Raquel caught the undercurrent of murmuring as she passed and repassed the other couples. In an interlude, another Mexican youth in uniform bowed low and swung his arm within hers as a square dance began, and she smiled gayly, clasping the hand of one after another in the figures of the dance.
Indeed, Raquel was having a good time. But she was alive all the while to the necessity of escape. And although she smiled enchantingly, if discreetly, according to the etiquette of that region, and spoke scarcely at all, she clung ever so slightly to the Chihuahuan.
“May I see you home, Señorita?” he leaned above her persuasively. “My aide can bring your horse to the door. The duenna may follow.”
Her eyes flashed consent. “I must go now,” she whispered. “I have come without permission”—and that’s true enough, thought she. “My little sirviente waits outside. Let her go with your man to show him our horses. Come, I will call her.”
The lieutenant was carried away. He stepped with Raquel out into the patio. At Raquel’s call, an obedient little figure rose from a corner, a bundle under its arm, and was despatched through a side room with a soldier summoned there. It had all worked out too beautifully!
Raquel requested the lieutenant in a low voice that the horses be brought to the back gate. It would be better were she not observed. Sensing intrigue, the daft youth consented. It was all to his liking. He felt that he had indeed made a conquest.
She led him through the patio, within the arbor, where her dignity held him off, and then they passed through the gate, through the outer court, the second gate—Raquel drew a breath of infinite relief. The horses, led by a black-topped little girl, and followed by a peón soldado, came round the corner and stood before the house.
Raquel spoke to the pinto and he pricked up his ears and came close. She stroked his head, and nuzzled his chin.
“Come,” said her escort, “let me put you up.”
“The little girl first,” said Raquel, “she does not ride so well, and must go astride.” What would happen when her little wild Paintbrush felt the flap of skirts upon his flanks for the first time? Many a good horse had gone crazy with less, especially at night.
She spoke again to Paintbrush, softly, as she allowed the lieutenant to lift her up on the saddle sidewise.
The pinto leaped as a skirt struck his flank, came down trembling.
“Es broncho,” Raquel called out to the astonished teniente, as she brought down her quirt unobserved on the other flank, “he is afraid of my ruffled skirt.” And she shot ahead into the darkness with her small handmaiden following, and disappeared from sight before the startled and angry youth could dash over and grasp the reins of his own mount. He followed hot on their trail, taking the road toward Moctezuma, but they were gone, gone into the darkness, though he searched the streets till after midnight and made inquiries.
CHAPTER XV
WHAT BECAME OF RAQUEL
Where was Raquel? When she realized, as Paintbrush raced through the darkness, that she had outdistanced not only the teniente but Georgie also, she stopped and gathered the flimsy skirts tightly about her waist so that they would no longer terrify the pinto. Making a wide circle, she returned in the direction from which she had fled.
But in the dark she could not find her way, and after an hour she came to the bank of the river that flows west of Moctezuma. Here in the trees she was forced to hide till daylight. As soon as she could see she changed back into her boy’s clothes, having discovered the bundle which Georgie had thrust into the saddle bag.
Alas, when morning actually came she found she was north of the town, and could not go back again, for a cordon of soldiers rode back and forth across the outskirts all day.
She was hungry and thought thankfully of the lunches she had providently packed in both Georgie’s and her own saddle bags the afternoon before. Her saddle bag now looked curiously lumpy. “Mom’s sterno,” she thought ruefully. But investigation brought to light some delicacies which Georgie had evidently filched from the party the night before—delicious loaves of brown cane sugar and sweet native cakes.
As soon as it grew dark she crept into town afoot and ventured upon the streets. Not a soul was abroad. The soldiers had the occupants thoroughly well scared, and Raquel was roughly ordered to get back into the house when she peered from the shadow of a sheltering doorway. So she had to retire within a strange house, climb over a wall, and make her way through dark lanes down to the spot on the riverbank where she had left Paintbrush tethered.
That was perhaps the most precarious experience of the entire adventure, that careful, creeping journey, stumbling from bush to bush; and what joy finally to hear the pinto’s nicker, to fall upon his neck! She slept on the ground near him; if he had lain down she would have pillowed her head upon his flank. As it was, when she woke in the morning he was standing almost over her, keeping watch.
And so it was every day, hiding by day, hunting by night. Finally hunger forced her away in search of food, which she bought easily at far-away houses, returning always to her covert among the trees by the river.
Finally on the evening of the fourth day the detachment of Carrancistas left Moctezuma, and that night she slipped into town to make a thorough search for Georgie. First to the priest’s house, of course. The housekeeper was irate at being roused after dark.
What, a miserable child! Yes, one had hung around there for a few days, three days, but she had sent it away. An ugly little girl in a gingham dress—yes, color-de-rosa.
Well, Georgie wasn’t held by her teniente then. Somewhat relieved, Raquel gave the woman a piece of money that made her gasp, and a note for the child should she come back. “He,” Raquel amended, confiding that it was really a boy, and that he might be dressed as one if he came back.
Hardly knowing what to do next she found her way to the Hotel Moctezuma, and under its flower-hung balconies found rest for the night. While she waited for the man servant to carry water up to her room she inquired from the moso in a low voice if he had seen anything the last few days of a boy of twelve—a guero, a blonde, with front teeth wide apart.
At that description the man started involuntarily, and then shook his head stupidly without answering. Raquel pressed upon him a piece of money which loosened his tongue. He motioned her to follow, picking up her saddle and bags to carry them to her room. When they had entered he whispered cautiously, “What do you wish to know, gracioso Señorito?” Yes, such a lad had been at the hotel last night and had been attached as orderly for the officers and soldiers. The lad had inquired of him, old Pacifico, where a Rancho Escondido was. He had never heard of such a place. And the soldiers had departed that day, taking the boy with them.
Raquel went to bed trembling with relief. Sleep came at once, but she woke before dawn. There was a plentiful breakfast served on a white cloth by candle light, and then she was off.
Before her lay seventy-five miles before she could reach the Ranch of the Desert, their hidden rendezvous. Good old Paintbrush—how splendid were his sinewy legs! At regular intervals she dismounted, took off his saddle, cooled his back, smoothed the blanket. When they came to a stream she washed him off.
Late the next afternoon the road brought them up to one of those ruined houses that lay in the wake of soldiers, dotting the revolution-ridden land. The whole front of the dwelling had been torn away. There it stood, its poor mutilated interior still adorned with framed pictures, a cupboard still standing in the corner, a table in the center of the floor. It looked like a stage set, its homely intimacies bared to the passer-by. It must have been a good country home once, like the comfortable peasant homes of Europe.
“I’ll sleep on the other side,” thought Raquel. She wanted to reach Nacozari before noon the next day; to start out from there again for El Escondido. How would she find the ranch if she did not run across some one to guide her again?
On the other side of the house she found the remnants of a family living in what remained of the house. She stood upon a threshold that remained with no enclosing walls.
“Entra, entra, come in,” an old crone cooking over a little fire in a corner called hospitably. Through a far doorway Raquel caught a momentary glimpse of an exquisite madonna face, its perfect oval framed in long braids. It vanished with terror-stricken swiftness.
