Chapter 13. A Woman Of Emerald Eyes

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_ CHAPTER XIII. A WOMAN OF EMERALD EYES

At the first break of dawn, Rhodes was up, and without waiting for breakfast walked over to the rancherias of Palomitas to see Tula.

She was with some little girls and old women carrying water from the well as stolidly as though adventure had never stalked across her path. A whole garment had been given her instead of the tatter of rags in which she had returned to the little Indian pueblo. She replied briefly to his queries regarding her welfare, and when he asked where she was living, she accompanied him to an old adobe where there were two other motherless children--victims of the raiders.

An old, half-blind woman stirred meal into a kettle of porridge, and to her Kit addressed himself.

"A blessing will be on your house, but you have too many to feed here," he said "and the child of Miguel should go to the ranch house of Mesa Blanca. The wife of Isidro is a good woman and will give her care."

"Yes, senor, she is a good woman," agreed the old Indian. "Also it may be a safe house for a maiden, who knows? Here it is not safe; other raiders may come."

"That is true. Send her after she has eaten."

He then sought out one of the older men to learn who could be counted on to round up the stray cattle of the ranges. After that he went at once back to the ranch house, and did not even speak to Tula again. There was nothing to indicate that she was the principal object of his visit, or that she had acquired a guardian who was taking his job seriously.

Later in the day she was brought to Mesa Blanca by an elderly Indian woman of her mother's clan, and settled in the quiet Indian manner in the new dwelling place. Valencia was full of pity for the girl of few years who had yet known the hard trail, and had mourned alone for her dead.

There was a sort of suppressed bustle about la casa de Mesa Blanca that day, dainties of cookery prepared with difficulty from the diminished stores, and the rooms of the iron bars sprinkled and swept, and pillows of wondrous drawnwork decorated the more pretentious bed. To Tula it was more of magnificence than she had ever seen in her brief life, and the many rooms in one dwelling was a wonder. She would stand staring across the patio and into the various doorways through which she hesitated to pass. She for whom the wide silences of the desert held few terrors, hesitated to linger alone in the shadows of the circling walls. Kit noted that when each little task was finished for Valencia, she would go outside in the sunlight where she had the familiar ranges and far blue mountains in sight.

"Here it makes much trouble only to live in a house," she said pointing to the needlework on a table cover. "The bowls of food will make that dirty in one eating, and then what? Women in fine houses are only as mares in time of thrashing the grain--no end and no beginning to the work,--they only tread their circle."

"Right you are, sister," agreed Kit, "they do make a lot of whirligig work for themselves, all the same as your grandmothers painting pottery that smash like eggshells. But life here isn't all play at that, and there may be something doing before sleep time tonight. I went after you so I would have a comrade I knew would stick."

She only gazed at him without question.

"You remember, Tula, the woman led by the padre at Soledad?"

She nodded silently.

"It may be that woman is captive to the same men who took your people," he said slowly watching her, "and it may be we can save her."

"May it also be that we can catch the man?" she asked, and her eyes half closed, peered up at him in curious intensity. "Can that be, O friend?"

"Some day it must surely be, Tula."

"One day it must be,--one day, and prayers are making all the times for that day," she insisted stolidly. "The old women are talking, and for that day they want him."

"What day, Tula?"

"The Judas day."

Kit Rhodes felt a curious creepy sensation of being near an unseen danger, some sleeping serpent basking in the sun, harmless until aroused for attack. He thought of the gentle domestic Valencia, and now this child, both centered on one thought--to sacrifice a traitor on the day of Judas!

"Little girls should make helpful prayers," he ventured rather lamely, "not vengeance prayers."

"I was the one to make cry of a woman, when my father went under the earth," she said. It was her only expression of the fact that she had borne a woman's share of all their joint toil in the desert,--and he caught her by the shoulder, as she turned away.

"Why, Kid Cleopatra, it isn't a woman's work you've done at all. It's a man's job you've held down and held level," he declared heartily. "That's why I am counting on you now. I need eyes to watch when I have to be in other places."

"I watch," she agreed, "I watch for you, but maybe I make my own prayers also;--all the time prayers."

"Make one for a straight trail to the border, and all sentries asleep!" he suggested. "We have a pile of yellow rock to get across, to say nothing of our latest puzzling prospect."

As the day wore on the latest "prospect" presented many complications to the imagination, and he tramped the corridors of Mesa Blanca wondering why he had seen but one side of the question the night before, for in the broad light of day there seemed a dozen, and all leading to trouble! That emerald-eyed daughter of a renegade priest had proven a host in herself when it came to breeding trouble. She certainly had been unlucky.

"Well, it might be worse," he confided to Bunting out in the corral. "Cap Pike might have tagged along to discourse on the general tomfoolery of a partner who picks up a damsel in distress at every fork of the trail. Not that he'd be far wrong at that, Baby. If any hombre wanted to catch me in a bear trap he'd only need to bait it with a skirt."

