Chapter XII: Part 12

As they climbed the bank and rode onward into the night she said: "No matter what happens, dear, I shall be happy, for at last one of my dreams has come true." He reached out and patted her. "You've no idea what a coward I was until you came. But the moment I saw you all my fears vanished. I was like a lost child who suddenly sees her father; in your arms I felt perfectly safe, for the first time in all my life, I think. I--I couldn't bear to go on without you, after this."

Dave found nothing to say; they rode along side by side for a time in a great contentment that required no speech. Then Alaire asked:

"Dear, have you considered how we--are going to explain our marriage?"

"Won't the circumstances explain it?"

"Perhaps. And yet--It seems ages since I learned--what happened to Ed, but in reality it's only a few hours. Won't people talk?"

Dave caught at the suggestion. "I see. Then let's keep it secret for the present. I promise not to--act like a husband."

With a little reckless laugh she confessed, "I--I'm afraid I'll find it difficult to be conventional."

"My wife!" he cried in sharp agony. Leaning far out, he encircled her with his arm; then, half lifting her from her saddle, he crushed his lips to hers. It was his first display of emotion since Father O'Malley had united them.

There were few villages along the road they followed, and because of the lateness of the hour all were dark, hence the party passed through without exciting attention except from an occasional wakeful dog. But as morning came and the east began to glow Dave told the priest:

"We've got to hide out during the day or we'll get into trouble. Besides, these women must be getting hungry."

"I fear there is something feminine about me," confessed the little man. "I'm famished, too."

At the next rancho they came to they applied for shelter, but were denied; in fact, the owner cursed them so roundly for being Americans that they were glad to ride onward. A mile or two farther along they met a cart the driver of which refused to answer their greetings. As they passed out of his sight they saw that he had halted his lean oxen and was staring after them curiously. Later, when the sun was well up and the world had fully awakened, they descried a mounted man, evidently a cowboy, riding through the chaparral. He saw them, too, and came toward the road, but after a brief scrutiny he whirled his horse and galloped off through the cactus, shouting something over his shoulder.

"This won't do," O'Malley declared, uneasily. "I don't like the actions of these people. Let me appeal to the next person we meet. I can't believe they all hate us."

Soon they came to a rise in the road, and from the crest of this elevation beheld ahead of them a small village of white houses shining from the shelter of a grove. The rancheria was perhaps two miles away, and galloping toward it was the vaquero who had challenged them.

"That's the Rio Negro crossing," Dave announced. Then spying a little house squatting a short distance back from the road, he said: "We'd better try yonder. If they turn us down we'll have to take to the brush."

O'Malley agreed. "Yes, and we have no time to lose. That horseman is going to rouse the town. I'm afraid we're--in for it."

Dave nodded silently.

Leaving the beaten path, the refugees threaded their way through cactus and sage to a gate, entering which they approached the straw-thatched jacal they had seen. A naked boy baby watched them draw near, then scuttled for shelter, piping an alarm. A man appeared from somewhere, at sight of whom the priest rode forward with a pleasant greeting. But the fellow was unfriendly. His wife, too, emerged from the dwelling and joined her husband in warning Father O'Malley away.

"Let me try," Alaire begged, and spurred her horse up to the group. She smiled down at the country people, saying: "We have traveled a long way, and we're tired and hungry. Won't you give us something to eat? We'll pay you well for your trouble."

The man demurred sullenly, and began a refusal; but his wife, after a wondering scrutiny, interrupted him with a cry. Rushing forward, she took the edge of Alaire's skirt in her hands and kissed it.

"God be praised! A miracle!" she exclaimed. "Juan, don't you see? It is the beautiful senora for whom we pray every night of our lives. On your knees, shameless one! It is she who delivered you from the prison."

Juan stared unbelievingly, then his face changed; his teeth flashed in a smile, and, sweeping his hat from his head, he, too, approached Alaire.

"It is! senora, I am Juan Garcia, whom you saved, and this is Inez," he declared. "Heaven bless you and forgive me."