“Could I perhaps get something to eat, and rest here tonight?” Raquel asked wearily. “I am on my way north. Do you perhaps know where El Rancho Escondido is?”
The old woman looked up at the lad, dressed like a peon in his denim pantalones, in the teguas of the mountaineer. Something in the fine tired face, the sweetness of expression, assured her of the innocence of their prospective guest and she swept a place by the hearth.
But surely! And what did the lad know of the Ranch of the Desert? It was long since she had heard of that place, she said, but right well did she know where it lay.
With the despatch of the ever-ready bean pot she set a plate of food before Raquel, talking to her while she ate. The girl with the madonna face slipped timidly out of her room.
And so strangely, in this chance manner, Raquel learned the way to the Hidden Ranch. The old woman had once gone there, years ago, when she lived in Nacozari as a servant to the padrona.
The muchacho must follow this road up the stream bed, said the old woman, until he came to the canyon of Nacozari, not twenty leguas above. He should go through the town, she said, and above the place where the houses of the American superintendents had since been built Raquel would see a fair road leading east over the hills.
“Follow it across the sand dunes,” she said, “and when you come to the stream, ford it. But be careful of quicksands. A desert of sand dunes lies beyond, with not a palmetto, not a cactus on it, unlike most of our Mexican deserts. Go straight across it,” she continued, “a few miles only. Keep the trees of the river at your back and two dark dunes ahead for a guide. Over the last dune El Escondido spreads before you, a paradise, as well you know if you have been there.
“There is another way. But it is much longer, and only those who know it well and have traveled the road could possibly find the way among the trees and the hills. It was made after my time, this road, and I do not know it. That is where the rancho gets its name. It is indeed escondido.
“You are fatigued,” added the old woman. “Spread your blanket in that corner.”
Raquel slept, grateful in the thought that Georgie was ahead of her rather than behind. But where was he? And where the steers she had come to find?
CHAPTER XVI
GEORGIE GETS LOST
Three days after the gay ball at the military quarters of the Carrancista detachment a little Mexican girl wept disconsolately in the doorway of the priest’s home. The priest was not there; he had never returned since the first morning the little girl had presented herself. But she persisted in coming back. The housekeeper was quite annoyed. She had fed her, and now the ugly, rawboned child was crying. Roughly she swept her back into the house.
“What do you want?” she demanded.
“I wait for my big brother. Has he been here since I came yesterday afternoon?” The little girl wiped a smudged face.
“Your big brother? How do I know who is your big brother? Many men and boys come, but none ask after an ugly little girl. Here, take this for your dinner and don’t come back for a week.” And she thrust the child out through the door, with a palm leaf basket full of tortillas, sweet cakes and fruit.
George Washington Daniels retired into a quiet lane behind the church and gorged himself with food, topping off with figs and grapes that drooped conveniently over the wall. It was the first really full meal in three days. Comforted, he dropped asleep, and when he woke the grief of the past few days had left him, shaken off with that miraculous ease with which youth divests itself of sorrow too long held.
There was no use waiting here longer for Rakie. She must have got away to El Escondido. The last he’d seen of her was that flapping pink skirt as she shot past a window, and though he’d followed the hammer of the pinto’s hoofs for several miles—well, anyway half a mile—it turned out to be the lieutenant and not Rakie at all, and he’d had to escape in the other direction. There were soldiers there and the sentry had calmly made him get down and sent him off without his horse. It was Custer’s pony—the best of his string. What would he say? By golly, the horse thief! He’d get that animal back some way!
So Georgie had lived in the streets and haunted the padre’s house. On this night, however, he started out determined first of all to get rid of this hated girl’s dress. The bundle of clothes he had thrust entire into Raquel’s saddle pocket.
But he had not completely stripped off his own possessions, although he had no money; for round his waist was a belt with a knife, and several little treasures from which he never parted—a pocket compass, his watch, a burning glass. Now at dusk he was able to make a trade with a lad about his own size whom he found in the street, and shortly thereafter he emerged from behind a wall, clad like any other Mexican youngster, with a wide straw sombrero, calico pantaloons, and a blue gingham shirt, while the pink gingham dress lay in a huddle behind the wall.
He stepped forth into the orchid twilight of the little Mexican city, whose dusty streets, flat roofs and goats laden with water-filled skins, might have been those of a village on the Nile, though he did not know it. The quiet dusk was broken only by the screeching of the parakeets and the twitter of the birds in the court yards of the larger houses.
Georgie wandered along till he stood before a picturesque building with wrought-iron balconies. It was the hotel. Here the officer in charge of the troops sat at dinner. Georgie could see him through the window, a large fellow, coarse and drunken.
“What can the Americanos expect in the way of protection?” The words of the fiery-eyed miner up in the mountains came back to him. No use asking for any help up to the border from him. He pressed his face miserably up against the gratings and stared through unseeing.
Where was Raquel?
CHAPTER XVII
FATE PLAYS A TRICK
It was nearly noon when Paintbrush trotted quickly up the last rocky bit of road that led through the narrow defile into Nacozari. Across the valley the great works of the Nacozari Mining Company lay idle. There was not a sign of life about.
The gay little plaza, washed green with the rainy season, was deserted, but the torn grass and the débris littering the place showed that an army had bivouacked there. The doors of the hotel were closed and locked; the gates barred. On the main door hung a placard ordering that the hotel and mine were to remain closed awaiting the return of the regiment; it was signed by the Colonel. It was a bad place to stay around, and as Paintbrush had had his fill at the river, Raquel swung past the fountain and turned up the hill on which the officials of the company had built their residences. It looked like a California suburb on the hill—pretty bungalows, tennis courts, a rudimentary golf course. There were groves of citrus fruits. It was all very pretty.
Raquel dismounted, took off Paintbrush’s saddle and blanket, so that he could roll on the grass, and then stretched herself beneath the trees. Here in this hidden spot she and Paintbrush could rest without being seen.
She slept and dreamed—dreamed she heard some one crying pitifully, in a heartbroken way. Could it be Mom? The thought jarred her into consciousness, and she leaped to her feet. But there was not a sound in this deserted place, except the faint yapping of some little cur dog from a far hillside, where the huts of the peon miners clung like swallows’ nests.
The drip, drip of water from near one of the houses broke the stillness. Raquel stepped quietly over to where a pipe and faucet rose from the grass near a balcony. As she laid a hand upon the faucet a door on the balcony before her opened and a slight girlish figure stepped out.
Speechless with amazement, they stood face to face for a moment, the girl on the balcony wavering slightly back and forth. Then with a moan she tottered and fell forward. Raquel pulled open the screen door with a quick movement and reached the girl’s side; she caught her before she could fall to the floor.
It was Lois Wainwright! Thin and pale she was, but still lovely, though her closed eyes were red with weeping, and blue hollows smudged her cheeks. The shock of it almost stunned Raquel. Lois! How could she be here, of all places!
Lois’ eyelids began to flutter and Raquel, lifting her in wiry arms, half carried, half dragged the limp figure out on the grass. She bathed the white face with fresh water from the faucet and fanned her briskly with a palmetto leaf. Lois’ eyes opened slowly, almost reluctantly, and she sat up, looking hungrily into the face peering down at her.
