
-you were a little boy and Rosetta was suckled at my bosom. Why should I
-not have loved her?" asked the old duenna almost fiercely. "Why should
-I not love her still?" she added, in a lower tone, as she bowed her head
-and covered her eyes with her disengaged hand. "There is love that can
-never die, Don Manuel."
-
-"Nor should we wish it otherwise," he said gently, caressing the hand
-extended toward him. "And this very night our undying love for dear
-little Rosetta will be proved--tonight at last she will be avenged."
-
-With a start Tia Teresa sat erect.
-
-"Then it is all arranged?" she asked breathlessly.
-
-"Yes, all finally arranged," was his quiet rejoinder. "We meet this
-evening on Comanche Point--the place where I have always vowed he should
-answer for his crime. And you remember what day this is?"
-
-"I remember--can I ever forget?--the very day we found her dead beneath
-the cliff."
-
-"The very day, Tia Teresa. So my vengeance will be complete. Before now
-I could have shot him a dozen times. But he would never have known that
-his death was by my hand. Tonight, however, he will know. And he will
-realize that the vendetta is the law of God--an eye for an eye, a tooth
-for a tooth; his life, so precious to himself, for hers so dear to us in
-the happy old-time days."
-
-"But you, Don Manuel?" she asked fearfully.
-
-"It does not matter much about me," he answered. "But all the same I
-have come to speak a little in regard to myself. Tonight Ben Thurston
-assuredly will die, and should I perish with him, the story of the
-vendetta cannot fail to be revived and the identity of the recluse,
-Ricardo Robles, with Don Manuel, the outlaw, will be established. This
-will come as a great shock to all my dear friends at La Siesta--to
-Mrs. Darlington as well as to Grace and Merle. But this counts for
-little--the name of Don Manuel is just as honorable a name as that of
-Robles. And you can tell them further that all the loot I ever took from
-the gringos lies today untouched in Joaquin Murietta's cave. I sullied
-my hands with none of it. I was made rich by the sale of, my ancestral
-estates in Spain. And that wealth the law cannot confiscate, for I have
-been only its trustee during all those years. Everything I possess has
-been vested from the first in the names of Merle Farnsworth and Grace
-Darlington."
-
-"Grace as well?" murmured Tia Teresa, enquiringly.
-
-"Certainly, for I love both the girls dearly; there is ample to divide
-between them, and by ranking them together I guard Merle from the
-thought that I was anything more to her than to Grace. To both alike I
-was just a deeply attached friend." He paused a moment, then regarded
-Tia Teresa fixedly. "For my little girl must never know that her father
-was an outlaw, with a price on his head; yes, with blood on his hands,
-if it is only the blood of the worthless Thurston breed."
-
-"That is no stain--it is an honor--it is a duty that you owed,"
-exclaimed the duenna with fervency, her hands clenched against her bosom
-as she spoke.
-
-"You understand--we understand the vendetta, you and I, Tia Teresa. But
-the Americanos do not understand. And I have brought up my little girl
-as an American, for her own happiness I long ago realized. So she would
-never understand. When she comes to know that her old friend Ricardo
-Robles was Don Manuel de Valencia as well, she will breathe a gentle
-prayer of rest for his soul. But she will not be distressed by the
-knowledge that her father was the bandit and outlaw--she will not have
-to face the cruel world with that stigma attached to her name. For
-that I have contrived, for that I have suffered the dumb agony of
-childlessness all these years."
-
-"And that, in God's name," exclaimed Tia Teresa, "is part of the price
-Ben Thurston, thrice accursed, has to pay."
-
-"And tonight will pay," responded Don Manuel, determinedly. "But I speak
-of all this just to put you on your guard. It will be necessary for me
-to say something to Mrs. Darlington as well. I have brought for her the
-papers that will establish the rights of Merle and Grace to all I leave
-behind." As he spoke he touched his coat where the shape of a packet in
-an inner pocket showed.
-
-"Your will?"
-
-"No. As I have explained, I require no will. The property is theirs
-already. And I do not need to tell you, my dear Tia Teresa, my beloved
-friend, that you, too, have not been forgotten." As he spoke he raised
-her hand and pressed it reverently to his lips.
-
-"Don't speak like that, Don Manuel," she protested.
-
-"I know that all I owe to you can never be repaid," he continued,
-humbly, gratefully--"the devoted life-service for me and for Rosetta and
-our beloved parents as well."
-
-Again he kissed her hand, and this time she accepted the seal of his
-high-souled and chivalrous regard. There were tears in her eyes now.
-
-"But, Don Manuel, you need not die tonight. Death for him--that is
-right. But why for you?"
-
-"Perhaps not for me--most certainly," he replied with a little,
-reassuring smile. "Oh, do not imagine that I deliberately court death
-for tonight. On the contrary, I have all my plans carefully laid. An
-automobile is ready for the road, and I have a yacht waiting for me at
-a quiet spot on the coast, and if all is well, by tomorrow's dawn Pierre
-and I will be on the ocean. No one around here except at La Siesta will
-miss Ricardo Robles, and if the name of Don Manuel is associated with
-the death of Ben Thurston, only once more will the White Wolf have
-strangely disappeared just as he used to do in the old times."
-
-He was laughing, not loudly, but just with carefree, almost joyous
-triumph, as he rose to say good-bye.
-
-"Then, Tia Teresa, if events work out just as I have planned, we may
-all meet again, somewhere, somehow--I cannot say more at present. For
-I shall be happy to see my little girl happy in her married love, and
-later on I shall close my eyes contentedly when I can feel assured that
-nothing from the past will ever emerge to spoil her life or bring to her
-distress of mind."
-
-Tia Teresa, too, had arisen.
-
-"God grant it may be so," she fervently exclaimed. "But somehow my mind
-misgives me. Today I am softened as I have never been before. Even for
-the sake of our dear Rosetta in Heaven I feel inclined to plead with you
-to let Thurston go his way and the vendetta be forgotten." And she clung
-to his arm imploringly.
-
-"Never!" cried Don Manuel, putting her gently but resolutely aside.
-"That can never be, Tia Teresa. You know it. A vow sworn over my wronged
-and murdered sister's grave, over the graves of my parents as well, must
-be fulfilled. To break it at the very moment when it is in my power to
-give it fulfillment would be the act of a coward--a sacrilege that could
-never be atoned. No more words like that. I must not even listen."
-
-She was sobbing as she dropped back into her chair. Her silence was the
-confession that she was powerless to argue against the unwritten law of
-the vendetta.
-
-"So I kiss you good-bye for the present, Tia Teresa." He suited the
-action to the word, and, stooping, saluted her first on one cheek, then
-on the other. "Be your old brave and resolute self again. Where shall I
-find Mrs. Darlington?"
-
-"Alone in her boudoir. This is her day for correspondence," replied the
-duenna, resolutely striving to repress her tears.
-
-"Then I'll leave you here. Let your best wishes go with me."
-
-Almost lightly he touched her hand and was gone, disappearing among the
-roses.
-
-Tia Teresa bowed her head across her folded arms. She was thinking not
-of the past now, but solely of the future.
-
-"How would it all end?"
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXIII--Old Friends
-
-|AM glad to find you alone," spoke Mr. Robles, as he advanced into the
-subdued light of Mrs. Darlington's boudoir.
-
-She was seated at her escritoire. Around her were letters lying open
-for answer, others sealed and ready for the mail, also sundry books of
-account which indicated that the chatelaine of La Siesta was a business
-woman who paid attention to the running of her household and the
-management of her estate.
-
-"Always so pleased to see you," she replied, as she rose to give her
-visitor welcome.
-
-"Pray, keep your seat, Mrs. Darlington. You form an attractive
-picture--the lady who is not too much of a lady to neglect her
-correspondence and her business affairs. And it is about some business
-matters that I have come to talk with you this evening."
-
-She smiled pleasedly over the compliment paid in the old-fashioned
-courtly style of the true Spanish grandee. She herself always suggested
-the old-time, old-world lady of fashion--one belonging to the old lace
-and sweet lavender era that has so nearly passed away.
-
-"Business matters?" echoed Mrs. Darlington. "That sounds quite serious.
-We have had no cause to talk business for years and years. La Siesta has
-certainly justified its name."
-
-"But even the most pleasant siesta must in time come to an end," he
-replied with a grave smile. "There are things in this world that must be
-accomplished--calls of duty that interfere sadly with continuous repose.
-I am leaving tonight on a journey--perhaps a long journey," he added
-slowly and thoughtfully.
-
-"Oh, going abroad? The wanderlust again? That's too bad. We shall all
-miss you so much." She spoke the words with real concern in her tone and
-in her eyes.
-
-"Not exactly the wanderlust," he responded. "But there is a certain task
-I must perform. And it takes me away--far away from your delightful La
-Siesta."
-
-"And for a long time?"
-
-"That will be decided by events. I shall write you a long letter when
-once I am on the ocean. Meanwhile there are certain documents I wish to
-leave in your charge, my good kind friend."
-
-He drew the packet from the breast pocket of his coat. "They are
-important papers, and I wish them to be locked in your safe."
-
-"Under seal, I see," she remarked, indicating the big circle of wax that
-closed the cover.
-
-"Yes, sealed with my signet," he answered, touching the ring on his
-finger. "But all the same I wish you to know the nature of their
-contents. That is why I have sought this little private talk."
-
-Silently she settled herself to listen, and he went on:
-
-"You are aware that many years ago I sold out all my interests in
-Spain--lands and flocks and mines. Well, except for the money I used in
-building and furnishing my home, I invested the whole amount so realized
-in British Government bonds. But not in my own name. They stand in the
-names of Merle Farnsworth and Grace Darlington."
-
-Mrs. Darlington showed some surprise.
-
-"Merle, of course. But why Grace, Mr. Robles? I need not tell you that
-she is already well provided for."
-
-"That I fully understand. But I preferred it so. To me both children
-were very dear, and have always continued to be very dear. There was
-more than a sufficiency to divide. I wished them to share my patrimony,
-even though the one might have a greater claim on me than the other. But
-it was precisely, to guard against such a thought occurring to the mind
-of any outsider that I have treated Merle and Grace exactly alike. The
-secret that Merle is my daughter is known only to you and Tia Teresa and
-me, and, as I have always wished, it must be kept from Merle herself and
-from all others--now, more than ever," he added after a little pause.
-
-"I have never sought to pry into this mystery," replied Mrs. Darlington.
-"You had valid reasons for it, I well understood. But I was glad for the
-wee baby's sake to take her to my heart--the child of the dearest friend
-of my girlhood days. And it was nice, too, for her to have her mother's
-maiden name--Merle Farnsworth. So, from the very first, I loved her just
-as much as my own baby, Grace."
-
-"That I know," said Robles, gratefully touching her hand. "I can never
-adequately thank you for the mother love you have so generously bestowed
-on my child. And I have always been grateful, too, for the chivalrous
-manner in which you have never sought to have me explain my actions in
-this matter--my virtual separation from the daughter whom, while
-hiding our relationship, I have loved all through her young life with
-passionate devotion."
-
-Mr. Robles was deeply moved. He bowed his head and covered his eyes with
-his hand. In sympathy, Mrs. Darlington also was greatly affected.
-
-"You have been the best of fathers to Merle," she said in a trembling
-voice, "even though Merle little dreams of what she really means to your
-life. But oh, Mr. Robles, how often have I not pitied you when I have
-seen you restraining in her presence the natural impulses of your
-heart!"
-
-"It was my duty," he replied, regaining his composure by stern
-self-command and sitting erect again. "My bounden duty to her," he
-added, resolutely. "So, as you have so kindly done before, we shall
-leave that subject alone. You call it a mystery. Be it so. Just let
-it abide a mystery to the end. Now, Mrs. Darlington," he went on in a
-changed tone, "please lock up these papers. If I ever want them again I
-shall come to you. But if anything should happen to me, the seal is to
-be broken. You are my trustee. But there is no troublesome will to
-prove and execute. As I have already indicated, all the property I die
-possessed of, all the property that is inalienably and rightfully mine,
-including my home on the hill--everything is already apportioned between
-Merle and Grace, and stands in their names by a deed that dates back
-almost to their days of infancy."
-
-"It is unheard-of generosity," protested Mrs. Darlington. "I mean so far
-as Grace is concerned."
-
-"Not another word, I beg of you. I have already given valid reasons
-besides those of affection and gratitude. Now, Mrs. Darlington, let me
-see you lock up these documents, and my mind will be at rest."
-
-Without further speech she took the packet of papers from his hand,
-crossed the room, and, standing before a safe inset into the wall and
-already open, deposited the papers in a little drawer. Then she swung
-back the safe door, and the click of the combination as she turned the
-knob told that her visitor's wishes had been fully complied with. Slowly
-she returned to her seat at the desk.
-
-"Thank you," said Mr. Robles, pressing her hand.
-
-"Then I am not to ask why you are leaving us tonight?" enquired Mrs.
-Darlington.
-
-"Please not. I just came to you, as I have many times done before, to
-speak the little word--_Adios_. And it has always been spoken brightly
-between us, my dear friend. For have I not returned again and again like
-the proverbial bad penny?" he continued with a smile.
-
-"And so it will be yet again, I hope," she replied. "Bad pennies of your
-kind, Mr. Robles, are better than minted gold. And you must think of the
-young people. Engagements should not be too long. Everything is settled
-so far as Dick and Merle are concerned--with your full approval?"
-
-"With my fullest approval, and to my great joy and peace of mind."
-
-"Well, and you know, too, that it is just the same old story as regards
-Chester Munson and my little girl."
-
-"Munson has so informed me. He wanted my congratulations on his good
-fortune. Chester Munson is certainly a fine fellow, and Grace could have
-made no better choice for the bestowal of her love. Again I am filled
-with happiness at the turn events have taken."
-
-"But if there are to be wedding bells for four, their peal will not be
-so joyous if you are absent, my dear Mr. Robles."
-
-"I shall try to be present," he replied, with a little wistful smile.
-"Who knows? Wouldn't it be fine if the wedding bells were to ring in
-Spain?"
-
-"No, no, my friend. You forget that all four are young Americans.
-The honeymoons in Spain, if you like. But the weddings in California,
-please."
-
-"So be it," he answered. "Then if I cannot get back for the wedding
-bells, we may have a family reunion during the honeymoons." He laughed
-almost gaily as he rose. "Now, where are our young Americans? I wish to
-say good-bye to them, too."
-
-"Where Dick Willoughby is, I cannot say. But he is safe--you still
-assure me of his safety, Mr. Robles?"
-
-"Assuredly. And I have good news for our dear Merle. Tomorrow Willoughby
-will be free, with every suspicion removed from his name."
-
-"Oh, that will be glad tidings indeed for Merle--for both the girls."
-
-"Then let us take the news to them. Where shall we find them?"
-
-"As usual, I fancy, in their favorite cosy corner. And Mr. Munson is
-here, too. He is to have luncheon with us. He said you had given him a
-day off from his onerous library duties."
-
-"Quite correct. I told him I would meet him here, for I have a message
-for him as well. Come then, let us join the young people."
-
-Again, like the courtly hidalgo, he presented a hand to his hostess and
-led her from the room.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXIV--Heart Searchings
-
-|AS Mrs. Darlington had anticipated, the trio of young Americans were
-discovered in the cosy corner. Grace and Munson were engaged in a
-t�te-�-t�te that was obviously very delightful to themselves, while
-Merle at a discreet distance was busily engaged in watering the pot
-plants and flowers. She was the first to sound a note of warning.
-
-"Here comes mother, and Mr. Robles, also, I do declare."
-
-The young lovers started a little apart, and Grace in a moment was
-demurely busy over a bit of sewing that had been resting undisturbed in
-her lap during the previous half hour.
-
-Merle advanced toward Mr. Robles.
-
-"This is delightful," she exclaimed, as she warmly shook hands. "You
-will stay to luncheon, of course."
-
-"No, my dear. This is to be only a brief visit, I am sorry to say."
-
-Grace had also come forward, and he saluted her in his usual quiet,
-kindly manner. But for Munson he had a word of sly banter.
-
-"Better than drilling a squad or cataloguing musty old books," he
-remarked, bestowing a significant side glance in Grace's direction.
-
-"Infinitely better," replied the ex-soldier and amateur librarian, with
-frank and unabashed satisfaction.
-
-Mr. Robles took a seat close to Merle.
-
-"I came to bring you two pieces of news," he said, taking her hand,
-yet addressing his words to all the company. "First and foremost, by
-tomorrow the charge against Dick Willoughby will be withdrawn, and he
-will be a free man."
-
-"Oh, that is good news indeed," cried Merle, fairly hugging its bearer.
-
-"Then they have at last discovered the murderer of young Thurston?"
-enquired Munson in a tone of eager satisfaction.
-
-"Yes, or rather he has discovered himself, I believe. Oh, you need
-not ask me for the name. It will only be made public when Willoughby
-formally claims his liberty."
-
-"I am so thankful," murmured Grace. "But of course Dick's complete
-exoneration was bound to come."
-
-"And I am the bearer of a special message to you, Mr. Munson. I have
-not read it. But it was given to me as the one most likely to get it
-promptly into your hands."
-
-Speaking thus, he passed over to Munson the hasty scrawl that Dick had
-written in the cavern and entrusted to Pierre Luzon for delivery.
-
-Munson ripped open the envelope, first scanned the contents, then read
-aloud:
-
-"On Tuesday night next, about six o'clock, meet me at Buck Ashley's
-old store. I shall want you to ride over to Bakersfield with me next
-morning, where my acquittal is assured. Give Merle the glad news. Yours,
-Dick."
-
-"That I have already been privileged to do," said Mr. Robles, as he
-smiled down on the young girl by his side. Their eyes met, and a look of
-grave earnestness came into Merle's.
-
-"And the second item of news, Mr. Robles?" she asked, in a low tone. "I
-hope it is also gladsome tidings."
-
-"Oh, it is of comparative unimportance," he answered. "Simply that I am
-going away on a long journey, and may not see all you happy young people
-again for quite awhile."
-
-Merle's face fell. "I am so sorry," she murmured, a note of real feeling
-in the softly-spoken words.
-
-"As you grow older you will realize that the world is full of partings,
-Merle," he answered.
-
-"But why should there be partings among us?" she protested. "Now that
-Dick is free, there is not a shadow on all our happiness. And we do so
-wish you to share it, Mr. Robles. It will not be just the same if you
-are gone."
-
-"It is very kind of you to think like that."
-
-"That's just how we all think," interjected Grace. "But when duty calls,
-one must needs answer," replied Robles. "Right there is an end to all
-argument."
-
-"And where are you going this time, Mr. Robles?" enquired Merle.
-
-"On a long journey--as far as Europe, I hope. But my plans are not
-quite certain, except that I start tonight. However, I shall be in
-correspondence with Mrs. Darlington, and I trust that when you young
-people come to make that contemplated foreign tour, your footsteps
-will be turned in my direction. Meanwhile you have, all of you, as you
-already know, my warmest congratulations and heartiest good wishes."
-
-As he spoke, Mr. Robles rose. His manner indicated that he wished no
-further questioning. After a comprehensive glance around, he advanced,
-first of all, to Munson and extended his hand.
-
-"Mr. Munson, you will receive a letter tomorrow that contains an offer
-for you to continue your work in my library, which I hope will prove
-acceptable, at least for the present. Grace, my dear, I take the liberty
-of an old friend." And he kissed her brow. "With your mother I
-already have had a good long talk," he continued, as he pressed Mrs.
-Darlington's hand and looked into her eyes. "And now, Merle, dear, I am
-going to ask you to gather me some roses in your garden. I want them for
-a particular purpose, and, as you know, there are no roses like those of
-La Siesta."
-
-Merle was standing eager and happy to do his bidding--privileged to have
-the chance of conferring such a little service on her dear old friend,
-her friend from the earliest childhood days of her remembrance. With
-impulsive good-nature, Grace was ready to help as well. But a quiet look
-from her mother restrained her, and Merle and Mr. Robles passed from the
-verandah, hand in hand.
-
-For nearly an hour they wandered among the rose bushes, picking the
-choicest blooms, talking a little on many things, silent at times, but
-both happy in each other's companionship. At last Mr. Robles looked at
-his watch. The hour of parting had come.
-
-Merle had deftly tied the roses in a bunch, and now she placed them in
-his hands.
-
-"A bouquet from me--from your little friend Merle," she murmured, with a
-wistful attempt at a smile.
-
-"From my dear little friend, Merle," he replied, gravely repeating her
-words as he looked down into her upraised face. It was a beautiful
-face, in its fresh youthfulness, its eager joy of living, the sublime
-unconsciousness of self that reveals the spotless soul. For an instant
-their eyes met.
-
-During that brief spell Robles' whole being trembled. His arms moved as
-if to enfold the sweet girl to his breast. But with a mighty effort he
-controlled himself, and he simply kissed her on the brow, just as he had
-done to Grace in the cosy corner.
-
-"God bless you, Merle, my dear," he murmured as he turned away with a
-final wave of his hand.
-
-In a moment he was gone from her view. But the girl's gaze remained
-fixed--still directed down the avenue of trees along which the figure
-of her life-long friend had disappeared. There was a look of dazed
-wonderment in her eyes.
-
-"Oh, can it be so--could it be so?" she faltered, as she raised a hand
-to hold back the tears.
-
-An hour later Robles was in the little Mexican churchyard, scattering
-the rose blooms gathered by his daughter Merle on the graves of the dead
-relatives whose names she would never know as such. Already there were
-the flowers that Tia Teresa had that morning brought--a garland of white
-arum lilies around the cross that marked the sleeping place of Rosetta,
-wreaths of rich red carnations on the tombstone inscribed with the
-father's and the mother's names.
-
-And now on the turf beneath the memorials Don Manuel, with lingering
-fingers, dropped the roses here and there, as if to rest with their
-beauty and their fragrance on the forms of his beloved dead. The last
-bloom fluttered to the ground. Then, standing erect, hands upraised, no
-words uttered, but with the unspoken words none the less reverberating
-through his very soul, he vowed once again the vendetta which he had
-sworn on the identical spot thirty long years before.
-
-When he turned to leave the tiny hamlet of the dead, a wonderful
-transformation had come over his countenance. The placid calm was gone;
-the fierce fire of implacable hatred and unswervable resolve burned in
-his eyes. He had bidden adieu to all the softer things in this life. His
-sole concern now was with the enemy whom he had marked down for death
-that night.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXV--At Comanche Point
-
-|BEN THURSTON, during the afternoon, seated in his big armchair, had
-first nodded over a newspaper and then dropped off to sleep. He was
-awakened by a touch on the shoulder--rudely awakened, for he jumped to
-his feet, and in a dazed way glared at the disturber.
-
-"Excuse me," apologized Leach Sharkey, "but I want to remind you that
-this is the afternoon when we are to meet that old Portugee I told you
-about."
-
-"I need no reminder," was the gruff reply. "I am ready to start when you
-are. By the way, what's the fellow's name?"
-
-"Jos�, he said. He claims to know every nook and corner in the range.
-Has lived in the mountains for many years; keeps goats and bees, and
-shoots a mountain lion occasionally, earning the bounty as well as
-getting the skin."
-
-"Shoots," echoed Thurston, somewhat nervously.
-
-"Oh, that was in his younger days mostly, I fancy. Today he is a
-tottering old man who couldn't hold a rifle straight if he tried. But
-he's well acquainted with the mountains, that's the main thing. He tells
-me he has known where Dick Willoughby is hiding since the very day after
-he broke jail."
-
-"Then why didn't he come to me?"
-
-"Because he knew nothing about the reward. But at our very first chance
-meeting among the hills I very soon made five thousand dollars look
-mighty good to him. By gad, you should have seen his eyes pop and his
-hands tremble."
-
-"It is a fortune for such a man."
-
-"That's what got him. He has been supplying Willoughby with goats'
-milk, but is paid only two bits a quart. So he grabbed at my bait like
-a hungry coyote. You have the money ready, I suppose? Treasury
-bills--that's what he stipulated for, because he's too frail to hump a
-sack of gold around."
-
-"The money is in that wallet on my desk. You had better carry it."
-
-Sharkey stepped across the room and shoved a fat leather wallet into the
-breast pocket of his coat.
-
-"So frail, is he?" Thurston went on, musingly. "Well, I needn't take a
-gun."
-
-Sharkey smiled. He knew Ben Thurston's timidity in even handling a
-revolver, and the man's abject reliance on his armed bodyguard.
-
-"Not the slightest necessity," assented the sleuth. "I've always got
-my brace of bulldogs ready;" and the professional gunman, touching
-the broad leather belt to which his holsters were attached, grinned
-complacently.
-
-"And no danger to be feared from Willoughby himself, you said?"
-
-"None whatever. In fact, he don't have a gun, Jos� declares. So he only
-sneaks out after dark for a constitutional. The old fellow will take us
-to the spot where we can grab him by the neck."
-
-"That sounds like business," replied Thurston, rubbing his hands. "And
-shoot him down, Sharkey, if he runs."
-
-"He won't give us the slip this time--you can bet dollars to doughnuts
-on that. But of course he's got to have the chance of hands-up before
-I fire. Killing is killing, and I prefer the handcuffs. There is really
-less trouble in the long run."
-
-"Well, perhaps I, too, would prefer to see him hanged," murmured
-Thurston, with gloating satisfaction. "But don't forget that we must get
-him this afternoon, dead or alive. I'm sick of this life of watching and
-waiting."
-
-"The end's in sight at last."
-
-"Then we'll go back East--after I have had my revenge. It will be
-sweeter to me after all the trouble we've encountered. And by God, we'll
-drag that Farnsworth girl, too, through the mire. Hell to all of them!
-I've never had anyone but enemies around me here."
-
-While speaking, Thurston reached for his overcoat thrown across the back
-of a chair.
-
-"All right, we'll start," said Sharkey. "I'll go and get the horses
-ready."
-
-It was about half past three o'clock when the riders reached the base of
-the mountain barrier not far from the entrance to Tejon Pass.
-
-"We've got to make it on foot now," remarked Sharkey, as he swung
-himself from the saddle. "I'll tether the horses to this manzanita."
-Thurston dismounted, and while his companion led the animals under the
-trees, he gazed aloft at the precipice beetling in front of them.
-
-"Damn it, I wish you had chosen any other place than Comanche Point," he
-exclaimed irritably.
-
-"We had to come to the spot where we can find our man," replied Sharkey
-complacently. "It is on the ridge above that Willoughby has his place of
-hiding. Come along, we have a good stiff climb before us."
-
-He led the way up the first slope of the winding trail and Ben Thurston
-followed, reluctantly now, half doubting the wisdom of his having left
-his home for such an adventure.
-
-Meanwhile there had been two other riders on the range that afternoon,
-mounted on little hill ponies. The one man was blindfolded; the other
-rode in advance and guided the second pony by a leading rein. It had
-been the usual experience to which Dick Willoughby had now become
-accustomed--hour after hour along winding, maze-like trails. At last the
-call had come to dismount, and the bandage had been removed from Dick's
-eyes. He saw that he was in a little box-like nook in the mountains.
-
-"You will remain here," said Pierre Luzon, "until I whistle for you--you
-know my signal. Zen you will lead ze ponies along zis path. When
-you come to me, I will put you on ze road for home, and we will say
-good-bye."
-
-"I suppose I may smoke," laughed Dick, philosophically. The day of
-surprises had left him dulled to any further wonderment.
-
-"Sure, smoke," replied Pierre. "But remember ze forest regulations," he
-added with a chuckle, "and do not set ze brush on fire."
-
-"Oh, I'm no green tenderfoot," laughed
-
-Willoughby, as he drew his briar-root from his pocket. "And it's quite a
-balmy afternoon for October."
-
-He sat down and propped his back against a moss-grown rock.
-
-"You must not stir from here," continued Pierre. "Remember I have to
-find you again."
-
-"Guess I've learned to obey orders. I'm quite comfortable where I am."
-And Dick started contentedly smoking.
-
-Pierre, following the little path to which he had drawn Dick's
-attention, pushed through the brushwood and disappeared.
-
-Just ten minutes later Pierre Luzon stood on Comanche Point and gazed
-down the trail leading up from the pass below.
-
-"Zey are coming, zey are coming!" he exclaimed eagerly to himself, with
-finger outpointed in the direction of the two climbers on foot half
-way up the ascent. Then he slipped back into the shadow of a clump of
-stunted pines that grew close to the cliff.
-
-Fifteen minutes or so passed. Then the heads of Ben Thurston and Leach
-Sharkey showed above the final steep ascent that led directly on to the
-projecting spur known as Comanche Point. Thurston was breathing hard
-after the difficult climb.
-
-"Here we are at last," remarked Sharkey cheerfully, as he glanced
-around.
-
-Even as he spoke, a tottering figure came forth from among the pines. A
-few minutes before, Pierre Luzon had been erect and vigorous and nimble
-on his feet, but now he seemed to be indeed a frail and bowed old man.
-
-"I have come," he said, as he approached the figures on the cliff.
-
-"Hands up, then," cried the sleuth, half laughing. "You remember, I said
-I would search you for a gun."
-
-"I have no gun," Pierre answered, as he halted and elevated his arms.
-
-Sharkey advanced and, without taking the trouble to draw either of his
-own weapons, ran his fingers with the quick touch of experience over the
-old man's clothes.
-
-"I knew you were on the square, Jos�," said the bodyguard, quickly
-satisfied. "Well, I've brought the mazuma."
-
-He drew from his pocket the fat wallet, opening it for a moment to
-display the wads of greenbacks. Then he put it back again.
-
-"Now where is our man?"
-
-"He is down here, just a little distance," replied Pierre, in a cautious
-whisper. "I am not strong enough to hold him. But you come. Ze boss, he
-can remain here for ze present."
-
-Ben Thurston had turned away and was looking down into the valley.
-
-"We'll be back in a short time," called out Sharkey.
-
-But Thurston, if he had heard, made no reply.
-
-"Now show the way, old fellow," continued the sleuth, addressing his
-guide.
-
-A moment later Ben Thurston was alone.
-
-Alone on Comanche Point--gazing over the broad sweep of lands that
-had been his princely heritage, but which he had now lost forever! The
-valley lay beneath him, bathed in the mellow evening sunshine. But his
-eyes were riveted on a single spot. And what a transformation scene
-for the erstwhile cattle king--this new city with its checkerboard of
-streets and all around it new homes amid plots of young fruit trees and
-meadows of alfalfa!
-
-The whole picture was one of fascinating beauty--the city itself the
-finishing touch that gave it human interest. But in Ben Thurston's soul
-there was nothing but bitterness and disgust. He had kept on complaining
-that he had been unscrupulously plundered by the Los Angeles syndicate,
-and with the realization now of what enterprise and enlightened progress
-could achieve, he began to feel that he had been mercilessly stripped
-of what was rightfully his. Greed and envy and vain regrets were all
-commingled in his surge of envenomed thoughts. But avarice predominated.
-
-"Good God, to think I parted with the rancho at a beggarly acreage
-price, when I might have been selling town lots today. There will be a
-dozen other towns springing up to follow this one."
-
-In his agony he groaned aloud and covered his eyes with his hands to
-shut out the hateful sight.
-
-Just at that moment the sound of a twig crackling underfoot smote his
-ear. He turned round; into his face stole an ashen look of terror as he
-watched an approaching figure wrapped in a Spanish cloak and crowned by
-a broad-brimmed sombrero. His haggard eyes asked: "Is it man or ghost?"
-He would have screamed aloud, but found himself voiceless from fear.
-
-At last the figure stood before him with proudly folded arms.
-
-"The White Wolf!" gasped Thurston, in a faint whisper.
-
-"Yes, Don Manuel de Valencia--the White Wolf, as you choose to call him.
-And now at last, Ben Thurston, we meet face to face, and alone--after
-thirty long years, and without a woman's tears this time to save you!"
-
-Ben Thurston sank to the ground, a huddled heap, trembling in every
-limb.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXVI---Outwitted
-
-|PIERRE LUZON led Leach Sharkey along the trail. Beyond Comanche Point
-it dipped again owing to the contour of the mountain, then at a distance
-of about fifty yards, took a sharp turn round an abrupt face of rock.
-
-"Where the hell are you taking me?" asked the sleuth, as they approached
-this bend.
-
-"Only a little further," replied the guide, in a feeble quavering voice
-as he glanced over his shoulder.
-
-The men were only a few paces apart. In the shadow cast by the cliff,
-Pierre's pallid face with its stubbly white beard looked like that of a
-veritable ancient, and his bent form and tottering steps completed the
-picture. The sleuth smiled at his momentary discomposure.
-
-Around the turn, however, Pierre grabbed at a revolver lying ready to
-his hand on a ledge of rock, and when Sharkey followed, it was to find
-a hale and stalwart man, erect, alert, with the flash of conscious power
-in his eyes.
-
-"Hands up!" cried Pierre, in a voice of stern command. Leach Sharkey was
-standing three short steps away and was looking now into the muzzle of
-a big automatic pistol. Over his countenance there stole a sickly smile.
-But he knew the rules of the game too well to attempt any resistance.
-His hands went slowly above his head until both arms were fully
-extended.
-
-"You've got the drop on me all right, Jos�," he murmured, in
-self-apology.
-
-"Face the rock," came the next curt order--the very tone was reminiscent
-of old bandit days.
-
-Sharkey obeyed in silence, and in a trice both his guns were withdrawn
-from their holsters and flung among the brushwood.
-
-"You go ahead now," said Pierre, stepping aside to let the other pass.
-"You can drop your hands, but if you cry out or attempt to run, zen you
-are one dead man."
-
-The discomfited sleuth meekly complied, although there was now a black
-scowl on his face as he stepped on ahead. In all his professional
-career, Leach Sharkey had never before fallen so ignominiously into a
-trap like this.
-
-Not a word was spoken while a distance of some two hundred yards was
-being traversed. Then Pierre called out the one word: "Halt!"
-
-Sharkey did not dare even to look round. He stood still as a piece of
-statuary.
-
-"You sit on zat stone over zere," continued Pierre, "and do not rise
-until I give you permission. Now we will proceed to business."
-
-Sharkey sat down as ordered.
-
-"Hell, you can have your five thousand dollars right enough," he said,
-pulling the wallet from his pocket.
-
-"No, my friend. I did not bring you here to rob you. I am out on parole,
-and I never break my word. I am Pierre Luzon!" He spoke the name with
-triumphant pride.
-
-"Good God!" exclaimed Sharkey, in dumfounded surprise. "You belonged to
-the White Wolf's gang?"
-
-"I belong now to ze gang. Ze White Wolf is alive!"
-
-Leach Sharkey had looked sick before, but a ghastly grey pallor came
-into his face now.
-
-"Then he has got hold of Ben Thurston--at last?" he faltered.
-
-"Yes, at last," replied Pierre, with a grim smile of joy. "Don Manuel
-and Ben Thurston are alone on Comanche Point just now. Zey will settle
-old scores--zat is zeir affair. Now, I attend to my affair."
-
-Sharkey looked up enquiringly, but said no more.
-
-"Leach Sharkey," continued the old Frenchman, "you are one strong
-man. You will now take ze handcuffs from your pocket--I know you carry
-zem--and drop zem over your shoulder. Zere, zat is right. I am glad you
-obey wizout giving me any further trouble. Now, you will hold out your
-hands, behind your back--you know exactly how."
-
-Yes, Leach Sharkey knew exactly how. And he also knew what the business
-end of a big revolver meant, with the forefinger of a daring bandit like
-Pierre Luzon on the trigger. He was handcuffed and helpless right enough
-in very short order. For the first time in his life the man who had so
-often slipped the bracelets on others, found the bracelets around his
-own wrists.
-
-"Next I want ze key of ze handcuffs," Pierre resumed. "Which pocket,
-please?"
-
-Sharkey, with a downward thrust of his chin, indicated the waistcoat
-pocket.
-
-"Zank you," said Pierre, as he thrust in his fingers and produced the
-key. "Now, we will throw zis zing away"--as he spoke it went whizzing
-through the air--"and when you get home to ze rancho, ze blacksmith zere
-will set you free."
-
-"Oh, I'm going home, am I?" said the sleuth, considerably reassured.
-
-"Yes, Pierre Luzon no longer rob or kill or break ze law. He keep his
-word of honor always. And I promised to bring Dick Willoughby to you
-tonight. Now I shall be true to zat promise, too."
-
-And through his teeth he blew a shrill whistle.
-
-At the sound Dick Willoughby started up, and shook the ashes from his
-pipe. Following Pierre's instructions, he led the two ponies along the
-little trail through the chaparral. Within five minutes he emerged on a
-broader trail, right at the spot where the Frenchman was standing.
-
-"Hello, Pierre!" Then Dick's eyes fell on Leach Sharkey, and at the very
-first glance he saw the shackled hands. "But what's the meaning of all
-this?" he asked in bewildered surprise.
-
-"It means zat you will take zis man down ze mountains. He came to arrest
-you, but you can tell him now zat you are one free man. You can show him
-ze paper which proves it was not you, but Don Manuel, who is responsible
-for ze death of young Thurston."
-
-"Great Caesar!" muttered the sleuth, "I thought that from the first, but
-the old fool would not listen to me."
-
-"Mr. Sharkey," said Dick, "you and I have no quarrel. What Pierre
-says is true--I have a sworn affidavit in my pocket, fixing the
-responsibility for that unhappy affair where it belongs."
-
-"I believe you, Mr. Willoughby," replied the sleuth. "I'm glad you
-are innocent, but I was only doing my duty in trying to arrest the man
-charged with the crime."
-
-"I understand all that. I bear you no ill will."
-
-"And I'd shake hands if it were not for these damned bracelets,"
-continued Sharkey.
-
-"Pierre, there is no need of handcuffs," said Dick, turning to the
-Frenchman. "Set him free. We will go peaceably home together."
-
-"No, no," replied Pierre, determinedly. "Leach Sharkey, he is one giant
-in strength. He will go home as he is. Besides, I have trown ze key
-away." And he laughed aloud.
-
-Sharkey nodded in helpless admission of his sorry plight.
-
-"Too bad," murmured Dick.
-
-"And now," continued Pierre, "zere is no time to be lost. We will help
-zis man onto your pony, and you will ride my pony and hold ze leading
-rein."
-
-"But he can't ride with his hands behind his back like that," objected
-Dick.
-
-"Oh, yes, he can," grinned Pierre. "Ze good horseman ride wid his knees,
-and most of ze road you can be by his side and hold him on. And it is ze
-only way, for ze key, as I have said, is gone."
-
-"I suppose we've got to accept the situation," said Dick, with a glance
-at Sharkey's lugubrious countenance. The man of strength was obviously
-crestfallen at his almost ridiculous plight of powerlessness.
-
-Pierre resumed his instructions. "You will not go back to Comanche
-Point, but will take ze mule trail down into ze valley. You know it, Mr.
-Willoughby--it is about one mile furzer on."
-
-"I know it," replied Dick.
-
-"You will leave Mr. Sharkey at the rancho and zen ride to ze place where
-your friends are waiting for you. Now, zat is all. I must go. We have
-already said our _adios_, my dear young friend." Dick grasped the
-proffered hand and warmly pressed it.
-
-"Good-bye, Pierre. I can never thank you enough for all you have done
-for me. Good-bye." Leach Sharkey was assisted into the saddle, and the
-horsemen started on their way.
-
-"Good-bye," shouted back Dick Willoughby, yet once again.
-
-"_Adios!_"
-
-And as the two figures disappeared around a bend, the Frenchman uttered
-a deep sigh. "A splendid young fellow! I wonder shall we ever meet
-again!"--this was the thought in his mind as for just a moment he stood
-in an attitude of deep dejection.
-
-Then swinging around, he started back at a run for Comanche Point.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXVII--The Dawn of Comprehension
-
-|ALL through the afternoon at La Siesta, Merle was in a meditative mood.
-After luncheon Mrs. Darlington had returned to her letter-writing and
-her book-keeping. Munson and Grace had departed for a walk through the
-pine woods, after vain but not too strenuous endeavors to get Merle to
-accompany them. Left to her own resources she had retired to the drawing
-room, had tried to interest herself at the piano, but after a little
-while had given up the attempt; and, coiled in a big chair, had
-surrendered herself to a "big think," as she mentally termed it.
-
-In that momentary searching of the eyes between her and Mr. Robles
-just before their parting in the rose garden, there had come a flash of
-revelation to her soul. She had divined a yearning in his gaze that was
-surely more than the affection of an old and devoted friend. There was
-passionate tenderness that belied the gentle yet almost perfunctory kiss
-on the brow that he had finally bestowed at parting. Nor had she failed
-to notice the restraint which the strong man had imposed upon himself.
-And strangely enough, her own momentary impulse had been to throw her
-arms around his neck and kiss him, just as a fond daughter might have
-kissed a father at such an emotional moment--on the eve of a long
-journey, the whither unrevealed, the return all so uncertain.
-
-She recalled, too, their previous conversation while she was gathering
-the roses--his words of kindly wisdom, his little bits of advice that
-now seemed to be weighted by more than mere friendly interest in her
-future happiness. Then her mind traveled back slowly, step by step, all
-the way to childhood days--a long vista marked by his comings and
-his goings, his prolonged absences, his unexpected but always welcome
-reappearances, his numberless acts of thoughtful kindness. Once she had
-been seriously ill, when a little girl, and the memory of that illness
-had ever been the memory of his face hovering over her cot, night and
-day, till the crisis had been passed and she had been on the way to
-assured convalescence.
-
-There had always been an air of mystery about Mr. Robles, but she had
-never sought to penetrate it, instinctively recognizing that there had
-been some great sorrow in his life, and almost unconsciously accepting
-the affectionate regard he had lavished on Grace and herself as some
-sort of consolation for him in his loneliness. She knew that Grace
-was only her sister in name, but none the less Grace was to her a real
-sister, just as Mrs. Darlington was a real mother--the only mother she
-had ever known. Weaving together now the threads of memory, she became
-conscious of the mystery in her own life. There was assuredly some
-fuller story than the story she had been told in the past and had always
-tacitly accepted--that her parents had been neighbors and dear friends
-of Mrs. Darlington in the long ago, and when they had died, the baby
-girl left behind had been bequeathed to her motherly care.
-
-At this stage in her ruminations Merle sat bolt upright in her chair.
-The shadows of evening were beginning to close around her, but the dawn
-of revelation was in her heart.
-
-Would Mrs. Darlington still be alone in her boudoir? Merle answered the
-unspoken thought by stealing from the room.
-
-Yes, Mrs. Darlington was at her writing table, lighted now by candles
-on each side which, covered by little red shades, only dimly illuminated
-the apartment. Merle flitted in without her coming being observed.
-
-Mrs. Darlington was no longer writing--her elbows were resting on the
-table and both hands were covering her eyes in an attitude of deep
-thought, perhaps of sleep, as Merle for a moment imagined when she had
-noiselessly gained her side.
-
-"Mother dear," she said softly, laying a hand on her shoulder.
-
-"You here, my child?" exclaimed Mrs. Darlington. There was no trace of
-slumber in her eyes.
-
-"Yes, and I want to have a little talk with you--all alone," said
-Merle, as she dropped into a chair, the very chair which Mr. Robles had
-previously occupied.
-
-The look of vague sadness and anxiety in Mrs. Darlington's face
-deepened.
-
-"What about, dear?" she asked.
-
-Merle's mind had been made up, and she came to the issue with
-point-blank abruptness.
-
-"Is Mr. Robles my father?"
-
-The startled look on the other's face was almost in itself an admission
-of the truth--Mrs. Darlington had been caught off her guard. But she
-made a desperate attempt to parry the question.
-
-"What makes you fancy such a thing?" she faltered.
-
-"Because there is certainty in my heart," replied
-
-Merle bravely. "It came to me first when he bade me good-bye in the
-garden. And now I see it in your face."
-
-The young girl dropped on her knees, and, an arm around her mother's
-waist, gazed up imploringly.
-
-Eyes met eyes. Falsehood was impossible in either case. Mrs. Darlington
-stooped and folded the kneeling girl in a fond embrace. Both were
-weeping now. No word had been spoken, but Merle knew that she had
-correctly divined.
-
-It was a few minutes before there was sufficient self-control for the
-conversation to be resumed. But then, Merle still kneeling by her side,
-Mrs. Darlington spoke:
-
-"I had promised to keep this secret, dear," she began, fondling the
-girl's tresses. "But you have gained your knowledge apart from me, so
-I cannot be held to have betrayed my trust. Yes, Mr. Robles is your
-father--your loving and devoted father. Your real name is his--Merle
-Robles you should always have been called."
-
-"And why not?" asked Merle. "Oh, I am proud and overjoyed to think of
-him as my father."
-
-"Because he has some important reason to have the world think otherwise.
-I know you will believe me, dear Merle, when I say I do not know that
-reason. He is too grand and honorable a man for me to have ever pressed
-for an explanation. I just accepted you as a gift from his hands--his
-child and the child of my girlhood chum, named Merle, as you know, like
-yourself."
-
-"So, if I have solved one mystery, there is still another mystery
-beyond," murmured Merle.
-
-She rose, seated herself, and remained silent for a moment, her hands
-locked across her knees, her brows knit in thought.
-
-"But why distress your heart over unknown things?" said Mrs. Darlington.
-"As you have learned by your today's experience, mysteries solve
-themselves in due time."
-
-"Yes," replied Merle, "but somehow I feel that this is the due time that
-I should know everything--for my dear father's sake," she added, "not
-for my own. Oh, mother, you should have seen his face of anguish just
-before he parted from me this afternoon. It was revealed to me only
-for an instant. But now I feel sure that something terrible is going to
-happen--to him."
-
-She was sobbing again, as she flung her arms impulsively around Mrs.
-Darlington's neck and sat in her lap, just as if once again she had
-become a little child.
-
-"Oh, mother mine--I shall always call you mother mine, for you have been
-a dear, sweet, kind mother to me ever since I can remember. But don't
-you see that today I have also found a father whom I deeply love?
-Nothing must happen to him."
-
-"Why should anything happen to him?"
-
-"I do not know. Where is Tia Teresa?"
-
-The question came with startling suddenness as Merle started up with
-another ray of illumination in her mind.
-
-"I haven't seen her since morning," replied Mrs. Darlington.
-
-"Nor have I," said Merle, standing erect, wiping away the traces of her
-tears, and with a few pats adjusting her rumpled hair. "That is very
-strange."
-
-"No. I happen to know that this day, the eleventh of October, is always
-a sad anniversary for Tia Teresa--the death of some dear friend who
-lies buried in the little Mexican cemetery on the hill. She has always
-refused to tell me the story. But early this morning she went, as usual,
-to place flowers upon the grave."
-
-"Flowers--for a grave!" exclaimed Merle. She was thinking of the roses
-she had gathered that afternoon for Mr. Robles--for her father--because
-he specially wanted the most beautiful blooms. But she did not give her
-thought to Mrs. Darlington.
-
-"It is all so strange," continued Merle. Then her air of decisiveness
-returned. "I'll go and see if Tia Teresa is in her room."
-
-Mrs. Darlington was gravely perturbed at this persistency. Oh, if only
-the mysteries of the past could be left alone, the joys of the present
-accepted for themselves! Probing into trouble cannot but lead to further
-trouble--that, for her, had been the secret of contentment. But she was
-powerless to intervene. Merle had already departed on her mission of
-enquiry.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXVIII--Exit Leach Sharkey
-
-|THE ponies were jogging down the trail, Leach Sharkey uncomfortably
-lurching in his saddle when some sudden bend or dip was encountered,
-Dick Willoughby good-humoredly holding him on when such emergencies
-rendered the service advisable if an ignominious fall were to be
-avoided. There was a song of joy in Dick's heart--liberty was at hand;
-he was riding down from the hills to join his loved one again. But there
-was sullen brooding in the soul of the outwitted sleuth--growing more
-sullen with every mile traversed, with every kindness rendered, with the
-very realization of his own ridiculous predicament and the contrast of
-his companion's light-hearted happiness.
-
-At last they reached the foot of the trail, leading on to the road that
-crossed the plain. At the distance of a few miles the Rancho San Antonio
-showed amid its clustering shade and orchard trees.
-
-"Let us dismount for a bit," suggested Sharkey. "I feel all in--dead
-beat and tired."
-
-"But how will I get you on to your horse again?" replied Dick, a trifle
-dubiously.
-
-"Oh, we'll manage that. Please help me down." Dick sprang to the ground,
-dropped the reins over his pony's head, and soon had Leach Sharkey on
-_terra firma_.
-
-"You're no light weight to handle," he laughed. "By the way, Sharkey, I
-forgot to ask: Where's your boss this afternoon?"
-
-Sharkey eyed Dick curiously.
-
-"You don't know?"
-
-"Why should I know? It's quite a time since I met the gentleman."
-
-"You are aware who Pierre Luzon is?"
-
-"Certainly. Pierre has come to be quite a friend of mine. He's a good
-fellow all right." There was a moment's pause. Dick was rolling a
-cigarette, Sharkey furtively watching every expression on his face.
-
-"Well, the Frenchie played me a dirty trick when he threw that key
-away," remarked the sleuth, rattling, the handcuffs behind his back.
-
-"I guess Pierre was resolved to take no chances," replied Dick, grinning
-through the tobacco smoke as he surveyed the helpless bodyguard. "He
-only needed a pair of hobbles to complete the job."
-
-A muttered curse came from Sharkey's lips--but this was an aside. For
-Dick he had an insinuating smile.
-
-"You might get these blamed handcuffs off all right, Willoughby. Look
-at that big boulder there. If I set my hands across it, you might hammer
-through the chain. Or if you have a pistol, that might do the trick."
-
-"No, I've got no pistol," Dick replied.
-
-He did not notice the gleam of satisfaction in Sharkey's eyes--the
-wolfish smile at the corners of his wolf-like teeth. At the moment he
-was looking around for a convenient stone that might serve as a hammer.
-
-"But I think I might break that chain all right with this," he went on,
-as he stooped and picked up a heavy, sharp-edged fragment of granite
-from the rock-strewn ground. "Come along, then. Set your wrists just
-here. At least, we can try."
-
-The trial succeeded--the slender steel strain stretched across the
-boulder soon yielded to the succession of battering blows.
-
-Sharkey flung his great big brawny arms aloft. He was still wearing the
-bracelets, but his hands were free.
-
-"Feels better, don't it?" said Dick, with a sympathetic smile.
-
-"A damned sight better," roared the sleuth, as he turned quickly round.
-"Now, young man, you are my prisoner. I arrest you for jail-breaking.
-There's my star. I don't say hands up, for I know you haven't a gun."
-
-As he spoke, Sharkey opened his coat so that the official badge might be
-displayed.
-
-Dick in his amazement stepped back, just one pace. Sharkey advanced, his
-high hands outstretched.
-
-"Make no trouble, now. You know I am only doing my duty."
-
-"Duty be hanged," cried Dick, as with a swift uppercut he caught
-his would-be captor on the jaw. Sharkey staggered, and Dick, with a
-right-arm swing, banged him on the temple, bowling him over like a
-ninepin.
-
-Sharkey was soon on his hands and knees; then dazed and tottering, he
-got onto his feet again. But Dick was watchfully waiting, and with sharp
-jabs, right and left, sent him down once more. The sleuth lay motionless
-now.
-
-Like a flash Dick grabbed the riata hanging from the saddle-horn of his
-pony, and without a moment's loss of time had its coils around the arms
-and chest of the prostrate man, roping him like a thrown steer with all
-the skill of the trained cowboy. In a brief minute the knots were tied,
-and with the final clove-hitch the fallen Samson was turned over on his
-back. Sharkey's eyes opened, glaring dully at his conqueror.
-
-"You contemptible hound!" exclaimed Dick, as he tossed the loose end of
-the lariat from him. "By God, I've seen a few low-down things done in
-my lifetime, but this is certainly the limit. I suppose you would have
-betrayed me for the sake of the reward, even though you know now for
-certain that I was wrongfully arrested at the start. You damned Judas!
-You deserve to be hanged like a horse-thief, Leach Sharkey--that's about
-your proper finish."
-
-And Dick in his righteous indignation glanced around as if in search of
-a convenient tree for the operation.
-
-"I'll give no further trouble," mumbled Sharkey.
-
-"It will be my particular care that you don't," replied Dick. "Get
-up, you hulking brute." And grabbing the coils of the riata, he fairly
-lifted Sharkey to his feet.
-
-"Now, I wouldn't shame the pony by putting you on his back again. Follow
-me."
-
-Picking up the free end of the rope, and gathering the leading rein of
-Sharkey's horse into the same hand, Willoughby vaulted into his saddle.
-
-"Come along," he called out, turning round as the riata came taut. And
-thus, a dozen paces behind, the sleuth, discomfited again a second
-time that day, and humiliated worse than ever, followed perforce in his
-victor's trail.
-
-Perhaps half a mile of the open road was thus traversed, Dick speaking
-not another word, but looking round occasionally and giving an energetic
-yank at the rope whenever there was evidence of laggard steps. Sharkey
-stumbled along, his chin buried in his breast, his eyes half-closed to
-conceal their dumb, vicious glare of concentrated but impotent fury.
-
-They had now reached a gate; Dick dismounted and threw it open, pointing
-the way for Sharkey to take.
-
-"It's about five miles to the rancho," he said. "I don't know how you'll
-get through the other gates, but I reckon you can crawl under them, like
-the snake you've proved yourself to be. Now, off you go," and with
-the words he looped the loose end of the riata around the victim's
-shoulders. "That's a better necktie than you deserve, Leach Sharkey.
-If it was any one but myself, you would be helped to a start by a few
-vigorous kicks behind."
-
-The sleuth shambled through the gateway, with shamed, averted face. With
-a click the gate was closed. For just a few minutes Dick watched the
-figure moving away through the now gathering dusk. Then he laid a hand
-on his saddle-horn.
-
-"I hope it's the last I'll see of that animal," he murmured to himself,
-as he sprang lightly into the saddle. And at a canter he started along
-the road, the led pony, after a few heel-kicks as if in joy at being
-relieved of its burden, soon dropping into the swinging stride.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXXIX--The Fight on the Cliff
-
-|FOR a few moments Don Manuel contemplated the cowering figure of Ben
-Thurston in contemptuous silence. His end was accomplished; his enemy
-was in his power; like the cat with the mouse just a few inches from its
-paw, he could strike at any moment. He spoke now with measured calm.
-
-"Do you remember what day this is? The eleventh of October."
-
-He paused for a reply. Thurston's lips were parted but remained dumb.
-Don Manuel resumed:
-
-"Thirty years ago this very night--here at this very spot, you brutally
-killed my poor little sister, Rosetta."
-
-Thurston shrank back. His lips moved, but no sound came.
-
-"Oh, attempt no denial," continued Don Manuel, for the moment clenching
-a menacing fist over him. "You cannot forget the tell-tale button which
-you snatched from my hand to hide the proof. Nor have I forgotten the
-lash of your quirt that drew blood from my cheek"--and he wiped his face
-with the tips of his fingers as if to rub away the memory of the deadly
-insult--"the very day on which I buried my dear father and mother," he
-added, in a voice vibrant with emotion.
-
-He bowed his head; there was another brief period of silence. Then he
-recovered himself and went on:
-
-"The deaths of my beloved parents are just as much on your head, Ben
-Thurston, as the death of the guileless, innocent, young girl whom you
-betrayed, and then with coward hands pushed over this cliff, mangling
-her body on the rocks below. My vengeance has been slow in coming, but
-after all, I am glad of the delay. For all through these years you have
-not only suffered the agony of constant fear, but I have lived to see
-you landless, bereft of the broad rich acres which belonged to my father
-and were never rightfully yours."
-
-"That's not so--my claim was established in the law courts." Thurston
-managed to articulate the words. The sound of his voice seemed to
-restore some little measure of courage, for he sat up, and leaning an
-elbow on a rock, adjusted himself in a more comfortable position. But
-he did not seek to gain his feet--the bandit's figure still towered over
-him.
-
-"Law courts--your American law courts!" exclaimed Don Manuel, with
-ineffable scorn. "You know you bribed the judge who gave the decision.
-Dare you deny it?"
-
-Thurston ventured no denial--his dropped jaw proclaimed his
-consciousness of guilt.
-
-"Nothing was too base for you," Don Manuel proceeded. "You robbed,
-despoiled, destroyed my home. But now at last your hour has come.
-I have waited patiently for this hour. On many an occasion, Ben
-Thurston, I could have shot you dead from a distance. But I have
-waited--waited--waited for the time when you would know that it was I,
-the White Wolf, who was sending you to your doom just as I have already
-sent your ruffian son to his."
-
-"So it was really you--who murdered my boy?" stammered Thurston.
-
-"Don't call it murder--it was righteous retribution for both him and
-you. Oh, I can tell you something tonight, for a secret does not pass
-from a dead man's lips."
-
-The victim so confidently doomed, shuddered. Don Manuel continued:
-
-"Merle Farnsworth is my daughter; your vile and debauched son dared to
-insult her, and so he died--rightly died. Yes, at my hands--I take full
-responsibility. And I am glad to tell you this before you follow him out
-of the world. Tonight, Ben Thurston, you go over this cliff--you die the
-death you gave to my sister."
-
-As he spoke, Don Manuel cast loose his Spanish cloak, and dropped both
-it and his sombrero to the ground.
-
-Thurston at last staggered to his feet.
-
-"So get ready now to fight for your life," Don Manuel resumed, folding
-his arms across his breast as he surveyed his victim.
-
-"But I am unarmed," cried Thurston, pointing to the revolver at the
-other's belt. His outstretched hand trembled, his voice was a terrified
-shriek.
-
-"Then I, too, shall be unarmed," replied Don Manuel, as he unbuckled his
-belt and tossed it lightly from him. "Come along, then--it is man to
-man with naked hands." His tone now was one of concentrated passion and
-hate, and he advanced with arms extended for an enfolding embrace.
-
-Now did Ben Thurston realize that his only chance for life lay in his
-superior weight, possibly his superior strength. At the thought, craven
-fear changed of a sudden to the courage of desperation, and like a wild
-cat he leaped at the throat of his adversary.
-
-Then began a terrible struggle--two strong men writhing in each other's
-grip like savage beasts. Soon their clothes were torn, their bodies
-begrimed with sweat and mud, their faces and naked arms bespattered
-with blood, for Ben Thurston's nose had been broken in one of the first
-falls. Thurston, besides his extra pounds, had also the advantage of
-being younger by a few years. But Don Manuel was in better physical
-condition and his muscles were like bands of steel. So it was pretty
-much of a level match in this grim fight to the death.
-
-[Illustration: 0305]
-
-As they tugged at each other, as each attempted to bear the other down
-or trip and throw him, as at times, each tried in their locked embrace
-to crush in his adversary's ribs and squeeze the last breath out of his
-body, as they milled round and round, swayed and fell and rolled over
-and then for a moment regained a kneeling or an upright position--both
-men realized that it was the one who could last the longest with whom
-the mastery would rest.
-
-Pierre Luzon, running up the trail, came to the edge of the open space
-where the desperate contest was in progress. But the onlooker did
-not attempt to interfere--he had had his orders; he just crouched and
-watched the swaying, writhing figures.
-
-For an hour or more the fight proceeded, at times fast and furious,
-with breathing spells to follow, during which grips were tenaciously
-maintained. Points of advantage alternated now to the one side, now
-to the other, but after each succeeding tussle both combatants were
-exhausted without victory being pronounced for either. Every vestige
-of clothing above the belt line had long since been torn away, and they
-were sweating like lathered horses.
-
-The milling and wrestling had gradually grown weaker, and it was clear
-now that the final test of endurance could not be much longer delayed.
-Yet again Don Manuel renewed the attack, and had forced Thurston to his
-knees, when the latter by a supreme effort raised himself again, and
-then by sheer weight pressed his opponent back a pace or two. But just
-at this moment Thurston's strength seemed to give out, for he dropped
-down sideways, dragging his enemy after him.
-
-Then Pierre Luzon saw the object of the manoeuvre. Thurston had gained
-the spot where Don Manuel's discarded pistol belt was lying, and now he
-was reaching out with a disengaged hand to grab the gun.
-
-The Frenchman darted forward.
-
-"Keep out of this," cried Don Manuel, peremptorily, although he was
-breathing hard.
-
-"Look out! Your gun!" screamed Pierre, as he seized Thurston's wrist in
-a vice-like grip.
-
-Just an instant too late, however, for Thurston's fingers had already
-closed round the weapon and it went off with a bang.
-
-Pierre dropped to his knees. It was he who had received the
-bullet--through one of his lungs. But he had wrested the pistol from
-the treacherous villain's grasp and now it fell, still smoking, to the
-ground.
-
-The wounded man coughed a great mouthful of crimson blood on to the slab
-of rock. Then he recovered himself and raised his head. Thurston and
-Don Manuel, even in their weakened state, were fighting more desperately
-than ever, blinded by hate to every sense of danger, and Pierre was just
-in time to see them slip on some loosened stones and then, still locked
-in the death clench, go rolling over the edge of the precipice.
-
-"_Mon Dieu! Mon Dieu!_" murmured the Frenchman. He staggered to his feet
-and without waiting turned and started down the steep trail, stumbling
-like a drunken man.
-
-At the foot of the zig-zag pathway he gazed helplessly around. He would
-have pushed his way through the brushwood to seek his beloved chief.
-Dead! He must be dead. No one could have dropped that sheer three
-hundred feet onto the cruel jagged rocks below and live. Yet, who knows?
-A tree might have broken the fall--Don Manuel might still be alive.
-
-Pierre, however, was incapable of further effort. His limbs trembled
-beneath him, and again he was spitting blood.
-
-All of a sudden he spied the two horses tethered under the manzanita
-tree. He tottered toward them, untied the first one he reached, and with
-difficulty pulled himself up into the saddle.
-
-To reach Dick Willoughby and get help--that was the thought in the
-reeling brain of Pierre Luzon as with a final effort, leaning forward
-over the saddle, he turned his steed in the direction of Buck Ashley's
-old store, and urged it to a canter.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XL--Revelation
-
-|MERLE paused at the foot of the stairway leading up to one of the
-towers where Tia Teresa had her room. She deliberated for a moment,
-consulted the tiny watch on her wrist, then turned to retrace her
-footsteps.
-
-"There will be plenty of time," she murmured to herself. "I shall be
-best able to manage Tia Teresa when I know still more than I do now."
-She repaired to her own room and put on her automobile cloak, cap, and
-veil. Without telling anyone of her plan, she left the house, went to
-the garage, selected a runabout that was specially her own, and was soon
-speeding along the highway in the direction of the cluster of hills amid
-which the little Mexican cemetery was nestled.
-
-She had been there just once before, several years ago, and she knew
-that her machine would have no difficulty in ascending the trail. Within
-less than an hour, indeed, she was at her destination.
-
-In the grey evening twilight the place looked very dismal and desolate.
-The tiny adobe chapel in one corner was falling into ruins because of
-disuse and neglect. A tall rank growth of weeds overran most of the
-graves. But there were two that showed marks of loving attention, and
-toward these Merle advanced. Here she found the fresh wreaths around the
-headstones, and her own roses scattered on the turf.
-
-"Hermana"--she read the single word on the white marble cross adorned
-with spotless arum lilies. "Sister," Merle murmured, translating the
-word.
-
-Then she turned to the big gravestone close at hand, and moved the
-wreaths of red carnations so that she might read the words inscribed.
-From these she soon knew that this was the family burial place of the de
-Valencias--that here rested the former owners of the San Antonio Rancho,
-the beloved parents of two children, Manuel and Rosetta.
-
-"Manuel,"
-
-"Rosetta"--she repeated the names. The latter awakened no memory,
-but when she filled out the former to "Don Manuel de Valencia," she
-instantly recalled the old-time bandit of whom she had heard many a
-tale.
-
-"The White Wolf," she murmured eagerly.
-
-"Yes, yes. His father once owned the rancho, and that was the cause of
-the deadly feud--the Vendetta of the Hills. But I thought all that was
-forgotten. Yet here are the beautiful fresh flowers."
-
-Seating herself on a flat monument near by, Merle pondered, piecing
-things together. "Sister"--the cross must mark the grave of the girl
-Rosetta, and have been erected by her brother, Don Manuel. Then whose
-hand had strewn the roses? Mr. Robles! In a flash she knew that Mr.
-Robles was Don Manuel.
-
-And her father, too! The further thought came with such suddenness,
-with such absolute conviction of certainty, that for a moment she felt
-appalled. Her father the notorious robber chief, the desperado on whose
-head a price had been set, the outlaw who had defied the whole state
-of California to arrest him. Somehow she felt no shame--Don Manuel de
-Valencia had been a sort of heroic knight-errant in all the stories she
-had heard--his hand only against the rich, his heart always for the poor
-and oppressed, his attitude toward the intrusive gringos quite justified
-by the sharp practice whereby he had been robbed of his patrimonial
-acres. It was this very story of wrong which had been one of the reasons
-that had from the first predisposed the household at La Siesta to
-despise the Thurston family at the Rancho San Antonio.
-
-Then from thinking of Don Manuel, Merle's mind passed to Ricardo
-Robles--the courteous, dignified, generous, lovable man she had known
-all her life, the very man whom she had rejoiced that day to call her
-own father. Don Manuel could be judged only by this standard, and her
-heart went out again to Mr. Robles, whatever the name which he had
-formerly worn.
-
-The shadows were closing around her, the night air bit sharply, and
-Merle arose. Two or three of the rose blooms had fallen beyond the lines
-of white stones that marked the graves. Merle advanced, and picking
-these up gently, placed them on the breasts of the sleeping dead. Her
-own kith and kin! Now she realized how she came to have brown eyes and
-raven tresses--the blood of Spain was in her veins. With this thought
-throbbing in her heart, she left the cemetery and hurried away for home.
