-NRLF 
 
 HARPERS 1 
 : LiTTLE-f| 
 NOVELS 
 
ST. JOHN S WOOING 
 
 a 
 
 M. G. MCCLELLAND 
 
 AUTHOR OP 
 
 OBLIVION" "PRINCESS" "BUKKETT S LOOK" 
 "WHITE HEKON" "BROADOAKS" ETC. 
 
 ILLUSTRATED 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS 
 1895 
 
Copyright, 18M, by HARPIB 4 BROTHKM. 
 AU rigklt rtttntd. 
 
3T JOHNS 
 WOOING 
 
ST. JOHN S WOOING 
 
 HE was an Englishman, but not at all arro 
 gant, and he had been in the country twelve 
 years, drifting about from point to point, 
 always hopeful, always unsuccessful, always 
 obedient to his nomadic instincts. His name 
 was Clere St. John. He had tried America, 
 in its western half, from Vancouver s Island 
 to the Staked Plains, and could make noth 
 ing of it. His business associates were wont 
 to affirm that this was entirely due to the fact 
 of his not knowing what he was fit for ; to 
 his being, in brief, a round peg with an aston 
 ishing facility for getting himself into square 
 holes. 
 
 When this opinion had, by repetition, crys 
 tallized into formula, St. John ceased resent- 
 i 
 
 M5329G5 
 
ing it. More : being truthful even with him 
 self, he began to admit that the testimony of 
 witnesses might establish a verity. He had 
 certainly been no good at mining, no good at 
 vine or fruit culture, no good at lumbering, 
 or merchandising, or speculating, or at the 
 rearing of ostriches. He had tried them all, 
 and devoted to the discovery of his incapaci 
 ty to cope with their conditions twelve years 
 of his manhood and all of his available capi 
 tal. And still, at five-and-thirty, the prob 
 lem of his legitimate work in the world and 
 the proper method of getting himself into 
 position for doing it remained unsolved. 
 
 " What the dickens am I fit for ?" he de 
 manded of himself with asperity, one after 
 noon, as he sat alone on the veranda of a 
 railway hotel in middle Arizona. 
 
 Three weeks previous, with mutual joy, 
 he and his last business partner had dis 
 solved connection, so that St. John found 
 himself his own man once more, plus 100 
 in cash, and the world before him where to 
 choose. 
 
 "I haven t struck the right combination 
 yet," he ruminated, " which seems odd, con- 
 
sidering the diligence I ve manifested in 
 seeking it. Perhaps it s the sections I ve 
 tried which are unpropitious* That conclu 
 sion pats amour propre on the back, and is 
 vastly pleasanter than the notion that I 
 haven t sense enough to discover my apti 
 tudes. I shall adopt it con amore, for it s a 
 deuced deal easier to change an environment 
 than a character. Hang it all ! I ll trot 
 around a bit more on the chance of finding 
 the home pasture," 
 
 An indignant chirp from a flower-bed be 
 side the veranda steps attracted his attention, 
 and he leaned his elbows on the railing and 
 looked over. An English sparrow had dis 
 covered an alluring bit of string attached to 
 one of the straggling geraniums and was 
 minded to have it for building purposes. 
 His little legs were planted wide apart, with 
 the toes braced ; his wings were half open, 
 and his tail spread ; he turned and twisted 
 and rocked backwards and forwards, pulling 
 with all his might. The stalk shook and 
 bent with the strain, but the string held fast. 
 Finding he could make nothing of it, the 
 bird slacked up a moment, scratched his 
 
head with his claw, and squatted down to 
 think, twittering low in his throat very sulk- 
 ily. 
 
 St. John laughed. 
 
 " That s it, old fellow," he recommended. 
 " Curse a bit. Twill ease your muscles and 
 your mind. Then, when you re through 
 slanging and have got your second wind, 
 have at it again. For the honor of England, 
 my lad, don t let a bit of Yankee string beat 
 yon." 
 
 A little native wren, trim-built and saucy, 
 who had been watching the performance 
 from a twig hard by, now fluttered down 
 close, and, apparently, proffered advice and 
 suggestion in an amiable twitter. The Eng 
 lish bird received it with contempt, cocking 
 his eye viciously, flirting his tail, and utter 
 ing a quarrelsome note or two, as though 
 bidding his counsellor mind his own busi 
 ness, or go to the devil. Then, as if to 
 demonstrate that he felt himself quite suiVi- 
 cient for the matter in hand, the sparrow 
 hopped up to the geranium stalk, examined it 
 closely for a sappy place, pounded it thor 
 oughly with his beak, grabbed the string 
 
again, spread his wings wider, and hopped 
 backward, jerking with all his strength. Over 
 came the stalk, sawed through at the base, and 
 over tumbled the bird, flat on his back, but 
 with the released string in his beak. The 
 wren puffed out his feathers, ducked down 
 his head, and burst out into a derisively mirth 
 ful whistle, which so incensed the sparrow 
 that he gathered himself up and offered battle 
 wrathfully, tweaking a feather out of the 
 wren s pert little tail, and hurling it at him. 
 The wren departed in consternation, leaving 
 the victorious foreigner to execute a war- 
 dance of triumph with the feather in his beak. 
 When satisfied with this performance, the 
 sparrow dropped his trophy again and re 
 turned to business, chirping lustily the while. 
 The string was long and a bit unwieldy, but 
 he grabbed it pluckily by the middle and bore 
 it away to a honeysuckle in a neighboring 
 yard, where doubtless he boastfully related 
 the story of its acquisition to the lady of his 
 household. 
 
 " That s as good an object - lesson as the 
 Bruce s spider," was St. John s inward 
 comment. " I ll try another fall with fortune 
 
immediately, but with an amendment. The 
 next thing I clinch I ll hold to." He sat 
 quiet a while, whistling "Ye wives o* Merrie 
 England " under his breath ; then he rose and 
 stretched himself. "Heigh-ho! this is very 
 dull ! Here I ve been for a week and noth 
 ing s happened. I wonder if the post is in ? 
 My mail was to be forwarded, and it s about 
 time her ladyship honored me. I wish she d 
 let up on that matrimonial business though." 
 
 lie betook himself to the clerk s office and 
 found there a couple of letters awaiting him ; 
 both forwarded from his late address. One 
 bore the English post-mark, the other that of 
 an unimportant town in Texas. St. John re 
 turned with them to his chair on the veranda. 
 
 The English letter received first attention. 
 It was from his sister, Lady Wolcott, and 
 contained all the home intelligence, in detail, 
 given with the sprightliness and savoirfaire 
 of a woman of the world. St. John pored 
 over the closely written pages with keen in 
 terest and a twinge of homesickness. How 
 jolly it all was ! how attractive, how finely 
 finished ! Even the perfume exhaled by the 
 thin, bluish, crested paper touched memory 
 
and awakened association. How he longed 
 for it all, setting it in contrast with the crude, 
 almost elementary, life of the past dozen 
 years the crass, unfinished surroundings. 
 Stay ; here was a summons back to it. 
 
 "When are you coming to see us?" de 
 manded the written page. " Surely in twelve 
 years you must have made money enough to 
 afford a visit home. I long to show you my 
 boys the babies you left in petticoats 
 grown to be great, manly, public-school fel 
 lows. Leave your partner to regulate affairs 
 for a while, and come you home to embrace 
 your family. My Harry, as usual, takes pes 
 simistic views of this new venture of yours, 
 and vows you ll make nothing of it, be 
 cause of the trouble on the South African 
 ostrich farms last season. I tell him that 
 can t possibly apply to California, and that 
 mortality among the African birds may in 
 crease the value and the profit of "the Ameri 
 can. He still shakes his head, however, 
 thinking lightly of my logic ; so come over 
 and convince him yourself that this time you 
 really have been judicious." 
 
 St. John laid the letter on his knee and 
 
gazed away to the southwest, where the 
 Sierras lay purple against the sky, with a cu 
 riously regretful expression in his eyes. 
 
 " Not yet, Maudie," he pondered ; " not yet 
 a while, dear girl. I haven t been judicious, 
 and have had the devil s luck in consequence. 
 We ll leave it, dear, for, after all that s been 
 said and predicted, I can t go home a failure. 
 Harry shakes his head, does he ? He ll nod 
 it like a mandarin, with triumph, when he 
 hears the ostrich business has gone to pot, 
 too. Hanged if I tell him a word about it, 
 or Maudie either. There s Tom, too, with 
 the bulk of the family estate in his pocket, 
 would be wagging his head in addition and 
 recommending me to recoup myself with a 
 cotton-spinner s daughter. No, friends, I ll 
 knock about a bit longer trying for a big pot, 
 keeping the ocean neatly between me and 
 family comment. Twill be more whole 
 some. Brothers and brothers-in-law are all 
 very well at a distance, but close at hand 
 they ve a nasty habit of being hard on fail 
 ure. I d like well to see Maudie and her 
 boys though uncommonly well. But it 
 can t be yet a while. I came to the States to 
 
make a big strike, and here I ll stay till I 
 make it, or go under altogether." 
 
 Then he addressed himself to his letter 
 again. There were still four closely written 
 pages to read. 
 
 " Have you thought over what I said in 
 my last letter about that step-uncle of ours ?" 
 questioned Lady Wolcott. "And, more than 
 all, have you taken any steps towards track 
 ing him up ? I told you of finding his photo 
 in the Book of Revelations in papa s Bible, 
 last spring, when I was hunting up a date. 
 It s a faded old thing, but very gentlemanly 
 looking. Last week I took it down to Marsh 
 Mallow Hall and showed it to Tom. Tom 
 was six years old when Uncle Clere went to 
 the States, and remembers him distinctly a 
 fine, soldierly man, he was, Tom says, and 
 devoted to papa, his half-brother. We rum 
 maged over his old letters in papa s desk, and 
 found that he settled first in Virginia owned 
 a plantation there and slaves. During the 
 Civil War he fought for the Confederacy ; was 
 a colonel in their army. After the war, Uncle 
 Clere seems to have become disgusted with the 
 way things were going in Virginia, and sold out 
 
ra 
 
 and moved to the Southwest somewhere. He 
 mentions this in the last letter I can find, one 
 written shortly before papa s death, but he 
 doesn t say to what portion of the country he 
 was going. Says * I ll write again when I ve 
 located. Since papa s death, you know, none 
 of us have troubled our heads about him, al 
 though you should have done so, being his 
 namesake, and for the last dozen years right 
 in the same country with him. Do hunt him 
 up, Clere, without any more loss of time ! 
 llis letters are those of a prosperous man, 
 and he may be able to do something hand 
 some for you. Who knows? You always 
 neglect your chances so that I m quite in 
 despair about you. Any other man would 
 have hunted up Uncle Clere inside of twelve 
 months, and you ve let twelve years slip by 
 without an effort to find him. It all comes 
 back to what I -always say you need a woman 
 at your back to look out for you. You ll 
 never make a success of your life until you 
 marry. Some horses, you know, are nothing 
 in single harness, and yet work splendidly in 
 a span. There really must be some nice, 
 clever girl in America with beauty and wealth, 
 
H 
 
 who would be glad of a chance to ally herself 
 with your sweet temper and the St. John 
 blood. American women, when they have 
 money and looks, are the rage here, and some 
 of them are really very nice. They ve a pen 
 chant for Englishmen, too, and from all 1 can 
 hear make very fair wives. Do find yourself 
 a rich, pretty, well-bred girl, and marry her, 
 Clere. You are five-and-thirty, you know, and, 
 perhaps, are even getting gray. Papa did at 
 thirty. You ll be twice the man with a wife 
 to look after you, and if she should be even 
 moderately presentable I ll take her up. A 
 wife would be the making of you all around." 
 
 St. John put the letter back into its en 
 velope a trifle impatiently. This constant 
 harping on material advantages to be brought 
 about by marriage vexed him. It seemed to 
 brush the bloom from the grape, to reduce 
 that which is highest to a business basis. He 
 was past his first youth, but had not outlived 
 youth s reverence for romance. His whole 
 being revolted from the unloveliness of the 
 mariage de convenance. 
 
 The reference to his step-uncle interested 
 him more nearly, and he pulled out Lady 
 
Wolcott s letter again, and read that part of 
 it over, noticing now a marginal note in which 
 the lady stated, evidently as an after-thought, 
 her intention of dropping a line to Mr. Grif 
 fith, their family solicitor, lest haply he might 
 have more recent tidings of the missing kins 
 man. The result of this inquiry she would 
 forward later, should it prove of interest or 
 importance, Lady Wolcott said. 
 
 When the existence of this long-lost-sight- 
 of relative had first been brought to his no 
 tice, St. John had vaguely determined to 
 " hunt the old boy up some day," but be 
 yond that he had done nothing. His indi 
 vidual affairs absorbed his attention, and 
 America is a big place to track down a man 
 in especially on the insufficient data given 
 in Lady Wolcott s first epistle. He had 
 known all his life that his grandmother had 
 been twice married, and also that the son of 
 the first union Clere Lawless a man of 
 whom his own father was fond had emi 
 grated to America before he himself had 
 been born. But beyond that he had known 
 nothing, nor had he troubled himself to in 
 quire. This last letter of Maudie s put mat- 
 
13 
 
 tcrs in better shape, for a colonel of the Con 
 federacy must be more easily identified than 
 an utterly undistinguished individual. 
 
 " I wish the old boy d take a notion to 
 hunt me up," meditated St. John. " I m 
 lots easier tracked up than he will be in this 
 country of no family solicitors." 
 
 By a singular coincidence this was exactly 
 what Colonel Lawless had been about ; prov 
 ing that a sequence of thought operating 
 from diverse starting-points may happily 
 meet at a common centre. St. John opened 
 his second letter carelessly, but in less than 
 a moment straightened up in his chair with 
 every faculty at attention. It was dated 
 from a place called Marsh Mallow Ranch, in 
 Texas, and its contents was as follows : 
 
 " To Mr. CLERE ST. JOHN, Tahoia, Cal. : 
 
 "DEAR NEPHEW, A Calif ornian, named 
 Thomlins, stopped at my ranch six months 
 ago, and in the course of conversation men 
 tioned an ostrich farm started near him by a 
 Vermont Yankee and an Englishman a 
 Devonshire man called Clere St. John. 
 Now that name and locality coming to- 
 
gether set me thinking, for I m Devon my- 
 self, and had (God rest his soul !) a half- 
 brother named St. John, who was dear to 
 me. The upshot of the matter is, that I 
 wrote home to Griffiths, the family solicitor, 
 to make inquiries, and I find that my brother 
 Tom s son the little chap he named after 
 me has been within hail of me, so to speak, 
 for many years, and I not knowing it. My 
 own fault, you will say, for dropping the 
 home ties, and you ll be in the right. But 
 after Tom s death I didn t feel near to any 
 body in the old country ; his children were 
 strangers, and my own interests all on this 
 side, and so the drifting came about. We ll 
 mend it now, lad, if you re willing, and 
 will set your own matters aside and come 
 down to my ranch for a visit. I don t stir 
 around much myself any more, because of a 
 wound I ve got, and also the oncoming of 
 age. Let me hear from you at earliest con 
 venience, and make the answer affirmative. 
 I ll like rarely well to shake Tom s boy by 
 the hand, and chat a bit over old Devon 
 days. Affectionately, your uncle, 
 
 "CLERE LAWLESS." 
 
St. John laid the letter open on his knee, 
 and slapped his hand down on it amusedly. 
 
 " Talk of brain-waves " quoth he to him 
 self. " Here s a case of it, with a vengeance. 
 * We think o he he o we, and presto ! a 
 connection is established. To think of the 
 old chappie writing to Griffith for informa 
 tion just what Maudie was going to do. 
 There must be a precious deal in common 
 between those two to set them conjuring 
 simultaneously, and along the same lines. 
 Fifty years ago they d have earned a stake 
 apiece, and faggots. A good job for them 
 that these are the days of psychic research, 
 and folks don t scare easy. To think of the 
 pair of them, with no previous knowledge of 
 each other, or collusion, and an ocean be 
 tween them, joining issue on me, so success 
 fully ! It beats out Blavatsky with the tea 
 cups and roses." Then his thought took a 
 turn. " Poor Uncle Clere ! he seems to have 
 cared a good deal for my father, which makes 
 it incumbent on my father s son to gratify 
 him in this matter of acquaintance. I ll hie 
 me down to Texas, and give the wheel of fort 
 une another spin. It may twirl to luck this 
 time. Who knows ?" 
 
II 
 
 " Miss JUDY !" 
 
 Well, Nat." 
 
 "Ole Dick s down flat! I dunno what 
 ails him." 
 
 " Good gracious ! Where are the men ?" 
 
 " Off to the round-up every jack-rabbit of 
 em. Left afore sun-up." 
 
 " That s awful ! What ever shall we do ? 
 Run back to the corral, Nat, and make him 
 get up. Is he locoed, do you think ?" 
 
 " Nary time ! Locoed creeters play high- 
 jinks, an Dick s quiet as a steer down on 
 his side an trimblin like agur fits. Dad had 
 a mustang eat loco weed once an three men 
 couldn t hold him, he had such connip- 
 shuns." 
 
 "Truly? This can t be loco then. Scamper 
 back to the corral, Nat, and wait for me. We 
 must do something. I won t be a minute." 
 
 Then came the sound of a leap out of bed, 
 
17 
 
 the opening and shutting of drawers, and a 
 general skurry of preparation. 
 
 The messenger of evil, a freckled, tow- 
 headed imp of twelve, the son of one of the 
 cowboys, and the special factotum of Miss Ju 
 dith Fontaine, the proprietor s daughter, heark 
 ened a moment, then quitted the gallery with 
 a whoop and sped back towards the corral. 
 
 The sun was just showing himself above 
 the rim of the prairie, dull red and sulky, as 
 though the other side of the world had been 
 too much for his nerves. He blinked at, rath 
 er than shone upon, the quaint, white adobe 
 mansion, with its red-tiled roof and surround 
 ing outer gallery. The inner court-yard was 
 still dusk with shadow, and, since the riding 
 forth, half an hour before, of Henry Fontaine, 
 with his following of native vaqueros and 
 imported cowboys, had relapsed into silence 
 and slumber. Besides the boy, Nat Thomas, 
 there were only women left about the house. 
 And wherefore not ? since the men would 
 return by moonrise, perhaps, and the only 
 creatures ih the house corral to be cared for 
 were a couple of kittenish colts, whose dams 
 had gone to the round-up, and a sedate mid- 
 2 
 
die - aged mule with a swelled leg, who 
 weighed eighteen hundred pounds, and was 
 supposed to be able to look out for himself. 
 As though to prove the weakness of all hu 
 man calculation, this mule now lay upon his 
 side in a corner of the corral, trembling like 
 an aspen in a breeze, his countenance dis 
 tressed with pain, and his huge ears cold and 
 flopping. His afflicted leg was outstretched 
 to its limit, but the other three were doubled 
 under him in a helpless sort of fashion. He 
 held his head up still, but in a melancholy 
 position; and to Nat s suggestions about 
 getting up he paid no sort of heed, beyond 
 backing his ears irritably and switching his 
 stump tail about in reprobation. 
 
 Judy came running into the corral, at 
 speed, with a stout quart bottle in her hand. 
 Her brown hair was clubbed into a fluffy knot 
 on the top of her head, and her winsome face 
 was filled with anxiety. She had not taken 
 time to dress, but had come in her dressing- 
 gown, with her little bare feet thrust into 
 scarlet slippers. She was an impulsive young 
 woman, brimming over with energy and the 
 out-reaching to helpfulness. 
 
19 
 
 " Is he very bad ?" she demanded, hasten 
 ing forward. 
 
 " I dunno m," Nat answered. " He won t 
 get up, all I can do." 
 
 "lie must he shall / Get a bridle and 
 put it on him. He ll obey the bit from habit. 
 Poor old Dicky ! What hurts you ? Can t 
 you make mistress understand ? Make haste, 
 Nat!" 
 
 The mule sucked in his breath and gave it 
 out again in a sigh of pain ; he drooped his 
 head until his muzzle rested on the ground, 
 and fell a-trembling again worse than ever. 
 
 " Hurry up Nat ! for Heaven s sake ! He s 
 going to faint, or die, or something !" 
 
 They got the bridle on him, and, under its 
 coercion, the mule dragged himself to his 
 feet, but contrived to look sicker standing 
 than he had lying down. 
 
 " Maybe he s got cramp, Nat," suggested 
 the young lady. "If he has he ought to 
 be drenched with something. I know that 
 much, and here s a quart of whiskey. Whiskey 
 is bound to be good for cramps people take 
 it. Carmclita always does. Let s give it to 
 him. Do you know how ?" 
 
Nat grinned and nodded. 
 
 " I ve helped Dad drench horses," he ad 
 mitted. " But he never give em whiskey. 
 lie stewed up roots to a strong tea an 
 drenched with that. Or he give em turpen 
 tine." 
 
 " How much ?" 
 
 " I ain t never noticed." 
 
 " There it is !" impatiently, " and while we 
 are hesitating this poor creature suffers. 
 There ! see, he wants to lie down again. 
 Something must be done at once, or he ll die. 
 Keep him up, Nat. I m going to give him 
 this whiskey." 
 
 " Come on then," grinned Nat. " We all 
 got to take him to a tree an hold his head 
 up, or he won t swallow wuth a cent." 
 
 The ranch was an old one, and trees about 
 the house were abundant. They led the 
 mule to a low- branching pecan, which Nat 
 climbed nimbly. Straddling a limb securely, 
 he threw the reins over one higher and drew 
 the beast s head up to the limit of his throat, 
 holding him helpless, and within proper range 
 for further operations. Then he skilfully 
 inserted the neck of the bottle into the tooth- 
 
less vacancy at the side of the mule s mouth 
 and began to pour. Judy watched the per 
 formance anxiously from the ground. 
 