“Raquel Daniels,” she faltered. “So it really is you? I was afraid to look again. I hardly dared believe it.” And she turned her head away as tears rolled down her cheeks.
“Come, Lois,” Raquel spoke quietly, patiently, as to a child. “Come, dear, you mustn’t cry. Tell me, is it possible that you are all alone here? Where is your father?”
“Take me away, save me!” Lois’ eyes widened with terror. “Papa, papa—is dead. He died suddenly.” She could say no more. She was almost unstrung with strain, fright and grief. A few babbling words about the Chino cook who had gone away with everything and the Mexican boy who was coming back to take her off into the mountains roused Raquel to the necessity for getting away.
Could she get Lois to El Escondido? How was it possible with one so weak and broken? Leading her gently back into the house, Raquel glanced about the attractive bungalow. How pleasant it would be to stay right here, if they only dared. But she herself must return to the Ranch of the Desert to find Georgie, and she couldn’t leave Lois alone. No, Lois would have to go with her.
But there was little food in the pantries. They had been looted; doors were ajar; cupboards open. She found, however, in the places where it always occurs to womankind to look, whole-wheat crackers, some cheese, and a box of guava paste. She threw them into a sack, leaving the tinned milk and sea foods which were most likely to be spoiled. She dashed back to Lois, who, with frightened eyes, was hastily stuffing clothes and toilet articles into a suitcase.
“You can’t take that, Lois.” Raquel spoke gently. “We have no way of carrying it, dear. I am going out now while you put on some riding clothes—that linen suit would be best—to see if I can’t rout out a burro, or a mule, to carry what we need—unless I can find another horse for you to ride. Quick, Lois! We must be quick.”
Lois, with a swift obedience that was touching, and with a piteous reliance on Raquel, began at once to get into her things. She seemed afraid to speak aloud, but she did not want Raquel to leave her there alone for an instant.
“Don’t go, don’t go,” she pleaded, in a whisper. “Wait for me.”
Raquel helped her. They left the wardrobe full of lovely, flimsy frocks, the bureau drawers full of scented undergarments. Lois snatched her father’s picture from the dressing table and Raquel, on impulse, pushed the silver articles into the wardrobe and turned the key in the lock. It was a stalwart piece of furniture. The owners would be back some day and might return the things if they had not been filched.
In the corrals they found not a horse nor even a burro. Nor did a quick survey of the hill top discover a single animal. There was nothing to do but find some horse for Lois to ride. They could not get away without it.
It was dangerous to stay where they were. The troops might be back at any moment. No one knew what treatment the girls might receive. They could not hope to hide here forever. Bandits looking for ransom were everywhere. What chance would there be for a fragile, lovely creature with golden hair like Lois? Raquel was frantic with the dilemma. She reasoned to herself, “Perhaps it’s better at that to stay here. Here it’s cool and comfortable; there’s something to eat; wouldn’t it be better to take our chances so long as we’re alive than to go out on the desert with only the pinto to carry the two of us, and water and food?”
Then she remembered the threatening placard on the hotel door; she thought of Georgie. It was a terrible decision, but they must go.
She brought the pinto up to where Lois was waiting on the porch and spoke to him. She tied on the bag of food and put Lois’ things in her saddle bag, then she half lifted Lois on his back and took the bridle to reassure the horse, still wild at heart when any one but his mistress came too near.
On a last impulse Raquel turned down the hill again toward the plaza, hoping to catch a glimpse of some stray horse. Perhaps some second-rate animal had been left behind, tied in a corral, or hobbled on the mountain side.
As if in answer to prayer she heard a nicker and, down at the end of the plaza, under a flaming paradise tree, she caught sight of a large roan horse, awkwardly jumping toward the fountain in the center of the square. His front feet were hobbled.
She helped Lois off again and left her in the shelter of the trees. Then Raquel ran out and up to the animal. He was thoroughly manso and offered her his hind hoof for inspection. He had cast a shoe, but that was not what made him limp. A nail had become thrust into the tender part of the hoof just enough to hurt when pressure was put upon it. Raquel pulled it out and the friendly creature stretched out his head and wriggled his lips in appreciation.
“And they left you behind for that, old boy!” Raquel talked to him as she quickly untied the hobble ropes. “Too lazy to find out what made him lame! Can you beat the ways of a péon with a horse? You were most certainly picked up over the border anyway, old boy. What a find just now, when I’d have given several kingdoms for a gentle horse.”
The brown horse still limped, but only slightly. There was no saddle, no blanket, in sight. They could go by the bungalow again and pick up a blanket, and Raquel remembered a decrepit old saddle hanging in one of the stable sheds behind the house.
Every minute seemed an age, yet it was only ten minutes after they left Lois’ house before they were back; and a few minutes later Raquel had the new horse nicely blanketed and saddled with the patched-up saddle, roping the cinch rings together. A rope bridle was rigged from the pieces with which the animal had been hobbled.
With Lois mounted, they went quietly side by side down through the grapefruit grove, plucking a number of the big fruits as they passed. Behind the last house should be the trail which Raquel’s host of the night before had described. She could not in the least remember what direction they had taken to Escondido before. Now she was too far to the right. “Above the houses,” the old woman had said. Ah, there it was, a fair trail surely! And they were on it, winding over foothills in a northeasterly direction.
All this while Lois remained silent, dazed. But as they dropped down into an arroyo, out of sight of the rest of the world, she whispered timidly, “Where are we going, Raquel?”
“To a ranch called El Escondido, where I hope to find my brother Georgie, and where we can be very comfortable and safe. It’s not far, and we’ll rest by the river we are coming to, and eat something before we start across.”
It was very hot there in the sandhills, with no protection from the blazing sun. Before them a peccary scuttled away with her drove of young. Lois’ face was like the white flower of the Lilia de la Crucifixion.
“Just a coche Javalina, the wild pig of this country,” Raquel reassured her. Pigs did not seem formidable to Lois and she relaxed in her saddle. Raquel was glad that the fierce old sow had not seen fit to charge them, for a horse will run from a peccary.
Over another hill still! But it was the last, and below them ran a sluggish, muddy stream, yellow and swollen with the rains. There were no trees along the river, only mesquite bushes, Spanish dagger and stunted palms. Lois was already exhausted, though they had ridden scarcely an hour, and Raquel felt as happy as a lizard in the sun.
“How much farther?” Lois gasped.
“Come, dear, try to pull yourself together.” Raquel spoke sharply, for a glance at Lois showed her that she was letting go of what reserve force she had.
Lois winced as if she had been struck, but closed her lips tightly and held desperately to the saddle horn. Raquel rode close and put an arm about her. They reached the sandy flats of the river bed and Raquel leaped off, lifting Lois from her horse. Quickly she sought the one large spot of shade beneath a maguey plant and, spiking the burlap sack and the saddle blankets from one thorn to another, contrived a nice bit of shade.
She pulled out a clean shirt that Lois had given her and wet it in the stream; then hurried back to fan Lois. A slight breeze was stirring, and it was surprisingly cooler there in the shade by the river.