Baby Bunting nodded sagaciously, and nuzzled after Kit who was cleaning up the best looking saddle horse brought in from the Indian herd. It was a scraggy sorrel with twitchy ears and wicked eyes, but it looked tough as a mountain buck. Kit knew he should need two like that for the northern trail, and had hopes that the bewitched Marto Cavayso, whoever he was, would furnish another.

He went steadily about his preparations for the border trail, just as if the addition of an enchantress with green-jewel eyes was an every day bit of good fortune expected in every outfit, but as the desert ranges flamed rose and mauve in the lowering sun there was a restless expectancy at the ranch house, bolts and locks and firearms were given final inspection. Even at the best it was a scantily manned fort for defense in case Mario's companions at dice should question his winning and endeavor to capture the stake.

"I shall go part way on the Soledad trail and wait what happens," he told Isidro. "I will remain at a distance unless Clodomiro needs me. There is no telling what tricks this Cavayso may have up his sleeve."

"I was thinking that same thought," said the old Indian. "The men of Perez are not trusted long, even by Perez. When it is a woman, they are not trusted even in sight! Go with God on the trail."

The ugly young sorrel ran tirelessly the first half of the way, just enough to prove his wind. Then they entered a canon where scrub cottonwoods and greasebush gathered moisture enough for scant growth among the boulders worn out of the cliffs by erosion. It was the safest place to wait, as it was also the most likely place for treachery if any was intended to Clodomiro. At either end of the pass lay open range and brown desert, with only far patches of oasis where a well was found, or a sunken river marked a green pasture in some valley.

When he wrote the note he had not thought of danger to Clodomiro, regarding him only as a fearless messenger, but if the boy should prove an incumbrance to Cavayso after they were free of Soledad, that might prove another matter, and as old Isidro had stated, no one trusted a Perez man when a woman was in question!

He dismounted to listen and seek safe shadow, for the dusk had come, and desert stars swung like brilliant lamps in the night sky, and the white rocks served as clear background for any moving body.

The plan was, if possible, to get the woman out with Clodomiro while the men were at supper. The manta of Elena could cover her, and if she could walk with a water jar to the far well as any Indian woman would walk, and a horse hid in the willows there----!

It had been well thought out, and if nothing had interfered they should have reached the canon an hour earlier. If Clodomiro had failed it might be a serious matter, and Kit Rhodes had some anxious moments for the stolen woman while dusk descended on the canon.

He listened for the beat of horse hoofs, but what he heard first was a shot, and a woman's scream, and then the walls of the canon echoed the tumult of horses racing towards him in flight.

He recognized Clodomiro by the bare head and banda, and a woman bent low beside him, her manta flapping like the wings of a great bird as her horse leaped forward beside the Indian boy.

Back of them galloped a man who slowed up and shot backward at the foremost of a pursuing band.

He missed, and the fire was returned, evidently with some effect, for the first marksman grunted and cursed, and Kit heard the clatter of his gun as it fell from his hand. He leaned forward and spurred his horse to outrun the pursuers. He was evidently Marto.

Kit had a mental vision of fighting Marto alone for the woman at Mesa Blanca, or fighting with the entire band and decided to halt the leader of the pursuers and gain that much time at least for the woman and Clodomiro.

He had mounted at the first sound of the runaways, and crouching low in the saddle, hid back of the thick green of a dwarfed mesquite, and as the leader came into range against the white rock well he aimed low and touched the trigger.

The horse leaped up and the rider slid off as the animal sunk to the ground. Kit guided his mount carefully along shadowed places into the road expecting each instant a shot from the man on the ground.

But it did not come, and he gained the trail before the other pursuers rounded the bend of the canon. The sound of their hoofs would deafen them to his, and once on the trail he gave the sorrel the rein, and the wild thing went down the gully like an arrow from a bow.

He was more than a little puzzled at the silence back of him. The going down of the one man and horse had evidently checked all pursuit. Relieved though he was at the fact, he realized it was not a natural condition of affairs, and called for explanation.

The other three riders were a half mile ahead and he had no idea of joining them on the trail. It occurred to him there was a possible chance of taking a short cut over the point of the mesa and beating them to the home ranch. There was an even chance that the rougher trail would offer difficulties in the dark, but that was up to the sorrel and was worth the trial.

The bronco took the mesa walls like a cat, climbed and staggered up, slid and tumbled down and crossed the level intervening space to the corral as the first sound of the others came beating across the sands.

A dark little figure arose by the corral bars and reached for the horse as he slipped from the saddle.

"Quickly, Tulita!" he said, stripping saddle and bridle from its back, "one instant only to make ourselves as still as shadows under the walls of the house."

Fast as he ran, she kept pace with him to the corridor where Isidro waited.

"All is well," he said briefly to the old man. "Clodomiro comes safe with the senora, and the man who would steal her was shot and lost his gun. All has gone very well."