 " He isn t swallowing a bit," she exclaimed, 
 indignantly ; " he s just holding it in his 
 mouth. He hasn t gulped once. Swallow, 
 you idiot, swallow, this minute !" 
 
 Nat kept pouring, and the liquor dribbled 
 in a tiny stream down the outside of the ani 
 mal s brown throat. 
 
 " That won t do," Nat observed, disgusted 
 ly. " The truck s just wastin . Thar ought 
 to be somebody to rub his gullet down an* 
 sort of fumble it under his chin to make him 
 swallow. Dad allus has help in drenchin ;" 
 he looked at the girl doubtfully, and then 
 cast his glance abroad, seeking more stalwart 
 assistance. 
 
 Judy pushed up the sleeves of her dressing- 
 gown and advanced at once. She was not at 
 all timid about beasts, and hated to see any 
 thing suffer. 
 
 " Tell me what to do, and I ll do it," she 
 said, valiantly. 
 
 But Nat had his eye on a horseman who 
 was travelling the prairie just beyond the 
 
hacienda enclosures. Some belated cowboy 
 on his way to the round-up, he concluded, 
 and, on the impulse of the moment, sent his 
 voice out in a shout for assistance. 
 
 Judy, meanwhile, having glanced over her 
 shoulder to see who her assistant was hailing, 
 had fallen to work on the mule s gullet, and 
 was massaging to the limit of her ability. In a 
 moment she proudly announced that the creat 
 ure had swallowed, and Nat proceeded to 
 pour again. So busy and excited were they 
 over this unexpected success that they neg 
 lected to notice that the horseman had heard, 
 and was responding to Nat s summons. He 
 rode to the enclosure, dismounted, and joined 
 the group quite unheeded, for Nat was giving 
 the bottle a final tilt, the last drops were gur 
 gling to the place where they would do the 
 most good, and Judy s little white hands were 
 chasing one another up and down the mule s 
 throat with energy. 
 
 The lace and ribbons of her dressing-gown 
 had loosened, leaving her pretty rounded 
 throat and a bit of her white neck exposed ; 
 the sleeves had slipped above the elbows, 
 showing the white flesh of the forearms and 
 
the roguish little dimples which played in 
 and out, at wrist and elbow, with her ener 
 getic movements. Her eyes were alight with 
 sympathy and interest ; her lips were parted; 
 the exercise had stained her cheeks with car 
 mine. Altogether she made a winsome pict 
 ure standing under the chin of the ungainly 
 brown brute, and Clere St. John appreciated 
 it, from the knot of fluffy hair to the naked 
 slippered feet. 
 
 " Let me do that for you," he said, regard 
 less of preliminary courtesies. 
 
 Judy moved aside at once. 
 
 " He s swallowed it all pretty well," she 
 said. "But perhaps it would be better to 
 rub his poor old throat a little more." 
 
 Instinctively, she huddled her laces close 
 at her own throat, and held them, at the same 
 time covering her feet. She recognized St. 
 John s social status at the first glance ; but 
 cowboys, who were also gentlemen born, were 
 no novelty in that region, so that she pro 
 ceeded to explain the situation without the 
 faintest embarrassment. 
 
 " All the men have gone to the round-up," 
 she informed him, " and this creature took 
 
it upon him to be ill. We were frightened 
 out of our wits, Nat and I, but we ve dosed 
 him well, and 1 think he ll be better soon. 
 Let his head down, Nat. Why, he looks 
 better already." 
 
 " What did you give him ?" St. John in 
 quired, regarding the animal critically. 
 
 " Whiskey. A whole quart," indicating 
 the bottle with pride. 
 
 St. John strangled a desire to laugh, and 
 glanced up at Nat, who was dangling his legs 
 from the pecan limb and grinning from ear to 
 ear. 
 
 " I tole Miss Judy I never hearn o drench 
 ing with whiskey," the boy giggled. 
 
 "Was it wrong?" Judy demanded, ad 
 dressing herself directly to St. John. " Will 
 it kill him?" 
 
 " By no means," St. John answered. " It ll 
 make him feel foolish after a bit, but it won t 
 hurt him. A mule has no character to lose. 
 Now, this leg, / should say, was the trouble," 
 indicating the swelling. " It looks pretty 
 painful. Have you any liniment or turpentine 
 either will do. It ought to be rubbed and 
 fomented. I ll fix it for you, with pleasure." 
 
Nat was despatched to the house on an 
 other medical quest, and, during his absence, 
 St. John improved the opportunity by mak 
 ing some inquiries as to Marsh Mallow Ranch, 
 which he was beginning to regard as an ig 
 nis fatuus. He had left the railway a hun 
 dred miles below, and staged to a prairie 
 town called Dundalk, said to be only fifty 
 miles from the ranch in question. Here, 
 being enamoured of the clever device of tak 
 ing his kindred by surprise, he had bought 
 a mustang, and since the previous morning 
 had been riding by verbal directions, with 
 quite the customary result. 
 
 "As far as I can see, I m imitating the 
 White Queen in Alice" he smiled. " I seem 
 to be * going as fast as I can to stay in one 
 place. Every question gets the same an 
 swer about ten miles along ; not that I ve 
 had much chance for questions, however. 
 And I travel that ten and ten to it, and don t 
 get any nearer. This can t be Marsh Mal 
 low ?" looking at her rather eagerly. 
 
 Judy shook her head. 
 
 " Marsh Mallow Ranch is over there," sho 
 said, pointing southwest. 
 
"Ten miles?" 
 
 The girl laughed. 
 
 " Eight this time. It s beyond that ridge. 
 See there where the prairie lifts to the sky 
 line. There s a canon over there, and a wa 
 tercourse. Marsh Mallow is beyond. Colo 
 nel Lawless joins us thereaway." 
 
 She was taking stock of the young fellow 
 while she spoke, wondering who he could be. 
 Nat had unceremoniously halted a traveller ! 
 She began to be conscious of her deficiencies 
 of toilet. Strangely enough, too, the face 
 began to seem familiar in contour and ex 
 pression. Who did this stranger remind her 
 of ? St. John himself dissipated that little 
 mystery ere it was well formulated. 
 
 " Colonel Lawless is my uncle," he ex 
 plained ; " or, rather, my half-uncle, my fa 
 ther being the son of a second marriage. 
 My name is St. John, and I am on my way 
 to Marsh Mallow to make my kinsman s ac 
 quaintance. He left home left England, I 
 mean before I was born." For some unex- 
 plainable reason he felt eagerly explicit. " I m 
 glad you are neighbors," he added. 
 
 The young lady waived that point. 
 
" You are like your uncle," she said. " I 
 noticed something familiar about you at once, 
 and see now that it s your resemblance to 
 Colonel Lawless. Here s Nat with the lini 
 ment. Are you sure it won t trouble you to 
 fix Dick s leg? Nat can do it, you know, 
 under your direction." 
 
 She hesitated an instant, and then, obe 
 dient to her hospitable instincts, invited him 
 to remain and breakfast with them. 
 
 " My aunt, Mrs. Lestrange, will welcome 
 you in my father s place," she observed, as 
 sedately as though she were not confronting 
 him in dressing-gown and slippers. " Nat 
 will attend to your horse, and all things else 
 that are needful. The breakfast - bell will 
 ring in half an hour. Au revoir /" 
 
 And " au revoir /" St. John repeated, well 
 pleased with himself, with her, and with the 
 prospect of a substantial morning meal. 
 
Ill 
 
 BREAKFAST was served in a long, low-brow 
 ed apartment, with wide lattices opening on a 
 garden which, under the October sun, was a 
 blaze of beauty and color. Luxuriant Ma 
 deira vines and climbing roses rioted over 
 trellises and leaped from them upward into 
 the arms of fig and pecan trees. Thickets of 
 strange cacti huddled under tropical-looking 
 bananas, thrusting abroad distorted limbs, 
 weirdly glowing at the joints with flame-col 
 ored and carmine blossoms. Caladiums, be 
 gonias, cyclomens, and coleus in manifold 
 variety mingled tinted foliage in a gorgeous 
 harlequinade of contrasting hues and harmo 
 nious shadings ; while above their radiant 
 masses tall cannas uplifted spikes of scarlet, 
 red, and orange flowers. Mingled. with these, 
 contesting supremacy in variety and beauty 
 of color, were mats of verbenas, spreading 
 themselves, like glorious Oriental rugs, over 
 
the walks and the little grass-plots. Near 
 the centre of the garden a fountain cast its 
 jet aloft to wanton in the sunlight, or to coyly 
 slant aside, in myriad rainbow flashings, at 
 the instance of each vagrant breeze. Beyond 
 the garden were groups of hackberry, cotton- 
 wood, and umbrella trees, and beyond again 
 the limitless stretch of the prairie. 
 
 Judy, decorously gowned and shod, with 
 a bunch of roses at her trim belt and a smile 
 of hilarity upon her countenance, met her 
 guest in the hall, and marshalled him into 
 the breakfast-room, where she presented him 
 to an elderly lady. The latter had a face of 
 great beauty and trailing garments of black, 
 and, having been instructed aforehand, re 
 ceived him with grace, and that perfection 
 of cordiality which converts an unceremo 
 nious happening into a pleasant matter of 
 course. 
 
 St. John, feeling his British shyness dis 
 solve like frost in sunlight, stoutly endeav 
 ored to be responsive. He succeeded so 
 well that, by the time old Carmilita, the half- 
 breed cook, had sent in the last batch of tor 
 tillas, or St. John himself had conquered the 
 
...I 
 
 fire of his first tamale, the two were chatting 
 like old acquaintances ; and many items of 
 interest connected with the Fontaine and Le 
 strange family history had passed into the 
 stranger s keeping. 
 
 For instance, St. John learned that his ab 
 sent host, Henry Fontaine, was a widower of 
 twenty years standing, that Judy was his 
 only child, and that the combination of phys 
 ical circumstances which had presented him 
 with the one joy had deprived him of the 
 other. By which he made out to his entire 
 satisfaction that Miss Fontaine could have no 
 recollection of her mother, and also that she 
 must be twenty years of age. Then he inci 
 dentally discovered that Mrs. Lestrange was 
 not the childless relic her garments seemed 
 to indicate, but possessed a stalwart, sea-going 
 husband addicted to long absences and the 
 South American coast trade, and a couple of 
 equally stalwart sons who dutifully emulated 
 the paternal methods. During her temporary 
 widowhoods that is, about two-thirds of her 
 time Mrs. Lestrange visited in the interior 
 at her brother s ranch, and during the re 
 maining third she visited at her own house 
 
in Galveston. That her sombre robes were 
 apart from affliction and death, and worn be 
 cause she deemed them becoming, St. John 
 figured out for himself. 
 
 After breakfast Judy took him -into the 
 garden. St. John seized the opportunity to 
 free his mind of some burning questions rel 
 ative to his little-known kinsman. Within 
 doors he had been too much occupied in re 
 ceiving impressions of another sort to pay 
 heed to his own affairs. Now, he collared 
 his subject after the British manner, with a 
 straight thrust and no unnecessary preamble. 
 
 " See here, Miss Fontaine," he said, as they 
 paused beside the fountain, "I wish you d 
 coach me a bit about Marsh Mallow. I m 
 Colonel Lawless s step -nephew, and on my 
 way to visit him, but I really know precious 
 little about him. Can t you enlighten me ? 
 His letter of invitation is aggravatingly de 
 void of personal information. You can see 
 for yourself, if you like" he drew the mis 
 sive from his pocket and presented it to her. 
 
 Judy seated herself on the grass beside the 
 fountain and began throwing bread-crumbs 
 into the basin for the goldfish. 
 
" What do you wish to know ?" she in 
 quired. 
 
 " First, is there any family ? My uncle 
 mentions none. Then, what manner of man 
 is Colonel Lawless himself ?" 
 
 Judy took the questions in order. 
 
 " There is a daughter and a son," she said, 
 laying the colonel s letter, unread, on the 
 grass beside her. " The daughter is married 
 to a Spanish - American and lives at home. 
 Her husband is a literary man and a cripple. 
 It was sad about him. When he went for his 
 license to be married to Miss Lawless, a long 
 journey, ten years ago, it was to the court 
 house ; his horse frightened and ran away, 
 breaking the buggy into kindling-wood, and 
 throwing Colonel Lawless and Luis Mejares 
 both out on the rocky edge of a canon. 
 Colonel Lawless escaped with a few bruises, 
 but Mejares had both legs broken. Bringing 
 him home made matters worse, and then a 
 young doctor they fished up from somewhere 
 in a hurry mismanaged the case, so that the 
 bones knit badly. Mr. Mejares used crutches 
 for a while, but he began to lay on flesh about 
 five years ago, as people of Spanish blood 
 
88 
 
 are prone to do, and got too heavy for it to 
 be safe. He uses a wheeled chair now, and 
 gets about more comfortably. He writes 
 charming stories, and has quite a reputation. 
 Perhaps you know his work." 
 
 " Perhaps I do," he assented ; " I read lots 
 of stories as I go along, but I don t always 
 notice the author s name, or remember it 
 when I do notice. It s a good thing this 
 poor fellow has a profession which doesn t 
 require legs. I m glad my cousin had the 
 pluck to carry on the engagement." 
 
 Judy looked up at him with wide-open 
 eyes of inquiry. 
 
 " What pluck was required ?" demanded 
 she, in surprise. "She loved Mr. Mejares 
 devotedly. It was a love-match from the be 
 ginning, for her father would have preferred 
 an Englishman for her, and there were plenty 
 in Texas, even ten years ago. Mejares got 
 hurt going for his license to wed her, more 
 over ; so of course Miss Lawless felt responsi 
 ble, and as if she could never make it up. 
 She married him the minute his legs were 
 set, standing in her white dress among the 
 bottles and bandages. She had to do that, 
 
you know, so as to take chief part in the 
 nursing." 
 
 St. John looked approval. Maudic s house 
 of cards as to a possible heirship for himself 
 had tumbled into ruins, as such structures 
 have a malicious habit of doing. He had 
 given that aspect of the matter small thought 
 himself, so that this news of a family at Marsh 
 Mallow had no poignant sting. It was pleas 
 ant to know that his kinsfolk were credit 
 able. 
 
 " How about the son ?" he queried, briskly. 
 " Is he distinguished and literary too ?" 
 
 A shade of reserve crept into the girl s 
 manner at once ; her face chilled, and she 
 followed the movements of the goldfish, dart 
 ing about the floating bread-crumbs, assid 
 uously with her glance. 
 
 " The son is away most of the time," she 
 answered, non-committally. " He is a mining- 
 engineer, and his field of work lies else 
 where." 
 
 St. John looked at her curiously, feeling 
 suddenly confident that a little investigation 
 along this line might develop matter of in 
 terest. Inquiries burned on his tongue, but 
 
85 
 
 there was that in the girl s manner which 
 caused him to restrain his curiosity, and to 
 remember that their acquaintance was acci 
 dental, and should not be made the means of 
 pushing the young lady into a false position. 
 Why should she, an outsider, be entrapped 
 into telling a man discreditable tales if such 
 there should be about his own kindred? 
 Clearly she had no intention of being so en 
 trapped, and he respected both her acumen 
 and reticence. But all the same, he promptly 
 decided that this young Lawless must be a 
 mauvais sujet. 
 
 In the pause which followed the closing of 
 the subject of the son, Judy picked up the 
 father s letter. She was not devoid of curi 
 osity herself. 
 
 " Am I to read this ?" she questioned. 
 
 St. John was thinking how prettily his 
 companion s hair curled around her small ear, 
 and how gracious were the curves with which 
 her chin melted into her round throat. 
 Caught in the act, with admiration in his 
 eyes, he gladly took refuge in the letter, as 
 suring the girl with empressement that he 
 would joy to have her read it. 
 
86 
 
 " It s a very nice letter," he affirmed. " An 
 exceptionally nice letter, when one remem 
 bers that the kind old boy has never seen 
 me." 
 
 Judy thought so likewise, and voiced the 
 sentiment. 
 
 " Underneath the surface cordiality there is 
 a shy tenderness which is captivating," she 
 declared. " How very fond he seems to have 
 been of your father. Do you resemble him 
 at all ? your father, I mean. It will be a good 
 point of departure if you do. You re very 
 like Colonel Lawless himself. Any one might 
 think you his son." 
 
 The slight emphasis on the pronoun put 
 St. John s newly enlisted resolutions to 
 flight. 
 
 "Isn t his son like him?" he queried. 
 
 No." 
 
 She returned the letter to its envelope, and 
 restored it to him, smiling curiously. St. 
 John felt exasperated, and with reason. 
 
 " You ll get on with your uncle, perhaps," 
 she nodded. 
 
 " Why, perhaps ?" very sulkily. " Is he so 
 uncommonly difficult ?" 
 
" Most uncommonly," laughing up at him. 
 " He s a man of colossal prejudices. Many 
 people can t get on with him at all." 
 
 " Who, for instance 3" 
 
 " My father, for one. The relations be 
 tween the two are strained to freezing cour 
 tesy and immeasurable distance. It s a pity ; 
 for the people over there," nodding in the di 
 rection of Marsh Mallow, " are our nearest 
 neighbors, and Anita Mejares and her husband 
 are charming." 
 
 The new inmate for Marsh Mallow felt that 
 it was more than a pity that it was unrea 
 sonable, almost childish. " What s the trouble 
 between the old boys?" he disrespectfully 
 demanded. 
 
 Judy sprang to her feet, laughing. 
 " Burning questions," she mocked ; " vital 
 interests matters that stir the souls of men ! 
 My father is of French extraction; your uncle, 
 the British lion incarnate ! My father was a 
 United States officer ; your uncle, a Confed 
 erate ! What more would you ?" 
 
 She moved towards the house, smiling back 
 at him over her shoulder. And St. John fol 
 lowed, greatly amused, and also not a little 
 
perplexed by the new elements which seemed 
 spreading out around him. 
 
 "Cross-currents and eddies all about," he 
 inwardly commented ; " tides uncertain, and 
 a foul point or two to weather, maybe. That s 
 all right, and a fellow can look out for em. 
 I ll get in a bit of sailing in company with 
 the little craft ahead while I m down here 
 though, or my name isn t Clere St. John." 
 
IV 
 
 ST. JOHN had been domiciled at Marsh 
 Mallow for a week, and, to use his own phrase, 
 found himself " very satisfied." The patriar 
 chal life amid flocks and herds and a limitless 
 environment, which is after all the natural 
 life of man, suited him. He cared for it all 
 the riding after the cattle, the administration 
 of pastoral affairs, the dignity of a life apart, 
 the space for individual development, the 
 quaint domestic leisureliness and freedom. 
 
 The old house pleased him also; rested 
 and refreshed his artistic taste, jaded and 
 worn by crude aggressiveness and spick-and- 
 span newness. It fitted in harmoniously with 
 the architectural background of his memory, 
 and made him realize as he had never done 
 before that this virile continent is old and 
 storied like the rest. More : that its history 
 and civilization antedates by many cycles that 
 day of grace whereon Columbus persuaded 
 
10 
 
 Isabella of Spain to part with her jewels for 
 the god-mothering of his venture. 
 
 Like the neighboring hacienda, Marsh 
 Mallow was one-storied and rambling. Like 
 it, also, it was roofed with glazed red tiles, 
 fire-burned by some lost method. Its adobe 
 walls, hard as friable stone, were many feet in 
 thickness, and its casements were wide and 
 latticed. The central courtyard, common to 
 Spanish-Mexican houses, in this instance, was 
 uncommonly spacious, and flagged with rock 
 from the neighboring canon. Its archway 
 was also of stone, and boasted carving such 
 as may be seen at the missions about San 
 Antonio, and also a pair of folding gates of 
 hand-wrought copper, said to have been 
 brought from the interior of Mexico by a de 
 scendant of the conquistadorcs. They were 
 green with age and damp, those gates, and 
 no longer closed with accuracy, but, in them 
 selves, were works of art as well as historic 
 monuments. All the color-values of the place 
 its wealth of reds, yellows, browns, and 
 greens, with a thousand intermediate shades 
 were toned to rich perfection, and subtly 
 blended into soft true harmonies. 
 
41 
 
 The picturcsqucness of the edifice, as well 
 as its aspect of antiquity, was enhanced by a 
 dark mantling of vines English ivy and Vir 
 ginia creeper which clung to the walls and 
 angles, and even cast embracing arms across 
 the tiles. To St. John, the presence of the 
 ivy gave just the touch of home and old asso 
 ciation which is requisite to make a habita 
 tion seem at one with its occupants. It was 
 an actual disappointment to him to learn that 
 it had not been brought direct from England. 
 
 "It s Colonial English," Mrs. Mejares ex 
 plained. " The old homestead in Virginia 
 was covered with it, and, when we came out 
 here, the padre brought with him the ivy roots, 
 and also those of the Virginia creeper. That 
 last was a point of sentiment also ; my mother 
 was a Virginian." 
 
 " Did your mother come out with you ?" 
 St. John asked, gently. 
 
 He knew that his uncle had been many 
 years alone. 
 
 Mrs. Mejares bright face clouded. " Poor 
 padre! No, she died at home. Twas this 
 \vay very sad, you know, and difficult to 
 bear. There was hard fighting in the valley 
 
i. 1 
 
 of Virginia, and my father was away at the 
 front. Our Lome was in middle Virginia, 
 and we were left alone there with the negroes. 
 My mother managed the plantation and eared 
 for my brother Tom and myself, botli chil 
 dren. One day our house was surrounded 
 by Federal riders. I can well remember it 
 the confusion of uniformed men and strange 
 horses. Our own negroes went about with 
 alien looks, and many of them fraternized 
 with the enemy. The house was rifled from 
 garret to cellar, many of the outer offices 
 burned, and the growing crops devastated. It 
 was terrible. Tom had a colt he was fond of, 
 and when they led it out and saddled it, he 
 interfered, claiming the animal, and disput 
 ing any man s right to touch it. lie was only 
 seven years old, and high-tempered ; he felt 
 himself robbed, and stormed and raged about 
 it. The man who had taken the colt laughed 
 at first; then, wearied of the boy s persist 
 ence, struck at him with the flat of his sabre. 
 My mother was standing near, and, to save 
 her child, sprang forward. I don t know how 
 really it happened ; whether the blow fell on 
 her and knocked her down, or whether the 
 
colt frightened and pushed against her only 
 that she got a heavy fall some way, and that 
 it killed her. Ay de mi! It was a sad day !" 
 