"Now I know you," Alaire laughed, and slipped down from her saddle. "This is a happy meeting. So! You live here, and that was little Juan who ran away as if we were going to eat him. Well, we are hungry, but not hungry enough to devour Juanito."

Turning to her companions, she explained the circumstances of her first meeting with these good people, and as she talked the Garcias broke in joyfully, adding their own account of her goodness.

"We've fallen among friends," Alaire told Dave and Father O'Malley. "They will let us rest here, I am sure."

Husband and wife agreed in one voice. In fact, they were overjoyed at an opportunity of serving her; and little Juan, his suspicions partially allayed, issued from hiding and waddled forward to take part in the welcome.

Shamefacedly the elder Garcia explained his inhospitable reception of the travelers. "We hear the gringos are coming to kill us and take our farms. Everybody is badly frightened. We are driving our herds away and hiding what we can. Yesterday at the big Obispo ranch our people shot two Americans and burned some of their houses. They intend to kill all the Americans they find, so you'd better be careful. Just now a fellow rode up shouting that you were coming, but of course I didn't know--"

"Yes, of course. We're trying to reach the border," Father O'Malley told him. "Will you hide us here until we can go on?"

Juan courtesied respectfully to the priest. "My house is yours, Father."

"Can you take care of our horses, too, and--give us a place to sleep?" Dave asked. His eyes were heavy; he had been almost constantly in the saddle since leaving Jonesville, and now could barely keep himself awake.

"Trust me," the Mexican assured them, confidently. "If somebody comes I'll send them away. Oh, I can lie with the best of them."

The Garcias were not ordinary people, and they lived in rather good circumstances for country folk. There were three rooms to their little house, all of which were reasonably clean. The food that Inez set before her guests, too, was excellent if scanty.

Juanito, taking the cue from his parents, flung himself whole-heartedly into the task of entertainment, and since Alaire met his advances halfway he began, before long, to look upon her with particular favor. Once they had thoroughly made friends, he showered her with the most flattering attentions. His shyness, it seemed, was but a pretense--at heart he was a bold and enterprising fellow--and so, as a mark of his admiration, he presented her with all his personal treasures. First he fetched and laid in her lap a cigar-box wagon with wooden wheels--evidently the handiwork of his father. Then he gave her, one by one, a highly prized blue bottle, a rusty Mexican spur, and the ruins of what had been a splendid clasp knife. There were no blades in the knife, but he showed her how to peep through a tiny hole in the handle, where was concealed the picture of a dashing Spanish bullfighter. The appreciation which these gifts evoked intoxicated the little man and roused him to a very madness of generosity. He pattered away and returned shortly, staggering and grunting under the weight of another and a still greater offering. It was a dog--a patient, hungry dog with very little hair. The animal was alive with fleas--it scratched absent-mindedly with one hind paw, even while Juanito strangled it against his naked breast--but it was the apple of its owner's eye, and when Inez unfeelingly banished it from the house Juanito began to squall lustily. Nor could he be conciliated until Alaire took him upon her knee and told him about another boy, of precisely his own age and size, who planted a magic bean in his mother's dooryard, which grew up and up until it reached clear to the sky, where a giant lived. Juanito Garcia had never heard the like. He was spellbound with delight; he held his breath in ecstasy; only his toes moved, and they wriggled like ten fat, brown tadpoles.

In the midst of this recital Garcia senior appeared in the door with a warning.

"Conceal yourselves," he said, quickly. "Some of our neighbors are coming this way." Inez led her guests into the bedchamber, a bare room with a dirt floor, from the window of which they watched Juan go to meet a group of horsemen. Inez went out, too, and joined in the parley. Then, after a time, the riders galloped away.

When Alaire, having watched the party out of sight, turned from the window she found that Dave had collapsed upon a chair and was sleeping, his limbs relaxed, his body sagging.

"Poor fellow, he's done up," Father O'Malley exclaimed.

