ON the evening of the day that followed the big round-up of cattle, Dick Willoughby and Chester Munson rode over to the store. As they cantered along, both men were pre-occupied with their thoughts.
Dick was not worrying over his sharp passage of words with his employer’s son, for he knew that his services at the present time were quite indispensable, more especially if the rancho was to be sold to the best advantage. The owner had spoken lightly of the negotiations, and had chuckled in a sinister way about the money he had frequently made over unexercised options. But this time it was a Los Angeles syndicate that was seeking the property, composed of men whose financial reputation and keen business ability Willoughby knew well. For he had learned their names after his interview with Ben Thurston, and he felt certain that this particular group of capitalists would have entered into no serious negotiations without having both the cash and the intention to put the deal through. Therefore he scented a change of ownership in the rancho, and consequently, perhaps, the necessity for his looking around to find employment elsewhere. He hated to think of leaving a place that he had come to look on as home and parting from all the friends he had made throughout the countryside. Unconsciously to himself, the greatest tie of all was proximity to La Siesta and to Merle Farnsworth. But Dick was not thinking of Merle just then—he was merely turning things over generally in his mind as he rode across the valley.
Munson also was cogitating the change in his own outlook that had been brought about by the mailing of the letter of resignation to army headquarters. He was recalling the many years he had striven to reach the lieutenancy now voluntarily surrendered—of his youthful zeal and ambition for an army career which had been powerless to withstand the witching call of the West. And although Grace Darlington’s act of putting the letter in the post had been only the last feather to tip an evenly balanced scale, he could not but feel that thereby this beautiful girl of the West had entered into his life and into all his future plans, hopes, and aspirations. The thought gave him joy; he was more pleased than ever that the decisive step had at last been taken.
Arriving at the store, they found old Tom Baker seated on a dry goods box, while Buck Ashley leaned against the counter, waiting for the stage coach and the mails. Already two or three others were beginning to congregate under the trees, in readiness for the distribution of letters and newspapers.
“Hello, Dick,” called out the sheriff, “I heard of your scrap yesterday morning with that young ne’er-do-well, Marshall Thurston. My God, I’m glad you gave him hell.”
“Please don’t speak about it,” replied Willoughby quietly. “That was my affair and mine alone. I guess we can find some more agreeable topic.”
“Wal,” drawled Buck Ashley, “Tom here was just a-tellin’ me a yarn that’ll interest both you boys a heap, or the lieutenant at all events, for he’s new to these parts and don’t know the local hist’ry yet. Of course I’ve heard the story before, but not all the pertic’lars the way Tom can tell ‘em. And its a dangnation good story. So start from the beginnin’ again, Tom.”
Thus addressed, the sheriff, after taking a bite from his tobacco plug, began:
“The yarn has to do with the old-time bandit Joaquin Murietta, about whom we were speakin’ the other morn in’. Well, the way it all happened was this: On a neighboring ranch, over Ventura way, beyond the Lagunita Rancho, owned at that time by Senor Olivas, a rich cattle dealer comes down from ‘Frisco to buy a bunch of beeves. The stock had all been driven up on a mesa near the Olivas ranch house, and for several days the herders had been cuttin’ out the cows and the young calves from the steers, ‘cause this feller was only goin’ to buy the steers.
“The great herd was bellerin’ and pawin’ in a big cloud of dust, through which the vaqueros—cowboys, you know, lieutenant—could be seen ridin’ round and round. Of course roundin’ up cattle is always more or less excitin’ work, but this rich chap had come down from ‘Frisco with his saddle bags bulgin’ out with gold, and this sorta added a mighty sight to the interest of the doin’s. Part of the bargain was that the deal was to be for spot cash, all in gold, too, mind you, and it was arranged that the buyer and Senor Olivas were to take their stations at one side of the narrow gate, and every time a steer was driven through that gate a twenty-dollar gold piece was to be tossed into a big bag which Senor Olivas was holdin’.
“They do say as how the work continued all day, from early mornin’ until dark, afore the last blamed steer passed that ‘ere gate, and they claim that there was eighty thousand dollars in the Senor’s bag as pay for the day’s drive. They say, too, that Joaquin Murietta, disguised, was one of the vaqueros doin’ the drivin’. Anyway that very night old Olivas was waked up mighty abruptly by feelin’ the cold nose of a revolver shoved against his own nose.