 This story, so briefly outlined, gave St. John 
 a glimpse into the arcana of an animosity 
 which, to his outside view, had seemed un 
 reasonable. With the flight of years should 
 have come mitigation of offence, if not abso 
 lute placidity, St. John thought, unconsciously 
 assuming that his own standpoint must neces 
 sarily be that of every other Englishman on 
 the Western Continent. To St. John, Amer 
 icans were Americans without geographical 
 difference. This story gave him another 
 point of view, and enabled him to realize 
 how his uncle might hold himself justified in 
 differentiating, and also in cherishing prej 
 udices. He had suffered with one side, by 
 and through the other. 
 
 Still, it did seem a pity that old issues should 
 overlay and dominate new ones. Judith 
 Fontaine could be guilty of neither political 
 nor military misdemeanors, and it was really 
 outrageous that social intercourse should be 
 barred with her. St. John felt his instinct of 
 fair-play revolt. Judy had, in their brief in- 
 
14 
 
 tercourse, attracted him more than any woman 
 he had ever met, in a like space of time ; his 
 instant and cordial acceptance at the neigh 
 boring hacienda had pleased his self-love also, 
 and altogether he was minded to continue the 
 acquaintance. But for these outside compli 
 cations, how jolly it would be ! His cousin, 
 Mrs. Mejares, to whom he had taken an im 
 mense liking, because, in an indefinable way, 
 and despite her pretty semi-Spanish affecta 
 tions, she reminded him of his sister Maud, 
 would, he felt convinced, lend herself readily 
 to social projects. It was very provoking. 
 
 He had incidentally mentioned his uncon 
 ventional stoppage at the Fontaine hacienda 
 the very afternoon of his arrival at Marsh 
 Mallow, but nobody seemed interested, so 
 that he had refrained from details. Indeed, in 
 these first few days the talk had been mostly 
 personal, or else reminiscent. 
 
 Like most men who are well past middle 
 life, Colonel Lawless was returning, in thought 
 and interest, to the people and events which 
 had filled his youth. England and, above all, 
 Devonshire, with its associations, had ranged 
 up close again, and become vital. In round- 
 
ing his course to the finish, the old veteran s 
 anchor, in a spiritual sense, seemed in truth 
 to fall " where first his pennons flew." The 
 companionship of a man of his own blood, a 
 man reared amid the traditions, customs, and 
 surroundings which had nurtured him, was a 
 keen joy to Colonel Lawless, and the more 
 that, in the sanctuary of his British soul, he 
 was compelled to admit that his children 
 were alien in thought as in birth. It was 
 natural, even inevitable; but the knowledge 
 that they were not Britons girded him at 
 times. 
 
 "Aye, lad," he would say, cherishing his 
 snowy whiskers, " it s a rare joy to chat with a 
 man who knows old Dartmoor ! Saw you ever 
 such purple heather, or such golden whin as 
 grows about Great Cawsand ? Or a ridge 
 more bold to its size than Yestor where it 
 lifts itself up black against the western sky, 
 and throws shadows athwart the waste of 
 rocks at its foot ? There s magnificence and 
 gloom enough in some of those northern 
 passes of Dartmoor to content any scenery- 
 lover, without crossing seas for canons and 
 such in the Rockies. I mind well how your 
 
father and I used to fish in the Taw when 
 I d come down for the long from Eton. A 
 plucky little chap he was, six years my junior, 
 and many s the royal day we ve had hearken 
 ing to the lazy water crawling around the 
 rocks that choke its bed, and waiting for the 
 fish to rise. There were stones in the stream 
 so balanced that the motion of the stream 
 would make them cluck cluck like an angry 
 Langshang and we boys used to pretend 
 twas the nixies grumbling together and warn 
 ing the fish against us. Lord ! I can hear 
 the chicking of the stone -chat now, and the 
 scream of the golden plover. Then how the 
 wind used to rush through tor and crag, and 
 bring to mind the gammers tales of storm- 
 elves and wailing banshee ! Ah, man ! there s 
 no place like England, after all, to the folks 
 born there. And of all fair England, to my 
 mind the fairest bit is Devonshire." 
 
 And yet, when cornered, he would admit 
 that this great Southwestern "divide" of 
 the so-called New World was a good place 
 enough a prosperous, wealthy land, with 
 room for all and a chance for every man to 
 live out his life manfully, and show the stuff 
 
17 
 
 that is in him. Sitting in the saddle on 
 some prairie knoll and letting his eyes wan 
 der over the miles of rolling plain covered 
 with gray-green mesquite and buffalo grass 
 which owned him lord, and watching the 
 cattle string out into grazing lines, or club 
 together in bunches, the old soldier was fain 
 to confess that he had come to good camp 
 ing-ground, and that peace and plenty were 
 his in abundance. Then, because he was hu 
 man and therefore only intermittently grateful, 
 he would bring his glance back to his nephew s 
 face and forget it all in yearning for the 
 green of Hatherleigh Meadows, and the purl 
 of the trout stream meandering through them. 
 To that part of his life spent in Virginia 
 and culminating in the tragedy of the Civil 
 War, Colonel Lawless rarely alluded. There 
 are years in a man s life those big with love, 
 happiness, disaster, or death, those holding 
 the very pith and marrow of existence which 
 seem too sacred for ordinary mention. They 
 are held apart in their own sanctuary and 
 approached with bared head and unshod 
 feet. Even with this man of his own race, 
 who had played amid the graves in the 
 
churchyard of his own native village and had 
 been carried under the same lychgate for 
 christening at the same font, the old soldier 
 had reserves. 
 
 But that thoso years in Virginia held him 
 with a grip of strength St. John speedily had 
 demonstration. 
 
 Their ride, one forenoon, took them in a 
 new direction, and Colonel Lawless, an en 
 thusiastic geologist, called the attention of 
 his guest to those strange cracks and fissures 
 with which the prairie is serrated. Some 
 times they seemed only a few feet deep, and 
 could be readily jumped by a horse, while in 
 other places they were clear, stiff gashes, 
 yawning sheer and verdureless to a consider 
 able depth. Through one of these cuts, 
 wide enough at bottom to accommodate a 
 pony trail, they took their way, keenly inter 
 ested in examining its formation, which was 
 new to St. John, and in observing the various 
 strata laid bare in the abrupt walls. The 
 Colonel rose to the occasion with every one 
 of his pet theories, and enjoyed himself as 
 only an amateur scientist can with an appre 
 ciative but unlearned audience. 
 
After a bit, the gulch cornered into a 
 canon of depth and spaciousness whose rai- 
 son d etre lay in the presence of a stream of 
 water which gurgled and bubbled, amid 
 rocks and luxuriant masses of vegetation, 
 through its midst. Here the Colonel was 
 swift to call attention to the difference in the 
 appearance of a gorge whose cleavage force 
 had been water, the gentler and more gradual 
 descent of the walls, the marks of the vari 
 ous water levels, and the harmonious trend 
 of the erosion. 
 
 " You should talk with my boy Tom about 
 such things," he observed, as they paused to 
 let the horses drink at a water-hole. " He s 
 a better hand than I at getting the results of 
 observation into language has the American 
 gift of speech, and of epigrammatic illus 
 tration. He s nimbler on his pins, more 
 over, and can scramble about to better pur 
 pose. He s a clever lad, is Tom. Your 
 father s namesake, as you are mine. You 
 two should know each other." 
 
 St. John cordially seconded the sugges 
 tion, inquiring, in addition, whether there 
 was any possibility of his kinsman s return to 
 
60 
 
 Marsh Mallow within a reasonable limit of 
 time. 
 
 The Colonel s face gloomed over at once. 
 
 " Hardly a possibility," he admitted, re 
 luctantly. "It s a pity, too, for I d like 
 well to bring you lads together. The truth 
 is, Clere, this region is hateful to Tom just 
 now. He came a nasty cropper hereaway, 
 and it s shaken him, and put him wrong. 
 He s better away for a while, poor lad." 
 
 " Through a woman ?" St. John ventured. 
 
 The Colonel nodded, and reined into the 
 trail again. He volunteered no details, nor 
 did his nephew press the matter. A trouble 
 engendered by love should be treated with 
 delicacy and reserve. 
 
 Talking, therefore, of other things, they 
 zigzagged up the slope of the canon and 
 came out on a ridge from which the prairie 
 sloped away, without unseemly haste, in 
 long, slow undulations. Here they paused 
 to breathe the horses and look to their cinch 
 es, slackened by the climb. Away in the dis 
 tance St. John beheld with pleasure" the Fon 
 taine hacienda, set like a jewel of color and 
 brightness amid the dull gray of the plains. 
 
51 
 
 He reverted at once to his visit, and with 
 considerable animation. The Colonel listened 
 impassively. 
 
 " What sort of man is Fontaine ?" St. John 
 questioned, at length. " He was away at a 
 round-up, so I didn t meet him." 
 
 " As to person, you mean ?" 
 
 " All around." 
 
 " He s a handsome fellow tall, dignified, 
 and all that. Was a volunteer during the 
 war, and saw hard service. Distinguished 
 himself on the field, I believe, and won his 
 straps. His manners are good, and a trifle 
 ornate an inheritance, I take it, from his 
 Gallic grandsires. He comes of a Huguenot 
 family that originally settled in Delaware." 
 
 The Colonel quit himself of this informa 
 tion with an air of rendering painstaking 
 justice. 
 
 "How d they get out here?" St. John 
 wanted to know in addition. 
 
 " Easily enough. Fontaine pere was an 
 army man likewise only regular, a gradu 
 ate of West Point. He was stationed here 
 during the Mexican troubles, and either fell 
 in love with the country or was long-headed 
 
enough to foresee the southwestern influx. 
 He bought that ranch twenty thousand 
 acres from a dissatisfied don who wanted 
 to live and die under the flag of Mexico. He 
 kept an agent here during his life, and none 
 of his family have ever lived in Texas except 
 this son, who settled here after the war, and 
 a daughter, Mrs. Lestrange. I don t even 
 know whether there were more children. 
 That hacienda is older than Marsh Mallow, 
 I believe, although it don t look it, and the 
 courtyard entrance is not nearly so fine. My 
 place was built by a different set of hidal 
 gos, and, tradition says, was started for a 
 mission. You should get Luis Mejarcs to 
 tell you the story. It s worth hearing." 
 
 But St. John was not to be diverted from 
 his own point of interest. 
 
 " You probably see a good deal of the Fon 
 taines, being such near neighbors," he ob 
 served, with diplomatic intention. 
 
 The Colonel laughed. 
 
 "There you re mistaken, my lad," quoth 
 he. "The families see next to nothing of 
 each other, and the less the better, to my 
 notion. We ve nothing in common in the 
 
59 
 
 present, and armed hostility in the past. 
 Henry Fontaine is a Yankee dyed in the 
 bone; and his daughter " He paused, 
 and his eyes flashed. 
 
 St. John felt suddenly and unaccountably 
 nettled. 
 
 " Well, what of his daughter ?" he interro 
 gated, sharply. 
 
 " She s the most infernal flirt in Texas 
 that is all," growled the Colonel. 
 
ST. JOHN S anger cooled as suddenly as it 
 had flamed up. Never having been flirted 
 with, or even actively in love, he could re 
 gard the question abstractly and debate about 
 it. Flirtation in woman, he argued, might 
 be classified as a natural instinct the sport 
 ing instinct a trifle off color, because of the 
 hypocrisy involved. In men, of course, flir 
 tation was abominable, caddish at all times, 
 and, under certain circumstances, villanous. 
 Their sporting instincts had other and more 
 legitimate outlets, from which women were 
 debarred. To rail at an attractive, high-spir 
 ited woman for flirtation, to St. John, seemed 
 as futile as to fall foul of a playful kitten for 
 gamboling with a mouse. He thought none 
 the worse of Judy for his uncle s blunt ac- 
 cusal, but he wondered how she could have 
 managed to touch up the old gentleman so 
 
56 
 
 sharply, seeing that all neighborly intercourse 
 had been disclaimed. 
 
 Later he found out the inwardness of the 
 matter from his cousin s husband, Senor Luis 
 Mejares. 
 
 The library and work-room of the novelist, 
 a cheery, comfortable apartment, opened on 
 the outer gallery with broad lattices, set with 
 quaint little panes of stained glass. The floors 
 were on a level, so that Mejares had no diffi 
 culty in whirling away from his desk and 
 sending his wheeled chair through the portal 
 and along the gallery whenever dominated by 
 the restless impulse which lifts sound men to 
 their feet and sets them tramping about with 
 their hands behind them. During these pere 
 grinations he was very approachable. St. 
 John had fallen into the habit of joining him 
 and lending a hand with the chair. The pair 
 got on well together, the pluck and patience 
 of the more gifted man, under physical in 
 firmity, begetting in the less gifted man a 
 sense of kinship and nearness, quickening 
 his appreciation of brilliant intellectual en 
 dowments and a growing fame with warm 
 throbs of personal liking. 
 
" He s a capital fellow, Mejares," he ob 
 served to his uncle with friendly frankness a 
 day or so after his arrival. "Jolly, and 
 straightforward, and simple as a child. I 
 thought swell authors were generally a bit 
 cocky, but Mejares isn t." 
 
 " That depends on their quality," the Colo 
 nel responded astutely. " The same laws oper 
 ate in literary as in social life ; the Brumma 
 gem fellows, uplifted, swagger and brag, 
 while the princes of the blood, being born to 
 exaltation, take it quietly. When a little suc 
 cess converts a clever fellow into an arrogant 
 ass, you may be sure there s asses blood in 
 his veins. The big geniuses are gentlemen in 
 the fullest sense of the word. Legs are tre 
 mendously convenient, there s no denying 
 that ; but, by George, sir ! there are things 
 about a man that outweigh a sound body ! 
 And my Anne s husband is a millionaire in 
 the real values." 
 
 In this dictum St. John acquiesced with 
 perfect cordiality. He liked his cousin Anne 
 sufficiently to make it a distinct pleasure to 
 be able to like her husband as well. Follow 
 ing his uncle s example, he refrained from 
 
57 
 
 softening Mrs. Mejares Saxon patronymic 
 into the pretty Spanish diminutive affected 
 by her husband. He had a shy sort of feel 
 ing that in him it would seem overt familiar 
 ity. There were subtle reserves about St. 
 John. 
 
 With Colonel Lawless the name in its sim 
 plicity was dearest. It had been that of his 
 wife. 
 
 Coming in from his ride St. John found 
 Mejares on the gallery, and joined him. 
 " How are the legs ?" he inquired, cordially, 
 as they shook hands. 
 
 Mejares was subject to acute neuralgia in 
 his afflicted members, and, for a couple of 
 days, had been in purgatory. 
 
 " Jumping a bit still," the novelist replied, 
 with a smile, " but steadying down. They ll 
 work all right presently. They humped them 
 selves and bucked like demons about day 
 break, which rather threw my day s work out. 
 Since noon I ve been playing ladies, as the 
 children say. Stop a bit and talk to me. 
 Which way did you ride ?" 
 
 St. John laid hold of the back of the chair, 
 pushing it slowly. 
 
f>s 
 
 " The new bull has arrived," he answered, 
 " and is np in the old corral with a few out 
 side head to get acquainted. We rode out to 
 see him, and afterwards circled about the 
 prairie a bit." 
 
 " What sort of a beast is he ?" 
 
 " A very pretty beast ; fine in the flank, 
 deep in the brisket, back like a table, pasterns 
 clean, and hoofs like onyx. He s Devon, 
 every inch of him. Uncle Clere got quite 
 sentimental over him. Odd, how the old boy 
 clings to home after all these years of expa 
 triation ! One would think that the new in 
 terests would have weaned him." 
 
 Mejares laughed. 
 
 " What s bred in the bone comes out in the 
 flesh, " quoth he, amusedly. " The padre, lias 
 never even been naturalized, although he s 
 held property here ever since he came over, 
 and borne arms for the Confederacy. He s a 
 red-hot rebel, too, and touchy as a bear with a 
 sore head about the late war. Haven t you 
 noticed it?" 
 
 St. John nodded. Then, with the air of one 
 confessing to a sentiment, he said: " I haven t 
 been naturalized either. Been here twelve 
 
59 
 
 years, too, and may stay the balance of my 
 life. Somehow I can t get my consent to 
 giving up the old country formally. It goes 
 against me." 
 
 " That s what the padre says. You two are 
 ridiculously alike chips from the same oak 
 block. Now my wife and Tom scarcely show 
 the strain at all. They are both Americans." 
 
 " Anne reminds me of my sister," observed 
 St. John. " There s a pose of the head and 
 movement of the lips that s Maudie all over. 
 Tell me about Tom. He should be a clever 
 chap, from his father s account of him. We 
 rode through one of those queer cuts in the 
 plain the one that elbows into a canon. 
 Uncle Clere was directing my attention to the 
 various formation, and brought in Tom s 
 name ; rather crowing of his scientific at 
 tainments, you know." 
 
 Mejares looked thoughtful. 
 
 " Tom s clever enough," he assented. " Too 
 clever, in fact, for the use he makes of it. 
 Tisn t brains Tom lacks, it s ballast. He s a 
 first-rate geologist and mining engineer a 
 first honor graduate of Freiburg, and ought 
 to be well on the road to success and distinc- 
 
00 
 
 tion. Instead of which he s fooling away his 
 time in the Sierras with a lot of roughs, with- 
 out regular position or employment, or even 
 definite aim. Madre de Dios ! It s enough 
 to make a man forswear brains to ponder 
 Tom ! lie might be anything, and is con 
 tent to drivel. It s conservation of force that 
 tells, and Tom " he lifted his shoulders and 
 spread abroad his hands with a gesture which 
 rounded the sentence. 
 
 St. John s instinct of fair play caused him 
 to put in a word for the absent man. 
 
 "His university record seems good," he 
 suggested. 
 
 " Very good," assented Mejares. " That s 
 what frets me. If he could make a start 
 like that, he could hold it. It s disgraceful 
 to peter out without adequate cause, and 
 Tom s faculties are all there. Even abroad 
 he was wild, though wilder than the padre 
 ever knew. He went the pace for a while, 
 plunged at Monte Carlo and got into scrapes 
 with other students. One side of his face 
 was laid open in a university row. It dis 
 figures him. There was nothing dishonor 
 able in the scrapes, you know, only woful 
 
81 
 
 lack of consideration and self-restraint. Tom s 
 impulsive and hot-tempered; flies off the 
 handle at a word, sometimes at a look. Lots 
 of Virginians are so, and Tom takes after his 
 mother s people. He s a likable fellow, too. 
 His sister adores him." 
 
 " The Colonel intimated that he d come a 
 cropper over a woman," observed St. John. 
 " That sort of thing lays a fellow on his 
 back, you know if it don t smash him up 
 entirely." 
 
 " Yes, it does," the novelist admitted. 
 "But Tom" he paused, meditatively "I d 
 like to know the woman s side of the affair. 
 
 " Who is the woman ?" 
 
 " Our little neighbor yonder Judith Fon 
 taine." 
 
 " No !" 
 
 " Fact, I assure you." 
 
 " But I understand there was no inter 
 course between the families." 
 
 " There isn t. The Fontaines tried to be 
 friendly at first, but the padre s aspect was 
 that of one who turneth away his ear, and 
 his countenance was bitter. When advances 
 were made, his manner proclaimed Lo ! an 
 
enemy hath done this. 7 So the Fontaines, 
 not unnaturally, became discouraged. Tom 
 met the young lady first in San Antonio, at 
 the graduating exercises of her school, and 
 then followed her to Galveston, where she 
 went to visit her aunt. He was fairly crazed 
 about her. Poor Tom ! Nobody knows the 
 details of the affair, save those most con 
 cerned ; not even Anita, although Tom has 
 few reserves from his sister. AVe only know 
 that, about a year ago, there must have been 
 a flare-up, and that Tom has been acting 
 vaquero for the devil ever since." 
 
VI 
 
 WHEN men are holiday-making, with lei 
 sure of mind and body, the happenings of 
 the present satisfy them, and the influence 
 of their immediate surroundings becomes para 
 mount. St. John, interested by the stories 
 told of Judith Fontaine, amused, attracted, 
 and not a little curious, was not long in de 
 ciding that, having partaken of the Fontaine 
 hospitality, it behooved him to make ac 
 knowledgment of the same. To permit prej 
 udices in which he could have neither part 
 nor lot to influence him to a breach of the 
 social amenities would be ridiculous an over 
 strain of deference and neither as relative 
 nor host could the Colonel require it. Al 
 ready he had been derelict in allowing a 
 week to elapse without calling, and he would 
 brand himself boor should the courtesy be 
 longer delayed. 
 
 The morning following his talk with Me- 
 
61 
 
 jarcs, therefore, be got him to horse, and 
 cantered away through the sunshine to pay 
 his respects to the ladies of the neighboring 
 hacienda. 
 
 The buoyancy of the atmosphere expanded 
 his lungs and set his blood tingling so that 
 he longed for hurdles to jump, or stiffish 
 fences with a ditch on the off-side. He in 
 creased his pace to a gallop, and circled 
 about, first to examine some queer cacti, 
 and then to inspect a nasty tumble-weed, 
 big as a cart-wheel, and lying loose in a buf 
 falo wallow, awaiting a breeze to send it 
 bounding on its evil way. He was glad of 
 the chance to see it, for the Colonel had told 
 him the day before that this pest of the 
 prairies was getting rare, so relentless had 
 been the settlers war of extermination upon 
 it. The blue of the sky and the gray-green 
 sheen of the prairie dappled darkly where 
 cloud shadows rested ; the dim, slow-moving 
 masses against the horizon, like waves in 
 an offing, which he knew to be vast herds 
 of cattle at graze ; the silence of it all, the 
 vehement vitality everywhere underlying its 
 somnolent repression, excited his imagina- 
 
69 
 
 tion like wine, and set him to speculating 
 about his neighbors affairs, and to dream 
 ing vague dreams begotten of friendliness 
 and inexperience. 
 