"Yes; he hasn't slept for days," she whispered. "Help me." With the assistance of Dolores they succeeded in lifting Dave to the bed, but he half roused himself. "Lie down, dear," Alaire told him. "Close your eyes for a few minutes. We're safe now."

"Somebody has to keep watch," he muttered, thickly, and tried to fight off his fatigue. But he was like a drunken man.

"I'm not sleepy; I'll stand guard," the priest volunteered, and, disregarding further protest, he helped Alaire remove Dave's coat.

Seeing that the bed was nothing more than a board platform covered with straw matting, Alaire folded the garment for a pillow; as she did so a handful of soiled, frayed letters spilled out upon the floor.

"Rest now, while you have a chance," she begged of her husband. "Just for a little while."

"All right," he agreed. "Call me in--an hour. Couldn't sleep--wasn't time." He shook off his weariness and smiled at his wife, while his eyes filmed with some emotion. "There is something I ought to tell you, but--I can't now--not now. Too sleepy." His head drooped again; she forced him back; he stretched himself out with a sigh, and was asleep almost instantly.

Alaire motioned the others out of the room, then stood looking down at the man into whose keeping she had given her life. As she looked her face became radiant. Dave was unkempt, unshaven, dirty, but to her he was of a godlike beauty, and the knowledge that he was hers to comfort and guard was strangely thrilling. Her love for Ed, even that first love of her girlhood, had been nothing like this. How could it have been like this? she asked herself. How could she have loved deeply when, at the time, her own nature lacked depth? Experience had broadened her, and suffering had uncovered depths in her being which nothing else had had the power to uncover. Stooping, she kissed Dave softly, then let her cheek rest against his. Her man! Her man! She found herself whispering the words.

Her eyes were wet, but there was a smile upon her lips when she gathered up the letters which had dropped from her husband's pocket. She wondered, with a little jealous twinge, who could be writing to him. It seemed to her that she owned him now, and that she could not bear to share him with any other. She studied the inscriptions with a frown, noticing as she did so that several of the envelopes were unopened--either Dave was careless about such things or else he had had no leisure in which to read his mail. One letter was longer and heavier than the rest, and its covering, sweat-stained and worn at the edges, came apart in her hands, exposing several pages of type-writing in the Spanish language. The opening words challenged her attention.

In the name of God, Amen,

Alaire read. Involuntarily her eye followed the next line:

Know all men by this public instrument that I, Maria Josefa Law, of this vicinity--

Alaire started, Who, she asked herself, was Maria Josefa Law? Dave had no sisters; no female relatives whatever, so far as she knew. She glanced at the sleeping man and then back at the writing.

--finding myself seriously ill in bed, but with sound judgment, full memory and understanding, believing in the ineffable mysteries of the Holy Trinity, three distinct persons in one God, in essence, and in the other mysteries acknowledged by our Mother, the Church--

So! This was a will--one of those queer Spanish documents of which Alaire had heard--but who was Maria Josefa Law? Alaire scanned the sheets curiously, and on the reverse side of the last one discovered a few lines, also in Spanish, but scrawled in pencil. They read:

MY DEAR NEPHEW,--Here is the copy of your mother's will that I told you about. At the time of her death she was not possessed of the property mentioned herein, and so the original document was never filed for record, but came to me along with certain family possessions of small value. It seems to contain the information you desire.

Y'rs aff'ly,

FRANCISCO RAMIREZ.

The will of Dave's mother! Then Maria Josefa Law was that poor woman regarding whose tragic end Judge Ellsworth had spoken so peculiarly. Alaire felt not a little curiosity to know more about the mother of the man whose name she had taken. Accordingly, after a moment of debate with herself, she sat down to translate the instrument. Surely Dave would not object if she occupied herself thus while he slept.