-
-Tia Teresa was the only Roman Catholic at La Siesta, a devout member
-of the faith of her fathers and of her childhood days with which no
-one around her had ever sought to interfere. Her room was her private
-chapel, a curtained recess at one end being fitted up with a crucifix, a
-small altar, and a _prie-dieu_.
-
-Here Tia Teresa was kneeling and praying, the only light in the
-apartment coming from the altar candles, when Merle softly tiptoed
-in, still wearing her automobile cloak. She hesitated to advance, and
-momentarily turned to withdraw. But Tia Teresa had seen her, and by a
-gesture had bidden her to remain. For a few moments the old duenna's
-lips continued to move, then she told another bead on her rosary, arose
-from her knees, crossed herself devoutly, and with a final prostration
-before the crucifix, terminated her devotional exercises.
-
-"What brought you here, my child?" she asked, approaching Merle.
-
-"Why are you engaged in prayer tonight?" asked Merle, answering question
-with question.
-
-"You know I often pray," replied Tia Teresa. "You have seen me many,
-many times."
-
-"Yes, but not at this hour, when you are always with my mother."
-
-"She will be wondering where I am. I had better go to her now."
-
-"No," rejoined Merle. "I wish to speak to you. Come here, Tia Teresa;
-sit down by my side, and treat me once again as the little girl of the
-long ago whom you used to pet and fondle."
-
-"That's very easily done," responded Tia Teresa, with a pleased smile,
-seating herself on the low sofa close to Merle. "Come to my heart, my
-darling, as in the long ago."
-
-And the duenna drew the girl to her loving, protecting bosom. She
-noticed now that Merle was trembling under the influence of some deep
-emotion.
-
-"What is wrong with you, my dear?" she asked anxiously.
-
-"I have learned many things today, Tia Teresa," replied Merle, taking
-her old nurse's hands and softly stroking them. "First, that Mr. Robles
-is my father"--the duenna started, but Merle went quietly on--"and that
-he is really Don Manuel de Valencia, the famous outlaw."
-
-"Whoever told you that?" fairly gasped Tia Teresa.
-
-"No one. I found everything out for myself. After I had looked into Mr.
-Robles' eyes at our parting this afternoon, I knew the truth. It was
-impossible for mother to deny it, but it is not she who has told me
-anything. I have just returned from the little Mexican cemetery on the
-hillside where Mr. Robles, my father, had taken the flowers for which he
-asked me."
-
-"And you saw his flowers--and my flowers, too?" faltered the duenna,
-realizing now how Merle had gleaned her knowledge.
-
-"Yes; I inferred that the wreaths were yours, and of course I knew that
-the scattered roses were from my father. He is Don Manuel. But I want
-you to tell me a little about Rosetta." It was Merle now who put her
-arms around Tia Teresa and drew her affectionately to her.
-
-"You have always loved me, you know, my dear," the girl went on
-coaxingly. "Now I understand why you were so deeply attached to Mr.
-Robles, for you told me once that you had nursed Don Manuel. And that is
-why I have been, perhaps, just a little closer to you than Grace"--the
-pressure of Tia Teresa's arms told that Merle had correctly
-divined--"because I was of the blood of your old master. But why has
-there been all this secrecy toward me?"
-
-"Don Manuel's name could not be revealed--he had been outlawed."
-
-"And Rosetta--tell me about Rosetta?"
-
-"She was the real cause of the feud between Mr. Thurston and Don
-Manuel."
-
-The duenna had spoken the words before she had realized how much they
-told. With unfaltering intuition Merle guessed their meaning.
-
-"You mean to tell me that Thurston wronged Rosetta--betrayed her?"
-
-Tia Teresa nodded assent--she was too deeply agitated to speak another
-word.
-
-"And this day--the eleventh of October--the day when you decorate her
-grave?" enquired Merle, in a tone and with a look that compelled an
-answer.
-
-"Is the day she was found dead on the rocks below Comanche Point,"
-replied Tia Teresa.
-
-At the same moment the duenna started to her feet. A wonderful and
-terrible transition came over her usually placid countenance. Her eyes
-fairly blazed with mingled fury and hatred. Her fists were clenched by
-her side. Her whole frame trembled.
-
-"Murdered by Ben Thurston!" she added, the words hissing like hot lava
-from her lips.
-
-"Murdered?" cried Merle, incredulously. She too, had risen.
-
-"Yes, pushed over the cliff by his coward hands. His torn coat, one of
-the buttons between her dead fingers, proclaimed his guilt before God
-and man. But there was no justice in the land in those days--the
-days when the gringos broke up our Spanish homes. Now you know
-everything--that was the real reason of the Vendetta of the Hills."
-
-Tia Teresa was calm again--it was Merle who was deeply agitated, too
-deeply agitated for a moment to speak.
-
-The duenna went on triumphantly. "But the vendetta once sworn will
-always be fulfilled. Tonight at Comanche Point--"
-
-Then she stopped short, as she saw the look of terror and horror on
-Merle's pale face.
-
-"Tonight?" queried the young girl tremulously. "They meet tonight? Then
-that is where Mr. Robles is going--that is why he bade us all that sad
-good-bye? My father, oh, my dear father!" And dropping down again on the
-sofa, she burst into a passion of weeping.
-
-Tia Teresa sought to soothe her. But Merle was not to be comforted.
-Yet while she sobbed she was thinking, for suddenly she rose again and
-dashed away her tears.
-
-"At what hour tonight?" she asked.
-
-"I do not know," answered the duenna.
-
-"Then he is in danger--perhaps at this very moment he is in danger. Don
-Manuel's life--my father's life is worth a hundred lives of such a man
-as Ben Thurston. Quick, quick, Teresa. Get your mantilla and cloak. My
-runabout is in readiness. There, let me help you."
-
-Merle was speaking with swift insistence.
-
-"Where are you going?" whispered Tia Teresa, as the girl's fingers were
-buttoning her cloak.
-
-"To Comanche Point. We may not be too late to save him."
-
-A minute later the two women had stolen down the narrow stairway of the
-tower and were speeding through the gathering darkness of the night.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XLI--Beneath the Precipice
-
-|WILLOUGHBY had found his friends Munson and Jack Rover at Buck Ashley's
-old store, eagerly awaiting his coming, with a fine supper sizzling on
-the cook stove, prepared in Jack's finest professional cowboy style.
-
-"We've got to feed you up a bit, I reckon," grinned Jack, as he slipped
-the Gargantuan slab of beef-steak from the griller on to the big hot
-dish waiting for its reception.
-
-"And some potatoes, too," he went on, "not forgetting the fried onions
-that beat all your newfangled sauces to a frazzle."
-
-Dick was nothing loth to fall to. He had been too excited to do more
-than taste the midday meal that Pierre Luzon had prepared for him in the
-cavern. It had been a long hard day, and now he was hungry as a wolf.
-In ordinary circumstances he had no objection to fried onions, but,
-with delicate regard for possible contingencies, he left to the others a
-monopoly over this item in the bill-of-fare.
-
-There were so many things to talk about that it was a difficult matter
-to know where to begin. But at the close of the meal Jack Rover solved
-the question by sweeping the supper things from the table, and emptying
-thereon the contents of one of the bags of gold.
-
-"Good old Guadalupe!" exclaimed the delighted cowboy, as he patted the
-nuggets with a loving hand. "I always told you that the ancient squaw
-had a real gold mine. I guess we'll be able to stake out our claims
-tomorrow, eh, Dick, my boy?"
-
-"I'm afraid not," smiled Willoughby. "The fact is that, although I
-helped to wash out that gold, I have not the faintest idea where the
-riffle is up among the hills."
-
-Jack's face fell. There was a moment of disappointed silence, and just
-then there came the sound of a faint tapping at the outer door.
-
-"What's that?" asked Munson. The faces of all three showed that they had
-heard simultaneously.
-
-Dick rose, crossed over, and threw the door wide open.
-
-"My God, who's this?" he asked, as he stooped over the figure lying
-prone across the steps. "Pierre, Pierre!" he added, as he turned over
-the face. "It's Pierre Luzon, boys, and desperately wounded!"
-
-The others were pressed together in the doorway.
-
-"Looks as if he had crawled here on his hands and knees," remarked
-Munson.
-
-"There's his horse out among the chaparral," exclaimed Jack, pointing to
-the shadowy form of the animal from which the wounded man had obviously
-tumbled.
-
-"Stand clear," cried Dick, gathering up Pierre in his arms. "He has
-fainted, but is still alive."
-
-And Dick, carrying the senseless form, passed into the bedroom beyond
-the living room, and there laid poor old Pierre on the very cot which
-he had occupied once before--on the eventful night when Tom Baker had
-brought the paroled convict from San Quentin.
-
-A few drops of whisky brought the wounded man back to consciousness.
-Dick leaned over him and caught the faintly whispered words. Pi�rre was
-speaking in the French of his childhood days.
-
-"He is dead--he is dead! At last Rosetta is avenged!"
-
-Dick motioned his companions to silence. He bent down close to the dying
-bandit.
-
-"Who is dead, Pierre? Ben Thurston?"
-
-"Yes, yes. Ben Thurston. Glory be to God! Don Manuel is avenged!"
-
-"And how did you come to be shot, Pierre? Where is Don Manuel?"
-
-"Dead--dead, too!" The wounded man this time cried out the words and
-struggled to sit up. His eyes opened wide, and fastened themselves on
-Dick. His voice again dropped to a whisper; he was speaking lucidly now.
-"But perhaps he lives. Who knows? Go and save him, Dick--Don Manuel--go,
-go."
-
-Exhausted, Pierre sank back on the pillow. His eyes closed. The death
-rattle was in his throat. "Where is he--where shall I find Don Manuel?"
-Dick uttered the words close to Pierre's ear. He alone caught the faint
-answer. Pierre Luzon was dead.
-
-"He's gone, Chester," said Dick, standing erect. Munson stooped, put his
-ear to Pierre's breast, then pressed apart one pair of the eyelids.
-
-"Yes, it's all over," he said solemnly, as he folded the coverlet over
-the already marble-like face.
-
-In stricken silence the three men passed to the outer room, shutting the
-door softly behind them.
-
-"What's happened?" asked Jack Rover, "I couldn't catch his bloomin'
-lingo."
-
-"Something terrible. There has evidently been a fight to the death on
-Comanche Point between Ben Thurston and Don Manuel. Looks as if both of
-them had gone over the cliff in the struggle."
-
-"Gee!" muttered the cowboy.
-
-Dick remained just a moment in deep thought. His plan of action was
-promptly decided on.
-
-"Munson, old man, you saddle my pony, and ride to Tejon for help. Jack,
-you remain here with the body."
-
-"And with the nuggets," remarked the cowboy drily.
-
-Dick paid no heed to the interruption. He continued:
-
-"I'll take the horse outside, and ride back to Comanche Point. That's
-the best we can do, and the main thing is to do it quickly. Pass me that
-flask of whisky--it may come in handy. I'm off now, boys. You'll find me
-at the cliff. Bring a doctor, Ches. So long!"
-
-The moon had now risen, and while Dick was galloping toward Comanche
-Point from the one direction, the runabout, with Merle at the wheel and
-Tia Teresa by her side, was speeding from the other end of the valley
-toward the same destination. The horseman was the first to arrive.
-
-Willoughby had no need to search long beneath the precipice. A loud,
-continuous cry of lamentation guided him to the spot. There, wailing
-over the corpse of Don Manuel, was the old Indian squaw, Guadalupe. Even
-in death the two bodies were locked in each other's embrace, and Dick
-noted with horror that Ben Thurston's teeth were buried in the flesh of
-his enemy's shoulder. Guadalupe was in the act of trying to separate the
-dead men when Dick intervened.
-
-Great heavens, what a withered, aged face was raised toward his own!
-It was the first time he had ever seen Guadalupe unveiled and at close
-quarters. Her cheeks were wrinkled into a hundred folds; her eyes were
-sunken in deep cavernous hollows. When he touched her, she rose and,
-jabbering furiously for all the world like an angry ape, reviled him
-with curses, her meaning unmistakable, although she spoke in some
-strange Indian tongue.
-
-Just then Dick caught the distant chug-chug of the automobile. He looked
-up the valley, wondering who might be passing at that hour of night.
-This was not the main highway; nobody ever came to Comanche Point after
-dark. Some intervening spur of the foothills dulled the sound; all was
-still and silent.
-
-He became conscious that Guadalupe's fury had spent itself, and turned
-round. The squaw was gone. His eyes searched the scrub; at one place he
-saw the twigs bending, and he even fancied he could detect the outline
-of the white wolf gliding away through the brushwood. But that was all.
-
-Again the sound of the automobile smote his ears; louder now, and only a
-few hundred yards away he beheld the headlights sweeping toward the spot
-where he stood. He resolved to intercept the vehicle and stepped across
-the belt of chaparral that intervened between him and the roadway.
-Gaining the thoroughfare, he called aloud and the machine slowed down.
-
-But what was his utter amazement when Merle jumped' from the runabout.
-To her there could be no more surprises on this night of surprises.
-
-"Dick," she exclaimed, as she accepted his embrace almost as a matter of
-course.
-
-"How do you come to be here, Merle, my darling?" he asked, holding her
-in his arms.
-
-"Something terrible is going to happen. I have come to try to prevent
-it. Have you seen Don Manuel?"
-
-"Don Manuel!" He repeated the name in great surprise.
-
-"Mr. Robles is Don Manuel," she gasped by way of explanation.
-
-"I am aware. He told me so today."
-
-"Well, where is he now? And his enemy, Mr. Thurston?"
-
-Dick still had an arm on her shoulder. She was gazing up into his face,
-her voice trembling with emotion as she breathlessly plied him with her
-questions.
-
-"You have come too late, dearest," Willoughby gently replied.
-
-"Dead!" she exclaimed.
-
-"Both are dead. They fought and rolled over the precipice. I have just
-found their bodies lying in the chaparral back there."
-
-Merle leaned forward, sobbing on his breast.
-
-"Take me to him, take me to him," she cried.
-
-"No, Merle, my dear. It is better not. You must go home. Tia Teresa,"
-he added, addressing the duenna who had drawn near, "she must go home.
-Munson has gone to Tejon for help. There will be people arriving here
-very soon now."
-
-"He is really dead--Don Manuel?" asked Tia Teresa in a voice of awed
-sadness.
-
-"There can be nothing but the one answer," replied Dick. "Don Manuel has
-passed on."
-
-"Take me to him," moaned Merle.
-
-"No, no, Merle. This is no sight for you."
-
-"But, Dick, Dick, don't you know one other thing?" she pleaded, raising
-her tearful eyes.
-
-"What other thing?"
-
-"Don Manuel--was my father--my dear, dear father."
-
-Again Willoughby was overwhelmed with amazement.
-
-"Your father?" he murmured.
-
-"Yes, I only came to know it today. So, Dick, dear, even though he is
-dead, let me kiss him now, let me kneel by his side and tell him that I
-loved him, and will always love and revere his memory. Let me watch by
-him until the others come."
-
-Dick drew the sobbing girl close to him. His eyes sought those of Tia
-Teresa. He shook his head, telling the duenna in an unmistakable way
-that Merle must be taken home--that she must not be shocked by the
-gruesome spectacle hidden in the chaparral.
-
-Even as their eyes met, the faint throb of an automobile was heard, and
-glancing across the plain Dick saw the far-away headlights twinkling
-like twin stars. With a gesture he directed Tia Teresa's attention to
-the coming help.
-
-"I shall watch by our beloved dead one," said the duenna. "My place is
-by his side. Come, dearie," she went on, placing an arm around Merle's
-waist. "Mr. Willoughby will drive you back to La Siesta, and I shall
-see that your father's body is taken to his home. There we shall pay all
-honor to the dead."
-
-Together they led Merle, unresisting now, to the runabout. Dick got in
-beside her, and took the wheel.
-
-"They will be here very soon now," he said to Tia Teresa. "Mr. Munson
-will give you all the help you require. I'll look after Merle." He
-backed the machine, turned, and the little red light swept up the
-roadway into the distance. From across the valley the headlights of
-a big automobile were now glaring like flashing suns in the soft
-moonlight.
-
-It was the hands of Tia Teresa that separated the bodies. That of Ben
-Thurston she flung from her as if it had been carrion for the buzzards
-and coyotes. Then she knelt down and stroked with loving hand the brow
-of Don Manuel. On the dead face was a look of ineffable calm.
-
-"Manuel, my Manuel, the little child I nursed! My beautiful, brave
-Manuel!"
-
-Thus lamenting, she awaited the coming of Munson and his friends.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XLII--Wedding Bells
-
-|A FULL year had passed, and the good people of Tejon had at last
-ceased to speak daily about Dick Willoughby's exciting adventures, Ben
-Thurston's inglorious death, and the romantic and now indubitable ending
-of the famous outlaw, Don Manuel.
-
-Both the victims of the desperate fight on Comanche Point had been laid
-to rest--Don Manuel, in the little Mission churchyard above the hill,
-side by side with the beloved sister of his youthful days, whose
-betrayal and death he had at last avenged, although at the cost of his
-own life; Ben Thurston, in the modern cemetery beside his son, the poor
-weak youth in whom the once sturdy family of pioneers had sunk to final
-decadency. Pierre Luzon, the brave and chivalrous old Frenchman, slept
-near the grave of the chief he had served so loyally, and, according to
-the old-time bandit code of ethics, so nobly and so well. In the God's
-acres where all feuds pass to oblivion there was perfect peace.
-
-Sing Ling had unobtrusively departed for China, a wealthy man, as the
-bank manager at Bakersfield could have told, no doubt destined to become
-a leading magnate in the Flowery Land. Guadalupe was never seen again;
-the aged squaw had probably died in her secret cave. The white wolf,
-too, had perished; a cowboy riding the range had been attracted by some
-buzzards flying and circling round and round far up on the mountain
-side, and on making his way to the indicated spot, had found the
-animal's carcass picked almost to the bones. The old days were forever
-gone.
-
-But in the beautiful city of Tejon a glorious era of happiness was in
-progress. Christmas-tide had come round again, and had been made gay
-with a tournament of roses, and then with the dawning of the New Year
-had followed a round of festivities in honor of the double wedding
-of Dick Willoughby and Merle Farnsworth, Chester Munson and Grace
-Darlington.
-
-In no place was there more sincere and hilarious rejoicing than in the
-back parlor of Buck Ashley's fine new store, where the mystery keg,
-sacredly reserved for this great occasion, was once more on tap and the
-postmaster, assisted by Tom Baker and Jack Rover, dispensed hospitality
-to a few chosen friends. But all good things come to an end, and it was
-with a regretful sigh that the sheriff squeezed out the last few drops
-from the tilted keg and sipped for the last time "the blessed nectar"
-that had served to keep green the memory of "dear old Pierre."
-
-The marriage ceremonies had been performed in a fine little church that
-sheltered all denominations in the new town, and amidst a shower of rice
-and old shoes the happy couples had departed for the wedding breakfast
-at La Siesta.
-
-To Merle the day was one of blissful joy, but of tender regrets as well.
-During the quiet afternoon hours she and Dick had conversed about their
-dear old friend, Mr. Robles--the gallant and chivalrous Don Manuel--the
-beloved father whose identity as such was known only to their own two
-selves besides Mrs. Darlington and Tia Teresa.
-
-And now the hour of departure on the honeymoon trail had come. The
-idea of a trip to Europe had been abandoned for the present. The young
-couples were going up among the Canadian Rockies, by divergent routes
-which would meet a little later on, and all were full of enthusiasm at
-the thought of seeing the mighty mountains in their wintry grandeur.
-
-Mrs. Darlington accompanied the young people to the railway station,
-but Tia Teresa was too deeply affected to trust herself away from home.
-Merle had kissed her a tender good-bye in the apartment in the tower,
-and, despite the joyful promise that they would soon meet again, had
-left the old duenna in prayerful tears before her little altar.
-
-At last they were pulling out from the depot, where the church crowd
-of the morning had reassembled in full force, with fresh supplies of
-good-luck munitions.
-
-[Illustration: 0371]
-
-Thus, like a disbanding company of players, the actors in this tale of
-California, pass into history. The olden days of bandits are no more,
-while the hatred of the gringo is only a tradition. The broad acres of
-the San Antonio Rancho no longer lie comparatively fallow in Nature's
-pasture, but are tilled by the thrifty plowman as he labors afield with
-fullest confidence of a bountiful reward. Meanwhile, the mountains
-that look down upon the beauteous valley guard their secret well. But
-searching eyes will yet, undoubtedly, sometime, somewhere, rediscover
-the mysterious cavern with its hoarded millions of loot, stored by the
-rapacious hands of Joaquin Murietta, the White Wolf, and their brigand
-bands, its lake of oil from which outlaws fed their lamps, and its
-subterranean river from whose shallow riffles Guadalupe, and Dick
-Willoughby also, gathered a wealth of golden spoil.
-
-THE END
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-End of Project Gutenberg's A Vendetta of the Hills, by Willis George Emerson
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-    <title>
-      A Vendetta of the Hills, by Willis George Emerson
-    </title>
-    <link rel="coverpage" href="images/cover.jpg" />
-    <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve">
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-    body { margin:5%; background:#faebd0; text-align:justify}
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-<pre>
-
-Project Gutenberg's A Vendetta of the Hills, by Willis George Emerson
-
-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most
-other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
-whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of
-the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at
-www.gutenberg.org.  If you are not located in the United States, you'll have
-to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook.
-
-
-
-Title: A Vendetta of the Hills
-
-Author: Willis George Emerson
-
-Illustrator: A. Hutchins
-
-Release Date: June 9, 2016 [EBook #52289]
-Last Updated: August 2, 2016
-
-Language: English
-
-Character set encoding: UTF-8
-
-*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A VENDETTA OF THE HILLS ***
-
-
-
-
-Produced by David Widger from page images generously
-provided by the Internet Archive
-
-
-
-
-
-
-</pre>
-
-    <div style="height: 8em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h1>
-      A VENDETTA OF THE HILLS
-    </h1>
-    <h2>
-      By Willis George Emerson
-    </h2>
-    <h4>
-      Author of &ldquo;The Treasure of Hidden Valley,&rdquo; &ldquo;Buell Hampton,&rdquo; &ldquo;The
-      Builders,&rdquo; etc.
-    </h4>
-    <h3>
-      Illustrated by A. Hutchins
-    </h3>
-    <h5>
-      Boston: The Chappie Publishing Company, Ltd.
-    </h5>
-    <h3>
-      1917
-    </h3>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0001" id="linkimage-0001"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
-      <img src="images/0001.jpg" alt="0001 " width="100%" /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h5>
-      <a href="images/0001.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
-    </h5>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0002" id="linkimage-0002"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
-      <img src="images/0006.jpg" alt="0006 " width="100%" /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h5>
-      <a href="images/0006.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
-    </h5>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0003" id="linkimage-0003"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
-      <img src="images/0007.jpg" alt="0007 " width="100%" /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h5>
-      <a href="images/0007.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
-    </h5>
-    <h3>
-      TO MY WIFE
-    </h3>
-    <h3>
-      BONNIE O&rsquo;NEAL EMERSON
-    </h3>
-    <p>
-      Our enchanting years of pleasure, dear, are speeding all too fast,
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      As our ever-fleeting joys become blest mem&rsquo;ries of the past.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Heaven&rsquo;s blessings, glad and golden, strew with bliss the paths of life
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      When a sweetheart, fond and cheery,
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Has her &ldquo;hubby&rdquo; for her dearie,
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And her &ldquo;hubby&rdquo; has a sweetheart for his wife.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &mdash;The Author.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      January 18, 1917.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <b>CONTENTS</b>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0001"> CHAPTER I&mdash;Guadalupe </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0002"> CHAPTER II&mdash;Charmed Lives </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0003"> CHAPTER III&mdash;Feminine Attractions </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0004"> CHAPTER IV&mdash;Back to the Soil </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0005"> CHAPTER V&mdash;At La Siesta </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0006"> CHAPTER VI&mdash;The Quarrel </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0007"> CHAPTER VII&mdash;Old Bandit Days </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0008"> CHAPTER VIII&mdash;A Letter from San Quentin </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0009"> CHAPTER IX&mdash;Tia Teresa </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0010"> CHAPTER X&mdash;The Home of the Recluse </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0011"> CHAPTER XI&mdash;A Rejected Suitor </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0012"> CHAPTER XII&mdash;The Sped Bullet </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0013"> CHAPTER XIII&mdash;Accused </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0014"> CHAPTER XIV&mdash;Entanglements </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0015"> CHAPTER XV&mdash;Behind the Bars </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0016"> CHAPTER XVI&mdash;Pierre Luzon Returns </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0017"> CHAPTER XVII&mdash;The Bitter Bit </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0018"> CHAPTER XVIII&mdash;Elusive Riches </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0019"> CHAPTER XIX&mdash;The Jail Delivery </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0020"> CHAPTER XX&mdash;In the Cavern </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0021"> CHAPTER XXI&mdash;A Debt of Honor </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0022"> CHAPTER XXII&mdash;Underqround Wonders </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0023"> CHAPTER XXIII&mdash;The Unexpected Visitor </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0024"> CHAPTER XXIV&mdash;In a Tight Corner </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0025"> CHAPTER XXV&mdash;Love and Revenge </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0026"> CHAPTER XXVI&mdash;A Date is Fixed </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0027"> CHAPTER XXVII&mdash;Among the Old Oaks </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0028"> CHAPTER XXVIII&mdash;The Prize Winner </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0029"> CHAPTER XXIX&mdash;-The Rendezvous </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0030"> CHAPTER XXX&mdash;Don Manuel Appears </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0031"> CHAPTER XXXI&mdash;Shadows of the Past </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0032"> CHAPTER XXXII&mdash;Forebodings </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0033"> CHAPTER XXXIII&mdash;Old Friends </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0034"> CHAPTER XXXIV&mdash;Heart Searchings </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0035"> CHAPTER XXXV&mdash;At Comanche Point </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0036"> CHAPTER XXXVI&mdash;-Outwitted </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0037"> CHAPTER XXXVII&mdash;The Dawn of Comprehension
-      </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0038"> CHAPTER XXXVIII&mdash;Exit Leach Sharkey </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0039"> CHAPTER XXXIX&mdash;The Fight on the Cliff </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0040"> CHAPTER XL&mdash;Revelation </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0041"> CHAPTER XLI&mdash;Beneath the Precipice </a>
-    </p>
-    <p class="toc">
-      <a href="#link2HCH0042"> CHAPTER XLII&mdash;Wedding Bells </a>
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0001" id="link2HCH0001"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER I&mdash;Guadalupe
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>T was a June
-      morning in mid-California. The sun was just rising over the rim of the
-      horizon, dissipating the purple haze of dawn and bathing in golden
-      sunshine a great valley spread out like a parchment scroll. It was a rural
-      scene of magnificent grandeur&mdash;encircling mountains, rolling
-      foothills, and then the vast expanse of plain dotted here and there with
-      clumps of trees and clothed with luxuriant grasses.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Thousands of cattle were bestirring themselves from their slumbers&mdash;some
-      sniffing the air and bellowing lowly, others paving the earth in an
-      indifferent way, and all moving slowly toward one or other of the mountain
-      streams that wound serpent-like through the valley, as if they deemed it
-      proper to begin the day with a morning libation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      To the south, commanding a narrow pass that pierced the Tehachapi mountain
-      range, stood old Fort Tejon, dismantled now and partly in ruins,
-      picturesque if no longer formidable&mdash;a romantic relic of old frontier
-      fighting days. In the foreground of the crumbling adobe walls, sheltered
-      under giant oaks, was a trading store and postoffice combined.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Within this building half a dozen men were in earnest conversation,
-      swapping yarns even at that early hour. Perhaps they, too, like the
-      cattle, had felt the call for their &ldquo;morning&rsquo;s morning.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      A young army officer, Lieutenant Chester Munson, was telling of a rough
-      experience he had had a few days before with a mountain lion in one of the
-      near-by rugged canyons.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The story was interrupted by a sound of galloping hoofs.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Here&rsquo;s Dick Willoughby,&rdquo; someone announced.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The rider brought his mustang to a panting stop, threw the bridle rein
-      over its head, and, leaping lightly from his saddle, entered the store.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick Willoughby was a tall, athletic, square-jawed, grey-eyed young fellow
-      who looked determinedly purposeful. He was originally an architect from
-      New York City, but during the last five years had become an adopted son of
-      the West&mdash;had made the sacrifice, or rather gone through the
-      improving metamorphosis, of assimilation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good morning, Ches, old boy,&rdquo; he shouted to the lieutenant.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The latter returned the salutation with a friendly nod.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The camp was lonely without you last night, Dick,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Who is the
-      fair senorita that keeps you away?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s all right,&rdquo; replied Willoughby, smiling. &ldquo;I will tell you later.&rdquo;
-       Then after a genial allround greeting for the others present, he eagerly
-      exclaimed: &ldquo;Boys, she is coming.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What! Guadalupe?&rdquo; shouted everyone in chorus of surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, Guadalupe is headed this way. I spied her on the mountain trail an
-      hour ago, and thanks to my field glasses, was able to determine the moving
-      speck was none other than the old squaw herself. She is just beyond yon
-      clump of trees and will be here shortly.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I am wonderin&rsquo; if she&rsquo;s got her apron filled again with them there gold
-      nuggets,&rdquo; remarked Tom Baker inquiringly, while a smile flitted over his
-      grey-bearded countenance. &ldquo;That squaw is a regular free-gold placer
-      proposition.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;She would have been held up before now in the old days, eh, sheriff?&rdquo;
-       laughed one of the cowboys. Tom Baker had been sheriff for a long term of
-      years in early times, and, although no longer in office, the title had
-      still clung to him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;By gad!&rdquo; exclaimed Jack Rover, another cowboy, and a gentlemanly young
-      fellow in manner and appearance. &ldquo;She&rsquo;s not going to get back to her
-      hiding-place this time, nor to that will-o&rsquo;-the-wisp placer gold mine of
-      hers unless she shows me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That will do for you,&rdquo; said Dick Willoughby with an admonishing look.
-      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t you forget that Guadalupe, although an old Indian squaw, is also a
-      human being. There is going to be no violence if I can prevent it.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; laughed Jack, pushing his hat back as if to acknowledge that he
-      had been checkmated, &ldquo;you&rsquo;re my boss on the cattle ranch, and I&rsquo;ll have to
-      take your tip, I guess.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I say, Dick,&rdquo; asked the other cowboy, &ldquo;did you see anything of the white
-      wolf?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Do you mean the real wolf?&rdquo; interjected Jack Rover, &ldquo;or the bandit, Don
-      Manuel?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Willoughby was looking along the road and took no notice.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I guess both are real,&rdquo; mused Tom Baker, grimly smiling, and a general
-      laugh followed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, I for one will subscribe to that,&rdquo; exclaimed Buck Ashley,
-      storekeeper, postmaster, bartender, and all-round <i>generalissimo</i> of
-      the trading establishment. &ldquo;If Don Manuel is not a wolf in human form, and
-      a bigger outlaw than Joaquin Murietta ever thought of being, why you may
-      take my head for a football.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But he&rsquo;s dead, ain&rsquo;t he?&rdquo; asked the cowboy who had introduced the subject
-      of the white wolf.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Just one thing that I want to emphasize good and plenty to you fellers,&rdquo;
-       said Tom Baker, &ldquo;and that is&mdash;&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Here she comes!&rdquo; interrupted Dick Willoughby.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      A hush fell over the group as the bent, aged figure of an Indian woman was
-      seen approaching the store. Her features were hidden by a shawl that
-      closely muffled her head and shoulders.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck Ashley saluted Guadalupe with a &ldquo;How?&rdquo; The squaw answered with the
-      same abrupt salutation, shuffled up to the counter and said brokenly,
-      &ldquo;Coffee&mdash;sugar&mdash;tea&mdash;rice.&rdquo; With her left hand she had
-      gathered up the lower portion of her calico apron and held it pouch
-      fashion. She thrust her right hand into the pocket so formed, and bringing
-      forth a handful of gold nuggets, laid them on the counter. Some were the
-      size of peas, and others as large as hulled hickory nuts. Not a word was
-      spoken by the onlookers, who were wild-eyed in their astonishment. Soon
-      interest rose to high tension.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck Ashley tied up a large package of sugar and pushed it toward the bent
-      form of his customer; then resting his hand on the counter, he looked
-      fixedly at the squaw and said, &ldquo;More gold.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Again she thrust her hand into the apron pocket and brought out another
-      handful of nuggets, whereupon Ashley proceeded to tie up a large package
-      of coffee. This done, he repeated the request for more gold. Old Guadalupe
-      added another handful of nuggets to those already on the counter, and
-      Ashley tied up a package of rice.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The squaw looked up at the storekeeper for a moment and then said, &ldquo;Tea.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck Ashley&rsquo;s laconic response was &ldquo;More gold,&rdquo; and immediately another
-      handful of nuggets was brought forth, whereupon a fourth package was
-      deposited on the counter.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Old Guadalupe stowed the parcels in her apron on top of any remaining gold
-      nuggets she might have brought. Then she turned and walked limpingly away,
-      through the low brushwood toward a little grove of gnarled and twisted
-      sycamores close to the ruined fort.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      When she had gone Buck Ashley observed, &ldquo;No use following her&mdash;not a
-      damn bit of use in the world! She&rsquo;ll make camp out there under the trees
-      until some time tonight, and then vanish like a shadow into the dark.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      While speaking, Ashley had been gathering up the gold.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I say, Buck,&rdquo; observed Dick Willoughby, winking at his friend Lieutenant
-      Munson, &ldquo;it is my private opinion that that bandit, the White Wolf, has
-      nothing on you.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Tom Baker laughingly chimed in: &ldquo;If I am any judge, and I allow as how I
-      am, Buck here would make that pound-of-flesh Shylock feller look like
-      thirty cents Mex.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Ashley smiled greedily, but in a satisfied way, as he said with unruffled
-      calm: &ldquo;Guess I&rsquo;d better weigh them nuggets and see how much the old
-      squaw&rsquo;s groceries cost her.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The treacherous Indian and the honest paleface,&rdquo; laughed Dick Willoughby
-      in a half-rebuking tone.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck Ashley bridled up. His voice rang with deep feeling.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Boys,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;you think I&rsquo;m a Shylock, a robber, a devil I expect, and
-      everything that&rsquo;s bad. I don&rsquo;t talk much about myself, but just so you&rsquo;ll
-      not think too blamed hard of me, I&rsquo;ll ask you a question. Supposen when
-      you was only about fifteen years old, you stood by, tied hand and foot,
-      and saw a lot of redskins scalp and kill your father and mother and two
-      little sisters, and then rob your dead father of over ten thousand dollars
-      in gold, run off the family stock, and take you to their camp to burn at
-      the stake as a sort of incidental diversion at one of their pow-wow
-      dances; and supposen you performed a miracle and got away and took an oath
-      to kill and rob every derned Indian you might see throughout the remaining
-      days of your life&mdash;what, then, if I reformed and gave up the kilin&rsquo;
-      and stuck to robbin&rsquo;, would you blame me?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      During this tragic recital of his wrongs the old storekeeper had become
-      noticeably excited.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick Willoughby got up from the cracker-box where he had been resting, and
-      advancing with hand extended, said: &ldquo;Buck, what you have told us presents
-      the whole matter in a new light. Shake!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Thanks,&rdquo; replied the storekeeper as he turned away to wipe a mist from
-      his eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Then quickly facing about, he called out in his usual gruff, hale and
-      hearty manner: &ldquo;Say, boys, what&rsquo;ll you all have? This round is on the
-      house.&rdquo; They drank in silence. A fragment of Buck Ashley&rsquo;s history had
-      cleared away a good deal of previous misunderstanding.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0002" id="link2HCH0002"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER II&mdash;Charmed Lives
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>HE spell of
-      restraint that resulted from Buck Ashley&rsquo;s story was at last broken by the
-      cowboy, Jack Rover.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Look here, Dick,&rdquo; he exclaimed, &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll give a month&rsquo;s salary if you will
-      let me take a chance and follow old Guadalupe. I&rsquo;ve simply got to find out
-      and locate that sand-bar in some mountain stream from which she brings in
-      all this gold. This is the third time I&rsquo;ve seen our friend Buck Ashley
-      collect a grocery bill from the old squaw, and the whole business, gold
-      nuggets and all, is getting on my nerves. Why, I dreamed about it for a
-      week last time I saw her forking out whole handfuls of gold.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Very well,&rdquo; replied Willoughby, &ldquo;if you want to take the chance, Jack, go
-      ahead. But it is a mad project which will end in my expressing your
-      remains back East or else planting you in the cemetery on the hill. It&rsquo;s
-      up to you to make your choice before you tackle the job. You certainly
-      know what happened to four or five others who attempted to follow the old
-      squaw. Each mother&rsquo;s son of them was buried the next day.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, that&rsquo;s ancient history,&rdquo; Jack retorted.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not such very ancient hist&rsquo;ry,&rdquo; remarked Tom Baker. &ldquo;I myself saw young
-      Bill McNab drilled through the heart with a bullet that seemed to come
-      from nowhere. After that I&rsquo;ll allow I wasn&rsquo;t filled up with too much
-      curiosity as to where Guadalupe hiked over the mountains.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;There was a regular sharp-shootin&rsquo; outfit,&rdquo; concurred Buck Ashley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And there wasn&rsquo;t a sheriff in the country would have led a posse into
-      that damned ambush,&rdquo; Tom went on. &ldquo;There wasn&rsquo;t a sportin&rsquo; chance along
-      that narrow ledge round which Guadalupe always disappeared. And with all
-      them outlaws in the mountains!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But the outlaws have been wiped out years ago,&rdquo; persisted Jack Rover.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mebbe,&rdquo; said Tom Baker, sententiously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You forget the White Wolf,&rdquo; added Buck Ashley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Which white wolf?&rdquo; asked Jack. &ldquo;I put that question before but got no
-      answer.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Both,&rdquo; replied Tom. &ldquo;To begin with I don&rsquo;t believe that Don Manuel is
-      dead at all. That was only a newspaper story. You may take it from me that
-      the bandit won&rsquo;t pass in his checks till he gets old Ben Thurston. I&rsquo;m
-      allowin&rsquo; as how Ben Thurston would quick enough give a thousand head of
-      his fattest beeves just to rest easy in his mind on that score. He&rsquo;ll find
-      out, sure enough, some day.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, when the White Wolf finds him,&rdquo; interjected the storekeeper with a
-      terse emphasis.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What&rsquo;s that old feud anyway?&rdquo; queried Lieutenant Munson. &ldquo;Tell me, Tom.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, it is an old story,&rdquo; the sheriff answered. &ldquo;I thought everybody knew
-      about it, but of course you&rsquo;re a newcomer. Well, you see,&rdquo; he continued,
-      clearing his throat and expectorating a copious and accurately aimed
-      pit-tew of tobacco juice toward a knot-hole in the floor, &ldquo;the White
-      Wolf&rsquo;s father, Don Antonio de Valencia, a reg&rsquo;lar high-toned grandee from
-      Spain, had settled in these here parts away back longer than anyone could
-      remember. He claimed this whole stretch of country from horizon to
-      horizon. Then came the Americans, among them a government surveyor named
-      Thurston. He had a pull at Washington and managed to get a legal grant to
-      the San Antonio property. Of course the old Spaniard had no real title&mdash;his
-      was just a sort of squatter&rsquo;s claim. But they do say as how he had lived
-      in this here valley more than half a century, so it was mighty hard luck
-      to lose the land. And the boy Manuel never would admit the Thurstons had
-      any right to call it theirs.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don Manuel had a younger sister,&rdquo; interposed Buck Ashley. &ldquo;Rosetta, a
-      beautiful girl&mdash;looked like a morning-glory. Gad! but she sure had a
-      purty face. You remember, Tom, don&rsquo;t you?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, yes,&rdquo; replied Tom Baker, &ldquo;it&rsquo;s not likely I should forget the poor
-      girl. It was &lsquo;cause of her the quarrel became a bitter blood feud&mdash;the
-      Vendetta of the Hills, as we got to calling it. You see,&rdquo; he went on,
-      resuming the thread of his story, &ldquo;old man Thurston&rsquo;s son, Ben, the
-      present owner of the rancho, was in his younger days a gay Lothario scamp,
-      and he came from the East to his new home in California loaded down with a
-      college education and a mighty intimate knowledge of the ways of the world
-      that decent folks don&rsquo;t talk about, much less practice. He had not been
-      here a month until he commenced makin&rsquo; love to little Senorita Rosetta.
-      Before the second sheep-shearin&rsquo; time came around, she was&mdash;well, in
-      a delicate condition. To save himself and, as he thought, cover up the
-      disgrace&mdash;you see he was engaged to a rich Eastern girl of prominent
-      family&mdash;why, the young scoundrel conceived the hellish plot of lurin&rsquo;
-      little Rosetta to Comanche Point one dark night. And when he got her there
-      he threw her over the cliff&mdash;at least that&rsquo;s the way the story goes.
-      Guess Don Manuel was about twenty-five years old at that time, and Ben
-      Thurston two or three years his junior. Well, the disgrace killed
-      Rosetta&rsquo;s father and mother. They died of grief and shame soon after the
-      affair, almost on the same day, and Don Manuel buried them together in the
-      old churchyard on the hill by the side of his murdered sister. And it was
-      there and then, they say, that he took an oath to kill Ben Thurston. That
-      was mor&rsquo;n thirty years ago and the feud has been on ever since, and all us
-      old-timers know hell will be poppin&rsquo; &lsquo;round here one of these days.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But nobody ever sees the White Wolf, Don Manuel,&rdquo; added Buck Ashley.
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s the ex-tr&rsquo;ornery part of it.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, you yourself are likely to see him one of these dark nights, Buck,&rdquo;
-       laughed Jack Rover, as he winked at the other boys. &ldquo;A storekeeper that&rsquo;ll
-      work night and day stacking up money year in and year out is liable to
-      have a call sooner or later from the bandit and his friends.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, hell!&rdquo; was the laconic response of Buck Ashley. &ldquo;Guess I sure can
-      take care of myself.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But Don Manuel may not be alive,&rdquo; suggested the young lieutenant.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He&rsquo;s alive right enough, make no mistake,&rdquo; said Tom Baker, &ldquo;although I&rsquo;ll
-      allow I don&rsquo;t know a single soul who has actually seen him personally for
-      more&rsquo;n twenty years. He is a kind o&rsquo; shadowy cuss. Everybody knows him by
-      his old-time deeds of high-way robbin&rsquo; and all-round murderin&rsquo; for golden
-      loot. I heard of a feller last year who claims to have seen the White Wolf
-      when he was makin&rsquo; that last big stage delivery over by Tulare Lake. He
-      was masked, and had all the passengers out on the roadside with their
-      hands thrown up over their heads while he was takin&rsquo; their valuables away
-      from them.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s a dead cinch,&rdquo; Buck Ashley observed, &ldquo;that whenever there was a
-      hold-up or a robbery, or a murder in cold blood for money, why everybody
-      knew that the White Wolf was again in the hills and playin&rsquo; his cut-throat
-      game for pelf and plunder, or mebbe just for revenge against the gringos,
-      whom he hated like hell. Sometimes he was not heard of in these parts for
-      two or three years, and then he showed up more blood-thirsty than ever.
-      His hand was agin every man, and it looked like as every man&rsquo;s hand was
-      agin him.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve been told,&rdquo; said Dick Willoughby, &ldquo;that when the White Wolf was a
-      boy he saved the life of the old highwayman, Joaquin Murietta.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, them are facts,&rdquo; replied Tom Baker. &ldquo;Leastways I&rsquo;ve heard say so.
-      They claim that he saved Murietta&rsquo;s life from a posse of deputies one
-      night, and altho&rsquo; the White Wolf was only a boy at that time, yet a heap
-      of people think he&rsquo;s the only livin&rsquo; soul who knows the whereabouts and
-      location of the secret cavern where Joaquin Murietta planted his loot,
-      amountin&rsquo;, they say, to millions of dollars in gold and jewels and
-      valuables of all kinds. The retreat always proved a safe one for the
-      murderin&rsquo; gang, and now they&rsquo;re gone no one even to this day can find the
-      place. It&rsquo;s somewhere on San Antonio Rancho, but where? The White Wolf
-      kept his secret well.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;If old Pierre Luzon ever gets out of San Quentin,&rdquo; remarked the
-      storekeeper, &ldquo;I guess he could tell, but he&rsquo;s up for life. He was nabbed
-      in that same Tulare Lake affair &lsquo;bout which Tom had been talkin&rsquo;.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; said the sheriff, &ldquo;two others were shot dead before they got back
-      to the mountains. The White Wolf and Pierre were ridin&rsquo; alone when the
-      Frenchie&rsquo;s horse stumbled. They picked him up insensible, a broken leg and
-      concussion of the brain, and he was the only one of the gang who ever went
-      to jail.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;God &lsquo;lmighty,&rdquo; exclaimed Buck, &ldquo;old Pierre used to sit around in this
-      here store day after day, smokin&rsquo; an old foreign-lookin&rsquo; pipe, and hardly
-      speakin&rsquo; a word. He used to pretend he knew no English. We never once
-      suspected that he was one of Don Manuel&rsquo;s bunch&mdash;always thought of
-      him as an old sheepherder, a bit off his nut, who had saved a few dollars
-      and was takin&rsquo; things easy. And hell, all the time he was the White Wolf&rsquo;s
-      look-out man, makin&rsquo; note of everything and passin&rsquo; the word o&rsquo; warnin&rsquo;
-      when there was talk of the sheriff gettin&rsquo; busy.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll allow Pierre Luzon fooled me proper,&rdquo; concurred Tom Baker. &ldquo;However,
-      he got what was cornin&rsquo; to him all right, a life sentence, though he ought
-      to have been hanged. Well, perhaps it is only the White Wolf and Pierre
-      Luzon who now know the cave where Joaquin Murietta cached his treasure.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And Guadalupe perhaps as well,&rdquo; remarked Buck Ashley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, perhaps Guadalupe also,&rdquo; assented the sheriff. &ldquo;But the White Wolf
-      keeps guard over her.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s the real White Wolf this time,&rdquo; laughed
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick Willoughby, with a nod toward the young lieutenant, who had been
-      listening intently to the tale of weird romance.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The real White Wolf?&rdquo; replied Munson, enquiringly. &ldquo;You&rsquo;ve got me all
-      tangled up. What do you mean?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t you know how Don Manuel came by his name of the White Wolf?&rdquo; asked
-      the sheriff.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, all this folk lore is new to me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Why, gosh all hemlock! He is named because of a darn big white wolf that
-      has been seen at different times in this here country for a hundred
-      years.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Wolves don&rsquo;t live so long,&rdquo; protested the lieutenant incredulously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, this one does,&rdquo; retorted Tom, curtly. &ldquo;Leastwise he&rsquo;s been seen
-      from time to time since ever I can remember. In the old days they named
-      the White Wolf Rancho after this monster animal. It has a charmed life. No
-      one can kill this big fellow, altho&rsquo; lots of shots have been fired at him.
-      And the same was true of Don Manuel de Valencia. He escaped so often that
-      folks believed his life a charmed one. And so they called him the White
-      Wolf.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I saw the white wolf once myself,&rdquo; said Buck Ashley, &ldquo;the real white wolf
-      that even now, as Tom says, guards old Guadalupe and makes it best for
-      young fellows like you, Jack Rover, to leave the squaw alone when she
-      makes back for her hidin&rsquo; place in the mountains. I&rsquo;ll never forget that
-      morning, although it&rsquo;s more or less twenty years ago. The great shaggy
-      brute was following Guadalupe along the trail like a Newfoundland dog. In
-      those days I was out on the hills roundin&rsquo; up some mavericks. One of the
-      calves broke from the herd and scampered along a trail that led directly
-      in front of the old squaw. And say, boys, would you believe it? From less
-      than half a mile away I saw with my own eyes that monster devil of a white
-      wolf&mdash;white as the driven snow&mdash;make one terrific mad leap and
-      grab that yearlin&rsquo; by the neck. Guadalupe spotted me and disappeared, and
-      the white wolf trotted after her round the bend, carryin&rsquo; the dead calf in
-      its jaws as a cat carries a mouse.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Did you not shoot at the wolf?&rdquo; excitedly asked Lieutenant Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Shoot, hell! What would have been the use? Didn&rsquo;t you hear what Tom Baker
-      said? White wolves have charmed lives whether they go on two legs or
-      four.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0003" id="link2HCH0003"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER III&mdash;Feminine Attractions
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>OM BAKER, the
-      sheriff, cleared his throat. &ldquo;You fellers, I&rsquo;m assoomin&rsquo;, are all boys. I
-      have been loafin&rsquo; &lsquo;round in this man&rsquo;s land for forty years. I was here
-      the day Don Manuel had been buryin&rsquo; his old father and mother from the
-      little Mission Church, less than a quarter of a mile from where we are
-      settin&rsquo;. He was standin&rsquo; right in front of this store when young Ben
-      Thurston and two of his ranch hands rode up. If ever I saw real bravery it
-      was that mornin&rsquo;. Don&rsquo;t take much bravery to do some things heroic when
-      you have your artillery handy, but it requires the real stuff when you&rsquo;re
-      gunless.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Young Thurston spoke to his companions and they drew their guns and kept
-      them leveled at Don Manuel as their boss dismounted.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don Manuel was one of the handsomest young fellers I ever laid my two
-      eyes on. He walked straight up to Thurston, and notwithstandin&rsquo; the two
-      loaded pieces of artillery was pintin&rsquo; straight at him said:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;&lsquo;Ben Thurston, you are the man who killed my sister.&rsquo;
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;&lsquo;You are a damned liar!&rsquo; retorted Thurston.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;&lsquo;Yes, you killed her,&rsquo; went on Don Manuel. I found this button in her
-      dead hand, and right there, by God! is where it came from. Look at your
-      coat. Your life shall pay for this dastardly murder. If I had my gun I
-      would settle the matter now, notwithstandin&rsquo; that today I have been
-      burying my beloved father and mother.&rsquo;
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;When young Thurston heard about there bein&rsquo; no gun, he snatched the
-      tell-tale button from his accuser&rsquo;s hand, swung himself into his saddle,
-      laughed mockingly, and with his quirt struck Don Manuel across the face;
-      then he wheeled round his pony and rode away with his bodyguards in a
-      cloud of dust.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;God! I will never forget it. Don Manuel stood there, as white as a piece
-      of paper, and never moved for a whole minute. The quirt had drawn the
-      blood from his face in one long streak. At last he turned away with a
-      resolve in his eyes&mdash;one of them there terrible resolves that change
-      the life of a man, and went back to the little church to finish the last
-      sad rites to his people. It&rsquo;s my opinion Don Manuel, from that very hour,
-      turned bandit in his heart and took oath to murder all the gringos in
-      California.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;As I said before, that was thirty years back, and mebbe a little more,
-      and I have never seen him since. But we all heard of him good and plenty.
-      He certainly left a red trail.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      A silence followed. Presently Buck Ashley in the way of explanation, said:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That tombstone on his sister&rsquo;s grave was put up one night. Nobody saw it
-      done, but everyone knows, of course, it was the work of Don Manuel. It has
-      just one word&mdash;&rsquo;Hermana&rsquo;&mdash;chiseled on the cross of white marble.
-      That&rsquo;s the Mexican for &lsquo;sister,&rsquo; guess you all know. So the name Rosetta
-      is only remembered by old-stagers here, like Tom Baker and me. And we
-      ain&rsquo;t forgotten her pretty face either. Poor little girl!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A doggoned shame,&rdquo; muttered the sheriff, meditatively, his eyes cast
-      down.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How about the law?&rdquo; asked Lieutenant Munson. &ldquo;The law!&rdquo; exclaimed Baker,
-      raising his eyes and flashing a look of withering contempt. &ldquo;What kind o&rsquo;
-      law was there in those days and in these parts? A gun was usually both
-      judge and jury. Besides, with the only bit of evidence gone, how could Don
-      Manuel prove anything agin a rich young feller like Ben Thurston?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But if he was laying for him all the time, how is it that the White Wolf
-      never got his man all through those thirty years?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Because Ben Thurston lit out&mdash;he was too demed scared to live on the
-      rancho any longer. But that&rsquo;s another story.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Let&rsquo;s have it, sheriff.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, it&rsquo;s a longish yarn, and p&rsquo;raps you fellers are about tired of
-      hearing me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      No one protested; there was rather a movement of settling down in pleased
-      expectancy of something worth listening to. So Tom Baker continued:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ben Thurston had one warnin&rsquo;, good and plenty, and he didn&rsquo;t wait around
-      for a second one. After Don Manuel&rsquo;s threat, he seldom left his home, and
-      a little later went back East again. It wasn&rsquo;t till more&rsquo;n a year that he
-      showed up agin at the rancho. This time he brought with him his Eastern
-      bride, a fine slap-dash young woman who could ride a horse and handle a
-      team in good shape. But we could all see that she wasn&rsquo;t too happy, for
-      Ben Thurston started in to drink heavily, and she was ashamed of him and
-      showed it.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guess it was to drown his conscience and keep from thinkin&rsquo; about
-      Rosetta,&rdquo; interjected Buck Ashley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Like as not,&rdquo; assented Tom. &ldquo;Well, anyhow, he hadn&rsquo;t been here very long
-      afore Don Manuel got him&mdash;yes, got him fair and square, although he
-      managed to save his neck at the last moment. There was card-playin&rsquo; and
-      drinkin&rsquo; one night at the rancho&mdash;Thurston had got a bunch o&rsquo; gay
-      young dogs down from San Francisco. Mrs. Thurston had left the room, and
-      was sittin&rsquo; out alone in the moonlight on the verandah. Suddenly she heard
-      a sound that made her sit up and listen&mdash;the clatter o&rsquo; twenty pairs
-      o&rsquo; gallopin&rsquo; hoofs a-comin&rsquo; straight for the house. She must ha&rsquo; known
-      something about the vendetta, for she rushed in terror to her husband and
-      gave him warnin&rsquo;. He escaped by a back door, and a minute later the place
-      was surrounded. The shootin&rsquo; came first from some of the ranch hands, who
-      had tumbled out of the bunk house and were spyin&rsquo; around corners. They
-      said later that the hold-up party numbered more&rsquo;n twenty, some of them
-      masked with handkerchiefs tied around their faces, but others bold as
-      brass and not carin&rsquo; a dang who saw &lsquo;em. Among these last was Don Manuel.
-      But Pierre Luzon was a downy duck, for no one spotted him, although later
-      on we came to know that he played the principal part that night, next to
-      the leader of the gang.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, after the shootin&rsquo;-scrap became general, there was a pretty scare
-      in the ranch house&mdash;one of the card-players dropped, and the others
-      were hiding under tables, when Don Manuel appeared and asked for Ben
-      Thurston. His wife, mighty brave, denied that he was there&mdash;he had
-      left that afternoon for Visalia to buy some cattle, she boldly declared.
-      Don Manuel, always the true gentleman, mark ye, was for believin&rsquo; her when
-      Pierre, his face masked, came in from the verandah and in a low voice
-      passed some words to his chief. Mrs. Thurston knew in a moment that her
-      bluff was goin&rsquo; to be called, and, while the outlaws were confabbin&rsquo;,
-      darted from the room.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But Pierre was just as quick out by the verandah, and before she got to
-      the door o&rsquo; the woolshed beyond the horse corral, he was there to block
-      her passage. It was Pierre who had caught a glimpse of the fugitive
-      sneakin&rsquo; into this outbuilding, and now he knew for certain that Thurston
-      was hiding among the bags o&rsquo; wool inside. But a cornered man is a
-      dangerous animal, and it might mean a good few lives if the door was
-      opened and any attempt made to rush the place.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The gang was soon buzzin&rsquo; all around; the woman, now almost in hysterics,
-      was hustled aside, and a few bundles of loose hay was being dumped into
-      the shed through an open window. A match did the rest. Within three
-      minutes the door opened and Thurston came staggerin&rsquo; out through thick
-      clouds of smoke. Pierre grabbed him and had a noose around his neck in
-      doublequick time.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The shootin&rsquo; was over before this, and some of the ranch hands were
-      lookin&rsquo; on from a little distance, for now everyone knew that it was only
-      the boss that the night-riders were after. So more&rsquo;n one was able
-      afterwards to tell the story&mdash;how the young wife threw herself at Don
-      Manuel&rsquo;s feet, and with sobs and tears pleaded for mercy. And by the
-      living God she won out even after the rope, with her husband at the end of
-      it, had been swung over the limb of a near-by sycamore.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The White Wolf stood stock-still for perhaps a minute, weighin&rsquo; things
-      like, his arms folded across his breast. Then he raised the weepin&rsquo; woman,
-      and, turnin&rsquo; to Thurston, now half-dead with fear, laid hold of him by the
-      shoulder and shook him as a terrier shakes a rat. Then with his other hand
-      he flung the noose from around his neck. &lsquo;Take your miserable life, then,
-      this time&rsquo;&mdash;that&rsquo;s what Don Manuel said. &lsquo;Take it, but the day will
-      come when we shall meet again, man to man, with no woman&rsquo;s tears to save
-      you.&rsquo; And he pushed Thurston away contemptuously, topplin&rsquo; him over like a
-      ninepin, and a minute later rode off at the head of his men.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The narrator paused, and there was a general murmur of repressed
-      excitement.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My word, that&rsquo;s a peach of a story,&rdquo; exclaimed Jack Rover.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He certainly was a chivalrous fellow, this oldtime Don Manuel,&rdquo; remarked
-      the lieutenant.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And don&rsquo;t you see,&rdquo; said the sheriff, &ldquo;that, when a man acted like that
-      and spoke like that, his words must come true? Don&rsquo;t tell me that Don
-      Manuel today is dead while Ben Thurston is still alive. But he has taken
-      mighty good care of himself ever since that day. He an&rsquo; his wife skipped
-      East the very next morning, and I&rsquo;m told they never stopped till they got
-      to Europe. Nobody knows where exactly they lived during the time that
-      followed, but news came through years later that the wife had died,
-      somewhere in the south of England, leaving a son behind. That&rsquo;s young
-      Marshall who has come West with his dad now&mdash;the young man&rsquo;s first
-      visit and his father&rsquo;s last one, I reckon, if he sells the ranch, as I&rsquo;m
-      told he&rsquo;s trying to do.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But I say, boys,&rdquo; observed Jack Rover, &ldquo;what do you suppose the White
-      Wolf did with all the gold he took away from the people? It&rsquo;s said that in
-      one stage robbery he got over fifty thousand dollars of the yellow stuff.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hid it,&rdquo; replied Buck Ashley, &ldquo;with Joaquin Murietta&rsquo;s hoarded gold. For
-      it&rsquo;s sure as sure can be that Don Manuel came to know the secret o&rsquo; the
-      bandits&rsquo; cave where Murietta used to store his loot. The only thing
-      anybody else knows is that it is around here somewheres.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But they do say,&rdquo; observed one of the cowboys, &ldquo;whatever Sheriff Baker
-      may think, and you, too, Buck, that Don Manuel is sure &lsquo;nuff dead. Most
-      folks herabouts believe that the White Wolf has gone to his long restin&rsquo;
-      place, sort a j&rsquo;ined forces with old Joaquin Murietta. The Tulare Lake
-      affair was, I guess, his last raid.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He ain&rsquo;t dead,&rdquo; muttered Tom, determinedly, while Buck Ashley also shook
-      his head in repudiation of the cowboy&rsquo;s theory.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, I happen to know,&rdquo; observed Dick Willoughby, &ldquo;that Mr. Thurston has
-      run down the story of the White Wolf&rsquo;s death in that Seattle saloon brawl
-      pretty thoroughly, and he is of the opinion that the big-featured articles
-      in the San Francisco and Los Angeles papers were correct&mdash;that the
-      dead man&rsquo;s identity was absolutely established.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s how he&rsquo;d wish it to be, at all events,&rdquo; said Buck Ashley. &ldquo;But
-      even now, when Ben Thurston ventures to come home to the rancho, he brings
-      with him a great big hulking bodyguard&mdash;Leach Sharkey, I&rsquo;m told is
-      the fellow&rsquo;s name. That don&rsquo;t look much like believin&rsquo; the White Wolf to
-      be dead and the vendetta played out, does it? You can see it in his
-      hang-dog face that it isn&rsquo;t any real pleasure for him to be around in
-      these parts. He ain&rsquo;t once paid me a visit at the store. Guess he thinks
-      his hide&rsquo;ll last longer by stickin&rsquo; close to home. You owe your job o&rsquo;
-      runnin&rsquo; his cattle, Dick Willoughby, to the fact that he&rsquo;s still plumb
-      scared.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, well, I am in his employ,&rdquo; said Dick loyally, &ldquo;and I&rsquo;m inclined to
-      give him the benefit of the doubt as regards these ugly rumors and idle
-      stories. He has always been on the square with me. But perhaps he&rsquo;ll stick
-      to the rancho, now he believes the White Wolf to be dead.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He may believe it, but, as Buck says, why then the bodyguard?&rdquo; commented
-      the sheriff as he relighted his pipe.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes.&rdquo; replied Dick Willoughby, &ldquo;but I believe he is thinking of letting
-      Leach Sharkey go. Personally I would be willing to wager that Don Manuel,
-      whom no one has seen since that last raid on the stage coach, is dead and
-      sleeping with his sires.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, dead or alive,&rdquo; exclaimed Jack Rover, &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t care a hang for the
-      White Wolf and his-buried treasure. But what I would like to know is the
-      exact location of that rippling mountain stream, the identical sandbar
-      where the old squaw Guadalupe gathers up her pocket change with which to
-      buy groceries. That would be a heap better than any blooming cave. Them&rsquo;s
-      my sentiments.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      As he said this he threw some silver on the bar and invited everybody to
-      lubricate.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Just nominate your poison, boys, and let&rsquo;s drink to my finding old
-      Guadalupe&rsquo;s gold mine.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      They all laughed good-naturedly, and Lieutenant Munson declared that he
-      thought he would put in the balance of his furlough days prospecting. &ldquo;You
-      know,&rdquo; he explained in an aside to the storekeeper while the latter was
-      preparing the drinks, &ldquo;I am only here to visit my old college pal, Dick
-      Willoughby, and incidentally see the place where my father was a soldier
-      in the early California days. He was stationed several years in Fort
-      Tejon.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That was before my time,&rdquo; said Buck Ashley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The soldiers had abandoned the old fort when I came first into these
-      parts.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Meanwhile Dick Willoughby was clinking glasses with Jack Hover.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;There are some mighty pretty little senoritas hereabouts,&rdquo; said Dick,
-      &ldquo;good American blood mixed with Spanish blood, you know, and all that. If
-      a fellow could only find the right one&mdash;understand, I say the right
-      one, Jack&mdash;he wouldn&rsquo;t be losing any time in chasing after the old
-      squaw&rsquo;s secret gold mine or the White Wolf&rsquo;s buried millions.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Jack Rover laughed outright.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I say, Dick, what are you reddening up about? Gee, if I had as fine a
-      lead as you have staked out, I&rsquo;d feel the same way. Ain&rsquo;t that right,
-      Buck?&rdquo; Buck Ashley winked at Jack Rover and said: &ldquo;If you mean who I think
-      you mean, you sure are righter than right. I speak wide open and
-      unrestrained when I give it as my opinion that Miss Merle Farnsworth is
-      the finest specimen of young womanhood that I ever set eyes on, and I have
-      seen some girls East as well as West. Take it from me, she is a jewel, she
-      is a regular beauty rose. Yes,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;and too damned good for that
-      young Thurston whelp, who hangs around tryin&rsquo; to act smart whenever she
-      and that old duenna chaperon of hers comes here to trade. I&rsquo;ll simply boot
-      him out of the store one of these days.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick Willoughby smiled in a satisfied way as he moved toward the door.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, hold on, Dick,&rdquo; called out Jack Rover, &ldquo;don&rsquo;t be in such a
-      dangnation hurry. I&rsquo;ll ride with you in a minute. I&rsquo;ve just got this to
-      say to you, Buck Ashley, that I like you better than ever for what you&rsquo;ve
-      said about Marshall Thurston. Even though I&rsquo;m working for the Thurston
-      outfit, I&rsquo;m free to express my opinion that that young feller is about the
-      meanest specimen of low-down humanity I&rsquo;ve ever struck.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s a case of the second decadency, I suppose,&rdquo; remarked Munson. &ldquo;The
-      worthless profligate, spawn of the rich old roué, Ben Thurston.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Such a drunken pup,&rdquo; continued Rover, &ldquo;aint&rsquo; good enough for a half-breed
-      Indian, much less for the likes of the young ladies of La Siesta. Gee, if
-      I thought there was one chance in a thousand for me with either of them,
-      why goodbye to that placer gold mine ambition that&rsquo;s eating my vitals, or
-      to the planted millions of the White Wolf.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      As he spoke the last words, he followed Dick Willoughby into the open.