In a little while Raquel peeled an orange, making the girl eat it with a few wheat cakes. She herself then ate as much of the slender provender as she dared, and with good appetite, for she had breakfasted before five that morning.
A little color was returning to Lois’ lips. She lay back resting. Presently she looked at Raquel with puzzled eyes.
“You—you act as though nothing had ever happened, I should think you’d hate me. I wouldn’t have blamed you for leaving me there—in that terrible place.” At the thought tears filled her eyes again. Lois was quite unnerved. What she must have been through, poor child!
“There, you mustn’t think of it,” Raquel said soothingly. “Why, I wouldn’t leave a horse to suffer, would I? Much less a person.”
Lois was silent, taking this in.
“And perhaps——” It had been on the tip of Raquel’s tongue to say, “I’d better have left you there. This may be a hard trip.” But she caught herself just in time, and said instead, “Probably you will feel better to get into new surroundings.”
Raquel had left her wrist watch at El Escondido on the night of their hasty flight, but Lois wore a delicate little toy on her own wrist, and it now started bravely ticking when Raquel wound it and set it at two o’clock, which she judged by the sun was the correct time.
Raquel hung wet cloths on the bushes above Lois’ head to create a bit of moisture in that fearful dryness, while the horses flicked their tails contentedly near, backed into the coolness of the mesquite leaves. Presently the girls slept. The shadows grew longer and the little watch said six-thirty when they gradually roused.
Lois’ face was flushed and she seemed scarcely able to shake off the stupor and heat languor which possessed her. Raquel bathed her face in the stream, which was running clearer now, and freeing the horses she led them down to water. The bank seemed firm, without any quicksands near.
Paintbrush was vastly at home and, as the air cooled, was playful as a colt. He rolled his pretty, silky back over and over in the water.
“You wouldn’t think of running off from me and playing me a trick, old boy, would you?” Raquel said to him. “I’ll not take any chances with the call of the wild,” she thought, and staked Paintbrush with the length of her reata near by. The big horse stood gratefully in the water, but seemed unused to open country. “I knew you were stable-bred, old feller, you,” Raquel told him. “Now don’t get caught in the quicksands.”
“Are you just talking to the horses, Raquel?” Lois asked, weakly.
“Of course,” laughed Raquel. “Come down here, Lois, can’t you, and we can take a bath here in the river that will refresh us for the ride this evening.”
“Oh, Raquel,” Lois gasped, in dismay, “I couldn’t ride another step today. Oh, I can’t.”
“You’ll feel better when you have had a bath and some food,” Raquel answered reassuringly.
After they had bathed and slipped on their freshened clothes they felt much better. Lois let down her long hair, and brushed it out. In the rich light of the setting sun it looked like a web of purest gold. But her thin skin was cracked and blistered from the unaccustomed exposure, while Raquel’s face was like velvet, well nourished from within. Raquel remembered a tiny bottle of olive oil in her saddle bag, and she had Lois rub some over her lips and face. She went off into the desert a little way and came back with a small bundle of amole root.
“I pulled this out,” she said, “and we’ll put a bit in water. You try it and see how soft it is. It’s soapweed, you know, and better than any soap I ever saw.”
She lined a little hollow in the earth with stones that were hot from the sun, and in a few moments there was a basin of foamy water.
Lois bathed her hands gratefully. “Oh, it’s like velvet.”
They ate sandwiches of crackers and cheese and guava paste. Lois ate with effort, although the first food she had eaten in days, she said, was what Raquel had given her that day. “There was no one to fix it,” she explained.
“You’ve got to get over that,” Raquel remarked dryly. “If we should get separated I don’t aim to come back and find you all in with starvation because you are too proud, or too lazy, or something, to fix yourself something to eat.”
“Separated?” Lois exclaimed. “Don’t leave me a minute, Raquel.”
Lois was not angry at the rebuke, only surprised at the idea of getting food for herself.
“I—I didn’t feel like eating,” she excused herself. “I’ve never ridden very far before. Couldn’t we stay here tonight?”
Raquel said nothing for a moment, then answered sternly, “Lois, we can’t stop at a good hotel till we feel like going on. There’s no choice. We’ve got to go now. I’ve got to get back to my mother and take her son back to her; that’s the least I can do. She’s back home not knowing what has become of me and my kid brother. Her husband and other sons are at war. She’s alone. We haven’t enough food or fresh water to last another day. Another hot day in the desert would mean—well, we can’t do it.”
And without another word she got up and saddled the horses methodically, for the sun had already set and a baby moon was far up in the sky.
In silence she helped Lois to her feet and upon the horse’s back, then quickly mounted Paintbrush and made for the narrowest part of the widespread stream. The pinto examined the bottom carefully, withdrew from two places that he did not like, and finally picked the widest part of the meandering river as his choice for fording.
The big horse followed obediently in the pinto’s every footstep, which was a good thing, for he would not lead on a rope. Raquel had already tried that and found he pulled back. When they were nearly across, Raquel looked back to see if Lois was all right. She was clinging with one hand to the pommel while the other was thrown back over her tightly closed eyes. Her face was white as death. Raquel would have gone to her side, but the crossing was fraught with too much possible danger to take her attention from it for an instant. The soluble, slippery, red soil, the shifting sand of that country, is too treacherous ever to rely upon.
Suddenly in the center of the stream the pinto sank down above his flanks, rose up with a fine effort of splendid muscles and, bounding clear of the bottom, began to swim toward the main current.
In a moment he was shaking himself nonchalantly on a firm bit of beach. But Lois’ horse stood up to his knees on the far side, refusing to budge. So Raquel had to put Paintbrush across again, which she did easily a bit further up. Lois was transferred to his back and he seemed to realize that he must carry her safely across.
Raquel had no trouble in guiding the big brown, though he floundered dangerously for a few minutes. Ahead of her the pinto swam with Lois bent over the saddle, and then he leaped violently clear of the shaky sands beneath him. Raquel’s heart was in her mouth for fear that Lois, wavering in the saddle, would fall off. But they came through safely, and mounted the long dune opposite the river, to see a sandy desert stretching before them, rosy in the setting sun.
“Raquel, Raquel,” begged Lois. “Let me get off. I can’t do these things. Oh, leave me behind then, if you must go on. I’d rather die.”
“Lois! Hush!” Raquel spoke sternly. “You can do it. You did do it already, and it is easy riding now across the desert,” she added relenting.
As the pinto was too quick in movement for Lois, Raquel changed back to her own compadre. The stars were out; the night had fallen as softly and quietly as a velvet leaf; the little moon rode higher and higher. Behind them the dark vegetation along the river served as a guide to Raquel, and ahead were two dark spots that she tried to keep in position.
“Raquel,” Lois said after a while, “please talk to me. Are we to ride all—all night?”
“Oh, I was thinking,” Raquel answered, contritely. “I was thinking about Georgie, my brother. I don’t know where he is. I hope he’ll be at El Escondido when we get there.
“Why, no, Lois, we don’t need to ride all night, my dear, but we must get nearly across this mesa tonight.”
“Yes, I know you must be worried about your brother,” Lois faltered. “I am, too.”