 This cousin of his this love-fevered fel 
 low who, in default of his inamorata, was 
 wooing blind folly it was really a pity about 
 him. What if he Clere St. John should 
 constitute himself minister extraordinary to 
 the court of love, with self-invested powers 
 for the disentanglement and regulation of 
 this affair of the heart ? It would be diver 
 sion of the most delicate, and a friendly 
 thing besides, despite his uncle s prejudices. 
 And in truth, what prejudice would have the 
 ghost of a chance for survival if subjected 
 to the light of Judy s eyes or the charm of 
 her witching personality ? 
 
 This thought switched him off, and he 
 quit posing before himself as a sentimental 
 benefactor, and let Tom Lawless drift away 
 out of sight while he conjured up personal 
 recollections of Judy. 
 
 The damsel, meanwhile, lay at ease in a 
 hammock on the outer gallery, clad in a 
 charming neglige of turquoise India silk, 
 
1,1, 
 
 plcntcously garnished with ribbons and lace. 
 One dainty blue-stockinged foot was in evi 
 dence, with the kid slipper off at the heel 
 and dangling loosely, as the ankle was wagged 
 to keep the hammock in motion. She had 
 a fresh magazine up before her face, and was 
 reading aloud a most wonderful tale of Japan. 
 Mrs. Lestrange, still a monument of woe as 
 to garments, sat with her chair turned side 
 ways, so as to face the reader, and sorted, 
 on her sorrowful lap, embroidery silks of 
 the most light-hearted and frivolous hues. 
 A Maltese cat on the window-ledge made 
 her toilet with assiduity, and a handsome 
 collie pup a couple of months old sat up 
 right on his haunches beside the hammock, 
 and watched the swaying slipper with mis 
 chief in his eyes. 
 
 The ladies had discussed St. John, of 
 course, for in country solitudes even the 
 casual appearance of an interesting stranger 
 becomes an item of moment, just as a trivial 
 happening will elevate itself into an event. 
 They had decided that he was very pleasant 
 and gentlemanly, and that it was a pity they 
 should see no more of him. Of course there 
 
(17 
 
 could be no calling at Marsh Mallow by the 
 male representative of the Fontaines, for the 
 manner in which Colonel Lawless had met 
 former advances had proved an effectual quie 
 tus to neighborly amenities. 
 
 "And," quoth Mrs. Lestrange, conclusively, 
 " if the stranger within the gate isn t called 
 upon and so bidden welcome, he s mighty 
 apt to keep himself to himself during the 
 term of his sojourn. So senseless of Colonel 
 Lawless to take this ultra stand about the 
 war, when he isn t even an American, and 
 wouldn t be if he could. I d just as well 
 draw a line about the War of the Roses. If 
 he were a Virginian born, or a Southerner 
 of any sort, it wouldn t be so ridiculous. It 
 wasn t his war." 
 
 Which was doubtless the proper stand 
 point from which to regard the matter, only, 
 unfortunately, men cling to nonsensical prej 
 udices much tighter than to things able- 
 bodied with wisdom. And an adopted quarrel 
 is often nearer to the heart than one which 
 comes in natural sequence. 
 
 It was therefore a surprise as well as a 
 pleasure to behold St. John ascend the gal- 
 
lery steps, with his hat and riding-crop in 
 one hand, and the other extended with beam 
 ing cordiality. Mrs. Lestrange permitted her 
 self a soft Spanish expletive of amazement, 
 sotto voce, and then rose to welcome him, 
 jumbling, with one hand, her nicely sorted 
 silks into confusion again. And Judy lifted 
 herself upright in the hammock so suddenly 
 that her slipper fell off, and was instantly 
 pounced upon by the puppy, who sped off with 
 it, utterly indifferent to the first principle of 
 canine duty, which is to stand solid and bark 
 at a stranger until ordered to desist. 
 
 The puppy fled along the gallery hilari 
 ously, with Judy and St. John both in pur 
 suit. When they divided forces so as to 
 head him off, he curled his legs under him and 
 let himself roll off the gallery, alighted on a 
 soft bit of grass right side up, and bound 
 ed away to a rose thicket, with intent to 
 there ensconce himself with his prize and 
 chew it to atoms. St. John leaped after him, 
 and Judy sat herself down on the gallery 
 steps, with one foot tucked under her, and 
 laughed. 
 
 In a moment St. John, flushed but trium- 
 
phant, returned, holding the slipper at dif 
 ferent altitudes, and inciting the puppy 
 that circled around him in a succession of 
 jumps to have at it again. 
 
 "Nice little dog that," he announced, cheer 
 fully. " He showed his teeth and growled 
 finely when I tweaked the slipper away ; had 
 to be boxed smartly to make him drop it, too. 
 But he bears no malice eh, doggalums? See 
 him leap for it ! He hasn t hurt it, barring a 
 little wetting of the kid. Here, let me put it 
 on for you." 
 
 He knelt on a lower step and tilted the 
 shoe, and Judy, with a manner as unembar 
 rassed as his own, poked out a dainty little 
 foot from beneath her skirts and submitted 
 to his ministration. The puppy looked on 
 with his head cocked on one side, and a 
 world of speculation in his eyes. And Mrs. 
 Lestrange bent over her silks with a smile of 
 great subtlety. 
 
 The talk naturally started from St. John s 
 former visit ; and the subject of animals be 
 ing for the moment uppermost, the young 
 man inquired the fate of the mule. 
 
 " I looked into the corral just before start- 
 
ing," he said, " and saw the old fellow nod 
 ding in the sun like a mandarin. lie looked 
 pretty " he paused, with a laugh. 
 
 " lie was" assented Judy, " just as much 
 so as he looked. The whiskey flew to his 
 head and settled. After your departure, I 
 also visited my patient. He was down by 
 that time stretched out prone, with his legs 
 and his neck made the most of. I thought 
 he was dead, and made lamentation ; but he 
 wasn t. He opened one eye and glowered 
 at me groggily, then shut it up again. He 
 was sleeping off his debauch. Later he 
 staggered up and went for some water, look 
 ing vague, and stepping with circumspection. 
 He d a splitting headache, too. I know it 
 because the sockets over his eyes puffed in 
 and out, and moisture beaded his brow. He 
 eschewed food likewise, and consumed gallons 
 of water. Poor old Dick ! Twas a sad ex 
 perience for an exemplary mule ! That wasn t 
 all, either." 
 
 " What else ?" smiled St. John. 
 
 " Much ; and of a like nature. Misfortunes 
 hunt in couples and packs, as that mule found 
 to his sorrow. He was the victim of igno- 
 
71 
 
 ranee and tenderness of heart. The men 
 didn t get in until noon the next day, so for 
 many hours Nat and I were herdsmen in 
 charge. I d distinguished myself, so next 
 morning at daybreak Nat tried his hand. 
 He had heard that a spree could be com 
 fortably tapered off with soda-water, and 
 feeling sorry for Dick s woe -begone con 
 dition, he undertook to compound some from 
 the house -keeping supplies. He wouldn t 
 wake up Carmelita to get him the soda box, 
 but undertook to rummage the kitchen for 
 himself, and the consequence was that that 
 unhappy mule got cooled off with a big dose 
 of baking powdfer." 
 
 St. John shouted with laughter. 
 
 "You should set up in practice, you two," 
 he declared. " Such reckless self-confidence 
 and boldness in experiment would insure 
 you capital success. Is the beast still alive ?" 
 
 "Yes; but much depraved in character. 
 Our treatment affected his morals disas 
 trously, and only yesterday he put a climax 
 to a course of small rebellions by kicking 
 over a new cutting-machine and injuring it 
 mortally. This, you see, is a tale with a 
 
moral. I m thinking of sending it to Senor 
 Mcjarcs to get into shape for the blue-ribbon 
 people. Will you give it to him ?" 
 
 St. John laughed again. 
 
 " You ll have to hunt up another chron 
 icler," quoth he. " Mejares likes a glass of 
 wine himself upon occasion." 
 
 Then Mrs. Lestrange asked a question which 
 drifted the conversation away to St. John s 
 own affairs, and he expatiated with pleasure 
 upon the reception he had met with at Marsh 
 Mallow. 
 
 " It s more like home than any place I ve 
 struck in the States," he explained, eagerly. 
 " And my uncle s a dear old t>oy, full of prej 
 udices and conservatism, but loyal and ten 
 der-hearted under it all, when you get at him 
 right. It made a lump in my throat the first 
 time he got talking about my father to me, 
 and the days when they were little lads in 
 Devonshire. I don t remember much about 
 my father myself, for I was only four years 
 old when he died. My brother and sister re 
 member him better. My cousin Anne resem 
 bles my sister in many intangible ways, and 
 I really like her immensely." 
 
73 
 
 He seemed so unaffectedly pleased to put 
 his kindred before them in a becoming light, 
 and so completely ignored all strained rela 
 tions, that the ladies both warmed to him, and 
 put the requisite questions with a fair degree 
 of cordiality. Their interest in the Marsh 
 Mallow household, however, clustered most 
 naturally about Luis Mejares. He was, in a 
 measure, their own ; an American, even as 
 themselves, and doubly their own in being a 
 public character. They spoke of his work 
 with enthusiasm, and displayed that intimate 
 knowledge of it which is the finest possible 
 tribute. And St. John, out of his liking for 
 the man, drew for them many charming pict 
 ures of the novelist s home life. 
 
 Then Judy, at her aunt s suggestion, 
 brought out her guitar and sang for him a 
 madrigal of Mejares composition, in a voice 
 which vibrated through him with its sweet 
 ness. As she sang, his expression changed 
 subtly, softened, grew thoughtful, and touched 
 to a finer quality. He twisted the puppy s 
 soft, silken ears absently through his fin 
 gers, and when the girl finished gave simple 
 thanks, unsupplemented by comment or praise. 
 
Judy looked at him shyly through her lashes, 
 and met his eyes and was satisfied. And 
 Mrs. Lestrange, her silks now in order, smiled 
 quietly, and, during the rest of the call, as 
 sumed the burden of the conversation. 
 
VII 
 
 DURING the weeks following, St. John fell 
 into the way of spending a good deal of time 
 at the Fontaine hacienda. His uncle was 
 much occupied by a Mexican lawsuit, involv 
 ing the title to some property owned by his 
 son-in-law over the border, which Mejares was 
 incapacitated from actively looking after him 
 self by an unusually acute and prolonged at 
 tack of neuralgic rheumatism. His suffering 
 was intense, confining him frequently to his 
 bed, and his wife s time and thoughts were 
 filled with care for him, to the exclusion of 
 everything save imperative household duties. 
 St. John was as helpful as circumstances 
 would permit, but there were many unoccu 
 pied hours during which he must devise his 
 own amusement, and this he found quite 
 ready to his hand in the society of Judy Fon 
 taine. 
 
 With the Marsh Mallow stud at his dis- 
 
posal, the eight - miles ride dwindled to a 
 mere breather for horse and man ; and in 
 addition to his regular visits he would often 
 encounter Judy in her rides, and the pair 
 would have long scampers together, to their 
 mutual satisfaction and St. John s undoing. 
 
 Of her father, Captain Fontaine, the young 
 man saw relatively little, for the ranch was a 
 large one, and the vaqucros required a good 
 deal of looking after. St. John s visits were 
 paid at off hours, and he would never dine at 
 the hacienda, alleging as a reason that in the 
 evenings he could make himself useful at 
 home, and give his cousin Anne a rest ; be 
 sides which, at that time, his uncle would be 
 at leisure and want to talk to him. In pleas 
 ing himself, St. John had always a just ap 
 preciation of the legitimate -claims of others. 
 He had met Captain Fontaine, of course, and 
 considered him a wonderfully fine specimen 
 of physical manhood, with an exceptional 
 charm of manner, lie did not share Judy s 
 enthusiasm for her father in even a remote 
 degree, but he was sufficiently impressed with 
 the gentleman s attractions to wonder at his 
 twenty years connubial abstinence. 
 
77 
 
 One day, when they were riding together, 
 he rather astonished Judy by bluntly broach 
 ing the subject. 
 
 " It seems queer that your father never 
 married a second time, Miss Fontaine," he ob 
 served. "He s a wonderfully attractive man, 
 and his age doesn t hurt him ; prosperous, 
 too, and well accredited. Most widowers 
 marry. Men are not monogamists, as a rule. 
 Some theorists hold that they should be, and 
 I ve heard that the inhabitants of other earths 
 in the universe are ; but all that s clean aside 
 from the custom with us. We terrestrial fel 
 lows aren t exalted enough. / should think 
 that a man who d once had the comfort of a 
 wife would feel pretty lonesome when left to 
 himself. Have you ever thought that your 
 father might marry again ?" 
 
 Judy settled her hat before replying. They 
 had come to a bit of broken ground, and the 
 horses were walking. 
 
 " Yes, I have," Judy admitted. " And long 
 ago I used to be jealous whenever the idea 
 was mooted by the servants, you know, or 
 my school-mates. Not jealous for mamma, 
 because she died at my birth, and conse- 
 
qucntly is but a heavenly ideal to me ; but 
 jealous for myself. When I got old enough 
 I was sent to the convent school in San An 
 tonio, because it s accounted the best. They 
 take pupils who are outside of their com 
 munion, and papa could not bear to send me 
 very far away. The good Sisters there put 
 some sense into my silly noddle." 
 
 " On the subject of second marriages ?" 
 " On the subject of that which consecrates 
 all marriage the subject of love," she re 
 sponded, gravely. " They made me realize 
 the good Sisters that much that goes by the 
 name of affection is just selfishness in stolen 
 garments. They said that love is sunshine, 
 and that no one has a right to erect barriers 
 to turn it aside from their fellows ; that we 
 should rather clear them away, and keep the 
 atmosphere so that none of the life-giving 
 rays are weakened in force or dissipated. It 
 is a great responsibility to set one s self up 
 and dictate. They said love could be best 
 demonstrated by self-sacrifice. That set me 
 thinking. I knew that papa had promised 
 my mother not to marry again until I was 
 grown and able to take care of myself. That 
 
looked to me hard, when papa was still a 
 young man when she died. When I was 
 about fourteen I told him so, and that I was 
 quite willing he should marry again if it 
 would be for his happiness." 
 
 St. John felt touched. " What was his 
 answer?" he queried, gently. 
 
 Judy laughed. " He pinched my cheeks 
 till they burned, and then kissed me," she 
 said. " Then he told me that he had not yet 
 seen a woman he accounted worthy to fill 
 mamma s place. So that was comfortable for 
 us both, you see, and I hadn t the feeling that 
 I might be spoiling his life. It is a hideous 
 thing to spoil another life. And I really 
 would not object to a step-mother who was a 
 very nice woman, and loved papa well enough 
 to put his happiness first." 
 
 St. John bent towards her a little. 
 
 " You may marry yourself," he said, and 
 a glow leaped from his heart to his eyes. 
 
 Judy kept hers averted, scooping up her 
 horse s mane with her crop, and throwing it 
 from side to side. 
 
 " Things that are stranger have happened," 
 she murmured, non-cominittally. 
 
" That would not be strange," St. John as 
 serted. " It is a natural an inevitable se 
 quence. Women like you are made to bless 
 men s lives; to fill their hearts and homes 
 with light and love and a glory of happi 
 ness." 
 
 lie paused abruptly and caught his breath 
 hard. It had rushed over him in a strong wave 
 that he loved her himself that he wanted 
 her; yearned for her with every force and fibre 
 of his being. And behind this wave, a wake 
 flotsam, came the conviction that for a man 
 without income or prospects to feel as he did 
 was little short of madness. He steadied 
 himself, and forced back the words which 
 thronged to his lips, lie must first canvass 
 this matter alone, and decide whether he had 
 a right to speak. 
 
 The balance of the ride was unsatisfacto 
 ry, long silences being disrupted with eager 
 explosions of talk about irrelevant matters. 
 Much earlier than her wont Judy insisted 
 upon turning homeward, giving as a reason 
 that her aunt s visit was hurrying to a close. 
 Mrs. Lestrange s migratory family were on 
 the point of reassembling, and it behooved 
 
81 
 
 the wife and mother to return to Galveston 
 to welcome them. 
 
 Whether or not the girl divined St. John s 
 perturbation, and had no wish to precipitate 
 a climax, is an open question. Certain it is 
 that a new expression had come to his face ; 
 and that feminine insight in love matters 
 might pass muster for revelation. 
 
VIII 
 
 IN his own room that night St. John went 
 over the situation. He accepted the great 
 fact of his love unhesitatingly, unquestion- 
 ingly, as he accepted other great facts of his 
 being. There was even in his recognition of 
 it that fine humility, that tender wistfulness 
 and solemnity which a true-natured man will 
 always feel when, for the first time, he basks in 
 the glory which transforms the world. The 
 impulse was in him to uncover his head, as 
 one does in a place of worship, and his love 
 seemed to him an element of marvellous puri 
 ty and value. 
 
 Abstractly he knew about love, had played 
 with the passion, and jested about it; but 
 never until now had he realized its force, or 
 recognized it for that which it is an omni 
 present and dominating factor of life. 
 
 After a little the fact of his love for Judy 
 gave place to desire to tell her about it, and 
 
jy, 
 
 tiRr* 
 
 m 
 
 ,/ 
 
 fp 
 
 . 
 
to win from her some evidence of reciprocal 
 passion. He went over their intercourse care 
 fully, seeking a sign. Could she ever love 
 him ? Did she guess that he loved her ? 
 Then he thought of her eyes, of her lips; of 
 the gracious curves of her form, and the soft 
 dimpling of her throat where it rose from the 
 shoulders. He dwelt on her tenderness, her 
 honor and truth ; and on the quaint humor 
 which gave zest to her speech and made in 
 tercourse with her an unflagging delight. He 
 compared her with the women of his own 
 land, and exulted to think that not one of 
 the titled matrons or maids whom he remem 
 bered was her peer in loveliness, brilliance, or 
 breeding. If only she could love him well 
 enough to become his wife, how he would 
 joy to parade her before the prejudiced dames 
 and ignorant damsels who presumed to look 
 down upon this vigorous land, and to account 
 its human products elemental and crude. 
 His sweet Southern wife would outshine 
 them all in her beauty and brightness. He 
 half extended his arms, as though by so do 
 ing he could compass the space which lay be 
 tween them ; his eyes glowed with a hot 
 
light, and with his thought he caressed her. 
 What would Maudie say if she could look 
 upon his love ? 
 
 The thought of his sister acted as a cold 
 douche upon St. John s passion ; he sat for a 
 second paralyzed, almost gasping. A point 
 of view suddenly presented itself which ill- 
 pleased him. He had known all along that 
 it existed, and, sooner or later, must be taken 
 into account ; but he hated it, and had will 
 ingly enough let passion thrust it one side. 
 He sprang to his feet and paced the floor 
 restlessly. He had fallen in love with a 
 wealthy man s daughter, and Lady Wolcott 
 would be delighted. He had fallen in love 
 with a wealthy man s daughter, and had just 
 twenty-five dollars in the world with which to 
 make a home for her. He drew his breath hard, 
 and then laughed the disproportion touch 
 ing his sense of humor. It was no laughing 
 matter, however. Lord ! what a fool he must 
 be, to sit weaving visions with only twenty- 
 five hard dollars to base them upon ! 
 
 True, he could work could establish him 
 self somewhere, and toil for success as other 
 men did. But where, and at what ? He had 
 
already demonstrated his incapacity for most 
 enterprises going, arid now, plus a reputation 
 for failure, and minus capital, he did not seem 
 to himself calculated for business pioneering 
 in new directions. The life of a ranchman 
 would, he knew, suit him admirably ; he liked 
 it in every detail, and had recognized his own 
 fitness for it from the first. Given, for a start, 
 a fair tract of country and a few cattle, and 
 he felt confident he could engineer his fort 
 unes to success : the round peg would have 
 gravitated to a hole of the proper shape and 
 proportions. This would be the sort of life 
 and home he would choose for himself, and 
 Judy was accustomed to it also, so that its 
 conditions would be no strain upon her. If 
 only it could be somehow managed. As he 
 stood, however, he was as well accoutred for 
 purchasing and equipping a ship of the line 
 as for buying and stocking a ranch of even 
 the most modest proportions. 
 
 He paused in his walk as the idea of his 
 uncle presented itself. Perhaps the Colonel 
 might back him in a venture. He was of 
 the old gentleman s blood his nephew and 
 namesake ; the son of a much-beloved broth- 
 
cr. Then, too, since his arrival he had been 
 given to understand in various unmistakable 
 ways that his own personality had not been 
 a disappointment to his kinsman. Surely all 
 this must constitute some sort of claim. 
 
 Then he remembered that he really knew 
 next to nothing of his uncle s resources ; that 
 the Colonel had a family of his own to pro 
 vide for, and, in addition, that he was un 
 reasonably therefore violently prejudiced 
 against the very people with whom his neph 
 ew wished to ally him. Then, too, the young 
 lady in the case was supposed to have flirted 
 (with disastrous results) with the Colonel s 
 own son. 
 