-      Dick was standing by his pony.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;re superlatively in earnest, aren&rsquo;t you?&rdquo; he said as he laughed
-      good-naturedly at the cowboy.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You bet your life I&rsquo;m in earnest,&rdquo; replied Jack. &ldquo;And if you don&rsquo;t get
-      busy with that love affair of yours, well, take it from me, you had better
-      look out, for somebody will be picking the peach right from under your
-      very nose. Well, so long, Dick; I&rsquo;ve changed my mind; I&rsquo;ll not ride with
-      you. I&rsquo;ll see to that bit of fence repairing up on the range. And who
-      knows but I may find a sand-bar and a riffle sparkling with yellow gold?&rdquo;
-       He laughed like a big overgrown boy as he touched the rowel to his pony
-      and galloped away across the valley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0004" id="link2HCH0004"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER IV&mdash;Back to the Soil
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">J</span>ACK ROVER is a
-      great boy,&rdquo; said Dick Willoughby to Lieutenant Munson as the two rode off
-      at a leisurely pace toward the group of ranch buildings peeping through a
-      clump of trees at the edge of the foothills.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A type of Western character,&rdquo; replied Munson, &ldquo;that in a way is quite new
-      to me. And yet, do you know, I rather like this Western atmosphere.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Like it!&rdquo; exclaimed Dick. &ldquo;Why, man, it is <i>the</i> atmosphere in which
-      to live, move and have one&rsquo;s being.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      They both laughed at his enthusiasm.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Really,&rdquo; continued Dick, soberly, &ldquo;I would not live another year in New
-      York City for all the property fronting on the Circle, the coming centre
-      of old Gotham. Out here a man is a man for what he is worth. You grow
-      bigger, you think broader thoughts, you are not confined to following
-      precedents or taking orders from the man higher up.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I know,&rdquo; replied Munson, &ldquo;or at least I am beginning to understand
-      something of what you mean. I have only been here ten days and I am
-      already feeling loath to return to my post.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ches,&rdquo; exclaimed Dick, turning abruptly and facing his companion, &ldquo;give
-      it all up, old fellow, and come and live in this glorious country&mdash;California!
-      There&rsquo;s music in the very name. It is the land of sunshine, of fruits and
-      flowers, and of pretty girls into the bargain.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You keep telling me of the pretty girls, but when am I to see them?&rdquo;
-       questioned Munson. &ldquo;If you have any real senoritas who will cause a fellow
-      to forsake his Eastern home and send in his resignation to army
-      headquarters, let me get a peep at them.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Again they both laughed, this time at the challenge in Munson&rsquo;s words.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;All right,&rdquo; said Dick, &ldquo;you shall see them. And, by the way, don&rsquo;t you
-      remember that this is the very day we have arranged to call on Mrs.
-      Darlington at the Rancho La Siesta? It is a beautiful place, this little
-      rancho, and Mrs. Darlington you will find to be a most admirable woman.
-      But just wait until you see Grace Darlington.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How about Miss Farnsworth?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not for you, old man,&rdquo; replied the other quickly, reddening at the
-      temples. &ldquo;Not as long as my name is Dick Willoughby&mdash;providing, you
-      understand, always providing that I shall prove successful in my wooing.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Is it as bad as that, Dick?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo;&mdash;his laughing tone was only a mask to deeper feelings&mdash;&ldquo;I
-      cannot deny that I am pretty hard hit.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My, but you do whet my impatience,&rdquo; said the lieutenant. &ldquo;And I am about
-      as anxious to be paying that afternoon call as I am to have my breakfast.
-      I don&rsquo;t know how you feel, Dick, but I&rsquo;m as hungry as a lean coyote.&rdquo; He
-      paused a moment, then asked in a musing tone: &ldquo;How far away is this
-      wonderful La Siesta Rancho?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, only about twenty miles.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Twenty miles! You speak of miles out here in the same way as we speak of
-      city blocks back in New York. Surely it must be quite a farm.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Quite a farm? I should say! You musn&rsquo;t confound our Californian ranchos
-      with Eastern farms, old man. Why, this rancho of San Antonio covers over
-      four hundred square miles of territory.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You astonish me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;La Siesta Rancho adjoins the great San Antonio possession and contains
-      comparatively few acres, just under three thousand. But it surely is a
-      beautiful little place, fixed up like a nobleman&rsquo;s park in the old world.
-      And then the ladies&mdash;&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Aha, the ladies,&rdquo; repeated Munson, doffing his hat in courtly fashion and
-      smiling audaciously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick touched the flank of his pony with his spur, and for a few miles they
-      rode on at a quicker pace and in silence. Soon they were approaching the
-      ranch buildings. On the outer edge was a little cottage, covered with
-      vines and surrounded by fruit trees, the place which Dick Willoughby, the
-      cattle foreman, had called &ldquo;home&rdquo; for the past five years.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      After turning their horses into a corral, they passed by way of a broad
-      verandah into a big room, roughly but comfortably furnished. Some logs
-      were smouldering in the fireplace, and quickly started into a bright blaze
-      when Dick kicked them together. The warmth was grateful, for while out of
-      doors everything was now bathed in genial sunshine, here the morning air
-      was still keen.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      A Chinaman appeared from the back quarters, and smiled expectantly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Breakfast, Sing Ling,&rdquo; called out Dick, &ldquo;and just as quick as you can
-      serve it.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Sing Ling departed as noiselessly as he had come.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;These are certainly great quarters,&rdquo; observed Munson, settling himself in
-      a big Old Mission rocker and glancing around.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The walls, curiously enough, were pretty well covered with pen-and-ink
-      sketches and designs of buildings that might have adorned an architect&rsquo;s
-      office, while there was a partly completed landscape painting in oils
-      standing on a rudely fashioned easel.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And you&rsquo;ve certainly stuck to the old line of work, Dick,&rdquo; the lieutenant
-      went on.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Of course one must have something to think about when he is all alone in
-      a new country,&rdquo; replied Willoughby. &ldquo;But most of that stuff I did in my
-      first year here,&rdquo; he added, following the other&rsquo;s survey of the walls.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You still paint, however,&rdquo; remarked Munson, his eyes resting on the
-      unfinished canvas.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Or try to,&rdquo; was the laughing response.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, that&rsquo;s a modest way of putting it. Do you know, old man,&rdquo; Munson went
-      on, &ldquo;since I came here I have often thought what a marvelous change has
-      been wrought in you&mdash;what a transplanting has taken place? You were a
-      chronic New Yorker, except for that one year you spent in the Latin
-      Quarter of gay Paree. You thought then you were going to make a great
-      painter. And, by gad, I almost believe so myself,&rdquo; he added, bending
-      forward to make a more critical scrutiny of the work on the easel. &ldquo;By
-      jove, that&rsquo;s really fine, Dick.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m afraid that&rsquo;s flattery, Chester, my boy,&rdquo; responded Willoughby.
-      &ldquo;However, it sounds good to hear you say so. A word of appreciation is
-      what all hearts hunger for. Personally I even believe in a moderate amount
-      of flattery. Its psychic influence is more potent in arousing and causing
-      the heart to throb with ambition than all the stimulants, drugs or
-      reasoning in the world. Indeed, without a certain amount of flattery one
-      becomes ambitionless, languid, and perishes; whereas the unexpected caress
-      or kindly words of praise from loved ones, just or unjust, adds more
-      strength to the good right arm of the breadwinner than all the beef in
-      Christendom, and makes the sunshine seem brighter and earth&rsquo;s every breeze
-      a south wind blowing across beds of violets.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A bit of a poet, too, I see,&rdquo; smiled Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Willoughby made no reply. He had crossed over to the open door and was
-      looking out on the valley that stretched away for miles&mdash;great oak
-      trees in the foreground, with cattle-dotted pasture lands beyond. Waving
-      his hand toward the vast expanse, he said:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Just look at that for a picture, and see how tame a man-made gallery is
-      as compared with this great art gallery of Nature. Do you know, Ches, I
-      despise New York? There was a time, when I first came here, that I felt I
-      should die of ennui, yearning for the Great White Way once again. But I
-      have outgrown all that. I know now, thank God, there&rsquo;s nothing to it. Here
-      a man can fill his lungs with pure air, and at the same time feast his
-      soul all day long with beautiful things.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      There followed a brief interval of silence. Munson had risen and joined
-      his comrade at the door. Both were gazing over the glorious sunlit sweep
-      of territory rimmed by the distant, pine-clad hills. In the heart of Dick
-      Willoughby was supreme contentment, in that of Chester Munson a vague
-      longing to get away from red-tape army routine and breathe the
-      exhilarating and inspiring freedom of life in the open.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Blakeflast,&rdquo; bleated a soft voice behind them, and turning round they
-      found the suave, smiling Chinaman with hand outstretched toward the
-      smoking viands upon the table. Sentiment was instantly forgotten in favor
-      of lamb chops grilled to a turn, a great fluffled omelette with fine herbs
-      that would have done credit to a Parisian chef, and coffee that was
-      veritable nectar.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At last appetite was satisfied. The lieutenant had produced his cigar
-      case, Dick was filling his briar-root pipe with tobacco from the humidor.
-      The latter spoke:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Say, Ches, we were talking about New York. Do you want me to give you a
-      toast on that modern Babylon?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Sure, old man, go ahead! You know I haven&rsquo;t lost my interest in old
-      Gotham, by any manner of means. It may the a modern Babylon. But to me it
-      is none the less the greatest of American cities.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s just the trouble,&rdquo; said Dick, seriously. &ldquo;It is too great. There
-      identities are swallowed up. Individualism cannot survive. It is all one
-      great composite.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, let us hear the toast.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick raised his cup of coffee and said: &ldquo;Very well, here it is; here is my
-      opinion of New York:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br />
-    </p>
-    <p class="indent15">
-      &lsquo;Vulgar in manners; overfed,
-    </p>
-    <p class="indent15">
-      Over-dressed and under-bred;
-    </p>
-    <p class="indent15">
-      Heartless, godless, hell&rsquo;s delight,
-    </p>
-    <p class="indent15">
-      Rude by day and lewd by night.
-    </p>
-    <p class="indent15">
-      Bedwarfed the man, enlarged the brute;
-    </p>
-    <p class="indent15">
-      Ruled by boss and prostitute.
-    </p>
-    <p class="indent15">
-      Purple robed and pauper clad;
-    </p>
-    <p class="indent15">
-      Raving, rotten, money mad;
-    </p>
-    <p class="indent15">
-      A squirming herd in Mammon&rsquo;s mesh;
-    </p>
-    <p class="indent15">
-      A wilderness of human flesh;
-    </p>
-    <p class="indent15">
-      Crazed by avarice, lust and rum&mdash;
-    </p>
-    <p class="indent15">
-      New York! thy name&rsquo;s delirium.&rsquo;.rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br />
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great Heavens, old man,&rdquo; exclaimed Munson, when Dick had finished, &ldquo;you
-      are severe, to say the least.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Willoughby laughed good-naturedly as he passed the match box to his
-      friend.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not severe, only truthful,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;You see, in New York no man dares
-      think for himself. Everything is controlled by a machine-appointed
-      chairman, secretary and committee, and you must hear the resolutions read
-      before you know the doctrine you are perforce to advocate.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Then he lit his pipe and rose from the table.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Now, I have a lot of things to attend to, old fellow,&rdquo; he resumed. &ldquo;Make
-      yourself comfortable. Here&rsquo;s a bunch of Eastern newspapers&mdash;oh, I
-      read them regularly, haven&rsquo;t got rid of that bad habit yet. I&rsquo;ll tell Sing
-      Ling to have lunch ready on the stroke of noon. Then we&rsquo;ll be in good time
-      to start out for the Rancho La Siesta. So long!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0005" id="link2HCH0005"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER V&mdash;At La Siesta
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">S</span>OON after one
-      o&rsquo;clock Dick Willoughby and Chester Munson were again in the saddle. They
-      galloped along the foothills for some time in silence. But coming to the
-      boulder-strewn wash of a mountain stream, they had perforce to rein their
-      horses to a walk. Conversation was now possible.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dick, will you give me a job as a cowboy if I quit the army?&rdquo; asked
-      Munson abruptly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Surest thing you know,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;But why try to kid me like that?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh,&rdquo; laughed the other, &ldquo;I am not jesting.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, by gad, if you feel that way already, the chances are you will
-      write out your resignation when you get back to the shack tonight.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You mean by that&mdash;&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I mean,&rdquo; said Dick, smiling benignly at his friend, &ldquo;that when you have
-      once seen Grace Darlington you will feel like browsing on the California
-      range until you have learned to throw a riata.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, it is not the thought of any mere girl that will influence my
-      decision. I feel like getting back to Nature&mdash;back to the soil&mdash;back
-      to a life of untrammeled freedom.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Back to unspoiled womanhood,&rdquo; added Dick sententiously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, you&rsquo;ve certainly got my curiosity aroused over these young ladies
-      at La Siesta. How much farther do we have to go?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Within an hour, sir, within the hour, my lord, shall you see the lady
-      fair. But remember,&rdquo; Dick went on banteringly, &ldquo;that you are not to
-      practise any riata-throwing on Miss Merle Farnsworth.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I understand. But we won&rsquo;t fall out over her. You may have your beautiful
-      brunette. I have always been partial to blondes.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;In the plural number,&rdquo; grinned Dick. &ldquo;But Grace Darlington will dim the
-      light of all your previous flames. She is the most perfect blonde you have
-      ever yet encountered.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You are certainly enthusiastic&mdash;for a disinterested party.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, you&rsquo;ll say the same thing, Ches, my boy, when you see her.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      It was not yet four o&rsquo;clock when they approached the Rancho La Siesta. The
-      house was of a style quite unusual in California&mdash;a miniature castle
-      that might have been planned by some European architect of renown. It
-      stood amid noble oak trees, old and gnarled and of gigantic size, but not
-      too numerous to hide the architectural features of the building. To the
-      rear the trees grew more thickly till they finally merged into one great
-      forest that covered the lower ridge of the mountain beyond. Far up, just
-      within the timber line, could be seen the red-tiled roof of a house which
-      Dick told his friend was the home of a Mr. Ricardo Robles. Beneath the
-      forest, the gently undulating lands sloped away to a considerable stream
-      that dashed down from one of the mountain canyons and debouched into the
-      great valley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Whew!&rdquo; exclaimed Munson admiringly, as they rode up and turned their
-      horses over to an attendant. &ldquo;Some swell architecture around here! Is this
-      your work, Dick?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0004" id="linkimage-0004"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
-      <img src="images/0055.jpg" alt="0055 " width="100%" /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h5>
-      <a href="images/0055.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
-    </h5>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, no!&rdquo; replied Willoughby. &ldquo;I had nothing to do with it. But I do like
-      the architectural lines of Mrs. Darlington&rsquo;s home. She&rsquo;s English and has
-      English tastes, and transplanted ideas are not always successful in a new
-      country. But in this case the building just seems to fit the scenery. It
-      has always delighted me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is certainly beautiful,&rdquo; concurred Munson as they walked along a
-      winding graveled pathway that climbed the gentle slope and led to the
-      portico of the mansion.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Around them were gay beds of flowers dotting the greensward. Almost hiding
-      the columns of the portico were climbing roses, one bush of the purest
-      white, the other of deep crimson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      As they passed under the porch roof, a handsome and well-preserved lady of
-      middle age appeared at the top of the steps with a welcoming smile. She
-      descended to give them gracious greeting.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How glad I am to see you, Mr. Willoughby. No one could be more welcome at
-      La Siesta.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Thank you,&rdquo; said Dick with marked chivalry.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mrs. Darlington, permit me to present my friend, Lieutenant Munson.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The introduction over, they ascended the steps together, and passed into a
-      spacious courtyard, with broad verandahs running all around and a fountain
-      playing in the centre. The hostess conducted her visitors to a cosy
-      corner, screened by glass panels from the open air and furnished with rich
-      Persian rugs, divans, cushions, tapestries, carved ebony tabarets, all in
-      oriental fashion. When they were comfortably settled, she opened the
-      conversation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Lieutenant, the young ladies of La Siesta are most impatient to meet you.
-      Mr. Willoughby has told us so much about you and yet has been so very
-      dilatory&mdash;yes, really you have, Mr. Willoughby&mdash;in bringing you
-      over, that we have put down several black marks against his name.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, thank you,&rdquo; stammered the young officer, reddening. &ldquo;I quite agree
-      with you about Willoughby, for I have been pleading with him to present me
-      from the very first day of my arrival.&rdquo; Turning to Mrs. Darlington, Dick
-      laughingly protested: &ldquo;My dear Mrs. Darlington, that is the first whopper
-      you have heard from my esteemed friend. You have yet to learn that he
-      always speaks in the superlative degree.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      At this moment Grace Darlington stepped through one of the French windows.
-      As she stood hesitating for a moment, Chester Munson there and then agreed
-      with all the preliminary praise Dick Willoughby had bestowed. She was
-      certainly a vision of loveliness, with a wealth of golden hair and eyes of
-      sapphire blue; petite, her figure plump but beautifully molded, her cheeks
-      aglow with the red roses of health and youth and happiness.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My daughter Grace,&rdquo; announced Mrs. Darlington, rising and formally
-      introducing the lieutenant to her as she joined the group.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Again Munson blushed and stammered. Dick was chuckling; he saw that the
-      gallant son of battle, with a penchant for blonde beauties, had succumbed
-      to the first glance from Grace Darlington&rsquo;s eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Delighted to meet you, Lieutenant Munson,&rdquo; she declared with frank
-      friendliness as they shook hands.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Where&rsquo;s Merle?&rdquo; asked Dick almost before Grace had time to turn to him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;There now, Mr. Impatience,&rdquo; she replied, shaking her finger teasingly at,
-      him, &ldquo;Merle will be here in her own good time. She&rsquo;s busy with Bob just
-      now.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Who the dickens is Bob?&rdquo; asked Dick, visibly disconcerted.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, her new Irish terrier,&rdquo; laughed Grace, her voice ringing with
-      mischievous merriment. &ldquo;And such a beauty!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick breathed again. The lieutenant had recovered his composure; it was
-      his turn now to bestow a sardonic smile upon his comrade.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll have afternoon tea,&rdquo; suggested Mrs. Darlington. &ldquo;And of course you
-      two young men will stay for dinner.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Both uttered a simultaneous protest&mdash;they were only in riding
-      clothes. But Mrs. Darlington made short work of the argument, and touched
-      a pushbutton by her side. A maid responded, the extra covers for dinner
-      were ordered, and meanwhile tea was to be sent on to the verandah.
-      Pleasant small talk succeeded, the lieutenant being called upon for his
-      first impressions of California.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Of a sudden Grace exclaimed in a voice, half of joy, half of surprise:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Why, here comes Mr. Robles!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Advancing along the verandah, hat in hand, was a man of striking presence
-      and dignity, perhaps fifty years of age. His jet black hair was streaked
-      with gray, the full beard almost verging on whiteness. Olive complexion
-      and brown eyes, together with the courtly manner of his salutation,
-      indicated the thoroughbred Castilian.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      He bowed and raised to his lips the hand of his hostess. To Grace he paid
-      the same deference. Next he turned to Dick Willoughby and extended his
-      hand.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have met Mr. Willoughby. I am pleased, sir, to see you again.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Then his eyes rested on Lieutenant Munson, and Mrs. Darlington presented
-      the young army officer.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And where, I pray, is Miss Merle?&rdquo; Mr. Robles finally asked, glancing
-      around.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s what I want to know,&rdquo; blurted out Dick. Then he reddened just a
-      little.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The older man looked kindly at Dick, and smilingly said: &ldquo;The audacity of
-      youth.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; put in Grace, &ldquo;the audacity and the impatience as well.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      But just at that moment there floated from the recesses of the home the
-      fragment of a song: &ldquo;I dreamt I dwelt in marble halls, with vassals and
-      serfs at my side.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ah, here comes the recreant now,&rdquo; exclaimed Mrs. Darlington.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The song stopped abruptly, and a moment later Merle Farnsworth appeared.
-      She went first of all to Mr. Robles and greeted him warmly, giving him
-      both her hands, which he kissed in his princely fashion. For Willoughby
-      she had a pleasant smile, and for his friend, the lieutenant, a kindly
-      welcome to California.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The tea tray had meanwhile arrived, and soon both the young ladies were
-      busy attending to their guests. While he sipped his tea, Munson completed
-      his inspection of Merle Farnsworth&mdash;dispassionately, for the brunette
-      type of beauty had never yet made his pulses beat faster. But he could
-      none the less admire. She was a stately girl, taller than Grace
-      Darlington, with fine, regular features and brown eyes that matched the
-      dark heavy braids of her hair. Her manner was alert and vivacious, yet
-      there was the quiet dignity of gentle breeding even in her smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      After half an hour of general conversation, Mr. Robles arose to take his
-      leave, notwithstanding Mrs. Darlington&rsquo;s pressing invitation that he
-      should remain and join the dinner party.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My home is not far away,&rdquo; he said when shaking hands with Munson, &ldquo;up in
-      the woods yonder. Perhaps you may have seen it as you came along the
-      road.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; observed Dick, &ldquo;I pointed it out to the lieutenant.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, both you gentlemen are cordially invited to pay me a visit any time
-      you are riding through this part of the country. Although I live far away
-      from the busy world, and am a recluse by choice, I have some things that
-      may interest you&mdash;pictures, old manuscripts and books of the Spanish
-      days.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Pictures?&rdquo; interposed Dick, inquiringly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, a few that I picked up during several visits to Europe.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;If people only knew it,&rdquo; remarked Mrs. Darlington, &ldquo;Mr. Robles has
-      perhaps one of the finest private picture galleries in America.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then I&rsquo;m certainly coming to see you,&rdquo; said Dick, eagerly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Me or my pictures?&rdquo; asked Mr. Robles with a quizzical smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Both,&rdquo; and the young fellow showed he meant it by a cordial hand grip.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You will pass our door, Mr. Willoughby?&rdquo; exclaimed Merle in half-laughing
-      reproachfulness. &ldquo;You will dare to give the go-by to La Siesta?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, art is art,&rdquo; replied Dick sturdily, although he did not trust
-      himself to look at Merle while he answered.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But perhaps the young ladies will show you the way through the oak
-      forest,&rdquo; suggested Mr. Robles.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That would be great,&rdquo; said Lieutenant Munson, with his eyes fixed on
-      Grace Darlington.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Delightful,&rdquo; she blushingly assented.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, arrange it among yourselves. For the present, <i>adios</i>.&rdquo; And
-      with a sweeping bow the senor took his departure.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      A stroll through the gardens and orchards, dinner and sprightly
-      conversation, an hour of piano-playing and singing to follow&mdash;altogether
-      a delightful evening was spent. The nearly full moon had risen before the
-      young men found themselves on the homeward trail.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      As side by side they rode down into the valley, Munson said:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dick, boy, there&rsquo;s no use talking. You have introduced me to some
-      perfectly charming people today&mdash;they&rsquo;re wonderful.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What did I tell you?&rdquo; asked Dick.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You surely did not tell me the half,&rdquo; replied the other. &ldquo;I think Grace
-      Darlington is the prettiest girl I have ever seen.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guess you&rsquo;ll be writing out your resignation and sending it to army
-      headquarters,&rdquo; laughed Dick. &ldquo;<i>Quien sabe?</i>&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The lieutenant made no reply, and quickening their pace, they pushed on in
-      silence.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At last they were nearing home&mdash;passing round the last spur of the
-      mountain. The moon was now riding high overhead, bathing the whole
-      landscape in bright effulgence. Willoughby brought his pony to a walk, and
-      Munson, coming up behind, soon joined him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How do you like riding by the light of the California moon?&rdquo; asked
-      Willoughby.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Really, Dick, you call even the moon a California moon, as if the same
-      moon didn&rsquo;t shine in New York City or in Paris.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not in the same way,&rdquo; said Dick soberly. &ldquo;The truth is, the moon really
-      looks larger and brighter here, and the stars, too, are more brilliant.
-      Haven&rsquo;t you noticed it?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have noticed that the atmosphere is exceedingly clear,&rdquo; replied Munson,
-      and, as if to verify his observation, he cast a glance up to the
-      rock-ribbed flank of the mountain above the belt of timber.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good God, what&rsquo;s that?&rdquo; he added breathlessly grasping the arm of his
-      friend.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Instinctively both halted their horses as they continued to gaze.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0005" id="linkimage-0005"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
-      <img src="images/0105.jpg" alt="0105 " width="100%" /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h5>
-      <a href="images/0105.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
-    </h5>
-    <p>
-      The bent form of the old Indian squaw Guadalupe was unmistakable as she
-      toiled slowly along a narrow ledge on the face of the precipice. But
-      following close behind her was a vague, shadowy figure&mdash;the figure of
-      some four-footed beast, bigger than a big dog.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The white wolf!&rdquo; gasped Dick.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Is it real, or is it a spectre?&rdquo; whispered Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Just then a scudding cloud momentarily obscured the moon, and when the
-      full light again shone forth, both woman and wolf had vanished.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The young men looked into each other&rsquo;s eyes in awe and wonderment.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0006" id="link2HCH0006"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER VI&mdash;The Quarrel
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>HE following days
-      were busy ones on San Antonio Rancho. Dick Willoughby was constantly in
-      the saddle, looking after his subordinates, watching the line fences, and
-      generally keeping track of the vast herds. Lieutenant Munson was becoming
-      acclimated. He not only accompanied Willoughby on many of his rides, but
-      had also paid several visits to La Siesta, and one afternoon in particular
-      had enjoyed immensely a successful trout fishing expedition with the young
-      ladies along the mountain stream that flowed through the property.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      One morning there was great excitement at San Antonio headquarters. Ben
-      Thurston returned from a visit he had been paying to Los Angeles, and with
-      him floated in a circumstantial story that the rancho had been really
-      sold. As usual, he was attended by the plain-clothes detective whom he
-      retained as bodyguard. Leach Sharkey was a big, hulking fellow, more than
-      six feet in height, with a tousled shock of reddish hair, a stubby red
-      mustache, and teeth that showed even when his face was in repose. Bulging
-      hip pockets indicated the brace of heavy revolvers which he invariably
-      carried.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Within an hour of Mr. Thurston&rsquo;s coming, Dick Willoughby, as foreman, was
-      summoned to an interview at the ranch house. The owner received him alone
-      in his office.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Ben Thurston was a squat, solidly built man, and despite his life of idle
-      luxury, carried his fifty odd years well. He was sullen and taciturn in
-      manner, but brusque and imperious when he did choose to speak. Two
-      features were markedly characteristic&mdash;the chin was weak and the eyes
-      had the restless, alert look of one who constantly lived in an atmosphere
-      of fear and suspicion.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Thurston opened the conversation without any preliminaries.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Willoughby, I want an accurate count of all the cattle and horses on the
-      ranch; and especially I require a fair idea as to the number of fatted
-      beeves&mdash;those ready for the market, you understand.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Very well,&rdquo; replied Dick, &ldquo;your orders shall be carried out as
-      expeditiously as possible, but it will require a few days to complete the
-      work.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How many days?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;If I make use of all the force it may take a week&mdash;perhaps a little
-      longer.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;All right, use all the help you can get. I must have these figures
-      promptly. There is a Los Angeles syndicate who are after an option on the
-      rancho. They are counting on buying me out&mdash;lock, stock and barrel.&rdquo;
-       Ben Thurston smiled, squinted his shifty eyes and blew his nose
-      vigorously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It always makes me laugh,&rdquo; he added pompously, &ldquo;to have these fellows
-      come around this great principality of mine and try to buy me out.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Just then someone outside flitted past the window, and, quick as
-      lightning, Thurston turned and exclaimed in a startled tone: &ldquo;Who was
-      that?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That was Jack Rover,&rdquo; replied Dick, &ldquo;one of our cowboys.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh,&rdquo; and the frightened look in the eyes subsided.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Tomorrow then,&rdquo; Dick went on, returning to their former topic of
-      conversation, &ldquo;we&rsquo;ll begin a round-up of the stock at this end of the
-      range. I&rsquo;ll put the boys on the job right now.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll join you tomorrow myself.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;All right, Mr. Thurston.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What time?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;At any time agreeable to you.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, say eight o&rsquo;clock in the morning. You see,&rdquo; he continued, &ldquo;I want
-      to get through with this damned business in a hurry and start back East. I
-      have friends who are waiting for me. Of course I will have to stay here
-      until the representatives of this syndicate come up from Los Angeles, but
-      I will make short work of them, believe me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      This time Ben Thurston laughed outright and rubbed his hands together in a
-      satisfied way. For once he seemed inclined to be communicative, and,
-      turning to Willoughby, resumed:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Do you know, I have collected over three hundred thousand dollars, first
-      and last, selling options on this San Antonio Rancho? It is quite a joke.
-      They all fall down. They make a first payment of twenty-five or fifty
-      thousand dollars, and then,&rdquo; throwing up both his hands and shrugging his
-      shoulders, &ldquo;their payments cease and I am just that much ahead of the
-      game.&rdquo; Willoughby listened in frigid silence; there was not even the
-      flicker of a responsive smile on his face.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Thurston, eyeing him for a moment, looked disconcerted. He drew himself up
-      stiffly in his chair. His voice assumed its usual gruff tone.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s all; get to work then,&rdquo; he said curtly as he lifted some papers to
-      show that the interview was at an end.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The first round-up was held some twenty miles southwest of the ranch
-      house, at the base of the foothills across the valley from La Siesta. Ben
-      Thurston, attended closely by his bodyguard, was there, his shifting eyes
-      scanning each new face. Not fewer than ten thousand head of cattle were
-      milling about, pawing the earth and bellowing in low tones of irritation
-      at being herded together and held away from their accustomed haunts of
-      juicy grasses.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      From a knoll at a little distance Lieutenant Munson, seated on a fine
-      riding pony, watched the great performance, which to him was more
-      wonderful than any hippodrome show or military parade. He was so engrossed
-      with the spectacle that he did not hear the patter of approaching hoofs.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good morning, Senor Lieutenant,&rdquo; came a lady&rsquo;s voice in cheery greeting.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Turning quickly in his saddle he saw Grace Darlington and Merle Farnsworth
-      on their ponies, which had been brought to a sudden halt close behind him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Really, Mr. Munson,&rdquo; said Grace Darlington, &ldquo;one would think you were so
-      completely lost in contemplation of a mob of cattle that you had no eyes
-      for your friends.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Chester bowed and raised his hat as he replied with a bright smile:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is certainly a great scene, isn&rsquo;t it? But you are none the less
-      welcome. Indeed when one is witnessing something unusual, it always adds
-      to the interest to have the companionship of friends.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Very prettily put,&rdquo; observed Merle Farnsworth. &ldquo;Fortunately the place
-      selected for the round-up this year isn&rsquo;t very far from La Siesta, so we
-      rode across the valley.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Have you anything in New York,&rdquo; asked Grace, &ldquo;to compare with this?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Indeed we have not,&rdquo; replied the lieutenant with conviction. &ldquo;I am
-      beginning to think that the West is a pretty good place in which to live.
-      By the way,&rdquo; he went on, taking a newspaper clipping from his pocket,
-      &ldquo;here is something that our mutual friend, Dick, gave me, and said I
-      should read once a day for a month, and then&mdash;well, then, he says I
-      will never go East again, but remain in this great picture country. Shall
-      I read it?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, do, by all means,&rdquo; said the girls in unison. &ldquo;Well, here goes! &lsquo;Every
-      idea we have in the East is run with a convention. We cannot think without
-      a chairman. Our whims have secretaries; our fads have by-laws. Literature
-      is a club. Philosophy is a society. Our reforms are mass meetings. We
-      cannot mourn our mighty dead without some great chairman and a half
-      hundred vice-presidents. We remember our novelists and poets with
-      trustees, while the immortality of a dead genius is looked after by a
-      standing committee. Charity is an association, and theology at best only a
-      set of resolutions.&rsquo;.rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What do you think of that?&rdquo; he asked, laughing. &ldquo;Isn&rsquo;t that an awful slam
-      on the East?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is rather severe,&rdquo; smiled Merle. &ldquo;But you know, Mr. Willoughby has
-      become a thorough Westerner. The lure of the hills and the valleys has
-      taken complete possession of him.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And yet he remains unspoiled.&rdquo; exclaimed the lieutenant. &ldquo;But are you
-      aware he is trying to tamper with my old allegiance to the East?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Indeed,&rdquo; asked Grace, &ldquo;in what way?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He wants me to resign my commission and take pot luck with him, as he
-      terms it.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You couldn&rsquo;t do better,&rdquo; exclaimed Grace enthusiastically.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      While this conversation was going on, an exciting incident was taking
-      place only a short distance away. Young Marshall Thurston had come with
-      his father to the round-up, and was riding about watching the operations.
-      Chancing to pass near, Dick Willoughby overheard him use an insulting
-      epithet in regard to Miss Farnsworth&mdash;the young man was evidently
-      peeved that the ladies had not sought him out instead of Munson, and it
-      was obvious, too, that he had been drinking even at that early hour in the
-      morning.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Swiftly wheeling, Dick rode up to him with a look of anger so intense that
-      even the cowboys who knew him were taken aback.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You foul-mouthed beast!&rdquo; he hissed, as he pushed his quirt into the
-      slanderer&rsquo;s face. &ldquo;Just let me overhear you make a rude remark again about
-      Miss Farnsworth and I will hammer the life out of you. You are nothing
-      better than a drunken hobo, not fit to associate with ladies.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The outburst was so sudden that young Thurston was cowed and attempted no
-      reply. But as Willoughby rode off he sent after him a look of sullen and
-      resentful hatred. Two or three of the cowboys, who really were good
-      friends of Dick Willoughby, but were nevertheless not above fawning for
-      the favor of the heir to the great rancho, indicated that they were on
-      Marshall&rsquo;s side.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guess two can play at the hammering game,&rdquo; remarked one.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He don&rsquo;t come any of his rough-house business over you, Marshall, while
-      I&rsquo;m around,&rdquo; affirmed another, pugnaciously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But the young man, still without uttering a word, turned gloomily away and
-      started his pony in the direction of home.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guess he feels like another drink,&rdquo; grinned an irreverent youth.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hell,&rdquo; exclaimed an elderly man, the blacksmith at the rancho, &ldquo;if the
-      Thurston family don&rsquo;t beat the band for quarrels and bloody feuds!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      But just then a bunch of cattle broke from the main herd and the group of
-      cowboys dispersed in a galloping scamper.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson and the young ladies, engrossed in their light conversation, knew
-      nothing of this unpleasant episode. They were now discussing the date of
-      the projected visit to the home of Mr. Ricardo Robles among the oaks above
-      La Siesta. It was decided to fix it for the first Sunday after the cattle
-      muster was completed, when Dick Willoughby would be free to make one of
-      the party.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But hold a moment,&rdquo; exclaimed the lieutenant suddenly, &ldquo;unless I&rsquo;m to be
-      court-martialled for absence without leave, I must take the train East
-      next Saturday, or&mdash;or&mdash;&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      His eyes fixed on Grace, he hesitated to complete the alternative.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Or what?&rdquo; she inquired.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Follow Dick&rsquo;s advice and send in my resignation.&rdquo; As he spoke he thrust a
-      hand into his breast pocket and drew forth a letter, sealed, addressed and
-      stamped, all ready for the mail. &ldquo;I really can&rsquo;t quite make up my mind,&rdquo;
-       he added, dubiously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0006" id="linkimage-0006"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
-      <img src="images/0155.jpg" alt="0155 " width="100%" /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h5>
-      <a href="images/0155.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
-    </h5>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Let me help you,&rdquo; said Grace with a gay smile as she extended her hand
-      for the letter.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How?&rdquo; he asked.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll mail your resignation for you. We shall be riding home by La Siesta
-      postoffice.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, Grace!&rdquo; murmured Merle in timid protest. &ldquo;Think of the responsibility
-      you are taking.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A woman&rsquo;s mission in life is to encourage men to do the proper thing,&rdquo;
-       replied Grace with roguish defiance. &ldquo;Our friend here is enamored of the
-      West, and the West is the very best place for him. I&rsquo;ll post your letter,
-      lieutenant.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He placed it between her fingers, doffed his hat, and bowed gallantly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Be it so. Let the gods&mdash;or should I say, a fair goddess?&mdash;decide.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Thanks for the compliment,&rdquo; cried Grace, with a pretty flush on her face.
-      &ldquo;Good-bye, then, for the present. Get ready for Sunday&rsquo;s picnic among the
-      oaks. Come along, Merle, my dear.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      And with a touch of the quirt she started her pony into a canter.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great guns, but she&rsquo;s worth while,&rdquo; exclaimed Munson as he gazed after
-      the retreating figures.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0007" id="link2HCH0007"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER VII&mdash;Old Bandit Days
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">O</span>N the evening of
-      the day that followed the big round-up of cattle, Dick Willoughby and
-      Chester Munson rode over to the store. As they cantered along, both men
-      were pre-occupied with their thoughts.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick was not worrying over his sharp passage of words with his employer&rsquo;s
-      son, for he knew that his services at the present time were quite
-      indispensable, more especially if the rancho was to be sold to the best
-      advantage. The owner had spoken lightly of the negotiations, and had
-      chuckled in a sinister way about the money he had frequently made over
-      unexercised options. But this time it was a Los Angeles syndicate that was
-      seeking the property, composed of men whose financial reputation and keen
-      business ability Willoughby knew well. For he had learned their names
-      after his interview with Ben Thurston, and he felt certain that this
-      particular group of capitalists would have entered into no serious
-      negotiations without having both the cash and the intention to put the
-      deal through. Therefore he scented a change of ownership in the rancho,
-      and consequently, perhaps, the necessity for his looking around to find
-      employment elsewhere. He hated to think of leaving a place that he had
-      come to look on as home and parting from all the friends he had made
-      throughout the countryside. Unconsciously to himself, the greatest tie of
-      all was proximity to La Siesta and to Merle Farnsworth. But Dick was not
-      thinking of Merle just then&mdash;he was merely turning things over
-      generally in his mind as he rode across the valley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson also was cogitating the change in his own outlook that had been
-      brought about by the mailing of the letter of resignation to army
-      headquarters. He was recalling the many years he had striven to reach the
-      lieutenancy now voluntarily surrendered&mdash;of his youthful zeal and
-      ambition for an army career which had been powerless to withstand the
-      witching call of the West. And although Grace Darlington&rsquo;s act of putting
-      the letter in the post had been only the last feather to tip an evenly
-      balanced scale, he could not but feel that thereby this beautiful girl of
-      the West had entered into his life and into all his future plans, hopes,
-      and aspirations. The thought gave him joy; he was more pleased than ever
-      that the decisive step had at last been taken.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Arriving at the store, they found old Tom Baker seated on a dry goods box,
-      while Buck Ashley leaned against the counter, waiting for the stage coach
-      and the mails. Already two or three others were beginning to congregate
-      under the trees, in readiness for the distribution of letters and
-      newspapers.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hello, Dick,&rdquo; called out the sheriff, &ldquo;I heard of your scrap yesterday
-      morning with that young ne&rsquo;er-do-well, Marshall Thurston. My God, I&rsquo;m glad
-      you gave him hell.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Please don&rsquo;t speak about it,&rdquo; replied Willoughby quietly. &ldquo;That was my
-      affair and mine alone. I guess we can find some more agreeable topic.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Wal,&rdquo; drawled Buck Ashley, &ldquo;Tom here was just a-tellin&rsquo; me a yarn that&rsquo;ll
-      interest both you boys a heap, or the lieutenant at all events, for he&rsquo;s
-      new to these parts and don&rsquo;t know the local hist&rsquo;ry yet. Of course I&rsquo;ve
-      heard the story before, but not all the pertic&rsquo;lars the way Tom can tell
-      &lsquo;em. And its a dangnation good story. So start from the beginnin&rsquo; again,
-      Tom.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Thus addressed, the sheriff, after taking a bite from his tobacco plug,
-      began:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The yarn has to do with the old-time bandit Joaquin Murietta, about whom
-      we were speakin&rsquo; the other morn in&rsquo;. Well, the way it all happened was
-      this: On a neighboring ranch, over Ventura way, beyond the Lagunita
-      Rancho, owned at that time by Senor Olivas, a rich cattle dealer comes
-      down from &lsquo;Frisco to buy a bunch of beeves. The stock had all been driven
-      up on a mesa near the Olivas ranch house, and for several days the herders
-      had been cuttin&rsquo; out the cows and the young calves from the steers, &lsquo;cause
-      this feller was only goin&rsquo; to buy the steers.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The great herd was bellerin&rsquo; and pawin&rsquo; in a big cloud of dust, through
-      which the vaqueros&mdash;cowboys, you know, lieutenant&mdash;could be seen
-      ridin&rsquo; round and round. Of course roundin&rsquo; up cattle is always more or
-      less excitin&rsquo; work, but this rich chap had come down from &lsquo;Frisco with his
-      saddle bags bulgin&rsquo; out with gold, and this sorta added a mighty sight to
-      the interest of the doin&rsquo;s. Part of the bargain was that the deal was to
-      be for spot cash, all in gold, too, mind you, and it was arranged that the
-      buyer and Senor Olivas were to take their stations at one side of the
-      narrow gate, and every time a steer was driven through that gate a
-      twenty-dollar gold piece was to be tossed into a big bag which Senor
-      Olivas was holdin&rsquo;.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;They do say as how the work continued all day, from early mornin&rsquo; until
-      dark, afore the last blamed steer passed that &lsquo;ere gate, and they claim
-      that there was eighty thousand dollars in the Senor&rsquo;s bag as pay for the
-      day&rsquo;s drive. They say, too, that Joaquin Murietta, disguised, was one of
-      the vaqueros doin&rsquo; the drivin&rsquo;. Anyway that very night old Olivas was
-      waked up mighty abruptly by feelin&rsquo; the cold nose of a revolver shoved
-      against his own nose.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, the long and short of it all was that Senor Olivas and his wife
-      were both gagged and bound hand and foot, while Murietta ransacked the
-      house, found the strong box and carried away every blamed gold coin that
-      Olivas had received for the sale of his steers. The outlaw succeeded in
-      makin&rsquo; his escape into the Tehachapi mountains with his cut-throat gang,
-      and they found a hidin&rsquo; place in the robbers&rsquo; cave that is somewhere
-      hereabouts on the San Antonio Rancho. It sure was as slick a piece of
-      rascality as was ever pulled off in the old lawless days.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; observed Buck Ashley, as he shook his head reflectively, &ldquo;I&rsquo;m
-      assoomin&rsquo; some of the cowboy fellers around here will find that cave one
-      of these days. I&rsquo;ve put in a good many Sundays huntin&rsquo; for it myself.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Just then there was the sound of horses&rsquo; hoofs outside, and a moment later
-      Jack Rover strolled into the store. Over his shoulder was slung the big
-      leather bag for the rancho mails.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hallo, everybody,&rdquo; was his greeting. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m ahead of time Buck, but the
-      stage will be here in five minutes. I saw its dust above the ridge. I
-      hear, lieutenant,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;you&rsquo;re going to stick to the West and be
-      one of us.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Quit the army?&rdquo; exclaimed Tom Baker in surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That is so,&rdquo; replied Munson. &ldquo;California has fairly got hold of me, and I
-      intend to make my home in the West.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then you just stick here, young man,&rdquo; said the sheriff, rising to his
-      feet and extending his hand. &ldquo;California is the pick of the States, and
-      our valley the pick of California. Don&rsquo;t you forget it. We&rsquo;re proud to
-      welcome you as a new resident.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s what I say, too,&rdquo; concurred Buck Ashley, cordially.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson smiled. &ldquo;Well, I don&rsquo;t know if you can put me in the resident class
-      all at once,&rdquo; he observed, diffidently. &ldquo;Guess I&rsquo;ve got to join the cowboy
-      brigade first, if Dick and Jack here will break me in.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Sure thing,&rdquo; assented Jack Hover. &ldquo;You&rsquo;re a good rider now&mdash;for an
-      army man.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;An ex-army man,&rdquo; corrected Willoughby, laughing.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It strikes me we should put you in as postmaster, Munson,&rdquo; suggested the
-      sheriff, a sly gleam of mischief in his eye. &ldquo;Buck Ashley here is growin&rsquo;
-      old.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, but not too old to hold down his job till your tombstone&rsquo;s in the
-      cemetery, Tom Baker,&rdquo; retorted the storekeeper, with a grin. &ldquo;No man takes
-      the Tejon postmastership while I&rsquo;m alive,&rdquo; he added defiantly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m forewarned and won&rsquo;t apply for your job, Buck,&rdquo; laughed Munson. &ldquo;But
-      here comes the stage, so show your spryness, old fellow, by getting us our
-      mail.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0008" id="link2HCH0008"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER VIII&mdash;A Letter from San Quentin
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">B</span>UCK ASHLEY had
-      retired into the partitioned-off section of the store that formed the
-      postoffice, and was busy stamping and sorting out the mail. The scattered
-      loiterers outside crowded into the building expectantly, and the local
-      parliament was in session. Amid the buzz of conversation Willoughby could
-      not but hear his own name mentioned, coupled with that of Marshall
-      Thurston. He understood quite well that all manner of gossip was flying
-      around in regard to the quarrel at the round-up. But he remained stoically
-      indifferent, shut his ears, and leaning against the counter busied himself
-      with an old <i>Saturday Evening Post</i> that had been lying there.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At last the wicket was shoved up with a bang, and those present began to
-      move toward the little aperture through which Buck Ashley proceeded to
-      hand out correspondence and newspapers. One by one the throng melted away.
-      Jack Rover was examining the big bunch of mail for San Antonio Rancho as
-      he stowed it into the letter bag. Munson was opening and gleaning the
-      contents of two or three letters that had come to him from New York. Dick
-      Willoughby continued his reading, unconcerned; Jack would pass over any
-      correspondence for him. Old Tom Baker had not risen from his accustomed
-      seat on an empty box; he had few correspondents, and the mail did not
-      worry him, although he invariably assisted with his presence at its
-      distribution.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      These four were now the only ones in the store besides Buck Ashley, who
-      still remained behind the partition. At last the postmaster appeared,
-      holding in his hand an open letter. His face showed great agitation as he
-      glanced around to take stock of those who might be present.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Say, boys,&rdquo; he whispered in a mysterious manner, as he held up the
-      letter, &ldquo;this is the most dangnation extr&rsquo;ornery thing that has ever
-      happened to me. You&rsquo;re just the bunch of fellers I&rsquo;d like to consult.
-      Close the door, Tom.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What&rsquo;s up, Buck?&rdquo; asked the sheriff as he rose to comply. &ldquo;You look as if
-      you had the ague shakes.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No ague in this here land of California,&rdquo; laughed Jack Rover. &ldquo;Is it a
-      proposal of marriage you&rsquo;ve been getting, Buck?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A derned heap better&rsquo;n that. God &lsquo;lmighty, boys, this may mean millions
-      for all of us. Shoot the bolt, Tom; I&rsquo;ll hand out no more groceries
-      tonight. Come close together, all of you. You read the letter aloud, Dick.
-      My hand&rsquo;s a-tremb-lin&rsquo;, and I can&rsquo;t get the Frenchie&rsquo;s lingo just right.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The Frenchie?&rdquo; echoed Tom Baker in puzzled surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s a letter from Pierre Luzon,&rdquo; explained Buck.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good God!&rdquo; The sheriff was now as deeply stirred as his old crony.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The bandit scout you were telling us about the other morning?&rdquo; exclaimed
-      Jack Rover, also fired with excitement.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I thought that fellow was in San Quentin for life.&rdquo; remarked Munson,
-      composedly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Wal, and ain&rsquo;t this letter from San Quentin?&rdquo; retorted Buck. &ldquo;See the
-      headin&rsquo;. But Dick&rsquo;ll read it aloud. I feel clean knocked out.&rdquo; And the old
-      man sank back on his chair behind the counter.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The four others were now clustered around Dick Willoughby. The latter,
-      deputized to do the reading, had nonchalantly taken the epistle from Buck
-      Ashley&rsquo;s trembling hand. While the others were speaking he had bestowed a
-      preliminary glance, and from his lips there escaped a murmur of surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great Caesar!&rdquo; As he uttered the ejaculation Dick sat up, keenly alert.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, what&rsquo;s it all about?&rdquo; inquired Munson, by this time the only cool
-      man in the bunch.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Read, read!&rdquo; cried the storekeeper hoarsely.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick Willoughby began:
-    </p>
-    <blockquote>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mr. Buck Ashley, Storekeeper, Tejon, California.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;If God in His goodness permits this letter to come to your hands,
-      remember it is from old Pierre, the Frenchman, who used to be about your
-      store sometimes a half a day at a time, smoking his pipe. You never knew
-      much about me or where I lived. But I will tell you.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I am an old man now&mdash;very old. I was born in the South of France,
-      came to this country in the &lsquo;40&rsquo;. and entered into the service of Joaquin
-      Murietta, who was one great man, but a big bandit. Peace to his soul!
-      Well, he was good to me, and I was faithful to him, taking care of the
-      cave, the big grotto, the cavern among the Tehachapi mountains where he
-      many times hid from the sheriff&rsquo;s posse, and also, where he brought all
-      his gold to stack up and keep from everybody.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You also know Don Manuel, him whom the people call White Wolf. Well, once
-      when a boy, Don Manuel he save Marietta&rsquo;s life from the sheriff by helping
-      him to escape from one close place. Murietta was very grateful, and one
-      day he bring the boy to the grotto cave, and there I see him and like him
-      very much. That was while Murietta still lived.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Afterward when the little boy grow up and was one man, and turned bitter
-      against the gringos because they wrong his sister, Senorita Rosetta, and
-      his old father and mother die of grief, he say to me, &lsquo;I will become a
-      bandit like Joaquin Murietta.&rsquo; He came to the cavern one night and tell me
-      and say, &lsquo;You be my servant.&rsquo; So I say, &lsquo;All right,&rsquo; because Don Manuel
-      one brave man.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So that night of the great stage robbery over near Lake of Tulare, I hold
-      horses. That&rsquo;s all I do, but all the same they put me in this horrid
-      prison, and here I am. The other two men, Felix Vasquez and Fox Cassidy,
-      were shot by the posse and I have been told by a Portugee in the jail here
-      about the White Wolf being killed away north in Seattle, and he is no
-      more.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don Manuel de Valencia, he was one great man. Peace to his soul!
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I am alone. I want to get away from this terrible prison. I have promised
-      one of my guards&mdash;a good Frenchman who comes from my town in France&mdash;$5,000
-      in gold if he can secretly get this letter into postoffice to you and get
-      me away from this living hell. You do this and I show you the cavern.
-      Nobody knows where it is but me.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Come and get me, please, my good Mr. Ashley, come, and may the spirit of
-      the Virgin Mary reward you. All I say here is truth. You come get me and I
-      show you the secret grotto. I show you the great stacks of gold hidden by
-      Joaquin Murietta and Don Manuel. Also the sand-bar in the hidden stream
-      where Guadalupe gathered up much gold.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I beg and pray you to keep what I say in this letter secret. I am old and
-      weak and sick. Come and get me.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Obedient servant,
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Pierre Luzon.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-</blockquote>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ain&rsquo;t that just one hell of a letter, boys?&rdquo; exclaimed Buck Ashley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Gospel truth, every word,&rdquo; cried Tom Baker, emphatically.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It certainly reads like the truth,&rdquo; concurred Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then what are we going to do about it?&rdquo; asked Jack Rover.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick Willoughby spoke now with the quiet and quick decision that marks the
-      leader of men:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What we will do is this. We five are partners in this secret, and, if
-      Buck is willing, we&rsquo;ll play the game together for all it is worth. To
-      begin with, we&rsquo;ll put up one hundred dollars apiece to send Tom Baker to
-      Sacramento. He will try to get a pardon or a parole for Pierre Luzon.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That can be managed,&rdquo; assented the sheriff. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve got a political pull,
-      you know, boys.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; continued Dick, &ldquo;we&rsquo;ll bring old Pierre here and we&rsquo;ll get from
-      him the information he promises about the secret grotto.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not forgetting Guadalupe&rsquo;s placer mine,&rdquo; interjected Jack Rover.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Everything will be attended to in its turn,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;One thing at
-      a time, and the first thing to be done is to get the Frenchman out of San
-      Quentin. When can you start, Tom?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The day after tomorrow.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, we&rsquo;ll have the cash ready for you by tomorrow night. You must bring
-      Pierre Luzon here without anyone else besides ourselves knowing his name
-      or getting next to him.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll fix up a cot for him in my own room behind the store,&rdquo; suggested
-      Buck Ashley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s a good plan,&rdquo; assented Dick. &ldquo;When the Frenchman&rsquo;s here, it will
-      be time then to discuss our next move. Meanwhile, it&rsquo;s an honorable
-      promise of secrecy all round, and to begin with I give my word.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      While speaking the last words, Dick solemnly raised his hand, and each man
-      in turn followed his example as he gave the pledge required.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0009" id="link2HCH0009"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER IX&mdash;Tia Teresa
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>EN days had passed
-      and the count of the stock on San Antonio Rancho had been completed, every
-      canyon searched, the last wandering maverick roped and branded, the number
-      of fat beeves accurately estimated. Three members of the Los Angeles
-      syndicate had arrived in a big automobile and remained over night at the
-      ranch house. Most of the time they had been closeted with Ben Thurston in
-      his office, and had finally taken their departure without exchanging a
-      word with anyone else on the rancho. Nobody knew whether the deal had gone
-      through or not, but rumor said that, after some disagreement on the first
-      day, terms had been arranged next morning.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick Willoughby, although he discussed the question with no one, made his
-      own inferences. The very fact that the visitors had not made any
-      inspection of the property proved that they already knew it thoroughly
-      well. The counting of the cattle and horses had been the final factor in
-      the negotiations, and the figures had enabled the deal to advance a
-      further stage toward completion. Ben Thurston might fool himself about
-      easy option money put up only to be forfeited, but Dick Willoughby was not
-      fooled. The days of closer settlement in California had come, and these
-      Los Angeles men were the most enterprising and skilful subdividers in the
-      West. They dealt only in big propositions, and after mopping up all the
-      available tracts in the southern end of the State, were extending their
-      operations northward. This vast so-called &ldquo;Spanish grant,&rdquo; an empire in
-      itself, had no doubt for several years been in their eye, and now they
-      were prepared to handle the San Antonio Rancho with the lavish expenditure
-      it deserved and required to transform the great sweep of cattle range&mdash;rich
-      agricultural land, as the luxuriant native grasses showed&mdash;into
-      smiling orchards and alfalfa farms, each provided with the irrigation
-      water which intelligent conservation would ensure in abundance.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick knew in his heart that the era of transformation had at last come,
-      that the roaming herds were to be pushed back into regions more remote,
-      that homes and schoolhouses and garden cities would soon be dotting the
-      landscape, that the passing of Ben Thurston, the cattle king, and of his
-      hard-riding, devil-may-care vaqueros was at hand.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Yet Thurston spoke no word&mdash;in fact, he seemed to be more grouchy and
-      taciturn than ever. Not even his son Marshall was in his confidence, for
-      the young man was seldom with his father, preferring to spend his time in
-      the drinking saloons and dance halls of Bakersfield, where the activity of
-      oil-developing operations attracted all sorts and conditions of men, among
-      whom the dissipated decadent had readily found friends to his liking.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Ben Thurston who had gone the pace himself in his early days, did not seek
-      to interfere with his son&rsquo;s pursuit of pleasures, but he had very promptly
-      squelched any interference from Marshall with his own business operations.
-      On the evening of the quarrel with Dick Willoughby at the round-up,
-      Marshall had attempted to tell his father about the affair and suggest
-      Dick&rsquo;s dismissal. But the old man had at once silenced him by saying:
-      &ldquo;Why, damn you! I brought you out to this country to enjoy yourself and
-      not to get into trouble. So far as Willoughby is concerned, I can&rsquo;t afford
-      to quarrel with him. He is my foreman, and I am right in the midst of a
-      big business transaction. So just you mind your own business, my boy, and
-      leave him alone.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Accordingly, Marshall Thurston, a coward at heart, had not sought to
-      pursue the feud singlehanded, and Dick had seen but little of him during
-      the rest of the mustering work. When they did happen to meet, it was a
-      case of a black scowl of hate from the one and a contemptuous smile of
-      indifference from the other. And so the days had passed until the task was
-      finished.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      It was the Sunday morning that had been fixed for the visit to the home of
-      Mr. Ricardo Robles, when the cattle foreman could at last conscientiously
-      take a day of recreation. With the first break of dawn he and Munson were
-      in the saddle, for they had been invited to breakfast at La Siesta before
-      starting with the young ladies on the ride through the oak forest.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The visitors arrived early, but not too early for their hostesses. Grace
-      and Merle were waiting to welcome them in the portico, looking more
-      charming than ever in their neat riding suits of khaki.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We saw you cross the bridge,&rdquo; declared Grace, &ldquo;and mother has gone in to
-      order breakfast to be served. You must be hungry after your early start.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, Sing Ling didn&rsquo;t let us go without a cup of coffee,&rdquo; laughed Dick.
-      &ldquo;But I fancy we&rsquo;ll do full justice, all right, to the bountiful fare of La
-      Siesta.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      It proved to be a delightful meal in every way, the viands seasoned with
-      gay repartee and laughter. A full hour had sped before Dick recalled the
-      real object of the day&rsquo;s excursion.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We usually walk to Mr. Robles&rsquo; place,&rdquo; remarked Merle. &ldquo;It is only a mile
-      or so by the short cuts up the hill, but by the winding road it is very
-      much longer. So we ordered our ponies.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I see,&rdquo; smiled Munson, &ldquo;to prolong the pleasure of our foursome among the
-      oaks.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not at all, sir,&rdquo; retorted Grace. &ldquo;The climb on foot is a stiff one, and
-      we knew that you must be out of condition from the lazy life you are
-      living.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I am only waiting for Willoughby to give me a cowboy&rsquo;s job,&rdquo; replied the
-      ex-lieutenant.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know if there will be any cowboy jobs going,&rdquo; observed
-      Willoughby. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s my belief that San Antonio Rancho is sold and is going
-      to be broken up into small holdings.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, what a pity!&rdquo; exclaimed Merle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;From one point of view, perhaps,&rdquo; answered Dick. &ldquo;But from a hundred
-      other points of view, what a blessing! There will be a dozen happy homes
-      for every steer the range now feeds!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But La Siesta will remain just as it is,&rdquo; cried Grace.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That will be all right,&rdquo; replied Dick, gallantly, &ldquo;It&rsquo;s already a happy
-      home.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The ladies smiled pleasantly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then this will mean the elimination of Mr. Ben Thurston,&rdquo; observed Mrs.
-      Darlington.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The greatest blessing of all,&rdquo; declared Merle, clapping her hands. &ldquo;You
-      see, I am already converted to the change, Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo; she added
-      merrily.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But what about my job?&rdquo; asked Munson in mock dolefulness.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Consult Mr. Robles,&rdquo; laughed Grace. &ldquo;He may take pity on you, and find
-      you a place as handy man on his estate.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      In merry mood they all sallied forth. The saddle horses were waiting, and
-      standing beside them was an elderly Spanish woman.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Tia Teresa, Mr. Munson,&rdquo; said Mrs. Darlington by way of introduction.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson had often enough heard the name, and in answer to an inquiry,
-      Willoughby had told him that the old dame had been the personal attendant
-      of the two young ladies ever since they could remember. Tia or Aunt Teresa
-      was now more a friend of the family than a servant of the house, and,
-      taking her hand in salutation, Munson treated her with the affable
-      courtesy that was her due.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I am glad to make your acquaintance,&rdquo; he said, raising his hat.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Tia Teresa looked pleased. Despite her seventy years, she was a buxom and
-      splendidly preserved woman, and there was still the flash of youthfulness
-      in her big dark eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You will look after my little girls,&rdquo; she said, as she gathered together
-      the folds of her black lace mantilla. &ldquo;By rights I should be coming with
-      you, too,&rdquo; she added, in the manner of a true Spanish duenna.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You forget that we are home again&mdash;in free America,&rdquo; laughed Merle
-      as she settled herself in the saddle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Too free, I sometimes think,&rdquo; rejoined Tia Teresa. &ldquo;But there is safety
-      in four,&rdquo; she added, turning with a smile to Mrs. Darlington.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And as the young folks rode away she waved them a pleasant <i>adios</i>.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0010" id="link2HCH0010"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER X&mdash;The Home of the Recluse
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span>T a gentle pace
-      they wound their way through the forest of magnificent old oaks.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      As for Munson, riding by Grace Darlington&rsquo;s side, the miles were the
-      shortest he had ever before traversed. It seemed only a few minutes before
-      the red tiled roof and towers of a house built in the California Mission
-      style were gleaming through the trees only a short distance ahead.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Great oaken doors closed the arched gateway, but at the clatter of hoofs
-      and the sound of voices, a little peep-hole wicket was withdrawn. The
-      inspection by unseen eyes apparently was satisfactory, for a moment later
-      a postern was opened, and two men, Mexicans obviously by their garb and
-      deferential manner, emerged to take and lead away the horses. Within the
-      patio stood Senor Robles, his usually grave face lighted by a smile of
-      cordial welcome.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Let me tell you, young men,&rdquo; he said while shaking hands, &ldquo;that while
-      Grace and Merle are quite at home here, you are the very first strangers
-      who have passed through my portals.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Strangers no longer then,&rdquo; said Dick, good-naturedly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Precisely,&rdquo; replied Mr. Robles, &ldquo;or you would not be here. But I foresee
-      that all of us are going to be very close friends. Isn&rsquo;t that so, Grace,
-      my dear?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m sure I cannot say,&rdquo; replied Grace, with a smile of demure innocence
-      toward Mr. Munson. Then she turned to Mr. Robles with a roguish twinkle in
-      her eye. &ldquo;But I&rsquo;ve news for you. Mr. Munson has resigned from the army and
-      is looking for a job.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Both facts are already known to me,&rdquo; answered Robles, smiling.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh,&rdquo; exclaimed Grace, &ldquo;one can never surprise you, Mr. Robles. Although
-      you live the life of a hermit, you seem to be always the first to learn
-      everything that is going on.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A hermit, my dear, need not necessarily be out of touch with the world,&rdquo;
-       replied Robles, playfully pinching her ear. &ldquo;And now, Mr. Willoughby, you
-      came specially to see my pictures. Lead the way, Merle. Gentlemen, I say
-      again&mdash;welcome to my mountain home.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      They lingered awhile in the patio to admire the marble columns of the
-      cloister that ran all around, the playing fountains at each of the four
-      comers, with groups of symbolical statuary, the wealth of beautiful shrubs
-      and flowers. On the side opposite to the gateway rose a tall tower,
-      fashioned like the campanile of an Old Mission and crowned with bright red
-      tiles.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We shall ascend there later on,&rdquo; remarked Mr. Robles, following Dick&rsquo;s
-      upward glance.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Then they passed through the wide-opened French window into the living
-      rooms.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The first was a great apartment that occupied one entire side of the
-      building. In the centre was a large globe of the world. Here and there
-      were glass cases displaying manuscripts and illuminated missals. Along the
-      walls were finely-carved bookcases filled with several thousands of
-      volumes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;When you have the leisure you can come and browse here,&rdquo; said the host,
-      addressing both young men. &ldquo;Meanwhile you may care to look at the bronzes
-      and statuary&rdquo;&mdash;this with a sweep of the hand that indicated the art
-      treasures distributed about the apartment.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      On the side of the house beneath the tower were the dining room and the
-      billiard and smoking room. Passing through these, the visitors came to the
-      picture gallery, a room corresponding in size to the library. Here were
-      hung treasures of the painter&rsquo;s art, masterpieces signed by names that are
-      immortal. These, as their owner again explained, had been acquired by him
-      during several prolonged visits to Europe.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Count this just as a preliminary survey, Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo; he said
-      finally. &ldquo;Then come again. There are guest chambers on either side of the
-      gateway, and one of these will always be at your disposal when I am at
-      home. I extend the same invitation to you, Mr. Munson.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My word, but you may feel honored,&rdquo; exclaimed Grace, in unconcealed
-      amazement.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;When I open my gates, I open my heart as well,&rdquo; said Mr. Robles, with a
-      courtly little bow to his new friends.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Next they ascended the tower. Its first floor, above the living rooms, was
-      a delightful den filled with curios of all kinds. From this sprang a
-      winding iron staircase, up which Mr. Robles led the way.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The upper chamber, extending on all sides some distance beyond the
-      supporting tower, proved larger than might have been expected. Its one
-      conspicuous article of furniture was a great terrestrial telescope. The
-      sliding panels of glass which formed a complete window all around the room
-      showed that the instrument could be used without obstruction in any
-      direction.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Here a Mexican boy was on duty. When the visitors entered, his hand was
-      resting on the telescope. A bright red sash around his waist imparted a
-      touch of picturesqueness to his costume. He was perhaps only twelve or
-      thirteen years of age, but wonderfully keen and alert-looking for his
-      years. At a glance from his master, the youngster took his departure,
-      closing the door behind him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Gentlemen,&rdquo; remarked Mr. Robles, when they were again alone, &ldquo;perhaps
-      before I brought you here I should have exacted the promise I am now going
-      to ask you to make. Grace and Merle know that I am a recluse and wish to
-      live undisturbed by curiosity-mongers or tittle-tattlers. I want nobody
-      but the friends I deliberately choose to know about my habits of living or
-      the contents of my home. Only in this way can I hope to be left alone.