Raquel was touched, for she had never had a considerate thought from Lois before. She began to feel the charm which Lois had always had for the girls at school. You couldn’t expect such a girl to stand any hardship, after all, brought up as she had been. Anne, now—Anne would probably stand the iron like a good one. Raquel laughed aloud.
“I haven’t thought of school for a mighty long time now, I can tell you,” she said. “But I thought of it just then. Wouldn’t they be surprised, back there, at us being together like this? I mean, ’way off down here.”
So they rode, talking of one thing and another. School—inconsequential things that did not really enter into the drama of their own lives.
But at length the story of Lois and her father came out, bit by bit. After spending the winter in California her father had suddenly decided, Lois said, to return to El Paso; but he stopped off at Douglas, Arizona, with the sudden idea of going on down to the mine at Nacozari. That was in April. His physician had told him that the climate would be ideal. He craved dryness and warmth. He was a large stockholder in the company and a close friend of two of the high officials of the mining company at Nacozari. A few telegrams were sent and down they came.
It was very comfortable for the first two months, and there was a nice young engineer with whom Lois played tennis and croquet. Her father seemed very happy, and breathed much more easily than he had in the foggy climate of California.
Then in May every one else went back north to avoid the heat, but her father would stay. And all at once this new revolutionary disturbance burst out again, and the troops came down into that part of Sonora. And then suddenly—oh, so suddenly, her father died. The Mexicans had buried him up there, on the hillside, and she couldn’t telegraph anybody because all of the wires had been cut by the Mexican general.
She had waited for the officials to come back; and she had written letters, including one to her Cousin Jimmy, and given them to some Mexicans who said they would mail them.
Then the Chinese cook ran away; he was always so frightened that he would hide when he heard a shot. And the Mexican boy had gone and taken everything, and the little girl who had been her maid did not come any more to wait on her.
“What did you do when the army came into town the day before yesterday?” asked Raquel.
“I hid all the time,” sobbed Lois, “in the cooling cellar. But I had to come out for water and everything was quiet—that was when I saw you. I thought you were just a Mexican boy at first, but I could never forget your face. And then—it was you.” She ended on a gulp of intense relief.
The big brown horse began to limp. Raquel looked at Lois’ watch by the light of the moon. It was after twelve, clear and beautiful. They had been riding for four hours. They must have come at least twelve miles, perhaps fourteen, she judged. Yet about them stretched only the silvery desert. The old woman had had the usual native’s idea of distances.
Looking back the way they had come there was nothing to be seen, and ahead of them the two dark spots had grown steadily larger; they were apparently two rocky foothills thrusting into the desert. If they could make that spot tonight, Raquel thought, then by daylight she could see where they were. Lois did not ask again to stop. She did not speak at all.
Two hours more of silent riding passed before they stood in the shadow of a hill at the foot of which the sands of the desert washed like the sea. There they stopped. Raquel dismounted and spoke to Lois, who was sitting drooped in the saddle with bent head. She was past speaking, her eyes closed.
“Asleep in her saddle, poor kid,” breathed Raquel.
Lois slipped gently into Raquel’s arms and was carried to a soft spot where she lay without so much as stirring. Raquel leaned over and listened for a moment to the quiet breathing. Then she lay down close to her charge and fell asleep, while the pinto drooped his head above his mistress.
It was nearly seven when Raquel waked and looked about. She saw that these sentinels in the desert were not real foothills. No little water courses wound their way among the crevices. The horses would have to go dry for a while, though Raquel could scarcely bear not giving the pinto a sip from the canteens. They did not seem to mind it, however, and after all they had drunk their fill last night.
IT WAS STILL COOL ON THE DESERT WHEN THEY RODE AWAY OVER THE SANDS
From the top of the hill she saw far off to the east a valley of trees, in the center of which she knew El Escondido must lie, for behind them rose the foothills, just as she remembered them from that night. Only three weeks before—less than that! But she had lost count of the exact number of days that had passed since then.
She came down and found Lois awake. “Lois, when I have made this grass and wood catch fire, I’ll give you the best breakfast you ever had,” she promised cheerily.
The fire caught from her burning glass. She made a little stove of stones about it, and produced from the saddle bags a tiny frying pan, into which she poured a bit of the oil. From her pockets she took four good-sized, mottled brown eggs and broke them into the pan.
“A ground bird of some sort laid them. I know they’re good,” laughed Raquel. They were delicious and satisfying, making a good meal with crackers and water.
It was still cool on the desert when they rode away over the sands at a pace that brought them by nine o’clock to the end of the desert, where a road led away toward the east. There the sands lost themselves in a growth of stunted shrubbery that rose into a higher vegetation the farther they went.
But the day grew hotter and hotter. And the brown horse limped more and more. “I’m afraid his foot is infected,” Raquel thought. At last the animal stopped, and would go no farther. Lois was herself exhausted, wilted by the heat. The girls dismounted.
Raquel took the saddle off the brown horse, poured some of the precious oil in his foot, bound it so that flies could not get at it, and left him there. He absolutely would not be led another step. “I’ll send back for you tomorrow, old boy, if I can. You can make out without water until then.”
She put Lois on the pinto, who by now had become somewhat accustomed to her, and walked by their side over the heavy sand. Lois looked down at Raquel trudging stoutly along and every now and then throwing out a cheerful word. Lois tried to speak, but tears choked her, and she only shook her head and bit her lips.
Raquel herself was frightened. Dear Heaven! Were they lost? “Just keep your head, keep your nerve, Rakie, old girl,” she said to herself. Her feet were growing tired. She was not used to walking any great distance. The cowhide sandals that she had exchanged for her boots when she escaped from the mine were not stout enough to protect tender feet from stone bruises, or from the blistering heat of the road. In spite of her indifference to fatigue, the pain of her swelling, burning feet became insistent, unbearable. They stopped again to rest, but when she walked on a bit farther the discomfort was as great as before.
“Lois, dear, I guess I’ll get up behind you, and let the pinto give us both a lift for a while.” Paintbrush had never carried a double burden before, and shied a bit at first, but at Raquel’s soothing command trotted obediently ahead. But his pace grew slower and slower under the increased load, and his tender-hearted mistress felt she was asking too much of the faithful animal.
So she slipped from his back again when they had gone less than half a mile, and as her foot touched the ground an excruciating pain shot through it. She had stepped on a cactus thorn which had gone right through the tough hide sole of the tegua, and imbedded itself in the sole of her foot. At her involuntary cry, Paintbrush stopped dead and turned a startled eye upon his mistress. Lois clambered off his back and ran to Raquel.
“Oh, my dear, what have you done? Oh, your poor foot!” Raquel was trying to pull the thorn out through the sole of the sandal. She could not remove the sandal without breaking the thorn off in her foot, when the flesh would close tightly around it.
She explained this to Lois, and they both tried in turn to loosen the incredible spike. But they could not draw it through the tough hide of the tegua and at length had to break it, and Raquel took off the sandal. Her blunt fingernails could not fasten on the stub of the thorn that remained in her foot, but Lois’ long pointed nails managed to grasp it before it could become completely imbedded.