 St. John did not himself blame Judy in 
 the least. He felt convinced that whatever 
 may have occurred in the past must have 
 been entirely Tom Lawless s fault. Mascu 
 line vanity is prone to misconstrue social 
 empressement and natural amiability and the 
 gregarious instinct in women ; to mistake ev 
 idences of these harmless qualities for evi 
 dences of love. St. John was open to the 
 same charge himself, but similitude in case 
 did not strike him. Instead, he over judged 
 
87 
 
 his cousin, and being ignorant of love troubles, 
 and forceful by nature himself, could not make 
 necessary allowance for a weaker character and 
 wilder impulses. Still, he could see plainly 
 enough that, under existing circumstances, it 
 would require assurance to request Colonel 
 Lawless to smooth the path to marriage for 
 Judy Fontaine. 
 
 Mejares might help him perhaps. All pop 
 ular novelists are supposed by the ignorant 
 populace to coin money hand over fist, and 
 St. John knew that the work of Mejares was 
 in demand. But then the novelist was a 
 cripple, and, while his infirmities by no means 
 interfered with his ability to acquire wealth, 
 it seemed to St. John, striding about on strong 
 legs, rather mean for an able-bodied man to 
 borrow money of Mejares. 
 
 Then the devil tempted him with thoughts 
 of how easy life could be made for him by 
 others if only Judy should love him. But he 
 kicked the devil out with some very strong 
 language. A man should be self-supporting, 
 at least, whether he could be wife-supporting 
 or not. 
 
 lie tramped about a good part of the night, 
 
reviewing the situation in all its bearings, but 
 coming to no conclusions. When the chick 
 ens were crowing for day he betook himself 
 to bed and fell into uneasy slumber, diversi 
 fied by dreams of an uncomfortable quality, 
 chief among which was a vision of Captain 
 Fontaine s conducting him St. John into 
 an apartment of the hacienda, and there pre 
 senting him to a lady luxuriant enough to 
 become a mother in Israel, and to five grin 
 ning urchins already in evidence. This was 
 a possibility of the near future, his dream 
 father-in-law assured him, adding, impres 
 sively, " there will be long division, my dear 
 sir, very long division." 
 
IX 
 
 THE adage that "colors seen by candle 
 light are different seen by day " applies to 
 most things in life. St. John awoke very 
 cheerful, and with such energies as he pos 
 sessed in full force. While he splashed 
 through his bath, shaved himself, and got 
 into his garments, he elaborated a scheme 
 for his future which looked to him feasible. 
 With the capital in hand he would hie him 
 at once to San Antonio, and there consult 
 agents people who had that sort of business 
 in charge on the chances for getting a po 
 sition as manager on some cattle or sheep 
 ranch, with a definite salary on which a wife 
 might be supported. He remembered hav 
 ing heard that reliable, intelligent men were 
 sometimes in demand for positions of the 
 sort, and also that men of education were 
 preferred by gentleman owners. About this 
 matter he could, and would, consult with both 
 
.Ml 
 
 his uncle and Mejares, keeping, of course, his 
 interior motive concealed for the present. He 
 felt that he might count on both men for ad 
 vice, possibly for suggestion and influence. 
 There were many Englishmen about, even a 
 nobleman or two, and among them might 
 haply be found a berth for a fellow Briton. 
 
 Even with an assured position, St. John 
 knew that, financially speaking, he would be 
 no match for Judy ; but he had been in the 
 States long enough to discover that ethnical 
 values count at full worth with even the 
 stoutest republican. America is still too 
 quick with the blood of the old world for the 
 old-world precedents and prejudices to have 
 died out of consciousness. The young fellow, 
 as was natural, thought well of himself for be 
 ing English and a St. John, and, involuntarily, 
 assumed that both facts must count in his 
 favor. A man of birth and lineage stood in 
 less need of gilding than would a mere par 
 venu. So light of heart did he become, now 
 that he had evolved a definite scheme, that 
 lie fell to whistling Mejares madrigal as he 
 plied his hair -brushes, and visions of love 
 and prosperity, conjured up by his imagi- 
 
91 
 
 nation, flitted before him in alluring se 
 quence. 
 
 To reveal his passion at once to the girl, 
 he felt, might be premature, but he would 
 see her that day and prepare her for a possi 
 ble departure for a few days upon business. 
 And, having already so openly devoted him 
 self to her, it might be as well to leave in 
 her mind a tender suggestion or two to 
 work for him during his absence. Women 
 were delicate creatures, and required consid 
 erate handling. He would not have his dear 
 love hurt, even in amour propre, through neg 
 ligence of his. 
 
 Colonel Lawless, he found, had been sum 
 moned, at daybreak, to a distant part of the 
 ranch by an alarm of sickness among the 
 cattle, and might not be home for hours. 
 Mejares, however, was more at ease than he 
 had been for weeks, had been promoted to 
 his wheeled chair again, and was enjoying 
 the morning freshness in a sunny corner of 
 the gallery. This was told him by Mrs. Me 
 jares, as the pair breakfasted together, and 
 St. John noticed that she was pale, seemed 
 troubled, and had little or no appetite. When 
 
questioned, she admitted that she had slept 
 little the night before, and that her head 
 ached. 
 
 Then she diverted the talk from herself 
 and drifted it, by gradations too fine for mas 
 culine perception, to the people at the neigh 
 boring hacienda. She led St. John on spe 
 cially to discourse of Judy (which the young 
 man was not loath to do), and seemed curi 
 ously interested in discovering his impres 
 sions of her nature and characteristics. 
 
 "Is she at all tender-hearted?" Mrs. Me- 
 jares questioned, a trifle wistfully. " Sym 
 pathetic, I mean, and capable of putting her 
 self in another s place. That sort of nature 
 is rare. Many women who would not delib 
 erately set out to hurt anything, when they ve 
 done it inadvertently thrust the responsibil 
 ity away from them, and are not even sorry .- 
 What you tell me of Miss Fontaine seems 
 gentle and kindly, however; it attracts me." 
 
 St. John, with a lover s enthusiasm, prompt 
 ly asserted that he had given her but rags of 
 impressions, while the warp and woof of Miss 
 Fontaine s nature was of the fibre of which 
 angels are constructed. lie waxed fairly elo- 
 
03 
 
 quent, and gave Judy a character which no 
 finite woman possesses, or could by any pos 
 sibility sustain. And Mrs. Mejares listened 
 with so much complacence and such evident 
 appreciation, that her cousin had much ado 
 not to take her into his confidence on the 
 spot, and was only deterred from so doing 
 by the coming and going of servants. Surely 
 Anne must suspect something, he told him 
 self joyously, and had taken this way of as 
 suring him of her sympathy and interest. 
 Decidedly, Anne was a woman of penetra 
 tion and sweetness ; no wonder she reminded 
 him of Maudie, when she was so kindly and 
 affectionate. He went out on the gallery to 
 talk to Mejares in quite a glow of fraternal 
 feeling for Anne. 
 
 St. John did Mrs. Mejares far more than 
 justice ; the truth of the business being that 
 she had not the faintest suspicion of his love- 
 affair. During the major portion of his visit 
 she had been absorbed in family matters and 
 nursing, and, with the exception of meal 
 times and during the evenings, had given 
 little heed to her cousin s movements. When 
 he was out of the house, if she noted the 
 
.tl 
 
 fact, she supposed him to be away on the 
 range with her father, or amusing himself 
 with the horses. Her desire for information 
 about Miss Fontaine had been prompted by 
 purely personal motives. The previous even 
 ing she had committed an indiscretion which 
 she was seeking to justify to herself. Her 
 reason for interviewing St. John was because 
 she chanced to remember that he had some 
 acquaintance with the inmates of the neigh 
 boring hacienda. 
 
 Mejares laid aside his paper when St. John 
 joined him, and replied to all personal inqui 
 ries with his customary courtesy. He was 
 afraid to risk much motion yet, he explained, 
 when St. John offered to wheel him about ; 
 his pain was in abeyance for the time, but it 
 hung about, tiger-like, and might pounce on 
 him again at any moment. lie motioned his 
 guest to a seat, and strove to entertain him, 
 but with an absent atmosphere and in a per 
 functory manner. St. John noticed it at 
 once. 
 
 " See here, Luis," he remarked with com 
 fortable directness ; " that isn t necessary, 
 you know. You mustn t fancy you ve got to 
 
06 
 
 lay yourself out for me when you re bothered. 
 That sort of thing s a curse when a fellow s 
 mind isn t free, and I can see plainly enough 
 that you re in some sort of a hole. Can t I 
 help you out ? If so, I ll stay ; if not, I ll take 
 myself off until another time." 
 
 Mejares glanced up with a smile of appre 
 ciation. The other man s simple straight 
 forwardness made matters easy. He took a 
 sudden resolution. 
 
 " You ve got a deal of that rare quality 
 called common -sense, Clere," he responded. 
 " And a bit of it might be of service. I am 
 bothered, most particularly bothered, and I 
 don t quite see my way out. Perhaps you 
 can help me find it." 
 
 "All right," St. John said; "two heads 
 beat one, you know. We can corral the ani 
 mal together, I fancy. Let me see him." 
 
 " We can try, at all events," Mejares de 
 clared. "You re a man to be trusted and a 
 member of the family, so there s no reason 
 you should be excluded from counsel. Just 
 wheel me into the study, Clere. We ll be less 
 liable to interruption, and I want to talk con 
 fidentially to you." 
 
96 
 
 St. John did as requested, grinning inward 
 ly at this complete turning of the tables. lie 
 had come out with the intention of securing 
 advice, and, possibly, assistance, from Mejares, 
 and by a swift twirl of the wheel found him 
 self anticipated. " All the better," thought 
 he with great cheerfulness ; " my turn will 
 come later, and if I can give him a pretty 
 stout boost he ll be all the more willing to 
 give me one." Aloud he simply signified that 
 he was quite at the novelist s disposal. 
 
 Mejares settled himself irritably. "It s 
 about Tom," he announced, without circum 
 locution. " He s up a tree the worst sort. 
 A real top-lofty one, poor devil !" 
 
 " What s the matter ?" 
 
 " Quien sabe ! The usual thing, I suppose. 
 Bucking the tiger, and all that. Ecarte, 
 monte, rouge-et-noir, faro, and the whole 
 gamut of deviltry. Folly at the start and 
 ruin at the finish ! Tom comes out on bad 
 lands. They all do finally. lie s given a note 
 for three thousand, and he can t meet it." 
 
 St. John whistled. 
 
 When does it fall due ?" 
 
 " In a week. Tom sent me a letter by pri- 
 
vate hand last night. He s at a bit of a Mex 
 ican lay-out, a few jacals, a store and a bar 
 room, to the northwest here, sixty miles ; a 
 tag-rag sort of place, at the intersection of 
 trails, and mostly inhabited by greasers and 
 toughs. Not the sort of place for a self-re 
 specting fellow to sojourn, but it s close by. 
 Tom don t want to come home yet, and he 
 asks me to send the money to him there by 
 safe hand." 
 
 " Why didn t he ask his father ?" ques 
 tioned St. John, bluntly. 
 
 Mejares smiled. 
 
 "Because, with all his recklessness, Tom 
 has a most unbounded admiration and re 
 spect for his father, and won t willingly ap 
 pear to disadvantage before him. He s work 
 ed through pretty much all his scrapes with 
 out letting the padre know. This affair would 
 cut the old fellow deep, and Tom knows it. 
 The padre isn t a martinet, but he s rough on 
 some follies, and gambling is one of em. He 
 counts it not only dishonorable, but caddish 
 sinking a gentleman to the level of scalawags 
 and rowdies. Tom and I are near of an age, 
 and were chums at school before we became 
 
 7 
 
.IS 
 
 brothers-in-law. It wasn t such a pull to come 
 to me for help." 
 
 " But can you give it? Three thousand s 
 a big sum to hand over at short notice. Have 
 you got it by you ?" 
 
 " Not exactly ; but I can get it. I ve se 
 curities on which it can be easily raised, if 
 there was only time to go about the matter in 
 the regular way. But Tom s crowned his 
 folly by leaving his request until almost the 
 last moment, and then putting himself in a 
 hole with which there is no postal communi 
 cation. God knows what he did it for, unless, 
 as he hints, he expects me to drive up there 
 and straighten things out. I d do it too, but 
 for these cursed legs having downed me so 
 completely just now. The only way out I 
 can see, in the time allowed, will be for Tom 
 to take the securities, with a private letter of 
 instructions, over to Fort Twilight, and get 
 the adjutant there, who is a wealthy fellow 
 and a personal friend of my own, to fix up the 
 business until I can communicate with my 
 banker. It can be managed that way, only 
 I ve got to communicate with Tom at once, 
 and put him in the way of getting the money, 
 
99 
 
 and I don t feel right about trusting valuable 
 papers to any sort of a messenger. Then I m 
 not sure I can make certain points in regard 
 to the matter impressive enough in writing. 
 If Tom s been drinking, he mayn t half read 
 my instructions, or understand them. He 
 ought to be talked to and have things rubbed 
 into him. Ordinarily I could stand the trip 
 up yonder ; but now " he paused irritably. 
 
 St. John saw his drift at once. 
 
 " You d like me to go, perhaps," he sug 
 gested. 
 
 Mejares nodded emphatically. 
 
 " It would be the best way, if you wouldn t 
 mind it too much. I lay awake a good part 
 of the night studying it out. This last bout 
 of neuralgia has worsted me terribly, and 
 there is Anita also to be considered. We have 
 been married a long time, and had almost 
 given up hope ; but now you ve noticed 2" 
 
 St. John s face softened. " Yes, I ve no 
 ticed," he answered, gently. 
 
 " That being the case, you can see the im 
 portance of sparing her anxiety. If I make 
 the attempt myself, I ll have to justify it by 
 telling her about Tom, and then she ll have 
 
100 
 
 two worries, and fret herself ill over them. 
 Tom s escapades are enough on her mind 
 as it is, without this climax. The padre 
 ought to be spared, if possible, also. He s 
 getting into years now." 
 
 " I ve no sort of objection to going if you 
 think I can manage, and are willing to trust 
 me with the affair. But how about Tom ?" 
 
 " Tom be hanged !" returned Mejares, an 
 grily. " When a man plays the fool with his 
 eyes open, and flounders into a bog, he s got 
 no business dictating the method by which 
 he s to be pulled out. / // be thankful 
 enough if you ll take charge of the affair. 
 You re a stranger to Tom, and will appear 
 simply as my agent. I ll coach you on the 
 points I want pressed. It s asking a tre 
 mendous deal of you, Clere ; but I really see 
 no other way. The time s limited, and these 
 legs of mine are virtually a Bastile." 
 
 "That s all right," St. John hastened to 
 say. " I m more than pleased to oblige 
 you. Give me a straight lead in the busi 
 ness, and I ll work through to the best of 
 my ability." 
 
 " I m sure of it," acquiesced Mejares heart- 
 
101 
 
 ily. " For the padre s sake, and Anita s. 
 And see here, Clere : I don t ask you this 
 additional favor, you know, but if you could 
 get around Tom and make him cut deviltry 
 and come home for a bit, it would be the 
 best thing possible. An outsider can turn a 
 man sometimes when a member of his own 
 family would only make him kick by inter 
 fering. You ve tact, and sympathy, and 
 quite an uncommon lot of sense." 
 
 " Go on," grinned St. John ; " butter me 
 well while your hand s in. I m a model pre 
 ceptor of youth a regular sugar-coated nos 
 trum that children all cry for ; that s me. 
 But how about Tom? Some fellows are 
 devilish touchy." 
 
 " Tom isn t. He s a lovable fellow in the 
 main, or he wouldn t have such a pull on his 
 people. Brainy, too, as you know, and 
 could be no end of a credit if only he d get 
 into harness and trot straight. All Tom 
 lacks is self-restraint and common -sense. 
 I d like to rake him fore and aft just at 
 this present. But that s impossible unless 
 somebody will tole him home for me. 
 He might come if he knew about Anita. 
 
103 
 
 He s tremendously fond of his sister, is 
 Tom." 
 
 They discussed the matter in detail. Tom s 
 messenger had gone to Dundalk on business 
 of his own, but would return by Marsh Mal 
 low early the following morning, and could 
 serve St. John as a guide. A curiosity to 
 inspect a greaser settlement would satisfac 
 torily account for St. John s absence for a 
 few days, and so the matter could be kept 
 quiet. 
 
 " YouVe lifted a weight from my mind by 
 your kindness, Clere," Mejares said, grate 
 fully, when everything had been arranged. 
 " I ll not forget it either, you may rest as 
 sured. Just you come to me for a favor 
 when you want one, that s all." 
 
 St. John, having his favor already in mind, 
 grinned more than ever, and nodded. He 
 would not speak out yet, however. Time 
 enough for that when he should return with 
 his mission satisfactorily fulfilled. The idea 
 of occupying the position of mentor as well 
 as messenger caused him inward amusement. 
 
 "By George," he thought, ** I ve had a col 
 lie at my own heels trying to hunt me into 
 
103 
 
 decent pastures so long that it s droll to be 
 invited to play collie for somebody else. 
 Wouldn t Maudie laugh if she could see me 
 working her racket. I ll do my best to bring 
 this youngster in by the ear, if only for 
 Anne s sake. Dear, sweet soul ! how sympa 
 thetic she was this morning, and how inter 
 ested about Miss Fontaine ! No, Anne sha n t 
 be bothered about that precious brother of 
 hers on this deal if I can help it. And now 
 I must get to horse, and have a word with my 
 lady before absenting myself. Will she be 
 sorry, I wonder, and miss me ? I hope so. 
 God bless her !" 
 
ON returning from her unsatisfactory ride, 
 Judy dismissed her cavalier somewhat dis 
 tantly. The hacienda was in considerable 
 commotion, for letters had come up from 
 below which necessitated Mrs. Lestrange s 
 immediate departure. Her brother, who had 
 business in Rosalita,the nearest railway town, 
 would accompany her that far on her journey, 
 and remain away from home several days. 
 During his absence, a Mrs. Mitchel, the wife 
 of one of the ranchmen, a most respectable 
 woman, and sufficiently educated to be com 
 panionable, would, with her baby, come to 
 the hacienda and bear Judy company. She 
 had filled this office on sundry other occa 
 sions, so the young lady made no objection, 
 but at once set to work aiding her aunt with 
 her preparations. The start on the follow 
 ing day must be a soon one, for Rosalita was 
 a hundred miles distant, and Mrs. Lestrange 
 
105 
 
 always preferred making the entire trip in 
 her brother s buck-board. It did away with 
 the necessity of making connection with the 
 stage at Dundalk. 
 
 After sunset Nat came into the courtyard 
 and crossed to Judy s window with a note 
 in his hand. It had been given him by one 
 of the Marsh Mallow vaqueros, he explained, 
 with a charge to deliver it into the senoritcCs 
 own hand. Judy turned the envelope, ex 
 amining it by the waning light, but the hand 
 writing was unfamiliar, so she slipped it into 
 her pocket unopened. Her aunt needed her, 
 and she was in a hurry. The letter must 
 wait. Naturally, she supposed it must be 
 from St. John, and wondered at his writing 
 so soon after leaving her. He had never 
 written before. But who else at Marsh Mal 
 low would dream of writing to her ? 
 
 The satiny envelope lay within touch of 
 her hand all through the evening, which was 
 necessarily a short one, because of the early 
 start to be made the following day. When 
 she returned to her room Judy took it out 
 and laid it among the dainty toilet arrange 
 ments on her bureau, while she brushed out 
 
100 
 
 and plaited her masses of hair, and made her 
 self comfortable in dressing-gown and slip 
 pers. She was really curious to know what 
 St. John could have to say to her, but took 
 a childish delight in tantalizing herself. 
 When she could think of nothing else to do, 
 she seated herself in an easy-chair and broke 
 the seal, with a smile on her lips. 
 
 Although dated from Marsh Mallow that 
 very evening, the note was not from St. John. 
 Judy read it hurriedly, glanced at the sig 
 nature " A. Mejares " and then reread it 
 slowly, her eyes widening and her breath 
 coming quickly. 
 
 It was a pitiful note of the sort which 
 impulsive, tender-hearted women will write, 
 on an unconsidered impulse, in a moment 
 of stress. It did not anger Judy as a com 
 munication on the same theme, couched in 
 different terms, might have done. There was 
 no reproach in it, and no vexing insinuations. 
 A few facts were implied, and an appeal 
 made. That was all. 
 
 The writer was nearing her time of trou 
 ble, she said, and the closeness of mother 
 hood had caused her to recall and understand 
 
107 
 
 an expression she had seen long ago on her 
 own mother s face when she Anita a child 
 of six, had been first taken in to see the 
 brother which God had given her the ex 
 pression of celestial fruition, won, she now 
 knew, by the suffering and sacrifice of love. 
 Memory of that mother -look, and love for 
 her own unborn babe, had interplayed within 
 her and vanquished all pride and foolishness. 
 She could not go down to the valley of death 
 without trving to comfort and save her own 
 mother s child from the folly and reckless 
 ness into which he had plunged to stifle the 
 pain of his heart-hurt. Miss Fontaine must 
 know how fine were his traits, how noble and 
 generous his impulses. She could not help 
 knowing. And then he was so clever, so 
 lovable, so eagerly enthusiastic. Those who 
 could rise to the noblest altitudes could also 
 plumb the depths ; it was the heritage of a 
 vital, impassioned nature. And with men of 
 this sort love was all-powerful love lifted 
 them, love debased them. The fruition of 
 love made of them men greater than their 
 fellows ; the futility of love was as a whip 
 of scorpions urging them to destruction. 
 