-      Therefore, please give me your word, Mr. Willoughby and Lieutenant Munson,
-      that you will not speak with any outsider about the things I am showing
-      you today.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The promise was instantly given and sealed by a hearty hand clasp.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Now,&rdquo; resumed the host in lighter tone, &ldquo;perhaps you would like to view
-      the landscape. I may explain that I had this observatory, as I call it,
-      specially built and equipped so that I could sweep the valley from end to
-      end. For example, I saw you two young men riding along the road this
-      morning,&rdquo; he went on, with a smile. &ldquo;I saw one of you alight, about twelve
-      miles from here&mdash;it was you, lieutenant&mdash;and tighten the girths
-      of your saddle.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great Scott!&rdquo; murmured Munson, in half-incredulous surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Test the glass for yourself,&rdquo; continued Robles, as, placing one eye at
-      the lens, he adjusted the instrument. &ldquo;Look&rdquo;&mdash;and he stepped back,
-      motioning Munson to approach.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson peeped through the long tube and there came from his lips a cry of
-      mingled delight and amazement.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dick, Dick, there&rsquo;s the store as large as life&mdash;Buck Ashley standing
-      at the door and lighting a cigar. Geewhizz, and it must be twenty miles
-      away.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He rose erect and made room for Dick. The latter gazed in silence for a
-      few moments. When he turned to Mr. Robles he said:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s really wonderful&mdash;it is the most wonderful glass I ever looked
-      through.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      There was the glimmer of an exultant smile on the face of Ricardo Robles.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I saw you at the round-up across the valley the other day,&rdquo; he remarked.
-      &ldquo;You were much nearer to me than is the store. And while I do not invite
-      any confidence, Mr. Willoughby, you certainly engaged in a very spirited
-      conversation, to say the least, with young Marshall Thurston. Indeed, I
-      half expected to see you come to blows.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What was that?&rdquo; asked Merle in some trepidation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Willoughby had reddened.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Nothing of consequence,&rdquo; he responded, almost curtly. &ldquo;I had to tell the
-      young cub to mind his own business. That was all.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You certainly have the whole valley under observation,&rdquo; remarked Munson,
-      considerately diverting the conversation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; assented Mr. Robles, with an almost grim smile of satisfaction.
-      &ldquo;The telescope teaches one not merely to observe, but to reason from the
-      facts observed. Tia Teresa evidently thought that she should have come
-      along today to play duenna, eh, Merle?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t say you guessed that?&rdquo; exclaimed Merle in great astonishment.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guessed it! I knew it when she raised her protesting finger.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You are a magician, Mr. Robles,&rdquo; cried Grace.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, only a logician,&rdquo; was the sententious rejoinder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Please let me peep at our garden,&rdquo; asked Merle. &ldquo;I wonder if mother is
-      among her roses.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Without a word Robles swung round the instrument on its pivot and changed
-      the focus.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s about right,&rdquo; he said, stepping back. &ldquo;There is no one out of
-      doors at present. Move the glass slightly and you can see over the entire
-      garden.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Each girl in turn made a prolonged scrutiny; they were enchanted with the
-      clearness and marvellous detail of the picture.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Henceforth we&rsquo;ll have to be on our best behavior, Dick,&rdquo; laughed Munson,
-      as they turned toward the winding stairway. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ve got to remember Mr.
-      Robles has a constant eye on us.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Perhaps I&rsquo;ve had you under observation quite a while,&rdquo; laughed the senor,
-      tapping the young fellow on the shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Then he threw open the door, and, with a slight bow and extended hand,
-      motioned to his visitors to descend. At the foot of the narrow, winding
-      staircase they found the Mexican youth standing on guard. He bowed low as
-      the ladies passed, and when Mr. Robles followed last of all, saluted, and
-      then immediately returned to the chamber above, again without a single
-      word of instruction from his master. Munson and Willoughby exchanged
-      meaning looks; obviously a well-disciplined outlook was kept from the
-      observatory all the time, as if from the conning-tower of a battleship.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Again the party was in the patio. Mr. Robles turned to Willoughby.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I hope Grace and Merle have explained to you that at present I do not
-      entertain. My own fare is of the simplest.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mother is to have luncheon ready at one,&rdquo; interposed Grace. &ldquo;I caught the
-      broiled trout myself this morning.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You caught them ready broiled, eh?&rdquo; laughed Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, you know what I mean,&rdquo; rejoined Grace, with a pretty little <i>moue</i>.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Broiled trout!&rdquo; exclaimed Dick, appreciatively. &ldquo;Then I think we&rsquo;ll be
-      hurrying down the hill, senor.&rdquo; He had recognized with intuitive courtesy
-      that the interview was at an end.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Is he not delightful?&rdquo; asked Merle, as their horses started off at a
-      walk. &ldquo;And you would never guess how sweet and kind he can be.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t doubt it,&rdquo; assented Willoughby. &ldquo;A polished gentleman, but a man
-      of mystery, isn&rsquo;t he?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not when you come to know him. A recluse always has his little
-      idiosyncrasies.&rdquo; As she spoke, she set her pony at a canter down the
-      gentle incline.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      After luncheon, Dick found himself tête-à-tête with Mrs. Darlington in the
-      music room. The mystery attaching to the personality of the recluse was
-      still uppermost in his mind. But for the present the music claimed his
-      attention.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle had seated herself at the grand piano and was softly fingering the
-      keys, striking a chord here and there, until finally she drifted into
-      Chopin&rsquo;s Fifth Nocturne. There was something almost divine in her
-      interpretation. The music fairly rippled from her deft fingers, as they
-      glided on from one beautiful cadence to another until at last, note by
-      note, as if sobbing a reluctant adieu, the melody died away.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Both the visitors were generous in their tributes of congratulation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Thank you,&rdquo; said Merle, as she arose from the piano and proceeded to
-      unfasten the clasps of a violin case.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What now?&rdquo; exclaimed Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I am not the performer; I am merely the accompanist,&rdquo; and she held
-      out a beautiful old violin to Grace. As Merle sounded a key on the piano,
-      Grace touched the strings of the Stradivarius. When all was ready she
-      tenderly caressed the violin with her chin, and, her bow sweeping across
-      the instrument, Beethoven&rsquo;s Moonlight Sonata trembled from the strings, in
-      soft and plaintive melody, filling the room with echoing and re-echoing
-      notes of sweetness, while Merle&rsquo;s accompanying notes lent support, in
-      blending harmony, to the rich cadences.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Splendid! magnificent!&rdquo; exclaimed the young men in unison.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson was now called upon to sing, and Dick felt himself at full liberty
-      to converse with Mrs. Darlington. He broached the subject that had been
-      occupying his thoughts.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What is known of Senor Ricardo Robles?&rdquo; he enquired. &ldquo;Have you been long
-      acquainted?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I have known him for many, many years,&rdquo; replied Mrs. Darlington. &ldquo;We
-      used to be next door neighbors in Los Angeles. That was twenty years ago.
-      Then we returned to England&mdash;Mr. Darlington had fallen heir to the
-      family estates. Mr. Robles used to visit us off and on. He is, as you have
-      seen, very fond of Grace&rdquo;&mdash;she paused a moment, then went on&mdash;&ldquo;and
-      of my adopted daughter Merle as well. Merle, you know, was the child of my
-      dearest girl friend who died a year after her baby was born.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, Merle has told me this.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, six years ago my dear husband died, and it was Mr. Robles who
-      persuaded me to return to California. He selected this beautiful ranch for
-      us, near to his own home. And we have all been so happy here at La
-      Siesta.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mr. Robles is certainly a wonderful man, with all those art treasures
-      around him.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He has princely tastes and princely wealth as well&mdash;this you will
-      have seen for yourself today. He travels a great deal abroad, sometimes
-      for a whole year at a time, and then returns quietly to his hermitage. He
-      has taken a great fancy to you, Mr. Willoughby. You are lucky in gaining
-      the friendship of such a man.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I think I&rsquo;ll like him, too&mdash;when I know him better,&rdquo; replied
-      Willoughby, with cautious reserve.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0011" id="link2HCH0011"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XI&mdash;A Rejected Suitor
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>N Dick
-      Willoughby&rsquo;s presence Marshall Thurston contented himself with sullen
-      looks. But beyond his sight and hearing he spoke truculently of what he
-      was going to do some day to get level with &ldquo;the hired hand who had had the
-      infernal insolence to call him down in public.&rdquo; So all the little world on
-      the rancho knew, or at least believed, that a bitter feud was in progress.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Two or three of the cowboys fostered young Marshall&rsquo;s feelings of
-      animosity, partly out of sheer devilment, partly because they deemed it
-      good policy to keep in the good graces of the heir to the rancho.
-      Moreover, so long as old Ben Thurston knew nothing about it, they were
-      always willing to break a bottle with the dissipated spendthrift, not only
-      because good liquor was not to be despised at any time, but also for the
-      sake of the amusement afforded by Marshall, in his cups, with his stories
-      of fast life in New York and his apparently inexhaustible fund of highly
-      spiced anecdotes. Even his braggart threats against Willoughby had an
-      element of fun.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Why don&rsquo;t you cut him out with the girl?&rdquo; one of his boon companions had
-      suggested on an occasion of this kind.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;By gad, I will,&rdquo; Marshall had responded with vehemence. &ldquo;You just watch
-      me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Thenceforward this thought was uppermost in his alcohol-sodden brain.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Marshall Thurston had met Mrs. Darlington and her daughter on several
-      occasions, but, although he had been formally introduced, he had never
-      been invited to call at La Siesta. Nor up to the present had he felt any
-      inducement to take the initiative. Like clings to like, and these people
-      were not of his kind&mdash;in the presence of pure and refined womanhood
-      the human toad becomes uncomfortably conscious of his own loathsomeness.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But now there was a valid reason to egg him on. He would show Dick
-      Willoughby who was who on the San Antonio Rancho. If the heir to all those
-      broad acres chose to pay court to Merle Farnsworth, the girl would only be
-      too glad to jump at him and his millions. He would tell her, too, that
-      Willoughby was going to be fired and that the fellow was not worth a
-      moment&rsquo;s consideration.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Such was his mood one afternoon when, his motor car being in the repair
-      shop, he had not made his usual trip to Bakersfield. &ldquo;Yes, he would ride
-      over that very day to La Siesta;&rdquo; and he proceeded to fortify the resolve
-      by opening a bottle of champagne in the solitary seclusion of his den.
-      After gulping down the wine he felt brave enough to face the devil
-      himself. Yet, when mounted on his horse, he still evinced sufficient
-      discretion to make a wide detour lest Willoughby should catch sight of him
-      and divine his intentions.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      As he rode along young Thurston nursed his wrath to keep it warm. At the
-      same time the desire to possess the girl for her own sake began to inflame
-      his imagination. Unscrupulous passion had been bred in the very bone of
-      this worthless degenerate. Just as his father, Ben Thurston, had thirty
-      years before trampled on the virtue of the young Spanish beauty, Senorita
-      Rosetta, the sister of Don Manuel, so now was the son hatching in his
-      brain a foul plot of spoliation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll get even with Willoughby, by God, in the very way that will hurt his
-      pride the most. Women!&mdash;pshaw, they&rsquo;re all alike. And she&rsquo;s a
-      peacherino all right&mdash;those flashing dark eyes&mdash;she sure looks
-      good to me.&rdquo; This was now the tenor of his musing as his pony cantered up
-      the slope to La Siesta.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      He advanced on foot to the portico with a swagger and a smile, and there,
-      as luck would have it, he found Merle seated in a rocker, reading, and
-      alone. She rose with quiet courtesy and returned his greeting.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I am sorry,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;mother is not at home. She and my sister Grace
-      have driven over to the dairy. We have a model dairy, you know, on La
-      Siesta,&rdquo; she went on, anxious to make conversation that would not prove
-      embarrassing. For already she divined some particular object in the young
-      man&rsquo;s visit, knowing as she did that he and Willoughby had recently
-      exchanged angry words.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Won&rsquo;t you show me your famous rose gardens?&rdquo; asked Thurston, boldly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;With pleasure,&rdquo; she replied, assenting with a sweet smile of politeness,
-      although there was sore reluctance in her heart, as she stepped from under
-      the portico.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But, unknown to herself, she did not go unattended, for as Merle and her
-      visitor passed round the house and through the shrubberies there glided
-      after them the figure of a woman, clothed in black, wearing over her head
-      and shoulders a Spanish mantilla. It was Tia Teresa, the ever watchful
-      duenna.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The roses of La Siesta, as Marshall Thurston had said, were indeed famous.
-      Here were all the finest varieties, growing in the perfection to which
-      only care and scientific skill applied under ideal climatic conditions can
-      attain. Merle was glad to point out the different blooms and give them
-      their names&mdash;the topic was certainly an innocuous one, and she smiled
-      at the thought as they strolled along. She was vaguely wondering, too,
-      whether Dick Willoughby would approve even this slight measure of courtesy
-      toward the visitor to her home. Although she had as yet not the remotest
-      conception that the quarrel at the round-up had been in any way connected
-      with her name, she knew that the two young men were at daggers drawn, and
-      toward Dick there was the instinctive loyalty in her heart that prompted
-      her to count his enemies as her enemies, his friends as her friends.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The young girl was too unversed in the ways of the world to notice that
-      Marshall Thurston was under the influence of wine. He was too experienced
-      a toper to show any signs of unsteadiness on his feet, but all the same
-      there was undoubted tipsiness in his leering side-glances and occasional
-      slurring of his words. Of this Merle in her maidenly innocence was
-      supremely unconscious, nor did she dream that the very sparkle of her eyes
-      was completing the intoxication of wine fumes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Once she cast a look up the hill and asked herself whether the wizard of
-      the red-tiled tower had his spy-glass on La Siesta and was even then
-      quietly surveying the scene in the gardens. The thought made her
-      uncomfortable; she felt sure that her kind friend, Mr. Robles, would not
-      look with favor on her condescending to show even the slightest attention
-      to one whose evil ways of living were notorious.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Suddenly she came to a halt, close beside a little clump of oleander trees
-      laden with rich blossoms.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I am sorry I must leave you now,&rdquo; she said, quite abruptly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Leave me?&rdquo; stammered Thurston. &ldquo;What for?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have other things to attend to,&rdquo; she replied.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I say, Miss Farnsworth&rdquo;&mdash;the inebriate as he spoke made a
-      gesture of appeal&mdash;&ldquo;I hope you are not angry with me. If that
-      scalawag of a fellow Willoughby told you I said anything disrespectful of
-      you the other day, he is a demed liar&mdash;that&rsquo;s what he is, a derned
-      liar, and a poor penniless beggar as well, whom my father&rsquo;s going to fire
-      off the ranch.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle stood speechless. She stepped back when Thurston advanced with
-      outstretched hands.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The truth of the whole matter is,&rdquo; he rambled on, with growing
-      incoherence, &ldquo;I am madly in love with you myself. That&rsquo;s what I am, and
-      I&rsquo;m going to have you, too.&rdquo; And he grabbed her fiercely and attempted to
-      draw her to him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle screamed both in fear and in repulsion as she tried to push him
-      away.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Just then, from among the oleanders, rushed Tia Teresa. The old duenna
-      came like a cyclone. Her eyes blazed with anger. Grasping the young
-      libertine by the collar of his coat, she pulled him madly from the now
-      half-fainting girl. Then, whirling him around, she rushed him, with the
-      strength and ferocity of a tigress defending her whelps, down the
-      gravelled path and flung him bodily over the low retaining wall along the
-      embankment that separated the rose gardens from the public road. She spat
-      upon his prostrate figure below and rained down on him a torrent of
-      imprecations in the Spanish tongue.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      It was all over in one brief minute. When young Thurston picked himself
-      up, it was to see the aged fury half-leading, half-carrying Merle away in
-      the direction of the house.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The hell cat,&rdquo; he murmured.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Then he brushed the dirt from his coat and straightened out his tumbled
-      appearance as best he could. His horse was tied to the gate post a hundred
-      yards along the road. He slunk toward it, climbed into the saddle, and
-      rode slowly away in the falling twilight. He had been thoroughly sobered
-      by the incident, yet continued somewhat dazed, for his horse was headed
-      toward the woods and hills and not in the direction of home.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0012" id="link2HCH0012"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XII&mdash;The Sped Bullet
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">M</span>EANWHILE events
-      had been happening in the conning tower high up among the hills. The
-      Mexican boy on duty had observed the lone rider approaching the gateway at
-      La Siesta, and for a brief few moments had put the figure under
-      observation by the telescope. He had then sprung alertly erect and pressed
-      a button on the wall. Mr. Robles had quickly responded to the summons, and
-      it was he who had had his eye to the lens during the scene in the rose
-      garden which had terminated in the ignominious expulsion of young Thurston
-      at the hands of the infuriated duenna.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      When the recluse at last withdrew his gaze, his hands were clenched and he
-      stood absolutely rigid in the tenseness of his indignation. He had seen
-      Merle&rsquo;s insultor ride toward the hills and Merle herself taken indoors
-      under Tia Teresa&rsquo;s protecting care. For almost a minute the storm of rage
-      held him, then he relaxed and his look changed to one of terrible
-      determination. He seized a rifle that was hanging on one of the walls and
-      swiftly departed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At the arched gateway he spoke a few words to the two retainers on guard,
-      and when he passed through the postern one of them, also equipped with a
-      rifle, followed. Taking a cross-cut from the high road, together they
-      descended the wooded hillside.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      In a little canyon just below the forest Dick Willoughby was rounding up a
-      bunch of vagrant steers. He was alone, riding at a walking pace, driving a
-      dozen or more beasts in front of him, and keeping an eye among the
-      brushwood searching for more.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      On the roadway through the woods Marshall Thurston ambled along. He was a
-      poor and awkward rider at all times, the discreetly-veiled jest of the
-      nimble cowboys, to whom reins, saddle, and spurs were all as second
-      nature. Now, when he imagined himself free from observation, he did not
-      take pains to display even a semblance of horsemanship and, with bridle
-      dropped, steadied himself by a grip on the saddle horn.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      In her bedroom Merle had soon recovered from her distress of mind. Dashing
-      the tears from her eyes, she had enjoined Tia Teresa to say nothing to
-      anyone about the unpleasant incident. Mrs. Darlington would be angered and
-      would certainly tell Mr. Robles, while if the story ever reached Dick&rsquo;s
-      ears there could be no saying what further trouble might not ensue&mdash;a
-      horse-whipping at least, with jeopardy to Dick&rsquo;s position at the rancho
-      and embitterment of an already dangerous quarrel. So Tia Teresa, to
-      complete the comforting process, had assented to secrecy.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      On the pathway down through the forest the Mexican, now in advance,
-      uttered a low &ldquo;hist,&rdquo; halted, and held out a warning hand toward his
-      master. The gaze of both was now fixed in the same direction. Below them
-      could be seen the figure of the horseman coming around a bend in the
-      roadway. The Mexican raised his rifle to the shoulder, but the hand of
-      Robles detained him. The time was not yet&mdash;the distance was too great
-      in view of the obstructing timber.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Robles turned away and rested an arm against a tree trunk. His eyes were
-      downcast; for the moment his mind was far away. He saw once again the
-      little cemetery on the hill, with the marble cross inscribed &ldquo;Hermana,&rdquo;
-       and the other gravestone at the head of the twin mounds that marked the
-      resting place of his parents whose hearts had been broken by Rosetta&rsquo;s
-      tragic end. The fingers of the man who had long years ago sworn the
-      vendetta worked nervously, closing and unclosing themselves.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The rider was nearer now, in a higher loop of the road where the trees
-      were more scattered than below. Merle, drowsy from the reaction of her
-      emotions, had dropped off asleep on her sofa. Tia Teresa had returned to
-      the portico, to make sure that the interloper had taken himself off for
-      good and would not return. In the little canyon Dick Willoughby was
-      quietly riding behind his accumulating drove of cattle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Suddenly a shot from among the woods rang through the air. Tia Teresa
-      heard it, and after the start of first surprise, into her eyes came the
-      light of swift comprehension and her whole face was illumed by fierce
-      vindictive joy. &ldquo;At last, at last,&rdquo; she murmured, &ldquo;vengeance begins.&rdquo; And
-      in the fervor of her triumph she threw up her extended arms, as if to give
-      benediction to a righteous deed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick also heard the sharp detonation which his experienced ear knew at
-      once to be from a rifle, not from the shot-gun that some sportsman after
-      quail or rabbits might have been using. He betrayed no great surprise&mdash;just
-      the unspoken word &ldquo;curious&rdquo; hovered on his lips as, halting his horse, he
-      turned in his saddle to glance upward in the direction whence the sound
-      had come. Then after a moment he wheeled the pony round, and, abandoning
-      his drove for the present, ascended at a leisurely pace the narrow pathway
-      which he knew communicated with the winding highroad above.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      When the bullet had reached its fated billet, Marshall Thurston&rsquo;s fingers
-      were still gripping the saddle horn. And right there the missile of death
-      struck, glancing upward from the metal crown and piercing the victim right
-      through the heart. Not a cry&mdash;just an outflung arm, a swaying figure
-      slipping down onto the roadway, and a terrified riderless horse pivoting
-      quickly round on its haunches, then galloping madly for home.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick, glancing upward through the timber, caught a glimpse of the fleeing
-      steed, and he touched his own pony with the spur so that it, too, darted
-      forward.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Farther along the road Tia Teresa heard the clatter of the hoofs and saw
-      the animal in its swift stride disappear in the direction of the rancho.
-      She knew now for certain that her surmise was correct, and the first flush
-      of triumph on her fact settled down into an expression of grim
-      satisfaction. &ldquo;It served him right in any case.&rdquo; she muttered. &ldquo;It was
-      just what the young villain deserved.&rdquo; Then she re-entered the house and
-      passed upstairs. Her young mistress was placidly asleep, smiling in her
-      dreams. The duenna nodded her head in a satisfied sort of way; Merle would
-      learn the news at the proper time, and would not meanwhile be agitated by
-      wild conjectures. So she tiptoed from the room, and was soon busied with
-      domestic duties as if nothing had happened.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick, emerging on foot from the last steep ascent of the canyon, promptly
-      swung himself again into the saddle and started at a loping canter up the
-      winding roadway through the woods. After rounding the first comer he spied
-      the huddled figure on the ground. Before he turned the body over he knew
-      that the man was dead. But when the dead face looked up at his, it was
-      with a terrible shock of surprise that he recognized Marshall Thurston.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick stood for a few moments, gazing around in utter bewilderment. One
-      hand of the dead man was shattered and bloody, while a big splurge of red
-      on the shirt showed where the bullet had completed its work. Murder&mdash;palpable
-      murder! But who could have done this deed? Who had any valid motive to rid
-      the world of this stray piece of humanity&mdash;and in such coldblooded
-      manner, not in the heat of some angry quarrel, but by a deliberate act of
-      assassination in a place so lonely as these pine-clad hills? Dick sat him
-      down by the roadside and pondered these questions.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      There was no real pity in his heart. Young Thurston had been utterly bad&mdash;not
-      big-brained enough to belong to the social dregs, but just equally
-      worthless scum, the more repellent because it made itself visible all the
-      time. He would pass almost without a tear except from the father whose own
-      record had been so foully besmeared that there could be scant sympathy
-      even for him in the hour of his bereavement.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick just wondered and wondered. For the time being he had quite forgotten
-      that old legend&mdash;the Vendetta of the Hills.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0013" id="link2HCH0013"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XIII&mdash;Accused
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span>ROUND the horse
-      corral at the San Antonio Rancho some half-dozen cowboys were squatted on
-      their heels, cowboy-fashion, swapping the news of the day. They had ridden
-      in from various points of the compass, and two or three of their horses,
-      those of the latest comers, still stood saddled outside the enclosure, the
-      reins dropped loosely over their heads, which for the trained cow-pony is
-      just as effective an anchorage as any stake and rope.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Two or three cigarettes were a-light, and the &ldquo;makings&rdquo; were passing from
-      hand to hand among those not yet engaged in the leisurely blowing of smoke
-      rings. The topic of conversation was the rumored sale of the ranch, which
-      some declared to be assuredly impending, while others dismissed the
-      possibility of such a big deal going through as the merest moonshine.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Jack Rover was among those who had no illusions as to the future.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Believe me, fellers,&rdquo; he was remarking, &ldquo;it&rsquo;s no false alarm this time.
-      The old rancho is as good as sold, the stock is a-going to be shipped out,
-      the farmers is a-coming in, and in a few months&rsquo; time we&rsquo;ll all be hunting
-      jobs if there&rsquo;s any more cow-punching jobs left in this blamed new
-      topsy-turvy world. And that&rsquo;s the straight goods&mdash;hell!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Just as this terse and vigorous summation of the whole dispute found
-      utterance, all eyes were turned in a particular direction. It was young
-      Thurston&rsquo;s riderless steed that had attracted attention as it swept toward
-      its accustomed quarters in the corral.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s Marshall&rsquo;s horse,&rdquo; observed one of the boys.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Off again, on again, gone again, Flannigan,&rdquo; laughed another&mdash;an
-      adaptation of a popular story that evoked a general grin.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But one youth had sprung to his feet, and skilfully caught the bridle of
-      the panting animal as it passed him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Whoa, beauty!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The others had not stirred. The involuntary dismounting of the young boss
-      was too familiar an episode to provoke anything more than a laugh
-      tinctured with mild satisfaction&mdash;
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No Easterner can ride a Western broncho, anyhow.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Pass your baccy, Bob,&rdquo; came a voice from the ring. But the cowboy holding
-      the riderless horse now brought them all to instant attention.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;By God, he&rsquo;s been shot! There&rsquo;s blood on the horn, and here&rsquo;s the rip of
-      the bullet.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Everyone was on their feet now, and the situation was being eagerly
-      discussed while the saddle was undergoing confirmatory inspection.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Something&rsquo;s happened, boys,&rdquo; exclaimed the big husky fellow addressed as
-      Bob, conclusively, if somewhat obviously. &ldquo;And I guess we&rsquo;d better
-      investigate.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      As he spoke he swung himself into his saddle&mdash;he had been one of the
-      late arrivals and his horse was all ready for the road or the range.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Up toward the hills then,&rdquo; remarked another, indicating the direction
-      whence the riderless horse had come. And a moment later he, too, was
-      astride his broncho.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll borrow your pony, Ted,&rdquo; cried out Jack Rover as he jumped astride a
-      third mustang.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And a moment later all three riders were pelting along the road leading to
-      La Siesta. There was no difficulty whatever in picking up the long
-      galloping strides on the dusty highway, and the speed of the trackers
-      depended only on the swiftness and endurance of their mounts.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Meanwhile the boy who had caught Marshall&rsquo;s horse had disencumbered it of
-      saddle and bridle, and turned it into the corral with a kindly pat on its
-      heaving flank.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guess I&rsquo;ll report to the boss,&rdquo; he called out, as he picked up the saddle
-      and moved away toward the ranch home.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Look out for yourself,&rdquo; shouted one of the group. &ldquo;Old Thurston will be
-      madder than hell.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      But it was terror, selfish terror, not anger nor grief, that came into Ben
-      Thurston&rsquo;s eyes when he saw the saddle horn smeared with fresh blood and
-      scarred by a bullet.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My God, and I believed Don Manuel was dead,&rdquo; he whispered in a hoarse
-      voice to Leach Sharkey.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The two had been, as usual, in close companionship; Sharkey reading a
-      weekly newspaper, while the employer he was paid to protect, restlessly,
-      as was his wont, paced the room.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Disappeared and dead ain&rsquo;t exactly the same thing,&rdquo; replied the sleuth as
-      he critically examined the saddle. &ldquo;And there may be another explanation
-      to this. What about Dick Willoughby?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, yes, Dick Willoughby,&rdquo; eagerly assented the trembling man.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You saw them quarreling the other day&mdash;they hate each other like
-      poison,&rdquo; continued Sharkey. &ldquo;Where&rsquo;s Dick Willoughby now?&rdquo; he enquired,
-      with a swift glance at the cowboy.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good Lord, that&rsquo;s just where he is&mdash;searching the canyons below the
-      forest for mavericks,&rdquo; was the reply.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey smiled blandly; the informant looked disappointed, yet confident.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I couldn&rsquo;t have believed that of Dick,&rdquo; he added, regretfully.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, clear out now,&rdquo; said Sharkey. &ldquo;Mr. Thurston and I will want to be
-      alone. You say Jack Rover and two others have gone out to search? Well, we
-      can&rsquo;t do more till they bring us in some news. Let us know at once when
-      they return.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Ben Thurston had collapsed onto a chair, then raised himself, and was
-      leaning eagerly forward now. He met Sharkey&rsquo;s glance of hardly concealed
-      contempt.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s right,&rdquo; he murmured, &ldquo;It has been Dick Willoughby&rsquo;s work. I knew
-      Don Manuel was dead.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And what about your boy?&rdquo; asked the sleuth curtly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, yes, poor Marshall! I forgot about him. But perhaps he&rsquo;s only
-      wounded. We&rsquo;ll send to Bakersfield for a doctor.&rdquo; And he half rose from
-      his seat.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;ll just wait patiently here,&rdquo; replied Sharkey, as he pushed Thurston
-      back into his chair. &ldquo;All that is possible for the present is being done.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      And the rôles were now reversed&mdash;it was the bodyguard who slowly and
-      meditatively paced the room.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Meanwhile Dick Willoughby had ceased from his ruminations, and was
-      beginning to take practical steps for getting Marshall&rsquo;s body home. He had
-      no thought of coroner&rsquo;s regulations that a corpse should be left
-      undisturbed till the proper official investigation had been made. He had
-      got his riata ready, and was just going to sling the body across his
-      saddle and tie it there, when the rhythmic thud of clattering hoofs smote
-      upon his ear. Thank God! Help was coming. There would be others to assist
-      him in his gruesome task. So Dick patiently waited while the sound grew
-      nearer and nearer, until at last the three cowboys dashed round the bend.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I heard the rifle shot,&rdquo; Dick explained, &ldquo;and rode up from the canyon
-      below to have a look. I found him here, huddled up just as you see him by
-      the side of the road.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Who the devil did this?&rdquo; asked Jack Rover, contemplating the corpse.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;God only knows,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;You take him on your saddle, Bob,&rdquo; he
-      added, addressing the big cowboy, whose horse was a full hand taller than
-      the other ponies and more stalwart in proportion.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And so the cortege was formed, Jack Rover leading the way, with Bob and
-      the body following and Dick Willoughby bringing up the rear.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The sun was low when at last they gained the rancho. They made their way
-      quietly round to the bunk house and quite tenderly swathed the mortal
-      remains of the young boss in a blanket, before carrying it to his father&rsquo;s
-      home.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At the sound of approaching footsteps old Ben Thurston, with Leach Sharkey
-      close on his heels, emerged onto the verandah. There was no need to
-      announce the death of his son&mdash;the ominous bundle told its own sad
-      tale. The ranch owner stared at it, horrified, inarticulate from a
-      conflict of emotions, the hunted look of terror again in his eyes. Leach
-      Sharkey took up the work of interrogation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How did it happen?&rdquo; He was addressing Jack Rover, who chanced to stand
-      next to him after helping to deposit the body on a bench that stood
-      conveniently against the wall.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dick Willoughby heard the shot up among the woods, and found him lying
-      dead on the road.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey advanced a pace or two and confronted Dick.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Who fired the shot?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How should I know?&rdquo; retorted Dick, reddening slightly from the
-      brusqueness of the enquiry.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I reckon I can tell,&rdquo; cried Sharkey. And with a swift, experienced
-      movement he grabbed Dick by both arms and clicked a pair of handcuffs on
-      his wrists before anyone, Dick least of all, had fathomed his intention.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick Willoughby was a square-shouldered, powerful fellow, but the great
-      husky bodyguard, Leach Sharkey, towered above him. In the first flush of
-      anger and surprise Dick struggled to break the shackles of ignominy. But
-      the sleuth grabbed him by both shoulders with a grip that rendered its
-      recipient absolutely powerless.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Go easy, young man.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick&rsquo;s muscles relaxed, and Sharkey was content to release his hold.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Go easy. If you have any answer to make to the charge of murdering that
-      boy, you&rsquo;ll have the chance all in good time.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What right have you to arrest me?&rdquo; demanded Dick, somewhat recovering his
-      poise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;ve a special constable&rsquo;s star all right,&rdquo; replied Sharkey, throwing
-      open his coat and displaying, close to his armpit, the badge of the office
-      he had claimed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guess that&rsquo;s good enough for you and all others here. And now take my
-      advice, Willoughby. You&rsquo;ll come quietly with me to Bakersfield. I&rsquo;ve no
-      special grudge against you, but have my obvious duty to perform. You
-      threatened young Marshall more than once in all our hearing, and it will
-      be up to you to prove yourself guiltless of his death. You bring round Mr.
-      Thurston&rsquo;s automobile, Rover. We start right now.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Everything had happened so rapidly that none of the cowboys, had they so
-      desired, could have protested or interfered. Meanwhile the news had
-      spread, for others among the ranch hands were coming up and crowding
-      toward the verandah rails. General sympathy was obviously with Dick
-      Several of the onlookers advanced and shook his manacled hands. &ldquo;All
-      right, Mr. Willoughby.&rdquo; &ldquo;You&rsquo;ll be home again tomorrow,&rdquo; &ldquo;Buck up, it&rsquo;s a
-      ridiculous charge&rdquo;&mdash;these were among their expressions of
-      encouragement. Dick just smiled his thanks&mdash;a wan, wistful smile. He
-      now had himself under perfect control&mdash;even his resentment toward
-      Sharkey had been allowed to evaporate.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Very well,&rdquo; he said quietly, addressing the sleuth. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll give you no
-      trouble, Sharkey. Let us get away from here as quickly as possible.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Just then Lieutenant Munson came hurriedly onto the scene. For a moment he
-      looked thunderstruck when he saw the handcuffs around Dick&rsquo;s wrists.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great Scott, Dick! What&rsquo;s the meaning of this?&rdquo; Then without waiting for
-      a reply he turned to the sleuth.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve just heard about young Thurston&rsquo;s death, but you&rsquo;re surely not going
-      to mix up Dick Willoughby&rsquo;s name with it, Mr. Sharkey? You must know that
-      he would have nothing to do with such a cowardly crime.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He can prove all that at the proper time and place,&rdquo; was the cool,
-      determined rejoinder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t interfere, Munson,&rdquo; interposed Dick. &ldquo;Mr. Sharkey considers that he
-      is doing his duty. That&rsquo;s an end to all argument. I&rsquo;ll have no difficulty
-      in obtaining my release once we get to Bakersfield.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And the lieutenant can come along with us if he likes,&rdquo; observed the
-      sleuth, conciliated by his prisoner&rsquo;s sensible view of things. &ldquo;As Mr.
-      Willoughby&rsquo;s best friend, you can see that everything&rsquo;s done right, Mr.
-      Munson.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But why these handcuffs?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I know my own business,&rdquo; replied the sleuth, with returning severity, as
-      he touched the constable&rsquo;s star on his breast. &ldquo;And as a soldier you
-      should know the wisdom of letting it go at that, sir.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson turned to Mr. Thurston. All through the colloquy the ranch-owner
-      had spoken not a word. He had dropped onto the bench beside the still
-      swathed body of his son, and was sitting there with bowed head and
-      stolidly fixed eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You are no party to this accusation, Mr. Thurston?&rdquo; the lieutenant
-      enquired. &ldquo;I am sorry for the blow that has fallen on you. But you can&rsquo;t
-      seriously believe that Dick Willoughby&rsquo;s the man who fired that shot.&rdquo; As
-      he spoke he pointed at the dead rigid form.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Thurston raised his eyes. There was a dull glare of fury in them, a savage
-      snarl on his parted lips.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mind your own business, young man. He killed my boy, and by God he&rsquo;ll
-      hang for it.&rdquo; While speaking he rose to his feet, holding forth a
-      denouncing arm toward Willoughby, &ldquo;Yes, he&rsquo;ll hang for it,&rdquo; he growled
-      again with savage determination, turning round to the open door.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      With a gesture to the cowboys standing nearest, he bade them carry the
-      body within. He stood aside to let them pass with their burden, then
-      followed and slammed the door behind him with an angry bang.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Despite the tragedy of it all, a little smile went round the group of
-      onlookers. It meant to say that that was just Ben Thurston all over&mdash;irascible
-      and vindictive. But some faces looked grave.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;May go mighty hard with Willoughby,&rdquo; murmured one voice, that of the old
-      grey-headed man, the blacksmith at the rancho for twenty years or more. &ldquo;I
-      wouldn&rsquo;t like to feel the weight of the old devil&rsquo;s hand.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      But just then the automobile came round the house, piloted by Jack Rover.
-      Sharkey began to make his dispositions for the journey.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Do you want to take anything with you, Willoughby?&rdquo; he asked in a
-      considerate manner.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Nothing,&rdquo; was the prompt reply.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well then, you&rsquo;ll ride with me on the front seat. Lieutenant, you can
-      share the tonneau with Mr. Thurston.&rdquo; There was a slight grin on the
-      sleuth&rsquo;s face as he signified the arrangement.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mr. Thurston?&rdquo; queried Munson, taken somewhat aback. &ldquo;Does he come, too?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Sure,&rdquo; replied Sharkey. &ldquo;Who&rsquo;s going to make the charge, I&rsquo;d like to
-      know? Willoughby, I just need your promise that you won&rsquo;t move from this
-      verandah till I return.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick nodded assent. &ldquo;You have my word,&rdquo; he said with quiet dignity.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then I&rsquo;ll be back in a minute,&rdquo; added the sleuth, his hand on the door
-      knob.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Ben Thurston was standing alone in the centre of the living room, the body
-      with its bearers having passed to an inner apartment. His arms were folded
-      across his breast in an attitude of deep dejection. But it was with the
-      scared look of a hunted beast that he started away at the touch of Leach
-      Sharkey&rsquo;s hand upon his shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The sleuth smiled understandingly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t want to be left here all alone, do you?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no. For God&rsquo;s sake, no. I had forgotten that.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then you&rsquo;ve got to come with me to Bakersfield. In any case you will be
-      wanted to swear the information. And you can also make arrangements for
-      the funeral. So get your hat and overcoat. We are all ready outside.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, yes, I&rsquo;m coming,&rdquo; faltered Thurston. &ldquo;Wait for me, Sharkey,&rdquo; he
-      added, as with nervous fingers he detached his overcoat from a rack on the
-      wall.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And a few minutes later the automobile, with Sharkey at the wheel, the
-      handcuffed prisoner by his side, and Thurston and the lieutenant seated
-      frigidly apart in opposite comers of the tonneau, was spinning through the
-      gathering dusk of evening on its way to the county town of Bakersfield.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0014" id="link2HCH0014"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XIV&mdash;Entanglements
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">F</span>ROM the
-      observatory high up among the hills, Mr. Robles had witnessed the arrest
-      and the departure of the prisoner. He had understood every move just as if
-      he had been present on the verandah down below and had heard each spoken
-      word.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      As he stood erect, his hand still rested on the telescope. For a few
-      moments he pondered, then murmured to himself as he turned to leave the
-      room: &ldquo;A bad complication! I must break the news tonight to Merle. Poor
-      little girl!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      But it was two hours later before he wended his way down through the
-      moonlit forest in the direction of La Siesta.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      There dinner was over. No word of untoward happenings had as yet come from
-      the outside world to disturb the tranquillity of the little household. In
-      the drawing room Merle was at the piano, while Grace, close by, was curled
-      on a sofa reading the latest novel. At some distance from the young girls
-      was Mrs. Darlington, occupied intermittently over a piece of embroidery.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      She was seated in semi-darkness, only her hands and her work illumed by
-      the soft pink radiance of a shaded lamp resting on a little table by her
-      side. In the evening costume of the chatelaine of La Siesta was the
-      suggestion of old lace and old-time lavender&mdash;the old lace at her
-      bosom and around her neck, the subtle fragrance of lavender exhaled from
-      her garments that gave to her a sort of personal atmosphere. And as she
-      sat musingly, with the skeins of silk passing through her fingers, she
-      might have formed a picture of some Penelope seated at the loom of pensive
-      memory.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The music from the piano was in harmony with both her mood and her
-      attitude&mdash;the soft dreamy melodies of Mendelssohn&rsquo;s &ldquo;Songs without
-      Words&rdquo; to which she was vaguely listening while busy with her thoughts and
-      her stitches.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Downstairs amid the oriental luxuriousness of the cosy corner sat Tia
-      Teresa, waiting in the dark to intercept the visitor of whose coming she
-      had been apprized by a secret messenger. And at last Ricardo Robles came,
-      with the noiseless footfall that was characteristic of the man and
-      imparted to him an air of mystery. He was standing by the old duenna&rsquo;s
-      side before she had realized his presence.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I wanted a few words with you first of all, Tia Teresa,&rdquo; he murmured, as
-      she grasped his hand in both her own and affectionately kissed it.
-      &ldquo;Something has happened.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I know what has happened, Don Manuel,&rdquo; she whispered. &ldquo;The young man
-      deserved his fate, for I am sure you saw what occurred in the rose garden
-      during the afternoon. For one of his breed to have dared even to touch my
-      little girl!&rdquo; She hissed the words venomously, then added in calmer tone:
-      &ldquo;So all is well. He brought down his doom upon his own head, and vengeance
-      for Rosetta begins.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Robles pressed her hand as he disengaged his own from her almost fiercely
-      caressing touch.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I nursed you both,&rdquo; continued the duenna in a low impassioned voice.
-      &ldquo;Your people were my people, you children were my very life, and your
-      revenge has come to be my own. So I rejoice that the young ruffian died.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He had seated himself by her side on the divan. &ldquo;We shall say no more then
-      about that,&rdquo; he responded. &ldquo;In some ways I am sorry over the day&rsquo;s work.
-      At times I find it difficult to reconcile my firmness with my softness.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But you cannot forget that you are no longer the owner of your father&rsquo;s
-      lands and flocks, and are virtually childless besides.&rdquo; She breathed the
-      words with intense repressed fury, intensified as she added: &ldquo;And all
-      through the accursed gringo who wrecked our happy lives&mdash;Rosetta&rsquo;s,
-      yours, your beloved parents&rsquo; as well. While that abominable wretch lives,
-      the vendetta can never end.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      For a moment Robles remained silent. Then he spoke resolutely:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I know it, Tia Teresa. Today my work only begins. Rest assured that it
-      will be carried to the bitter finish. For this I have waited all through
-      those long years. But I wanted to tell you of another matter&mdash;to warn
-      you of a very serious complication. Dick Willoughby has been arrested for
-      the slaying of Marshall Thurston.&rdquo; The duenna sat bolt upright in shocked
-      surprise. &ldquo;Oh, my! What will this mean?&rdquo; she murmured.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Terrible grief for my little girl&mdash;possibly much suffering for him
-      until I choose to take the responsibility upon myself.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You must not do that.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No. Not yet, at all events. Or the victory will be his&mdash;my enemy&rsquo;s.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He mused again. She, too, remained silent. At last he broke the spell.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But I have already devised measures for his safety. Now I must go
-      upstairs. They have heard nothing yet?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not a word.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then I must tell them of the mysterious shooting in the woods, and at the
-      same time reassure Merle that her lover is in no real danger.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And Mrs. Darlington?&rdquo; asked Tia Teresa. &ldquo;How much is she to know?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Nothing! The vendetta is for us Spaniards. It is ours and ours alone. No
-      one knows of my vow but you and I. Let it remain so. <i>Adios</i>, my dear
-      friend.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      In the darkness he stooped and kissed her on both cheeks. For a moment she
-      clung to him, but he gently liberated himself from her embrace. He moved
-      toward the stairway, and Tia Teresa followed him cautiously up to the
-      drawing room door, outside of which she remained. Knowing that she was
-      there, he left the door ajar. The soft music was still playing, but
-      suddenly ceased when Robles advanced into the apartment.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My word, but this is an unexpected pleasure,&rdquo; exclaimed Merle, as she
-      came from the piano with outstretched hands.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      He took them both in his own, and bestowed on her a grave but kindly
-      smile. He also nodded to Grace, who had dropped her book and risen in
-      courteous greeting.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But you look sad and serious,&rdquo; Merle went on, with quick intuition that
-      his coming at this late hour meant something more than a mere neighborly
-      visit.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Something sad and serious has happened,&rdquo; he replied.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Mrs. Darlington had advanced from her lamp-lit table.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What?&rdquo; she enquired eagerly. &ldquo;Somehow I had a sense of impending trouble
-      all day long.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Young Thurston of the rancho has met with an accident.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dead?&rdquo; gasped Merle, her hands clasped against her bosom.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, dead, I am afraid. He was mysteriously shot this afternoon when
-      riding through the pine woods.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle was stricken dumb. Grace glided to her side and listened in silent
-      expectancy.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Shot! By whom?&rdquo; asked Mrs. Darlington.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That I cannot tell,&rdquo; gravely replied Robles. Then he smiled faintly. &ldquo;But
-      an amazingly stupid blunder has been made. By some combination of
-      circumstances suspicion is being fastened on our dear friend Dick
-      Willoughby.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dick!&rdquo; exclaimed Merle. &ldquo;Who dares to suggest such a thing?&rdquo; she added
-      indignantly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I infer that Mr. Thurston is his accuser,&rdquo; replied Robles.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The two young men quarreled,&rdquo; murmured Mrs. Darlington, in a voice of
-      deep agitation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mother!&rdquo; cried Merle reprovingly. &ldquo;Even to think for one moment that
-      Dick, whatever the provocation, could have done such a thing! He is
-      absolutely innocent, Mr. Robles,&rdquo; she went on decisively, again turning to
-      their visitor.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Of course he is innocent&mdash;absolutely innocent. No one knows that
-      better than myself.&rdquo; And he gave an enigmatic smile as he spoke the words
-      of reassuring confidence.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Where is Mr. Willoughby now?&rdquo; queried Grace.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He has been compelled to go to Bakersfield.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;To Bakersfield?&rdquo; exclaimed Merle, half wonderingly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;There to prove his innocence,&rdquo; replied Robles.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But Mrs. Darlington had probed the real significance of his words.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t mean to say that they have&mdash;arrested him?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Robles nodded gravely. &ldquo;That&rsquo;s how the law acts. A man under suspicion
-      must be taken into custody&mdash;he must be charged so that he can refute
-      the shameful calumny.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle had dropped into a settee&mdash;white and speechless. Her lips
-      trembled. Then she burst into a passion of weeping, burying her face
-      against an arm flung across the upholstery.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Mrs. Darlington moved forward quickly to comfort the sobbing girl.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, don&rsquo;t take on like this, my dear child. The arrest was a mere
-      formality. He will be immediately set at liberty.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle raised her tear-stained face. She spoke in gulping sobs.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But, mother, I never told you&mdash;I shrank from telling any of you.
-      While you and Grace were away this afternoon, Marshall Thurston called and
-      wanted to make love to me&mdash;he even dared to try to kiss me. Tia
-      Teresa flung him out of the rose garden. It was I who made Tia Teresa
-      promise to say nothing about it to anyone. I feared trouble. And, oh,
-      trouble, terrible trouble, has already come.&rdquo; Again she bowed her head and
-      continued weeping, but quietly weeping now. Grace was bending over her,
-      patting her shoulder in soothing sympathy.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Mrs. Darlington&rsquo;s eyes met those of Robles.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;This may prove serious,&rdquo; she said softly, that Merle might not overhear.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is decidedly unfortunate,&rdquo; replied Robles; &ldquo;an unfortunate
-      complication that may, of course, strengthen the suspicion against
-      Willoughby and so render it more difficult for us to help him.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle sprang to her feet, and with a hand dashed away her tears.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Suspicion!&rdquo; she exclaimed. &ldquo;There can be not one moment&rsquo;s suspicion.&rdquo; And
-      she gazed up into Robles&rsquo; face in ardent appeal.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Of course not, my dear, among us&mdash;among all those who know Dick
-      Willoughby. But there is the harshly judging world to reckon with besides.
-      They may say that this discloses a motive for the crime.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;However, Merle has just told us,&rdquo; commented Mrs. Darlington, &ldquo;that only
-      she and Tia Teresa know anything about this unhappy episode in the rose
-      garden. Mr. Willoughby has not been here at all today.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But I happen to know that he was not far away this afternoon&mdash;that
-      he was rounding up some cattle in the near-by canyons. Malice may suggest
-      that he was a witness of Thurston&rsquo;s insolent behavior.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then we should all keep silent on the subject.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Which might be compromising in the long run, my dear Mrs. Darlington.
-      Altogether it is a difficult situation.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle had been hardly listening to this conversation. She had been
-      thinking, and with thinking had regained her composure. Her mind was
-      quickly made up as to the line of prompt action that must be taken. She
-      spoke quite calmly now.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He is in prison. You have not spoken the word, Mr. Robles, but I know the
-      truth all the same. We shall go to him tonight.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not tonight, my dear,&rdquo; replied Robles, with gentle firmness. &ldquo;But
-      tomorrow morning, certainly, I would suggest that you drive over to
-      Bakersfield. He will appreciate your kindness in paying him this prompt
-      visit, and you can at the same time convey to him my message of absolute
-      belief in his innocence.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You will not come, too?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I can do more for him, Merle, by not going to Bakersfield for the
-      present. Do not forget that for reasons of my own I live in seclusion. My
-      name must be mentioned to no one but Mr. Willoughby. Trust me, all three
-      of you, and leave me to work quietly alone and by my own methods. There, I
-      give my promise. The captive will be set free within a short time. My hand
-      on that, and you know that I never break my word.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      There was a joyous smile of confidence on his face as he spoke the words.
-      Merle took the extended hand gratefully, trustfully, and pressed it to her
-      lips. Robles went on:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My advice is&mdash;try to sleep tonight. Tomorrow, or within a few brief
-      tomorrows, all will be well. Good night.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Tia Teresa followed him from the open door down into the outer hall.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You heard everything,&rdquo; he said as he paused to speak a final word of
-      parting. &ldquo;Comfort her, but at the same time guard our secret closer than
-      ever. Not one hair of Willoughby&rsquo;s head will be touched&mdash;make her
-      know that for certain. And everything will come right in a very little
-      time.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My poor little girl,&rdquo; he murmured to himself as he strode down the silent
-      tree-shadowed avenue.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0015" id="link2HCH0015"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XV&mdash;Behind the Bars
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">D</span>ick Willoughby had
-      been lodged in the county jail at Bakersfield, duly charged by Ben
-      Thurston as the murderer of his son. To his surprise, and indeed to his
-      dismay, the prisoner was informed that, the crime alleged being a capital
-      one, no bail could be accepted. This was first of all a blow to
-      Willoughby&rsquo;s pride. Here he was under the stigma of imprisonment, but with
-      no possibility of redress. It was not the loss of comforts, the
-      deprivation of personal liberty, the hardships to body and to soul,
-      inseparable from such restraint, that he resented, so much as the
-      semiconviction of guilt implied by the durance vile to which he was to be
-      subjected, although absolutely innocent of the deed of which he was
-      accused.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      However, after first chagrin came manly philosophy. The law might be right
-      or wrong, wise or unwise, necessary or superfluous. But all the same it
-      was the law of the state and had therefore to be obeyed. So, when the
-      situation was finally reviewed, it was Lieutenant Munson who, when bidding
-      his friend good-night, had been the angry man, fretting and fuming over
-      such an abominable act of injustice, while the prisoner himself was
-      tranquilly resigned to the ordeal through which he must pass and to which
-      unkind fate was subjecting him for reasons that he was powerless to
-      fathom.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good night, Ches, old man. You&rsquo;ll see me again in the morning. It&rsquo;s
-      mighty kind of you to stay in town all night. But we can decide on the
-      best lawyer to employ, and then you must hasten back to break the bad news
-      at La Siesta.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Such had been Dick&rsquo;s quiet words when their colloquy had been broken up,
-      and he had been ordered to the retirement of his prison cell. To enter
-      that place was for Dick a horrible experience. But he accepted the
-      experience calmly, bade the turnkey a cheerful good-night, and laid him
-      down to sleep on the narrow mattress resting upon the hard bench, at peace
-      with himself and the world, even with the bitter enemy who had all so
-      unexpectedly appeared on his path.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Although Munson was back in the jail betimes next morning, he found Dick
-      already conferring with a lawyer&mdash;the best and most honored in the
-      town, as Munson knew the moment his name was mentioned.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Let me introduce you to Mr. Bradley,&rdquo; said Dick, presenting him. &ldquo;Some
-      kind friend whose name he declines to reveal for the present, sent him a
-      special message last night retaining his services for my defence.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mrs. Darlington, I bet,&rdquo; interjected the lieutenant.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, not Mrs. Darlington, let me assure you,&rdquo; rejoined the lawyer,
-      &ldquo;although undoubtedly she would be willing to do the same thing. But I am
-      not permitted to say any more.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And he has <i>carte blanche</i> for all expenses,&rdquo; smiled Dick. &ldquo;Although
-      I should not think there will be much money required to clear an innocent
-      man,&rdquo; he added.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Wait till you see,&rdquo; said the lawyer crisply. &ldquo;We have to reckon with a
-      malignant persecutor, I am already informed.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, I&rsquo;ve got a bit to my bank credit,&rdquo; Dick replied. &ldquo;And we&rsquo;ll draw on
-      that first before I accept the generosity of an unknown friend. It will be
-      quite a saving here,&rdquo; he went on with a humorous twinkle in his eye as he
-      glanced around. &ldquo;Free board and lodging at the state&rsquo;s expense for a week
-      at all events.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Much longer than that, I am afraid,&rdquo; gravely remarked the lawyer. &ldquo;You
-      see, Mr. Munson, just before you arrived we were discussing the decidedly
-      unfortunate coincidence that at the time the shooting occurred, Mr.
-      Willoughby, by his own admission, was in the little canyon below the scene
-      of the tragedy.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Rounding up some cattle,&rdquo; observed Dick. &ldquo;Of course. But all the same,
-      open to suspicion as being on the ground, and indeed being the first to
-      reach the dead man&rsquo;s side.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That should be proof of innocence,&rdquo; observed Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Or may be taken as evidence of well-reasoned audacity to throw accusers
-      off the trail,&rdquo; retorted the attorney. &ldquo;You see we have to look at
-      everything, not from our own point of view, but from the other side. Now I
-      want to learn something more about that quarrel between you and young
-      Thurston at the cattle muster.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He made an insulting remark about one of the young ladies from La
-      Siesta,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;I told him I would tan his hide if he ever did it
-      again. That&rsquo;s all. But the last thing I want is that these ladies&rsquo; names
-      should be dragged into the case.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But his remark and your reproof were overheard by others,&rdquo; commented the
-      attorney.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, yes, by a bunch of ranch hands.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Whose evidence will undoubtedly be called for the prosecution,
-      necessitating, perhaps, the evidence of the young ladies on our side.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;By God, I won&rsquo;t stand for that,&rdquo; exclaimed Dick hotly. &ldquo;I can defend
-      myself without their being called to the witness stand. Think, Munson, of
-      subjecting Merle or Grace to any such thing&rdquo;&mdash;and his indignant face
-      appealed to the lieutenant&rsquo;s.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I saw nothing of the quarrel,&rdquo; observed Munson, addressing the lawyer,
-      &ldquo;although, of course, I heard something about it later on&mdash;not from
-      Willoughby, however, for he has never once referred to the matter in
-      conversation with me. But I say, Dick, old fellow, you know that Merle
-      Farnsworth and Grace Darlington, too, will be only too proud and happy to
-      stand up for you in a law court or anywhere else.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That may be,&rdquo; replied Dick gloomily, &ldquo;but I don&rsquo;t propose that they shall
-      be made the objects of vulgar curiosity in a crowded court-room, or that
-      their ears should ever hear the vile words that fell from that miserable
-      degenerate who has at last met the fate he properly deserved.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, it is a point that we shall have to consider carefully,&rdquo; spoke the
-      lawyer as he rose to take his departure. &ldquo;I have all the main facts of the
-      case now, Mr. Willoughby. Of course I shall apply formally to the court
-      for bail, but I know it is bound to be refused. I&rsquo;ll make all arrangements
-      outside for your comfort here&mdash;meals, etc., and no doubt your friend,
-      Mr. Munson, will bring you over clothing, toilet requisites, and the other
-      little things you will require. I&rsquo;ll see you again later on today.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The lawyer was gone, and the two comrades were alone in the little room,
-      stone-walled and bare of furniture except for a few chairs, where the
-      consultation had been held. Beyond the open door stood a constable, just
-      out of earshot. But he now took his stand within the room.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, Munson, old chap,&rdquo; said Dick with cheerful alacrity, &ldquo;you get back
-      to the rancho in double-quick time. Then go on to La Siesta and tell Merle
-      not to worry on my account. Tell her that I&rsquo;m bright and happy, and just
-      enjoying a good rest, and will be set at liberty within a week or so. But
-      remember, she is not to come here. Good Lord, I never want her to see me
-      in a place like this.&rdquo; And he glanced around forlornly, and in a measure
-      ashamed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But at the very moment there was a flutter along the corridor&mdash;the
-      sound of voices, and women&rsquo;s voices, too. A moment later the
-      superintendent of the jail appeared, bringing with him Mrs. Darlington and
-      Merle. At the doorway he spoke to the officer on guard; the man withdrew.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mr. Willoughby, here are some more friends,&rdquo; said the superintendent as
-      he ushered in the ladies. &ldquo;I am going to interpret the regulations as
-      leniently as possible&mdash;that&rsquo;s a matter which can rest between
-      ourselves. I&rsquo;ll come back for you, Mrs. Darlington, in half an hour.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle advanced toward Dick with outstretched hand. In her other hand was a
-      fine bouquet of roses.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What a shame that you should be here,&rdquo; she exclaimed. &ldquo;But I realize that
-      the only thing to do is to submit as cheerfully as possible to the
-      inevitable. Mother and I came over to give you our sympathy and proffer
-      our help in every possible way. Grace also sends her very kindest regards,
-      and I was bidden by Mr. Robles, whom we saw last night, to assure you of
-      his complete belief in your innocence.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m not afraid of any real friend thinking me capable of a cowardly
-      deed like that,&rdquo; replied Willoughby. &ldquo;But it is nice to have these kind
-      messages, although I could have wished, Miss Farnsworth, that you had not
-      seen me amid such surroundings.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Do you think that we would desert you in such a time of trouble as this?&rdquo;
-       replied Merle, as she sat down. &ldquo;But seeing that our visit is to be
-      restricted to half an hour, it is well that we should get to the important
-      points without delay. I have been talking over a certain matter both with
-      mother and Mr. Robles, and although I shrink from telling it, they have
-      decided that you must know about the affair.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      She then proceeded, in a low voice and with lips that trembled, to tell
-      how young Thurston had forced his attentions on her just a little time
-      before the shooting occurred and how Tia Teresa had rescued her from his
-      clutches.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      This was the first that Dick had heard of the incident and his face
-      flushed with anger. But Merle quieted him at once. &ldquo;You need not be angry
-      now, Mr. Willoughby. It is all over. But your lawyer will want to consider
-      what bearing this may possibly have upon the case.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It can have no bearing at all,&rdquo; maintained Dick. &ldquo;In the first place I
-      didn&rsquo;t even know till now that Marshall had been visiting at La Siesta.
-      And in the second place, just as I was saying to Munson a few minutes ago,
-      I am determined that the names of you ladies shall not be dragged into
-      this miserable affair. Isn&rsquo;t that right, Mrs. Darlington?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;In a measure. But all the same we are ready to stand by you so as to
-      establish your innocence with the least possible delay. I heard this
-      morning that Mr. Thurston is very bitter against you, keeps vowing
-      vengeance, and announces that no money will be spared to bring the slayer
-      of his son to retribution.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, I hope he&rsquo;ll find him without loss of time,&rdquo; smiled Dick. &ldquo;That
-      will be the quickest and easiest way to get me out of confinement. But at
-      this moment I have not the faintest idea on whom to fasten the charge.
-      Lots of the cowboys despised young Thurston, but none were really his
-      enemies, and I don&rsquo;t know any one among the bunch who would have shot him
-      in that dastardly, cold-blooded manner.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Which makes the situation for you all the more disagreeable,&rdquo; commented
-      Munson. &ldquo;You had been known to threaten him, and if there is no one else
-      to whom suspicion can point, you may be kept here, Dick, for quite a time&mdash;for
-      months, perhaps, until the case goes to trial.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick&rsquo;s face fell. &ldquo;For months!&rdquo; he exclaimed. &ldquo;Surely that would be an
-      outrage.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I wouldn&rsquo;t be too despondent,&rdquo; protested Merle. &ldquo;Besides, Mr. Robles
-      has pledged his word to me that you will be free in a very brief time.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then he may know who the culprit is,&rdquo; remarked Dick eagerly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; interposed Mrs. Darlington. &ldquo;He is like ourselves&mdash;quite in the
-      dark. But you may rest assured that Mr. Robles will leave no stone
-      unturned to solve the mystery and restore you to liberty, Mr. Willoughby,
-      for I happen to know that he holds you in highest esteem.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m glad of that,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;Well, I want you to tell him from me
-      how keen I am that you ladies shall be spared from all association with
-      this case. You know that I am exercising great self-denial, Miss
-      Farnsworth, when I say that you are never to come here again. This is no
-      place for you.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Pardon me,&rdquo; laughed Merle, &ldquo;but we are interested in you and will excuse
-      the hotel you have chosen to patronize. We brought these roses for you
-      from La Siesta&rdquo;&mdash;as she spoke she presented him with the beautiful
-      blooms&mdash;&ldquo;and if Lieutenant Munson will be kind enough to come out to
-      our automobile he will find there some books, also a box of fruit and a
-      few delicacies which we hope will help to make your stay here just a
-      little more tolerable.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;re kind indeed,&rdquo; murmured Dick gratefully. &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t worry about me,&rdquo; he
-      added cheerfully, &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll have a fine rest here, and will be able to catch
-      up with my arrears of reading.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      And in this philosophic frame of mind the prisoner was left to begin his
-      holiday.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0016" id="link2HCH0016"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XVI&mdash;Pierre Luzon Returns
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>N the outside
-      world the question on everybody&rsquo;s lips was&mdash;who had fired the fatal
-      shot among the pine woods? The young reprobate had been thoroughly
-      despised, but he had no known enemies except Willoughby. So while
-      Willoughby&rsquo;s staunch friends could only reiterate the question in vain
-      perplexity, most people were inclined to answer it with Dick&rsquo;s name. The
-      angry quarrel between the two young men was universally known and had been
-      subjected to sundry embellishments&mdash;for example, the threatened
-      horse-whipping had become an actual recorded event, and so on. And even
-      there were whispers about rivalry in some love affair&mdash;that Marshall
-      had had his eye on one of the young ladies at La Siesta where Dick for
-      some time had been a constant caller.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      So among the cowboys on the ranch, the oil drillers who frequented the
-      Bakersfield saloons and had often enough stood around while young Thurston
-      had set up the drinks, the newspaper reading public generally for whom all
-      the facts had been set forth in elaborate detail&mdash;the universal
-      concensus of opinion seemed to be that Dick Willoughby was the man. Not
-      that this verdict of popular opinion carried with it any real reprobation.
-      Everyone agreed that the worthless degenerate had met even a kindlier fate
-      than he merited. Had he lived, not all his father&rsquo;s millions could have
-      long saved him either from the penitentiary or an asylum for the insane.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      A week passed. Thurston brooded in solitude, but at his bidding Leach
-      Sharkey kept up active investigations with a view to nose out every bit of
-      evidence that could tell against the accused man. Sharkey worked, not from
-      any special animosity against Willoughby, but from keen professional
-      pride.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick accepted his confinement with manly fortitude. It. was one of those
-      untoward happenings that come into some people&rsquo;s lives for no obvious
-      reason, but he was calm in the confidence that everything would be made
-      clear in a very short time.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Moreover he was clear to his own conscience, which was the main thing.
-      Next in importance was that Merle, Grace and Mrs. Darlington, Robles and
-      Munson, all the friends whom he held in highest esteem, had never for one
-      moment doubted him. In their unshaken friendship was sufficient reward for
-      all the tribulations through which he was passing.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Meanwhile word had reached Buck Ashley that old Tom Baker was on his way
-      home in company with Pierre Luzon, to whom the Governor of the State had
-      at last granted parole. In view of Dick&rsquo;s imprisonment Munson had
-      well-nigh lost all interest in the romance of the buried treasure. But it
-      had been Dick himself who had insisted that his friend must attend to
-      their joint interests during his period of enforced sequestration.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Thus it had come about that Munson found himself one evening at the store,
-      awaiting with Jack Rover and Buck Ashley the arrival of the automobile in
-      which the sheriff was bringing the liberated convict from San Quentin. In
-      a brief letter Tom Baker had explained that he had decided on this manner
-      of transportation both because of its ensuring privacy and also because
-      Pierre Luzon was so enfeebled by age, sickness and prolonged confinement
-      that he could not travel by train. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve rigged up a stretcher,&rdquo; wrote
-      Tom, &ldquo;but the poor old Frenchie is as weak as a kitten, and we&rsquo;ll have to
-      run slow.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Nine o&rsquo;clock that night was the scheduled hour around which the automobile
-      might be expected. Buck Ashley had the extra cot for the invalid all ready
-      in his own bedroom at the rear of the store.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      It was close on ten o&rsquo;clock, however, before the headlight of the
-      automobile showed across the valley on the high-road. Buck piled another
-      big log on the fire in the sitting room. He saw that the doors were all
-      carefully closed and the shades pulled down. Then he brought in from the
-      bar a tray with glasses and a bottle of whisky.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Kentucky bourbon&mdash;that was old Pierre Luzon&rsquo;s favorite lotion,&rdquo; he
-      said as he set down the tray. &ldquo;And I guess he&rsquo;ll be glad of a good stiff
-      drink on a cold night like this.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      At last the automobile entered the yard, and the invalid was carried in on
-      the stretcher and propped up comfortably in a rocking chair near the
-      cheerful blaze. His teeth were chattering from cold, and he gratefully
-      gulped down the stiff glass of bourbon which Buck lost no time in
-      proffering him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You see,&rdquo; explained Tom Baker, as he bustled around, &ldquo;the Governor just
-      grants paroles; he can&rsquo;t grant pardons. Some sort of a board has to pass
-      on the pardons. But I got him out all right, and that&rsquo;s the main thing.