Try as she would, however, Lois could not extract the thorn, and finally she took Raquel’s poor swollen foot in her hands, and placing her mouth over the slowly bleeding wound, she drew the thorn out with her sharp little teeth. The pain for a moment made Raquel’s eyes dim like a hurt deer’s. Lois was tearing her handkerchief into strips, for there was a rush of blood as the spike came out. When she had bound the wound as deftly as any nurse, she helped Raquel to the side of the road where there was shade under a flowering tree. It was impossible to go on. The heat was terrific, and Raquel could not walk.
“We’ll wait till sundown,” Raquel decided. “Lois, what would I have done if you hadn’t been so smart getting out that thorn?”
Paintbrush, glad of a chance to rest, browsed quietly on mesquite leaves and the tender green of a strange plant they did not know. Raquel drowsed, for the pain had taken her strength and left her sleepy.
When she woke after a while, she sent Lois out to forage for prickly pear, “tunas” the Mexicans call them, and told her how to knock the fruit off with a stick. Lois came back with her hat full, and the juicy sweet fruit allayed their thirst wonderfully, and refreshed them somewhat. But there were no crackers left in the saddle bags, and hunger pains gnawed them.
Rabbits were hopping about curiously, and Raquel asked Lois to get her automatic from the bottom of one of the bags. There were, fortunately, a few cartridges left. Raquel shot a foolish young cottontail from where she lay. Lois winced at the sound of the shot, but she went over and picked up the rabbit, quivering as she laid it beside Raquel.
She gathered moss and sticks, and held the burning glass over the heap until it caught fire. While Raquel skinned the rabbit, Lois gathered more fuel. They cooked it at once, and almost starving, could hardly wait to snatch the pieces from the pan. Never had they been so close to stark hunger. A faint color came into Lois’ cheeks, as she ate almost greedily. The two girls finished the rabbit and took a sip from the canteen.
“My goodness!” said Lois, “look—we’ve eaten a whole rabbit!”
Raquel smiled. Lois was coming on. Indeed, a new spirit seemed to have come over her. “Food certainly makes a difference, doesn’t it?” she sighed contentedly as she lay back against the bank at Raquel’s side. “Let’s start on right away. It’s getting cooler.” But her voice was drowsy.
Raquel’s eyes were closed. She did not answer, and Lois fell silent. When night came over the desert it found them both asleep, and covered them with its soothing mantle of darkness. They did not ride that night, though the pinto drooped patiently near, and finally lay down in his saddle, a thing he had never done before.
It was the piercing bright ray of the morning sun that sent a shaft of recollection to Raquel’s sleeping brain. She sat up, startled, and called the pinto a trifle wildly. He came running, neighing gratefully. The girls never knew it, but he had had business with a rattlesnake just a few paces away, and his lightning hoofs had left a mangled thing for the coyotes to turn away from.
He nickered at Raquel’s call. Lois did not stir from her deep sleep. Raquel hated to wake her, but there was no choice and she shook her insistently. Lois sat up quickly. When she was fully awake Raquel talked over plans for continuing the journey. These were complicated by her swollen foot. She knew she could not endure the pain of walking.
“I’ll walk,” Lois insisted. “You know, Raquel, it’s much easier for me to walk than ride. I’m used to walking, truly I am.”
Raquel agreed, because, really, there was nothing else to do. Lois gathered some more cactus fruit. They ate these, drank the last of the water from the canteen, and set out, Lois trudging along so bravely that Raquel did not suspect what an effort it was for her to keep pace with Paintbrush’s steady gait.
It must have been past ten-thirty when, after two hours or more, they struck a hard road. The path from the desert joined it abruptly. As they turned into it, Raquel looked up and down it and recognized with relief that this was the way she and Georgie had come before, when they were guided by the mine foreman. Fortune was with them, for Raquel knew she could never have found the road again except by stumbling on it as she had. Her spirits rose immeasurably, and Lois’ too, when Raquel told her that they were now on familiar ground. Paintbrush also sensed that they were nearing their goal. Perhaps he knew, for he was almost frisky when the little party halted, and Lois somewhat awkwardly uncinched him and pulled off his saddle and blankets with willing but clumsy hands.
“You will not have to walk any more, Lois dear,” Raquel said. “Paintbrush will carry us both the last three miles to El Escondido.”
They rested a full hour, for Lois was not so hardy a walker as she liked to believe. Then the two girls saddled the pinto again, Lois lifting on the heavy saddle and buckling the cinches with much effort after Raquel had smoothed the blanket. Lois climbed to the saddle, with the aid of Raquel’s boosting, and Raquel pulled herself on behind. Thus it was they covered the last blistering miles.
All at once they were there. A lovely paradise opened before them. They rode through the grove before the front of the hacienda. A windmill was lazily pumping water that overflowed tanks and troughs, and slipped clear and brimming through the acequias, the irrigation ditches that nourished the fields of El Escondido.
On through the arched gateway to the courtyard, where there was a strange silence and not a sign of life. Raquel called. There was a flash of a bright skirt, and a young Mexican girl appeared from the hacienda.
“Concha,” cried Raquel. “Don’t you remember me? It is Raquel Daniels.” She pronounced it in the Spanish way, Dan-ee-el, with the accent on the last syllable.
Concha hurried forward, smiling with relief. But indeed, she did well remember el señorito. So he had escaped safely? That was good. No, she shook her head commiseratingly, the little brother had not returned. Raquel’s heart sank. He must be with the army. He must.
And Don Nestor, she inquired. How was he? And where were all of the sirvientes?
Don Nestor was ill, Concha recited. He had been ill nearly three weeks—ever since the night of the raid, and was still lying in the basement where he had taken refuge. He could not himself walk up the escalera, and who was she, Concha, to carry him! Indeed, el padrón had shouted at her with terrible wrath when she had offered to push from behind. Piedad was cooking for them, but then el señorito remembered how fat was Piedad. He could scarcely move himself further than the kitchen door, and was of no assistance in the dilemma.
All the others had departed. Manuel had not returned after that night. Concha always had suspected Manuel anyway, and that hussy Maddalena, who had disappeared too. Worst of all, her novio, Concha’s novio, whom she was to wed next month, had been seized by the troops and carried off, she knew not where.
Concha’s tongue was all for running on, but Raquel interrupted with the request that a room be made ready at once for the señorita with her. The one she herself had had before, Raquel suggested. Concha disappeared round a corner of the house, and in a moment was heard unbarring the strong front door from within.
The girls stepped into the cool dimness of the zaguan and passed through into the patio. Raquel caught Lois by the arm for, now that they had arrived at their refuge, she gave signs of collapsing. With Concha’s aid, Raquel got Lois upstairs and to the high white bed. Her face was pinched with fatigue, and gray; her blonde hair hung in dry and brittle wisps about her face. She was covered with dust. This was not the delicately lovely Lois Raquel had known, and her heart was touched with pity as well as concern.
“Concha, ve, see! She faints. Get me quickly some water, some wine if there is any still, and tell Don Nestor I will be there at once as soon as I have attended my friend.”
Concha clattered down the stairs, and Raquel slapped water upon Lois’ temples and wrists. Her own sore foot was forgotten. It was the second time Lois had fainted, and Raquel was not accustomed to such things. She pulled off the poor child’s boots, and laid her head on the soft pillow.