"Thanks to God!" said the old Indian. "The stealing of women has ever been a danger near, but luck comes well to you, senor, and it is good to be under the protection of you."

"Open the door and show a light of welcome," said Kit. "Call your wife and let all be as planned by us. I will be in the shadows, and a good gun for safety of the woman if needed, but all will work well, as you will see."

The three riders came up to the portal before dismounting, and Valencia went forward, while Isidro held high a blazing torch, and Clodomiro dismounted quickly, and offered help to the woman.

"My grandmother has all for your comfort, senora," he said, "will it please you to descend?"

The man swung from the saddle, awkwardly nursing his right arm.

"Yes this is a safe place, Dona Jocasta," he declared. "It is all well arranged. With your permission I may assist you."

He offered his left hand, but she looked from him to Valencia, and then to Clodomiro.

"You are young to be a stealer of women;--the saints send you a whiter road!" she said. "And you may help me, for my shoulder has a hurt from that first shot of the comrade of this man."

"No, senora," stated her captor, "the evil shot came from no comrade of mine. They did not follow us, those bandits--accursed be their names! They were hid in the canoncita and jumped our trail. But have no fear, Dona Jocasta, they are left behind, and it will be my pleasure to nurse the wounds they have made."

"Be occupied with your own," she suggested pointing to his hand from which blood still dripped, "and you, mother, can show me the new prison. It can be no worse than the others."

"Better, much better, little dove," said Marto, who followed after the two women, and glanced over their shoulders into the guest chamber of the iron bars, "it is a bird cage of the finest, and a nest for harmonies."

Then to Valencia he turned with authority, "When you have made the senorita comfortable, bring the key of the door to me."

"Si, senor," said Valencia bending low, and even as the prisoner entered the room, she changed the key to the outside of the door. Marto nodded his approval and turned away.

"Now this shirt off, and a basin of water and a bandage," he ordered Isidro. "It is not much, and it still bleeds."

"True, it does, senor, and the room ordered for you has already the water and a clean shirt on the pillow. Clodomiro, go you for a bandage, and fetch wine to take dust out of the throat! This way, senor,--and may you be at home in your own house!"

Unsuspecting, the amorous Marto followed the old man into the room prepared. He grunted contemptuous satisfaction at evidences of comfort extending to lace curtains hanging white and full over the one window.

"It is the time for a shirt of such cleanness," he observed, with a grin. "Jesusita! but the sleeve sticks to me! Cut it off, and be quick to make me over into a bridegroom."

The old man did as he was bidden, and when Clodomiro brought in a woven tray covered with a napkin from which a bottle of wine was discernible, Marto grinned at him.

"It is a soft nest you found for me, boy," he said appreciatively, "and when I am capitan I will make you lieutenant."

"Thanks to you, senor, and hasten the day!"

Clodomiro assisted his grandfather, and stood aside at the door respectfully as the old man passed out with his primitive supply of salves and antiseptics, and only when all need of caution was ended the boy smiled at the would-be Lothario, and the smile held a subtle mockery as he murmured, "The saints send you a good night's sleep, senor, and a waking to health--and clearer sight!"

"Hell and its blazes to you! why do you grin?" demanded the other setting down the bottle from which he had taken a long and grateful drink, but quick as a cat the boy pulled the door shut, and slipped the bolt on the outside, and laughed aloud.

"Not this night will you be bridegroom for another man's wife, senor!" he called. "Also it is better that you put curb on your curses,--for the lady has a mind for a quiet night of sleep."

Marto rushed to the curtained window only to find iron bars and the glint of a gun barrel. Isidro held the gun, and admonished the storming captive with the gentle fatalism of the Indian.

"It is done under orders of the major-domo, senor. There is no other way. If your words are hard or rough to the ears of the lady, there is a bullet for you, and a hidden place for your grave. This is the only word to you, senor. It is given me to say."

"But--Gods, saints, and devils--hearken you to me!" stormed the man. "This is a fool's joke! It can't go on! I must be back at sunrise--I must!"

"You will see many suns rise through these bars if the padrone so pleases," murmured Isidro gently. "That is not for us to decide."

"To hottest hell with your padrone and you! Bring him here to listen to me. This is no affair of a man and a woman,--curse her witch eyes and their green fires! There is work afoot,--big work, and I must get back to Soledad. You know what goes over the trail to Soledad,--every Indian knows! It is the cache of ammunition with which to save the peon and Indian slave,--you know that! You know the revolutionists must get it to win in Sonora. A trap is set for tomorrow, a big trap! I must be there to help spring it. To you there will be riches and safety all your life for my freedom--on the cross I will swear that. I----"

"Senor, nothing is in my power, and of your traps I know nothing. I am told you set a trap for a lady who is in grief and your own feet were caught in it. That is all I know of traps," said Isidro.