-      Eh, Pierre, old man?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The sheriff nodded with great friendliness to his protégé. Luzon responded
-      with a wan smile that silently spoke his thankfulness. His face was
-      deathly pale, but there was wonderful snap and vitality in the black
-      bead-like eyes that roamed around the room and searched each countenance.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck was now standing by the rocker. He laid a hand familiarly on the
-      Frenchman&rsquo;s shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You see, Pierre, old scout, I don&rsquo;t forget you&rdquo;&mdash;he pointed to the
-      bottle on the table. &ldquo;Kentucky bourbon, the best I&rsquo;ve got in the house,
-      and the very label you used to call for. Now we&rsquo;ve got to drink to your
-      speedy recovery. Fill up all round, boys. The drinks are on me tonight.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hip, hip, hooray!&rdquo; shouted Tom, as the glasses tinkled.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hush!&rdquo; exclaimed Buck, warningly. &ldquo;We don&rsquo;t want to bring any booze
-      fighters prowlin&rsquo; around here tonight. You see, Pierre, we four are in
-      cahoots and understand each other. You know Tom and myself&mdash;we ain&rsquo;t
-      in need of any guarantee. And you can trust Mr. Chester Munson and Jack
-      Rover here to the limit.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Luzon bowed acknowledgment of the informal introduction.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It was we who put up the cash to get you out of San Quentin,&rdquo; continued
-      Buck, as he dropped into a chair close beside Tom Baker.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Together with Dick Willoughby,&rdquo; interjected Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, yes, not forgettin&rsquo; Dick,&rdquo; resumed the storekeeper, &ldquo;as fine a young
-      feller as ever walked on shoe leather. But, by God, he&rsquo;s in jail just
-      now.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Eh?&rdquo; ejaculated the ex-convict, with a look of awakening, almost
-      fraternal, interest.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck turned to the sheriff.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Of course, Tom, you&rsquo;ll have read all about that terrible affair in the
-      newspapers?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The sheriff surreptitiously grabbed Buck&rsquo;s arm. He spoke in a confidential
-      whisper.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Drop that subject for the present. I&rsquo;ve said nothin&rsquo; about it to old
-      Pierre in case it might upset him. I ain&rsquo;t dared to mention the name
-      Thurston to him, for he shared the White Wolf&rsquo;s hatred of the breed.&rdquo; Then
-      Tom gave a little cough and glanced across the fireplace at the Frenchman.
-      &ldquo;Just a little cowboy shootin&rsquo; scrap, Pierre, in which our chum Dick
-      Willoughby has got himself temporarily involved. But say, boys,&rdquo; he went
-      on, casting his eyes toward Munson and Rover, &ldquo;I just thanked the Lord it
-      wasn&rsquo;t me as had to arrest Dick. Of course if I had still been sheriff I&rsquo;d
-      a done it&mdash;when I was a sworn-in officer, duty was duty all the time
-      with me, as every damned horse-thief within a hundred miles knows. But to
-      take an honest man into custody for shootin&rsquo; a miserable human coyote like
-      that young&mdash;&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, we&rsquo;re not a-goin&rsquo; to speak about him just now,&rdquo; interrupted Buck,
-      bestowing a cautioning kick on the sheriff&rsquo;s shins.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Tom took the timely reminder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That would have gone sore against the grain,&rdquo; he said emphatically, as he
-      reached for the whisky bottle and replenished his tumbler.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Glad to be back?&rdquo; asked Buck, beaming pleasantly on old Pierre.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The Frenchman lifted one thin hand and smiled.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Here I will become once more strong,&rdquo; he murmured. &ldquo;No place in ze world
-      like ze dear old Tehachapi mountains.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Wal, I see you&rsquo;ve begun to let your beard grow again,&rdquo; continued Buck,
-      pointing to the gray stubbled chin. &ldquo;And when your hair comes along, too,
-      you&rsquo;ll just be lookin&rsquo; fine and dandy. The same old Pierre that used to
-      sit for hours at a time in the store.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He paused a moment, surveying the visitor.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A leetle more whisky, please,&rdquo; murmured Pierre, as he watched the sheriff
-      lay down his glass.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;All the whisky you want, old fellow,&rdquo; exclaimed Buck, with effusive
-      hospitality. &ldquo;By gunnies, you&rsquo;re entitled to a good few nips after all the
-      long years you&rsquo;ve been locked up. Ain&rsquo;t that so, boys?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I should say,&rdquo; declared Tom, fervently, wiping his lips with the back of
-      his hand.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The Frenchman drank gratefully, and as he felt the warm alcoholic glow in
-      his vitals, uttered a deep-drawn &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; of appreciation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Tastes good, don&rsquo;t it?&rdquo; observed Buck. &ldquo;You never turned down a drink of
-      good whisky in the old days, did you, Pierre? Great times then! And gosh
-      almighty, don&rsquo;t it beat hell, I never suspected who you were all those
-      years you used to sit around the store smokin&rsquo; that big-bowled pipe of
-      yourn? And you knew about the cave then?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, Pierre Luzon, he know how to keep one secret,&rdquo; responded the
-      Frenchman, smiling.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, and good for us all you kept it, old man,&rdquo; exclaimed the sheriff.
-      &ldquo;He&rsquo;s a-goin&rsquo; to show us the cave tomorrow, Buck. There will be six in the
-      divvy-up now, boys, for of course Pierre Luzon stands in. That&rsquo;s agreeable
-      all round, fellers?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Sure, sure,&rdquo; responded the others in unison. Tom turned to the Frenchman.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I told you, Pierre, we&rsquo;d play the game fair and square with you. Ain&rsquo;t
-      that right?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I trust you all,&rdquo; replied Luzon. &ldquo;I show ze cave tomorrow to my friend,
-      Tom Baker, and you gentlemen who have been so kind to make up one purse to
-      bring me back here from zat horrid prison.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guess you&rsquo;re about the only feller that knows where it is?&rdquo; enquired
-      Buck, cautiously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Luzon looked at his questioner and spoke just one word: &ldquo;Guadalupe.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Does Gaudalupe know?&rdquo; exclaimed Jack Rover. &ldquo;I thought her long suit was
-      the riffle where she gets her placer gold.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guadalupe,&rdquo; answered Pierre, speaking slowly, &ldquo;she know ze cave, but she
-      not know where ze treasure is buried. Ze cave her home. She live zere.
-      Lots and lots of times she come out, and nobody ever track her when she go
-      back. Ze outlaws they sharp-shoot from places in ze hills nobody could
-      see. But I show you,&rdquo; he continued, nodding his head at Jack Rover, &ldquo;I,
-      Pierre, show you where zat riffle is. I know both where Guadalupe wash out
-      placer gold and ze secret chamber in ze big cave where Joaquin Murietta
-      bury him money and where ze White Wolf, Don Manuel&mdash;peace to his
-      soul!&rdquo;&mdash;Pierre Luzon crossed himself&mdash;&ldquo;hide sacks and sacks of
-      ze yellow gold. Oh, yes!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      This long speech had exhausted the old man. He dropped his head wearily.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What you need now is a good long sleep,&rdquo; exclaimed Tom Baker. &ldquo;Another
-      jolt of bourbon Pierre, and then you get in between the blankets, old
-      fellow.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve got your bed all ready in the next room,&rdquo; observed Buck.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I guess I go to bed zen,&rdquo; assented Luzon.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      He gulped down with relish a nightcap of the old whisky. Then Buck and Tom
-      helped him from his chair.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is good to be here,&rdquo; murmured the Frenchman. &ldquo;I grow strong again
-      among ze mountains. I never go back&mdash;never go back to San Quentin,
-      that one horrid prison.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll nurse you like a baby,&rdquo; said Buck assuringly, as he led the feeble
-      old man into the adjoining room.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0017" id="link2HCH0017"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XVII&mdash;The Bitter Bit
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">O</span>N the very night
-      of Pierre Luzon&rsquo;s return, Ben Thurston was in close colloquy with his
-      attorney, summoned specially from New York. It was not only the murder of
-      his son that had brought about this consultation. The owner of San Antonio
-      Rancho, while filled with fury against Dick Willoughby, was also gravely
-      perturbed over other things. Immediately after dinner the two men shut
-      themselves up in Thurston&rsquo;s office.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Thurston opened the safe and produced a little bundle of neatly-folded,
-      legal-looking documents.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;These are the option papers,&rdquo; he said gruffly, as he tossed them across
-      the table to the lawyer. &ldquo;Look them over, Mr. Hawkins.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The attorney glanced through the documents in a preliminary way.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I see the first big payment falls due on April 1st,&rdquo; he remarked.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, April 1st,&rdquo; responded Thurston, &ldquo;and I was a damned fool, too, to
-      let that Trust Company fellow inveigle me into making the date April 1st,
-      instead of March 1st. You see,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;the taxes come due on March
-      1st, and on this principality they amount to quite a pretty figure, I can
-      tell you.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How much?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, about $18,000.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The lawyer again read the papers through, this time more carefully.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, Mr. Thurston,&rdquo; he said, as he lighted a cigar and sat back in his
-      chair, &ldquo;I left some very important matters to come to you in answer to
-      your imperative message. What&rsquo;s the work in hand?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Why, this option for one thing; and then, too, I want you to help me put
-      the noose around the neck of that scoundrel who killed my son.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll take one thing at a time, please,&rdquo; replied the attorney, speaking
-      slowly and quietly. &ldquo;So far as this option on the rancho is concerned, it
-      seems to be quite regular. Nevertheless, five million dollars is a whole
-      lot of money. Is there any danger of their forfeiting their option payment
-      of $100,000?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Danger? Forfeiting?&rdquo; ejaculated Ben Thurston. &ldquo;Well, I&rsquo;m not at all
-      afraid of that. My fear now is that they may take up the option.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Why, didn&rsquo;t you wish to make the sale?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, but I am not getting money enough. The ranch is really worth ten
-      million dollars today, in cold cash. I have recently had some San
-      Francisco capitalists down here appraising it for me, but I had already
-      given the option.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I see that the agreement provides for your cattle and horses going in at
-      the stipulated price.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, I don&rsquo;t know why I should have been so infernally stupid. But you
-      see those Los Angeles fellows came over here one day in an automobile and
-      stayed all night. We had a sort of a tiff&mdash;didn&rsquo;t agree very well&mdash;and
-      I let them start away the next morning without their breakfast&mdash;rather
-      uncivil, I&rsquo;ll admit. After they had gone I got to thinking matters over,
-      and I sent a telephone message along the road to stop them and ask them to
-      come back. They returned all right. There was one of their number, this
-      fellow from some Title and Trust Company, who was pretty warm under the
-      collar, and, if I do say it myself, was as peeved as hell at me. Well, he
-      was the one who drew up the agreement, sitting here at this table. The
-      paper looked all right to me, and so I just went ahead and signed. I know
-      now they caught me for the $18,000 of taxes because I didn&rsquo;t just insist
-      on having the option expire March 1st, instead of April 1st. But, to be
-      frank with you, I really didn&rsquo;t much mind, for at that time I was only
-      keen to get their $100,000 for the option, never believing for a moment
-      that they would come across with the million-dollar first payment due
-      April 1st. You see the cattle and horses and all the stock on the ranch
-      was a sort of sheaf of oats that I hung out in order to get them to put up
-      their option money&mdash;just so much bait.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Mr. Hawkins shrugged his shoulders and said: &ldquo;Well, Mr. Thurston, judging
-      from this inventory before me, you certainly hung up a most generous
-      bait.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I didn&rsquo;t stop to think&mdash;that&rsquo;s all there is to be said. All these
-      details hadn&rsquo;t been worked out into cold figures at the time I gave the
-      option. When these men were here I just wanted to wheedle them into a
-      bargain which would leave a cool $100,000 in my hands. I never for one
-      moment believed they could make the million-dollar payment, although, by
-      God, I begin to realize the danger of their doing so now.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The lawyer looked up in silent surprise. Thurston continued:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Of course I should have had this detailed valuation made before I went
-      into the deal. Up to the time I read that inventory I had no real idea of
-      the increased value of the property and what was on it. Oh, you may shake
-      your head; I&rsquo;m not a good business man&mdash;never cared a damn for
-      business&mdash;and I know quite well I haven&rsquo;t given enough attention to
-      the ranch. You see I have been living mostly in the East, for good
-      reasons. I don&rsquo;t like it here at all&mdash;I&rsquo;ve never felt safe in
-      California,&rdquo; and he glanced nervously at the window of the room, as if
-      some enemy were lurking there.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Mr. Hawkins once more reached for the inventory, and carefully examined
-      the figures. Finally he said: &ldquo;Pardon me, Mr. Thurston, for the
-      observation. But you should have sent for me <i>before</i> the option was
-      signed, if you did not really intend to carry out its terms. I find that
-      you have twenty-six thousand head of cattle, and you say that the price of
-      cattle is very high just now&mdash;that the whole herd ought to average
-      forty dollars a head. This item alone makes one million and forty thousand
-      dollars, or, in other words, if they exercise the option and pay you the
-      first million dollars, they will have forty thousand dollars more than the
-      payment which they make at that time.&rdquo; The lawyer pencilled down the
-      figures while he spoke.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Ben Thurston had been listening with a gloomy look on his brow. But when
-      he saw the figures translated into dollars he fairly bounced from his
-      chair, walked rapidly up and down the room, and then, coming to a sudden
-      halt, shouted: &ldquo;By God, that&rsquo;s where they got me again. I see it all now;
-      these fellows were a damned sight too smart for me. Well, Hawkins, you are
-      my attorney. I don&rsquo;t want to go on with this deal, even if they are able
-      to dig up the money.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The lawyer puffed at his cigar, wholly undisturbed, and then replied: &ldquo;Mr.
-      Thurston, you have already made a sale.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, by God, I haven&rsquo;t; nothing of the kind,&rdquo; replied Thurston. &ldquo;The truth
-      is that I should get ten million dollars for this ranch, and keep all my
-      horses and cattle, too. I don&rsquo;t propose to be fleeced by that Los Angeles
-      outfit either,&rdquo; he continued, running his hands through his hair. &ldquo;I have
-      it; we&rsquo;ll break the contract. I&rsquo;ll bet that option is so faulty that you
-      can drive a load of hay right through it. Hunt up a flaw and we will send
-      them back their option money. I don&rsquo;t want their $100,000 now.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have already carefully studied the paper,&rdquo; replied Hawkins, &ldquo;and can
-      find no flaw in it. It was evidently drawn by a master hand.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Master hand be damned,&rdquo; thundered Thurston. &ldquo;Why, the stiff wasn&rsquo;t even a
-      lawyer. He was just one of the syndicate&mdash;the one I told you about a
-      while back. He knows so cussed much about titles that the other fellows
-      let him write the option.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I see,&rdquo; replied the attorney, as a half-smile flitted over his face;
-      &ldquo;about all you seemingly had to do was to sign the option papers and count
-      the option money. The sole hope you have now, Mr. Thurston, in my opinion,
-      is for those Los Angeles gentlemen to let this valuable option lapse. You
-      have only a few days to wait.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But I haven&rsquo;t told you the worst yet,&rdquo; said Thurston sullenly, dropping
-      again into his chair.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What do you mean?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I had a long-distance telephone this morning from the First National Bank
-      at Los Angeles saying that the million dollars due April 1st has been
-      already paid in to my credit. But I won&rsquo;t touch the money&mdash;I&rsquo;ll be
-      damned if I do.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You have no choice but to accept it,&rdquo; said the lawyer. &ldquo;It would be
-      foolish to deceive yourself; San Antonio Rancho is sold, and with the
-      payment just made, you, by the terms of your contract, are compelled to
-      give immediate possession. I can only advise you to take your medicine
-      like a man, but don&rsquo;t let those Los Angeles gentlemen know that you are
-      swallowing a bitter dose.&rdquo; He refolded the papers, and pushed them across
-      the table. &ldquo;Now, Mr. Thurston, if there is anything I can do to assist you
-      in the prosecution of your son&rsquo;s murderer, I stand ready to do so.&rdquo; Ben
-      Thurston arose.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll talk about that tomorrow. I&rsquo;ll hang Dick Willoughby right enough in
-      good time. Meanwhile you tell me the rancho is sold&mdash;that I have lost
-      my great estate for less than half its value? Hell! Isn&rsquo;t that enough for
-      one night?&rdquo; And he stalked wrathfully out of the room, slamming the door
-      behind him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He sold at the wrong price,&rdquo; mused the lawyer with a quiet smile.
-      &ldquo;Perhaps he&rsquo;ll be trying next to hang the wrong man.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0018" id="link2HCH0018"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XVIII&mdash;Elusive Riches
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>N the meantime the
-      quartet at the store were making a night of it. With old Pierre Luzon
-      peacefully asleep in the adjoining room, there were many things to speak
-      about. Tom Baker recounted in elaborate detail his story of interviews
-      with the governor and state officials at Sacramento, the weary and
-      harassing delays before parole was finally granted, his own dogged
-      determination, together with the artful pulling of political strings that
-      had finally brought about the results desired. Then there was the trip to
-      San Quentin, the breaking of the joyful news to Pierre Luzon in his cell,
-      the delivery of the paroled convict into Tom&rsquo;s hands, and the clever
-      solution of all further difficulties by hiring an automobile for the
-      journey south. The narrative was all very interesting, each listener
-      eagerly followed every word, and at the close Tom Baker&rsquo;s chest had
-      expanded several inches.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I tell you boys, there&rsquo;s no man alive could have done what I did. The
-      business was in the right hands. If it hadn&rsquo;t been for me, you wouldn&rsquo;t
-      have Pierre Luzon here tonight.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But if Pierre Luzon hadn&rsquo;t written that letter,&rdquo; growled Buck Ashley,
-      &ldquo;you would never have started for Sacramento and San Quentin.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, all&rsquo;s well that ends well,&rdquo; discreetly interposed Munson, as he
-      raked the smouldering wood ashes together. &ldquo;Gee, but its cold tonight.&rdquo;
-       Jack Rover rose and tossed another log onto the fire. In a moment a bright
-      flame sprang up.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The bottle&rsquo;s empty,&rdquo; observed the sheriff. &ldquo;The next one&rsquo;s on me, Buck.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guess we&rsquo;ll charge it to syndicate account,&rdquo; grinned the storekeeper,
-      whose momentary grouch seemed to have been dissipated by the cheerful
-      blaze. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll have to open books, boys, and go about things in a reg&rsquo;lar
-      way,&rdquo; he added, as he drew the bolt of the door that communicated with the
-      store and groped his way into the darkness beyond.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck needed no candle, and was soon back with another bottle of the
-      Kentucky bourbon. Glasses were filled and clinked and pledges of
-      brotherhood renewed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s champagne we&rsquo;ll be drinkin&rsquo; tomorrow night, Buck, old sport,&rdquo;
-       exclaimed Tom, slapping his old crony on the shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll long-distance Bakersfield for a case in the morning,&rdquo; responded
-      Buck, genially. &ldquo;By gosh, we&rsquo;ll be swimmin&rsquo; in wine afore long, boys.
-      First thing I&rsquo;ve got to do is to sell out this &lsquo;ere store.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Sell it!&rdquo; cried the sheriff, contemptuously. &ldquo;You can afford to give it
-      away, Buck. We ain&rsquo;t a-goin&rsquo; to be pikers in our old age, are we now?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I ain&rsquo;t old by a danged sight,&rdquo; snapped back the storekeeper, for Tom had
-      touched a sore spot once again. &ldquo;Besides, when I&rsquo;ve got a barrel of
-      Joaquin Murietta&rsquo;s gold safe in the bank, you&rsquo;ll see me friskin&rsquo; around
-      like a two-year-old colt,&rdquo; he added, his momentary surliness changing to a
-      smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And it ain&rsquo;t only gold, boys,&rdquo; said Tom Baker. &ldquo;That &lsquo;ere story old
-      Pierre told me about the grotto cavern havin&rsquo; a lake of oil in it as big
-      as a city block, sure &lsquo;nuff got me goin&rsquo;. Why, we&rsquo;ll be able to blossom
-      out into oil kings.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What&rsquo;s that?&rdquo; asked Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Why, the Frenchie told me, you know, confidential like, comin&rsquo; along on
-      our motor car that since fifty years back those bandit fellers skimmed oil
-      from the surface of that lake and burned it in lamps down in that cavern.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;By Jove, that&rsquo;s interesting,&rdquo; replied Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We know there is oil to the west, oil to the north, and oil to the south,
-      and it stands to reason there must be oil here as well.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; interposed Buck, &ldquo;but old Ben Thurston would never allow any
-      drillin&rsquo; on his place.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Who the hell wants oil anyhow?&rdquo; exclaimed Jack Rover. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll have all the
-      money we need with the buried gold and Guadalupe&rsquo;s placer mine.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, but oil is oil,&rdquo; replied the storekeeper, with a shrewd nod of his
-      head. &ldquo;They say Rockefeller has only to raise the price a quarter of a
-      cent a gallon whenever he wants to give away another million or so to a
-      university or a hospital.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, we ain&rsquo;t interested in universities or hospitals,&rdquo; said Tom Baker.
-      &ldquo;But I agree with Buck that oil&rsquo;s oil, and I, for one, intend to take
-      everything that&rsquo;s comin&rsquo; to me. My God, we can afford to buy Ben Thurston
-      out and do some drillin&rsquo; for ourselves on San Antonio Rancho. It&rsquo;ll help
-      to pass the time anyways.&rdquo; As he finished, he began to pour out another
-      round of drinks.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Help to keep you from the booze,&rdquo; muttered Buck, in an inaudible aside.
-      But he drained his own glass and smacked his lips with satisfaction.
-      &ldquo;Guess I&rsquo;ll be gettin&rsquo; another bottle, boys,&rdquo; he said aloud, genially.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, we&rsquo;ve had enough,&rdquo; mildly protested Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not by a jugful,&rdquo; replied Buck. &ldquo;You and Jack ain&rsquo;t goin&rsquo; to ride home
-      till mornin&rsquo;, and there&rsquo;s lots of things to be talked over yet.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great Scott, it&rsquo;s already two o&rsquo;clock,&rdquo; remarked Munson, consulting his
-      watch.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then the night&rsquo;s still young, boys,&rdquo; exclaimed Tom Baker, hilariously.
-      &ldquo;Get the brew, Buck. The empty bottles will keep the tally. Come on,
-      lieutenant, drain your glass. No heel taps in this crowd.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      They had started their conversation in low tones so as not to disturb the
-      slumbers of Pierre Luzon. But this precaution, or act of delicate
-      consideration, had been long since forgotten. They were talking loud now,
-      and often all together, and when Buck Ashley had returned from yet another
-      pilgrimage to the store, none heard or noticed the door of the bedroom
-      being cautiously pushed open by just the fraction of an inch.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      All four chairs had been again drawn around the cheerful log fire.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You were talking, Tom, of buying out Ben Thurston,&rdquo; remarked Jack Rover.
-      &ldquo;Then you haven&rsquo;t heard there&rsquo;s an option been given to a Los Angeles
-      syndicate? Guess mebbe Ben Thurston won&rsquo;t be the owner of the big rancho
-      very much longer.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And a good job, too,&rdquo; replied the sheriff, as he helped himself to yet
-      another drink.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck Ashley shook his head incredulously. &ldquo;Oh, lots of fellers have paid
-      down money for an option, as they call it, on the Thurston property, and
-      finally when the rub came they didn&rsquo;t come across and live up to their
-      bargain, and so they just naturally lost their option money.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I was talking to a geologist,&rdquo; intervened Munson, in whose mind the oil
-      question seemed to be still uppermost, &ldquo;and he says there is every
-      indication that the Midway Oil fields, a few miles north, are not one whit
-      better than wells that can be opened up right here.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But what&rsquo;s the use,&rdquo; said Tom Baker, &ldquo;of all the oil fields in California
-      to us fellers if we are about to be let into the secret door of a big
-      cavern where they&rsquo;ve got twelve or fifteen millions of twenty-dollar gold
-      pieces stacked up, jest awaitin&rsquo; for us to take &lsquo;em.&rdquo; The whisky was
-      beginning to do its work; he had already forgotten his aspirations of
-      being an oil king.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s right,&rdquo; said Jack Rover, &ldquo;and don&rsquo;t forget, while you&rsquo;re counting
-      them twenty-dollar gold pieces, that Pierre Luzon has promised to show us
-      the shallow riffle in the mountain stream where Guadalupe gets all that
-      placer gold.&rdquo; In the cowboy&rsquo;s case the alcohol was making only still more
-      fixed the one fixed idea in his brain.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Damn this store business anyway,&rdquo; said Buck Ashley, inconsequentially
-      returning to the theme that appealed to him most directly. &ldquo;Do you &lsquo;spose
-      I&rsquo;m goin&rsquo; to work my fingers off tying up groceries after we find old
-      Murietta&rsquo;s money and the White Wolf&rsquo;s treasure? Not by one hell of a
-      sight, if I know myself, and I &lsquo;low as how I do.&rdquo; And at the slightly
-      opened bedroom door old Pierre, Luzon whom they all thought to be fast
-      asleep, was listening to every word!
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But there is one thing,&rdquo; cried Tom Baker, striking the table fiercely as
-      he set down his glass, &ldquo;I want you fellers to get next to yourselves now
-      and make up your mind to.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Wa&rsquo;al, don&rsquo;t stop, Tom,&rdquo; said Rover. &ldquo;Go on and tell us what you&rsquo;re
-      thinking about. Get it off your chest, old man.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s just this way. By God, you fellers are not entitled to as much of
-      this &lsquo;ere twelve or fifteen million dollars as I am, for I&rsquo;m the feller
-      that went to the governor and got his parole and brought Pierre back here
-      to Tejon. Do you get me?&rdquo; Buck Ashley had straightened up and looked at
-      Tom Baker with an ugly scowl on his face. &ldquo;It was me,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;got that
-      letter from Pierre Luzon and we all throwed in, share and share alike, all
-      five of us. And we&rsquo;ll cut what we find, too, whether it&rsquo;s one million or
-      fifteen million, into five equal parts, or there&rsquo;ll be blood flowin good
-      and plenty.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Baker staggered to his feet, steadied himself for a moment and began to
-      roll up his sleeves.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;There be some things,&rdquo; he ejaculated, &ldquo;that you jest can&rsquo;t let wait and
-      settle up when the deal is all closed. I know what my rights are and you
-      fellers can&rsquo;t bluff me, not by a derned sight.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hold on, hold on, gentlemen,&rdquo; interposed Munson. &ldquo;Let&rsquo;s not commence
-      quarreling about something we are not even sure we shall ever see. Of
-      course we hope to be escorted into the cavern by old Pierre Luzon, and we
-      likewise hope that he&rsquo;ll find a hidden treasure. And by the way, Buck,
-      this reminds me&mdash;the cut has to be into six equal parts, not five,
-      for we owe Luzon the squarest of square deals.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m not agin&rsquo; that,&rdquo; muttered Buck. &ldquo;I just didn&rsquo;t remember him.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; resumed Munson, &ldquo;why quarrel about something that is as yet
-      nothing but a myth? It occurs to me that we should rather, individually
-      and collectively, be exceedingly thankful that Pierre Luzon is alive, and
-      that the White Wolf is dead, and that the one man who holds the secret has
-      promised to show us this treasure.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve never believed one cussed word about the White Wolf being dead,&rdquo;
-       growled Buck Ashley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, it sure was in the newspapers,&rdquo; said Tom Baker, turning down his
-      sleeves and resuming his seat.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, it sure was in the newspapers,&rdquo; replied Buck, &ldquo;and they jest seemed
-      to settle the fact, leastways to their own satisfaction. But I&rsquo;ve been
-      a-thinkin&rsquo; about Dick Willoughby. I don&rsquo;t believe he ever killed Marshall
-      Thurston, I don&rsquo;t.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Whoever did kill him,&rdquo; put in Jack Rover, &ldquo;did it good and plenty. Put
-      the shot right square through his heart.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; said Tom Baker, reaching for more whisky, &ldquo;I ain&rsquo;t got much to
-      say, but what I says I stands to on this &lsquo;ere subject, and that is&mdash;&rdquo;
-       Almost with one accord all turned at the creaking of the bedroom door, and
-      <i>there</i> was Pierre Luzon, looking as if he had seen a ghost. His
-      short prison-cropped hair seemed to be standing on end like bristles, and
-      his eyes stared wildly at the four men. At last he cried out in a shrill
-      voice that was almost a scream:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ze son of Ben Thurston killed! Ah, ha!&rdquo; he laughed, hysterically. &ldquo;Shot
-      through ze heart!&mdash;vengeance at last begins! Ze White Wolf is not
-      dead! He is one live man!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0008" id="linkimage-0008"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
-      <img src="images/0205.jpg" alt="0205 " width="100%" /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h5>
-      <a href="images/0205.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
-    </h5>
-    <p>
-      The door was hastily closed with a loud bang, and the weird figure
-      vanished like an apparition.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      For a few moments the revellers sat in stupefied silence. Finally Buck
-      Ashley said in a low voice: &ldquo;Damn that whisky anyhow. It has made us talk
-      too loud.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; remarked Tom Baker, &ldquo;and also too dangnation much, I&rsquo;m a-thinkin&rsquo;.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Both were sober men now.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Believe I&rsquo;ll have a snooze,&rdquo; said Jack rover, seating himself on an old
-      lounge in a corner of the room. But he did not lie down.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Nothing more was said for perhaps a full half hour; all were nodding or
-      busy with their brooding thoughts.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At last Buck Ashley rose and tiptoed toward the bedroom.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guess I&rsquo;ll see if poor Pierre has gone to sleep again,&rdquo; he murmured.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      A moment later he shouted out from the inner chamber:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hell, boys!&mdash;he&rsquo;s gone! He&rsquo;s given us the slip&mdash;the damned old
-      jail-bird!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0019" id="link2HCH0019"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XIX&mdash;The Jail Delivery
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span>ROUND Dick
-      Willoughby there had been woven a web of circumstantial evidence that even
-      before his trial had convinced most people of his guilt. Only a few tried
-      friends who absolutely refused to believe him capable of shooting down an
-      unarmed man from ambush clung to their faith that he had had nothing to do
-      with the slaying of young Marshall Thurston. Among the general public the
-      only question in discussion was whether the jury were likely to find
-      extenuating circumstances and, should the life of the prisoner come to be
-      spared, how long would be his sentence.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Ben Thurston had lavished money with a free hand toward securing every
-      possible piece of testimony in support of the prosecution, and before his
-      return home even the cautious New York lawyer, Mr. Hawkins, had admitted
-      that the case against Willoughby appeared to be conclusive. It was only a
-      matter of a few weeks now when Thurston would be leaving the district.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Already San Antonio Rancho was in possession of the syndicate; their
-      foreman was in charge, the stock under their control, and it was only out
-      of consideration that the former owner was being permitted to linger a
-      little longer in residence. But for the gloomy and morose man there seemed
-      to be gloating satisfaction in the grim thought that before shaking off
-      forever the dust of his old home he would first of all ensure the hanging
-      of his son&rsquo;s murderer.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Among the most regular visitors at the jail were the ladies of La Siesta,
-      and rumor now began to run around that Miss Merle Farnsworth, despite
-      Willoughby&rsquo;s pleading that she should not mix her name up in the case,
-      would offer some surprising evidence in favor of the accused man&mdash;evidence
-      that might not exonerate Willoughby from responsibility for the deed, but
-      perhaps would fully justify his act to the minds of the jurymen.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      It was now only three days from the trial, and the whole county was agog
-      with expectation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      That night in the small hours five masked men rode very quietly through
-      the streets to the vicinity of the jail. All were heavily armed, and one
-      of them was leading an extra saddle horse. The party dismounted under the
-      shadow of some trees. One man held the horses, while his four companions,
-      with drawn revolvers, advanced to the gateway. Whether it was a simple
-      case of cowardly yielding to threats, or whether there had been
-      preliminary financial greasing of locks and bolts, aided perhaps by
-      sympathy for the prisoner, the fact remains that within a very few minutes
-      Dick Willoughby had been brought from his cell.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You are a free man, Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo; said the leader of the masked band
-      in a low voice. &ldquo;You will come with us.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Who are you?&rdquo; asked Dick.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We are friends&mdash;that is enough.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have no wish to go,&rdquo; protested Dick in the hearing of the jailers. &ldquo;The
-      jury must acquit me&mdash;I am ready to remain here until they do acquit
-      me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Take care. The man with the money can put the rope round your neck.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I am not afraid.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;There is another reason. The name of a certain young lady must not be
-      introduced into this case.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have begged her not to testify.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But she will testify if this trial goes on&mdash;that you know well. Now
-      you will come with us, for her sake if not for your own.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Be it so then,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;Lead the way.&rdquo; Just as quietly as they had
-      come the little band of riders rode through the silent and deserted
-      streets. They took the southern road, and for the first few miles kept to
-      the thoroughfare. Then, reaching a stretch of unreclaimed land, they
-      started across country. The night was moonless and dark, but Dick knew
-      instinctively that they were making for the mountainous country to the
-      north of the Tejon Pass.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The leader rode a short distance ahead. Not a word was spoken. In about
-      two hours they were among the foothills. The pace slackened, and then, as
-      they reached a clump of oaks, a halt was called. From under the shadow of
-      the trees a man appeared, leading two sturdy little mountain ponies. The
-      newcomer wore no mask.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;This man will be your guide from now on,&rdquo; announced the leader, whose
-      features were still concealed by the strip of black cloth tied around the
-      lower part of his face. &ldquo;I am sorry we must ask you to wear a blindfold,
-      Mr. Willoughby. But you are among friends, and I feel sure you will help
-      us all by your ready assent.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I am in your hands,&rdquo; replied Dick, quietly. A few minutes later he was
-      seated on one of the ponies, his eyes securely bandaged. The saddle was a
-      big comfortable Mexican one, and he rested his hands on the horn; for
-      there was no bridle, only a leading rein held by the man mounted on the
-      other pony.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;<i>Adios!</i>&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      It was the leader&rsquo;s voice again, and now once more Dick was on the move,
-      the nimble little pony cantering gently over the turf.
-    </p>
-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
-      <img src="images/0006.jpg" alt="0006 " width="100%" /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h5>
-      <a href="images/0006.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
-    </h5>
-    <p>
-      Hour succeeded hour. The sun had risen, as the blindfolded rider could
-      tell from the warmth of the atmosphere. The canter had long since changed
-      to a walk, and Dick knew that they had been climbing steadily, with many a
-      turn and sometimes up precipitous slopes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At last a strange chilliness came into the air. Dick imagined that he
-      heard a growl, as of some savage animal. Then there came a stop, and he
-      caught some whispered words&mdash;a woman&rsquo;s voice he could have sworn,
-      speaking in some strange tongue. After a few minutes his pony started
-      again.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But they had not gone more than a hundred yards further when his guide
-      called out.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Here we are, sir. I will help you to descend. Zen I take ze bandage away.
-      You see again.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The voice had a quaint foreign accent. For a little time Willoughby
-      remained blind. Then he began to see things, and involuntarily rubbed his
-      eyes in amazement.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      He was in a vast vaulted cavern with no visible entrance revealed by the
-      dim light of several lanterns suspended from the roof. In the far distance
-      a log fire was burning, and silhouetted against its ruddy glow was the
-      figure of the aged Indian squaw, Guadalupe, with a great dog-like creature
-      standing by her side.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guadalupe!&rdquo; exclaimed Dick in profound surprise, turning to his guide.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      This man he now saw was old, with short gray hair and a short gray beard.
-      His face was pale, but there was a pleasant gleam in his eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, Guadalupe,&rdquo; the guide replied. &ldquo;Guadalupe, she guard ze entrance to
-      our cave&mdash;she and ze white wolf. No one can get past ze white wolf
-      unless Guadalupe speaks ze word.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And who are you?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, call me Pierre. I am Mr. Willoughby&rsquo;s servant. Here are fine
-      beefsteaks ready for breakfast. Come.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Pierre!&rdquo; murmured Dick. &ldquo;Pierre Luzon?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Zat is my name. I am Pierre Luzon.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0020" id="link2HCH0020"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XX&mdash;In the Cavern
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">W</span>HEN Dick proceeded
-      to follow Pierre Luzon he found that the ponies had already trotted away
-      through the semidarkness, evidently quite capable on their own account of
-      finding their accustomed stable. Leading the way across the cavern, Pierre
-      entered a corridor at the far end of which bright lights were burning.
-      Soon, Dick, to his great wonderment, found himself in a comfortably,
-      almost luxuriously furnished apartment.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      There were big thick rugs on the floor, and the rock walls were completely
-      hidden by tapestries. The dining table in the centre was set with napery,
-      china, glass, cutlery and silverware that would have done credit to a
-      first-class hotel. Above swung a bronze lamp of antique pattern. Another
-      table was laden with books, newspapers and magazines. In one corner
-      gleamed the snow-white counterpane of a massive bedstead built of oak in
-      Old Mission style. Here and there portable oil stoves were burning,
-      diffusing a genial warmth throughout the grotto.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre watched the guest&rsquo;s look of bewilderment as he gazed around him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You will be very comfortable here,&rdquo; said the Frenchman. &ldquo;I have orders to
-      attend to all your wants.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Orders, from whom?&rdquo; asked Dick abruptly. &ldquo;After breakfast you will know.
-      I have one letter for you in my pocket.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      With characteristic philosophy Dick accepted the situation. The very
-      mention of breakfast gave a keener edge to an already sharply whetted
-      appetite. Pierre departed and presently returned with a superb sirloin
-      steak sizzling on a hot platter. Under his arm was tucked a bottle of
-      wine. As he set down the latter, Dick noted that it was dusty and
-      cobwebby, as if it had emerged from some ancient cellar.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Zis is not ze vintage of California,&rdquo; remarked Pierre, as he drew the
-      cork. &ldquo;It is rare old Burgundy&mdash;all ze way from my beloved France.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;<i>La belle</i> France,&rdquo; murmured Dick. &ldquo;I spent a year there, Pierre,
-      most of the time in Paris.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ah, monsieur knows France and Paris,&rdquo; exclaimed the old man in great
-      delight. &ldquo;Zen you speak French, too?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;<i>Un peu</i>,&rdquo; laughed Dick. &ldquo;<i>Mais je fais beaucoup de fautes, mon
-      ami</i>.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;<i>Non, non, monsieur</i>,&rdquo; cried Pierre, breaking into voluble French.
-      &ldquo;Your accent is perfect&mdash;it is delightful to hear my native language
-      again. We shall be great friends, Mr. Willoughby. Already I am your
-      devoted servant.&rdquo; He bowed deferentially, as he held Dick&rsquo;s chair ready
-      for him to be seated.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You will breakfast with me, Pierre?&rdquo; asked Dick, still in his best
-      French.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no. I wait on monsieur. I shall breakfast in good time.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre was not to be persuaded to take a place at the table, so Dick sat
-      down in solitary state and was served in lordly fashion.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      With the <i>demi-tasse</i> of black coffee at the close of the meal came a
-      box of cigars&mdash;cigars fit for a prince, as Dick knew from the first
-      fragrant whiff.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The table was now cleared and Pierre ready to withdraw. He had taken a
-      letter from his pocket and was holding it in his hand. But Dick, warmed
-      and fed and supremely contented, was watching the ascending rings of
-      tobacco smoke.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Do you know, Pierre,&rdquo; he said between complacent puffs, &ldquo;that I was one
-      of the bunch that helped to get you out of San Quentin?&rdquo; He had lapsed
-      into English.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, yes, I know,&rdquo; replied Pierre, also dropping his French. &ldquo;Ze five men
-      who made up ze purse&mdash;I am very grateful to you all.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then what about the hidden treasure?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ah, I was to show ze hidden treasure. But one great change come about. I
-      made one big mistake.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then the story of all this gold was a frame-up, was it?&rdquo; laughed
-      Willoughby.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; protested Pierre earnestly. &ldquo;Ze cave&mdash;you are here in ze
-      cave, although you do not know ze secret hiding place. Ze treasure, it is
-      here, too. But I can no longer show ze gold, for ze man to whom it all
-      belong he is not dead&mdash;he is alive.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Whom do you mean?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don Manuel de Valencia&mdash;him you call ze White Wolf.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great guns! So he has appeared again. The newspaper stories were all
-      wrong?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Zat is how I made my mistake. But I did not know until I came back to
-      Tehachapi. Ze White Wolf is alive. It is he who has brought you here as
-      his guest. Now you will read zis letter, and zen all things you will
-      comprehend.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre laid the missive on the damask table cloth in front of Dick. The
-      latter fastened his eyes on it in speechless surprise. Before he recovered
-      himself Pierre, lifting the tray of empty dishes, had noiselessly
-      disappeared.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mystery upon mystery,&rdquo; murmured Dick as he broke the seal. The letter was
-      a brief one, and began without any of the usual forms of personal address:
-    </p>
-    <blockquote>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You are in safe and honorable keeping. Have no care. Nor need you worry
-      about your friends&mdash;they will be informed of your safety.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Just as soon as possible the real slayer of Marshall Thurston will be
-      revealed. You will be completely exonerated and can then return to the
-      world, a free man. By this means a certain young lady will be spared from
-      the gossip and the publicity which, although she has been brave enough to
-      say it does not matter, would bring for her annoyance and pain.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;If she is dear to you, as the writer of this letter believes, you will
-      help to shield her from vulgar curiosity by remaining quietly where you
-      are until the proper hour for your deliverance comes. It is only necessary
-      for you to give your word of honor to Pierre Luzon that you will make no
-      attempt to escape or reveal your whereabouts. Your trustfulness will be
-      rewarded&mdash;this is the solemn promise of
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don Manuel de Valencia,
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Your friend.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    </blockquote>
-    <p>
-      Dick read and re-read the strange message. All at once he became conscious
-      that Pierre Luzon was again standing by his chair. Their eyes met.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Does Mr. Willoughby give ze promise required?&rdquo; asked Pierre.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick rose to his feet and extended his hand.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I promise, Pierre. You have my word of honor. The letter says that is
-      enough.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have read ze letter before it was sealed. We all know Mr. Willoughby&rsquo;s
-      word is enough&mdash;it is as good as one gold bond.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;d do anything for Merle Farnsworth,&rdquo; continued Dick, carried away by
-      his fervid emotion. &ldquo;I would die for her, if need be, to save her from one
-      moment&rsquo;s pain.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don Manuel he know that,&rdquo; replied Pierre. Dick paused and his look
-      changed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How the devil does he know I love the girl?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; The Frenchman shrugged his shoulders and smiled. &ldquo;Ah! Don Manuel he
-      know everything. But now, I am under orders not to speak. Over there you
-      will find ze latest newspapers, sir,&rdquo; he went on, pointing to the table
-      laden with literature, &ldquo;and every few days more will be brought for you&mdash;not
-      only ze newspapers of Los Angeles and San Francisco, but also, ze
-      newspapers of New York and London and Paris, all of which monsieur is
-      accustomed to read.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great Scott, you seem to know,&rdquo; exclaimed Dick in a low voice.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre continued placidly:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And you play chess. There is a box of chess&mdash;<i>échecs</i> we call
-      it in France, you will remember. I too play ze game. Don Manuel and I used
-      to spend many hours over ze board. After I have had my breakfast, I,
-      Pierre Luzon, challenge you to one game of chess.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Be it so,&rdquo; laughed Dick. &ldquo;But you must be hungry, man. For heaven&rsquo;s sake
-      go and eat. We&rsquo;ll yarn later on. Meanwhile, I&rsquo;ll have a glance through the
-      newspapers.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick handled the newspapers with renewed surprise&mdash;the very New York
-      papers he was accustomed to receive regularly, also the old familiar. <i>Times
-      Weekly</i> from London and the Paris <i>Figaro</i> to which he had
-      subscribed ever since the old Quartier Latin days! The same with the
-      magazines&mdash;all his favorites were on the table.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, I&rsquo;ll be blowed! Is it the guileless Sing Ling whom Don Manuel has
-      been tapping for information? This certainly looks like home,&rdquo; and again
-      he glanced over the table. He looked at the titles of the books&mdash;several
-      of the latest novels, a volume on socialism, another on the history of
-      architecture.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Seems to know my book tastes, too. I won&rsquo;t be lonesome, that&rsquo;s certain.
-      Well, I can&rsquo;t do better than make a start with the newspapers. I&rsquo;ve fallen
-      quite behind the times.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He stretched himself out on a long rattan chair, and started with a Los
-      Angeles daily. He had read lazily on for nearly an hour, when there came
-      from his lips a little cry of surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Starting up into a sitting posture, Dick again perused the paragraph that
-      had excited his special interest.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      It was an announcement stating that an ideal city was about to be built in
-      the Tehachapi valley, and that a prize of ten thousand dollars was to be
-      awarded to the designer of the best plans for laying out such a town.
-      Reference was made to an advertisement on another page giving the details
-      and the rules of the competition. To this Dick eagerly turned.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The advertisement set forth that the model city was to be located
-      somewhere near the centre of San Antonio Rancho, that the land was
-      traversed by the state highway, by two railroads, by two electric power
-      lines and two oil-carrying pipe lines, also the great Owen&rsquo;s River
-      aqueduct that supplied Los Angeles, some two hundred miles away, with
-      water from the high Sierras. It was further stated that the entire ranch
-      was to be subdivided into small tracts, and that already hundreds of
-      applicants were waiting to make choice of home sites just so soon as the
-      survey work was completed and the land thrown open to selection.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The plans required, and for which the prize of ten thousand dollars was
-      offered, were to show the finest landscape effects, the most impressive
-      and convenient location of public buildings, the most attractive ideas for
-      bringing into being a veritable ideal city provided with all the most
-      modern conveniences and sanitary equipment.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;By gad, I&rsquo;d like to have a shot at that,&rdquo; murmured Willoughby as he lay
-      back in his chair and meditated.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      After a time he picked up the London journal, and the very first thing
-      that met his eye was the identical advertisement on the back of the cover.
-      He rose and began to search through the week&rsquo;s file of the <i>Figaro</i>,
-      and there again he found the announcement of the contest. He was too
-      keenly excited now for more reading. He began to pace the chamber. What a
-      clever head had planned all this world-wide publicity!
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That Los Angeles bunch of fellows are certainly great. They are evidently
-      going into this thing right. Doubtless they are determined to build the
-      ideal&mdash;the model&mdash;city of California. They want the best brains
-      of all lands to help beautify the place. Gee! but I&rsquo;d like to be in this
-      contest game. But perhaps it would be presumption on my part. Yet, who
-      knows the country better than I do? When it comes to landscape effects,
-      I&rsquo;m Johnny-on-the-spot all right. And they&rsquo;re in a hurry&mdash;only sixty
-      days for the drawings. Unusual, such a short time. But I guess they&rsquo;re
-      going to make the dust fly without a week&rsquo;s unnecessary delay. They are
-      certainly live wires&mdash;they began by getting old Ben Thurston on the
-      run.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He was chuckling to himself at the thought when Pierre reappeared.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Pierre, old fellow,&rdquo; cried Dick, &ldquo;would you be able to get me a drawing
-      board, a box of instruments, india ink, water-colors, drawing paper, and
-      so on?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What are you going to do?&rdquo; asked the old man with a smile. &ldquo;Do you think
-      you are again in ze Quartier Latin, Mr. Willoughby?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No. But while I&rsquo;m here I&rsquo;m going back to the old Quartier Latin life,
-      that&rsquo;s a cinch. Can you buy me that stuff?&rdquo; he added, diving into his hip
-      pocket.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But he had forgotten&mdash;he had come out of jail, and his personal
-      possessions had been left behind.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre Luzon, however, had interpreted both the gesture and the thought
-      that had prompted it.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You need no money here, Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;My orders are to get
-      you everything you call for. Write all you need on a piece of paper. I
-      send a trusty messenger, and we have ze drawing paper, ze instruments, ze
-      ink and ze paints here very soon&mdash;yes, very soon.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then, by thunder, I&rsquo;m going to win that ten-thousand-dollar prize.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But she is worth millions of dollars.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What do you mean?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ze young lady&mdash;she very rich young lady, Miss Merle.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick laughed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, that&rsquo;s quite another prize, Pierre,&rdquo; he replied. &ldquo;And if she is so
-      very rich, as you say, why that puts her further out of my reach than
-      ever.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre nodded his head determinedly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;If I was you, Mr. Willoughby, ze prize I would try to win is ze beautiful
-      young lady.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      When Pierre had gone, Dick again lay back in the long chair. But he was
-      day-dreaming and love-dreaming now, wondering whether Merle Farnsworth
-      really cared for him, whether he might dare whisper to her the story of
-      his passionate love.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0021" id="link2HCH0021"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXI&mdash;A Debt of Honor
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">P</span>UBLIC excitement
-      had been running high over the approaching trial of Dick Willoughby, but
-      his delivery from jail by the masked night-riders came as the culminating
-      climax. Mystery and romance were piling up. Despite the strength of the
-      circumstantial evidence, the sudden fate that had overtaken the young heir
-      to San Antonio rancho had been shrouded with uncertainty; no witness had
-      seen the actual doing of the murderous deed. The sensational arrest of
-      Dick Willoughby had been followed by his still more sensational
-      disappearance; for he seemed to have vanished from the face of the earth&mdash;he
-      had been spirited to some place of concealment to which there was not the
-      slightest clue, while also the identity of his rescuers remained a
-      profound enigma.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      All sorts of speculations were rife, and it was small wonder that the name
-      of the famous bandit, Don Manuel, came to be revived. This was just the
-      sort of audacious work the White Wolf would have gloried in&mdash;breaking
-      into a prison, defying the authorities, leaving behind him a trail of
-      mystery and vague terror. But shrewd old-timers pointed out that Don
-      Manuel had never in his whole career helped a gringo&mdash;that his hand
-      had been against every American, and that in his earlier days at all
-      events he had killed ruthlessly, out of sheer lust for vengeance against
-      the race of newcomers who had despoiled him of his ancestral acres. What
-      reason, therefore, could he have had to help Dick Willoughby to liberty?
-      Even if it had been the outlaw&rsquo;s hand that had pulled the trigger against
-      the son of his hated enemy, Ben Thurston, little would he have cared if a
-      score of gringos had come to their end, justly or unjustly, as an
-      aftermath of the tragedy.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Old Ben Thurston had discussed this very question with himself. The
-      slaying of his only son, the clever business deal that had called his own
-      tricky and dishonest bluff and lost him his principality, the sight of his
-      herds being driven away, the approaching eviction from his home&mdash;all
-      these events crowding one upon the other had exasperated him beyond
-      measure and completed the change of the already grouchy, disgruntled man
-      into a veritable wild beast snapping and snarling at everyone. Yet his
-      mind was completely obsessed by the idea that it was Dick Willoughby, and
-      Dick Willoughby alone, who had shot his son, so there was no room in his
-      small and obfuscated brain for any seriously renewed apprehension that his
-      old enemy, the White Wolf, had come to life again.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick&rsquo;s escape from jail almost gave Ben Thurston a fit of apoplexy. It was
-      the sleuth, Leach Sharkey, who alone of those around him ventured to break
-      the news. After his first paroxysm of wrath, Thurston paced the room like
-      a caged animal. He had begun to make a confidant of this man, his constant
-      attendant, the protector with the handy guns in his hip pockets on whom he
-      had come to rely night and day, the one associate who phlegmatically
-      endured his irritable moods and abusive language.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      So, in Leach Sharkey&rsquo;s presence, Thurston, as he walked to and fro, spoke
-      his thoughts aloud.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Damn all pretty faces, anyhow. First and last they have cost me a fine
-      sum. And now it is a pretty face that has cost me my boy&rsquo;s life. It&rsquo;s
-      hell, that&rsquo;s what it is. But I will have my revenge. I&rsquo;ll hang Dick
-      Willoughby with my own hands if necessary&mdash;even if it is the last act
-      of my life I&rsquo;ll have his neck stretched for him.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He was glaring down at the sleuth, and the pause seemed to call for some
-      reply.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, he&rsquo;s given us the slip for the present,&rdquo; Sharkey ventured. Then he
-      caught the gathering fury in the other&rsquo;s eyes, and hurriedly went on: &ldquo;But
-      there is no question in the world we&rsquo;ll run the scoundrel down. I myself
-      will shoot him like the dog he is the moment I lay my two eyes on him.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, don&rsquo;t waste your breath telling me you are going to do it,&rdquo; growled
-      Thurston. &ldquo;Hunt him down. Take all the money you need. Get all the men you
-      can. Search every canyon. Guard every road out of the hill country. And
-      don&rsquo;t be misled by that damn fool talk about the White Wolf of which
-      you&rsquo;ve been telling me. That cursed outlaw is dead&mdash;dead as a
-      herring. I ran the story of his death to earth&mdash;stood on his very
-      grave in the potters&rsquo; field at Seattle. Dick Willoughby&rsquo;s the outlaw now.
-      Get him at any cost. Get him, or, by God, lose your own job, Leach
-      Sharkey. Do you follow me?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I follow you,&rdquo; replied the sleuth, a sardonic smile still further
-      exposing the teeth that were the most prominent feature of his face and at
-      all times gave him a hyena-like appearance. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll get him, make no
-      mistake, Mr. Thurston. Just draw me that check, and I&rsquo;ll have twenty more
-      men out on the range before morning.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      At the store, Dick Willoughby&rsquo;s disappearance was for days the sole topic
-      of conversation. One morning Tom Baker and Buck Ashley were gossiping
-      together.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What beats me,&rdquo; remarked the storekeeper, &ldquo;is that Chester Munson wears
-      such a spry look. He was Dick&rsquo;s closest chum, yet he don&rsquo;t seem to be one
-      bit anxious.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, he&rsquo;s got the word, make no mistake,&rdquo; replied Tom. &ldquo;Although the
-      lieutenant is as close as wax, he knows Dick&rsquo;s all right, for sure. And
-      I&rsquo;m told that up at La Siesta, where Dick has his girl, you know, they&rsquo;re
-      still a-playin&rsquo; the pianner and the fiddle all the time. Mark my words&mdash;there&rsquo;s
-      been some wireless telephone at work. Munson don&rsquo;t worry, his lady friends
-      don&rsquo;t worry, so I begin to think we&rsquo;re a couple of derned old fools to
-      fret ourselves on Dick&rsquo;s account.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s about Pierre Luzon I&rsquo;m frettin&rsquo; most,&rdquo; Buck Ashley rejoined. &ldquo;To
-      think that that damned Frenchman should have done us in the eye, got clean
-      away and robbed us of our share of the buried treasure&mdash;that&rsquo;s what
-      worries me, Tom Baker. And you&rsquo;ll allow now you made a mess of things by
-      not havin&rsquo; the old convict shackled to the bedpost.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A mess of things!&rdquo; cried the sheriff, rising anger in his voice and eyes.
-      &ldquo;You won&rsquo;t keep your mouth shut till I teach you&mdash;&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      But just then there was the clatter of hoofs outside, and Tom stopped in
-      the middle of his sentence. A moment later Munson and Jack Rover entered
-      in a state of visible excitement. Munson carried in his arms a rotund
-      canvas sack tied at the neck. The package was not very big, but clearly of
-      considerable weight.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great Caesar,&rdquo; exclaimed the lieutenant, without pausing to give any
-      greeting. &ldquo;A most surprising thing has happened. When I awoke this morning
-      I found this bag lying on my table. And what do you think it contains?&rdquo; As
-      he asked the question he dumped the sack on the counter with a heavy thud.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;ve got us guessin&rsquo;,&rdquo; drawled Tom.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ten thousand, five hundred dollars in gold!&rdquo; announced Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good Lord!&rdquo; ejaculated the sheriff in great surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson went on:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Five thousand dollars are for the French warder at San Quentin who
-      smuggled Pierre Luzon&rsquo;s letter out of the prison, and the balance is for
-      the syndicate.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What syndicate?&rdquo; gasped Buck, for the moment quite bewildered.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The Hidden Treasure Syndicate, of course,&rdquo; exclaimed Jack Rover. &ldquo;Pierre
-      Luzon has sent each man back the hundred dollars he put up to get him out
-      of the pen, and five thousand dollars extra to divide among us.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck and Tom sprang simultaneously to their feet.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hooroosh!&rdquo; shouted the sheriff. &ldquo;I always knew there was no yellow streak
-      in old Pierre Luzon.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And I always said I liked him, too,&rdquo; observed Buck. &ldquo;But come into the
-      parlor, boys,&rdquo; he went on, with a cautious look around. &ldquo;Let&rsquo;s count the
-      money.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And divvy it up,&rdquo; added Tom eagerly. &ldquo;Gosh &lsquo;lmighty, boys! I&rsquo;ve never yet
-      seen a thousand dollars in gold at one time outside a bank cashier&rsquo;s
-      window. And to think there&rsquo;s that amount cornin&rsquo; to me right now!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;One thousand, one hundred, pal, to be exact,&rdquo; laughed Jack Rover, lifting
-      the package and following the storekeeper into the sanctum beyond the
-      counter.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The gold was in United States twenty-dollar pieces, bearing dates which
-      showed they had been minted more than twenty years ago.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Some of Joaquin Murietta&rsquo;s loot,&rdquo; remarked Jack Rover, when attention had
-      been drawn to this detail.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; observed Tom Baker, holding up the coin he had been examining,
-      &ldquo;Murietta wasn&rsquo;t alive when this &lsquo;ere gold piece came from the mint. This
-      is some of Don Manuel&rsquo;s stuff.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The White Wolf!&rdquo; exclaimed Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, the White Wolf,&rdquo; continued the sheriff. &ldquo;So if the White Wolf ain&rsquo;t
-      dead, as Pierre declared that night&mdash;&rdquo; Tom gazed at the bedroom door
-      as if the spectral figure might reappear&mdash;&ldquo;he&rsquo;s honorin&rsquo; the
-      Frenchie&rsquo;s sight draft, that&rsquo;s sure.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I see,&rdquo; said Munson. &ldquo;He is paying the five thousand dollars old Pierre
-      promised in his letter if he was helped to freedom and five thousand
-      dollars besides.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Precisely,&rdquo; Tom Baker replied. &ldquo;But if the White Wolf is dead, as most
-      folks say, then the Frenchie&rsquo;s got the key to the treasure vault, all
-      right.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So we&rsquo;ve got to get him back here again, boys,&rdquo; murmured Buck, rubbing
-      his hands while his eyes feasted upon the heap of gold. &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t mind
-      boardin&rsquo; Pierre Luzon for a spell, and he can have all the bourbon he
-      wants.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Till he tells us where Guadalupe gets her nuggets,&rdquo; grinned Jack. &ldquo;But
-      you&rsquo;ve forgotten to show &lsquo;em, Munson, the card that came with the coin.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, yes,&rdquo; rejoined Munson, drawing a small piece of pasteboard from his
-      pocket. &ldquo;It is brief enough. Luzon gives his countryman&rsquo;s family address
-      in Marseilles where the first five thousand dollars is to be mailed. Then
-      he writes down our five names, Dick Willoughby&rsquo;s first, and says the five
-      of us are to share equally.&rdquo; He passed the card to Tom Baker for
-      inspection, and went on: &ldquo;Jack and I are going to ride over to
-      Bakersfield, get the French bank draft and put Dick&rsquo;s money in the bank
-      along with our own.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Where&rsquo;s Dick?&rdquo; asked Buck, with a quick uplift of his eyes into Munson&rsquo;s
-      face.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But the latter was not to be betrayed into divulging any information that
-      might be in his possession.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have not the slightest idea,&rdquo; he replied airily. &ldquo;But I feel sure
-      Dick&rsquo;s all right. He is the sort of fellow well able to look after
-      himself. Meanwhile, Jack and I will attend to his financial interests,&rdquo; he
-      added with a laugh, as he began to count the gold.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      In silence the task proceeded, five thousand dollars first being set
-      aside, and then the balance divided into five separate heaps. When all
-      were satisfied as to the correctness of the distribution, Munson swept the
-      gold back into the sack, except for the two little piles allotted to
-      Ashley and Baker. Then he securely tied the package, ready for the ride to
-      Bakersfield.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Buck will lock mine in his safe, boys,&rdquo; exclaimed Tom Baker. &ldquo;Gosh me,
-      but I&rsquo;ll want to look at it two or three times a day.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m drivin&rsquo; over to the bank myself tomorrer,&rdquo; declared Buck. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve
-      got a bit more to add to this pile.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A few handfuls of nuggets, I suppose,&rdquo; laughed Rover.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, I&rsquo;ll allow Guadalupe always pays her grocery bills. But this &lsquo;ere
-      store ain&rsquo;t goin&rsquo; to be a safe deposit vault, not on your demed life, with
-      bandits around again. So you&rsquo;d better arrange to come with me to town
-      tomorrer, Tom.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;ll need me to help you home, perhaps,&rdquo; grinned the sheriff. &ldquo;But, I
-      say, Munson, you ain&rsquo;t told us yet how this sack came to be delivered at
-      your place.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;There&rsquo;s a proper mystery for you!&rdquo; cried Munson. &ldquo;As I said before, I
-      found the bag this morning, lying on my dressing table. Sing Ling was the
-      only one besides myself in the shack, and he never heard a sound all
-      night.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;re still in Dick&rsquo;s old home?&rdquo; asked Buck. &ldquo;Yes, but I leave tomorrow&mdash;have
-      notice to quit, for some surveyor chaps are coming in. I&rsquo;m moving up to
-      Mr. Robles&rsquo; place. He wants me to catalog the books in his library.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And Sing Ling?&rdquo; queried Tom.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He goes, too. You see, Mr. Robles needs a crackerjack cook, now I&rsquo;ll be
-      boarding with him,&rdquo; Munson laughed, gaily. &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t happen to have a
-      porterhouse steak about the place, Buck?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I can heat you up a can of pork and beans.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Nothing doing! Jack and I wouldn&rsquo;t spoil our appetites with such truck as
-      that. We&rsquo;re going to set up a chicken dinner in Bakersfield.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Chicken and champagne,&rdquo; chimed in Jack, as he swung the sack over his
-      shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;re beginning to get big bugs these days,&rdquo; called out the storekeeper
-      as the young men left the room. &ldquo;Guess, Tom,&rdquo; he went on, turning to the
-      sheriff, &ldquo;we could do with a jolt of Kentucky.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Make it a bottle of bourbon,&rdquo; gurgled Tom, &ldquo;to remind us of our absent
-      friend.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dear old Pierre,&rdquo; murmured Buck, as he fumbled in his pocket for the key
-      of the safe, his eyes glued all the time on the two little heaps of gold.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0022" id="link2HCH0022"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXII&mdash;Underqround Wonders
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">D</span>ick Willoughby was
-      in a way happy in his retreat. At first he had been inclined to regret the
-      jail delivery&mdash;it might have been the manlier part to have faced the
-      music and cleared his name before the whole world. But then he reflected
-      on the uncertainties of a trial, the cases of innocent men having suffered
-      because of damning circumstantial evidence piled up against them, the
-      vindictiveness of Ben Thurston and the undoubted power of his money to
-      press the criminal charge by every unscrupulous means. So Dick soon came
-      round to the belief that he might be safer for the time being in the
-      guardianship of the White Wolf than at the mercy of a fallible jury.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Then there was Merle Farnsworth to consider. Yes; to have brought her into
-      a public court, to have allowed her to plead for him by telling the story
-      of Marshall Thurston&rsquo;s loathsome advances&mdash;that was a thing that
-      could never have been tolerated. The leader of the jail-breaking gang had
-      been right; Dick owed it to Merle to save her from such a cruel ordeal.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Finally Dick&rsquo;s contentment over his change of quarters was completed when
-      Pierre Luzon appeared with a superb equipment of drawing instruments and
-      materials. There was no time to worry now over surmises as to the wisdom
-      of this course or the other course. Work lay to his hand&mdash;work of the
-      most absorbing and delightful kind; and with all the ambitious enthusiasm
-      of his temperament he tackled it whole-heartedly there and then. Hour
-      after hour, day after day, Pierre watched in contemplative silence the
-      methodical advancement of the task to which the young architect had
-      applied himself.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But there were frequent intervals for conversation, sometimes in French,
-      sometimes in English, as the mood prompted. Occasionally Pierre drifted
-      into semi-confidential reminiscences, and Willoughby soon came to know in
-      close detail the story of Don Manuel&rsquo;s life&mdash;the tragedy of his
-      sister Rosetta&rsquo;s death, the vow of vengeance against Ben Thurston, the
-      early bandit days when the White Wolf counted every gringo in the land his
-      natural enemy, the often hairbreadth escapes of the outlaw, his sublime
-      courage and nerve in the direst emergencies.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don Manuel was one great man,&rdquo; remarked Pierre at the close of one of
-      these confidences&mdash;the phrase was a favorite one with the old
-      Frenchman. &ldquo;Many and many a time he could have shot his enemy from a
-      distance and got away. But Don Manuel had vowed zat he would kill him hand
-      to hand&mdash;zat ze villain must die with a last malediction in his ear,
-      and knowing zat it was he, ze White Wolf, who in ze end had revenged his
-      sister&rsquo;s shame.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He felt, too, didn&rsquo;t he, that his father had been wronged in being driven
-      from San Antonio Rancho?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Sure&mdash;zat was another great wrong&mdash;zat was why Don Manuel was
-      so bitter against all ze Americans. But he made zem pay for ze land many
-      and many times over.&rdquo; Then Pierre, as was now his custom in Dick&rsquo;s
-      presence when speaking at any length, lapsed into French as he continued:
-      &ldquo;But the White Wolf was a man of high honor. He never used any of the
-      proceeds of his robberies for himself. True, he spent the money to pay his
-      band, to pay the numerous scouts and spies whose services he secretly
-      retained, to plan and accomplish further hold-ups, to defy and outwit the
-      authorities. But on his own needs&mdash;never&mdash;not one dollar!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre went on to explain that after Ben Thurston had fled from California
-      and kept away in hiding, Don Manuel had visited Spain, to claim the family
-      estates in Valencia to which his father&rsquo;s death had left him the sole
-      heir. These he had sold for many millions of dollars, and most of that
-      money he kept in banks in London and Paris. So he was a very rich man, and
-      had no need to rob anyone except to gratify his vengeance. Even the
-      hoarded gold of Joaquin Murietta he had never touched. It remained intact
-      today in the treasure vault of the cave, boxes and sacks of gold and
-      jewels.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Won&rsquo;t I be allowed to see this wonderful treasure?&rdquo; asked Dick, half
-      jesting.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Perhaps, some day, if the White Wolf chooses to show you. But it is not
-      for me to do that&mdash;I swore an oath of secrecy when the White Wolf
-      trusted me&mdash;me and Felix Vasquez, who was also his confidant. But
-      Vasquez was killed at Tulare Lake. So now only we two know the secret, and
-      until the White Wolf himself dies my lips are sealed by the solemn oath I
-      swore to the Virgin Mary.&rdquo; The old man crossed himself devoutly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then where does the White Wolf live now?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ah, that is another secret. Again I would break my oath if I spoke one
-      word.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And Guadalupe&mdash;does she know these things?&rdquo; asked Dick in English.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guadalupe? Oh, no,&rdquo; responded Pierre, politely adopting the change of
-      language, &ldquo;she is just one servant, our cook&mdash;one very excellent
-      cook, as monsieur knows&mdash;and ze guardian of ze cave. For ze real
-      white wolf guards Guadalupe&mdash;ze big animal is just like one tame dog
-      to ze old squaw, but with his fierce jaws he would kill anyone who dared
-      to approach her or come near ze hidden entrance to zis cavern. No man can
-      ever find zat while ze white wolf is alive. In ze old days he killed
-      several men when zey dared to follow Guadalupe.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then the white wolf must be very old?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;As old as Guadalupe&mdash;as old as the Tehachapi mountains,&rdquo; exclaimed
-      Pierre, again crossing himself and thereby revealing the superstitious
-      dread in which he held the savage animal.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But you can pass the white wolf, can&rsquo;t you?&rsquo; asked Dick.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Never&mdash;except when Guadalupe give permission. Then ze wolf lies down
-      and I can come out of ze cave or enter. Ah! ze white wolf is one terrible
-      beast. But he never shows his teeth to Don Manuel. Only Don Manuel can
-      pass when Guadalupe is not there.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then where is Guadalupe&rsquo;s riffle of gold&mdash;where is the lake of oil
-      about which you told Tom Baker?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Come, I will show you zese,&rdquo; replied Pierre. As he rose he picked up the
-      lantern he usually carried.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick jumped to his feet with alacrity and followed his guide.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      They crossed the main cavern, then entered another side gallery. This had
-      many windings and from it ran several diverging rock corridors. But Pierre
-      led the way unfalteringly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Fully half a mile must have been traversed when at last the Frenchman
-      halted and swung his lantern aloft.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Zere!&rdquo; was all he said.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick followed the flash of the lantern, and there before him was a dark
-      pool stretching away indefinitely into the blackness beyond. He bent down
-      and scooped up a little of the fluid in his palm. It was a brown oil, as
-      thin as water, and therefore capable of use without any refining process.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great Scott, this is wonderful!&rdquo; exclaimed Dick in profound amazement.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Very wonderful,&rdquo; concurred Pierre. &ldquo;In zis cavern are oil and water, also
-      gold&mdash;Guadalupe&rsquo;s gold. Ze gold is close to here. Come.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre turned and again led the way through dark and winding corridors. At
-      a little distance Dick became conscious of the purling of a running
-      stream. Pierre stopped once more, but this time held the lantern close to
-      the ground.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Here Guadalupe come to wash out ze nuggets of gold, and since I have been
-      in prison she buy with zem, so Mr. Baker say to me, groceries at ze store.