The document had evidently been drawn in the strictest form, doubtless by some local priest, for it ran:

First: I commend my soul to the Supreme Being who from nothing formed it, and my body I order returned to earth, and which, as soon as it shall become a corpse, it is my wish shall be shrouded with a blue habit in resemblance to those used by the monks of our Seraphic Father, St. Francis; to be interred with high mass, without pomp--

Alaire mused with a certain reverent pleasure that Dave's mother had been a devout woman.

Second: I declare to have, in the possession of my husband, Franklin Law, three horses, with splendid equipment of saddles and bridles, which are to be sold and the proceeds applied to masses for the benefit of my soul. I so declare, that it may appear.

Third: I declare to owe to Mrs. Guillelmo Perez about twenty dollars, to be ascertained by what she may have noted in her book of accounts. So I declare, that this debt may be paid as I have ordered.

Fourth: In just remuneration for the services of my cousin, Margarita Ramirez, I bequeath and donate a silver tray which weighs one hundred ounces, seven breeding cows, and four fine linen and lace tablecloths. So I declare, that it may appear.

Fifth: I bequeath to my adopted son, David, offspring of the unfortunate American woman who died in my house at Escovedo, the share of land--

Alaire re-read this paragraph wonderingly, then let the document fall into her lap. So Dave was an adopted son, and not actually the child of this woman, Maria Josefa Law. She wondered if he knew it, and, if so, why he hadn't told her? But, after all, what difference did it make who or what he was? He was hers to love and to comfort, hers to cherish and to serve.

For a long time she sat gazing at him tenderly; then she tiptoed out and delighted the naked Garcia baby by taking him in her arms and hugging him. Inez thought the beautiful senora's voice was like the music of birds.

It was growing dark when Dave was awakened by cool hands upon his face and by soft lips upon his. He opened his eyes to find Alaire bending over him.

"You must get up," she smiled. "It is nearly time to go, and Inez is cooking our supper."

He reached up and took her in his arms. She lay upon his breast, thrilling happily with her nearness to him, and they remained so for a while, whispering now and then, trying ineffectually to voice the thoughts that needed no expression.

"Why did you let me sleep so long?" he asked her, reproachfully.

"Oh, I've been napping there in that chair, where I could keep one eye on you. I'm terribly selfish; I can't bear to lose one minute." After a while she said: "I've made a discovery. Father O'Malley snores dreadfully! Juanito never heard anything like it, and it frightened him nearly to death. He says the Father must be a very fierce man to growl so loudly. He says, too, that he likes me much better than his mother."

It seemed to Dave that the bliss of this awakening and the sweet intimacy of this one moment more than rewarded him for all he had gone through, and paid him for any unhappiness the future might hold in store.

He felt called upon to tell Alaire the truth about himself; but with her in his arms he had no strength of purpose; her every endearment made him the more aware of his weakness. Again he asked himself when and how he could bear to tell her? Not now. Certainly not now when she was trembling under his caresses.

"I've been busy, too," she was saying. "I sent Juan to the village to learn the news, and it's not very nice. It's good we stopped here. He says Nuevo Pueblo has been destroyed, and the Federal forces are all moving south, away from the border. So our troubles aren't over yet. We must reach the river tonight."

"Yes, by all means."

"Juan is going with us as guide."

"You arranged everything while I snoozed, eh? I'm ashamed of myself."

Alaire nodded, then pretended to frown darkly. "You ought to be," she told him. "While you were asleep I read your mail and--"

"My mail?" Dave was puzzled.

"Exactly. Have you forgotten that your pockets were full of unopened letters?"

"Oh, those! They came just as I was leaving Jonesville, and I haven't thought of them since. You know, I haven't had my clothes off."

"I'm going to read all your love letters," she told him, threateningly.

"Yes, and you're going to write all of them, too," he laughed.

But she shook a warning finger in his face. "I told you I'm a jealous person. I'm going to know all about you, past, present, and future. I--"

"Alaire! My darling!" he cried, and his face stiffened as if with pain.

Still in a joyous mood, she teased him. "You had better tremble, I've found you out, deceiver. I know who you really are."

"Who am I?"