Kit patted the old man on the shoulder for cleverness, even while he wondered at the ravings of the would-be abductor. Then he crept nearer the window where he could see the face of the prisoner clearly, and without the overshadowing hat he had worn on entrance. The face gave him something to think about, for it was that of one of the men who had ridden up to the Yaqui spring the day he had found Tula and Miguel in the desert. How should this rebel who rode on secret trails with Ramon Rotil be head man at Soledad for Rotil's enemy? And what was the trap?

"Look well at that man, Isidro," he whispered, "and tell me if such a man rode here to Mesa Blanca with General Rotil."

"No such man was here, senor, but this man was foreman at Soledad before the Deliverer came over the eastern range to Mesa Blanca. Also the general and Don Jose Perez are known as enemies;--the friend of one cannot be the friend of another."

"True enough, Isidro, but that does not help me to understand the trap set. Call your wife and learn if I can see the Dona Jocasta."

Tula had crept up beside them, and touched him on the arm.

"She asks for you, and sadness is with her very much. She watches us in fear, and cannot believe that the door is open for her."

"If that is her only trouble we can clear it away for her, pronto," he stated, and they entered the patio.

"It is not her only trouble, but of the other she does not speak. Valencia weeps to look at her."

"Heavens! Is she as bad looking as that?"

"No, it is another reason," stated the girl stolidly. "She is a caged humming bird, and her wings have broken."

Kit Rhodes never forgot that first picture of their kidnaped guest, for he agreed with Clodomiro who saw in her the living representation of old biblical saints.

The likeness was strengthened by the half Moorish drapery over her head, a black mantilla which, at sound of a man's step, she hurriedly drew across the lower part of her face. Her left arm and shoulder was bare, and Valencia bent over her with a strip of old linen for bandage, but the eyes of Dona Jocasta were turned half shrinking, half appraising to the strange Americano. It was plain to her that conquering men were merely the owners of women.

"It is good you come, senor," said Valencia. "Here is a wound and the bullet under the skin. I have waited for Isidro to help but he is slow on the way."

"He is busy otherwise, but I will call him unless my own help will serve here. That is for the senora to say."

The eyes of the girl,--she was not more,--never left his face, and above the lace scarf she peered at him as through a mask.

"It is you who sent messenger to save an unhappy one you did not know? You are the Americano of the letter?"

"At your service, senora. May that service begin now?"

"It began when that letter was written, and this room made ready," she said. "And if you can find the bullet it will end the unhappiness of this good woman. She weeps for the little bit of lead. It should have struck a heart instead of a shoulder."

"Ah, senora!" lamented Valencia, "weep like a woman over sorrows. It is a better way than to mock."

"God knows it is not for me to mock!" breathed the soft voice bitterly. "And if the senor will lend you his aid, I will again be in his debt."

Without further words Kit approached, and Valencia drew the cover from the shoulder and indicated where the ball could be felt.

"I cannot hold the shoulder and press the flesh there without making much pain, too much," stated Valencia, "but it must come out, or there will be trouble."

"Sure there will," asserted Kit, "and if you or Tula will hold the arm, and Dona Jocasta will pardon me----"

He took the white shoulder in his two hands and gently traced the direction of the bullet. It had struck in the back and slanted along the shoulder blade. It was evidently fired from a distance and little force left. Marto had been much nearer the pursuer, and his was a clean cut wound through the upper arm.

The girl turned chalky white as he began slowly to press the bullet backward along its trail, but she uttered no sound, only a deep intake of breath that was half a sob, and the cold moisture of sickening pain stood in beads on her face.

All of the little barriers with a stranger were forgotten, and the shielding scarf fell away from her face and bosom, and even with the shadowed emerald eyes closed, Kit Rhodes thought her the most perfect thing in beauty he had ever seen.

He hated himself for the pain he was forcing on her as he steadily followed the bullet upward and upward until it lay in his hand.

She did not faint, as he feared she might, but fell back in the chair, while Valencia busied herself with the ointment and bandage, and Tula, at a word from Kit, poured her a cup of wine.

"Drink," he said, "if only a little, senora. Your strength has served you well, but it needs help now."

She swallowed a little of the wine, and drew the scarf about her, and after a little opened her eyes and looked at him. He smiled at her approvingly, and offered her the bullet.

"It may be you will want it to go on some shrine to a patron saint, senora," he suggested, but she did not take it, only looked at him steadily with those wonderful eyes, green with black lashes, shining out of her marble Madonna-like face.

"My patron saint traveled the trail with you, Senor Americano, and the bullet is witness. Let me see it."

He gave it into her open hand where she balanced it thoughtfully.

"So near the mark, yet went aside," she murmured. "Could that mean there is yet any use left in the world for me?"

"Beauty has its own use in the world, senora; that is why rose gardens are planted."

"True, senor, though I belong no more to the gardens;--no, not to gardens, but to the desert. Neither have I place nor power today, and I may never have, but I give back to you this witness of your great favor. If a day comes when I, Jocasta, can give favor in return, bring or send this witness of the ride tonight. I will redeem it."