-      Don Manuel, when I tell him, he very angry&mdash;she never do zat again.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Poor old Buck Ashley!&rdquo; laughed Dick. &ldquo;He lost you, Pierre, and now he&rsquo;ll
-      be losing his best paying customer, too.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      While speaking, he knelt and dipped his hands into the stream, bringing up
-      some gravel into the lantern rays. But Pierre shook his head.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You no find ze gold. Guadalupe wash many hours to get, perhaps, just one
-      nugget. But there is heaps and heaps, if ze miners came with spades and
-      cradles.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great guns, there must be the reef, too, from which the nuggets have
-      come!&rdquo; exclaimed Dick, rising erect and dropping the handful of pebbles.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Now, we must go back,&rdquo; said Pierre, &ldquo;for zis evening you are to be
-      allowed to come for a ride with me down ze mountains.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t say?&rdquo; Dick cried, surprised and delighted.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes; Don manuel he send word today that he give permission. But you must
-      wear ze bandage round your eyes, and you must promise to return when I
-      give ze word.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t for one moment think, old fellow, that I would leave my drawings.
-      But where are we going tonight?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;To La Siesta,&rdquo; replied Pierre.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hurrah!&rdquo; shouted Dick. &ldquo;Hurry up, Pierre! I&rsquo;m mighty glad you got me
-      those ties and things from Los Angeles. You say you can give me a
-      hair-cut?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ze old-time bandit learned to trim ze hair of his friends as well as ze
-      pocket-books of his enemies,&rdquo; was the laughing answer.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0023" id="link2HCH0023"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXIII&mdash;The Unexpected Visitor
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">M</span>OST of the cattle
-      had been driven off the land. The vaqueros had dispersed to the four
-      points of the compass. Chester Munson had vacated his room in Dick
-      Willoughby&rsquo;s old home, and had taken up his residence and library duties
-      at Mr. Robles&rsquo; mansion on the hill. Sing Ling had folded his tent like the
-      Arab and silently stolen away in the same direction. A small army of
-      surveyors had appeared on the scene and were quartered in the rancho
-      buildings.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The only one of the old-timers who still lingered on was Ben Thurston,
-      more gloomy and morose than ever, seldom stirring out of doors now, but
-      conducting all his business by telephone or through the agency of the
-      sleuth, Leach Sharkey, his only companion.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Jack Rover had pitched his camp temporarily at the store. Buck Ashley had
-      assigned him Pierre&rsquo;s cot, but the cowboy had fixed it under a
-      wide-spreading sycamore, preferring to sleep in the open rather than share
-      the grocery-perfumed atmosphere of the store building.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Tom Baker was around most of the time. The three men clung together with a
-      vague sense that they had a common interest in the vast treasure which had
-      so far eluded them, but which might any day come again within reach of
-      their eager claws. It afforded an endless theme of conversation, varied by
-      talk about the passing of the rancho and all the train of changes which
-      were bound to follow the close settlement of the valley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      One morning Jack Rover found Buck at the door of the store, with a pair of
-      antiquated-looking field glasses at his eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Where did you get the goggles, Buck?&rdquo; asked Jack.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I rummaged &lsquo;em out of a trunk&mdash;had almost forgot I had the
-      blamed things. But we used to keep a sharp lookout in the old bandit days&mdash;got
-      kinda ready for any suspicious lookin&rsquo; riders on the road.&rdquo; He had spoken
-      while still peering through the binoculars, but now he turned to Jack and
-      proffered him the glasses. &ldquo;I do wonder what &lsquo;n hell we&rsquo;re all cornin&rsquo; to
-      anyway. This here ranch that we&rsquo;ve bragged up as bein&rsquo; the biggest in all
-      California! Ugh!&rdquo; The grunt was one of unspeakable disgust. &ldquo;Take a look
-      for yourself.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Jack turned the glasses in the direction Buck had been gazing, and began
-      to adjust the focus.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What&rsquo;s the matter now?&rdquo; he asked.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Matter &lsquo;nough,&rdquo; growled the storekeeper. &ldquo;San Antonio Rancho is goin&rsquo; to
-      the dogs. Do you see them specks away out yonder in the valley? That&rsquo;s
-      another band of surveyors. One feller&rsquo;s peekin&rsquo; through a spy-glass set on
-      a tripod; another feller goes ahead and puts up tall stakes with big
-      figgers on &lsquo;em, and the other fellers are chainin&rsquo; off the distances. This
-      &lsquo;ere ranch &lsquo;ll surely look like a checker-board blamed soon.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Progress,&rdquo; said Jack, laconically.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Progress, hell!&rdquo; snapped Ashley. &ldquo;These new fellers that bought the ranch
-      have sure &lsquo;nuff driv&rsquo; off all the cattle and now they&rsquo;re dividin&rsquo; up the
-      land. I bet they&rsquo;ll take the postoffice away from me&mdash;not that it
-      pays much, for the Lord knows it don&rsquo;t&mdash;but it brings customers to my
-      store.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, Buck,&rdquo; said the cowboy, consolingly, &ldquo;there are lots worse things
-      than moving a postoffice. What&rsquo;s to prevent your setting up the finest
-      grocery store in the new model city the advertisements speak about?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That would suit me fine, wouldn&rsquo;t it?&rdquo; cried the old storekeeper, with
-      scathing contempt. &ldquo;Goin&rsquo; around in a biled shirt, and handin&rsquo; out pencils
-      and chewin&rsquo; gum to the little school gals that&rsquo;ll be swarmin&rsquo; all over the
-      place. Not on your life, Jack! I&rsquo;ll be losin&rsquo; both my postoffice and my
-      store in these new-fangled times.&rdquo; He paused a moment, then his tone
-      changed to one of aggressiveness. &ldquo;However, they ain&rsquo;t built their
-      doggoned new town yet, and it&rsquo;s my belief all this boom talk is just so
-      much hot air.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;In any case you won&rsquo;t need to worry, Buck, after we get on the tracks of
-      Pierre Luzon again. I intend to find the old squaw&rsquo;s sand-bar, or my name
-      isn&rsquo;t Jack Rover.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And I betche I&rsquo;m a-goin&rsquo; to find Joaquin Murietta&rsquo;s cache,&rdquo; concurred the
-      old man with equal determination.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Just then Tom Baker slouched out of the store, where he had overheard the
-      conversation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, things are a-goin&rsquo; to turn out all right in the end, boys, don&rsquo;t fret
-      over that. And there&rsquo;s one thing gol-dern certain, there&rsquo;ll be some great
-      things doin&rsquo; in this &lsquo;ere valley once they get started on buildin&rsquo; the
-      town. The new place will just spring up like Oklahomy City, or Liberal,
-      Kansas, or some of them big towns that had twenty thousand people livin&rsquo;
-      in &lsquo;em inside o&rsquo; thirty days from the time they were surveyed and laid
-      out.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That seems quite impossible,&rdquo; commented Jack.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not impossible by a derned sight. My brother was at Liberal, Kansas, down
-      there on the Rock Island, near No Man&rsquo;s Land, you know. The new town had
-      been talked of and talked of for mebbe three or four months, just as this
-      new town is bein&rsquo; talked about today. Then finally the mornin&rsquo; came when
-      the new town of Liberal was to be opened up. There was to be a regular
-      town openin&rsquo;, so to speak, and a sale of lots. Why, great guns, when the
-      management of that town company rode into the station, on the early train,
-      they found more&rsquo;n ten thousand people right there campin&rsquo; in covered
-      wagons, tents and all that sorta business, just awaitin&rsquo; for the
-      auctioneerin&rsquo; to start.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Tom paused to take a fresh chew of tobacco and then rambled on:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I tell you, boys, that within thirty days there was twenty thousand
-      people livin&rsquo; in that &lsquo;ere town. Two banks were established, and one of
-      them had one hundred and eighty-five thousand dollars in deposits, too.
-      Oh, there&rsquo;s lots of people who remember the rush to Liberal, and the
-      boomin&rsquo; of Oklahomy City also. And history&rsquo;s fixin&rsquo; to repeat itself right
-      here on this &lsquo;ere ranch. Things will be sizzlin&rsquo; when the town site is
-      finally located and the rush starts pourin&rsquo; in from Portland, Oregon, on
-      the north, to San Diego on the south, with a few thousands from Texas and
-      other states this side o&rsquo; the Rocky Mountains. They&rsquo;ll sure be great
-      doin&rsquo;s when the Los Angeles syndicate announce they&rsquo;ve awarded to some
-      feller that ten-thousand-dollar prize for the best plans for their ideal
-      city, as they keep on callin&rsquo; it.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Munson and I were speaking about the contest and the prize,&rdquo; remarked
-      Jack, &ldquo;and were saying that if Dick Willoughby were only here, he&rsquo;d about
-      win, hands down. You know he was an architect once, before he came West.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dick Willoughby,&rdquo; snorted Ashley, &ldquo;How can he compete when he don&rsquo;t know
-      anything about the blamed business? He&rsquo;s hid away, right enough.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Munson knows a thing or two,&rdquo; remarked Tom Baker. &ldquo;If he&rsquo;d only apeak, he
-      could tell us where Dick is. That&rsquo;s my opinion.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And there once again you&rsquo;re dead wrong,&rdquo; retorted Jack, warmly. &ldquo;If
-      Munson only knew where Dick is hiding, he would have got that very prize
-      competition advertisement into his hands long before now. He&rsquo;s sore
-      because he can&rsquo;t send Dick the word. Where is Dick Willoughby? By gad,
-      it&rsquo;s a mystery.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I guess you&rsquo;re right,&rdquo; said the sheriff. &ldquo;That sort o&rsquo; exonerates Munson
-      from keepin&rsquo; things from his partners. I think I owe it to Chester Munson
-      to drink his health&mdash;just for ever doubtin&rsquo; him. What shall it be,
-      boys?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      And the open-air meeting adjourned.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      It was the very evening of the day on which this conversation had been
-      held in Buck Ashley&rsquo;s store that Dick Willoughby rode forth from the
-      cavern blindfolded and under the guidance of Pierre Luzon. For the first
-      hour progress was slow&mdash;round many turnings, down steep declivities,
-      with just here and there a few miles of easier trail. But then there had
-      been a swift canter for another hour over grass land, and now at last the
-      riders were upon a well-made road. Dick divined that this must be the
-      highway leading to La Siesta, but from what point of the compass they had
-      come he had not the remotest conception.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Very soon Pierre Luzon, still riding ahead with the leading rein, came to
-      a halt.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Here we are. Dismount, please,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;You are free to remove ze
-      bandage.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick looked; they were right below the knoll on which the Darlington home
-      stood. Lights were gleaming from the windows. Dick could even hear the
-      faint tinkle of the piano.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I hide ze ponies here in zis little grove of trees,&rdquo; Pierre continued,
-      pointing to a coppice not fifty yards from the main road. &ldquo;In two hours&rsquo;
-      time, at eleven o&rsquo;clock&rdquo;&mdash;Pierre looked at his watch in the bright
-      moonlight&mdash;&ldquo;monsieur will return. I have your word?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My word as a gentleman, Pierre,&rdquo; exclaimed Dick, extending his hand. &ldquo;So
-      long then, old fellow. I&rsquo;ve got to make the best use of my time.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The piano playing stopped abruptly when Willoughby, unannounced, appeared
-      at the door of the music room.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dick!&rdquo; exclaimed Merle delightedly, leaving the instrument and rushing
-      toward him. If they had been alone Dick felt that right then she would
-      have jumped into his arms. But at the distance of a few paces she halted
-      and clasped her hands.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How ever did you get here, Mr. Willoughby?&rdquo; she asked intensely.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I rode here,&rdquo; he answered, as they shook hands. &ldquo;But it is only a brief
-      visit. Hallo, Miss Grace! I&rsquo;m delighted to see you again. And you, Ches,
-      old sport&mdash;why this is great luck to find you here! Mrs. Darlington,
-      I&rsquo;m mighty glad to see you all once more.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The whole bevy were crowding around him, shaking hands and expressing
-      their joyful surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We knew you were safe, that was all,&rdquo; explained Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So you were having just the same jolly good times,&rdquo; laughed Dick,
-      glancing at the piano. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m simply dying for some music.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But wait a minute,&rdquo; exclaimed Munson, drawing a fat wad of newspaper
-      cuttings from his pocket. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve got to tell you about a competition you
-      must get into&mdash;new plans for an ideal city here&mdash;&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;In the heart of the old rancho,&rdquo; smiled Dick, as he completed the
-      sentence. While he spoke, he placed his arm affectionately across his
-      chum&rsquo;s shoulders. &ldquo;I know all about it, old man. I&rsquo;m working hard on my
-      plans&mdash;they are already more than half done.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Bravo!&rdquo; shouted Munson. &ldquo;That&rsquo;s great news.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But here, too, is Mr. Robles,&rdquo; exclaimed Dick, breaking from the group
-      and stepping across the room. &ldquo;Excuse me, senor, but I did not notice you
-      were here till this moment.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No excuse needed, my friend. You were better engaged&rdquo;&mdash;this with a
-      humorous side-glance at the young ladies. &ldquo;But I am glad to see you
-      looking so well.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Where have you been, Mr. Willoughby?&rdquo; asked Grace.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That I cannot tell you,&rdquo; replied Dick gravely. &ldquo;I have pledged my solemn
-      word. I must leave you at eleven o&rsquo;clock, returning whence I came. And
-      meanwhile nobody must ask me a single question about my place of hiding.
-      There now&mdash;that&rsquo;s all. What shall it be first, Miss Merle, a piano
-      solo or a duet with the violin?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Supper, I should say,&rdquo; exclaimed Mrs. Darlington, as she left the room.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0024" id="link2HCH0024"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXIV&mdash;In a Tight Corner
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">D</span>ICK&rsquo;S after-dark
-      visit to La Siesta was only the first of several that followed at
-      intervals of a few days. He came and departed mysteriously, and during his
-      brief stay every precaution was taken that no one except his few trusted
-      friends should know of his presence. But by some means or other a whisper
-      had reached the ear of the sleuth, Leach Sharkey, that the fugitive had
-      been seen at the home of Mrs. Darlington.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      When the news was imparted to Ben Thurston, the old man quivered from
-      excitement.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;At La Siesta, do you tell me? Let us ride over there at once, and search
-      the place from basement to attic.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; replied Sharkey. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve got my scouts out. Don&rsquo;t you worry. We
-      must wait till the night bird comes back. Then we&rsquo;ll trap him like a fat
-      quail.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;All right. Have my automobile ready, and a bunch of well-armed fellows
-      right here, so that we can make a rush over at a moment&rsquo;s notice. By God,
-      I&rsquo;ve been disappointed in everything else&mdash;lost my son, lost my
-      ranch, lost my home. But I&rsquo;m not going to lose that man. I&rsquo;m going to get
-      him, even if we shoot him down on sight as an outlawed fugitive from
-      justice with a price on his head.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll get him,&rdquo; answered Sharkey, with a grim smile. &ldquo;You may count him a
-      dead bird. I guessed he wouldn&rsquo;t keep away from his girl very long.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;His girl! Curse her&mdash;it was she who lured my son to his death. But
-      I&rsquo;ll be avenged. If she has been harboring an outlaw, she, too, has broken
-      the law and shall go to jail.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, she no doubt thinks him innocent,&rdquo; suggested the sleuth.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Innocent! All women are alike&mdash;treacherous devils at heart. I would
-      give them the vote&mdash;yes, but the rope at the same time,&rdquo; he went on,
-      growling in savage incoherence.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And Sharkey, knowing that discussion or contradiction only added fresh
-      fuel to his vile temper, left him alone.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At last, a few nights later, a rider dashed up to Ben Thurston&rsquo;s house
-      with the news that Dick Willoughby had been seen entering La Siesta, and
-      that, following Sharkey&rsquo;s instructions, every avenue of escape was now
-      guarded.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hurry, hurry! I&rsquo;ve got to be in at the death,&rdquo; fairly screamed the old
-      man.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Five minutes later the big seven-passenger automobile, carrying three or
-      four armed men besides its owner and his personal guard, Leach Sharkey,
-      was devouring the twenty miles of road that lay between the two ranch
-      homes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      That evening the four young people were quietly chatting in the cosy
-      corner on the interior verandah&mdash;the comfortable little nook fixed up
-      with rugs and tapestries and oriental divans. It was summer now, and after
-      a sultry day the night air was sweet and balmy. Willoughby was smoking a
-      cigar in languid contentment with his surroundings, when all at once he
-      sprang to his feet.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Tia Teresa had rushed in, frantic with excitement.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A great big automobile is coming along the road,&rdquo; she cried, &ldquo;and there
-      are men watching outside the portico. Come with me,&rdquo; she went on,
-      addressing Dick. &ldquo;I know where your horses are hid. I can take you by a
-      secret path through the oleanders.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick vaguely wondered why the duenna should know anything about his mode
-      of coming. But there was no time to question, for just then there came the
-      sound of voices outside.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Mrs. Darlington, pale and agitated, emerged from the drawing room.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What has happened?&rdquo; she asked breathlessly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I guess I&rsquo;m trapped,&rdquo; replied Dick quietly. &ldquo;No doubt it&rsquo;s old Thurston.
-      There will be shooting if I resist. So there is nothing for it but to
-      surrender.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; exclaimed Merle. &ldquo;I dread that vindictive man. He must never get
-      you in his power again. We must gain time to smuggle you out of the house.
-      I have it. Tia Teresa&mdash;give me your mantilla and your cloak. Quick,
-      quick!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      A first loud knocking had come on the door at the head of the portico
-      steps. The duenna in a moment had divested herself of her loose black robe
-      and heavy lace veil.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Get something else to wear and meet us at the oleanders,&rdquo; continued
-      Merle, taking the garments from Tia Teresa. &ldquo;Put these on, Dick, and sit
-      right there in that corner. Mr. Munson, turn off two or three of the
-      lights. Mother, dear, control yourself. Take this book and be reading.
-      Now, that will do. They will be here in a moment.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      A second knock had been heard, and now they knew that the door was being
-      opened without further ceremony, for at placid La Siesta there were no
-      bolts or bars against unwelcome visitors.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      In that brief minute a wonderful transformation scene had taken place in
-      the cosy corner. Tia Teresa had disappeared. Munson was stretched on a
-      sofa, puffing his cigar. Merle and Grace had been playing patience during
-      the afternoon and had left the cards in scattered confusion. Mrs.
-      Darlington, beneath the single incandescent aglow, was quietly reading.
-      From the darksome corner the pretended duenna surveyed this peaceful scene
-      of domesticity.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      It was Ben Thurston himself who led the way for his swarm of myrmidons.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      He began without formality; his tone was coarse and rude.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We want the outlaw, Dick Willoughby. We know he is here. So make no fuss.
-      Deliver him over.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Mrs. Darlington had risen to her feet, and Munson, too, had sprung erect.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What do you mean?&rdquo; asked the lady with quiet dignity.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You know darned well what I mean.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson stepped forward, but he played the game best by keeping himself
-      under perfect control.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You will speak civilly, Mr. Thurston, or leave this house. What is
-      wanted?&rdquo; he added, turning to Leach Sharkey.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We want Dick Willoughby, of course,&rdquo; the sleuth replied, politely enough.
-      &ldquo;We have reason to believe he is here.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, you can see for yourself whether he is here or not,&rdquo; said Munson,
-      glancing around. &ldquo;But if you wish to look through the house, I don&rsquo;t
-      suppose Mrs. Darlington will refuse you permission.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The lady bowed her acquiescence.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;With your consent, Mrs. Darlington,&rdquo; Munson went on, &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll show these
-      gentlemen round and save you the annoyance. Come along then.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Ben Thurston had been fairly silenced by the army man&rsquo;s suave courtesy. He
-      was glowering at him, dully conscious of having been suppressed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson turned from the sleuth.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Perhaps Mr. Thurston would prefer to remain with the ladies?&rdquo; he asked,
-      with a touch of smiling irony.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t leave my man Sharkey,&rdquo; replied Thurston gruffly. &ldquo;Sharkey, keep
-      close watch on me. We&rsquo;ll search the place, but you stay near me all the
-      time.&rdquo; Once again there was the old hunted look in his eyes as he glanced
-      apprehensively into the courtyard.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then follow me,&rdquo; said Munson quietly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You have left a guard at the door of course?&rdquo; asked Thurston of Sharkey.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, you just allow me to know my business,&rdquo; replied the detective
-      sharply. He bowed to Mrs. Darlington and her daughters. &ldquo;I am really sorry
-      to disturb you, ladies.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then get the business over as soon as possible,&rdquo; said Munson. &ldquo;Come
-      along.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The moment the coast was clear, Merle jumped up.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Quick! Mr. Willoughby. Follow me downstairs. I&rsquo;ll take you through the
-      kitchen to the rose gardens.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      It was a strange looking duenna that stalked after Merle, with a robe
-      reaching only to the knees. But at the head of the kitchen stairway Dick
-      discarded the now useless garments, flinging them across the balustrade.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We must trust to our good luck now, Merle,&rdquo; he said.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Never fear. It won&rsquo;t desert us. Hurry on.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      At the clump of oleanders they found Tia Teresa, provided with another
-      shawl. Not a moment was to be wasted in words. Merle just pressed Dick&rsquo;s
-      hand by way of farewell. As he hastened away down the dark path, she, too,
-      sped from the spot.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Perhaps fifteen minutes later Ben Thurston, going the round of the house,
-      came to the head of the kitchen stairs. He saw the black cloak and
-      mantilla on the balustrade.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;By God!&rdquo; he cried with swift inspiration of what had happened. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ve
-      been properly fooled! Where is that old hag of a duenna?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Gathering the vestments in his hands he rushed through the house to the
-      verandah. Merle was quietly seated with her mother and Grace. But there
-      was no sign now of Tia Teresa.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey had followed close on his employer&rsquo;s heels. Munson came a few
-      paces behind.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Ben Thurston glared for a moment at the vacant place where the black-robed
-      figure had been seated. Then he turned round and, addressing Mrs.
-      Darlington, fairly shouted:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Where is Dick Willoughby? It was he who was wearing these damned
-      clothes.&rdquo; And he flung the garments on the rug before her.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No swearing, please,&rdquo; said Munson, tapping him on the shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;To hell! Who wouldn&rsquo;t swear? Where is the man I&rsquo;m after?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;An innocent man,&rdquo; exclaimed Merle, rising to her feet and proudly folding
-      her arms.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Looks like it&mdash;breaking jail and hiding in the hills,&rdquo; sneered
-      Thurston. &ldquo;He is nothing but a murderer and an outlaw. And I&rsquo;m going to
-      get him, dead or alive.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then catch him if you can,&rdquo; cried Merle, pointing toward the door that
-      opened on the portico.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Under the girl&rsquo;s fearless gaze Ben Thurston wilted. Baffled, humiliated,
-      speechless in his impotent rage, he allowed the sleuth to take him by the
-      arm and hustle him from the scene.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0025" id="link2HCH0025"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXV&mdash;Love and Revenge
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">B</span>EYOND the
-      oleanders a tall thick hedge of cypress favored the flight of the
-      fugitive. At the end of the gardens Tia Teresa took a little path that
-      dipped into the river bed, and when they ascended again out of the hollow,
-      Dick found himself quite close to the grove where Pierre was in hiding
-      with the ponies.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      By this time the young fellow was angry with himself for having fled so
-      precipitately. He was full of solicitude for Merle. Why had not he
-      remained to defend her from the brutality of that ruffian, Ben Thurston?
-      This was the question that was now making him both ashamed and anxious.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hush!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The caution came from Pierre, and showed that the Frenchman was alive to
-      what had happened.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I saw ze automobile rush by,&rdquo; he whispered. &ldquo;We will ride across country,
-      so zat it cannot follow us.&rdquo; He pointed in the direction he would go.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not yet,&rdquo; replied Dick, determinedly. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m off back to the house to see
-      that they are all safe there.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no, Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo; protested the duenna earnestly. &ldquo;You heard what
-      Miss Merle said&mdash;she is afraid of that raging old man. Besides I
-      know. He has vowed that he and his hired gunmen will shoot you on sight.
-      For my little girl&rsquo;s sake you must not go back,&rdquo; she implored.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Besides your word of honor is pledged to me,&rdquo; added Luzon. &ldquo;You must
-      return wiz me. I have your parole.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Parole be hanged,&rdquo; muttered Dick between his teeth.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The old Frenchman laid a kindly hand on the young man&rsquo;s shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no. Monsieur is a man of honor. And honor comes before love&mdash;always.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;If you love her,&rdquo; insisted Tia Teresa, &ldquo;you will save yourself tonight.
-      We will look after her. You need not worry on her account.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick for the moment was silenced, but unconvinced.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, at all events we&rsquo;ll wait a bit. I don&rsquo;t leave this spot till I&rsquo;m
-      sure that Ben Thurston himself has cleared.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;All right,&rdquo; assented Pierre. &ldquo;Stay where you are, Tia Teresa. You must
-      not be seen. Zey may be searching in ze gardens.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Even as he spoke there was the flash of a lantern among the rose bushes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      In tense silence they waited and watched. The leaden-winged minutes stole
-      on. For a time lights flitted about, then vanished. At last came the
-      &ldquo;honk-honk&rdquo; of the automobile, and a minute later the great machine with
-      its flaring headlights swept down the roadway. They could just see that it
-      was crowded with men. Then in a few seconds it had disappeared around the
-      bend.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Now we go,&rdquo; said Pierre.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Just a minute longer, please,&rdquo; replied Dick in a firm tone. &ldquo;Tia Teresa,
-      you slip back to the house. I will stay here till you bring me word from
-      Merle that she is safe and that all is well.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I will soon return,&rdquo; said the duenna as she hurried away on her mission.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Again an interval of high-tensioned waiting. Neither Dick nor Pierre spoke
-      a word. At last there came a rustle of the bushes from the direction of
-      the river bed, and a moment later Tia Teresa was again by their side.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo; she said, breathless from the speed she had made, &ldquo;Miss
-      Merle begs you to make good your escape. She is well, and happy because
-      you are safe. She sends this rose and&rdquo;&mdash;the old lady hesitated a
-      moment&mdash;&ldquo;her love.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;She said that?&rdquo; murmured Dick, tremblingly, as he took the white blossom
-      and breathed its fragrance.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, does not the flower speak her love?&rdquo; replied the duenna. &ldquo;Now go,
-      go.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Come,&rdquo; said Pierre, as he raised himself into the saddle. &ldquo;We shall fix
-      the blindfold later on.&rdquo; Dick furtively kissed the rose before he placed
-      it in the breast pocket of his coat. Then he mounted, and, bringing his
-      pony alongside of Pierre&rsquo;s, started off at a canter across the starlit
-      plain.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Ben Thurston did not feel inclined to sleep that night. He paced his
-      sitting room like an angry bear, and kept Leach Sharkey out of bed to
-      listen to his growls and threatenings.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;By God, I&rsquo;ll have that girl shoved into jail. Harboring an outlaw! It&rsquo;s a
-      criminal offence.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You can&rsquo;t do it,&rdquo; objected the sleuth.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Can&rsquo;t do it?&rdquo; shouted Thurston, halting and glowering down upon the man
-      who had dared to contradict him. &ldquo;You&rsquo;ll see damned quick if I can&rsquo;t.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not one of us could swear that Willoughby was there. Neither you nor I
-      could. We never saw him.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He wore that disguise,&rdquo; thundered Thurston. &ldquo;So you think. But thinking
-      ain&rsquo;t proof&mdash;not by a long chalk.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Thurston was now almost speechless from rage. Half articulate words of
-      blasphemy were upon his stuttering lips. But Sharkey went coolly on.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Besides the sympathy of everyone would be with the girl. You can&rsquo;t
-      succeed that way. You yourself would be covered with ridicule.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      At last the torrent of curses broke forth. &ldquo;Damn you, Leach Sharkey!
-      That&rsquo;s what I pay you for, is it? To let that scoundrel slip through our
-      very fingers? And you had the nerve to ask me for another big check this
-      evening. It&rsquo;s all a confounded plot. You&rsquo;re bleeding me. Leach is your
-      name, and leech is your nature.&rdquo; Leach Sharkey rose to his feet. His white
-      teeth gleamed as his short upper lip curled in a contemptuous smile. He
-      raised a threatening finger. It was his turn now to give free vent to
-      profanity.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Stop right there, you doggoned old fool. I bleed you, do I? Well, take my
-      resignation. All your pay ain&rsquo;t worth another five minutes of your
-      infernal temper. No man ever dared to browbeat me and insult me as you
-      have done. And now you may go to hell&mdash;where you belong.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The sleuth turned on his heel, and strode to the doorway. But Thurston was
-      after him in an instant, penitent, trembling, ashen pale. He grabbed
-      Sharkey by the coat sleeve.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no, don&rsquo;t go, I beg of you,&rdquo; he whined, &ldquo;I was wrong. I spoke in
-      anger. I apologize. Good God, some one or other will get me within an hour
-      if you leave me unprotected. I haven&rsquo;t a single friend&mdash;no one to
-      stand by me.&rdquo; There was craven fear in his eyes as he looked timidly
-      around. &ldquo;I hear the prowling footsteps of my enemies in the night. You
-      alone can save me, Mr. Sharkey.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Your damned civility comes too late,&rdquo; replied the sleuth, as he shook the
-      clutching hands from his shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no. Don&rsquo;t say that. Sit down again. See, here is my check book. I&rsquo;ll
-      pay you that money now&mdash;I&rsquo;ll double the amount&mdash;I&rsquo;ll never
-      haggle with you again. Stay with me till we go East together.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey showed himself somewhat mollified. He had played his game well,
-      for after all, cash with him was the main consideration. So smiling over
-      the success of his bluff, he watched the unnerved coward as he tottered to
-      his desk, dropped into a chair and drew the check with slow and painful
-      effort, and then returned with it between his still trembling fingers.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;ll stand by me, Mr. Sharkey, won&rsquo;t you?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, no more of that nonsense,&rdquo; was the curt reply, as the sleuth
-      glanced at the slip of paper, then thrust it in his waistcoat pocket.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      To Thurston the reconciliation brought instant relief. He drew himself up;
-      he rubbed his hands; he even attempted a smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s a good fellow, Sharkey. You know I&rsquo;ve always held you in high
-      esteem. And we&rsquo;ll get that man yet&rdquo;&mdash;the glare of vindictiveness was
-      again in his eyes, the rasp of accustomed irritability was returning to
-      his voice. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll get him, I say, even if it costs double the money I&rsquo;ve
-      already spent. And that devil of a girl, too&mdash;I hate her more than
-      ever now. She&rsquo;ll pay for her insults tonight with her lover&rsquo;s life.
-      Remember, Sharkey, no more chances. When you get the scoundrel within
-      gunshot, it&rsquo;s up to you to shoot. That will be best in any case. It will
-      save the cost of a judge and jury. You understand me?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I understand,&rdquo; nodded Sharkey. &ldquo;Then, as you&rsquo;re speaking about doubling.
-      Mr. Thurston, I suppose that ten-thousand-dollar reward coming to me goes
-      up to twenty thousand.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes; twenty thousand if you shoot him like a dog, and let me get away
-      from this damned place. I have come to loathe the very name of it. Well,
-      spread your cot now across my door. I&rsquo;ll try to get an hour&rsquo;s sleep. Good
-      night.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      And Ben Thurston disappeared into the inner room.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0026" id="link2HCH0026"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXVI&mdash;A Date is Fixed
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">O</span>N the morning
-      after the exciting episode at La Siesta, Chester Munson was in the library
-      of Mr. Robles&rsquo; home ready for his day&rsquo;s duties. But he was in no mood for
-      the routine work of cataloging and classifying the volumes on the
-      bookshelves. Up to now the task had been one of absorbing interest, for
-      Munson, although not a scholar, had always been fond of reading, and it
-      was a treat to dip at times into the contents of the rare and curious
-      works which wealth and the educated taste of a true bibliophile had
-      accumulated.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But today the amateur librarian was thinking of other things. He was
-      feverishly awaiting the usual morning visit of his employer, so that he
-      might tell him the story of the previous night&rsquo;s happenings. At last Mr.
-      Robles made his appearance, and gave his usual quiet greetings.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I see you are making great progress with your work,&rdquo; he remarked,
-      glancing at the pile of classified volumes resting temporarily on the
-      library table.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m getting along,&rdquo; replied Munson. &ldquo;But I have most surprising news
-      for you, Mr. Robles.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Indeed?&rdquo; The recluse arched his eyebrows in expectant curiosity as he
-      took a chair beside the desk at which Munson had been seated. &ldquo;Sit down,
-      please. Let me hear the story.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You know that I was at La Siesta yesterday evening?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I know that you are very often there,&rdquo; replied Mr. Robles, smiling. &ldquo;I
-      understand the attraction and congratulate you on your good fortune. Grace
-      Darlington is certainly a charming young lady.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson flushed and bowed his acquiescence in the compliment as he said:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It was not of her, however, that I was going to speak. I want to say to
-      you, Mr. Robles, that Miss Farnsworth did one of the bravest and cleverest
-      things imaginable last evening.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Tell me about it. I am all attention.&rdquo; Munson then proceeded to relate in
-      full detail the events of the preceding evening&mdash;the surprise visit
-      of Ben Thurston, the brutality of the man, the quick wit of Merle, the
-      escape of Dick Willoughby, and his final message by Tia Teresa that he was
-      safe and, in obedience to Merle&rsquo;s injunction, was returning to his place
-      of hiding. During the narrative only once did the listener betray emotion;
-      when Thurston&rsquo;s rude insults were repeated there came a flash into Robles&rsquo;
-      eyes, and he clenched his hands to restrain his indignation. But he
-      interrupted with no word, and at the end spoke no comment.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson was a little taken aback at this silence and impassivity.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My story does not seem to surprise you?&rdquo; he remarked, with a note of
-      interrogation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; was the quiet reply, &ldquo;I already knew it.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How?&rdquo; exclaimed Munson, wonderingly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You have forgotten, young man, that there is a private telephone between
-      my home here and La Siesta. Mrs. Darlington has already told me about the
-      matter. But I am pleased to have your version, and delighted more than I
-      can tell to know that Merle proved equal to the emergency&mdash;that it
-      was she who may be truly said to have saved Dick Willoughby.&rdquo; There was a
-      ring of pride and admiration in his voice as he spoke the words.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;She&rsquo;s the real stuff,&rdquo; cried Munson, enthusiastically.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It was well done,&rdquo; continued Mr. Robles, his tone taking a graver note.
-      &ldquo;For I want to warn you, Munson, as Willoughby&rsquo;s closest friend, that Ben
-      Thurston or one of his hired assassins will certainly shoot on sight the
-      instant they get the chance to do so. But by the Lord, if anything like
-      that happens, I will hang that villain Thurston to the highest tree in
-      Tejon for the buzzards to pick his bones.&rdquo; And the upraised hand, the
-      voice vibrating with passionate determination, showed that Ricardo Robles
-      meant just what he said.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Mr. Robles had risen to his feet. For a moment he turned his face away.
-      Then he again spoke, but now in his customary, sedate manner.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;This morning, Mr. Munson, I leave home for a few days. Go on with your
-      work, of course, but remember that it is quite a minor consideration.
-      During my absence I shall rely on you to see that Ben Thurston, on any
-      pretence of searching for Willoughby, does not cross my door.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He shall never do that, so long as I&rsquo;m here,&rdquo; declared the young army
-      man, with quiet confidence.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t think he will, either,&rdquo; replied Robles. &ldquo;I have given orders for
-      him to be shot down,&rdquo; he added grimly, &ldquo;if he should dare to approach my
-      gates. But I&rsquo;ll count on you all the same as a second guard to the
-      sanctity of my home.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You may count on me to the death,&rdquo; responded Munson, extending his hand.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I know it, and therefore I go away on a necessary duty with an easy mind.
-      But I have good news for you, Munson. I have instructed Sing Ling to
-      prepare luncheon for the ladies of La Siesta every day they choose to
-      come. So, while I prefer you to remain here on guard while I am gone, you
-      need not be lonely. Perhaps you&rsquo;ll hardly wish me to come back again,&rdquo; he
-      added with a smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, don&rsquo;t say that. But you&rsquo;re mighty kind thinking of such things at
-      all.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, you may expect our friends today about one o&rsquo;clock. Now, goodbye&mdash;but
-      not for long.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The library work proceeded but slowly during the hours that followed.
-      Munson was all impatience now for Grace and Merle to arrive. Books were of
-      little account, for there was none ever printed that could rival for him
-      the charm of a certain pair of laughing blue eyes. And it was a
-      self-confessed pseudo man-of-letters who at last rushed to the gateway to
-      greet the fair visitors.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mother couldn&rsquo;t come,&rdquo; cried Grace, as she jumped from her horse and
-      flung the bridle to a Mexican groom. &ldquo;She&rsquo;s putting up fruit with Tia
-      Teresa, and I think she really believes everything would go wrong if she
-      didn&rsquo;t superintend.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson, as he led the girls through the arched gateway, was inclined to
-      bless both the fruit and the fallacy.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Sing Ling came across the patio with a welcoming smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dinnel all leady,&rdquo; he announced in tinkling syllables.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And we&rsquo;re all ready, too, Sing Ling,&rdquo; laughed Merle, as she went up and
-      shook the Chinaman&rsquo;s hand.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Me vely glad to see you again, missie.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I didn&rsquo;t know you were old friends,&rdquo; exclaimed Munson, in some surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, didn&rsquo;t you? Sing Ling has been Mr. Robles&rsquo; cook off and on for nearly
-      twenty years. When Mr. Robles is abroad of course he works elsewhere.
-      That&rsquo;s why you found him at San Antonio Rancho.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But Dick told me he was his cook&mdash;had been for several years.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;With Mr. Robles&rsquo; tacit consent, then,&rdquo; replied Merle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The Chinaman was grinning in a vacuous sort of way, as if all the
-      conversation was so much Greek to him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Sing Ling, you scamp,&rdquo; cried Munson, &ldquo;I begin to understand now how Mr.
-      Robles comes to know so much about Dick and myself. You&rsquo;ve been telling
-      tales out of school.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, no; me cookee allee time; me no go school,&rdquo; replied the Celestial, in
-      guileless incomprehension.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      After the dainty luncheon, Merle proposed that they should visit the watch
-      tower. There they found the Mexican lad on duty. He had been strumming a
-      guitar to pass the time, but at the sound of voices had sprung erect and
-      alert. Munson noticed at a glance that the big telescope was ready trained
-      on San Antonio Rancho.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;<i>Como estas, Francisco?</i>&rdquo; asked Merle, addressing the boy in
-      Spanish.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;<i>Bien, gracias, senorita</i>,&rdquo; he replied, with a deferential bow. But
-      he averted his glance instantly, and gazed out on the landscape.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle turned to Munson: &ldquo;We are not allowed to converse with the servants
-      here,&rdquo; she explained. &ldquo;Just a word of greeting&mdash;that is all.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m under similar orders,&rdquo; replied Munson. &ldquo;Not that it much matters in
-      my case, for I haven&rsquo;t your accomplishment of knowing the Spanish
-      language.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, Grace and I speak Spanish almost as well as English. You see, Mr.
-      Robles, who has always been interested in us two girls, insisted that we
-      should be taught his native tongue.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And we&rsquo;ve been all over Spain, too,&rdquo; interposed Grace. &ldquo;Lived there a
-      whole year. That&rsquo;s where I fell in love with the violin and took my first
-      lessons.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;An inspiring country obviously,&rdquo; remarked Munson with a flattering
-      gesture.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Thank you for the subtle compliment,&rdquo; laughed Grace, tossing the vagrant,
-      wind-blown curls from her face.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I never come here but I love to gaze at the view,&rdquo; observed Merle. &ldquo;Is it
-      not glorious&mdash;this valley of Tehachapi?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      It was indeed a glorious scene&mdash;that noble sweep of verdured plain,
-      stretching north far as the eye could reach, on the south guarded by the
-      rugged pass, east and west embosoming hills twenty miles apart etching the
-      sky with peaks and domes and lines of beauty. For a few moments all three
-      visitors to the tower remained silent and enraptured.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Grace was the one to break the spell.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m going down now to the library to inspect your work, lieutenant,&rdquo; she
-      announced with a roguish smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Spare me,&rdquo; protested Munson. &ldquo;But perhaps you would help me with some of
-      those Spanish books,&rdquo; he added as an afterthought.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Delighted! Come along.&rdquo; And she led the way down the winding iron
-      staircase.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      In the library the three were for the first time during the visit quite
-      alone. Munson carefully closed the door.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Now I&rsquo;ve got the chance, Miss Merle,&rdquo; he began, &ldquo;I want to compliment you
-      on your splendid bravery last night.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Bravery!&rdquo; she laughed. &ldquo;Why I was so scared I could hardly stand.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, you deceived us all finely, then.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And that Ben Thurston&mdash;what an old ruffian!&rdquo; cried Grace. &ldquo;But I
-      agree with you, Mr. Munson; Merle was a hero.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A heroine,&rdquo; suggested the lieutenant.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, in these days we don&rsquo;t make such fine sex distinctions,&rdquo; laughed
-      Grace. &ldquo;A real hero, that&rsquo;s what I call her.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Rubbish,&rdquo; protested Merle. &ldquo;I just did what anyone else would have done
-      in the circumstances.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m afraid men are not so ready of wit in an emergency as are women,&rdquo;
-       remarked Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Just listen to that, Merle,&rdquo; exclaimed Grace. &ldquo;I verily believe the
-      lieutenant is a suffragette.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A suffragist,&rdquo; corrected Munson, emphatically this time. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m hanged if
-      I&rsquo;m going to wear a petticoat even if the women are determined to don&mdash;the
-      other things.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      They all laughed merrily.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Grace turned and began examining the carefully written library cards.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Any more news from Mr. Willoughby?&rdquo; asked Merle, with a look of
-      solicitude in her eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Nothing,&rdquo; replied Munson. &ldquo;But I&rsquo;m beginning to put two and two
-      together,&rdquo; he continued. &ldquo;Early every morning a horseman comes down here
-      from the mountains and evidently brings a report of some kind to Mr.
-      Robles. And when he rides off again Sing Ling has always ready a basket of
-      grub, all sorts of nice things, fried chicken, spiced beef&mdash;&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Sounds quite epicurean,&rdquo; interrupted Grace, tossing away the card she had
-      been pretending to examine.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, hang it all&mdash;just the little delicacies Dick used to like.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I never knew you fared so bountifully at San Antonio Rancho,&rdquo; remarked
-      Merle with a smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, Dick&rsquo;s no candy kid, as you know well,&rdquo; replied Munson. &ldquo;It was
-      mostly rough and ready fare all right, but Sing Ling had a knack of adding
-      a few dainty trifles to our meals, and it strikes me that for the purposes
-      of this mysterious and capacious lunch basket he is trying to excel
-      himself.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No doubt it goes to Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo; said Merle. &ldquo;Well, I&rsquo;m real glad to
-      know that they are making him comfortable.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I guess, though, he&rsquo;ll miss his occasional visits to La Siesta. Mr.
-      Robles says you were quite right, Miss Merle. Dick is in real danger.
-      Those gunmen of old Thurston have orders to shoot him on sight.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I knew it,&rdquo; exclaimed Merle. &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m so thankful he got away. Even
-      though we miss seeing him, he must never run such a risk again.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is all very mysterious,&rdquo; said Munson, in a musing tone. &ldquo;And I had no
-      idea, too, that this was such a lovely place. Mr. Robles has taken me
-      around several times. He has the choicest dairy cattle, the finest blooded
-      horses, rare trees and plants from every corner of the world.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;These are his hobbies,&rdquo; commented Merle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He says he wants to give me some practical lessons in estate management.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Why?&rdquo; asked Grace.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; laughed Munson, &ldquo;he thinks I may some day own a rancho of my own.
-      But that will be a mighty long time.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Who can tell?&rdquo; said Merle, glancing mischievously from the lieutenant to
-      Grace. &ldquo;Even in these humdrum days soldiers have been known to come in and
-      conquer.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Grace blushed crimson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Merle, how dare you?&rdquo; she exclaimed, half angry, half laughing. &ldquo;Next
-      time we visit you, Mr. Munson, I&rsquo;ll have to bring along Tia Teresa.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, dear Aunt Teresa has a soft side for the lieutenant,&rdquo; retorted Merle,
-      with merry audacity.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But Grace had recovered from her momentary confusion.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then I&rsquo;ll help you all I can, Mr. Munson, with dear Aunt Teresa,&rdquo; she
-      laughingly said. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll send her along tomorrow instead of coming
-      ourselves.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Heaven forbid!&rdquo; murmured the lieutenant, with pious fervor. He, too, had
-      been looking and feeling awkward.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So we&rsquo;ll say goodbye for the present,&rdquo; continued Grace, frankly extending
-      her hand.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I hope I haven&rsquo;t said anything to offend you,&rdquo; stammered Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is perhaps what you haven&rsquo;t said that is the cause of trouble,&rdquo;
-       laughed the irrepressible Merle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But Grace had fled from the room, and as the others followed, Merle went
-      on:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I said when we left home that two would be company but three&mdash;a
-      complication. Wasn&rsquo;t I right, lieutenant?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You are always right,&rdquo; murmured Munson, too bewildered to think of
-      anything else but the obvious gallant reply.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      He stood at the gateway watching the two young ladies as they cantered
-      away. At the bend of the road Merle turned round in the saddle and waved
-      her hand. But Grace rode steadily on.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;By jove, that&rsquo;s as good as telling me that I can sail in and win,&rdquo; he
-      said to himself. &ldquo;Thank you, Merle, little girl. Next time Grace and I are
-      alone, my fate will be sealed.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      But no one called again during Mr. Robles&rsquo; absence&mdash;not even Tia
-      Teresa.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      It was toward evening a few days later when the recluse strolled into the
-      library. Munson did not know that he had returned, and rose from his seat
-      in some surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Still hard at work?&rdquo; said Mr. Robles, as he nodded and shook hands.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;When did you get back, sir?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Last night. And today I have been busy with some important letters.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Any word of Dick?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;There is nothing new so far as I am aware.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mr. Robles, excuse me,&rdquo; said Munson earnestly. &ldquo;But I&rsquo;m anxious on Dick&rsquo;s
-      account. You know of his whereabouts, of course?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have indicated as much, although for the present I prefer to say
-      nothing.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, when is he to be restored to liberty?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;In due time. At latest he will be free on the eleventh of October.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, that&rsquo;s months ahead yet. But why the eleventh of October? You excite
-      my curiosity.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The date is not of my choosing&mdash;it was fixed many years ago, by
-      another than myself.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The enigmatic reply puzzled Chester Munson&mdash;not only the words
-      themselves, but the tremor of deep emotion in the voice of Ricardo Robles
-      as he gave them utterance.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0027" id="link2HCH0027"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXVII&mdash;Among the Old Oaks
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">P</span>IERRE, now my
-      sketches and plans are finished, how am I going to pass the time?&rdquo; It was
-      some ten days after the affair at La Siesta, and Dick had spent the
-      interval in close and absorbed work over his drawing board. Happy in his
-      occupation, he had not felt the restraints of confinement.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But now that the task was completed, and the big cardboard cylinder
-      containing the set of drawings rested on the ledge of the easel all ready
-      to be sent away on its mission, a feeling of chafing restlessness had
-      ensued.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good Lord, a fellow can&rsquo;t read all day,&rdquo; Dick went on, half in soliloquy,
-      half addressing his companion.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Monsieur is comfortable here?&rdquo; asked the latter solicitously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I should say, old fellow. I was never in better quarters in all my life.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And zere is nothing more I could get for ze table?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;For goodness sake, don&rsquo;t talk like that, Pierre! In any ease I don&rsquo;t
-      worry about what I eat. But this is a regular Delmonico&rsquo;s. Guadalupe is
-      certainly a crackerjack cook. She is even better than Sing Ling. Wherever
-      did she learn to turn out all these little delicacies? And just my
-      favorite dishes, too.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre smiled enigmatically.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guadalupe very clever old squaw,&rdquo; he remarked.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I would like to know her better. But she keeps out of my sight all the
-      time.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guadalupe is very old. She has her fixed ideas.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I suppose that means she does not love the Americans.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No doubt. She prefer to be alone&mdash;alone with ze white wolf all ze
-      time. And where the white wolf is, monsieur dare not go.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I understand that all right,&rdquo; laughed Willoughby. &ldquo;I strolled only once
-      toward the log fire, and the brute showed me a set of teeth which I never
-      wish to see again.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ze white wolf guard ze cave well,&rdquo; remarked Pierre, sententiously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m not thinking of trying to run away. You know I would never break
-      my word. But what the dickens am I to do all day long?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What do you say? Suppose we go to ze riffle and wash out some gold.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great Scott!&rdquo; exclaimed Dick eagerly. &ldquo;That&rsquo;s not a bad suggestion. But
-      Don Manuel won&rsquo;t mind?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He will be very pleased&mdash;he has no use for ze gold.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And Guadalupe?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Long ago she would have killed you if you had gone zere. But not now. She
-      very old, and all her people are dead.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And the white wolf? That confounded beast won&rsquo;t interfere?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no. Ze white wolf stay near Guadalupe all ze time.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then, by jove, it&rsquo;s a bully idea,&rdquo; cried Dick. &ldquo;It gets me all right.
-      We&rsquo;ll turn miners, Pierre, and we&rsquo;ll have a rare old sack of nuggets to
-      divide when the time comes for me to go free. I&rsquo;ll be better off in the
-      end than if I were holding down my old job at the rancho,&rdquo; he laughed
-      gaily.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I will find ze spades and ze pans to wash ze gravel. When shall we
-      begin?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, wait now,&rdquo; replied Dick, glancing reflectively at the roll of
-      drawings. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve got to send these plans away. I want you to get them at
-      once into the hands of my friend, Lieutenant Chester Munson. He will know
-      how to forward them to their proper destination.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;May I suggest one zing?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Go ahead, Pierre. What&rsquo;s in your mind?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I venture to make one little suggestion. Why not ask ze young lady to
-      take ze plans to your friend?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Miss Merle Farnsworth?&rdquo; asked Dick in surprise. &ldquo;But how am I to do
-      that?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I will promise to arrange a meeting&mdash;zat is, if you are not afraid
-      of Mr. Thurston and his men.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Afraid!&rdquo; shouted Dick. &ldquo;You give me the chance to see Merle again, and
-      old Ben Thurston and all his sleuths may go to blazes.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Zen I will arrange, and I zink it will please ze young lady very much to
-      have ze honor of taking care of ze plans.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You mean it will be a mighty honor for the plans to be in her care,
-      Pierre. But I know she will gladly do me this service. How and when can I
-      see her?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Be ready tomorrow morning by ten o&rsquo;clock. I will take you to a quiet
-      place among ze old oak trees.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Pierre, you&rsquo;re a regular brick,&rdquo; cried Dick, as he slapped the old
-      Frenchman on the shoulder in the exuberance of his delight.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The following morning they started out for the trysting place. Dick
-      without demur submitted to the usual precautions. He was blindfolded
-      before mounting his pony in the great central domed cavern and it was not
-      until a couple of hours later, after a veritable switchback ride up and
-      down and round about in a bewildering maze, that he was permitted to
-      remove the bandage. Dismounting, he found himself in the heart of a great
-      oak forest, in what precise locality he could not tell, for there was
-      nothing in sight but endless vistas of tree trunks under their thick
-      canopy of green leaves.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre touched him on the shoulder, and he followed the direction of the
-      Frenchman&rsquo;s eyes. There, advancing through the sylvan twilight, was Merle
-      Farnsworth, her hands eagerly extended, her face lighted with joy.
-      Following at a little distance came Tia Teresa.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick, hastening to meet Merle, took both her hands into his, and gazed
-      deep into her eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, it&rsquo;s great to meet you again,&rdquo; he exclaimed. &ldquo;And this is my first
-      chance to thank you for having saved me the other night. My word, but you
-      were quick to think and to act. You cannot know how I admired your courage
-      and coolness.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Nonsense, nonsense,&rdquo; protested Merle, in sweet blushing confusion. &ldquo;You
-      make far too much of the little I did.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You saved my life,&rdquo; said Dick, determinedly. &ldquo;You can call that a little
-      thing if you choose.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; she replied, earnestly. &ldquo;If I really did that, then it was truly
-      a big thing.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;For me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And for all of us,&rdquo; she added, with face half-averted.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And you, too?&rdquo; pressed Dick.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, for me, too,&rdquo; answered Merle, turning round and frankly meeting his
-      gaze. &ldquo;I should never have been happy again had any harm come to you there&mdash;that
-      night&mdash;in my very home&mdash;without a proper effort to get you away
-      to a place of safety.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;God bless you, Merle, dear,&rdquo; exclaimed Dick, as again he pressed her
-      hands. He had been carried away by his fervent emotions, but she did not
-      resent the familiar and endearing manner of his address.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      He would have taken her in his arms there and then, but Merle drew back
-      and gave a little glance aside. Then Dick remembered Tia Teresa. To his
-      astonishment he found her chatting with Pierre Luzon as if they were old
-      friends.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick left Merle for the moment to greet the duenna.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And I have to thank you, too, for helping me,&rdquo; he said. Then he added
-      with a laugh: &ldquo;When am I to be privileged to wear that mantilla again?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You are not to be allowed to endanger yourself again,&rdquo; replied Tia
-      Teresa. &ldquo;And I warn you now. We remain here only half an hour&mdash;these
-      are our orders.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Whose orders?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Never mind. Just one half hour, that is all.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then I&rsquo;ll make the best of my time,&rdquo; exclaimed Dick, turning toward
-      Merle. &ldquo;I see you won&rsquo;t be lonely with my gallant friend, Pierre Luzon,&rdquo;
-       he added with a smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I knew Pierre when he was just as handsome a young fellow as
-      yourself,&rdquo; retorted Tia Teresa. &ldquo;But we&rsquo;ll excuse you, and Pierre will
-      keep the time.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick led Merle down a glade of the forest, but before doing so he had
-      unstrapped the roll of drawings from the horn of his saddle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What are you carrying so very carefully?&rdquo; asked Merle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My plans for the ideal city. I told you I was going to have a try in that
-      competition.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I hope you&rsquo;ll have good luck.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, I want you to help me. Will you take this package, please, to
-      Chester Munson and ask him to send it to the proper address?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;With the greatest of pleasure, Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo;&mdash;and she put forth
-      her hands for the roll.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No&mdash;we&rsquo;ll lay it down here for the present. This log will serve as a
-      seat. See, this twisted, limb makes quite a comfortable nook for you.&rdquo; He
-      had halted at a fallen tree, had dropped the drawing on the turf, and was
-      now dusting away the twigs and leaves from the seat he had chosen.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Cannot I look at the drawings?&rdquo; she asked, after settling herself cosily.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Before handing them to Munson, if you like. But there are other things to
-      talk about now.&rdquo; As he spoke he tossed his hat on the ground at her feet.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Are you growing impatient over your confinement?&rdquo; she asked.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Impatient&mdash;it is hardly the word. I long to be out in the world
-      again. I could never have endured the long seclusion but for my work over
-      these drawings and my thoughts of you.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Why me?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have felt that I am doing the best for your sake as well as my own. I
-      would not have had you subjected to the vulgar gaze of a crowded court
-      room&mdash;not for worlds. The very thought that I have saved you from
-      that has made me contented with my enforced idleness.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not idleness,&rdquo; she said, tapping the roll of drawings with the toe of her
-      shoe.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, no, not idleness exactly.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And I do hope you&rsquo;ll win the prize,&rdquo; she added, looking up into his eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So do I. But perhaps you don&rsquo;t know what I count to be the real prize.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0010" id="linkimage-0010"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
-      <img src="images/0255.jpg" alt="0255 " width="100%" /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h5>
-      <a href="images/0255.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
-    </h5>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Pray, what is that?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick thrust a hand into the breast of his coat and brought forth a pocket
-      book. From this he produced a little package, and opening the folds of
-      paper disclosed the white rose which she had sent him on the night of his
-      escape from La Siesta.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Where did you get that?&rdquo; she asked demurely.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is your rose&mdash;the rose you sent me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I did not know you were so partial to roses as to keep them after they
-      are withered.&rdquo; Her voice trembled; she bravely tried to keep up the
-      pretence of not understanding.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is not the gift I treasure&mdash;it is the thought of who was the
-      giver.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      A blush stole over her beautiful face, while the long drooping eyelashes
-      half concealed her brown eyes. Dick&rsquo;s arms slipped around the girl&rsquo;s
-      slender waist.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Merle, my dear, I love you. For months past I have known that there is no
-      woman on earth for me but you. I would have spoken before, but I have
-      always been afraid that you could not love me, and that talk of such a
-      thing might terminate a friendship that had become my greatest pleasure in
-      life.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      For reply, placing one hand on his shoulder, she just buried her face in
-      his breast and gave way to tears&mdash;tears of joy, he knew, as he kissed
-      her hair again and again, and then at last her lips when she allowed him
-      to raise her face toward his.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My darling,&rdquo; he murmured, and the kiss she gave him back accepted and
-      returned the words of fond endearment.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      A moment of restful bliss followed; then Merle gently disengaged herself
-      and rose to her feet.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What will Tia Teresa say?&rdquo; she asked, laughingly, as she glanced over her
-      shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I think Tia Teresa knew all about my love long ago,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;Yes,
-      both she and Pierre Luzon, too.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then you have been wearing your heart on your sleeve.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Or we have been surrounded by very observant people. But, I say, Merle,
-      this reminds me of a thing I had quite forgotten for the moment.&rdquo; His face
-      fell. &ldquo;There is one great barrier that stands between us.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What do you mean? You are surely too strong and purposeful a man to care
-      for barriers.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I never knew until the other day that you are so very rich.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Rich!&rdquo; laughed Merle. &ldquo;Who ever told you such a foolish thing? While of
-      course I have never felt poverty, don&rsquo;t you know that I am absolutely
-      dependent upon Mrs. Darlington&rsquo;s kindness and generosity to me, her
-      adopted daughter?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      A smile of understanding broke over Dick&rsquo;s face.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You tell me that? I am so delighted,&rdquo; he exclaimed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You surely know my story well enough,&rdquo; continued Merle, &ldquo;not to have
-      mistaken me for an heiress. I lost both father and mother when I was a
-      baby. Mrs. Darlington took me to her heart, and no mother could have been
-      dearer and sweeter than she, no sister kinder and more loving than Grace.
-      But I am proud to think they have loved me for my own sake, not for any
-      wealth I might have owned.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then there is no barrier,&rdquo; cried Dick, as once again he drew her to him.
-      &ldquo;Unless my poverty is a barrier,&rdquo; he added. &ldquo;But won&rsquo;t I work hard all my
-      life to give you every comfort you can desire!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, we&rsquo;ll have a good start at all events,&rdquo; said Merle, with a merry
-      little upglance.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How&rsquo;s that?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The ten-thousand-dollar prize for the best plans. Have you forgotten
-      about that already?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But it is not won yet.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I have the firm presentiment that you are going to win, Dick, dear. I
-      am sure of it&mdash;sure!&rdquo; she repeated in a tone of conviction.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Her face was aglow and Dick caught the spirit of her enthusiasm.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then I&rsquo;m sure, too. And, by jove, won&rsquo;t we have one grand honeymoon trip,
-      dearest?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0028" id="link2HCH0028"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXVIII&mdash;The Prize Winner
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">D</span>ICK WILLOUGHBY&rsquo;S
-      sensational escape from La Siesta had added another thrill to the mystery
-      surrounding the murder of Marshall Thurston. But as week succeeded week
-      without further incident, the affair gradually faded away as a topic of
-      conversation. All the talk now was about the coming of the new town. The
-      fever of speculation was in the air.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Say, boys,&rdquo; remarked Jack Rover one evening to his two cronies at the
-      store, &ldquo;I&rsquo;m sure getting crazy about the new town. I&rsquo;ve got a thousand
-      bones of my own savings besides the money from old Pierre Luzon, and I&rsquo;m
-      going to invest every dangnation cent of it in town lots on opening day.
-      You bet I&rsquo;ll be there mighty early in the morning when the sale starts.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m sorta locoed myself,&rdquo; said Baker, &ldquo;about them lots in the new town.
-      Guess I&rsquo;ll grab off a few good corners. I look for an early rise&mdash;prices&rsquo;ll
-      go up like blazes,&rsquo; I&rsquo;m &lsquo;lowin&rsquo;.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck Ashley snorted contemptuously. &ldquo;Say, you fellers are two dippy ones.