"Don't you know?"

Dave shook his head.

"Really? Have you never read your mother's will?"

Law rose to his elbow, then swung his legs to the floor. "What are you talking about?" he asked.

For answer Alaire handed him the frayed envelope and its contents.

He examined it, and then said, heavily: "I see! I was expecting this. It seems I've been carrying it around all this time--"

"Why don't you read it?" she insisted. "There's light enough there by the window. I supposed you knew all about it or I wouldn't have joked with you."

He opened his lips to speak, but, seeing something in her eyes, he stepped to the window and read swiftly. A moment, and then he uttered a cry.

"Alaire!" he exclaimed, hoarsely. "Read this--My eyes--O God!"

Wonderingly she took the sheets from his shaking hands and read aloud the paragraph he indicated: Fifth: I bequeath to my adopted son, David, offspring of the unfortunate American woman who died in my house at Escovedo--

Again Dave cried out and knelt at Alaire's feet, his arms about her knees, his face buried in her dress. His shoulders were heaving and his whole body was racked with sobs.

Shocked, frightened, Alaire tried to raise him, but he encircled her in a tighter embrace.

"Dave! What is it? What have I done?" she implored. "Have I hurt you so?"

It was a long time before he could make known the significance of that paragraph, and when he finally managed to tell her about the terrible fear that had lain so heavily upon his soul it was in broken, choking words which showed his deep emotion. The story was out at last, however, and he stood over her transfigured.

Alaire lifted her arms and placed them upon his shoulders. "Were you going to give me up for that?--for a shadow?"

"Yes. I had made up my mind. I wouldn't have dared marry you last night, but--I never expected to see today's sun. I didn't think it would make much difference. It was more than a shadow, Alaire. It was real. I WAS mad--stark, staring mad--or in a fair way of becoming so. I suppose I brooded too much. Those violent spells, those wild moments I sometimes have, made me think it must be true. I dare say they are no more than temper, but they seemed to prove all that Ellsworth suspected."

"You must have thought me a very cowardly woman," she told him. "It wouldn't have made the slightest difference to me, Dave. We would have met it together when it came, just as we'll meet everything now--you and I, together."

"My wife!" He laid his lips against her hair.

They were standing beside the window, speechless, oblivious to all except their great love, when Dolores entered to tell them that supper was ready and that the horses were saddled.

XXXII

THE DAWN

Juan Garcia proved to be a good guide, and he saved the refugees many miles on their road to the Rio Grande. But every farm and every village was a menace, and at first they were forced to make numerous detours. As the night grew older, however, they rode a straighter course, urging their horses to the limit, hoping against hope to reach the border before daylight overtook them. This they might have done had it not been for Father O'Malley and Dolores, who were unused to the saddle and unable to maintain the pace Juan set for them.

About midnight the party stopped on the crest of a flinty ridge to give their horses breath and to estimate their progress. The night was fine and clear; outlined against the sky were the stalks of countless sotol-plants standing slim and bare, like the upright lances of an army at rest; ahead the road meandered across a mesa, covered with grama grass and black, formless blots of shrubbery.

Father O'Malley groaned and shifted his weight. "Juan tells me we'll never reach Romero by morning, at this rate," he said; and Dave was forced to agree. "I think you and he and Alaire had better go on and leave Dolores and me to follow as best we can."

Dolores plaintively seconded this suggestion. "I would rather be burned at the stake than suffer these agonies," she confessed. "My bones are broken. The devil is in this horse." She began to weep softly. "Go, senora. Save yourself! It is my accursed fat stomach that hinders me. Tell Benito that I perished breathing his name, and see to it, when he remarries, that he retains none of my treasures."

Alaire reassured her by saying: "We won't leave you. Be brave and make the best of it."

"Yes, grit your teeth and hold on," Dave echoed. "We'll manage to make it somehow."

But progress was far slower than it should have been, and the elder woman continued to lag behind, voicing her distress in groans and lamentations. The priest, who was made of sterner stuff, did his best to bear his tortures cheerfully.