When Lois had a few sips of the wine that Concha brought, she revived. “So sorry I’m such a bother, Raquel,” she said weakly. “Perhaps I can do better from now on.”
“Hush, dear.” Raquel, who had never been demonstrative, even with Mom, whom she loved so dearly and loyally, took this girl in her arms as if she had been a sister. “You are going to be all right.” And she knew that the last bit of hurt and hatred had melted away.
“I must go down to the old Don Nestor, who is ill in the cellar of his house,” she explained to Lois then. “Concha will stay right here and I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
Then she slipped out, though her foot was still burning and swollen, not stopping even to wipe her face, but only to take a deep draft from the stone water jar hanging in the shade of the galeria.
Down in the wine cellar, which had but a single window high up, a barred affair opening on some hidden inner court, lay Don Nestor on a freshly made pallet. Raquel spoke to him from the trapdoor above.
“It is I, Raquela,” she said. “I have returned safely, Don Nestor.
“Gracias a Dios,” replied a fervent voice from below. “Come down at once, my child, I have worried terribly about you. That I could have sent you off with that rascal Manuel whom I trusted so! I have lain here worrying. Had anything happened to you, I could never have forgiven myself.”
He seized her hand as, stepping from the ladder-like stairs, she limped towards his cot.
“Myself? It is nothing. We will speak of that later. But the lad?”
Questions flew back and forth as Don Nestor heard from Raquel her experiences of that night, of her subsequent adventures and the finding of Lois. Always, in spite of herself, Raquel returned to the fact that it had been agreed between Georgie and herself that they would make their way back to El Escondido if they became separated. She was near tears at not finding Georgie there.
“But there is no occasion, yet, to despair, for the muchachito would undoubtedly be obliged to stay with the soldiers for a while. But I am sure they would not harm him,” Don Nestor reassured her. He listened with interest to the account of their experiences with Manuel, upon whose head he invoked frequent holy imprecations.
It was Manuel, he told Raquel, in detailing his own experiences with the soldiers, who had brought about the raid. Manuel was not, it had transpired with the discovery of his perfidy, an honest man at all. He was a rebel—a bandit—who had fled Chihuahua two years before, and sought refuge in Sonora. He had taken Don Nestor in completely. While he attended the affairs of El Escondido, he maintained contacts with other miserable fugitives in the hills, and fomented trouble among the contented natives. News of his agitations had reached the governor, and it was to arrest him that the troops had come. After their first anger at the discovery that Manuel had flown, the troops had not molested El Escondido.
He knew these things from Concha and old Piedad, Don Nestor explained. They had conversed with him daily from the top of the escalera. Ill? It was his wretched ankle, dear Señorita, which he had broken in his hurried descent into this soterreno that terrible night. True, he had been somewhat ill with the shock and the excitement, for he was no longer a young man, and it was impossible for him to ascend the ladder with this useless foot.
Concha had explained to the lieutenant that the padrón could not see him (Raquel could imagine the dignity which sustained Don Nestor even under the trying circumstances of being detained in his wine cellar), and the soldiers had departed with apologies, profuse apologies, taking with them that fellow José, Concha’s novio, but none of Don Nestor’s good wine, gracias a Dios! Don Nestor had set his ankle himself the next day, and it was nearly well now. But he would run no risks and would not ascend, only to fall back and break it again.
The soldiers had not returned, and he felt that now that Miss Raquel was back with another young lady, he would attempt to go up to the upper chambers again. The gentle old caballero made a gallant effort to rise, but he was weakened by the pain in his injured foot, and his face grew white.
“Oh, Señor, do not molest yourself, I beg of you,” Raquel implored. “We must arrange to get you upstairs at once, for you are very weak and cannot gain strength down here in this air. It is unthinkable. I shall go to arrange it now.” The old gentleman lay back gratefully.
Presently the change was accomplished. Raquel and Concha found a high stepladder which they inclined against the perpendicular stairs that led from the wine cellar, thus making an easy ascent possible. With Concha on one side and Raquel on the other, Don Nestor, his ankle bound straight and stiff, at length climbed to the top where he all but collapsed on the floor. Then he would not move until Raquel had brought up the chest that he had kept beneath his cot all this time.
The girls got him into a chair and thus they drew him to the door of his bedroom, which was on the same floor, not far away. Concha had not even made the bed. Things were just as they had been on the night of the raid, because el padrón was very particular, and did not wish his possessions touched without orders, she explained volubly. Raquel helped her to lay the bed fresh and smooth, and to assist Don Nestor, weak and white, in the light of day, to get in.
“Put my treasure chest under my bed,” he directed, smiling whimsically. “It is many years since I have had a charming woman to think of me and offer me her services. It is many years since my wife died—and my baby daughter.” Don Nestor was deeply affected, and Raquel patted his hand tenderly.
“You must go now, my dear, and have rest,” he commanded. “What! No luncheon yet? Not even a refresco. Concha! Ah, what a place!” And he became at once so agitated and irascible that Raquel left, promising to eat something at once, and to lie down immediately.
Piedad already had arranged a table in a cool corner of the gallery under a honeysuckle vine. Raquel ate the food as in a dream. She had come at length almost to the end of her own resources. She was no longer conscious of her burning foot, she scarcely knew she was ascending the stairs to her room—and then nothing.
Concha undressed the limp, boyish figure on the bed—but, of course, she had known that the señorito was a girl—and tucked her sympathetically under the cool sheet, while she went across to the room opposite to see if that other pobrecito, so white faced, was still asleep.
CHAPTER XVIII
THE MAGIC FLAME
It was many days before either Lois or Don Nestor left their beds. Raquel recovered almost at once, although she still limped, but it was fortunate that the two invalids kept her in the house, for it gave her lame foot a chance to heal.
Lois lay listlessly in bed, not seeming to care much about anything. She made no trouble, asked for nothing, ate without appetite what was placed before her. Raquel could not understand it, and was worried at Lois’ indifference. She had seemed like another girl that last day in the desert.
Truth to tell, Lois was recovering from shock, and kindly nature had merely employed a beneficent anesthesia to give her an opportunity to do so. While she gathered strength, Raquel talked with their host, diverting him from his pain and boredom, so that at the end of the fourth day he was out on the gallery, the ankle almost well. Raquel recounted to him in detail the incidents of her escape.
At the story of the dance at Moctezuma he was highly elated and when she had finished he said:
“Señorita, I have been wanting to ask you to do me the favor to wear for me the costume of the ladies of Andalusia. In my room is a large chest of handsome clothing. It was my wife’s; it is yours, if you will accept it, and the jewels that go with the gowns.” He smiled, a fine, sweet smile, extending his hand deferentially toward her.
“I’d love to put them on, Don Nestor!” cried Raquel, rising. “And I know it will be more pleasant to you than seeing me in these riding clothes.” She still wore the extra linen suit which Lois had brought. “I’ll go now,” she said, “and come back for refrescos here.”
The old gentleman leaned back musing, a blue-veined hand over his kindly eyes.