-      That new town talk is a lot o&rsquo; hot air, d&rsquo;you hear? Jest the agitatin&rsquo;
-      work of them pesky town boomers. Won&rsquo;t &lsquo;mount to nothin&rsquo;.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Jack Rover started a defence, but was quickly motioned to silence by old
-      Tom Baker, who, after clearing his throat, pushed his hat back and glared
-      at Buck Ashley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Buck,&rdquo; said he, &ldquo;you&rsquo;re a thick-headed fool. The openin&rsquo; of that town
-      will amount to one hell of a sight, don&rsquo;t you fergit it. Why, that Los
-      Angeles syndicate cuss who&rsquo;s a-runnin&rsquo; the machine is sharper than a razor
-      blade. Just think for one little puny moment,&rdquo; Tom Baker went on,
-      enthusiastically, &ldquo;of that printed notice being in every blamed newspaper
-      in the whole country&mdash;yes, and on the other side of the Atlantic pond&mdash;offerin&rsquo;
-      ten thousand dollars for the best plans for an ideal city. Gosh all
-      hemlock, they do say as how the mails were just chuck full of answers&mdash;architect
-      fellers as well as them as ain&rsquo;t architects, a-tryin&rsquo; to get their hooks
-      on that ten-thousand-dollar prize. It was a mighty smart business notion,
-      I&rsquo;m a-tellin&rsquo; you, and has boomed the town to beat the band.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But,&rdquo; inquired Buck Ashley, in a sarcastic way, &ldquo;who is confounded fool
-      enough to buy lots in such a wild-cat scheme, no matter how much they
-      advertise it? That&rsquo;s what I&rsquo;m askin&rsquo;.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I will, for one,&rdquo; said Jack Rover. &ldquo;As I said before, I&rsquo;m going to put in
-      my last dollar.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;As for me,&rdquo; chimed in Tom Baker, &ldquo;I will lay my money on this &lsquo;ere
-      proposed new town bein&rsquo; the biggest town in the whole dangnation State of
-      California outside of sea-board towns.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Just then through the gathering darkness a lone horseman rode up to the
-      store, dismounted and came hurriedly in. It was none other than Chester
-      Munson, flushed and excited, as he sang out a good-natured salute: &ldquo;Hallo,
-      boys. I have news for you.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      As he spoke he pulled a Bakersfield daily paper from his pocket. &ldquo;The new
-      town!&rdquo; he fairly shouted. &ldquo;All about it, right on the front page, pictures
-      and all. And it is Dick Willoughby who wins the ten-thousand-dollar
-      prize!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s great news, sure,&rdquo; cried Jack.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s a mighty pity Dick ain&rsquo;t here to celebrate,&rdquo; growled the sheriff.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What&rsquo;s to be the name of the town?&rdquo; asked Buck Ashley, in a disbelieving
-      tone.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Tejon, after the old fort here,&rdquo; replied Munson, as he pointed to the
-      featured article with its big-type headlines and started to cull a few
-      sentences.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It says that the new city of Tejon, right here in the heart of a rich
-      horticultural valley, is bound to be one of the top-notch towns of
-      California. And the opening day is going to be immense. Next Tuesday is
-      the date fixed. Maps and plans of the new town will be ready for
-      distribution from the land company&rsquo;s office, corner Main Street and
-      Broadway, at nine o&rsquo;clock Monday morning. Let me see,&rdquo; he went on, looking
-      up from the paper, &ldquo;this is Wednesday. Mighty few days to wait, boys. You
-      just ought to see the excitement in Bakersfield.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, I say there ain&rsquo;t no such town,&rdquo; snapped Buck Ashley, &ldquo;nor no such
-      a company&rsquo;s office buildin&rsquo;, &lsquo;cause I was down there day before yesterday
-      myself, right where them surveyin&rsquo; fellers have been foolin&rsquo; &lsquo;round for
-      weeks, peekin&rsquo; through spy-glasses at each other and measurin&rsquo; off so many
-      feet this way and so many feet that way, like a bunch o&rsquo; kids playin&rsquo; some
-      game. No, siree, there&rsquo;s nothin&rsquo; but long rows of white stakes driv in the
-      ground. Looks to me as if they was a-gettin&rsquo; ready to build a lot of
-      henhouses. Of course the railroad&rsquo;s there, and the only thing changed that
-      I could see was a lot of side-tracks they&rsquo;ve put in.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, things have been humming the last two days,&rdquo; laughed Munson. &ldquo;This
-      afternoon I found all the side-tracks filled with trains of lumber,
-      carload after carload, and not less than two or three hundred workmen, all
-      as busy as nailers. Looked to me as if a three-ring circus were getting
-      ready for a big show. They are already running up electric light poles and
-      stringing the wires. Some of the men are unloading cars, some stacking up
-      lumber, others are putting up tents, and the entire business reminded me
-      of a hive of extremely busy bees. Go down and look for yourself, Buck, and
-      you&rsquo;ll be convinced at last that the new town has arrived.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The old storekeeper had come from behind the counter, and stood leaning
-      against a stack of boxes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve been here for more&rsquo;n a quarter of a century, boys,&rdquo; he said, in a
-      tone of seriousness that approached to sadness, &ldquo;and this old store seems
-      like home to me. I&rsquo;m some fighter and I&rsquo;m some stayer. But, hell, I reckon
-      I know when I&rsquo;m licked. I guess this new town puts a crimp in me and my
-      business, and&mdash;&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Honk-honk; honk-honk&rdquo;&mdash;it was the distant warning of an automobile
-      that interrupted Buck&rsquo;s speech, and drew all four present to the doorway.
-      There was the glare of twin headlights on the southern road.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Some of the Los Angeles buyers, most likely,&rdquo; suggested the sheriff.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And so the travellers proved to be. The automobile halted at the store,
-      but only one of the party of four or five descended.. He was a
-      bright-faced, clean-shaven man, of dapper build and faultlessly attired.
-      In his hand was a bunch of papers.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mr. Buck Ashley?&rdquo; he inquired.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m your man,&rdquo; replied Buck, stepping from the doorway.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, we can&rsquo;t stop tonight. But we wanted to say &lsquo;how-do.&rsquo; I represent
-      the Los Angeles Trust Syndicate, and these documents just arrived
-      yesterday from Washington, D. C.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Can&rsquo;t be for me, then,&rdquo; replied Buck, hesitating to take the proffered
-      papers.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But they are,&rdquo; replied the stranger with a laugh. &ldquo;Oh, we haven&rsquo;t
-      forgotten the interests of the old identities. We&rsquo;ve had your name in mind
-      all the time, and this is a removal order from the Government to change
-      your postoffice over to the new town of Tejon.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck was speechless as his fingers closed on the documents.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll hope to see you over on Tuesday morning, Mr. Ashley, so that you
-      can secure a good site for your new store. Now I must be going. We have
-      got to be in Bakersfield by eleven o&rsquo;clock.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Honk-honk,&rdquo; and the automobile was gone.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hell, Buck, have you lost your tongue?&rdquo; cried Tom Baker, slipping the
-      storekeeper on the shoulder. &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t you see what it all means? You&rsquo;re
-      goin&rsquo; to shift camp, old man; you&rsquo;re goin&rsquo; into the new town.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Gosh &lsquo;lmighty!&rdquo; murmured Buck, at last recovering the power of
-      articulation. &ldquo;I think the first thing to do is to lubricate.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A taste from the mystery keg,&rdquo; suggested the sheriff, as they all crowded
-      back into the store.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The mystery keg? What&rsquo;s that?&rdquo; asked Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck laid his hand on a small barrel at the end of the counter.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We call it the mystery keg,&rdquo; he replied, &ldquo;because we just found it
-      yesterday mornin&rsquo; settin&rsquo; at my back door. It has come to us sorta like
-      manna from heaven.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And tastes like manna, too,&rdquo; interjected Baker.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It means free drinks for all this pertic&rsquo;lar bunch,&rdquo; continued Buck, &ldquo;for
-      there is no question as to where the keg came from. Look at the date on
-      the top&mdash;1853. This &lsquo;ere barrel came out of Joaquin Murietta&rsquo;s wine
-      cellar.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t say?&rdquo; exclaimed Munson, pressing forward eagerly to examine the
-      little brass-hooped keg, looking bright and sound despite its antiquity.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;This whisky is sixty years old at least,&rdquo; Buck went on, turning the tap
-      and filling a small pitcher.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Tastes like it might be a hundred years older,&rdquo; remarked the sheriff.
-      &ldquo;Mellow as fresh drawn milk.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck handed Munson a pony glass of the rare old beverage.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;By jove, it is fine,&rdquo; said the lieutenant, judicially smacking his lips.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Just makes my internals feel as soft and roly-poly as a ripe
-      pomegranate,&rdquo; murmured Tom, as he set down his empty glass and rubbed his
-      belt-line in a complacent way.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, we&rsquo;ll fill up again, boys,&rdquo; cried Buck. &ldquo;Here&rsquo;s to dear old Pierre
-      Luzon, for it was sure him who sent us the mystery keg.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And to Dick Willoughby who won the prize,&rdquo; cried Jack Rover.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And to our host,&rdquo; added Munson in a courtly way. &ldquo;To Buck Ashley, boys,
-      the postmaster of the new city of Tejon.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hip, hip, hurrah!&rdquo;&mdash;all four voices shouted the triple toast as the
-      upraised glasses clinked merrily.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Buck resumed his former position, with his back against the cracker boxes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;As I was sayin&rsquo;, boys, when that automobile interrupted us, I know when
-      I&rsquo;m licked. But I know, too, that the fightin&rsquo; blood is still left in me,
-      and I was a-goin&rsquo; to remark that this new town sure &lsquo;nuff looks a winner.
-      I&rsquo;ve got plenty of lumber right in my back yard, and tomorrer mornin&rsquo; I
-      begin to have the scantlin&rsquo;s cut, for, by jingoes, I&rsquo;ll be the chap who
-      will build the first buildin&rsquo; in the new town.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Bully for you,&rdquo; cried Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I say what I mean,&rdquo; continued Buck, his face aglow with enthusiasm, &ldquo;and
-      on Tuesday mornin&rsquo; I&rsquo;ll buy the first town lot if I have to stand in line
-      for forty-eight hours to get it.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Life in the old dog yet,&rdquo; laughed Jack Rover. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s wonderful the effect
-      of Pierre Luzon&rsquo;s brew,&rdquo; smiled the sheriff. &ldquo;I think we&rsquo;ll just have four
-      more spoonfuls, Buck, of that distilled nectar of sunshine. Success to the
-      new store, old man!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0029" id="link2HCH0029"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXIX&mdash;-The Rendezvous
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">S</span>UMMER had come and
-      gone and it was now the early days of October. The mystery of Dick
-      Willoughby&rsquo;s disappearance had remained unsolved, yet it was on his plans
-      that the new city of Tejon had been laid out, and, like the fabled palace
-      in the Arabian Nights&rsquo; tale, had sprung into being with such rapidity that
-      men rubbed their eyes to satisfy themselves whether the transformation
-      scene were an actuality or the baseless fabric of a dream. Within three
-      months of the opening day auction of lots Tejon was a thriving, hustling
-      centre of population, with whole avenues of beautiful homes, several
-      blocks of stores on the main street, schoolhouse and other public
-      buildings well on the way to completion.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Electricity had helped to the accomplishment of the miracle, for it had
-      been only necessary to tap the great power cables running across the old
-      rancho from the Kern River canyon to secure the supplies of &ldquo;juice&rdquo; both
-      for lighting and traction purposes. So there was already an interurban
-      tramway service connecting with the county seat, Bakersfield, while at
-      night the new town was a blaze of electricity. All around country homes
-      were going up, and ten and twenty acre holdings were being planted to
-      fruit trees or ploughed for alfalfa.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Ben Thurston still clung to the ranch house, although it was definitely
-      understood now between him and the new owners that Thanksgiving Day was to
-      be the extreme limit of his occupancy. The hue and cry after Dick
-      Willoughby had in a measure subsided, but, if the authorities had relaxed
-      their efforts, Thurston still sought relentlessly and indefatigably for
-      the man accused of the slaying of his son.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      One night at a lonely road-house on the outskirts of Bakersfield, the
-      sleuth, Leach Sharkey, was in close and secret conference with a bent and
-      bowed old man. This was none other than Pierre Luzon, although his
-      physical condition seemed to have greatly changed and he answered now to
-      the name of José.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The two men had met a few days before on the range; Pierre had spoken of
-      the scant living he was making from a herd of goats he pastured on the
-      mountains, and in the course of conversation had thrown out a hint for
-      information as to the amount of the reward that Mr. Thurston would be
-      willing to pay if Dick Willoughby were handed over to him. Sharkey had
-      eagerly followed the lead thus given. Hence this midnight meeting in the
-      road-house parlor for the discussion of terms and conditions over the
-      bottle of whisky that helps so efficaciously to dispel distrust and
-      unloosen tongues.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      More than an hour had been spent in skirmishing preliminaries, but now
-      Leach Sharkey was congratulating himself that he had got his man fixed
-      just right. He was running over the final arrangements so as to make sure
-      that everything was clearly understood.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then Mr. Thurston and myself are to come to Comanche Point. You will take
-      us from there to the place where we&rsquo;ll find Willoughby. That&rsquo;s the
-      understanding, José?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre nodded in acquiescence.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And you will bring wiz you ze reward of five tousand dollars&mdash;not
-      gold or silver, remember, but treasury bills, for I am not strong enough
-      now to carry a very heavy weight. Zen when you have paid me ze money, I
-      will lead you to Mr. Willoughby.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;All right. I&rsquo;m going to trust you and take my chances. But bear in mind
-      that you don&rsquo;t get away with the cash until I have actually put the
-      handcuffs on the man I&rsquo;m after.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I will not run away, Mr. Sharkey.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;By God, if you try any monkey tricks on me, I&rsquo;ll shoot you in your
-      tracks. Make no mistake about that, José. And it will be hands up first to
-      prove to me you have no gun.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;As I have promised,&rdquo; replied Pierre with some dignity, &ldquo;I shall come
-      unarmed. But remember, Mr. Thurston and you must be alone. If zere are any
-      ozers I will not show myself&mdash;I will give no sign.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t worry about that. We&rsquo;ll be alone. I need no other protection than
-      the two guns I always carry.&rdquo; As he spoke, the sleuth slipped a hand to
-      one of his hip pockets, and with a grim smile, laid a vicious-looking
-      revolver on the table.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Luzon evinced no disquietude; he merely smiled.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mr. Sharkey he is ze famous man wiz ze two guns. I would take no risk wiz
-      him. But I wish to win ze reward.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, then, the reward is yours if you play the game straight. Thurston
-      and I will be there, and you will be there unarmed. The hour?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Four o&rsquo;clock. I will watch you come to Comanche Point all alone along ze
-      road.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;re certainly a cautious old duck,&rdquo; laughed Sharkey. &ldquo;However, that&rsquo;s
-      all right. Four o&rsquo;clock, then. And you said Tuesday next week, didn&rsquo;t
-      you?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, Tuesday.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey glanced at a big advertisement calendar on the wall.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That will be the eleventh of the month. Then I think everything is
-      understood. Now I want to be off. I can just catch the last car to Tejon.
-      Shake. You can finish that drop of whisky by yourself, old man.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      They shook hands and Sharkey was gone.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The other waited for a few moments, cautiously and cunningly listening to
-      the retreating footsteps. Then he sprang erect, transformed in an instant
-      into a hale and vigorous man. Into his eyes there leapt a flash of joy, in
-      his heart was a song of triumph.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So the villain Ben Thurston will be there at Comanche Point on the very
-      anniversary of the night, just thirty years ago, when he committed that
-      foul crime&mdash;at the very spot where the poor little Senorita Rosetta
-      and her unborn babe perished at his hands. Glory be to God! At last the
-      hour of vengeance comes!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0030" id="link2HCH0030"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXX&mdash;Don Manuel Appears
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span> GOODLY little
-      sack of water-worn nuggets of gold had been washed out of the subterranean
-      stream by Pierre Luzon and Dick Willoughby. The captive had found in the
-      work both an exciting pastime and the ease of mind that comes from the
-      thought that his time was being spent to profitable account. So week after
-      week he had toiled on cheerfully, setting for himself each day a full
-      day&rsquo;s task. In this way also, although the want of sunshine had paled his
-      cheeks, he had maintained his health by the regular physical exercise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But as the appointed date of his release drew near, Dick&rsquo;s mining
-      enthusiasm suffered an eclipse. The gold no longer tempted him, the
-      eight-hour day became a burden to his soul, his whole being was possessed
-      with feverish restlessness. He was not only filled with eager excitement
-      at the thought of again folding Merle in his arms, but he was fired with
-      curiosity to know what events were happening outside which would enable
-      him to step forth a free man, exculpated from all connection with the
-      crime of which he had been suspected, restored to an honorable place among
-      his fellow men.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But Pierre remained obstinately deaf to all hints for information.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I can say nozing,&rdquo; was his invariable reply. Then, to divert Dick&rsquo;s mind,
-      he would challenge him at chess, a game in which they had proved to be
-      pretty equally matched, or he would produce the latest batch of
-      newspapers.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The young fellow had read with great delight the announcement that his
-      plans for the ideal city had been awarded the prize of ten thousand
-      dollars. Still more welcome had been the warmly congratulatory note
-      received from Merle at the hands of Pierre; for this letter, while it made
-      no reference to the point, virtually sealed the pact between the two
-      lovers that the money would provide for a glorious honeymoon trip to
-      Europe. Dick had sent instructions to Munson to notify the Los Angeles
-      syndicate in his name that the reward was to remain to the credit of the
-      winner until he would come personally to Tejon to claim it, probably about
-      the middle of October.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      It wanted now only two days of the fateful date, the eleventh of that
-      month. Dick had already gathered together his personal belongings ready
-      for removal. He was pacing the grotto, when his eye chanced to fall upon
-      the sack of gold.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I forgot about that, Pierre, old fellow,&rdquo; he remarked. &ldquo;We have to divide
-      this spoil.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; replied Pierre, with quiet determination, &ldquo;it is all yours, Mr.
-      Willoughby, honestly earned, too. I have no need for any of ze gold. I
-      have all ze money I can ever spend during ze rest of my life.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      No amount of argument could shake the old Frenchman&rsquo;s resolution.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then what is to be done with the sack? By jove, I&rsquo;ll share it with our
-      Hidden Treasure Syndicate. By the way, where is Jack Rover now, Pierre?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He is living in Buck Ashley&rsquo;s old store. Buck, you know, is ze postmaster
-      at Tejon, and has a splendid store in ze new city. But Jack Rover, he just
-      hang about ze old place.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, Pierre, I&rsquo;ve got a plan. You say it will not be until Tuesday
-      afternoon that I leave these quarters?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Zat is so, and I am sorry you must still wear ze blindfold, but it will
-      be for ze last time now.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m not kicking about that. I know the conditions under which I came
-      here. But it will be evening when we get clear of the hills, and I won&rsquo;t
-      have any particular place to go to. Next morning it will be best for me to
-      ride right over to Bakersfield, to surrender myself and secure my formal
-      discharge. When, did you say, am I to get the necessary documents for all
-      this?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Before you depart from ze cave.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, everything will fit in fine. Tomorrow you have kindly promised to
-      take out my things. Just carry the nuggets along with you also, and leave
-      everything in Jack&rsquo;s charge. But tell him that nothing must be opened or
-      disturbed until I arrive. I&rsquo;m going to give Jack Rover the surprise of his
-      life when he sees that gold. The sack is too heavy to handle, but I guess
-      we can make it into several packages. Jack was always crazy to find
-      Guadalupe&rsquo;s sand-bar.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So were lots of ozers,&rdquo; grinned Pierre. &ldquo;But they have never found it
-      yet. Even you will not be able to find it again when you are led out of
-      zese hills wearing ze blindfold.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I am fully aware of that, old man,&rdquo; laughed Dick in reply. &ldquo;I suppose I
-      couldn&rsquo;t discover the place again in a hundred years. But Jack&rsquo;s eyes will
-      fairly pop when he sees that bunch of gold marbles. He will be mighty
-      pleased to show the nuggets around to some of the boys who have laughed
-      over his enthusiasm, always declaring that Guadalupe&rsquo;s gold simply came
-      from some old-timer&rsquo;s sack of dust that had been part of Joaquin
-      Murietta&rsquo;s plunder.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, no. All ze bandits get out much gold from ze riffle in zose days&mdash;Don
-      Manuel himself had plenty.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, Pierre, you just pack all my belongings to Buck Ashley&rsquo;s old store.
-      And you tell Jack Rover to expect me about six o&rsquo;clock the night after
-      tomorrow&mdash;that&rsquo;s Tuesday. And I wish Munson to be there, too&mdash;I&rsquo;ll
-      want him to accompany me to Bakersfield.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;If you write a leetle note to ze lieutenant,&rdquo; suggested Pierre, &ldquo;I will
-      see zat it reaches his hands. But you must say very leetle&mdash;just a
-      few words. For nozing must be told to anyone outside until you are free.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;All right, Pierre. Here goes.&rdquo; And Dick seated himself at the writing
-      table. In a very few moments he had completed his task.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;See,&rdquo; he said, returning to Pierre&rsquo;s side. &ldquo;I wish you to know exactly
-      what I have written&mdash;just a hurried scrawl.&rdquo; And he read aloud while
-      the old Frenchman&rsquo;s eyes rested on the paper:
-    </p>
-    <blockquote>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;On Tuesday night next, about six o&rsquo;clock, meet me at Buck Ashley&rsquo;s old
-      store. I shall want you to ride over to Bakersfield with me next morning,
-      where my acquittal is assured. Give Merle the glad news. Yours, Dick.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    </blockquote>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guess that&rsquo;s all right?&rdquo; he added, as he folded the note and placed it in
-      an envelope on which he had already inscribed the name of Lieutenant
-      Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre had signified his approval with a nod, and now he carefully
-      bestowed the letter in the pocket of his shirt.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He will get ze letter&mdash;he will surely be zere.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then you say I cannot write to Merle&mdash;Miss Farnsworth, I mean?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have ze strictest orders,&rdquo; replied Pierre. &ldquo;Nozing must be told just
-      yet. Bah! It is only two days more.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Two mighty long days for me, old sport,&rdquo; said Dick, half in jest and half
-      in sober earnest, as he sat down and began cutting at a plug of tobacco.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Most of next day Willoughby was alone. But at the regular dinner hour
-      Pierre appeared, and announced that he had safely packed the valise and
-      the gold in four bags to the old store, and Jack Rover had been apprised
-      of Dick&rsquo;s coming on the following night.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He knew what was in ze sacks,&rdquo; laughed Pierre. &ldquo;Zey were so very heavy,
-      oh my! But I told him I would come back and shoot him like a jack-rabbit
-      if he opened zem before you came.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guess it needed an old bandit like you to scare Jack Rover,&rdquo; replied
-      Dick, jocularly. But he was very happy&mdash;everything was going along
-      well&mdash;only another four-and-twenty hours now and his captivity would
-      be at an end.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      That night Dick could hardly sleep a wink, and next morning he was too
-      restless and impatient for his approaching liberation to keep within the
-      confines of the little grotto. In the darkness of the big central cavern
-      he walked up and down, casting occasional glances at the distant glow of
-      the log fire where, as he could see, both the aged squaw and the white
-      wolf were on vigilant and ceaseless guard.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Suddenly his steps were arrested. With great surprise he gazed toward the
-      log fire. There, with Guadalupe and the white wolf, stood the figure of a
-      strange man, cloaked and wearing a big sombrero. All their shapes were
-      outlined against the ruddy glow, and the monstrous beast was actually
-      fawning at the newcomer&rsquo;s feet. A moment later the stranger, with a
-      parting wave of his hand to Guadalupe, advanced toward the spot where Dick
-      was standing. Close by was an oil lantern set in a socket of the rock wall
-      to mark the entrance to the inner grotto.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      For a minute the approaching figure had been swallowed up in the darkness,
-      but now came the sound of his footsteps crunching on the sandy floor, and
-      a few seconds later he appeared in the flickering radiance. Dick
-      Willoughby had already made his inference as to the identity of the
-      newcomer&mdash;he had been so often told that no living man but the bandit
-      chief, Don Manuel, could pass the white wolf with impunity.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But the name Dick pronounced was quite a different one.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Senor Ricardo Robles&mdash;it is you&mdash;<i>you?</i>&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is I,&rdquo; replied the Spaniard, quietly, as he extended his hand.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then you are&mdash;Don Manuel&mdash;the&mdash;&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick faltered and paused.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, I am Don Manuel de Valencia, the outlaw, the bandit of Tehachapi,
-      the White Wolf, as he is commonly called. Come within, my friend. I have
-      matters of importance to communicate.&rdquo; And the visitor led the way with an
-      ease that showed his perfect familiarity with every opening and turning in
-      the great subterranean series of chambers.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I cannot remain with you very long,&rdquo; said Mr. Robles, when they were
-      seated in the inner grotto, &ldquo;for I have a number of things to attend to
-      during the few hours that still remain at my disposal.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I must not ask questions,&rdquo; remarked Dick, although his words belied the
-      questioning look in his eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, although I speak in confidence,&rdquo; Mr. Robles replied, &ldquo;having learned
-      to trust you, I shall make no secret of my contemplated movements. Tonight
-      I hope to settle my last score&rdquo;&mdash;he paused, then corrected himself&mdash;&ldquo;my
-      last piece of business in California. If all goes well, within twenty-four
-      hours I shall be on the high seas. Never mind my exact route, but my final
-      destination is Spain, the land of my fathers. There, perhaps, you and I
-      may meet again.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I hope so. I have come to be deeply interested in you, Mr. Robles.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And I in you, young man, all the more because you are now engaged to one
-      I hold very dear. Since her birth, Merle Farnsworth has been a&mdash;little
-      protégée of mine.&rdquo; Again he had hesitated, and his voice had vibrated from
-      emotion. But he was smiling now as he went on: &ldquo;I have watched with
-      sympathetic interest and approval the progress of your love affair.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Through your spy-glass on the tower?&rdquo; laughed Dick.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, partly in that way, perhaps,&rdquo; replied Mr. Robles, with eyebrows
-      humorously upraised. &ldquo;You have had my quiet support from beginning to end,
-      and now that you have won the young lady&rsquo;s heart, you have my most sincere
-      congratulations. May you have long years together, and every happiness.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He had clasped Dick&rsquo;s hand, and placed his disengaged hand affectionately
-      on the young man&rsquo;s shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You are really very kind,&rdquo; said Dick, cordially responding to the hand
-      clasp.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Because I have counted you worthy of your great good fortune in winning
-      such a girl as Merle. And I have taken much the same liking to your
-      friend, Chester Munson. Have you heard the news:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, but I can guess it.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, he and Grace Darlington are engaged. And to them I give my heartiest
-      blessing just as I have given it to you and Merle. For Grace, like her
-      adopted sister, has been always very dear to me. I have loved them both
-      very dearly indeed all through their young lives.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And both are devoted to you, as I happen to know,&rdquo; affirmed Dick with
-      warm conviction.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I believe it,&rdquo; replied Mr. Robles. His hand sought an inner pocket and
-      drew forth a legal-looking document. &ldquo;I came here not only to bid you
-      good-bye, but more important still to place this in your possession.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My release?&rdquo; exclaimed Dick eagerly, as his fingers closed on the paper.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, not exactly&mdash;but it will lead to that, never fear. It is an
-      affidavit which has been properly sworn to before a San Francisco notary
-      public. It briefly sets out my confession. It was I, Don Manuel de
-      Valencia, who killed Marshall Thurston, or at least was responsible for
-      his killing.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      As he spoke the words, the outlaw drew himself proudly erect. Dick was too
-      overwhelmed with amazement to reply.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The young ruffian was shot partly because he deserved his fate for
-      insulting Merle, partly because, as you cannot but know, Don Manuel, the
-      White Wolf, had sworn a vendetta against the whole Thurston brood.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then Ben Thurston&mdash;is he dead, too?&rdquo; gasped the listener.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not yet,&rdquo; was the grim reply. Then he paused and changed his tone.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But I want to speak not another word about this. What happens to Ben
-      Thurston is nothing of your concern&mdash;must be nothing of your concern.
-      For this document here frees you from all legal entanglements, and I have
-      no wish that you should by any chance become enmeshed again. So we dismiss
-      Ben Thurston from our talk and from our minds. When you lodge this paper
-      with the authorities at Bakersfield, it will be a matter only of a few
-      formalities to secure dismissal of the charge against you. For I even put
-      it on sworn record that your jail delivery that night was against your
-      will.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have forgotten to thank you for that same delivery. I never dreamed you
-      were my liberator, Mr. Robles.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Because that night I was Don Manuel de Valencia. But at present I am
-      Ricardo Robles, and in that capacity it is for me to thank you for having
-      so chivalrously protected our dear Merle from the necessity of associating
-      her name in any way with the death of that worthless young scoundrel. I
-      appreciate the cheerful manner in which you have, for her sake, and let me
-      add, for my sake, too, borne your long imprisonment here.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve been mighty comfortable,&rdquo; laughed Dick, with a glance around his
-      luxurious quarters. &ldquo;And Pierre Luzon has been a treasure&mdash;a good
-      comrade all the time.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Ah, yes, Pierre,&rdquo; exclaimed the outlaw, musingly. &ldquo;Pierre is a very good
-      fellow. He has been faithful to me for thirty long years.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And where does he go after tonight?&rdquo; asked Dick. &ldquo;He cannot stay here,
-      all alone except for Guadalupe.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Everything is arranged. Guadalupe is accustomed to live alone. But
-      tonight Pierre accompanies me on my long journey.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So we may all meet again?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, we may all meet again,&rdquo; responded Robles, slowly and gravely, &ldquo;far,
-      far away from the Tehachapi mountains. But now I must go,&rdquo; he went on in a
-      brisk tone, &ldquo;for I have to make some final preparations. You have the
-      affidavit; see that you do not lose it on your ride down the mountains.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You just bet I won&rsquo;t,&rdquo; replied Dick, as he held tightly to the precious
-      document with both hands.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Pierre will come for you here early in the afternoon. Be prepared to go
-      with him then. As for myself, Willoughby, there is for the present only
-      one word more to be spoken. Adios!&rdquo; Again they clasped hands, and a moment
-      later Don Manuel was gone.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0031" id="link2HCH0031"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXXI&mdash;Shadows of the Past
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>N a little
-      summer-house at the edge of the rose garden of La Siesta, Tia Teresa was
-      seated all alone. She was awaiting the coming of Mr. Robles to a
-      rendezvous which he had arranged by a confidential message sent on the
-      previous evening. It wanted some time yet of the appointed hour, but in
-      her state of deep emotion and repressed excitement she had gladly sought
-      the solitude of this secluded corner. Deep in thought, her mind was
-      divided between the faraway past and the near-impending future.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Each recurring year this day to her had always been a sad and tragic
-      anniversary. In the early hours of the morning she had been to the old
-      Mexican cemetery on the hillside, and had bedecked with flowers the grave
-      marked by the marble cross bearing the single word &ldquo;Hermana,&rdquo; also the
-      graves close by of the parents of Don Manuel and Rosetta, the children she
-      had nursed and tended and fondled from infancy to early manhood and
-      womanhood, through twenty years of unalloyed happiness until the gringo
-      had come, the ancestral acres had been filched away, and dishonor and
-      death been brought to the slumbrously peaceful home.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And from that slumbrous peace what a sudden and terrible change! On this
-      day thirty years ago poor little Rosetta had been found done to death
-      beneath the precipice at Comanche Point. No less done to death by the
-      shock and shame of the pitiful story thus revealed, the aged parents of
-      the beautiful young girl were, within a few days, sleeping their long last
-      sleep by her side in the churchyard on the hill. A whole family blighted
-      and withered as by the blast of some death-laden sirocco.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Then had followed the years of terror during which Don Manuel, the White
-      Wolf, the dreaded outlaw, had wreaked his vengeance on the whole race of
-      gringos. She had never seen him all through that time, although at
-      intervals money had reached her by Pierre Luzon&rsquo;s trusted hand, enabling
-      her to maintain herself in the little Mexican village near the old fort of
-      Tejon. At last had come the fight when the band of outlaws had been
-      finally dispersed, Pierre Luzon wounded and dragged away to serve the rest
-      of his days in prison, Don Manuel vanished like a wraith in the mist, gone
-      where no man could tell.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But through the years that succeeded, Tia Teresa had known that he lived&mdash;had
-      known in her heart of hearts that he would live until the vendetta he had
-      sworn against Ben Thurston would be accomplished. The remittances that
-      arrived from time to time, first from Spain, then from England, needed no
-      signature to show that they were from her young master of former years and
-      that he still held his faithful old nurse in affectionate remembrance. And
-      at last had come the crowning surprise of all.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Tia Teresa had been bidden to come to Los Angeles by a letter which bore a
-      strange signature, but the handwriting of which she had immediately
-      recognized. And there, in a fine home beneath the foothills that skirt the
-      city to the north, she had found Don Manuel again, much older in manner
-      than by lapse of years&mdash;quiet, reserved, tinged with a sadness of
-      which she knew the cause, but happy withal, for he was married to a
-      beautiful English girl and had a little baby daughter. And as nurse to
-      this child Tia Teresa, to her great joy, was promptly installed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Thus again she had become the trusted servant in Don Manuel&rsquo;s home, the
-      only one around him possessing his full confidence and knowing the secret
-      story of his past. For, amid these changed surroundings, his name was
-      Ricardo Robles, his standing that of a Spaniard or Mexican of wealth, of
-      scholarly tastes, and devoted to the seclusion of his home with its
-      spacious surrounding gardens.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Their next door neighbors were an English family named Darlington, Mrs.
-      Darlington and Mrs. Robles having been life-long friends. And here, too,
-      was another tiny child in the home, likewise a daughter.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Seated in the summer-house, Tia Teresa was going over in her mind the
-      whole chain of happenings&mdash;the new era that had dawned and had
-      brought the hope of restored and abiding happiness for Don Manuel. But it
-      had been fated not so to be. Within a year his young wife had died, his
-      child was motherless, he himself, if not alone in the world, was
-      broken-hearted. For a spell he had fits of brooding, then all of a sudden
-      he had sold the home that could only henceforth be for him a place of
-      saddening memories.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      His daughter Merle, taking her English mother&rsquo;s maiden name of Farnsworth,
-      was transferred to the loving care of Mrs. Darlington. Thus had it come
-      about that Grace Darlington and Merle Farnsworth had been brought up as
-      sisters, with Tia Teresa their nurse, and in later years their devoted
-      attendant.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Ricardo Robles had resolved to travel, but Tia Teresa had quickly divined
-      that the vendetta was again in his heart. For no other reason could he
-      have decided on masking the paternity of his infant daughter by giving her
-      the maternal name. And from Tia Teresa Don Manuel had no secret to
-      conceal. &ldquo;Yes.&rdquo; He had sworn he would hunt Ben Thurston through Europe,
-      and it was to protect the future life of his child from any association
-      with future consequences of the blood feud that he had handed her over to
-      his friends under their solemn promise that, as Merle grew up, she should
-      never know anything more than that both her parents had died.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      So once again Don Manuel had gone his way and disappeared. Some years
-      later the Darlington home had been transferred to England, where Mr.
-      Darlington had fallen heir to some ancestral estates. Again, after a lapse
-      of years, another change had occurred&mdash;Mr. Darlington dying, and Mrs.
-      Darlington being left a widow in the big, now gloomy, English
-      country-house, with Grace and Merle approaching young womanhood, and all
-      of them, Tia Teresa included, longing again for the sunshine of
-      California.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Intermittently during those years in England, Ricardo Robles had visited
-      his friends, but the secret about his real relationship to Merle had
-      always been preserved. Both daughters in the home had been brought up
-      alike to regard him simply as a dear and valued friend, whose comings
-      brought much happiness to their lives in the shape of gifts which
-      preserved fond memories during his prolonged spells of absence.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And while the little family was still plunged in deep sorrow for the death
-      of Mr. Darlington, Mr. Robles had reappeared as the messenger of great
-      joy. For he brought the news that the beautiful rancho of La Siesta, lying
-      in mid-California, among the foothills of the Tejon Valley, had been
-      purchased for the express purpose that the widow and children should make
-      it their future place of abode. In this way had come about the return to
-      the land which each and all already loved best and regarded as truly
-      &ldquo;home.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Five years ago!&rdquo; murmured Tia Teresa pensively. And they had been all so
-      happy here, the young girls growing up with every accomplishment money and
-      the best governesses could bestow, Don Manuel not far away watching the
-      progress and developing beauty of his daughter, always hovering near for
-      acts of helpful kindness.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Five years of placid enjoyment, of unbroken tranquility, till all of a
-      sudden the old enemy had returned and all the rankling wounds of the old
-      vendetta had been reopened!
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      In the Spanish soul of Tia Teresa there was bitter hate still, and fierce
-      joy even now that the hour of retribution was approaching&mdash;that at
-      last after all those years her little Rosetta would be avenged. Yet time
-      had had some mellowing influences, for in her musings now she experienced
-      a vague sense of uneasiness for possible consequences that in former times
-      had never for a moment been tolerated. The true spirit of the vendetta had
-      always been in her very blood&mdash;strike when you can, without thought
-      of what may happen next.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But now she was thinking of coming happenings&mdash;of sorrow perhaps for
-      Merle, of the undoubted danger for Don Manuel himself.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And while thus she conned the chances, her head bent in deep meditation,
-      her eyes half closed, Ricardo Robles, approaching with noiseless step,
-      stood by her side and laid an affectionate hand upon her shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have come, Tia Teresa,&rdquo; he said simply, as he sat down at the edge of
-      the little rustic table.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0032" id="link2HCH0032"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXXII&mdash;Forebodings
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">F</span>OR this last hour,
-      Don Manuel,&rdquo; she said, placing a hand on his, &ldquo;I have been going over all
-      the long story of the past, from the days when you were a little boy and
-      Rosetta was suckled at my bosom. Why should I not have loved her?&rdquo; asked
-      the old duenna almost fiercely. &ldquo;Why should I not love her still?&rdquo; she
-      added, in a lower tone, as she bowed her head and covered her eyes with
-      her disengaged hand. &ldquo;There is love that can never die, Don Manuel.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Nor should we wish it otherwise,&rdquo; he said gently, caressing the hand
-      extended toward him. &ldquo;And this very night our undying love for dear little
-      Rosetta will be proved&mdash;tonight at last she will be avenged.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      With a start Tia Teresa sat erect.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then it is all arranged?&rdquo; she asked breathlessly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, all finally arranged,&rdquo; was his quiet rejoinder. &ldquo;We meet this
-      evening on Comanche Point&mdash;the place where I have always vowed he
-      should answer for his crime. And you remember what day this is?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I remember&mdash;can I ever forget?&mdash;the very day we found her dead
-      beneath the cliff.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The very day, Tia Teresa. So my vengeance will be complete. Before now I
-      could have shot him a dozen times. But he would never have known that his
-      death was by my hand. Tonight, however, he will know. And he will realize
-      that the vendetta is the law of God&mdash;an eye for an eye, a tooth for a
-      tooth; his life, so precious to himself, for hers so dear to us in the
-      happy old-time days.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But you, Don Manuel?&rdquo; she asked fearfully.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It does not matter much about me,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;But all the same I have
-      come to speak a little in regard to myself. Tonight Ben Thurston assuredly
-      will die, and should I perish with him, the story of the vendetta cannot
-      fail to be revived and the identity of the recluse, Ricardo Robles, with
-      Don Manuel, the outlaw, will be established. This will come as a great
-      shock to all my dear friends at La Siesta&mdash;to Mrs. Darlington as well
-      as to Grace and Merle. But this counts for little&mdash;the name of Don
-      Manuel is just as honorable a name as that of Robles. And you can tell
-      them further that all the loot I ever took from the gringos lies today
-      untouched in Joaquin Murietta&rsquo;s cave. I sullied my hands with none of it.
-      I was made rich by the sale of, my ancestral estates in Spain. And that
-      wealth the law cannot confiscate, for I have been only its trustee during
-      all those years. Everything I possess has been vested from the first in
-      the names of Merle Farnsworth and Grace Darlington.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Grace as well?&rdquo; murmured Tia Teresa, enquiringly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Certainly, for I love both the girls dearly; there is ample to divide
-      between them, and by ranking them together I guard Merle from the thought
-      that I was anything more to her than to Grace. To both alike I was just a
-      deeply attached friend.&rdquo; He paused a moment, then regarded Tia Teresa
-      fixedly. &ldquo;For my little girl must never know that her father was an
-      outlaw, with a price on his head; yes, with blood on his hands, if it is
-      only the blood of the worthless Thurston breed.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That is no stain&mdash;it is an honor&mdash;it is a duty that you owed,&rdquo;
-       exclaimed the duenna with fervency, her hands clenched against her bosom
-      as she spoke.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You understand&mdash;we understand the vendetta, you and I, Tia Teresa.
-      But the Americanos do not understand. And I have brought up my little girl
-      as an American, for her own happiness I long ago realized. So she would
-      never understand. When she comes to know that her old friend Ricardo
-      Robles was Don Manuel de Valencia as well, she will breathe a gentle
-      prayer of rest for his soul. But she will not be distressed by the
-      knowledge that her father was the bandit and outlaw&mdash;she will not
-      have to face the cruel world with that stigma attached to her name. For
-      that I have contrived, for that I have suffered the dumb agony of
-      childlessness all these years.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And that, in God&rsquo;s name,&rdquo; exclaimed Tia Teresa, &ldquo;is part of the price Ben
-      Thurston, thrice accursed, has to pay.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And tonight will pay,&rdquo; responded Don Manuel, determinedly. &ldquo;But I speak
-      of all this just to put you on your guard. It will be necessary for me to
-      say something to Mrs. Darlington as well. I have brought for her the
-      papers that will establish the rights of Merle and Grace to all I leave
-      behind.&rdquo; As he spoke he touched his coat where the shape of a packet in an
-      inner pocket showed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Your will?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No. As I have explained, I require no will. The property is theirs
-      already. And I do not need to tell you, my dear Tia Teresa, my beloved
-      friend, that you, too, have not been forgotten.&rdquo; As he spoke he raised her
-      hand and pressed it reverently to his lips.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t speak like that, Don Manuel,&rdquo; she protested.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I know that all I owe to you can never be repaid,&rdquo; he continued, humbly,
-      gratefully&mdash;&ldquo;the devoted life-service for me and for Rosetta and our
-      beloved parents as well.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Again he kissed her hand, and this time she accepted the seal of his
-      high-souled and chivalrous regard. There were tears in her eyes now.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But, Don Manuel, you need not die tonight. Death for him&mdash;that is
-      right. But why for you?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Perhaps not for me&mdash;most certainly,&rdquo; he replied with a little,
-      reassuring smile. &ldquo;Oh, do not imagine that I deliberately court death for
-      tonight. On the contrary, I have all my plans carefully laid. An
-      automobile is ready for the road, and I have a yacht waiting for me at a
-      quiet spot on the coast, and if all is well, by tomorrow&rsquo;s dawn Pierre and
-      I will be on the ocean. No one around here except at La Siesta will miss
-      Ricardo Robles, and if the name of Don Manuel is associated with the death
-      of Ben Thurston, only once more will the White Wolf have strangely
-      disappeared just as he used to do in the old times.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He was laughing, not loudly, but just with carefree, almost joyous
-      triumph, as he rose to say good-bye.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then, Tia Teresa, if events work out just as I have planned, we may all
-      meet again, somewhere, somehow&mdash;I cannot say more at present. For I
-      shall be happy to see my little girl happy in her married love, and later
-      on I shall close my eyes contentedly when I can feel assured that nothing
-      from the past will ever emerge to spoil her life or bring to her distress
-      of mind.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Tia Teresa, too, had arisen.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;God grant it may be so,&rdquo; she fervently exclaimed. &ldquo;But somehow my mind
-      misgives me. Today I am softened as I have never been before. Even for the
-      sake of our dear Rosetta in Heaven I feel inclined to plead with you to
-      let Thurston go his way and the vendetta be forgotten.&rdquo; And she clung to
-      his arm imploringly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Never!&rdquo; cried Don Manuel, putting her gently but resolutely aside. &ldquo;That
-      can never be, Tia Teresa. You know it. A vow sworn over my wronged and
-      murdered sister&rsquo;s grave, over the graves of my parents as well, must be
-      fulfilled. To break it at the very moment when it is in my power to give
-      it fulfillment would be the act of a coward&mdash;a sacrilege that could
-      never be atoned. No more words like that. I must not even listen.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      She was sobbing as she dropped back into her chair. Her silence was the
-      confession that she was powerless to argue against the unwritten law of
-      the vendetta.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So I kiss you good-bye for the present, Tia Teresa.&rdquo; He suited the action
-      to the word, and, stooping, saluted her first on one cheek, then on the
-      other. &ldquo;Be your old brave and resolute self again. Where shall I find Mrs.
-      Darlington?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Alone in her boudoir. This is her day for correspondence,&rdquo; replied the
-      duenna, resolutely striving to repress her tears.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then I&rsquo;ll leave you here. Let your best wishes go with me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Almost lightly he touched her hand and was gone, disappearing among the
-      roses.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Tia Teresa bowed her head across her folded arms. She was thinking not of
-      the past now, but solely of the future.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How would it all end?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0033" id="link2HCH0033"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXXIII&mdash;Old Friends
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span>M glad to find you
-      alone,&rdquo; spoke Mr. Robles, as he advanced into the subdued light of Mrs.
-      Darlington&rsquo;s boudoir.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      She was seated at her escritoire. Around her were letters lying open for
-      answer, others sealed and ready for the mail, also sundry books of account
-      which indicated that the chatelaine of La Siesta was a business woman who
-      paid attention to the running of her household and the management of her
-      estate.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Always so pleased to see you,&rdquo; she replied, as she rose to give her
-      visitor welcome.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Pray, keep your seat, Mrs. Darlington. You form an attractive picture&mdash;the
-      lady who is not too much of a lady to neglect her correspondence and her
-      business affairs. And it is about some business matters that I have come
-      to talk with you this evening.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      She smiled pleasedly over the compliment paid in the old-fashioned courtly
-      style of the true Spanish grandee. She herself always suggested the
-      old-time, old-world lady of fashion&mdash;one belonging to the old lace
-      and sweet lavender era that has so nearly passed away.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Business matters?&rdquo; echoed Mrs. Darlington. &ldquo;That sounds quite serious. We
-      have had no cause to talk business for years and years. La Siesta has
-      certainly justified its name.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But even the most pleasant siesta must in time come to an end,&rdquo; he
-      replied with a grave smile. &ldquo;There are things in this world that must be
-      accomplished&mdash;calls of duty that interfere sadly with continuous
-      repose. I am leaving tonight on a journey&mdash;perhaps a long journey,&rdquo;
-       he added slowly and thoughtfully.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, going abroad? The wanderlust again? That&rsquo;s too bad. We shall all miss
-      you so much.&rdquo; She spoke the words with real concern in her tone and in her
-      eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not exactly the wanderlust,&rdquo; he responded. &ldquo;But there is a certain task I
-      must perform. And it takes me away&mdash;far away from your delightful La
-      Siesta.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And for a long time?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That will be decided by events. I shall write you a long letter when once
-      I am on the ocean. Meanwhile there are certain documents I wish to leave
-      in your charge, my good kind friend.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He drew the packet from the breast pocket of his coat. &ldquo;They are important
-      papers, and I wish them to be locked in your safe.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Under seal, I see,&rdquo; she remarked, indicating the big circle of wax that
-      closed the cover.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, sealed with my signet,&rdquo; he answered, touching the ring on his
-      finger. &ldquo;But all the same I wish you to know the nature of their contents.
-      That is why I have sought this little private talk.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Silently she settled herself to listen, and he went on:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You are aware that many years ago I sold out all my interests in Spain&mdash;lands
-      and flocks and mines. Well, except for the money I used in building and
-      furnishing my home, I invested the whole amount so realized in British
-      Government bonds. But not in my own name. They stand in the names of Merle
-      Farnsworth and Grace Darlington.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Mrs. Darlington showed some surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Merle, of course. But why Grace, Mr. Robles? I need not tell you that she
-      is already well provided for.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That I fully understand. But I preferred it so. To me both children were
-      very dear, and have always continued to be very dear. There was more than
-      a sufficiency to divide. I wished them to share my patrimony, even though
-      the one might have a greater claim on me than the other. But it was
-      precisely, to guard against such a thought occurring to the mind of any
-      outsider that I have treated Merle and Grace exactly alike. The secret
-      that Merle is my daughter is known only to you and Tia Teresa and me, and,
-      as I have always wished, it must be kept from Merle herself and from all
-      others&mdash;now, more than ever,&rdquo; he added after a little pause.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have never sought to pry into this mystery,&rdquo; replied Mrs. Darlington.
-      &ldquo;You had valid reasons for it, I well understood. But I was glad for the
-      wee baby&rsquo;s sake to take her to my heart&mdash;the child of the dearest
-      friend of my girlhood days. And it was nice, too, for her to have her
-      mother&rsquo;s maiden name&mdash;Merle Farnsworth. So, from the very first, I
-      loved her just as much as my own baby, Grace.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That I know,&rdquo; said Robles, gratefully touching her hand. &ldquo;I can never
-      adequately thank you for the mother love you have so generously bestowed
-      on my child. And I have always been grateful, too, for the chivalrous
-      manner in which you have never sought to have me explain my actions in
-      this matter&mdash;my virtual separation from the daughter whom, while
-      hiding our relationship, I have loved all through her young life with
-      passionate devotion.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Mr. Robles was deeply moved. He bowed his head and covered his eyes with
-      his hand. In sympathy, Mrs. Darlington also was greatly affected.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You have been the best of fathers to Merle,&rdquo; she said in a trembling
-      voice, &ldquo;even though Merle little dreams of what she really means to your
-      life. But oh, Mr. Robles, how often have I not pitied you when I have seen
-      you restraining in her presence the natural impulses of your heart!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It was my duty,&rdquo; he replied, regaining his composure by stern
-      self-command and sitting erect again. &ldquo;My bounden duty to her,&rdquo; he added,
-      resolutely. &ldquo;So, as you have so kindly done before, we shall leave that
-      subject alone. You call it a mystery. Be it so. Just let it abide a
-      mystery to the end. Now, Mrs. Darlington,&rdquo; he went on in a changed tone,
-      &ldquo;please lock up these papers. If I ever want them again I shall come to
-      you. But if anything should happen to me, the seal is to be broken. You
-      are my trustee. But there is no troublesome will to prove and execute. As
-      I have already indicated, all the property I die possessed of, all the
-      property that is inalienably and rightfully mine, including my home on the
-      hill&mdash;everything is already apportioned between Merle and Grace, and
-      stands in their names by a deed that dates back almost to their days of
-      infancy.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is unheard-of generosity,&rdquo; protested Mrs. Darlington. &ldquo;I mean so far
-      as Grace is concerned.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not another word, I beg of you. I have already given valid reasons
-      besides those of affection and gratitude. Now, Mrs. Darlington, let me see
-      you lock up these documents, and my mind will be at rest.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Without further speech she took the packet of papers from his hand,
-      crossed the room, and, standing before a safe inset into the wall and
-      already open, deposited the papers in a little drawer. Then she swung back
-      the safe door, and the click of the combination as she turned the knob
-      told that her visitor&rsquo;s wishes had been fully complied with. Slowly she
-      returned to her seat at the desk.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Thank you,&rdquo; said Mr. Robles, pressing her hand.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then I am not to ask why you are leaving us tonight?&rdquo; enquired Mrs.
-      Darlington.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Please not. I just came to you, as I have many times done before, to
-      speak the little word&mdash;<i>Adios</i>. And it has always been spoken
-      brightly between us, my dear friend. For have I not returned again and
-      again like the proverbial bad penny?&rdquo; he continued with a smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And so it will be yet again, I hope,&rdquo; she replied. &ldquo;Bad pennies of your
-      kind, Mr. Robles, are better than minted gold. And you must think of the
-      young people. Engagements should not be too long. Everything is settled so
-      far as Dick and Merle are concerned&mdash;with your full approval?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;With my fullest approval, and to my great joy and peace of mind.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, and you know, too, that it is just the same old story as regards
-      Chester Munson and my little girl.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Munson has so informed me. He wanted my congratulations on his good
-      fortune. Chester Munson is certainly a fine fellow, and Grace could have
-      made no better choice for the bestowal of her love. Again I am filled with
-      happiness at the turn events have taken.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But if there are to be wedding bells for four, their peal will not be so
-      joyous if you are absent, my dear Mr. Robles.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I shall try to be present,&rdquo; he replied, with a little wistful smile. &ldquo;Who
-      knows? Wouldn&rsquo;t it be fine if the wedding bells were to ring in Spain?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no, my friend. You forget that all four are young Americans. The
-      honeymoons in Spain, if you like. But the weddings in California, please.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So be it,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;Then if I cannot get back for the wedding bells,
-      we may have a family reunion during the honeymoons.&rdquo; He laughed almost
-      gaily as he rose. &ldquo;Now, where are our young Americans? I wish to say
-      good-bye to them, too.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Where Dick Willoughby is, I cannot say. But he is safe&mdash;you still
-      assure me of his safety, Mr. Robles?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Assuredly. And I have good news for our dear Merle. Tomorrow Willoughby
-      will be free, with every suspicion removed from his name.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, that will be glad tidings indeed for Merle&mdash;for both the girls.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then let us take the news to them. Where shall we find them?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;As usual, I fancy, in their favorite cosy corner. And Mr. Munson is here,
-      too. He is to have luncheon with us. He said you had given him a day off
-      from his onerous library duties.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Quite correct. I told him I would meet him here, for I have a message for
-      him as well. Come then, let us join the young people.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Again, like the courtly hidalgo, he presented a hand to his hostess and
-      led her from the room.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0034" id="link2HCH0034"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXXIV&mdash;Heart Searchings
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span>S Mrs. Darlington
-      had anticipated, the trio of young Americans were discovered in the cosy
-      corner. Grace and Munson were engaged in a tête-à-tête that was obviously
-      very delightful to themselves, while Merle at a discreet distance was
-      busily engaged in watering the pot plants and flowers. She was the first
-      to sound a note of warning.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Here comes mother, and Mr. Robles, also, I do declare.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The young lovers started a little apart, and Grace in a moment was
-      demurely busy over a bit of sewing that had been resting undisturbed in
-      her lap during the previous half hour.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle advanced toward Mr. Robles.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;This is delightful,&rdquo; she exclaimed, as she warmly shook hands. &ldquo;You will
-      stay to luncheon, of course.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, my dear. This is to be only a brief visit, I am sorry to say.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Grace had also come forward, and he saluted her in his usual quiet, kindly
-      manner. But for Munson he had a word of sly banter.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Better than drilling a squad or cataloguing musty old books,&rdquo; he
-      remarked, bestowing a significant side glance in Grace&rsquo;s direction.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Infinitely better,&rdquo; replied the ex-soldier and amateur librarian, with
-      frank and unabashed satisfaction.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Mr. Robles took a seat close to Merle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I came to bring you two pieces of news,&rdquo; he said, taking her hand, yet
-      addressing his words to all the company. &ldquo;First and foremost, by tomorrow
-      the charge against Dick Willoughby will be withdrawn, and he will be a
-      free man.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, that is good news indeed,&rdquo; cried Merle, fairly hugging its bearer.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then they have at last discovered the murderer of young Thurston?&rdquo;
-       enquired Munson in a tone of eager satisfaction.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, or rather he has discovered himself, I believe. Oh, you need not ask
-      me for the name. It will only be made public when Willoughby formally
-      claims his liberty.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I am so thankful,&rdquo; murmured Grace. &ldquo;But of course Dick&rsquo;s complete
-      exoneration was bound to come.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And I am the bearer of a special message to you, Mr. Munson. I have not
-      read it. But it was given to me as the one most likely to get it promptly
-      into your hands.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Speaking thus, he passed over to Munson the hasty scrawl that Dick had
-      written in the cavern and entrusted to Pierre Luzon for delivery.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Munson ripped open the envelope, first scanned the contents, then read
-      aloud:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;On Tuesday night next, about six o&rsquo;clock, meet me at Buck Ashley&rsquo;s old
-      store. I shall want you to ride over to Bakersfield with me next morning,
-      where my acquittal is assured. Give Merle the glad news. Yours, Dick.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That I have already been privileged to do,&rdquo; said Mr. Robles, as he smiled
-      down on the young girl by his side. Their eyes met, and a look of grave
-      earnestness came into Merle&rsquo;s.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And the second item of news, Mr. Robles?&rdquo; she asked, in a low tone. &ldquo;I
-      hope it is also gladsome tidings.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, it is of comparative unimportance,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;Simply that I am
-      going away on a long journey, and may not see all you happy young people
-      again for quite awhile.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle&rsquo;s face fell. &ldquo;I am so sorry,&rdquo; she murmured, a note of real feeling
-      in the softly-spoken words.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;As you grow older you will realize that the world is full of partings,
-      Merle,&rdquo; he answered.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But why should there be partings among us?&rdquo; she protested. &ldquo;Now that Dick
-      is free, there is not a shadow on all our happiness. And we do so wish you
-      to share it, Mr. Robles. It will not be just the same if you are gone.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is very kind of you to think like that.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s just how we all think,&rdquo; interjected Grace. &ldquo;But when duty calls,
-      one must needs answer,&rdquo; replied Robles. &ldquo;Right there is an end to all
-      argument.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And where are you going this time, Mr. Robles?&rdquo; enquired Merle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;On a long journey&mdash;as far as Europe, I hope. But my plans are not
-      quite certain, except that I start tonight. However, I shall be in
-      correspondence with Mrs. Darlington, and I trust that when you young
-      people come to make that contemplated foreign tour, your footsteps will be
-      turned in my direction. Meanwhile you have, all of you, as you already
-      know, my warmest congratulations and heartiest good wishes.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      As he spoke, Mr. Robles rose. His manner indicated that he wished no
-      further questioning. After a comprehensive glance around, he advanced,
-      first of all, to Munson and extended his hand.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mr. Munson, you will receive a letter tomorrow that contains an offer for
-      you to continue your work in my library, which I hope will prove
-      acceptable, at least for the present. Grace, my dear, I take the liberty
-      of an old friend.&rdquo; And he kissed her brow. &ldquo;With your mother I already
-      have had a good long talk,&rdquo; he continued, as he pressed Mrs. Darlington&rsquo;s
-      hand and looked into her eyes. &ldquo;And now, Merle, dear, I am going to ask
-      you to gather me some roses in your garden. I want them for a particular
-      purpose, and, as you know, there are no roses like those of La Siesta.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle was standing eager and happy to do his bidding&mdash;privileged to
-      have the chance of conferring such a little service on her dear old
-      friend, her friend from the earliest childhood days of her remembrance.
-      With impulsive good-nature, Grace was ready to help as well. But a quiet
-      look from her mother restrained her, and Merle and Mr. Robles passed from
-      the verandah, hand in hand.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      For nearly an hour they wandered among the rose bushes, picking the
-      choicest blooms, talking a little on many things, silent at times, but
-      both happy in each other&rsquo;s companionship. At last Mr. Robles looked at his
-      watch. The hour of parting had come.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle had deftly tied the roses in a bunch, and now she placed them in his
-      hands.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A bouquet from me&mdash;from your little friend Merle,&rdquo; she murmured,
-      with a wistful attempt at a smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;From my dear little friend, Merle,&rdquo; he replied, gravely repeating her
-      words as he looked down into her upraised face. It was a beautiful face,
-      in its fresh youthfulness, its eager joy of living, the sublime
-      unconsciousness of self that reveals the spotless soul. For an instant
-      their eyes met.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      During that brief spell Robles&rsquo; whole being trembled. His arms moved as if
-      to enfold the sweet girl to his breast. But with a mighty effort he
-      controlled himself, and he simply kissed her on the brow, just as he had
-      done to Grace in the cosy corner.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;God bless you, Merle, my dear,&rdquo; he murmured as he turned away with a
-      final wave of his hand.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      In a moment he was gone from her view. But the girl&rsquo;s gaze remained fixed&mdash;still
-      directed down the avenue of trees along which the figure of her life-long
-      friend had disappeared. There was a look of dazed wonderment in her eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, can it be so&mdash;could it be so?&rdquo; she faltered, as she raised a
-      hand to hold back the tears.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      An hour later Robles was in the little Mexican churchyard, scattering the
-      rose blooms gathered by his daughter Merle on the graves of the dead
-      relatives whose names she would never know as such. Already there were the
-      flowers that Tia Teresa had that morning brought&mdash;a garland of white
-      arum lilies around the cross that marked the sleeping place of Rosetta,
-      wreaths of rich red carnations on the tombstone inscribed with the
-      father&rsquo;s and the mother&rsquo;s names.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And now on the turf beneath the memorials Don Manuel, with lingering
-      fingers, dropped the roses here and there, as if to rest with their beauty
-      and their fragrance on the forms of his beloved dead. The last bloom
-      fluttered to the ground. Then, standing erect, hands upraised, no words
-      uttered, but with the unspoken words none the less reverberating through
-      his very soul, he vowed once again the vendetta which he had sworn on the
-      identical spot thirty long years before.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      When he turned to leave the tiny hamlet of the dead, a wonderful
-      transformation had come over his countenance. The placid calm was gone;
-      the fierce fire of implacable hatred and unswervable resolve burned in his
-      eyes. He had bidden adieu to all the softer things in this life. His sole
-      concern now was with the enemy whom he had marked down for death that
-      night.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0035" id="link2HCH0035"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXXV&mdash;At Comanche Point
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">B</span>EN THURSTON,
-      during the afternoon, seated in his big armchair, had first nodded over a
-      newspaper and then dropped off to sleep. He was awakened by a touch on the
-      shoulder&mdash;rudely awakened, for he jumped to his feet, and in a dazed
-      way glared at the disturber.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Excuse me,&rdquo; apologized Leach Sharkey, &ldquo;but I want to remind you that this
-      is the afternoon when we are to meet that old Portugee I told you about.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I need no reminder,&rdquo; was the gruff reply. &ldquo;I am ready to start when you
-      are. By the way, what&rsquo;s the fellow&rsquo;s name?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;José, he said. He claims to know every nook and corner in the range. Has
-      lived in the mountains for many years; keeps goats and bees, and shoots a
-      mountain lion occasionally, earning the bounty as well as getting the
-      skin.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Shoots,&rdquo; echoed Thurston, somewhat nervously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, that was in his younger days mostly, I fancy. Today he is a tottering
-      old man who couldn&rsquo;t hold a rifle straight if he tried. But he&rsquo;s well
-      acquainted with the mountains, that&rsquo;s the main thing. He tells me he has
-      known where Dick Willoughby is hiding since the very day after he broke
-      jail.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then why didn&rsquo;t he come to me?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Because he knew nothing about the reward. But at our very first chance
-      meeting among the hills I very soon made five thousand dollars look mighty
-      good to him. By gad, you should have seen his eyes pop and his hands
-      tremble.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is a fortune for such a man.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s what got him. He has been supplying Willoughby with goats&rsquo; milk,
-      but is paid only two bits a quart. So he grabbed at my bait like a hungry
-      coyote. You have the money ready, I suppose? Treasury bills&mdash;that&rsquo;s
-      what he stipulated for, because he&rsquo;s too frail to hump a sack of gold
-      around.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The money is in that wallet on my desk. You had better carry it.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey stepped across the room and shoved a fat leather wallet into the
-      breast pocket of his coat.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So frail, is he?&rdquo; Thurston went on, musingly. &ldquo;Well, I needn&rsquo;t take a
-      gun.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey smiled. He knew Ben Thurston&rsquo;s timidity in even handling a
-      revolver, and the man&rsquo;s abject reliance on his armed bodyguard.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Not the slightest necessity,&rdquo; assented the sleuth. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve always got my
-      brace of bulldogs ready;&rdquo; and the professional gunman, touching the broad
-      leather belt to which his holsters were attached, grinned complacently.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And no danger to be feared from Willoughby himself, you said?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;None whatever. In fact, he don&rsquo;t have a gun, José declares. So he only
-      sneaks out after dark for a constitutional. The old fellow will take us to
-      the spot where we can grab him by the neck.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That sounds like business,&rdquo; replied Thurston, rubbing his hands. &ldquo;And
-      shoot him down, Sharkey, if he runs.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He won&rsquo;t give us the slip this time&mdash;you can bet dollars to
-      doughnuts on that. But of course he&rsquo;s got to have the chance of hands-up
-      before I fire. Killing is killing, and I prefer the handcuffs. There is
-      really less trouble in the long run.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, perhaps I, too, would prefer to see him hanged,&rdquo; murmured Thurston,
-      with gloating satisfaction. &ldquo;But don&rsquo;t forget that we must get him this
-      afternoon, dead or alive. I&rsquo;m sick of this life of watching and waiting.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The end&rsquo;s in sight at last.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then we&rsquo;ll go back East&mdash;after I have had my revenge. It will be
-      sweeter to me after all the trouble we&rsquo;ve encountered. And by God, we&rsquo;ll
-      drag that Farnsworth girl, too, through the mire. Hell to all of them!