"The favor is to me, and calls for no redemption," said Kit awkward at the regal poise of her, and enchanted by the languorous glance and movement of her. Even the reaching out of her hand made him think of Tula's words, 'a humming bird,' if one could imagine such a jewel-winged thing weighted down with black folds of mourning.

"A caged humming bird with broken wings!" and that memory brought another thought, and he fumbled the bullet, and gave the first steady look into those emerald, side-glancing eyes.

"But--there is a compact I should appreciate if Dona Jocasta will do me the favor,--and it is that she sets value on the life that is now her very own, and, that she forgets not to cherish it."

"Ah-h!" She looked up at him piteously a moment, and then the long lashes hid her eyes, and her head was bent low. "Sinful and without shame have I been! and they have told you of the knife I tried to use--here!"

She touched her breast with her slender ring-laden hand, and her voice turned mocking.

"But you see, Senor Americano, even Death will not welcome me, and neither steel nor lead will serve me!"

"Life will serve you better, senora."

"Not yet has it done so, and I am a woman--old--old! I am twenty, senor, and refused of Death! Jocasta Benicia they named me. Jocasta Perdida it should have been to fit the soul of me, so why should I promise a man whom I do not know that I will cherish my life when I would not promise a padre? Answer me that, senor whose name has not been told me!"

"But you will promise, senora," insisted Kit, smiling a little, though thrilled by the sadness of life's end at twenty, "and as for names, if you are Dona Perdida I may surely name myself Don Esperenzo, for I have not only hope, but conviction, that life is worth living!"

"To a man, yes, and Mexico is a man's land."

"Ay, it must be yours as well,--beautiful that thou art!" murmured Valencia adoringly. "You should not give yourself a name of sadness, for this is our Senor El Pajarito, who is both gay and of honesty. He,--with God,--is your protection, and harm shall not be yours."

Dona Jocasta reached out and touched kindly the bent head of the Indian woman.

"As you will, mother. With hope and a singer for a shield, even a prison would not be so bad, El Pajarito, eh? Do you make songs--or sing them, senor?"

"Neither,--I am only a lucky bluff. My old partner and I used to sing fool things to the mules, and as we could out-bray the burros my Indio friends are kind and call it a singing;--as easy as that is it to get credit for talent in this beneficent land of yours! But--the compact, senora?"

Her brows lifted wearily, yet the hint of a smile was in her eyes.

"Yes, since you ask so small a thing, it is yours. Jocasta makes compact with you; give me a wish that the life is worth it."

"Sure I will," said Kit holding out his hand, but she shrunk perceptibly, and her hand crept out of sight in the black draperies.

"You have not, perhaps, ever sent a soul to God without absolution?" she asked in a breathless hushed sort of voice. "No senor, the look of you tells me you have not been so unpardonable. Is it not so?"

"Why, yes," returned Kit, "it hasn't been a habit with me to start anyone on the angels' flight without giving him time to bless himself, but even at that----"

"No, no!" as he took a step nearer. "The compact is ours without handclasp. The hand of Jocasta is the hand of the black glove, senor."

He looked from her to the two Indians, the old woman kneeling beside Jocasta and crossing herself, and Tula, erect and slender against the adobe wall, watching him stolidly. There was no light on the subject from either of them.

"Pardon, I'm but a clumsy Americano, not wise to your meanings," he ventured, "and beautiful hands look better without gloves of any color."

"It may be so, yet I have heard that no matter how handsome a headsman may be, he wears a black mask, and hands are not stretched out to touch his."

"Senora!"

"Senor, we arrive at nothing when making speech of me," she said with a little sigh. "Our ride was hard, and rest is best for all of us. Our friend here tells me there is supper, and if you will eat with me, we will know more of how all this has come about. It is strange that you, a lone Americano in this land, should plan this adventure like a bandit, and steal not only the major-domo of Soledad, but the woman he would steal!"

"It was so simple that the matter is not worth words except as concerns Clodomiro, who was the only one in danger."

"Ah! if ever they had suspected him! You have not seen that band of men, they are terrible! Of all the men of Jose Perez they are the blackest hearts, and if it had not been for the poor padre----"

"Tell me of him," said Kit who perceived she was willing enough to speak plainly of all things except herself. "He is a good man?"

"A blessing to me, senor!" she asserted earnestly as they were seated at the table so carefully prepared by Valencia. "Look you! I broke away from those animals and in a little mountain village,--such a one as I was born in, senor!--I ran to the altar of the little chapel, and that priest was a shield for me. Against all the men he spoke curses if they touched me. Well, after that there was only one task to do, and that was to carry him along. I think they wanted to kill him, and had not the courage. And after all that I came away from Soledad without saving him;--that was bad of me, very bad! I--I think I went wild in the head when I saw the men play games of cards, and I to go to the winner! Not even a knife for food would they give me, for they knew----"

She shuddered, and laid down quickly the knife she had lifted from beside her plate, and glanced away when she found him regarding her.