In spite of their efforts the first rosy heralds of dawn discovered them still a long way from the river and just entering a more thickly settled country. Daylight came swiftly, and Juan finally gave them warning.

"We can't go on; the danger is too great," he told them. "If the soldiers are still in Romero, what then?"

"Have you no friends hereabouts who would take us in?" Dave inquired.

The Mexican shook his head.

Dave considered for a moment. "You must hide here," he told his companions, "while I ride on to Romero and see what can be done. I suspect Blanco's troops have left, and in that case everything will be all right."

"Suppose they haven't?" Alaire inquired. All night she had been in the lightest of moods, and had steadily refused to take their perils seriously. Now her smile chased the frown from her husband's face.

"Well, perhaps I'll have breakfast with them," he laughed.

"Silly. I won't let you go," she told him, firmly; and, reading the expression in her face, he felt a dizzy wonder. "We'll find a nice secluded spot; then we'll sit down and wait for night to come. We'll pretend we're having a picnic."

Dolores sighed at the suggestion. "That would be heaven, but there can be no sitting down for me."

Garcia, who had been standing in his stirrups scanning the long, flat road ahead, spoke sharply: "CARAMBA! Here come those very soldiers now! See!"

Far away, but evidently approaching at a smart gait, was a body of mounted men. After one look at them Dave cried:

"Into the brush, quick!" He hurried his companions ahead of him, and when they had gone perhaps a hundred yards from the road he took Juan's Winchester, saying: "Ride in a little way farther and wait. I'm going back. If you hear me shoot, break for the river. Ride hard and keep under cover as much as possible." Before they could remonstrate he had wheeled Montrosa and was gone.

This was luck, he told himself. Ten miles more and they would have been safe, for the Rio Grande is not a difficult river either to ford or to swim. He dismounted and made his way on foot to a point where he could command a view, but he had barely established himself when he found Alaire at his side.

"Go back," he told her. But she would not, and so they waited together.

There were perhaps a dozen men in the approaching squad, and Dave saw that they were heavily accoutred. They rode fast, too, and at their head galloped a large man under a wide-brimmed felt hat. It soon became evident that the soldiers were not uniformed. Therefore, Dave reasoned, they were not Federals, but more probably some Rebel scouting band from the south, and yet--He rubbed his eyes and stared again.

Dave pressed forward eagerly, incredulously; the next instant he had broken cover with a shout. Alaire was at his side, clapping her hands and laughing with excitement.

The cavalcade halted; the big man tumbled from his saddle and came straddling through the high grass, waving his hat and yelling.

"Blaze! You old scoundrel!" Dave cried, and seized one of the ranchman's palms while Alaire shook the other.

"Say! We're right glad to see you-all," Jones exclaimed. "We reckoned you might be havin' a sort of unpleasantness with Longorio, so we organized up and came to get you."

The other horsemen were crowding close now, and their greetings were noisy. There were the two Guzman boys, Benito Gonzales, Phil Strange, and a number of Jonesville's younger and more adventurous citizens.

In the midst of the tumult Benito inquired for his wife, and Dave relieved his anxiety by calling Dolores and Father O'Malley. Then, in answer to the questions showered upon him, he swiftly sketched the story of Alaire's rescue and their flight from La Feria.

When he had finished Blaze Jones drew a deep breath. "We're mighty glad you got out safe, but you've kicked the legs from under one of my pet ambitions. I sure had planned to nail Longorio's hide on my barn door. Yes, and you've taken the bread out of the mouths of the space writers and sob sisters from here to Hudson's Bay. Miz Austin, your picture's in every newspaper in the country, and, believe me, it's the worst atrocity of the war."

"War!" Father O'Malley had joined the group now, and he asked, "Has war been declared?"