-      I&rsquo;ve never had anyone but enemies around me here.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      While speaking, Thurston reached for his overcoat thrown across the back
-      of a chair.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;All right, we&rsquo;ll start,&rdquo; said Sharkey. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll go and get the horses
-      ready.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      It was about half past three o&rsquo;clock when the riders reached the base of
-      the mountain barrier not far from the entrance to Tejon Pass.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ve got to make it on foot now,&rdquo; remarked Sharkey, as he swung himself
-      from the saddle. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll tether the horses to this manzanita.&rdquo; Thurston
-      dismounted, and while his companion led the animals under the trees, he
-      gazed aloft at the precipice beetling in front of them.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Damn it, I wish you had chosen any other place than Comanche Point,&rdquo; he
-      exclaimed irritably.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We had to come to the spot where we can find our man,&rdquo; replied Sharkey
-      complacently. &ldquo;It is on the ridge above that Willoughby has his place of
-      hiding. Come along, we have a good stiff climb before us.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He led the way up the first slope of the winding trail and Ben Thurston
-      followed, reluctantly now, half doubting the wisdom of his having left his
-      home for such an adventure.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Meanwhile there had been two other riders on the range that afternoon,
-      mounted on little hill ponies. The one man was blindfolded; the other rode
-      in advance and guided the second pony by a leading rein. It had been the
-      usual experience to which Dick Willoughby had now become accustomed&mdash;hour
-      after hour along winding, maze-like trails. At last the call had come to
-      dismount, and the bandage had been removed from Dick&rsquo;s eyes. He saw that
-      he was in a little box-like nook in the mountains.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You will remain here,&rdquo; said Pierre Luzon, &ldquo;until I whistle for you&mdash;you
-      know my signal. Zen you will lead ze ponies along zis path. When you come
-      to me, I will put you on ze road for home, and we will say good-bye.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I suppose I may smoke,&rdquo; laughed Dick, philosophically. The day of
-      surprises had left him dulled to any further wonderment.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Sure, smoke,&rdquo; replied Pierre. &ldquo;But remember ze forest regulations,&rdquo; he
-      added with a chuckle, &ldquo;and do not set ze brush on fire.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m no green tenderfoot,&rdquo; laughed
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Willoughby, as he drew his briar-root from his pocket. &ldquo;And it&rsquo;s quite a
-      balmy afternoon for October.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He sat down and propped his back against a moss-grown rock.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You must not stir from here,&rdquo; continued Pierre. &ldquo;Remember I have to find
-      you again.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Guess I&rsquo;ve learned to obey orders. I&rsquo;m quite comfortable where I am.&rdquo; And
-      Dick started contentedly smoking.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre, following the little path to which he had drawn Dick&rsquo;s attention,
-      pushed through the brushwood and disappeared.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Just ten minutes later Pierre Luzon stood on Comanche Point and gazed down
-      the trail leading up from the pass below.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Zey are coming, zey are coming!&rdquo; he exclaimed eagerly to himself, with
-      finger outpointed in the direction of the two climbers on foot half way up
-      the ascent. Then he slipped back into the shadow of a clump of stunted
-      pines that grew close to the cliff.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Fifteen minutes or so passed. Then the heads of Ben Thurston and Leach
-      Sharkey showed above the final steep ascent that led directly on to the
-      projecting spur known as Comanche Point. Thurston was breathing hard after
-      the difficult climb.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Here we are at last,&rdquo; remarked Sharkey cheerfully, as he glanced around.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Even as he spoke, a tottering figure came forth from among the pines. A
-      few minutes before, Pierre Luzon had been erect and vigorous and nimble on
-      his feet, but now he seemed to be indeed a frail and bowed old man.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have come,&rdquo; he said, as he approached the figures on the cliff.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hands up, then,&rdquo; cried the sleuth, half laughing. &ldquo;You remember, I said I
-      would search you for a gun.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have no gun,&rdquo; Pierre answered, as he halted and elevated his arms.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey advanced and, without taking the trouble to draw either of his own
-      weapons, ran his fingers with the quick touch of experience over the old
-      man&rsquo;s clothes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I knew you were on the square, José,&rdquo; said the bodyguard, quickly
-      satisfied. &ldquo;Well, I&rsquo;ve brought the mazuma.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He drew from his pocket the fat wallet, opening it for a moment to display
-      the wads of greenbacks. Then he put it back again.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Now where is our man?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He is down here, just a little distance,&rdquo; replied Pierre, in a cautious
-      whisper. &ldquo;I am not strong enough to hold him. But you come. Ze boss, he
-      can remain here for ze present.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Ben Thurston had turned away and was looking down into the valley.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll be back in a short time,&rdquo; called out Sharkey.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But Thurston, if he had heard, made no reply.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Now show the way, old fellow,&rdquo; continued the sleuth, addressing his
-      guide.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      A moment later Ben Thurston was alone.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Alone on Comanche Point&mdash;gazing over the broad sweep of lands that
-      had been his princely heritage, but which he had now lost forever! The
-      valley lay beneath him, bathed in the mellow evening sunshine. But his
-      eyes were riveted on a single spot. And what a transformation scene for
-      the erstwhile cattle king&mdash;this new city with its checkerboard of
-      streets and all around it new homes amid plots of young fruit trees and
-      meadows of alfalfa!
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The whole picture was one of fascinating beauty&mdash;the city itself the
-      finishing touch that gave it human interest. But in Ben Thurston&rsquo;s soul
-      there was nothing but bitterness and disgust. He had kept on complaining
-      that he had been unscrupulously plundered by the Los Angeles syndicate,
-      and with the realization now of what enterprise and enlightened progress
-      could achieve, he began to feel that he had been mercilessly stripped of
-      what was rightfully his. Greed and envy and vain regrets were all
-      commingled in his surge of envenomed thoughts. But avarice predominated.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good God, to think I parted with the rancho at a beggarly acreage price,
-      when I might have been selling town lots today. There will be a dozen
-      other towns springing up to follow this one.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      In his agony he groaned aloud and covered his eyes with his hands to shut
-      out the hateful sight.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Just at that moment the sound of a twig crackling underfoot smote his ear.
-      He turned round; into his face stole an ashen look of terror as he watched
-      an approaching figure wrapped in a Spanish cloak and crowned by a
-      broad-brimmed sombrero. His haggard eyes asked: &ldquo;Is it man or ghost?&rdquo; He
-      would have screamed aloud, but found himself voiceless from fear.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At last the figure stood before him with proudly folded arms.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The White Wolf!&rdquo; gasped Thurston, in a faint whisper.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, Don Manuel de Valencia&mdash;the White Wolf, as you choose to call
-      him. And now at last, Ben Thurston, we meet face to face, and alone&mdash;after
-      thirty long years, and without a woman&rsquo;s tears this time to save you!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Ben Thurston sank to the ground, a huddled heap, trembling in every limb.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0036" id="link2HCH0036"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXXVI&mdash;-Outwitted
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">P</span>IERRE LUZON led
-      Leach Sharkey along the trail. Beyond Comanche Point it dipped again owing
-      to the contour of the mountain, then at a distance of about fifty yards,
-      took a sharp turn round an abrupt face of rock.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Where the hell are you taking me?&rdquo; asked the sleuth, as they approached
-      this bend.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Only a little further,&rdquo; replied the guide, in a feeble quavering voice as
-      he glanced over his shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The men were only a few paces apart. In the shadow cast by the cliff,
-      Pierre&rsquo;s pallid face with its stubbly white beard looked like that of a
-      veritable ancient, and his bent form and tottering steps completed the
-      picture. The sleuth smiled at his momentary discomposure.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Around the turn, however, Pierre grabbed at a revolver lying ready to his
-      hand on a ledge of rock, and when Sharkey followed, it was to find a hale
-      and stalwart man, erect, alert, with the flash of conscious power in his
-      eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hands up!&rdquo; cried Pierre, in a voice of stern command. Leach Sharkey was
-      standing three short steps away and was looking now into the muzzle of a
-      big automatic pistol. Over his countenance there stole a sickly smile. But
-      he knew the rules of the game too well to attempt any resistance. His
-      hands went slowly above his head until both arms were fully extended.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;ve got the drop on me all right, José,&rdquo; he murmured, in self-apology.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Face the rock,&rdquo; came the next curt order&mdash;the very tone was
-      reminiscent of old bandit days.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey obeyed in silence, and in a trice both his guns were withdrawn
-      from their holsters and flung among the brushwood.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You go ahead now,&rdquo; said Pierre, stepping aside to let the other pass.
-      &ldquo;You can drop your hands, but if you cry out or attempt to run, zen you
-      are one dead man.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The discomfited sleuth meekly complied, although there was now a black
-      scowl on his face as he stepped on ahead. In all his professional career,
-      Leach Sharkey had never before fallen so ignominiously into a trap like
-      this.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Not a word was spoken while a distance of some two hundred yards was being
-      traversed. Then Pierre called out the one word: &ldquo;Halt!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey did not dare even to look round. He stood still as a piece of
-      statuary.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You sit on zat stone over zere,&rdquo; continued Pierre, &ldquo;and do not rise until
-      I give you permission. Now we will proceed to business.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey sat down as ordered.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hell, you can have your five thousand dollars right enough,&rdquo; he said,
-      pulling the wallet from his pocket.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, my friend. I did not bring you here to rob you. I am out on parole,
-      and I never break my word. I am Pierre Luzon!&rdquo; He spoke the name with
-      triumphant pride.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good God!&rdquo; exclaimed Sharkey, in dumfounded surprise. &ldquo;You belonged to
-      the White Wolf&rsquo;s gang?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I belong now to ze gang. Ze White Wolf is alive!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Leach Sharkey had looked sick before, but a ghastly grey pallor came into
-      his face now.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then he has got hold of Ben Thurston&mdash;at last?&rdquo; he faltered.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, at last,&rdquo; replied Pierre, with a grim smile of joy. &ldquo;Don Manuel and
-      Ben Thurston are alone on Comanche Point just now. Zey will settle old
-      scores&mdash;zat is zeir affair. Now, I attend to my affair.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey looked up enquiringly, but said no more.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Leach Sharkey,&rdquo; continued the old Frenchman, &ldquo;you are one strong man. You
-      will now take ze handcuffs from your pocket&mdash;I know you carry zem&mdash;and
-      drop zem over your shoulder. Zere, zat is right. I am glad you obey wizout
-      giving me any further trouble. Now, you will hold out your hands, behind
-      your back&mdash;you know exactly how.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Yes, Leach Sharkey knew exactly how. And he also knew what the business
-      end of a big revolver meant, with the forefinger of a daring bandit like
-      Pierre Luzon on the trigger. He was handcuffed and helpless right enough
-      in very short order. For the first time in his life the man who had so
-      often slipped the bracelets on others, found the bracelets around his own
-      wrists.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Next I want ze key of ze handcuffs,&rdquo; Pierre resumed. &ldquo;Which pocket,
-      please?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey, with a downward thrust of his chin, indicated the waistcoat
-      pocket.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Zank you,&rdquo; said Pierre, as he thrust in his fingers and produced the key.
-      &ldquo;Now, we will throw zis zing away&rdquo;&mdash;as he spoke it went whizzing
-      through the air&mdash;&ldquo;and when you get home to ze rancho, ze blacksmith
-      zere will set you free.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m going home, am I?&rdquo; said the sleuth, considerably reassured.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, Pierre Luzon no longer rob or kill or break ze law. He keep his word
-      of honor always. And I promised to bring Dick Willoughby to you tonight.
-      Now I shall be true to zat promise, too.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      And through his teeth he blew a shrill whistle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At the sound Dick Willoughby started up, and shook the ashes from his
-      pipe. Following Pierre&rsquo;s instructions, he led the two ponies along the
-      little trail through the chaparral. Within five minutes he emerged on a
-      broader trail, right at the spot where the Frenchman was standing.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hello, Pierre!&rdquo; Then Dick&rsquo;s eyes fell on Leach Sharkey, and at the very
-      first glance he saw the shackled hands. &ldquo;But what&rsquo;s the meaning of all
-      this?&rdquo; he asked in bewildered surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It means zat you will take zis man down ze mountains. He came to arrest
-      you, but you can tell him now zat you are one free man. You can show him
-      ze paper which proves it was not you, but Don Manuel, who is responsible
-      for ze death of young Thurston.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Great Caesar!&rdquo; muttered the sleuth, &ldquo;I thought that from the first, but
-      the old fool would not listen to me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mr. Sharkey,&rdquo; said Dick, &ldquo;you and I have no quarrel. What Pierre says is
-      true&mdash;I have a sworn affidavit in my pocket, fixing the
-      responsibility for that unhappy affair where it belongs.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I believe you, Mr. Willoughby,&rdquo; replied the sleuth. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m glad you are
-      innocent, but I was only doing my duty in trying to arrest the man charged
-      with the crime.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I understand all that. I bear you no ill will.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And I&rsquo;d shake hands if it were not for these damned bracelets,&rdquo; continued
-      Sharkey.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Pierre, there is no need of handcuffs,&rdquo; said Dick, turning to the
-      Frenchman. &ldquo;Set him free. We will go peaceably home together.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; replied Pierre, determinedly. &ldquo;Leach Sharkey, he is one giant in
-      strength. He will go home as he is. Besides, I have trown ze key away.&rdquo;
-       And he laughed aloud.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey nodded in helpless admission of his sorry plight.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Too bad,&rdquo; murmured Dick.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And now,&rdquo; continued Pierre, &ldquo;zere is no time to be lost. We will help zis
-      man onto your pony, and you will ride my pony and hold ze leading rein.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But he can&rsquo;t ride with his hands behind his back like that,&rdquo; objected
-      Dick.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, yes, he can,&rdquo; grinned Pierre. &ldquo;Ze good horseman ride wid his knees,
-      and most of ze road you can be by his side and hold him on. And it is ze
-      only way, for ze key, as I have said, is gone.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I suppose we&rsquo;ve got to accept the situation,&rdquo; said Dick, with a glance at
-      Sharkey&rsquo;s lugubrious countenance. The man of strength was obviously
-      crestfallen at his almost ridiculous plight of powerlessness.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre resumed his instructions. &ldquo;You will not go back to Comanche Point,
-      but will take ze mule trail down into ze valley. You know it, Mr.
-      Willoughby&mdash;it is about one mile furzer on.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I know it,&rdquo; replied Dick.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You will leave Mr. Sharkey at the rancho and zen ride to ze place where
-      your friends are waiting for you. Now, zat is all. I must go. We have
-      already said our <i>adios</i>, my dear young friend.&rdquo; Dick grasped the
-      proffered hand and warmly pressed it.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good-bye, Pierre. I can never thank you enough for all you have done for
-      me. Good-bye.&rdquo; Leach Sharkey was assisted into the saddle, and the
-      horsemen started on their way.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good-bye,&rdquo; shouted back Dick Willoughby, yet once again.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;<i>Adios!</i>&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      And as the two figures disappeared around a bend, the Frenchman uttered a
-      deep sigh. &ldquo;A splendid young fellow! I wonder shall we ever meet again!&rdquo;&mdash;this
-      was the thought in his mind as for just a moment he stood in an attitude
-      of deep dejection.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Then swinging around, he started back at a run for Comanche Point.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0037" id="link2HCH0037"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXXVII&mdash;The Dawn of Comprehension
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span>LL through the
-      afternoon at La Siesta, Merle was in a meditative mood. After luncheon
-      Mrs. Darlington had returned to her letter-writing and her book-keeping.
-      Munson and Grace had departed for a walk through the pine woods, after
-      vain but not too strenuous endeavors to get Merle to accompany them. Left
-      to her own resources she had retired to the drawing room, had tried to
-      interest herself at the piano, but after a little while had given up the
-      attempt; and, coiled in a big chair, had surrendered herself to a &ldquo;big
-      think,&rdquo; as she mentally termed it.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      In that momentary searching of the eyes between her and Mr. Robles just
-      before their parting in the rose garden, there had come a flash of
-      revelation to her soul. She had divined a yearning in his gaze that was
-      surely more than the affection of an old and devoted friend. There was
-      passionate tenderness that belied the gentle yet almost perfunctory kiss
-      on the brow that he had finally bestowed at parting. Nor had she failed to
-      notice the restraint which the strong man had imposed upon himself. And
-      strangely enough, her own momentary impulse had been to throw her arms
-      around his neck and kiss him, just as a fond daughter might have kissed a
-      father at such an emotional moment&mdash;on the eve of a long journey, the
-      whither unrevealed, the return all so uncertain.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      She recalled, too, their previous conversation while she was gathering the
-      roses&mdash;his words of kindly wisdom, his little bits of advice that now
-      seemed to be weighted by more than mere friendly interest in her future
-      happiness. Then her mind traveled back slowly, step by step, all the way
-      to childhood days&mdash;a long vista marked by his comings and his goings,
-      his prolonged absences, his unexpected but always welcome reappearances,
-      his numberless acts of thoughtful kindness. Once she had been seriously
-      ill, when a little girl, and the memory of that illness had ever been the
-      memory of his face hovering over her cot, night and day, till the crisis
-      had been passed and she had been on the way to assured convalescence.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      There had always been an air of mystery about Mr. Robles, but she had
-      never sought to penetrate it, instinctively recognizing that there had
-      been some great sorrow in his life, and almost unconsciously accepting the
-      affectionate regard he had lavished on Grace and herself as some sort of
-      consolation for him in his loneliness. She knew that Grace was only her
-      sister in name, but none the less Grace was to her a real sister, just as
-      Mrs. Darlington was a real mother&mdash;the only mother she had ever
-      known. Weaving together now the threads of memory, she became conscious of
-      the mystery in her own life. There was assuredly some fuller story than
-      the story she had been told in the past and had always tacitly accepted&mdash;that
-      her parents had been neighbors and dear friends of Mrs. Darlington in the
-      long ago, and when they had died, the baby girl left behind had been
-      bequeathed to her motherly care.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At this stage in her ruminations Merle sat bolt upright in her chair. The
-      shadows of evening were beginning to close around her, but the dawn of
-      revelation was in her heart.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Would Mrs. Darlington still be alone in her boudoir? Merle answered the
-      unspoken thought by stealing from the room.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Yes, Mrs. Darlington was at her writing table, lighted now by candles on
-      each side which, covered by little red shades, only dimly illuminated the
-      apartment. Merle flitted in without her coming being observed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Mrs. Darlington was no longer writing&mdash;her elbows were resting on the
-      table and both hands were covering her eyes in an attitude of deep
-      thought, perhaps of sleep, as Merle for a moment imagined when she had
-      noiselessly gained her side.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mother dear,&rdquo; she said softly, laying a hand on her shoulder.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You here, my child?&rdquo; exclaimed Mrs. Darlington. There was no trace of
-      slumber in her eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, and I want to have a little talk with you&mdash;all alone,&rdquo; said
-      Merle, as she dropped into a chair, the very chair which Mr. Robles had
-      previously occupied.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The look of vague sadness and anxiety in Mrs. Darlington&rsquo;s face deepened.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What about, dear?&rdquo; she asked.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle&rsquo;s mind had been made up, and she came to the issue with point-blank
-      abruptness.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Is Mr. Robles my father?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The startled look on the other&rsquo;s face was almost in itself an admission of
-      the truth&mdash;Mrs. Darlington had been caught off her guard. But she
-      made a desperate attempt to parry the question.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What makes you fancy such a thing?&rdquo; she faltered.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Because there is certainty in my heart,&rdquo; replied
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle bravely. &ldquo;It came to me first when he bade me good-bye in the
-      garden. And now I see it in your face.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The young girl dropped on her knees, and, an arm around her mother&rsquo;s
-      waist, gazed up imploringly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Eyes met eyes. Falsehood was impossible in either case. Mrs. Darlington
-      stooped and folded the kneeling girl in a fond embrace. Both were weeping
-      now. No word had been spoken, but Merle knew that she had correctly
-      divined.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      It was a few minutes before there was sufficient self-control for the
-      conversation to be resumed. But then, Merle still kneeling by her side,
-      Mrs. Darlington spoke:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I had promised to keep this secret, dear,&rdquo; she began, fondling the girl&rsquo;s
-      tresses. &ldquo;But you have gained your knowledge apart from me, so I cannot be
-      held to have betrayed my trust. Yes, Mr. Robles is your father&mdash;your
-      loving and devoted father. Your real name is his&mdash;Merle Robles you
-      should always have been called.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And why not?&rdquo; asked Merle. &ldquo;Oh, I am proud and overjoyed to think of him
-      as my father.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Because he has some important reason to have the world think otherwise. I
-      know you will believe me, dear Merle, when I say I do not know that
-      reason. He is too grand and honorable a man for me to have ever pressed
-      for an explanation. I just accepted you as a gift from his hands&mdash;his
-      child and the child of my girlhood chum, named Merle, as you know, like
-      yourself.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So, if I have solved one mystery, there is still another mystery beyond,&rdquo;
-       murmured Merle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      She rose, seated herself, and remained silent for a moment, her hands
-      locked across her knees, her brows knit in thought.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But why distress your heart over unknown things?&rdquo; said Mrs. Darlington.
-      &ldquo;As you have learned by your today&rsquo;s experience, mysteries solve
-      themselves in due time.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; replied Merle, &ldquo;but somehow I feel that this is the due time that I
-      should know everything&mdash;for my dear father&rsquo;s sake,&rdquo; she added, &ldquo;not
-      for my own. Oh, mother, you should have seen his face of anguish just
-      before he parted from me this afternoon. It was revealed to me only for an
-      instant. But now I feel sure that something terrible is going to happen&mdash;to
-      him.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      She was sobbing again, as she flung her arms impulsively around Mrs.
-      Darlington&rsquo;s neck and sat in her lap, just as if once again she had become
-      a little child.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, mother mine&mdash;I shall always call you mother mine, for you have
-      been a dear, sweet, kind mother to me ever since I can remember. But don&rsquo;t
-      you see that today I have also found a father whom I deeply love? Nothing
-      must happen to him.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Why should anything happen to him?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I do not know. Where is Tia Teresa?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The question came with startling suddenness as Merle started up with
-      another ray of illumination in her mind.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I haven&rsquo;t seen her since morning,&rdquo; replied Mrs. Darlington.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Nor have I,&rdquo; said Merle, standing erect, wiping away the traces of her
-      tears, and with a few pats adjusting her rumpled hair. &ldquo;That is very
-      strange.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No. I happen to know that this day, the eleventh of October, is always a
-      sad anniversary for Tia Teresa&mdash;the death of some dear friend who
-      lies buried in the little Mexican cemetery on the hill. She has always
-      refused to tell me the story. But early this morning she went, as usual,
-      to place flowers upon the grave.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Flowers&mdash;for a grave!&rdquo; exclaimed Merle. She was thinking of the
-      roses she had gathered that afternoon for Mr. Robles&mdash;for her father&mdash;because
-      he specially wanted the most beautiful blooms. But she did not give her
-      thought to Mrs. Darlington.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It is all so strange,&rdquo; continued Merle. Then her air of decisiveness
-      returned. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll go and see if Tia Teresa is in her room.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Mrs. Darlington was gravely perturbed at this persistency. Oh, if only the
-      mysteries of the past could be left alone, the joys of the present
-      accepted for themselves! Probing into trouble cannot but lead to further
-      trouble&mdash;that, for her, had been the secret of contentment. But she
-      was powerless to intervene. Merle had already departed on her mission of
-      enquiry.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0038" id="link2HCH0038"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXXVIII&mdash;Exit Leach Sharkey
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>HE ponies were
-      jogging down the trail, Leach Sharkey uncomfortably lurching in his saddle
-      when some sudden bend or dip was encountered, Dick Willoughby
-      good-humoredly holding him on when such emergencies rendered the service
-      advisable if an ignominious fall were to be avoided. There was a song of
-      joy in Dick&rsquo;s heart&mdash;liberty was at hand; he was riding down from the
-      hills to join his loved one again. But there was sullen brooding in the
-      soul of the outwitted sleuth&mdash;growing more sullen with every mile
-      traversed, with every kindness rendered, with the very realization of his
-      own ridiculous predicament and the contrast of his companion&rsquo;s
-      light-hearted happiness.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At last they reached the foot of the trail, leading on to the road that
-      crossed the plain. At the distance of a few miles the Rancho San Antonio
-      showed amid its clustering shade and orchard trees.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Let us dismount for a bit,&rdquo; suggested Sharkey. &ldquo;I feel all in&mdash;dead
-      beat and tired.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But how will I get you on to your horse again?&rdquo; replied Dick, a trifle
-      dubiously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, we&rsquo;ll manage that. Please help me down.&rdquo; Dick sprang to the ground,
-      dropped the reins over his pony&rsquo;s head, and soon had Leach Sharkey on <i>terra
-      firma</i>.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You&rsquo;re no light weight to handle,&rdquo; he laughed. &ldquo;By the way, Sharkey, I
-      forgot to ask: Where&rsquo;s your boss this afternoon?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey eyed Dick curiously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t know?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Why should I know? It&rsquo;s quite a time since I met the gentleman.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You are aware who Pierre Luzon is?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Certainly. Pierre has come to be quite a friend of mine. He&rsquo;s a good
-      fellow all right.&rdquo; There was a moment&rsquo;s pause. Dick was rolling a
-      cigarette, Sharkey furtively watching every expression on his face.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, the Frenchie played me a dirty trick when he threw that key away,&rdquo;
-       remarked the sleuth, rattling, the handcuffs behind his back.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I guess Pierre was resolved to take no chances,&rdquo; replied Dick, grinning
-      through the tobacco smoke as he surveyed the helpless bodyguard. &ldquo;He only
-      needed a pair of hobbles to complete the job.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      A muttered curse came from Sharkey&rsquo;s lips&mdash;but this was an aside. For
-      Dick he had an insinuating smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You might get these blamed handcuffs off all right, Willoughby. Look at
-      that big boulder there. If I set my hands across it, you might hammer
-      through the chain. Or if you have a pistol, that might do the trick.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, I&rsquo;ve got no pistol,&rdquo; Dick replied.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      He did not notice the gleam of satisfaction in Sharkey&rsquo;s eyes&mdash;the
-      wolfish smile at the corners of his wolf-like teeth. At the moment he was
-      looking around for a convenient stone that might serve as a hammer.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But I think I might break that chain all right with this,&rdquo; he went on, as
-      he stooped and picked up a heavy, sharp-edged fragment of granite from the
-      rock-strewn ground. &ldquo;Come along, then. Set your wrists just here. At
-      least, we can try.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The trial succeeded&mdash;the slender steel strain stretched across the
-      boulder soon yielded to the succession of battering blows.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey flung his great big brawny arms aloft. He was still wearing the
-      bracelets, but his hands were free.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Feels better, don&rsquo;t it?&rdquo; said Dick, with a sympathetic smile.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;A damned sight better,&rdquo; roared the sleuth, as he turned quickly round.
-      &ldquo;Now, young man, you are my prisoner. I arrest you for jail-breaking.
-      There&rsquo;s my star. I don&rsquo;t say hands up, for I know you haven&rsquo;t a gun.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      As he spoke, Sharkey opened his coat so that the official badge might be
-      displayed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick in his amazement stepped back, just one pace. Sharkey advanced, his
-      high hands outstretched.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Make no trouble, now. You know I am only doing my duty.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Duty be hanged,&rdquo; cried Dick, as with a swift uppercut he caught his
-      would-be captor on the jaw. Sharkey staggered, and Dick, with a right-arm
-      swing, banged him on the temple, bowling him over like a ninepin.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Sharkey was soon on his hands and knees; then dazed and tottering, he got
-      onto his feet again. But Dick was watchfully waiting, and with sharp jabs,
-      right and left, sent him down once more. The sleuth lay motionless now.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Like a flash Dick grabbed the riata hanging from the saddle-horn of his
-      pony, and without a moment&rsquo;s loss of time had its coils around the arms
-      and chest of the prostrate man, roping him like a thrown steer with all
-      the skill of the trained cowboy. In a brief minute the knots were tied,
-      and with the final clove-hitch the fallen Samson was turned over on his
-      back. Sharkey&rsquo;s eyes opened, glaring dully at his conqueror.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You contemptible hound!&rdquo; exclaimed Dick, as he tossed the loose end of
-      the lariat from him. &ldquo;By God, I&rsquo;ve seen a few low-down things done in my
-      lifetime, but this is certainly the limit. I suppose you would have
-      betrayed me for the sake of the reward, even though you know now for
-      certain that I was wrongfully arrested at the start. You damned Judas! You
-      deserve to be hanged like a horse-thief, Leach Sharkey&mdash;that&rsquo;s about
-      your proper finish.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      And Dick in his righteous indignation glanced around as if in search of a
-      convenient tree for the operation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll give no further trouble,&rdquo; mumbled Sharkey.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It will be my particular care that you don&rsquo;t,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;Get up, you
-      hulking brute.&rdquo; And grabbing the coils of the riata, he fairly lifted
-      Sharkey to his feet.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Now, I wouldn&rsquo;t shame the pony by putting you on his back again. Follow
-      me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Picking up the free end of the rope, and gathering the leading rein of
-      Sharkey&rsquo;s horse into the same hand, Willoughby vaulted into his saddle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Come along,&rdquo; he called out, turning round as the riata came taut. And
-      thus, a dozen paces behind, the sleuth, discomfited again a second time
-      that day, and humiliated worse than ever, followed perforce in his
-      victor&rsquo;s trail.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Perhaps half a mile of the open road was thus traversed, Dick speaking not
-      another word, but looking round occasionally and giving an energetic yank
-      at the rope whenever there was evidence of laggard steps. Sharkey stumbled
-      along, his chin buried in his breast, his eyes half-closed to conceal
-      their dumb, vicious glare of concentrated but impotent fury.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      They had now reached a gate; Dick dismounted and threw it open, pointing
-      the way for Sharkey to take.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s about five miles to the rancho,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know how you&rsquo;ll
-      get through the other gates, but I reckon you can crawl under them, like
-      the snake you&rsquo;ve proved yourself to be. Now, off you go,&rdquo; and with the
-      words he looped the loose end of the riata around the victim&rsquo;s shoulders.
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s a better necktie than you deserve, Leach Sharkey. If it was any
-      one but myself, you would be helped to a start by a few vigorous kicks
-      behind.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The sleuth shambled through the gateway, with shamed, averted face. With a
-      click the gate was closed. For just a few minutes Dick watched the figure
-      moving away through the now gathering dusk. Then he laid a hand on his
-      saddle-horn.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I hope it&rsquo;s the last I&rsquo;ll see of that animal,&rdquo; he murmured to himself, as
-      he sprang lightly into the saddle. And at a canter he started along the
-      road, the led pony, after a few heel-kicks as if in joy at being relieved
-      of its burden, soon dropping into the swinging stride.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0039" id="link2HCH0039"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XXXIX&mdash;The Fight on the Cliff
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">F</span>OR a few moments
-      Don Manuel contemplated the cowering figure of Ben Thurston in
-      contemptuous silence. His end was accomplished; his enemy was in his
-      power; like the cat with the mouse just a few inches from its paw, he
-      could strike at any moment. He spoke now with measured calm.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Do you remember what day this is? The eleventh of October.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      He paused for a reply. Thurston&rsquo;s lips were parted but remained dumb. Don
-      Manuel resumed:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Thirty years ago this very night&mdash;here at this very spot, you
-      brutally killed my poor little sister, Rosetta.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Thurston shrank back. His lips moved, but no sound came.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Oh, attempt no denial,&rdquo; continued Don Manuel, for the moment clenching a
-      menacing fist over him. &ldquo;You cannot forget the tell-tale button which you
-      snatched from my hand to hide the proof. Nor have I forgotten the lash of
-      your quirt that drew blood from my cheek&rdquo;&mdash;and he wiped his face with
-      the tips of his fingers as if to rub away the memory of the deadly insult&mdash;&ldquo;the
-      very day on which I buried my dear father and mother,&rdquo; he added, in a
-      voice vibrant with emotion.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      He bowed his head; there was another brief period of silence. Then he
-      recovered himself and went on:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The deaths of my beloved parents are just as much on your head, Ben
-      Thurston, as the death of the guileless, innocent, young girl whom you
-      betrayed, and then with coward hands pushed over this cliff, mangling her
-      body on the rocks below. My vengeance has been slow in coming, but after
-      all, I am glad of the delay. For all through these years you have not only
-      suffered the agony of constant fear, but I have lived to see you landless,
-      bereft of the broad rich acres which belonged to my father and were never
-      rightfully yours.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s not so&mdash;my claim was established in the law courts.&rdquo; Thurston
-      managed to articulate the words. The sound of his voice seemed to restore
-      some little measure of courage, for he sat up, and leaning an elbow on a
-      rock, adjusted himself in a more comfortable position. But he did not seek
-      to gain his feet&mdash;the bandit&rsquo;s figure still towered over him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Law courts&mdash;your American law courts!&rdquo; exclaimed Don Manuel, with
-      ineffable scorn. &ldquo;You know you bribed the judge who gave the decision.
-      Dare you deny it?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Thurston ventured no denial&mdash;his dropped jaw proclaimed his
-      consciousness of guilt.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Nothing was too base for you,&rdquo; Don Manuel proceeded. &ldquo;You robbed,
-      despoiled, destroyed my home. But now at last your hour has come. I have
-      waited patiently for this hour. On many an occasion, Ben Thurston, I could
-      have shot you dead from a distance. But I have waited&mdash;waited&mdash;waited
-      for the time when you would know that it was I, the White Wolf, who was
-      sending you to your doom just as I have already sent your ruffian son to
-      his.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So it was really you&mdash;who murdered my boy?&rdquo; stammered Thurston.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t call it murder&mdash;it was righteous retribution for both him and
-      you. Oh, I can tell you something tonight, for a secret does not pass from
-      a dead man&rsquo;s lips.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The victim so confidently doomed, shuddered. Don Manuel continued:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Merle Farnsworth is my daughter; your vile and debauched son dared to
-      insult her, and so he died&mdash;rightly died. Yes, at my hands&mdash;I
-      take full responsibility. And I am glad to tell you this before you follow
-      him out of the world. Tonight, Ben Thurston, you go over this cliff&mdash;you
-      die the death you gave to my sister.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      As he spoke, Don Manuel cast loose his Spanish cloak, and dropped both it
-      and his sombrero to the ground.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Thurston at last staggered to his feet.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;So get ready now to fight for your life,&rdquo; Don Manuel resumed, folding his
-      arms across his breast as he surveyed his victim.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But I am unarmed,&rdquo; cried Thurston, pointing to the revolver at the
-      other&rsquo;s belt. His outstretched hand trembled, his voice was a terrified
-      shriek.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then I, too, shall be unarmed,&rdquo; replied Don Manuel, as he unbuckled his
-      belt and tossed it lightly from him. &ldquo;Come along, then&mdash;it is man to
-      man with naked hands.&rdquo; His tone now was one of concentrated passion and
-      hate, and he advanced with arms extended for an enfolding embrace.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Now did Ben Thurston realize that his only chance for life lay in his
-      superior weight, possibly his superior strength. At the thought, craven
-      fear changed of a sudden to the courage of desperation, and like a wild
-      cat he leaped at the throat of his adversary.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Then began a terrible struggle&mdash;two strong men writhing in each
-      other&rsquo;s grip like savage beasts. Soon their clothes were torn, their
-      bodies begrimed with sweat and mud, their faces and naked arms bespattered
-      with blood, for Ben Thurston&rsquo;s nose had been broken in one of the first
-      falls. Thurston, besides his extra pounds, had also the advantage of being
-      younger by a few years. But Don Manuel was in better physical condition
-      and his muscles were like bands of steel. So it was pretty much of a level
-      match in this grim fight to the death.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0011" id="linkimage-0011"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
-      <img src="images/0305.jpg" alt="0305 " width="100%" /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h5>
-      <a href="images/0305.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
-    </h5>
-    <p>
-      As they tugged at each other, as each attempted to bear the other down or
-      trip and throw him, as at times, each tried in their locked embrace to
-      crush in his adversary&rsquo;s ribs and squeeze the last breath out of his body,
-      as they milled round and round, swayed and fell and rolled over and then
-      for a moment regained a kneeling or an upright position&mdash;both men
-      realized that it was the one who could last the longest with whom the
-      mastery would rest.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre Luzon, running up the trail, came to the edge of the open space
-      where the desperate contest was in progress. But the onlooker did not
-      attempt to interfere&mdash;he had had his orders; he just crouched and
-      watched the swaying, writhing figures.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      For an hour or more the fight proceeded, at times fast and furious, with
-      breathing spells to follow, during which grips were tenaciously
-      maintained. Points of advantage alternated now to the one side, now to the
-      other, but after each succeeding tussle both combatants were exhausted
-      without victory being pronounced for either. Every vestige of clothing
-      above the belt line had long since been torn away, and they were sweating
-      like lathered horses.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The milling and wrestling had gradually grown weaker, and it was clear now
-      that the final test of endurance could not be much longer delayed. Yet
-      again Don Manuel renewed the attack, and had forced Thurston to his knees,
-      when the latter by a supreme effort raised himself again, and then by
-      sheer weight pressed his opponent back a pace or two. But just at this
-      moment Thurston&rsquo;s strength seemed to give out, for he dropped down
-      sideways, dragging his enemy after him.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Then Pierre Luzon saw the object of the manoeuvre. Thurston had gained the
-      spot where Don Manuel&rsquo;s discarded pistol belt was lying, and now he was
-      reaching out with a disengaged hand to grab the gun.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The Frenchman darted forward.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Keep out of this,&rdquo; cried Don Manuel, peremptorily, although he was
-      breathing hard.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Look out! Your gun!&rdquo; screamed Pierre, as he seized Thurston&rsquo;s wrist in a
-      vice-like grip.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Just an instant too late, however, for Thurston&rsquo;s fingers had already
-      closed round the weapon and it went off with a bang.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre dropped to his knees. It was he who had received the bullet&mdash;through
-      one of his lungs. But he had wrested the pistol from the treacherous
-      villain&rsquo;s grasp and now it fell, still smoking, to the ground.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The wounded man coughed a great mouthful of crimson blood on to the slab
-      of rock. Then he recovered himself and raised his head. Thurston and Don
-      Manuel, even in their weakened state, were fighting more desperately than
-      ever, blinded by hate to every sense of danger, and Pierre was just in
-      time to see them slip on some loosened stones and then, still locked in
-      the death clench, go rolling over the edge of the precipice.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;<i>Mon Dieu! Mon Dieu!</i>&rdquo; murmured the Frenchman. He staggered to his
-      feet and without waiting turned and started down the steep trail,
-      stumbling like a drunken man.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At the foot of the zig-zag pathway he gazed helplessly around. He would
-      have pushed his way through the brushwood to seek his beloved chief. Dead!
-      He must be dead. No one could have dropped that sheer three hundred feet
-      onto the cruel jagged rocks below and live. Yet, who knows? A tree might
-      have broken the fall&mdash;Don Manuel might still be alive.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Pierre, however, was incapable of further effort. His limbs trembled
-      beneath him, and again he was spitting blood.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      All of a sudden he spied the two horses tethered under the manzanita tree.
-      He tottered toward them, untied the first one he reached, and with
-      difficulty pulled himself up into the saddle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      To reach Dick Willoughby and get help&mdash;that was the thought in the
-      reeling brain of Pierre Luzon as with a final effort, leaning forward over
-      the saddle, he turned his steed in the direction of Buck Ashley&rsquo;s old
-      store, and urged it to a canter.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0040" id="link2HCH0040"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XL&mdash;Revelation
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">M</span>ERLE paused at the
-      foot of the stairway leading up to one of the towers where Tia Teresa had
-      her room. She deliberated for a moment, consulted the tiny watch on her
-      wrist, then turned to retrace her footsteps.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;There will be plenty of time,&rdquo; she murmured to herself. &ldquo;I shall be best
-      able to manage Tia Teresa when I know still more than I do now.&rdquo; She
-      repaired to her own room and put on her automobile cloak, cap, and veil.
-      Without telling anyone of her plan, she left the house, went to the
-      garage, selected a runabout that was specially her own, and was soon
-      speeding along the highway in the direction of the cluster of hills amid
-      which the little Mexican cemetery was nestled.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      She had been there just once before, several years ago, and she knew that
-      her machine would have no difficulty in ascending the trail. Within less
-      than an hour, indeed, she was at her destination.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      In the grey evening twilight the place looked very dismal and desolate.
-      The tiny adobe chapel in one corner was falling into ruins because of
-      disuse and neglect. A tall rank growth of weeds overran most of the
-      graves. But there were two that showed marks of loving attention, and
-      toward these Merle advanced. Here she found the fresh wreaths around the
-      headstones, and her own roses scattered on the turf.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Hermana&rdquo;&mdash;she read the single word on the white marble cross adorned
-      with spotless arum lilies. &ldquo;Sister,&rdquo; Merle murmured, translating the word.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Then she turned to the big gravestone close at hand, and moved the wreaths
-      of red carnations so that she might read the words inscribed. From these
-      she soon knew that this was the family burial place of the de Valencias&mdash;that
-      here rested the former owners of the San Antonio Rancho, the beloved
-      parents of two children, Manuel and Rosetta.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Manuel,&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Rosetta&rdquo;&mdash;she repeated the names. The latter awakened no memory, but
-      when she filled out the former to &ldquo;Don Manuel de Valencia,&rdquo; she instantly
-      recalled the old-time bandit of whom she had heard many a tale.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;The White Wolf,&rdquo; she murmured eagerly.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, yes. His father once owned the rancho, and that was the cause of the
-      deadly feud&mdash;the Vendetta of the Hills. But I thought all that was
-      forgotten. Yet here are the beautiful fresh flowers.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Seating herself on a flat monument near by, Merle pondered, piecing things
-      together. &ldquo;Sister&rdquo;&mdash;the cross must mark the grave of the girl
-      Rosetta, and have been erected by her brother, Don Manuel. Then whose hand
-      had strewn the roses? Mr. Robles! In a flash she knew that Mr. Robles was
-      Don Manuel.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And her father, too! The further thought came with such suddenness, with
-      such absolute conviction of certainty, that for a moment she felt
-      appalled. Her father the notorious robber chief, the desperado on whose
-      head a price had been set, the outlaw who had defied the whole state of
-      California to arrest him. Somehow she felt no shame&mdash;Don Manuel de
-      Valencia had been a sort of heroic knight-errant in all the stories she
-      had heard&mdash;his hand only against the rich, his heart always for the
-      poor and oppressed, his attitude toward the intrusive gringos quite
-      justified by the sharp practice whereby he had been robbed of his
-      patrimonial acres. It was this very story of wrong which had been one of
-      the reasons that had from the first predisposed the household at La Siesta
-      to despise the Thurston family at the Rancho San Antonio.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Then from thinking of Don Manuel, Merle&rsquo;s mind passed to Ricardo Robles&mdash;the
-      courteous, dignified, generous, lovable man she had known all her life,
-      the very man whom she had rejoiced that day to call her own father. Don
-      Manuel could be judged only by this standard, and her heart went out again
-      to Mr. Robles, whatever the name which he had formerly worn.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The shadows were closing around her, the night air bit sharply, and Merle
-      arose. Two or three of the rose blooms had fallen beyond the lines of
-      white stones that marked the graves. Merle advanced, and picking these up
-      gently, placed them on the breasts of the sleeping dead. Her own kith and
-      kin! Now she realized how she came to have brown eyes and raven tresses&mdash;the
-      blood of Spain was in her veins. With this thought throbbing in her heart,
-      she left the cemetery and hurried away for home.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Tia Teresa was the only Roman Catholic at La Siesta, a devout member of
-      the faith of her fathers and of her childhood days with which no one
-      around her had ever sought to interfere. Her room was her private chapel,
-      a curtained recess at one end being fitted up with a crucifix, a small
-      altar, and a <i>prie-dieu</i>.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Here Tia Teresa was kneeling and praying, the only light in the apartment
-      coming from the altar candles, when Merle softly tiptoed in, still wearing
-      her automobile cloak. She hesitated to advance, and momentarily turned to
-      withdraw. But Tia Teresa had seen her, and by a gesture had bidden her to
-      remain. For a few moments the old duenna&rsquo;s lips continued to move, then
-      she told another bead on her rosary, arose from her knees, crossed herself
-      devoutly, and with a final prostration before the crucifix, terminated her
-      devotional exercises.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What brought you here, my child?&rdquo; she asked, approaching Merle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Why are you engaged in prayer tonight?&rdquo; asked Merle, answering question
-      with question.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You know I often pray,&rdquo; replied Tia Teresa. &ldquo;You have seen me many, many
-      times.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, but not at this hour, when you are always with my mother.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;She will be wondering where I am. I had better go to her now.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; rejoined Merle. &ldquo;I wish to speak to you. Come here, Tia Teresa; sit
-      down by my side, and treat me once again as the little girl of the long
-      ago whom you used to pet and fondle.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;That&rsquo;s very easily done,&rdquo; responded Tia Teresa, with a pleased smile,
-      seating herself on the low sofa close to Merle. &ldquo;Come to my heart, my
-      darling, as in the long ago.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      And the duenna drew the girl to her loving, protecting bosom. She noticed
-      now that Merle was trembling under the influence of some deep emotion.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What is wrong with you, my dear?&rdquo; she asked anxiously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I have learned many things today, Tia Teresa,&rdquo; replied Merle, taking her
-      old nurse&rsquo;s hands and softly stroking them. &ldquo;First, that Mr. Robles is my
-      father&rdquo;&mdash;the duenna started, but Merle went quietly on&mdash;&ldquo;and
-      that he is really Don Manuel de Valencia, the famous outlaw.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Whoever told you that?&rdquo; fairly gasped Tia Teresa.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No one. I found everything out for myself. After I had looked into Mr.
-      Robles&rsquo; eyes at our parting this afternoon, I knew the truth. It was
-      impossible for mother to deny it, but it is not she who has told me
-      anything. I have just returned from the little Mexican cemetery on the
-      hillside where Mr. Robles, my father, had taken the flowers for which he
-      asked me.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And you saw his flowers&mdash;and my flowers, too?&rdquo; faltered the duenna,
-      realizing now how Merle had gleaned her knowledge.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes; I inferred that the wreaths were yours, and of course I knew that
-      the scattered roses were from my father. He is Don Manuel. But I want you
-      to tell me a little about Rosetta.&rdquo; It was Merle now who put her arms
-      around Tia Teresa and drew her affectionately to her.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You have always loved me, you know, my dear,&rdquo; the girl went on coaxingly.
-      &ldquo;Now I understand why you were so deeply attached to Mr. Robles, for you
-      told me once that you had nursed Don Manuel. And that is why I have been,
-      perhaps, just a little closer to you than Grace&rdquo;&mdash;the pressure of Tia
-      Teresa&rsquo;s arms told that Merle had correctly divined&mdash;&ldquo;because I was
-      of the blood of your old master. But why has there been all this secrecy
-      toward me?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don Manuel&rsquo;s name could not be revealed&mdash;he had been outlawed.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And Rosetta&mdash;tell me about Rosetta?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;She was the real cause of the feud between Mr. Thurston and Don Manuel.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The duenna had spoken the words before she had realized how much they
-      told. With unfaltering intuition Merle guessed their meaning.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You mean to tell me that Thurston wronged Rosetta&mdash;betrayed her?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Tia Teresa nodded assent&mdash;she was too deeply agitated to speak
-      another word.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And this day&mdash;the eleventh of October&mdash;the day when you
-      decorate her grave?&rdquo; enquired Merle, in a tone and with a look that
-      compelled an answer.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Is the day she was found dead on the rocks below Comanche Point,&rdquo; replied
-      Tia Teresa.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At the same moment the duenna started to her feet. A wonderful and
-      terrible transition came over her usually placid countenance. Her eyes
-      fairly blazed with mingled fury and hatred. Her fists were clenched by her
-      side. Her whole frame trembled.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Murdered by Ben Thurston!&rdquo; she added, the words hissing like hot lava
-      from her lips.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Murdered?&rdquo; cried Merle, incredulously. She too, had risen.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, pushed over the cliff by his coward hands. His torn coat, one of the
-      buttons between her dead fingers, proclaimed his guilt before God and man.
-      But there was no justice in the land in those days&mdash;the days when the
-      gringos broke up our Spanish homes. Now you know everything&mdash;that was
-      the real reason of the Vendetta of the Hills.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Tia Teresa was calm again&mdash;it was Merle who was deeply agitated, too
-      deeply agitated for a moment to speak.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      The duenna went on triumphantly. &ldquo;But the vendetta once sworn will always
-      be fulfilled. Tonight at Comanche Point&mdash;&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Then she stopped short, as she saw the look of terror and horror on
-      Merle&rsquo;s pale face.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Tonight?&rdquo; queried the young girl tremulously. &ldquo;They meet tonight? Then
-      that is where Mr. Robles is going&mdash;that is why he bade us all that
-      sad good-bye? My father, oh, my dear father!&rdquo; And dropping down again on
-      the sofa, she burst into a passion of weeping.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Tia Teresa sought to soothe her. But Merle was not to be comforted. Yet
-      while she sobbed she was thinking, for suddenly she rose again and dashed
-      away her tears.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;At what hour tonight?&rdquo; she asked.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I do not know,&rdquo; answered the duenna.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Then he is in danger&mdash;perhaps at this very moment he is in danger.
-      Don Manuel&rsquo;s life&mdash;my father&rsquo;s life is worth a hundred lives of such
-      a man as Ben Thurston. Quick, quick, Teresa. Get your mantilla and cloak.
-      My runabout is in readiness. There, let me help you.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle was speaking with swift insistence.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Where are you going?&rdquo; whispered Tia Teresa, as the girl&rsquo;s fingers were
-      buttoning her cloak.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;To Comanche Point. We may not be too late to save him.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      A minute later the two women had stolen down the narrow stairway of the
-      tower and were speeding through the gathering darkness of the night.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0041" id="link2HCH0041"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XLI&mdash;Beneath the Precipice
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">W</span>ILLOUGHBY had
-      found his friends Munson and Jack Rover at Buck Ashley&rsquo;s old store,
-      eagerly awaiting his coming, with a fine supper sizzling on the cook
-      stove, prepared in Jack&rsquo;s finest professional cowboy style.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;We&rsquo;ve got to feed you up a bit, I reckon,&rdquo; grinned Jack, as he slipped
-      the Gargantuan slab of beef-steak from the griller on to the big hot dish
-      waiting for its reception.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And some potatoes, too,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;not forgetting the fried onions
-      that beat all your newfangled sauces to a frazzle.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick was nothing loth to fall to. He had been too excited to do more than
-      taste the midday meal that Pierre Luzon had prepared for him in the
-      cavern. It had been a long hard day, and now he was hungry as a wolf. In
-      ordinary circumstances he had no objection to fried onions, but, with
-      delicate regard for possible contingencies, he left to the others a
-      monopoly over this item in the bill-of-fare.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      There were so many things to talk about that it was a difficult matter to
-      know where to begin. But at the close of the meal Jack Rover solved the
-      question by sweeping the supper things from the table, and emptying
-      thereon the contents of one of the bags of gold.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Good old Guadalupe!&rdquo; exclaimed the delighted cowboy, as he patted the
-      nuggets with a loving hand. &ldquo;I always told you that the ancient squaw had
-      a real gold mine. I guess we&rsquo;ll be able to stake out our claims tomorrow,
-      eh, Dick, my boy?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;m afraid not,&rdquo; smiled Willoughby. &ldquo;The fact is that, although I helped
-      to wash out that gold, I have not the faintest idea where the riffle is up
-      among the hills.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Jack&rsquo;s face fell. There was a moment of disappointed silence, and just
-      then there came the sound of a faint tapping at the outer door.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What&rsquo;s that?&rdquo; asked Munson. The faces of all three showed that they had
-      heard simultaneously.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick rose, crossed over, and threw the door wide open.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;My God, who&rsquo;s this?&rdquo; he asked, as he stooped over the figure lying prone
-      across the steps. &ldquo;Pierre, Pierre!&rdquo; he added, as he turned over the face.
-      &ldquo;It&rsquo;s Pierre Luzon, boys, and desperately wounded!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The others were pressed together in the doorway.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Looks as if he had crawled here on his hands and knees,&rdquo; remarked Munson.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;There&rsquo;s his horse out among the chaparral,&rdquo; exclaimed Jack, pointing to
-      the shadowy form of the animal from which the wounded man had obviously
-      tumbled.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Stand clear,&rdquo; cried Dick, gathering up Pierre in his arms. &ldquo;He has
-      fainted, but is still alive.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      And Dick, carrying the senseless form, passed into the bedroom beyond the
-      living room, and there laid poor old Pierre on the very cot which he had
-      occupied once before&mdash;on the eventful night when Tom Baker had
-      brought the paroled convict from San Quentin.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      A few drops of whisky brought the wounded man back to consciousness. Dick
-      leaned over him and caught the faintly whispered words. Piérre was
-      speaking in the French of his childhood days.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He is dead&mdash;he is dead! At last Rosetta is avenged!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick motioned his companions to silence. He bent down close to the dying
-      bandit.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Who is dead, Pierre? Ben Thurston?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, yes. Ben Thurston. Glory be to God! Don Manuel is avenged!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And how did you come to be shot, Pierre? Where is Don Manuel?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dead&mdash;dead, too!&rdquo; The wounded man this time cried out the words and
-      struggled to sit up. His eyes opened wide, and fastened themselves on
-      Dick. His voice again dropped to a whisper; he was speaking lucidly now.
-      &ldquo;But perhaps he lives. Who knows? Go and save him, Dick&mdash;Don Manuel&mdash;go,
-      go.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Exhausted, Pierre sank back on the pillow. His eyes closed. The death
-      rattle was in his throat. &ldquo;Where is he&mdash;where shall I find Don
-      Manuel?&rdquo; Dick uttered the words close to Pierre&rsquo;s ear. He alone caught the
-      faint answer. Pierre Luzon was dead.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He&rsquo;s gone, Chester,&rdquo; said Dick, standing erect. Munson stooped, put his
-      ear to Pierre&rsquo;s breast, then pressed apart one pair of the eyelids.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, it&rsquo;s all over,&rdquo; he said solemnly, as he folded the coverlet over the
-      already marble-like face.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      In stricken silence the three men passed to the outer room, shutting the
-      door softly behind them.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What&rsquo;s happened?&rdquo; asked Jack Rover, &ldquo;I couldn&rsquo;t catch his bloomin&rsquo;
-      lingo.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Something terrible. There has evidently been a fight to the death on
-      Comanche Point between Ben Thurston and Don Manuel. Looks as if both of
-      them had gone over the cliff in the struggle.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Gee!&rdquo; muttered the cowboy.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick remained just a moment in deep thought. His plan of action was
-      promptly decided on.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Munson, old man, you saddle my pony, and ride to Tejon for help. Jack,
-      you remain here with the body.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;And with the nuggets,&rdquo; remarked the cowboy drily.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick paid no heed to the interruption. He continued:
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll take the horse outside, and ride back to Comanche Point. That&rsquo;s the
-      best we can do, and the main thing is to do it quickly. Pass me that flask
-      of whisky&mdash;it may come in handy. I&rsquo;m off now, boys. You&rsquo;ll find me at
-      the cliff. Bring a doctor, Ches. So long!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The moon had now risen, and while Dick was galloping toward Comanche Point
-      from the one direction, the runabout, with Merle at the wheel and Tia
-      Teresa by her side, was speeding from the other end of the valley toward
-      the same destination. The horseman was the first to arrive.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Willoughby had no need to search long beneath the precipice. A loud,
-      continuous cry of lamentation guided him to the spot. There, wailing over
-      the corpse of Don Manuel, was the old Indian squaw, Guadalupe. Even in
-      death the two bodies were locked in each other&rsquo;s embrace, and Dick noted
-      with horror that Ben Thurston&rsquo;s teeth were buried in the flesh of his
-      enemy&rsquo;s shoulder. Guadalupe was in the act of trying to separate the dead
-      men when Dick intervened.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Great heavens, what a withered, aged face was raised toward his own! It
-      was the first time he had ever seen Guadalupe unveiled and at close
-      quarters. Her cheeks were wrinkled into a hundred folds; her eyes were
-      sunken in deep cavernous hollows. When he touched her, she rose and,
-      jabbering furiously for all the world like an angry ape, reviled him with
-      curses, her meaning unmistakable, although she spoke in some strange
-      Indian tongue.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Just then Dick caught the distant chug-chug of the automobile. He looked
-      up the valley, wondering who might be passing at that hour of night. This
-      was not the main highway; nobody ever came to Comanche Point after dark.
-      Some intervening spur of the foothills dulled the sound; all was still and
-      silent.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      He became conscious that Guadalupe&rsquo;s fury had spent itself, and turned
-      round. The squaw was gone. His eyes searched the scrub; at one place he
-      saw the twigs bending, and he even fancied he could detect the outline of
-      the white wolf gliding away through the brushwood. But that was all.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Again the sound of the automobile smote his ears; louder now, and only a
-      few hundred yards away he beheld the headlights sweeping toward the spot
-      where he stood. He resolved to intercept the vehicle and stepped across
-      the belt of chaparral that intervened between him and the roadway. Gaining
-      the thoroughfare, he called aloud and the machine slowed down.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But what was his utter amazement when Merle jumped&rsquo; from the runabout. To
-      her there could be no more surprises on this night of surprises.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dick,&rdquo; she exclaimed, as she accepted his embrace almost as a matter of
-      course.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;How do you come to be here, Merle, my darling?&rdquo; he asked, holding her in
-      his arms.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Something terrible is going to happen. I have come to try to prevent it.
-      Have you seen Don Manuel?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don Manuel!&rdquo; He repeated the name in great surprise.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Mr. Robles is Don Manuel,&rdquo; she gasped by way of explanation.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I am aware. He told me so today.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Well, where is he now? And his enemy, Mr. Thurston?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick still had an arm on her shoulder. She was gazing up into his face,
-      her voice trembling with emotion as she breathlessly plied him with her
-      questions.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;You have come too late, dearest,&rdquo; Willoughby gently replied.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Dead!&rdquo; she exclaimed.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Both are dead. They fought and rolled over the precipice. I have just
-      found their bodies lying in the chaparral back there.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Merle leaned forward, sobbing on his breast.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Take me to him, take me to him,&rdquo; she cried.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, Merle, my dear. It is better not. You must go home. Tia Teresa,&rdquo; he
-      added, addressing the duenna who had drawn near, &ldquo;she must go home. Munson
-      has gone to Tejon for help. There will be people arriving here very soon
-      now.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;He is really dead&mdash;Don Manuel?&rdquo; asked Tia Teresa in a voice of awed
-      sadness.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;There can be nothing but the one answer,&rdquo; replied Dick. &ldquo;Don Manuel has
-      passed on.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Take me to him,&rdquo; moaned Merle.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;No, no, Merle. This is no sight for you.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;But, Dick, Dick, don&rsquo;t you know one other thing?&rdquo; she pleaded, raising
-      her tearful eyes.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;What other thing?&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Don Manuel&mdash;was my father&mdash;my dear, dear father.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Again Willoughby was overwhelmed with amazement.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Your father?&rdquo; he murmured.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Yes, I only came to know it today. So, Dick, dear, even though he is
-      dead, let me kiss him now, let me kneel by his side and tell him that I
-      loved him, and will always love and revere his memory. Let me watch by him
-      until the others come.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Dick drew the sobbing girl close to him. His eyes sought those of Tia
-      Teresa. He shook his head, telling the duenna in an unmistakable way that
-      Merle must be taken home&mdash;that she must not be shocked by the
-      gruesome spectacle hidden in the chaparral.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Even as their eyes met, the faint throb of an automobile was heard, and
-      glancing across the plain Dick saw the far-away headlights twinkling like
-      twin stars. With a gesture he directed Tia Teresa&rsquo;s attention to the
-      coming help.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;I shall watch by our beloved dead one,&rdquo; said the duenna. &ldquo;My place is by
-      his side. Come, dearie,&rdquo; she went on, placing an arm around Merle&rsquo;s waist.
-      &ldquo;Mr. Willoughby will drive you back to La Siesta, and I shall see that
-      your father&rsquo;s body is taken to his home. There we shall pay all honor to
-      the dead.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Together they led Merle, unresisting now, to the runabout. Dick got in
-      beside her, and took the wheel.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;They will be here very soon now,&rdquo; he said to Tia Teresa. &ldquo;Mr. Munson will
-      give you all the help you require. I&rsquo;ll look after Merle.&rdquo; He backed the
-      machine, turned, and the little red light swept up the roadway into the
-      distance. From across the valley the headlights of a big automobile were
-      now glaring like flashing suns in the soft moonlight.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      It was the hands of Tia Teresa that separated the bodies. That of Ben
-      Thurston she flung from her as if it had been carrion for the buzzards and
-      coyotes. Then she knelt down and stroked with loving hand the brow of Don
-      Manuel. On the dead face was a look of ineffable calm.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      &ldquo;Manuel, my Manuel, the little child I nursed! My beautiful, brave
-      Manuel!&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      Thus lamenting, she awaited the coming of Munson and his friends.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br />
-    </p>
-    <hr />
-    <p>
-      <a name="link2HCH0042" id="link2HCH0042"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div style="height: 4em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h2>
-      CHAPTER XLII&mdash;Wedding Bells
-    </h2>
-    <p class="pfirst">
-      <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span> FULL year had
-      passed, and the good people of Tejon had at last ceased to speak daily
-      about Dick Willoughby&rsquo;s exciting adventures, Ben Thurston&rsquo;s inglorious
-      death, and the romantic and now indubitable ending of the famous outlaw,
-      Don Manuel.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Both the victims of the desperate fight on Comanche Point had been laid to
-      rest&mdash;Don Manuel, in the little Mission churchyard above the hill,
-      side by side with the beloved sister of his youthful days, whose betrayal
-      and death he had at last avenged, although at the cost of his own life;
-      Ben Thurston, in the modern cemetery beside his son, the poor weak youth
-      in whom the once sturdy family of pioneers had sunk to final decadency.
-      Pierre Luzon, the brave and chivalrous old Frenchman, slept near the grave
-      of the chief he had served so loyally, and, according to the old-time
-      bandit code of ethics, so nobly and so well. In the God&rsquo;s acres where all
-      feuds pass to oblivion there was perfect peace.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Sing Ling had unobtrusively departed for China, a wealthy man, as the bank
-      manager at Bakersfield could have told, no doubt destined to become a
-      leading magnate in the Flowery Land. Guadalupe was never seen again; the
-      aged squaw had probably died in her secret cave. The white wolf, too, had
-      perished; a cowboy riding the range had been attracted by some buzzards
-      flying and circling round and round far up on the mountain side, and on
-      making his way to the indicated spot, had found the animal&rsquo;s carcass
-      picked almost to the bones. The old days were forever gone.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      But in the beautiful city of Tejon a glorious era of happiness was in
-      progress. Christmas-tide had come round again, and had been made gay with
-      a tournament of roses, and then with the dawning of the New Year had
-      followed a round of festivities in honor of the double wedding of Dick
-      Willoughby and Merle Farnsworth, Chester Munson and Grace Darlington.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      In no place was there more sincere and hilarious rejoicing than in the
-      back parlor of Buck Ashley&rsquo;s fine new store, where the mystery keg,
-      sacredly reserved for this great occasion, was once more on tap and the
-      postmaster, assisted by Tom Baker and Jack Rover, dispensed hospitality to
-      a few chosen friends. But all good things come to an end, and it was with
-      a regretful sigh that the sheriff squeezed out the last few drops from the
-      tilted keg and sipped for the last time &ldquo;the blessed nectar&rdquo; that had
-      served to keep green the memory of &ldquo;dear old Pierre.&rdquo;
-     </p>
-    <p>
-      The marriage ceremonies had been performed in a fine little church that
-      sheltered all denominations in the new town, and amidst a shower of rice
-      and old shoes the happy couples had departed for the wedding breakfast at
-      La Siesta.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      To Merle the day was one of blissful joy, but of tender regrets as well.
-      During the quiet afternoon hours she and Dick had conversed about their
-      dear old friend, Mr. Robles&mdash;the gallant and chivalrous Don Manuel&mdash;the
-      beloved father whose identity as such was known only to their own two
-      selves besides Mrs. Darlington and Tia Teresa.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      And now the hour of departure on the honeymoon trail had come. The idea of
-      a trip to Europe had been abandoned for the present. The young couples
-      were going up among the Canadian Rockies, by divergent routes which would
-      meet a little later on, and all were full of enthusiasm at the thought of
-      seeing the mighty mountains in their wintry grandeur.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      Mrs. Darlington accompanied the young people to the railway station, but
-      Tia Teresa was too deeply affected to trust herself away from home. Merle
-      had kissed her a tender good-bye in the apartment in the tower, and,
-      despite the joyful promise that they would soon meet again, had left the
-      old duenna in prayerful tears before her little altar.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      At last they were pulling out from the depot, where the church crowd of
-      the morning had reassembled in full force, with fresh supplies of
-      good-luck munitions.
-    </p>
-    <p>
-      <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0012" id="linkimage-0012"> </a>
-    </p>
-    <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
-      <img src="images/0371.jpg" alt="0371 " width="100%" /><br />
-    </div>
-    <h5>
-      <a href="images/0371.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
-    </h5>
-    <p>
-      Thus, like a disbanding company of players, the actors in this tale of
-      California, pass into history. The olden days of bandits are no more,
-      while the hatred of the gringo is only a tradition. The broad acres of the
-      San Antonio Rancho no longer lie comparatively fallow in Nature&rsquo;s pasture,
-      but are tilled by the thrifty plowman as he labors afield with fullest
-      confidence of a bountiful reward. Meanwhile, the mountains that look down
-      upon the beauteous valley guard their secret well. But searching eyes will
-      yet, undoubtedly, sometime, somewhere, rediscover the mysterious cavern
-      with its hoarded millions of loot, stored by the rapacious hands of
-      Joaquin Murietta, the White Wolf, and their brigand bands, its lake of oil
-      from which outlaws fed their lamps, and its subterranean river from whose
-      shallow riffles Guadalupe, and Dick Willoughby also, gathered a wealth of
-      golden spoil.
-    </p>
-    <h3>
-      THE END
-    </h3>
-    <div style="height: 6em;">
-      <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />
-    </div>
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-<pre>
-
-
-
-
-
-End of Project Gutenberg&rsquo;s A Vendetta of the Hills, by Willis George Emerson
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-</pre>
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