“Well, the long and short of it all was that Senor Olivas and his wife were both gagged and bound hand and foot, while Murietta ransacked the house, found the strong box and carried away every blamed gold coin that Olivas had received for the sale of his steers. The outlaw succeeded in makin’ his escape into the Tehachapi mountains with his cut-throat gang, and they found a hidin’ place in the robbers’ cave that is somewhere hereabouts on the San Antonio Rancho. It sure was as slick a piece of rascality as was ever pulled off in the old lawless days.”
“Well,” observed Buck Ashley, as he shook his head reflectively, “I’m assoomin’ some of the cowboy fellers around here will find that cave one of these days. I’ve put in a good many Sundays huntin’ for it myself.”
Just then there was the sound of horses’ hoofs outside, and a moment later Jack Rover strolled into the store. Over his shoulder was slung the big leather bag for the rancho mails.
“Hallo, everybody,” was his greeting. “I’m ahead of time Buck, but the stage will be here in five minutes. I saw its dust above the ridge. I hear, lieutenant,” he went on, “you’re going to stick to the West and be one of us.”
“Quit the army?” exclaimed Tom Baker in surprise.
“That is so,” replied Munson. “California has fairly got hold of me, and I intend to make my home in the West.”
“Then you just stick here, young man,” said the sheriff, rising to his feet and extending his hand. “California is the pick of the States, and our valley the pick of California. Don’t you forget it. We’re proud to welcome you as a new resident.”
“That’s what I say, too,” concurred Buck Ashley, cordially.
Munson smiled. “Well, I don’t know if you can put me in the resident class all at once,” he observed, diffidently. “Guess I’ve got to join the cowboy brigade first, if Dick and Jack here will break me in.”
“Sure thing,” assented Jack Hover. “You’re a good rider now—for an army man.”
“An ex-army man,” corrected Willoughby, laughing.
“It strikes me we should put you in as postmaster, Munson,” suggested the sheriff, a sly gleam of mischief in his eye. “Buck Ashley here is growin’ old.”
“Yes, but not too old to hold down his job till your tombstone’s in the cemetery, Tom Baker,” retorted the storekeeper, with a grin. “No man takes the Tejon postmastership while I’m alive,” he added defiantly.
“I’m forewarned and won’t apply for your job, Buck,” laughed Munson. “But here comes the stage, so show your spryness, old fellow, by getting us our mail.”
BUCK ASHLEY had retired into the partitioned-off section of the store that formed the postoffice, and was busy stamping and sorting out the mail. The scattered loiterers outside crowded into the building expectantly, and the local parliament was in session. Amid the buzz of conversation Willoughby could not but hear his own name mentioned, coupled with that of Marshall Thurston. He understood quite well that all manner of gossip was flying around in regard to the quarrel at the round-up. But he remained stoically indifferent, shut his ears, and leaning against the counter busied himself with an old Saturday Evening Post that had been lying there.
At last the wicket was shoved up with a bang, and those present began to move toward the little aperture through which Buck Ashley proceeded to hand out correspondence and newspapers. One by one the throng melted away. Jack Rover was examining the big bunch of mail for San Antonio Rancho as he stowed it into the letter bag. Munson was opening and gleaning the contents of two or three letters that had come to him from New York. Dick Willoughby continued his reading, unconcerned; Jack would pass over any correspondence for him. Old Tom Baker had not risen from his accustomed seat on an empty box; he had few correspondents, and the mail did not worry him, although he invariably assisted with his presence at its distribution.
These four were now the only ones in the store besides Buck Ashley, who still remained behind the partition. At last the postmaster appeared, holding in his hand an open letter. His face showed great agitation as he glanced around to take stock of those who might be present.
“Say, boys,” he whispered in a mysterious manner, as he held up the letter, “this is the most dangnation extr’ornery thing that has ever happened to me. You’re just the bunch of fellers I’d like to consult. Close the door, Tom.”
“What’s up, Buck?” asked the sheriff as he rose to comply. “You look as if you had the ague shakes.”
“No ague in this here land of California,” laughed Jack Rover. “Is it a proposal of marriage you’ve been getting, Buck?”