"Not yet, but we've got hopes." To Alaire Blaze explained: "Ellsworth's in Washington, wavin' the Stars and Stripes and singin' battle hymns, but I reckon the government figures that the original of those newspaper pictures would be safe anywhere. Well, we've got our own ideas in Jonesville, so some of us assembled ourselves and declared war on our own hook. These gentlemen"--Blaze waved his hand proudly at his neighbors--"constitute the Jonesville Guards, the finest body of American men that has invaded Mexican soil since me and Dave went after Ricardo Guzman's remains. Blamed if I ain't sorry you sidetracked our expedition."

It was evident, from the words of the others, that the Jonesville Guards were indeed quite as heedless of international complications as was their commander. One and all were highly incensed at Longorio's perfidy, and, had Alaire suggested such a thing, it was patent that they would have ridden on to La Feria and exacted a reckoning from him.

Such proof of friendship affected her deeply, and it was not until they were all under way back toward Romero that she felt she had made her appreciation fully known. When she reflected that these men were some of the very neighbors whom she had shunned and slighted, and whose honest interest she had so habitually misconstrued all these years, it seemed very strange that they should feel the least concern over her. It gave her a new appreciation of their chivalry and their worth; it filled her with a humble desire to know them better and to strengthen herself in their regard. Then, too, the esteem in which they held Dave--her husband--gratified her intensely. It made no more difference to them than to her that he was a poor man, a man without authority or position; they evidently saw and loved in him the qualities which she saw and loved. And that was as it should be.

They were gentle and considerate men, too, as she discovered when they told her, bit by bit, what had happened during her absence. She learned, much to her relief, that Ed's funeral had been held, and that all the distressing details of the inquiry had been attended to. Jose Sanchez, it appeared, had confessed freely. Although her new friends made plain their indignation at the manner of Ed's taking off, they likewise let her know that they considered his death only a slight loss, either to her or to the community. Not one of them pretended it was anything except a blessing.

The journey drew to an end very quickly. Romero, deserted now by its garrison, stirred and stared sleepily at the invaders, but concerned itself with their presence no more than to wonder why they laughed and talked so spiritedly. Plainly, these gringos were a barbarous race of people, what with their rushing here and there, and with their loud, senseless laughter. God had wisely placed them beyond the Rio Grande, said the citizens of Romero.

The crossing was made; Alaire found herself in Texas once again, and it seemed to her that the sun had never been so bright, the air so clear, the sky so high, the world so smiling, as here and now. The men who had ridden forth to seek her were smiling, too, and they were shaking her hands and congratulating her. Even the Guzman boys, who were shy in the presence of American ladies, were wishing her the best of fortune and the greatest of happiness.

Blaze Jones was the last to leave. With especial emphasis upon her name, he said: "Miz Austin, Paloma and me would like to have you come to our house and stay until you feel like goin' back to Las Palmas."

When Alaire declined with moistened eyes, explaining that she could not well accept his invitation, he signified his understanding.

"We're goin' to see a lot of you, just the same," he promised her, "'cause we feel as if you sort of belonged to us. There's a lot of good people in this part of Texas, and them that ain't so good God and the Rangers is slowly weedin' out. We don't always know the ones we like best until something happens to 'em, but if you'd heard the prayers the folks of Jonesville have been sayin' lately you'd know you was our favorite." Then, with a meaning twinkle in his eye, he told her, gravely: "It seems a pity that I ain't younger and better-lookin'. I would sure cut short your grief." Then he raised his hat and rode away, chuckling.

Alaire turned to Dave in dismay. "He knows!" she cried.

"I'm afraid they all know. But don't worry; they'll respect our wishes."

Father O'Malley had ridden on ahead with Benito and Dolores; Dave and Alaire followed leisurely. Now that the moment of their parting was at hand, they lingered by the way, delaying it as long as possible, feeling a natural constraint at what was in their minds.

"How long--will it be?" he asked her, finally. "How long before I can really have you for my own?"

Alaire smiled into his eyes. "Not long. But you'll be patient, won't you, dear?"

He took her hand in his, and they rode on silently, a song in the heart of each of them.

THE END