108 
 
 Poor Tom, love-hounded, was wrecking his 
 life in the effort to forget love. Would the 
 woman to whom he had given his all do 
 nothing to save him ? a word would suffice, 
 almost a look, to stem the current of his 
 course and turn it to good. It was a great 
 power this a great responsibility, which 
 God had given into the hands of women. 
 With love and hope in his future, Tom s 
 present would steady, and withdraw itself 
 from evil contact which begot reckless con 
 duct. Tom knew nothing of her writing, 
 Anita said. He was near, it was true, at a 
 small place called Vallejo, sixty miles to the 
 northwest; but he would not have written 
 himself, nor have permitted his sister to 
 write, had he known. It was on her own 
 responsibility that this appeal was made 
 because the motherhood within her yearned 
 in sympathy with that sweet remembered 
 motherhood of which Tom was the offspring. 
 That was all, and the fact that the poor 
 woman had believed every syllable that she 
 set down, and had written out of a full heart, 
 gave it force. Judy, although much less 
 blinded to Tom s weaknesses than was his 
 
109 
 
 sister, felt a lump rise in her throat, and her 
 eyes smart with tears. She laid down the 
 letter and sat, like a culprit arraigned, her 
 thoughts skurrying back into the past, seek 
 ing her sin to confront herself with. An 
 oppression of responsibility seemed settling 
 down upon her, and her emotions were so 
 stirred that, for the moment, she could not 
 determine how much was hers of right, and 
 how much might lawfully be thrust aside. 
 Nor could she see clearly that misery is no 
 excuse for wilful self-degradation. A man 
 should regard manhood s worth and its in 
 herent responsibilities. The very fact of 
 Tom s having sought to dispel disappoint 
 ment by folly, or worse, proved him deficient 
 in the qualities potent to win and hold the 
 love of a woman like Judy. But by some 
 natural paradox the girl s very superiority 
 prevented her from realizing this, and, in 
 stead of judging Tom, she humbled herself, 
 feeling constrained by issues and ideals the 
 like of which had, apparently, small weight 
 with her lover. She dropped her face on 
 her hands, and wept bitterly and guiltily, 
 because Tom was said to be going wrong for 
 
110 
 
 love of her; and knew so little of love her 
 self as to be ignorant that it is passion, not 
 love, which, under disappointment, generates 
 evil impulses. True love makes a sanctuary 
 of the heart, not a hell. 
 
 Being ignorant as yet of all this, Judy sat 
 in sackcloth, so to speak, and belabored her 
 breas^ with vain woe. And underneath all, 
 perdu, in sub-consciousness, vanity lay, tick 
 led softly under the fifth rib, and winking 
 complacently to the sort of self-love which is 
 gratified by implied possession of power. 
 
 The girl s sin, after all, had been nothing 
 heinous rather folly and thoughtlessness 
 long persisted in, than deeper delinquency. 
 A tougher conscience and less refined taste 
 would have held it as nothing, or a pastime 
 of pleasure. At the school festival in San 
 Antonio, where she had been a gay debutante, 
 and Tom Lawless the first good -looking 
 young fellow who had ever looked love in 
 her eyes, she had flirted with him joyously 
 give and take with neither party in earnest. 
 That had been fair enough, but later it had 
 not been fair, for, ere he followed her to 
 Galveston, the man had come into a heritage 
 
Ill 
 
 of deep earnestness, and the fullest passion 
 of which he was capable. During those Gal- 
 veston weeks the best that could be said for 
 Judy was that she had not meant to wrong 
 Tom. She liked him better than any man 
 she had yet seen, and let him know it ; she 
 enjoyed his attentions, and let him see it ; 
 she even accepted his love in a tacit sort of 
 way, believing herself always just on the 
 point of returning it. 
 
 And so she might have done, drifting into 
 an engagement as women will, despite in 
 nate recognition of uncongeniality, but for 
 Tom s own conduct. How could she help 
 shying off when she found out from actual 
 experience the spasmodic quality of her lov 
 er s character. Her instincts were for well- 
 regulated methods, and law and order ; and 
 Tom existed in paroxysms. Could she help 
 disgust when she saw him not always able to 
 control his appetites ? or a species of moral 
 revulsion when she found his views on many 
 points unstable, and capable of the most be 
 wildering gymnastics ? The truth was, Tom s 
 character was too complex for Judy s com 
 prehension ; therefore, instead of growing 
 
112 
 
 towards him, as she fully intended, she had 
 grown away. 
 
 She had not intended giving up her friend : 
 she liked Tom, and always had, and always 
 would like him ; but when she had been 
 fiercely arraigned for trifling with a man s 
 heart for her amusement, and, when weary of 
 the pastime, casting it aside, what could she 
 do but fly into a rage and hurl back the 
 charge with equal fire ? 
 
 Still, with his sister s pitiful note in her 
 hands, Judy s conscience ached sorely, and 
 she repented her that she had flirted with a 
 grievous repentance. 
 
 She got little sleep that night, and that 
 which visited her was troubled by dreams, 
 and did her no good. In helping the travel 
 lers off the following morning, she heartened 
 up a bit, but that excitement was soon over, 
 and, when the tail of the buck-board had 
 disappeared in the distance, misery laid its 
 claw on her again, and grimly accompanied 
 her whithersoever she went. Mrs. Mitchel 
 and her baby were not to arrive until late in 
 the afternoon, so she had not even that poor 
 distraction. 
 
113 
 
 If only she could devise some way to help 
 Tom. without personal interference ! That, 
 of course, was quite out of the question, as 
 even his sister would acknowledge, could she 
 but know the arcana of things. What a 
 sweet woman she seemed, this Anita Me- 
 jares so tender and womanly. If Tom 
 could be enticed home again and subjected to 
 home influences, surrounded by the love of 
 his own people, which must hold to him 
 through all, and bear with him, and which 
 might exhibit itself without limit why, 
 surely that would be best. The constant af 
 fection of this lovely sister, the interest and 
 companionship of his father and brother-in- 
 law, would surely fill life with value and 
 profit once more. She remembered well 
 Tom s talk of his people ; his unbounded re 
 spect and admiration for that noble-looking, 
 attractive old soldier, towards whom she her 
 self often felt drawn despite his provoking 
 and unreasonable prejudices ; his warm love 
 for his sister, and his almost venerating affec 
 tion for the genius and character of his dis 
 tinguished brother-in-law. She had always 
 thought Tom at his best when he discoursed 
 
114 
 
 of his home life and people, and so had en 
 couraged him often to do so, until her own 
 knowledge of and interest in the Marsh Mal 
 low household had become intimate and thor 
 ough. 
 
 If only her whilom lover could be brought 
 back to his own! She did not actively think 
 of the prodigal son, but she unconsciously 
 wished that a similar experience might de 
 velop in Tom ; that he might become dis 
 gusted with the swine husks and mire, and 
 arise and return unto his father s house. 
 
XI 
 
 IT was in this mood that St. John found 
 her when he came over, quick with his own 
 love and hope, and intent on making initial 
 amatory advances. They had barely touched 
 hands, however, when his lover s instinct in 
 formed him that her atmosphere was unpro- 
 pitious. It dashed him ; but he bore up, and 
 hoped for better luck presently instead of 
 which he got worse. 
 
 Judy entertained him in spiritless fashion, 
 telling him of her aunt s departure and her 
 father s plans ; of a new colt that had ap 
 peared in the watches of the night ; and of 
 the duenna she herself expected to share her 
 solitude. Then she listened politely to St. 
 John s own bit of news, but seemed in no 
 way affected by it. Which was not to be 
 wondered at, since her lack-lustre atmosphere 
 had taken all the snap out of St. John, so 
 that instead of announcing his departure for 
 
116 
 
 a brief season in the tenderly suggestive man 
 ner he had contemplated, he brought it out 
 casually, in a bluff, off-hand way, as though 
 it were a matter of small moment, and no 
 special interest. 
 
 It was all very triste and disconcerting ; 
 but then, as has been shown, Judy was in the 
 phase of emotional depression in which one s 
 estimate of one s self strikes bottom. Then, 
 too, her mind was full of Tom Lawless, so 
 that, for the nonce, Clere St. John was out of 
 touch with her. 
 
 The next moment he had put himself into 
 the very citadel of things, so to speak, with 
 one sentence. 
 
 " This place to which I m bound Vallejo 
 doesn t amount to much, they say ; but 
 Mejares has business there, and is tied by 
 the legs, as you know. My going is purely 
 to accommodate him." 
 
 Judy pricked up her ears, and faced about 
 briskly. This was the name Anita had men 
 tioned the place where Tom was. 
 
 "Where is Vallejo?" she questioned. 
 
 Come, thought St. John, this is better ; and 
 he gave the desired information with per- 
 
117 
 
 spicuity. It was a beastly little hole, from ac 
 counts a greaser settlement ; but as he had 
 never seen one, nor even a Mexican jacal, it 
 might prove interesting for a few hours. 
 Should he bring her any trophy of the place 
 bead-work, or fossils, or unpolished gems ? 
 Greasers often had very good bits of moss- 
 agate, onyx, or jasper, in the rough, picked 
 up in their peregrinations. If she had a fancy 
 for that sort of thing it would give him pleas 
 ure to bear it in mind. 
 
 Judy let him talk on without interruption. 
 Her mind was a perfect maelstrom of im 
 pulses and desires, in which discrimination 
 eddied and whirled, and prudence got sucked 
 under and carried out of sight. Here was a 
 chance for poor Tom. St. John was his 
 cousin a man of his blood and the guest 
 of his father. He would be obliged to take 
 interest in Tom and desire to help him. 
 Blood was said to be thicker than water to 
 constitute a tie of worth even between those 
 personally unknown to each other; it had 
 been proven so in St. John s own case, when 
 Tom s people had sought him out a stranger 
 and invited him to their home and affec- 
 
118 
 
 tion. St. John himself owned the force of 
 blood ties ; she had heard him often admit 
 it ; surely he would not repudiate this one, 
 when the kinsman was in such sore need of 
 countenance and aid ! St. John was a good 
 man, tender and true and strong-natured ; he 
 had thoughtfulness for others, and intelli 
 gent consideration, lie was going to this 
 very place where Tom was this Vallejo 
 and would doubtless see his cousin, or could, 
 without trouble, provided he could be made 
 to comprehend the necessity for it. Almost 
 it seemed like a providence that St. John 
 should visit Vallejo. 
 
 That the business of the novelist might in 
 some way be connected with his brother-in- 
 law never entered her mind ; nor that St. 
 John might misconstrue her own motive 
 should she interfere. Conventionalities have 
 slack hold on isolated people, and, as far as 
 Judy knew, St. John was ignorant of her 
 former intimacy with his cousin. She had 
 never talked of Tom to him, nor did she 
 realize that others might have done so. Her 
 dominant thought in the matter was that, 
 through St. John s aid, she might undo some 
 
119 
 
 of the harm she had done, and so quiet her 
 conscience. 
 
 She spoke out on impulse and without 
 considering her words ; and in less than five 
 minutes St. John was in possession of the 
 fact of her knowledge that his cousin, Tom 
 Lawless, was in this very village to which he 
 was bound ; that she was aware also of the 
 wild life he was leading, and that she earnest 
 ly desired that influence might be brought to 
 bear which would withdraw him from reck 
 less associations and give him a fresh start. 
 
 St. John squared himself, and his face 
 paled. It was a bad blow to him that she 
 should care so much ; totally unexpected, too, 
 since he had unconsciously held her apart 
 from other men in his thought since realiz 
 ing his own love for her. In his mental con 
 fusion at this abrupt transition of the point 
 of view he overlooked many details, and 
 jumped to the conclusion that she had loved 
 Tom all along, and now wished the estrange 
 ment between them to be brought to an end. 
 But to ask him, of all people, to aid her, 
 seemed to him terrible. She could not know ! 
 She must never have guessed his own feeling 
 
130 
 
 for her ! He groaned in spirit, but his body 
 was silent. 
 
 Judy, engrossed with her own thought, 
 and utterly heedless of her companion s 
 changing expression, proceeded to press her 
 point. 
 
 " He ought to be helped to his feet again," 
 she urged, vehemently. " Some man of his 
 blood should seek him out, be gentle with 
 him, and persuade him to give up and come 
 home. It is terrible that he should be going 
 wrong and no hand extended to check him ! 
 He is capable of so much that is good ; so 
 much that is fine and noble. His friends are 
 all anxious so miserably anxious !" 
 
 St. John bent forward with a strange look 
 in his eyes a compelling look, as of one who 
 would have truth at all costs. 
 
 "Are you anxious?" he demanded. 
 
 Something in his tone brought the blood 
 to Judy s face with a rush ; but she stood to 
 her guns. 
 
 " Yes, I am," she replied, stoutly, " very 
 anxious. Tom Lawless is an old friend, and 
 it hurts me that he should be wasting his life. 
 I think some one should interfere. You are 
 
121 
 
 of his blood, young like himself, the guest of 
 his father I think you should interfere." 
 
 It was on the point of St. John s tongue to 
 question why she should delegate the task 
 to another why she did not undertake it 
 herself? Surely no other could have so 
 much influence, or such a chance for success. 
 Manhood restrained him, however, and, in 
 stead, he said abruptly, almost savagely : 
 
 " Why should / be set to play mentor ? 
 Why not his father, or Luis ? They are near 
 er, and more fitted for the task." 
 
 " That s just it," pleaded Judy, eagerly. 
 " They are too near. Interviews would be 
 too untrammelled. They could, and would, 
 employ language that you that any outsider 
 would be chary of using. They would have 
 the matter too much at heart for diplomacy, 
 and, instead of leading Mr. Lawless, tactfully, 
 to see what a blunder he s making, they d 
 confront him with it vehemently and put him 
 in a rage. Their feeling, and his own shame, 
 would react in obstinacy. No, no : don t 
 you see that one outside one who cares a 
 little, but not overwhelmingly will be best? 
 Then, too, you are going to this place where 
 
122 
 
 he is. It will be all in your hands, so to 
 speak. Oh, you can help him, I know, if 
 only you will." 
 
 In her earnestness two great tears welled 
 to her eyes and made of them soft, starry 
 lakes of entreaty. The sight stung St. John 
 to the quick. He misunderstood her entire 
 ly and small blame to him for it. He gave 
 her emotion a meaning apart from the true 
 one, and silently ground his teeth. Her rea 
 soning was so good also for Lawless ; and 
 her pleading had been convincing. Oh, the 
 pain of it ! the brutal, bitter pain of it ! 
 
 He could not sit there like a block, how 
 ever, and allow a woman to weep. He was 
 obliged to be good to her ; to be gentle with 
 her. It must have cost her something to ap 
 peal to him. Even in his misery, he told him 
 self that. He must be considerate and gen 
 tle, because she was a woman, and because 
 he loved her. 
 
 He got himself to his feet, how he scarcely 
 knew, and steadied his voice to calmness. 
 
 " Don t cry any more," he said, simply. 
 " I ll do what I can for you. I will, on my 
 honor." 
 
123 
 
 He did not notice the pronoun made use 
 of, nor did Judy. A horrible intuition of her 
 mistake was forcing itself on her conscious 
 ness. The reflex of his emotion had touched, 
 and was stirring her ; memories and sugges 
 tions thrust themselves forward, jumbled cha 
 otically, but none the less significant. Her 
 eyes widened, regarding him piteously ; her 
 lips parted, and her breath came in sobs. 
 
 " You don t understand me," she panted. 
 "You you" then the impossibility of any 
 explanation swept over her, like a great tidal 
 wave, and stranded her on a reef of dismay 
 and regret. 
 
 She covered her face burning now with 
 confusion with her hands and turned away 
 from him, but not before, for one vital in 
 stant, she had seen the poor fellow s heart in 
 his eyes. And St. John, misunderstanding 
 her more completely than ever, accepted his 
 mute dismissal, and withdrew himself. 
 
 Judy, left to herself, dropped down in a 
 heap on the sofa, quivering with mortifica 
 tion, and wept with all her might. When 
 the fountain of her tears was exhausted, 
 she lifted herself, all dishevelled, and walked 
 
124 
 
 across the room to a mirror and looked deep 
 into her own eyes, and addressed remarks to 
 herself which, had they been levelled at an 
 other person, must have caused that person 
 abasement. 
 
XII 
 
 ST. JOHN took himself and his shattered 
 hopes off in such order as he could manage, ev 
 ery sob of Judy s finding its echo in his heart. 
 So that was the end of it all of his beauti 
 ful dream of a home and a wife in this alien 
 land ; a dream which had promised to change 
 into poetry of the noblest and best the dull, 
 sordid struggle for existence amid unpropi- 
 tious conditions. It was all gone to smash 
 broken like a prismatic globe formed by a 
 child s breath and set afloat in the sunlight. 
 Through and through, from start to finish, it 
 had been a failure, this American experience 
 of his ; mere fluctuations of high hope and 
 flat and utter downfall. He had just as well 
 give it up and go back to England, and let 
 Maudie, or even his own brother Tom, map 
 out the balance of his life for him, and mar 
 ry him to a cotton-spinner s daughter if they 
 would. It would be all one to him, for this 
 
126 
 
 last cropper had about used him up, wind 
 and limb. He would almost as soon be led 
 off the field and shot as anything else, in his 
 present mood. 
 
 His heart ached with a pain that surprised 
 him, so much more acute was it than mere 
 physical torture. He felt nerveless and bat 
 tered, like a man who had just pulled through 
 an illness. His love did not love him never 
 would love him, he told himself, over and 
 over, with desperate iteration. She could 
 not love him : she loved another man. 
 
 And what sort of man ? A fellow without 
 stamina enough to keep himself straight until 
 a temporary misunderstanding should right 
 itself. A fellow who flung himself devilward, 
 like a spoiled, inconsequent child, because 
 the thing wanted did not drop into his grasp 
 at once. A fellow whose conduct brought 
 tears to her eyes, and forced her to the hu 
 miliation of seeking outside aid in her ex 
 tremity. Bah ! it was wellnigh inconceivable 
 that this thing should be ! 
 
 In his jealous bitterness, St. John forgot 
 the general impression that the break be 
 tween Judy and his cousin had been regard- 
 
127 
 
 ed as final, and might have been so accepted 
 by the young man himself. What could Tom 
 know that hypothesis being granted of 
 Judy s present attitude, or that which St. 
 John assumed to be her present attitude ? 
 This point of view failed to present itself ; 
 and if it had, in St. John s present mood, he 
 would doubtless have growled that Lawless 
 should have divined how matters stood by 
 intuition ; or, in any event, have kept straight 
 for the sake of his own manhood a posi 
 tion which could not be well controverted. 
 
 And yet St. John himself was exhibiting 
 an obtuseness equivalent to that with which 
 he credited his cousin. His own intuition 
 was equally at fault, and to the full as blind 
 ed by personal emotion. Had he been capa 
 ble of reasonable analysis, his own sensibility 
 must have shown him how impossible it would 
 be for a woman who truly loves a man to in 
 vite an outsider to inspect with her that man 
 at a disadvantage. She could not do it, even 
 with the laudable intention of invoking aid 
 to help him slough off his follies. If she 
 knew her ideal to be tarnished, and love 
 burned in her heart, she would endeavor to 
 
hide the pitiful knowledge even from her 
 own sight. It is when friendship, not love, 
 rules a woman in her connection with a man 
 that she can be reasonable about him. And 
 had St. John been less perturbed himself, he 
 must have realized that Judy had been most 
 reasonable about his cousin. 
 
 But, lover-like, he saw nothing save his 
 own aching heart, and Judy, all shaken and 
 pleading. And the more he thought about 
 Tom the less patience he had, and the more 
 inclined he felt to let that brother sinner 
 " gang to t deil his ain gait." It is even to 
 be feared that he grimly decided that such 
 a fate would be good enough for him. 
 
 lie tramped the floor of his chamber half 
 of the night, fuming and fretting that he 
 would have nothing more to do with the 
 business, even while he knew positively that 
 he must go through with it, since he could 
 not in honor leave Mejares in the lurch. It 
 eased him to make futile protests, even when 
 acutely conscious of their futility. His gorge 
 could overflow into them as it rose. 
 
 " I must keep faith with Luis," he groaned. 
 " lie has my word on it devil take it. I ve 
 
129 
 
 got to take this money safe to that fool, or 
 be mansworn. Much good may it do him ! 
 But this elder-brother business I ll be hanged 
 if I ll undertake. Let him pull himself up. 
 He ll get help enough without me." 
 
 Then the vision of Judy returned, and 
 words he himself had spoken came back to 
 him. Had not he promised to help her? 
 and that, too, on his honor. He writhed, but 
 underneath it all he knew that that promise 
 of his would hold him with a grip of steel. 
 
 Towards daybreak he threw himself on his 
 bed and dropped into heavy slumber, dream 
 less and deep the sleep of exhaustion. And 
 at the time appointed he got him to horse, 
 and rode forth to the assistance of his rival 
 in a nobler and more manly spirit. 
 
XIII 
 
 A COUPLE of days passed cventlcssly, and 
 during them Judy recovered her tone and 
 much of her customary light -heartedness. 
 During the hours which immediately followed 
 St. John s departure she had put herself on 
 the rack of humiliation, and turned every 
 conceivable thumb-screw and pulley by which 
 amour propre might be tortured. She had 
 applied unflattering epithets to her conduct, 
 and decided, without appeal, that in blunder 
 ing officiousness and besotted idiocy she was 
 entitled to full graduate honors. She had 
 poured out perfect libations of tears over 
 the whole miserable situation, and over St. 
 John s probable estimate of her. And then 
 had suddenly bethought her of her own good 
 intentions, and also of the look in St. John s 
 eyes at the last. These reflections so cheered 
 her that she took heart of grace to believe 
 that, when St. John should calmly review 
 
131 
 
 the affair, enlightenment would come to him. 
 Surely, if a man felt that way himself, he 
 must understand that, if a woman felt that 
 way, she could not possibly do that which 
 she Judy had done. This was incoherent, 
 but, apparently, satisfactory. When St. John 
 should return, matters would adjust them 
 selves comfortably once more. 
 
 The prime factor in this return of cheerful 
 ness was not, however, hard common-sense, 
 but Mrs. Mitchel s baby, an engaging young 
 person of eighteen months old, who was hav 
 ing a respite from the horrors of dentition, 
 and, with true feminine philosophy, devoting 
 the interim to enjoyment and the acquisition 
 of accomplishments. She was a pretty little 
 creature, and manifested a most flattering 
 preference for Judy over every other woman 
 at the hacienda, and as a natural consequence 
 Judy became, for the nonce, her playmate 
 and nurse. Merry romps the pair had on 
 the gallery, and Judy taught the child to 
 ride on the puppy s fat back, to that ani 
 mal s annoyance, and to caper unsteadily to 
 music. 
 