“A derned heap better’n that. God ‘lmighty, boys, this may mean millions for all of us. Shoot the bolt, Tom; I’ll hand out no more groceries tonight. Come close together, all of you. You read the letter aloud, Dick. My hand’s a-tremb-lin’, and I can’t get the Frenchie’s lingo just right.”
“The Frenchie?” echoed Tom Baker in puzzled surprise.
“It’s a letter from Pierre Luzon,” explained Buck.
“Good God!” The sheriff was now as deeply stirred as his old crony.
“The bandit scout you were telling us about the other morning?” exclaimed Jack Rover, also fired with excitement.
“I thought that fellow was in San Quentin for life.” remarked Munson, composedly.
“Wal, and ain’t this letter from San Quentin?” retorted Buck. “See the headin’. But Dick’ll read it aloud. I feel clean knocked out.” And the old man sank back on his chair behind the counter.
The four others were now clustered around Dick Willoughby. The latter, deputized to do the reading, had nonchalantly taken the epistle from Buck Ashley’s trembling hand. While the others were speaking he had bestowed a preliminary glance, and from his lips there escaped a murmur of surprise.
“Great Caesar!” As he uttered the ejaculation Dick sat up, keenly alert.
“Well, what’s it all about?” inquired Munson, by this time the only cool man in the bunch.
“Read, read!” cried the storekeeper hoarsely.
Dick Willoughby began:
“Mr. Buck Ashley, Storekeeper, Tejon, California.
“If God in His goodness permits this letter to come to your hands, remember it is from old Pierre, the Frenchman, who used to be about your store sometimes a half a day at a time, smoking his pipe. You never knew much about me or where I lived. But I will tell you.
“I am an old man now—very old. I was born in the South of France, came to this country in the ‘40’. and entered into the service of Joaquin Murietta, who was one great man, but a big bandit. Peace to his soul! Well, he was good to me, and I was faithful to him, taking care of the cave, the big grotto, the cavern among the Tehachapi mountains where he many times hid from the sheriff’s posse, and also, where he brought all his gold to stack up and keep from everybody.
“You also know Don Manuel, him whom the people call White Wolf. Well, once when a boy, Don Manuel he save Marietta’s life from the sheriff by helping him to escape from one close place. Murietta was very grateful, and one day he bring the boy to the grotto cave, and there I see him and like him very much. That was while Murietta still lived.
“Afterward when the little boy grow up and was one man, and turned bitter against the gringos because they wrong his sister, Senorita Rosetta, and his old father and mother die of grief, he say to me, ‘I will become a bandit like Joaquin Murietta.’ He came to the cavern one night and tell me and say, ‘You be my servant.’ So I say, ‘All right,’ because Don Manuel one brave man.
“So that night of the great stage robbery over near Lake of Tulare, I hold horses. That’s all I do, but all the same they put me in this horrid prison, and here I am. The other two men, Felix Vasquez and Fox Cassidy, were shot by the posse and I have been told by a Portugee in the jail here about the White Wolf being killed away north in Seattle, and he is no more.
“Don Manuel de Valencia, he was one great man. Peace to his soul!
“I am alone. I want to get away from this terrible prison. I have promised one of my guards—a good Frenchman who comes from my town in France—$5,000 in gold if he can secretly get this letter into postoffice to you and get me away from this living hell. You do this and I show you the cavern. Nobody knows where it is but me.
“Come and get me, please, my good Mr. Ashley, come, and may the spirit of the Virgin Mary reward you. All I say here is truth. You come get me and I show you the secret grotto. I show you the great stacks of gold hidden by Joaquin Murietta and Don Manuel. Also the sand-bar in the hidden stream where Guadalupe gathered up much gold.
“I beg and pray you to keep what I say in this letter secret. I am old and weak and sick. Come and get me.
“Obedient servant,
“Pierre Luzon.”
“Ain’t that just one hell of a letter, boys?” exclaimed Buck Ashley.
“Gospel truth, every word,” cried Tom Baker, emphatically.
“It certainly reads like the truth,” concurred Munson.
“Then what are we going to do about it?” asked Jack Rover.