"It has been long weeks since I was trusted as you are trusting me here," she continued quietly. "See! On my wrists were chains at first."

"And this Marto Cavayso did that?" demanded Kit as she showed her scarred slender wrist over which Valencia had wept.

"No, it was before Cavayso--he is a new man--so I think this was when Conrad was first helping to plan me as an insane woman and have me put secretly to prison, but some fear struck Jose Perez, and that plan would not serve. In the dark of night I was half smothered in wraps and put in an ox-cart of a countryman and hauled north out of the city. Two men rode as guard. They chained me in the day and slept, traveling only in the night until they met Cavayso and his men. After that I remember little, I was so weary of life! One alcalde asked about me and Cavayso said I was his wife who had run away with a gypsy fiddler, and he was taking me home to my children. Of what use to speak? A dozen men would have added their testimony to his, and had sport in making other romance against me. They were sullen because they thought I had jewels hid under my clothes, and Cavayso would not let them search me. It has been hell in these hills of Sonora, Senor Pajarito."

"That is easy to understand," agreed Kit wondering at her endurance, and wondering at the poise and beauty of her after such experience. There was no trace of nervousness, or of tears, or self-pity. It was as if all this of which she told had been a minor affair, dwarfed by some tragic thing to which he had no key.

"So, Conrad was in this plot against you?" he asked, and knew that Tula, standing back of his chair had missed no word. "You mean the German Conrad who is manager of Granados ranches across the border?"

"Senor, I mean the beast whose trail is red with the blood of innocence, and whose poison is sinking into the veins of Mexico like a serpent, striking secretly, now here, now there, until the blood of the land is black with that venom. Ay! I know, senor;--the earth is acrawl with the German lizards creeping into the shining sun of Mexico! This so excellent Don Adolf Conrad is only one, and Jose Perez is his target--I am the one to know that! A year ago, and Don Jose was a man, with faults perhaps; but who is perfect on this earth? Then came Don Adolf riding south and is very great gentleman and makes friends. His home in Hermosillo becomes little by little the house of Perez, and little by little Perez goes on crooked paths. That is true! First it was to buy a ship for coast trade, then selling rifles in secret where they should not be sold, then--shame it is to tell--men and women were sold and carried on that ship like cattle! Not rebels, senor, not prisoners of battle,--but herdsmen and ranch people, poor Indian farmers whom only devils would harm! Thus it was, senor, until little by little Don Adolf knew so much that Jose Perez awoke to find he had a master, and a strong one! It was not one man alone who caught him in the net; it was the German comrades of Don Adolf who never forgot their task, even when he was north in the States. They needed a man of name in Hermosillo, and Jose Perez is now that man. When the whip of the German cracks, he must jump to serve their will."

"But Jose Perez is a strong man. Before this day he has wiped many a man from his trail if the man made him trouble," ventured Kit.

"You have right in that, senor, but I am telling you it is a wide net they spread and in that net he is snared. Also his household is no longer his own. The Indian house servants are gone, and outlaw Japanese are there instead. That is true and their dress is the dress of Indians. They are Japanese men of crimes, and German men gave aid that they escape from justice in Japan. It is because they need such men for German work in Mexico, men who have been taught German and dare not turn rebel. Not an hour of the life of Jose Perez is free from the eyes of a spy who is a man of crimes. And there are other snares. They tell him that he is to be a governor by their help;--that is a rich bait to float before the eyes of a man! His feet are set on a trail made by Adolph Conrad,--He is trapped, and there is no going back. Poison and shame and slavery and death have come upon that trail like black mushrooms grown in a night, and what the end of the trail will be is hid in the heart of God."

"But your sympathy is with those women in slavery there in the south, and not with the evil friend of Jose Perez?" asked Kit.

"Can you doubt, senor? Am I not as truly a victim as they? I have not worked under a whip, but there are other punishments--for a woman!"

Her voice dropped almost to a whisper, and she rested her chin on her hand, staring out into the shadows of the patio, oblivious of them all. Tula gazed at her as if fascinated, and there was a difference in her regard. That she was linked in hate against Conrad gave the Indian girl common cause with the jewel-eyed woman whose beauty had been the boast of a province. Kit noticed it and was vastly comforted. The absolute stolidity of Tula had left him in doubt as to the outcome if his little partner had disapproved of his fascinating protegee. He knew the thing she wanted to know, and asked it.

"Senora, the last band of Indian slaves from Sonora were driven from the little pueblo of Palomitas at the edge of this ranch. And there are sisters and mothers here with sick hearts over that raid. Can you tell me where those women were sent?"

"Which raid was that, and when?" asked Jocasta arousing herself from some memory in which she had been submerged. "Pardon, senor, I am but a doleful guest at supper, thinking too deeply of that which sent me here. Your question?"