 " See,wmo /" she would say, seating herself 
 
133 
 
 on the gallery floor with her guitar in her lap 
 and a plate of sweeties on a chair close at 
 hand. " See, I will play thee a cachucha, and 
 thou shalt dance for me pretty. Here are 
 dulces for thee, amorita, but first thou must 
 earn them. See ."and she would point to 
 the plate, laughing. 
 
 Then she would gayly thrum the cachucha, 
 and the little one, grasping her little short 
 skirts with her chubby hands, would stand 
 solidly on one foot and prance the other up 
 and down, varying the performance by turn 
 ing herself about with circumspection, and 
 rocking from side to side gleefully. After 
 which there would be kisses and sweeties, and 
 also a great deal of applause for the perform 
 er from both orchestra and audience, the last 
 represented by the mother sitting near. 
 
 It was very sweet and human, and it did 
 Judy a world of good. 
 
 On the afternoon of the second day, when 
 the child was asleep and the mother busied 
 about her own affairs, Judy repaired to her 
 room, with an unfinished novel, and curled 
 herself comfortably on a lounge beside an 
 open window. The spring was still young, 
 
133 
 
 but the air was exquisitely soft and richly 
 perfumed with the breath of violets, which 
 old Carmelita, who loved them, kept growing 
 in all the kitchen windows. The sounds of 
 the courtyard came to Judy distinctly, but 
 they were not inharmonious, so she remained 
 where she was. Carmelita had brought out 
 an armful of tins to the bench under the pe 
 can-tree in the centre of the court, and sat 
 in the sunshine brightening them. When one 
 attained a brilliance that pleased her, she 
 would turn it about in her hand with a smile, 
 causing the reflection to dance sportively 
 about the opposite wall. 
 
 Near her lounged a vaquero, the lover of 
 one of the girls that helped with the house 
 work. He was on his way home from some 
 expedition, and had stopped in to see his 
 sweetheart and tell her of the good hut which 
 his boss had promised to build for them when 
 the calving season should be over. It would 
 be a snug home when Maria should come to 
 keep house for him. While he waited for his 
 sweetheart to come out to him, the vaquero 
 told old Carmelita about it ; and Judy, laying 
 down her book, listened likewise. 
 
She could sec the man s figure, picturesque 
 and athletic, and thought how well the color 
 effects in his costume the red of his shirt, 
 the blue of the silk handkerchief hitched 
 carelessly about his bronzed throat, the russet 
 of his long boots, and the gleam of silver in 
 bell-buttons and sombrero ornamentation 
 came out in the sunlight against the brown 
 background of the tree-stem and the lighter, 
 more delicate tinting of the adobe walls be 
 yond. She had the eye of an artist and some 
 skill, so she raised up on her elbow and 
 reached for a sketch-book, pleased with the 
 picture the two figures made. 
 
 Never had lover an audience more unsym 
 pathetic than the vaquero was finding old 
 Carmel. She held his species cheap, and 
 as creatures devoid of truth and responsibil 
 ity. She had been wed to a vaquero once, a 
 man of great laxity, unless report did him in 
 justice, and, although the saints had de 
 livered her from his companionship for full 
 fifteen years, the memory of him abode, 
 and distorted the atmosphere through which 
 she regarded his fellows. She looked now 
 at the handsome, but rather weak, face 
 
135 
 
 of the specimen beside her with open dis 
 favor. 
 
 " Maria is a fool," she observed, sharply, 
 and went on with her work. 
 
 " In what way, Carmelita ?" 
 
 The young man s tone was nettled, and 
 Judy smiled over her work. Old Carmel was 
 so droll with her prejudices. 
 
 " For giving up something for nothing," 
 the old woman said. " This good home, 
 the light work, the good pay, the ease of 
 body, and the gifts. Saw you the mantilla 
 the senora brought Maria from the city lace, 
 I tell you, real lace. When can you match 
 it ? Then the gowns at the feast times silk 
 sometimes, or wool of the best, and the ker 
 chiefs, the ribbons, and stockings. The se- 
 norita gives with both hands, and Maria has 
 ever been a favorite. What can you set 
 against this? A wash-tub, I warrant, and a 
 cook-stove ; coarse rations for dulces ; blows, 
 when the liquor has gone to your head, hard 
 work, and always a fagged, aching body. 
 Holy Jesu ! that girl is a fool !" 
 
 The young fellow laughed lazily so sure 
 of himself and of his own desirability. 
 
130 
 
 " And the love, Carmel," he smiled ; " do 
 not forget to count that." 
 
 The old cynic put aside her work the bet 
 ter to scoff at him. 
 
 "The loveT she derided. " Madre de 
 Dios! just hearken. The passion it is here 
 to-day, gone to-morrow, like the flight of a 
 bird. Tell me, compadre, how many loves have 
 you had! No lies, now. I know you va- 
 queros ! diablos!" 
 
 The lover glanced about, disconcerted. 
 " 0i ji madre ! " he stammered. " It is a tale 
 you would make !" 
 
 Carmelita grinned abominably, and pushed 
 her advantage. 
 
 " Where were you night before last, demo- 
 nio?" she demanded. 
 
 " Abroad with the cattle." 
 
 " And last night ?" 
 
 The vaquero s face brightened. He saw a 
 way to rid himself of inopportune questions by 
 creating a diversion. This was important, for 
 who knew what tales the old crone would pres 
 ently be retailing to Maria, lie threw a world 
 of interest into his face, and tuned his voice 
 to the key of one possessed of excitement. 
 
137 
 
 " Last night was a bad one," lie said, 
 gravely. "Have you not heard? Three 
 men were knifed." 
 
 The old woman abandoned her investiga 
 tions at once, and bent forward, her black 
 eyes a-glitter with interest. Even Judy s 
 hand paused, with the pencil-point on the 
 end of Carmelita s nose, and her face was 
 turned to the window. 
 
 " We hear nothing," the old woman said. 
 " Where was this ?" 
 
 "At Vallejo. You know the place. I went 
 there on business. The greasers and toughs 
 who live there have had a growing quarrel 
 with neighboring cowboys. Last night it 
 headed. A lot of cowboys raided the town 
 after dark, and gutted the saloon. They 
 were crazy with drink, and insulted a woman. 
 Then the men of the place fell to, hammer 
 and tongs. Pistol shots cracked, and knives 
 flashed, until twas all a hell of confusion and 
 fighting. Every man whipped out his blade 
 and struck what was nearest. Jesu Maria! 
 but it was fine ! The women fought like 
 wise ! One girl had a revolver at a window 
 and fired blam blam at everything ! A 
 
138 
 
 man sprang inside tore it out of her grasp > 
 then she went for him with her hands and 
 her teeth ! Maldito ! what a fury !" 
 
 " Santa Maria /" muttered old Carmel, 
 crossing herself devoutly. " What next ?" 
 
 "Why then all in a moment it was 
 over, like that !" snapping his fingers. "The 
 cowboys had been beaten from town, and 
 were mounting their horses. They yelled 
 like Comanches ! They struck in the spurs 
 and vowed to return ; then they galloped 
 away over the prairie, even as they had come 
 el demonios!" 
 
 u But the men knifed ? Who were they ?" 
 Carmelita urged. 
 
 The listener inside rose, with a white face, 
 and bent forward. 
 
 " Qiiien sale? I m new to these parts," 
 drawled the vaquero, who caught a glimpse 
 of his sweetheart through an open window. 
 " They said one was the son of Senor Law 
 less, beyond here at Marsh Mallow, and an 
 other a stranger, a yellow-haired fellow who 
 fought beside Lawless. I saw the pair once, 
 in a doorway ; but that was before the fight 
 got so furious. The third man was the bar- 
 
139 
 
 tender. I helped carry him in a house my 
 self. The knife was in his heart to the hilt." 
 
 Again the old woman crossed herself. 
 " Gracios a Dios /" she muttered "what 
 times !" 
 
 Judy leaned out of the window and mo 
 tioned imperiously with her hand. She knew 
 the vaquero by sight, and now called him by 
 name. As he advanced at her bidding, he 
 could see that she was pallid to the lips, and 
 that her eyes burned. 
 
 " Is it true, that you said f she demanded, 
 hoarsely, bending out to him. " Those men 
 that were knifed are you sure they were 
 the men you mentioned? Think hard! In 
 the confusion the fighting might you not 
 make a mistake ?" 
 
 The vaquero shook his head, unwilling to 
 remit aught of the horror of his story. He 
 had seen the dead bar-tender himself, and 
 had helped to handle him. A greaser whose 
 head he had bandaged told him about the 
 others. He said the men fought side by 
 side, and against heavy odds. There was 
 little doubt of their fate. No, he had not 
 been to Marsh Mallow. He was new to these 
 
140 
 
 parjts, and knew none of the people about. 
 The Vallejo folks would send over a mes 
 senger, of course perhaps had sent. 
 
 " Get me a horse," ordered Judy, peremp 
 torily. "The best in the corral. Carmel 
 will give you my saddle. Lose no time, and 
 I ll pay you. I must find out the truth." 
 
 She spoke in hard gasps, and wasted no 
 words. The vaquero departed to do her 
 bidding without protest. During his short 
 absence she made the necessary change in 
 her dress swiftly, and gave directions to 
 Carmelita. Mrs. Mitchel must be explained 
 to, and if her father should get home during 
 her absence he must follow her to Marsh 
 Mallow. 
 
 Then she sprang through the window, 
 crossed the courtyard, and signed to the 
 vaquero to swing her up to the saddle. And 
 in a moment she had settled herself, gathered 
 up her reins, and was riding away southwest 
 at a hard gallop. 
 
 Old Carmelita looked after her an instant 
 and then flashed round on the vaquero. 
 
 " Twas a lie !" she declared. " You wished 
 to make a grand tale and you made it. Madre 
 
141 
 
 de Diosf You saw not the men dead, but 
 were told by a greaser ; he saw not the men 
 dead, but fighting. You are a fool ! And I 
 should be another to believe you !" 
 
 She spat contemptuously and went back to 
 her scouring. 
 
 The man followed her. 
 
 "If twas a lie to you," he growled, "why 
 didn t you stop the senorita ?" 
 
 She glanced up again. 
 
 " Can one catch and hold a norther in the 
 belly of one s scrape?" was the pertinent 
 counter query. 
 
 " No : nor halt a woman in love ! That is 
 the truth, Carmelita. And tis love which 
 rides double with the senorita this day and 
 lays on the whip. Take my word for it." 
 
 The old woman said nothing. 
 
XIV 
 
 JUDY instinctively followed the trail through 
 the canon. It was the nearest way, and every 
 moment was of value. The descent into the 
 canon forced her to slacken her speed, and, 
 again, the narrowness of the trail through the 
 branch gorge compelled circumspection. But 
 beyond was the open prairie, with only sage 
 and chaparro to impede progress, and there 
 she gave her horse rein and sped forward. 
 The long, level rays of the westering sun 
 slanted across the plain and glorified it, show 
 ing the brightness of cactus and verbena 
 blossoms diversifying the gray-green of the 
 mesquite grass. The gigantic shadow of 
 rider and horse slanted behind them, and 
 seemed to leap after, weird and distorted in 
 goblin mimicry. The sharp yelp of a wan 
 dering coyote, impatient for darkness, cut the 
 silence in twain, and was echoed hideously 
 by the howl of a lover, standing motionless, 
 
143 
 
 sentinel-wise, on the sky-line. A jack-rabbit, 
 scared up from his nap beside a sage-bush, 
 pricked his great ears to attention, and made 
 off across the trail in a swinging lope ; in the 
 dog villages the young puppies scudded to 
 earth, while the old dogs scrambled to the 
 top of the mound and barked like mechanical 
 toys. A couple of vultures, sailing slowly 
 above in the infinite blue, suddenly half furled 
 their wings and settled to earth far ahead. 
 
 Judy noticed it all every sight, every 
 movement and sound. Air and earth seemed 
 alive to her as never before, and every sense 
 was strained to abnormal keenness in the ef 
 fort she was making to hold thought at bay. 
 
 She would not let herself think she dared 
 not. The horrible story she had listened to, 
 quick with yet more horrible possibilities, lay 
 like a cloud of oppression close to conscious 
 ness, ready, at the slightest relaxation of vigi 
 lance, to roll forward and overwhelm her. 
 She held it off fiercely, saying over senseless 
 rhymes to herself, counting aloud, taking note 
 of her way, of her horse, of her animate 
 and inanimate surroundings ; resolute not to 
 let herself think; resolute to husband her 
 
144 
 
 strength and her courage for that which 
 might be before. Should the wounded men 
 still live, no messenger might have arrived 
 from Yallejo, and she herself might be the 
 first bearer of the grim intelligence. Action 
 must be instantly taken to set doubt at rest ; 
 the father must get him to horse ; the sister 
 must be prepared so that worse harm might 
 not follow the telling. And for the man who 
 had none near a spasm swept across her 
 pale face, and she bent in the saddle, urging 
 onward the horse. No : thought was bad ; 
 thought was agony, collapse, incapacity for 
 endurance, for action. She must ride. 
 
 Mile followed mile, and the good horse 
 spurned the plain with his hoofs with regu 
 lar, rhythmical beat. His grand space-de 
 vouring stride filled his rider with joy, with 
 wild exultation. Only a little longer mo 
 ments now and she would breast the slight 
 rise on which the hacienda stood, and learn 
 whether or not the worst could be verity. 
 
 The light had gone from the sky, and 
 even the pink after-glow was coo.ling, through 
 mauve, into slate-color, by the time that Judy 
 drew rein at the Marsh Mallow gateway. The 
 
145 
 
 hacienda seemed so peaceful and quiet that 
 she instinctively avoided the front approach, 
 nor would she ride directly into the court 
 yard. Her appearance could not fail to as 
 tonish, perhaps alarm, the inmates ; for why 
 should she Judith Fontaine come to Marsh 
 Mallow save as the bearer of tidings ? Even 
 in her own stress and excitement she was 
 thoughtful for Mrs. Mejares. In the corral 
 she found a cowboy attending to the stock, 
 and questioned him as to whether news had 
 come from Yallejo that day, and, receiving a 
 reply in the negative, sent him in to summon 
 Colonel Lawless, bidding him observe caution 
 should the senora be in the room. 
 
 The fellow, aglow with curiosity, did her 
 errand with speed, and when he returned, 
 with the Colonel at his heels, quietly stationed 
 himself within ear-shot. 
 
 A soldier is trained to surprises and to the 
 suppression of all emotion which may impede 
 instant comprehension and prompt action. 
 By the time Colonel Lawless had made out 
 who the messenger was, he decided that her 
 news must be urgent and evil ; so that when 
 he got to her side, and took her hand in his, 
 10 
 
146 
 
 the old discipline was in force, and he wasted 
 no time in social amenities. 
 
 " You bring news of importance," he said, 
 gravely. " What is it ?" 
 
 This prompt apprehension of the situation 
 braced the girl s quivering nerves like an 
 electric shock. She returned the pressure of 
 his hand with a strong clasp, bent down to 
 him and told her story, not as she herself had 
 heard it, but in terse sentences and without 
 circumlocution. 
 
 The old soldier did not flinch. 
 
 " When did it happen ?" 
 
 "Last night. I don t know the hour, but 
 it was along after dark." 
 
 "Both knifed, you say my son and my 
 nephew ?" 
 
 " The man said so. lie thought it likely 
 that word had been sent you already ; but I 
 could not rest satisfied, it was nobody s 
 business, in special, at Vallejo, and the risk 
 of your not having heard was too great. I ve 
 lost little time since I heard. There was no 
 one else who could come as quickly." 
 
 " That was right," the veteran said, with 
 approval. " That was sensible and brave. 
 
147 
 
 Now I mmst act, for every moment is pre 
 cious. Mr. Cartwright !" 
 
 The cowboy advanced with quite surpris 
 ing alacrity. 
 
 " You have heard the news this lady brings ? 
 That s well and saves time. You must come 
 with me to Vallejo at once. Saddle the grays, 
 Cartwright, and put corn in the pouches ; 
 we ll have to rest once to keep the nags go 
 ing. Say nothing to any one. My daughter 
 must hear nothing until she can hear all. If 
 there should be a messenger on the way, ten 
 to one we ll meet, and can turn him. Look 
 sharp, Cartwright ! Every second is precious." 
 
 Then he turned again to Judy, laying his 
 hand on the neck of her horse. 
 
 " Young lady," he said, " the expression 
 of my gratitude, and of my admiration for 
 your courage and promptness, must wait until 
 later. Let me take you into the house before 
 I go. I can trust your discretion. And all 
 requisite explanation of your appearance 
 among us I leave to your woman s wit. 
 Come ! It s too late for return, even under es 
 cort, for that which I can offer you is not 
 suitable." 
 
148 
 
 But Judy shrank away from him. In a 
 tidal wave of horror it swept over her that 
 hours and hours must pass before she herself 
 could hope for the relief of full knowledge, 
 that while the rest were shielded from anxi 
 ety by ignorance, she would be a prey to all 
 the torture of suspense. Worse : that while 
 she invented plausible explanations, and par 
 ried curiosity with small talk, the light 
 might go out of eyes that had looked love 
 into hers ; that hands she had never clasped 
 with affection might stiffen without that clasp 
 forever; that lips that had never touched 
 hers might grow cold without kisses. It was 
 not as though she were certain that death s 
 work was done then she might have schooled 
 herself to patience ; but now ! now ! when 
 uncertainty s self meant the glimmer of hope ! 
 No ; love had spoken within her heart with a 
 full voice, and would not be denied. She 
 could not remain behind more, she would 
 not. 
 
 She laid her ungloved hand on the Colonel s 
 and bent downward, in the waning light, until 
 she could look into his eyes. 
 
 " Take me with you," she pleaded. " I can- 
 
149 
 
 not stay behind, not knowing. This suspense 
 tortures me. Take me with you !" 
 
 The Colonel expostulated. 
 
 " My dear young lady, the thing is impos 
 sible ! I must ride through the night almost 
 without drawing rein. The fatigue would be 
 terrible for a woman ! Then this Vallejo is 
 no fit place to take you. Give it up !" 
 
 " I cannot," she responded, steadfastly. 
 " What matter about fatigue ? I am strong. 
 My horse is a good one. I shall not delay 
 you, or be an encumbrance. What matters 
 the place any place, in stress like this ?" 
 
 Her persistence annoyed the Colonel, and 
 he spoke sharply. 
 
 " It is out of the question ! the wildest 
 scheme I ever heard of ! Come, I shall take 
 you inside to my daughter at once. Time is 
 precious, and here are the horses." 
 
 Driven to bay, Judy abandoned every ves 
 tige of reserve, and let the agony in her heart 
 ring out in her voice. 
 
 " Can t you understand ?" she wailed, bit 
 terly. " Must I put it in words ? Have you 
 no heart, no memory, that you can t see how 
 it is ? I tell you I will go ! Nothing shall 
 
150 
 
 stop me. My heart is breaking under this 
 suspense !" 
 
 Strangely stirred, the old soldier withdrew 
 his opposition at once, and spoke to her 
 soothingly, tenderly, telling her that it should 
 be as she wished. 
 
 And as he swung himself into the saddle 
 and rode away at her side in the gathering 
 dusk, he caught himself wondering if his son 
 could be the man that she loved. And, in 
 spite of his long -cherished prejudices, he 
 hoped that such might indeed be the case. 
 
XV 
 
 THROUGH the long night they galloped, the 
 cowboy in the lead, because of greater famil 
 iarity with the trail, and the other two abreast, 
 riding silently. Once they halted for a brief 
 space at a water-hole, to loosen the cinches 
 and give the brave animals a drink and a 
 mouthful of corn. Then up and on again, 
 through moonlight and darkness and the keen 
 gray of dawn. 
 
 The sun was well up when they sighted 
 Vallejo, and the horses were nearly spent. 
 Judy s beautiful bay drooped his head, and 
 moved with effort, his nostrils flaring in and 
 out with his hurried breathing : the spume- 
 flakes had dried on his bit, and the sweat 
 crusted along his withers and flanks. He 
 had come farther than the others. Half a 
 mile from the village Judy slacked the reins 
 on his neck. 
 
 "He s done up," she said, desperately. 
 
152 
 
 " Don t wait for me. I ll come on as I 
 can." 
 
 The cowboy pulled up likewise. " Go on, 
 Colonel," he urged. "This means more to 
 you. I ll take care of her, and \ve ? ll come in 
 as the horse can. Find out about things and 
 meet us at Flinn s saloon. It s the best house 
 in the place. I ll bring Miss Fontaine there." 
 
 So the Colonel went forward alone. 
 
 When he entered Vallejo the place seemed 
 deserted. It was a miserable collection of 
 adobe huts for the most part, supplemented 
 }>y jacals of miscellaneous construction. The 
 liquor saloon, as Cartwright had stated, was 
 the most pretentious building in the place 
 a box house of four rooms, roofed with 
 canvas. Here the Colonel dismounted and 
 sought information from a deaf and rheumat 
 ic old crone who appeared the sole denizen 
 of the place, and who could speak nothing 
 but Spanish. The impossibility of making 
 her comprehend him nearly put the Colonel 
 beside himself ; but partly by pantomime, and 
 partly through his own imperfect knowledge 
 of Spanish, he gathered that a funeral was in 
 progress in a grove of cottonwoods beyond 
 
153 
 
 the village, and that the population en masse 
 were attending it. Whose funeral it was he 
 could not make out, only that the corpse had 
 been a good Catholic, and that the padre from 
 the Mission Dolores had been secured to per 
 form the obsequies. This satisfied him that 
 the dead man could be neither his son nor 
 his nephew ; so, leaving his tired horse in the 
 saloon yard, he proceeded on foot in quest of 
 fuller information. 
 