Dick Willoughby spoke now with the quiet and quick decision that marks the leader of men:
“What we will do is this. We five are partners in this secret, and, if Buck is willing, we’ll play the game together for all it is worth. To begin with, we’ll put up one hundred dollars apiece to send Tom Baker to Sacramento. He will try to get a pardon or a parole for Pierre Luzon.”
“That can be managed,” assented the sheriff. “I’ve got a political pull, you know, boys.”
“Well,” continued Dick, “we’ll bring old Pierre here and we’ll get from him the information he promises about the secret grotto.”
“Not forgetting Guadalupe’s placer mine,” interjected Jack Rover.
“Everything will be attended to in its turn,” replied Dick. “One thing at a time, and the first thing to be done is to get the Frenchman out of San Quentin. When can you start, Tom?”
“The day after tomorrow.”
“Well, we’ll have the cash ready for you by tomorrow night. You must bring Pierre Luzon here without anyone else besides ourselves knowing his name or getting next to him.”
“I’ll fix up a cot for him in my own room behind the store,” suggested Buck Ashley.
“That’s a good plan,” assented Dick. “When the Frenchman’s here, it will be time then to discuss our next move. Meanwhile, it’s an honorable promise of secrecy all round, and to begin with I give my word.”
While speaking the last words, Dick solemnly raised his hand, and each man in turn followed his example as he gave the pledge required.
TEN days had passed and the count of the stock on San Antonio Rancho had been completed, every canyon searched, the last wandering maverick roped and branded, the number of fat beeves accurately estimated. Three members of the Los Angeles syndicate had arrived in a big automobile and remained over night at the ranch house. Most of the time they had been closeted with Ben Thurston in his office, and had finally taken their departure without exchanging a word with anyone else on the rancho. Nobody knew whether the deal had gone through or not, but rumor said that, after some disagreement on the first day, terms had been arranged next morning.
Dick Willoughby, although he discussed the question with no one, made his own inferences. The very fact that the visitors had not made any inspection of the property proved that they already knew it thoroughly well. The counting of the cattle and horses had been the final factor in the negotiations, and the figures had enabled the deal to advance a further stage toward completion. Ben Thurston might fool himself about easy option money put up only to be forfeited, but Dick Willoughby was not fooled. The days of closer settlement in California had come, and these Los Angeles men were the most enterprising and skilful subdividers in the West. They dealt only in big propositions, and after mopping up all the available tracts in the southern end of the State, were extending their operations northward. This vast so-called “Spanish grant,” an empire in itself, had no doubt for several years been in their eye, and now they were prepared to handle the San Antonio Rancho with the lavish expenditure it deserved and required to transform the great sweep of cattle range—rich agricultural land, as the luxuriant native grasses showed—into smiling orchards and alfalfa farms, each provided with the irrigation water which intelligent conservation would ensure in abundance.
Dick knew in his heart that the era of transformation had at last come, that the roaming herds were to be pushed back into regions more remote, that homes and schoolhouses and garden cities would soon be dotting the landscape, that the passing of Ben Thurston, the cattle king, and of his hard-riding, devil-may-care vaqueros was at hand.
Yet Thurston spoke no word—in fact, he seemed to be more grouchy and taciturn than ever. Not even his son Marshall was in his confidence, for the young man was seldom with his father, preferring to spend his time in the drinking saloons and dance halls of Bakersfield, where the activity of oil-developing operations attracted all sorts and conditions of men, among whom the dissipated decadent had readily found friends to his liking.
Ben Thurston who had gone the pace himself in his early days, did not seek to interfere with his son’s pursuit of pleasures, but he had very promptly squelched any interference from Marshall with his own business operations. On the evening of the quarrel with Dick Willoughby at the round-up, Marshall had attempted to tell his father about the affair and suggest Dick’s dismissal. But the old man had at once silenced him by saying: “Why, damn you! I brought you out to this country to enjoy yourself and not to get into trouble. So far as Willoughby is concerned, I can’t afford to quarrel with him. He is my foreman, and I am right in the midst of a big business transaction. So just you mind your own business, my boy, and leave him alone.”
Accordingly, Marshall Thurston, a coward at heart, had not sought to pursue the feud singlehanded, and Dick had seen but little of him during the rest of the mustering work. When they did happen to meet, it was a case of a black scowl of hate from the one and a contemptuous smile of indifference from the other. And so the days had passed until the task was finished.