He repeated it, and she strove to remember.

"There were many, and no one was told whence they came. It was supposed they were war prisoners who had to be fed, and were being sent to grow their own maize. If it were the last band then it would be the time Conrad had the wound in the face, here, like a knife thrust, and that----"

"That was the time," interrupted Kit eagerly. "If you can tell us where those people were sent you will prove the best of blessings to Mesa Blanca this night."

She smiled sadly at that and looked from him to Tula, whom she evidently noted for the first time.

"It is long since the word of blessing has been given to Jocasta," she said wistfully. "It would be a comfort to earn it in this house. But that band was not sent away,--not far. Something went wrong with the boat down the coast, I forgot what it was, but there was much trouble, and the Indians were sent to a plantation of the General Terain until the boat was ready. I do not know what plantation, except that Conrad raged about it. He and Don Jose had a quarrel, very terrible! That wound given to him by a woman made him very difficult; then the quarrel ended by them drinking together too much. And after that many things happened very fast, and--I was brought north."

"And the Indians?"

"Senor, I do not think anyone thought again of those Indians. They are planting maize or cane somewhere along the Rio Sonora."

Tula sank down weeping against the wall, while Valencia stroked her hair and patted her. Dona Jocasta regarded her curiously.

"To be young enough to weep like that over a sorrow!" she murmured wistfully. "It is to envy her, and not mourn over her."

"But this weeping is of joy," explained Valencia. "It is as the senor says, a blessing has come with you over the hard road. This child was also stolen, and was clever to escape. Her mother and her sister are yet there in that place where the maize is planted. If the boat has not taken them, then they also may get back. It is a hope!"

"Poor little one! and now that I could make good use of power, it is no longer mine," said Jocasta, looking at Kit regretfully. "A young maid with courage to escape has earned the right to be given help."

"She will be given it," he answered quietly, "and since your patience has been great with my questions, I would ask more of this Cavayso we have trapped tonight. He is raging of curious things there across the patio. Isidro holds a gun on him that he subdue his shouts, and his offer is of rich bribes for quick freedom. He is as mad to get back to Soledad as he was to leave it, and he tells of a trap set there for someone. It concerns ammunition for the revolutionists."

"No, not for them, but for trade in the south," said Jocasta promptly. "Yes, Soledad has long been the place for hiding of arms. It was the task of Don Adolf to get them across the border, and then a man of Don Jose finds a safe trail for them. Sometimes a German officer from Tucson is of much help there in the north. I have heard Don Jose and Conrad laugh about the so easily deceived Americanos,--your pardon, senor!"

"Oh, we are used to that," agreed Kit easily, "and it is quite true. We have a whole flock of peace doves up there helping the Hohenzollern game. What was the officer's name?"

"A name difficult and long," she mused, striving to recall it. "But that name was a secret, and another was used. He was known only as a simple advocate--James, the name; I remember that for they told me it was the English for Diego, which was amusing to me,--there is no sound alike in them!"

"That's true, there isn't," said Kit, who had no special interest in any advocate named James. "But to get back to the man in the cell over there and the ammunition, may I ask if he confided to you anything of that place of storage? I mean Cavayso?"

"No, senor; and for a reason of the best. He knows nothing, and all his days and nights were spent searching secretly for the entrance to that dungeon,--if it is a dungeon! He thought I should know, and made threats against me because I would not tell. Myself, I think Jose Perez tells no one that hiding place, not even Conrad, though Conrad has long wanted it! I told Don Jose that if he told that he was as good as a dead man, and I believe it. But now," and she shook her head fatefully, "now he is sure to get it!"

"But he swears he must get back to Soledad by sunrise for a trap is set. A trap for whom?" persisted Kit.

Dona Jocasta shook her head uncomprehendingly.

"God forbid he should get free to put those wolves on my track; then indeed I would need a knife, senor! He held them back from me on the trail, but now he would not hold them back."

"But the trap, senora?" repeated the puzzled Kit. "That man was in earnest,--dead in earnest! He did not know I was listening, his words were only for an Indian,--for Isidro. Who could he trap? Was he expecting anyone at Soledad?"

Dona Jocasta looked up with a little gasp of remembrance.

"It is true, a courier did come two days ago from the south, and Cavayso told me he meant to take me to the desert and hide me before Don Jose arrived. Also more mules and wagons came in. And Elena scolded about men who came to eat but not to work. Yes, they smoked, and talked, and talked, and waited! I never thought of them except to have a great fear. Yesterday after the lad brought me that letter I had not one thought, but to count the hours, and watch the sun. But it may be Cavayso told the truth, and that Don Jose was indeed coming. He told me he had promised Perez to lose me in the Arroya Maldioso if in no other way, and he had to manage that I never be seen again."

"Arroya Maldioso?" repeated Kit, "I don't understand."