 Judy and her escort followed as rapidly as 
 the condition of the horses would permit. 
 At the saloon they found the Colonel s horse, 
 but no living human creature even the old 
 crone having hobbled away on some quest. 
 The cowboy slipped off the saddles with 
 celerity. 
 
 " Stop here, senorita" he said, and led the 
 way into a room behind the one used as a 
 gambling-place. " This is a wild place, but 
 you ll be safe here. I know Jack Flinn well 
 enough. Don t you fret ! I ll rouse up the 
 news, and be back in a brace o shakes." 
 
 Utterly broken-down and dispirited, the 
 girl submitted to being left, and sank down 
 on a long box in the middle of the room, 
 
1M 
 
 over which a scrape had been spread. It had 
 been recently used as the resting-place of a 
 coffin, but she did not know that. Iler head 
 sank on her breast, and her hands wrung 
 themselves together ; she sat waiting for that 
 which might come to her in a very apathy 
 of despair. Presently the mood lightened, 
 and she straightened herself and glanced 
 about. The room was evidently used for a 
 chamber, for rude bunks were fitted against 
 the walls, and above them, on pegs, hung 
 men s clothing. The door by which she had 
 entered was covered by a crimson Navajo 
 blanket, disposed like a curtain, and now 
 half pulled aside. Above the jJbrtal a bul 
 lock s frontlet, with branching horns, was 
 fastened. On the other end of the box on 
 which she was sitting lay a crucifix, and, near 
 it, a pair of huge rowclled Mexican spurs. 
 
 A slight movement attracted Judy s atten 
 tion to the doorway, in which a child pres 
 ently appeared a little creature of six, or 
 thereabout clad in a single garment. The 
 little thing stared at her solemnly, evidently 
 much impressed with this new specimen of 
 the genus woman, and not quite sure of its 
 
155 
 
 harmlessness. The thought came to the girl 
 that, even this baby might possess the knowl 
 edge for which her soul panted, and she set 
 about making overtures of friendship. Fum 
 bling in her pocket for some means of at 
 traction, she drew out a bright-colored bit of 
 cornelian, which St. John had picked up for 
 her during one of their rides. Her lips quiv 
 ered pitifully, but she held the stone out to 
 the child. 
 
 " Come, little one," she coaxed gently, 
 speaking in Spanish. "Here is a beautiful 
 stone for thee. Come and get it." 
 
 The child s black eyes glittered ; she ad 
 vanced a few steps and half-extended her 
 hand ; then a sudden spasm of shyness 
 seemed to overwhelm her, and she drew 
 back. 
 
 The soft voice coaxed on. 
 
 "Come, baby. Fear nothing. See how 
 pretty it is ! bright, like the scrape in the 
 doorway. Come in here and get it. I will 
 not hurt you." 
 
 The small creature advanced again, smiles 
 dimpling her dark, rosy cheeks, making them 
 resemble the sun-kissed side of a blood peach. 
 
156 
 
 Then a step in the outer room seemed to 
 bring back all her fears in an avalanche. She 
 glanced hurriedly about, like a frightened 
 animal, and tied swiftly away. 
 
 A sob rose in Judy s throat, and she began 
 to tremble hysterically. Would this suspense 
 never end ? Had she come all this distance 
 still to be held back from the truth ? Had 
 the men forgotten her ; or was the verity so 
 awful that they feared to disclose it ? 
 
 Then the footstep crossed the outer room, 
 the Navajo blanket was thrust still farther 
 aside, and St. John stood before her. 
 
XVI 
 
 HE was very pale and tired-looking, and a 
 great strip of black court - plaster slanted 
 across one side of his forehead from his hair 
 to his temple ; but he seemed otherwise in 
 pretty good case, and advanced at once into 
 the room. He had met Cartwright abroad in 
 quest of information, and learned from him 
 of Judy s presence and whereabouts. Volun 
 teering to set her mind at ease, he had sent 
 the cowboy in pursuit of Colonel Lawless, 
 whom he had not seen, and come on to the 
 saloon himself. He had looked in the outer 
 chambers first, not having understood clearly 
 in which room Cartwright had established his 
 charge. It seemed strange to him that Judy 
 should have come herself, but he put it all 
 down to alarm for his cousin. Cartwright 
 had told him that a rumor had come to them 
 that Tom had been killed. 
 
 Judy half rose from her seat with a stifled 
 
158 
 
 cry, and then sank back again trembling. 
 " You you /" she gasped " not dead not 
 dead !" Her face whitened to the lips, and 
 her eyes were almost wild. 
 
 St. John, realizing something of the strain 
 she must have been on, and frightened almost 
 out of his wits about her, sprang forward and 
 caught both her hands. 
 
 " Don t faint, for God s sake !" he entreated, 
 his tone fairly trembling with trepidation. 
 " There isn t any need, on my honor. It s all 
 right. Tom isn t hurt any to signify. He 
 got a nasty slash in the shoulder, but I coop 
 ered it at once, and the padre they sent 
 for is something of a doctor. Most priests 
 are, you know, and when he got here Tom 
 got bandaged up properly. We had no idea 
 the news would get around so quickly, or 
 would have sent a messenger over ourselves. 
 There s no need to Good Lord ! she s 
 off!" 
 
 But Judy had not fainted. The reaction 
 was so great that it unnerved her completely. 
 She began to cry first, then to laugh, and 
 finally went off into the first fit of hysterics 
 she had ever indulged in. 
 
159 
 
 St. John was at his wits end. lie had 
 never seen a woman in hysterics before, and 
 could not rise to the occasion. He thought, 
 at first, that she was going into convulsions, 
 and began frantically to entreat her not to. 
 Then, through his confusion dashed a recol 
 lection of having once read in a novel that, 
 under circumstances resembling these, the 
 patient s corset laces were cut and she was 
 given sal-volatile. The drawback to trying the 
 effect of this treatment in the present case 
 was that the nearest drug-shop was a hun 
 dred miles distant, and that he did not in the 
 least know where corset laces were situated. 
 He did the best he could, however, patting 
 Judy vigorously on the back and beseeching 
 her " for God s sake to give over, and pull 
 together a bit." Then all her soft hair came 
 down in a flood, covering his hand and fore 
 arm and twining itself about his fingers in 
 soft, silken meshes. A faint perfume rose 
 from it, like the odor of an old-fashioned 
 spring rose, and penetrated his senses and 
 set every pulse thrilling so that he stood 
 trembling and dazed, with his hand lost in 
 her hair. 
 
160 
 
 In a moment he pulled himself together 
 again and freed his fingers gently and moved 
 away a pace. Then an inspiration came to 
 him, and he dashed to the bar-room and there 
 procured a fiery fluid mendaciously labelled 
 French brandy, a spoonful of which he com 
 pelled the girl to swallow. It scalded her 
 throat and set her to coughing, but it produced 
 a diversion, and finally enabled her to regain 
 self-command. 
 
 When she had quieted down, St. John 
 leaned against the wall near her and heroic 
 ally began to talk about Tom again. 
 
 Ilis cousin had gone out to Fort Twilight, 
 he explained; had started that morning, in 
 fact, for his wound was going on well, and he 
 had business of urgency at the post. The 
 bridle-arm was sound, and the ride not a 
 long one, so there was no cause for appre 
 hension. Besides, the post -surgeon could 
 look at the shoulder. Tom had not even 
 gone by himself. A couple of fellows made 
 the trip with him acquaintances with whom 
 he had business. It was a thousand pities 
 she should have heard of the fight and en 
 dured so much needless anxiety. St. John 
 
161 
 
 spoke with effort, as one who compels him 
 self to a difficult task. His eyes were on 
 Judy, who still trembled, but who was trying 
 to recoil her hair. She gathered the rich 
 masses together with both of her hands, 
 drawing out the loosened hair-pins; then she 
 essayed to recoil it, but was still too much 
 shaken. Her hands fumbled helplessly, and 
 she let them fall again to her lap, while the 
 silky brown flood tumbled about her once 
 more, softly framing her face, and matching 
 in color and lustre her beautiful eyes. 
 
 There is something about the hair of a 
 woman which possesses a strange, almost 
 marvellous fascination for the opposite sex. 
 Not hair in order, curled, braided, or coiled 
 to the tip of the mode ; but hair free and 
 floating ; hair full of the abandon and witchery 
 of nature. Well may the Lorelei comb out 
 her tresses of gold and toss them afloat to 
 the breeze, as she sings wild elf-songs ! For, 
 truly, she knows tis the sheen of her hair 
 more than the witchery of her sweet siren 
 voice which lures men to her bidding ! 
 
 Judy, enshrouded with the wealth of her 
 tresses, dishevelled, and pale, was in St. John s 
 11 
 
16:3 
 
 eyes a thing more to be desired than all the 
 treasures and glory of earth. He stirred the 
 hand which but now had been baptized in its 
 beauty, and throbbed again with the emotion 
 which contact with the silken meshes had 
 caused him. His love surged with fierce 
 power, beating against the barrier of his self- 
 restraint ; a groan forced itself from his lips. 
 
 Judy caught the sound instantly. 
 
 " Are you in pain ?" she demanded. " That 
 cut on your forehead. Is it serious ? Has it 
 been properly attended to ?" 
 
 St. John reassured her impatiently. It 
 was nothing a surface gash of no moment. 
 The priest had fomented and plastered it. 
 Neither his wound nor Tom s at all justified 
 the anxiety .they had caused. She would 
 soon see for herself, as Tom would return to 
 Vallejo by nightfall. 
 
 Then Judy surprised him. 
 
 " Never mind about Mr. Lawless," she ob 
 served, quietly. " I want you to get some 
 one to attend to my horse for me. He must 
 be fed and rubbed down. I must arrange 
 to return home at once." 
 
 St. John stared at her. 
 
163 
 
 " But Tom !" he stammered. " I thought 
 I supposed" -- he paused in bewilder 
 ment. 
 
 " You thought all wrong," Judy retorted 
 with impatience. " And you hadn t any busi 
 ness to think at all. No man has : they are 
 too stupid. I must go home." 
 
 She lifted her hands again to her hair. 
 
 A light leaped to St. John s eyes. Could 
 she ? was it possible ? Could she have been 
 anxious about him? frightened for him? 
 His mouth settled into firm lines ; his ex 
 pression became resolute masterful. He 
 moved forward arid bent towards her. 
 
 " Look at me," he said, peremptorily. " Let 
 your hair alone ! Look me straight in the 
 face. I must get to the bottom of this thing. 
 It s life or death to me. Were you fright 
 ened for Lawless or me ?" 
 
 Judy kept her eyes down. Crimson waves 
 from her heart surged to her throat, to her 
 brow, and lost themselves in the dark of her 
 hair. St. John came nearer still, drew her to 
 her feet with one hand, and with the other 
 lifted her face to his. 
 
 " Was it for him or me ?" he repeated. 
 
104 
 
 The veiled lashes lifted themselves shyly, 
 but other answer there was none. 
 
 Nor was there need. St. John opened his 
 arms with a murmur of love, and drew her 
 into them, close to his heart, and lifted her 
 face again for his passionate kisses. 
 
 " My brave love !" he murmured. " My 
 courageous, beautiful darling ! To think of 
 your caring so much ! To think of your rid 
 ing through distance and night to see wheth 
 er a worthless fellow like me had been chop 
 ped into mincemeat, or not ! There isn t 
 another woman alive would have had the 
 pluck to do it. It was superb ! God ! how 
 I love you !" 
 
 He strained her to him again, and crowd 
 ed kisses on her eyes, on her throat, and on 
 the red of her mouth. 
 
 " Lord, what a donkey I was !" he broke 
 out again, "to think that you that any wom 
 an would have sent me gallivanting after 
 Tom ; to fish him out of the mud and brush 
 him off if she cared twopence about him." 
 
 Then Judy found breath and space to af 
 firm obstinately 
 
 u I do care. I always have cared, and al- 
 
165 
 
 ways shall. Mr. Lawless is my friend, and I 
 was as anxious to know that he hadn t been 
 killed as ever I could be." 
 
 St. John laughed. Then a jealous flame 
 kindled in his eyes. 
 
 "But you would not have come to find 
 out about him yourself, would you ?" 
 
 " I d have carried the word to Marsh Mal 
 low," asserted Judy, loftily. 
 
 " But here ? You wouldn t have come here 
 for any fellow but me, would you, dear? An 
 swer me ! It was love brought you blunder 
 ing across that blessed prairie in the dark, 
 wasn t it ? And that love is mine. Tell me 
 so, sweetheart. I ve endured such misery 
 over this thing. Tell me that it is me that 
 you love. You haven t once said it. Give 
 me my name, darling; say Clere, I love 
 you. " 
 
 His tone was so pleading that Judy re 
 frained from more teasing, and, lifting her 
 arms to his throat, said softly and tenderly, 
 " Clere, I love you. And it was for the sake 
 of that love I came." 
 
XVII 
 
 DURING most of this time Colonel Lawless 
 and Cartwright, having seen to the comfort 
 of the horses, were refreshing themselves 
 with tortillas, chili- con -carne, frijoles, fried 
 in bacon fat, and tamales, washed down with 
 strong coffee. The Colonel, it is true, on en 
 tering the house, had gone at once to the in 
 ner apartment to confer with Miss Fontaine 
 and discover her wishes, for he was already 
 aware from the cowboy that her anxiety must 
 be at rest. So engrossed were the pair that 
 they failed to notice his approach, and the 
 Colonel himself never entered. As lie neared 
 the doorway, the position of affairs made it 
 self manifest ; so with a muttered " By Jove !" 
 he reached out his hand and noiselessly drew 
 the Navajo blanket into place, after which he 
 retired. Nor would he suffer them to be dis 
 turbed, although he carefully reserved a por 
 tion of the food for them, and feed a Mexi- 
 
167 
 
 can woman to make fresh coffee and keep it 
 hot on her stove, and also to produce a plate 
 of dulces. 
 
 So that had been the reason of the girl s 
 wild alarm. It had been St. John s reported 
 death or wounding which had had such pow 
 er to move her ; St. John s last hours she had 
 fled hither to comfort. And all the time a 
 hope had been growing within him that the 
 heart of this brave lassie was inclined to his 
 son. It was a great disappointment, and the 
 old soldier sighed. 
 
 He had taken an enthusiastic liking to 
 Judy, whose courage and patience under the 
 long strain and fatigue had won his respect 
 and admiration. There was fine stuff in 
 the girl, he had told himself, more than 
 once, as he galloped beside her through the 
 long night. She was a real soldier s daugh 
 ter, so sensible, so resolute, and, withal, so 
 docile and grateful for care. He almost 
 thought well of his old enemy for having 
 reared such a child ; and coveted her for his 
 own son. Not that he begrudged his nephew 
 the prize, now that he knew how matters 
 were. He wondered a little when Clere had 
 
I. is 
 
 done his courting, and then remembered that 
 the fellow had, unavoidably, been left a good 
 bit to himself during his visit. Where maids 
 were men would gravitate. Clere was a good 
 fellow real English oak and had besides a 
 look of his father at times which the Colonel 
 was fain to confess had endeared the boy to 
 his own heart. Yes ; this was a good thing 
 for Clere. 
 
 And still, while acknowledging the good 
 ness of it loyally, the father could not quite 
 hold back regret. If only Judy could have 
 loved his own lad ! 
 
 When the lovers finally appeared, and had 
 been nourished, it was arranged that they, 
 in company with Cartwright, should return 
 homeward, camping for the dark hours at a 
 jacal by the wayside, and deploying to leave 
 Judy at her own home. The Colonel would 
 ride out to Fort Twilight to look after his 
 son, and let his movements for the next few 
 days be determined by the state of Tom s 
 wound. St. John could explain everything 
 satisfactorily at Marsh Mallow, and see that 
 Mrs. Mejares got no alarm. 
 
 While the younger men saddled up, Judy 
 
was left alone with the Colonel, who took 
 both her hands and spoke words that brought 
 the warm blood to her cheek with gratifica 
 tion and pride. Then he bent his stately 
 white head and kissed her forehead, in fath 
 erly fashion, speaking of his nephew in terms 
 of earnest affection. 
 
 " You were quite right to come, my lass," 
 he said, cordially. " I see how it is. Clere s 
 a fine man a man in a thousand, as was his 
 father before him. He ll make a true, faith 
 ful husband, one to lean on and look up to, 
 and that s as much as any woman need 
 wish." 
 
 They rode home very quietly, not pressing 
 the horses, and Judy found to her great con 
 tentment that her father had not returned, 
 and that Mrs. Mitchel and the baby were still 
 in possession. She had many questions to 
 answer, but patience for all only it was to 
 black-eyed Maria, the vaquero s pretty sweet 
 heart, that the fullest information was given. 
 
 The Colonel did not return for a week, ow 
 ing to some inflammation in Tom s wound, 
 which made it advisable to keep it under the 
 surgeon s eye for a few days. His son re- 
 
170 
 
 turned with him, and was straightway erect 
 ed into a hero by his sister Anne, and petted 
 and fussed over from daylight until dark. 
 The young sinner had the grace to be 
 ashamed of himself, and, although he ac 
 knowledged that salutary frame of mind to 
 no one, there was something in his expression 
 and tone, when he thanked Mejares for the 
 brotherly promptness with which he had come 
 to his aid, which caused that subtle delinea 
 tor of character to affirm afterwards to his 
 wife that he truly believed Tom would end 
 by being a credit to them after all. 
 
 How much of his son s wildness Colonel 
 Lawless knew or suspected he confided to no 
 one ; but he suddenly made the discovery 
 that a change would refresh him, ere he 
 should settle down into old age and grand- 
 fatherhood. He proposed to his son that 
 they should go abroad together. 
 
 " I want a taste of the breeze as it blows 
 over Dartmoor," he said, " with the salt of 
 the sea and the bloom of the heather in it. 
 I want to fish once again in Ilatherleigh wa 
 ter, and wander about the fells, and track the 
 Taw to its cradle between Cawsand and Yes- 
 
tor. I want to hold heather in my hand, and 
 hear the golden plover scream overhead. I m 
 homesick for England, my lad I Come away 
 with me, when Anne shall be through her 
 trouble, and let s wander together amid the 
 old sights, in the old places." 
 And so it was decided. 
 
xvm 
 
 DURING the interim St. John had a talk 
 with his uncle, and stated the condition of his 
 affairs in very plain language, ending with an 
 exposition of his plans and hopes in regard 
 to securing a position as ranch manager. 
 
 " I m fit for this sort of work," he averred 
 frankly, "and I m not fit for much else. 
 Added to which I m past thirty years old, 
 and wish to get married." 
 
 The Colonel listened kindly, and promised 
 to give the matter his best attention. For 
 reasons of his own he took his son into con 
 fidence and consultation, and in less than 
 a week informed St. John that he thought 
 they had found something that might suit 
 him. 
 
 An English eccentric, named Dudley, own 
 er of a good ranch and well stocked, with the 
 unrest of his nation, had wearied of the mo 
 notony of ranch life in Texas, and wished to 
 
173 
 
 betake himself to Bolivia, there to experiment 
 in minerals. His Texas property was now in 
 the market, and arrangements might be made, 
 the Colonel thought, by which St. John could 
 secure it. 
 
 The upshot of the matter was that the 
 Colonel and his nephew started for their com 
 patriot s ranch the next day, and there entered 
 into negotiations which resulted in the turn 
 ing over of the entire outfit to St. John, the 
 Colonel advancing the purchase -money and 
 taking a lien on the property. 
 
 To his son-in-law, later, the old gentleman 
 justified his kindness to St. John in a charac 
 teristic fashion. 
 
 " That French Yankee over yonder will 
 come down handsomely for his daughter," 
 he averred. " You just watch him. I couldn t 
 let my brother Tom s lad crow small before 
 him, hanged if I could. Not while love 
 of old England warms my heart, and recol 
 lection of Yellow Tavern, and the Wilderness, 
 and Appomattox rankles in my memory. No, 
 sir ! I ll see him on this deal, whether I can 
 go him one better or not. 
 
 Lady Wolcott wrote Judy the most de- 
 
174 
 
 licious of letters, which tickled that young 
 lady s vanity immensely. 
 
 " Fancy my being sister-in-law to a * lady 
 ship, " she laughed, gleefully ; " it s just like 
 a novel." 
 
 Whereupon St. John, of course, assured her 
 that she was n t to be sister-in-law to a queen. 
 
 Ilis sister s epistle to him he tore up, and 
 kept its contents to himself. And when, a 
 few days after its receipt, Judy gave him a 
 piece of domestic intelligence, he grinned 
 exceedingly. 
 
 "My father is going to be married again," 
 Judy informed him. " Isn t it droll, after 
 our having discussed it that day ? He in 
 formed me, with blushes, last night, and as 
 sured me twas the only thing that reconciled 
 him to losing me. She is a very nice lady, 
 he says ; tall and handsome, and not disgust 
 ingly young for him, or a widow. She s a 
 native Texan, and lives in Dallas. He met 
 her in Rosalita, where she was visiting friends, 
 more than a year ago, and has corresponded 
 with her since, and been to her home. She s 
 back in Rosalita now, and I ve promised to 
 let him take me to call, and entertain her here 
 
175 
 
 afterwards. Dear old father ! I hope he ll 
 be happy and well taken care of. This makes 
 me comfortable about leaving him." 
 
 St. John displayed the requisite interest, 
 and said everything that was congratulatory 
 and kind. Going home afterwards, he slapped 
 his thigh with his hand resoundingly, and 
 chuckled with delight. 
 
 " Long division, by Jupiter !" he grinned. 
 "Just as I dreamed! Poor Maudie ! But 
 isn t this a grand sell for her !" 
 
 THE END 
 
VIN^OJITVO JO AilSHHAINQ 
 
 93 
 
 9TITOOM 
 
 q-S