In the scented twilight of late summer they sat al fresco, the old caballero of Mexico, and the señorita of Old Spain. In white lace mantilla, made creamy by the years, and softest silk, gay-flowered, one would hardly have known our hard-riding Raquel. From her small white ears hung earrings heavy with rubies and wrought gold. Round her throat and wrists rich rubies and pearls gleamed.
“And I would like you to take up over the frontera with you to your rancho as many head of cattle as we can find vaqueros to drive.” Don Nestor was speaking. “It is little enough, querida señorita, after what you have suffered at my hands, through my mistake. There is no question of money. I have more than I shall ever use. I need none here. I am happy, drowsing away my life with memories, away from the world.” He nodded gently.
“But Don Nestor, no, no! I couldn’t accept that. I will be partners with you though, if you like.”
“Then why not let it be a gift for the Allies?” suggested Don Nestor. “I have great sympathy for them. I should like to be of a little service to the world. Come, let us say that we are partners, then,” he acceded.
“Your coming, my dear young friend, has been the one bright spot in many years. It has been very lonely at times. I wish that I might keep you here, but I know that may not be. Some times——”
He was interrupted by the sound of hammering at the front gate, followed by Concha’s running to answer. Concha returned quietly and, standing behind Don Nestor’s chair, beckoned Raquel. In the outer court she found a dusty peón, who regarded her with amazement.
“But it was a boy,” he objected, “to whom I was directed to give this note. And I was also promised that I would receive another peso duro [silver dollar] for my trip. Where is Señor Dan-i-eel?”
But Raquel had seized the note he held in his hand and was reading.
“Rakie: Come get me. I’ve tried five times to run away from this darn army, and they always drag me back. My horse is here too. Give the man a dollar if you see him. Signed, Georgie. P.S. We’re just above Nacozari.”
“I’ll have to go.” Raquel could have shouted. “It’s from Georgie. He’s found, he’s found. I must start tonight, right away. And perhaps we can get back by tomorrow night—the next day anyway.”
The man had left with the note that morning, after ten o’clock, he said, and he was here already. Georgie had given him a silver dollar to carry the message, and said his sister would give him more still if he would guide her back to him.
“Fine,” Raquel agreed and hurried away to get ready, having first excused herself to her host.
Don Nestor must not know of her going. He would be distressed and might object. But she must go at once. Paintbrush was saddled, and the big brown horse which she had herself recovered from the bush a few days before. His foot seemed to have completely healed, and she saw that this would be a good opportunity to return him to the regiment, and would furnish an excuse for her visit.
Back again she rode over the weary miles, only now the way was easier, with a hard road and the peón to guide her. He was a vaquero, he said, and she promised him work at El Escondido if he wished to return with them.
Early in the morning they neared Nacozari. Raquel had not yet determined what she must do in order to get Georgie away. Down the valley she could hear a trumpeter. The regiment was in the town.
She rode bravely into the plaza, which was filled with soldiers. No sign of Georgie, but he’d soon spot the pinto, all right. Straight up to the hotel she rode, dismounted, throwing the reins to her attendant, and strode into the dining-room.
At a table sat the Coronel at breakfast, with his aides and lieutenant. He glanced in surprise at the youngster who intruded so rashly.
“Pardon, Coronel,” Raquel swept her sombrero in salute, “does this roan gelding I have outside belong by chance to you? He was found near my rancho, lame, with an infected foot, which I have cured.”
The Coronel looked annoyed, but before he could speak one of the aides replied: “The Coronel can not be bothered. He has not yet had his coffee. But I will go out and see the horse. There was a roan horse belonging to el General left behind a week or two ago, and he was much annoyed.”
The Coronel was looking at Raquel aggrievedly. “I have not yet had my coffee,” he complained.
“Water boils slowly at this altitude,” Raquel sympathized.
“You talk like a native,” snapped the Coronel. “You mean every one moves slowly at this altitude. You don’t look like a native, though,” he added.
“I have spent much time in the states,” Raquel replied. “I only returned indeed, a few months ago.”
“Is that so?” The Coronel was mildly interested. “I myself went to school in California as a youth. Won’t you sit down and have breakfast with us? That is, if we ever get it! We have been waiting three-quarters of an hour for that dastardly cocinero to boil water for us.
“I die for my coffee!” he exploded with fresh wrath.
“You want coffee?” asked Raquel. What a question! Then a brilliant idea occurred to her, though just how brilliant it was she did not at the moment realize.
“I can give you an excellent cup in a moment, I think. Excuse me an instant, sir,” and she dashed from the room.
She had remembered the three little tins that through all her adventures had lain in the bottom of her saddle bag, Mom’s contribution. Would they still be there? Would the sterno be any good, or would it have evaporated or melted, in all the heat through which they had passed? At any rate, the coffee would keep perfectly.
Just outside the door she stumbled over Georgie. His blessed, freckled face, his wide-toothed grin! Raquel’s chin quivered ridiculously.
“Buenos dias, Señor. Como le va?—Don’t you know me?” Georgie inquired anxiously, for Raquel was standing there, looking at him sternly.
“Shut up,” she said. Then loudly, “Well, el Diente [the Tooth]! Well! I’ll have to get the Coronel to let me take you home with me, young runaway. Here, stay by my horse.”
With trembling fingers she searched into the depths of her bag and, sure enough, there they were, the three little tins. Georgie had followed, and was standing at her elbow.
“Raquel,” he whispered.
“Georgie,” huskily. “Wait.”
A few moments later she was back at the table where the sterno was set up. Opening a can with a stout table knife, she touched a match to it. The fluid flickered, flared, then settled down to burn with a lovely blue flame. She set a little tin of water over it.
The Coronel was enchanted. And as the water grew warm, steamed, boiled, all under his rapt gaze, and as the boy put a coffee powder into a cup, he began to gesticulate wildly. For in a moment here was a cup of steaming coffee, its unmistakable fragrance warming the heart.
He snatched the cup and drained the scalding drink. “More,” he sighed, handing it back to Raquel. “It is delicious!” As indeed it was.
“What may I give you in exchange for that little apparato, my lad!” beamed the Coronel after his third cup of coffee, all his irritability vanished.
“It is yours, Coronel,” Raquel replied. “All I want is a runaway youngster who belongs to our hacienda, but who I see has joined your company. I’d like to take him back with me.”
“By all means,” assented the Coronel, beaming in the possession of this new toy, this delightful tin stove (apparently it did not occur to him that it would ever burn out) which would always give him coffee.
“Unless it is the amusing and indispensable infant called ‘Tooth.’ Him I can part with for no one.”
“Alas, it is he, none other,” replied Raquel, grinning with apparent amusement.
“Oh, well, then, if he belongs at your place. Go with God. Only hurry up.”
“And may he have a horse to ride back?” She pushed her advantage a bit further.
“But certainly. Give him a horse. Give him his horse,” the Coronel shouted, waving dismissal.
The aide went out to authorize Georgie’s departure.
“You had better vamoose, my son,” he advised, “before the Coronel changes his mind. It’s a good thing you returned that roan horse.”
And it was a matter of very few moments before they clattered with indecent speed out of the plaza and away up the road. The vaquero sprang from the roadside when they had gone barely half a mile, and the three of them galloped briskly away and over a hill towards El Escondido.