"It is the great quicksand of Soledad, green things grow and blossom there but no living thing can cross over. It is beautiful--that little arroya, and very bad."

"I had heard of it, but forgot," acknowledged Kit, "but that is not the trap of which he is raving now. It is some other thing."

Dona Jocasta did not know. She confessed that her mind was dark and past thinking. The ways of Don Jose and Conrad were not easy for other men of different lives to understand;--there was a great net of war and scheming and barter, and Don Jose was snared in that net, and the end no man could see!

"Have you ever heard that Marto Cavayso was once a lieutenant of General Rotil?" Kit asked.

"The Deliverer!" she gasped, leaning forward and staring at him. A deep flush went over her face and receded, leaving her as deathly pale as when the bullet had been forced from the white shoulder. Her regard was curious, for her brows were contracted and there was domination and command in her eyes. "Why do you say this to me, senor? And why do you think it?"

Kit was astonished at the effect of his words, and quite as much astonished to hear anyone of the Perez household refer to Rotil as "the Deliverer."

"Senora, if you saw him ride side by side with Rotil, drinking from the same cup in the desert, would you not also think it?"

Tula rose to her feet, and moved closer to Kit.

"I too was seeing them together, senora," she said. "It was at the Yaqui well; I drew the water, and they drank it. This man of the loud curses is the man."

Dona Jocasta covered her eyes with her hand, and she seemed shaken. No one else spoke, and the silence was only broken by the muffled tones of Marto in the cell, and the brief bark of Clodomiro's dog at the corral.

"God knows what may be moving forward," she said at last, "but there is some terrible thing afoot. Take me to this man."

"It may not be a pleasant thing to do," advised Kit. "This is a man's game, senora, and his words might offend, for his rage is very great against you."

"Words!" she said with a note of disdain, and arose to her feet. She swayed slightly, and Valencia steadied her, and begged her to wait until morning, for her strength was gone and the night was late.

"Peace, woman! Who of us is sure of a morning? This minute is all the time that is ours, and--I must know."

She leaned on Valencia as they crossed the patio, and Tula moved a seat outside the door of Marto's room. Kit fastened a torch in the holder of the brick pillar and opened the door without being seen, and stood watching the prisoner.

Marto Cavayso, who had been pleading with Isidro, whirled only to find the barrel of another gun thrust through the carved grill in the top of the door.

"Isidro," said Kit, "this man is to answer questions of the senora. If he is uncivil you can singe him with a bullet at your own will."

"Many thanks, senor," returned Isidro promptly. "That is a pleasant work to think of, for the talk of this shameless gentleman is poison to the air."

"You!" burst out Marto, pointing a hand at Jocasta in the corridor. "You put witchcraft of hell on me, and wall me in here with an old lunatic for guard, and now----"

Bing! A bullet from Isidro's rifle whistled past Marto's ear and buried itself in the adobe, scattering plaster and causing the prisoner to crouch back in the corner.

Jocasta regarded him as if waiting further speech, but none came.

"That is better," she said. "No one wishes to do you harm, but you need a lesson very badly. Now Marto Cavayso,--if that be your name!--why did you carry me away? Was it your own doing, or were you under orders of your General Rotil?"

"I should have let the men have you," he muttered. "I was a bewitched man, or you never would have traveled alive to see Soledad. Rotil? Do not the handsome women everywhere offer him love and comradeship? Would he risk a good man to steal a woman of whom Jose Perez is tired?"

"You are not the one to give judgment," said a strange voice outside the barred window.--"That I did not send you to steal women is very true, and the task I did send you for has been better done by other men in your absence."

Cavayso swore, and sat on the bed, his head in his hands. Outside the window there were voices in friendly speech, that of Clodomiro very clear as he told his grandfather the dogs did not bark but once, because some of the Mesa Blanca boys were with the general, who was wounded.

Kit closed and bolted again the door of Cavayso, feeling that the guardianship of beauty in Sonora involved a man in many awkward and entangling situations. If it was indeed Rotil----

But a curious choking moan in the corridor caused him to turn quickly, but not quickly enough.

Dona Jocasta, who had been as a reed of steel against other dangers, had risen to her feet as if for flight at sound of the voice, and she crumpled down on the floor and lay, white as a dead woman, in a faint so deep that even her heartbeat seemed stilled.

Kit gathered her up, limp as a branch of willow, and preceded by Tula with the torch, bore her back to the chamber prepared for her. Valencia swept back the covers of the bed, and with many mutterings of fear and ejaculations to the saints, proceeded to the work of resuscitation.

"To think that she came over that black road and held fast to a heart of bravery,--and now at a word from the Deliverer, she falls dead in fear! So it is with many who hear his name; yet he is not bad to his friends. Every Indian in Sonora is knowing that," stated Valencia. _

Read next: Chapter 14. The Hawk Of The Sierras

Read previous: Chapter 12. Covering The Trail

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