It was the Sunday morning that had been fixed for the visit to the home of Mr. Ricardo Robles, when the cattle foreman could at last conscientiously take a day of recreation. With the first break of dawn he and Munson were in the saddle, for they had been invited to breakfast at La Siesta before starting with the young ladies on the ride through the oak forest.
The visitors arrived early, but not too early for their hostesses. Grace and Merle were waiting to welcome them in the portico, looking more charming than ever in their neat riding suits of khaki.
“We saw you cross the bridge,” declared Grace, “and mother has gone in to order breakfast to be served. You must be hungry after your early start.”
“Oh, Sing Ling didn’t let us go without a cup of coffee,” laughed Dick. “But I fancy we’ll do full justice, all right, to the bountiful fare of La Siesta.”
It proved to be a delightful meal in every way, the viands seasoned with gay repartee and laughter. A full hour had sped before Dick recalled the real object of the day’s excursion.
“We usually walk to Mr. Robles’ place,” remarked Merle. “It is only a mile or so by the short cuts up the hill, but by the winding road it is very much longer. So we ordered our ponies.”
“I see,” smiled Munson, “to prolong the pleasure of our foursome among the oaks.”
“Not at all, sir,” retorted Grace. “The climb on foot is a stiff one, and we knew that you must be out of condition from the lazy life you are living.”
“I am only waiting for Willoughby to give me a cowboy’s job,” replied the ex-lieutenant.
“I don’t know if there will be any cowboy jobs going,” observed Willoughby. “It’s my belief that San Antonio Rancho is sold and is going to be broken up into small holdings.”
“Oh, what a pity!” exclaimed Merle.
“From one point of view, perhaps,” answered Dick. “But from a hundred other points of view, what a blessing! There will be a dozen happy homes for every steer the range now feeds!”
“But La Siesta will remain just as it is,” cried Grace.
“That will be all right,” replied Dick, gallantly, “It’s already a happy home.”
The ladies smiled pleasantly.
“Then this will mean the elimination of Mr. Ben Thurston,” observed Mrs. Darlington.
“The greatest blessing of all,” declared Merle, clapping her hands. “You see, I am already converted to the change, Mr. Willoughby,” she added merrily.
“But what about my job?” asked Munson in mock dolefulness.
“Consult Mr. Robles,” laughed Grace. “He may take pity on you, and find you a place as handy man on his estate.”
In merry mood they all sallied forth. The saddle horses were waiting, and standing beside them was an elderly Spanish woman.
“Tia Teresa, Mr. Munson,” said Mrs. Darlington by way of introduction.
Munson had often enough heard the name, and in answer to an inquiry, Willoughby had told him that the old dame had been the personal attendant of the two young ladies ever since they could remember. Tia or Aunt Teresa was now more a friend of the family than a servant of the house, and, taking her hand in salutation, Munson treated her with the affable courtesy that was her due.
“I am glad to make your acquaintance,” he said, raising his hat.
Tia Teresa looked pleased. Despite her seventy years, she was a buxom and splendidly preserved woman, and there was still the flash of youthfulness in her big dark eyes.
“You will look after my little girls,” she said, as she gathered together the folds of her black lace mantilla. “By rights I should be coming with you, too,” she added, in the manner of a true Spanish duenna.
“You forget that we are home again—in free America,” laughed Merle as she settled herself in the saddle.
“Too free, I sometimes think,” rejoined Tia Teresa. “But there is safety in four,” she added, turning with a smile to Mrs. Darlington.
And as the young folks rode away she waved them a pleasant adios.
AT a gentle pace they wound their way through the forest of magnificent old oaks.
As for Munson, riding by Grace Darlington’s side, the miles were the shortest he had ever before traversed. It seemed only a few minutes before the red tiled roof and towers of a house built in the California Mission style were gleaming through the trees only a short distance ahead.
Great oaken doors closed the arched gateway, but at the clatter of hoofs and the sound of voices, a little peep-hole wicket was withdrawn. The inspection by unseen eyes apparently was satisfactory, for a moment later a postern was opened, and two men, Mexicans obviously by their garb and deferential manner, emerged to take and lead away the horses. Within the patio stood Senor Robles, his usually grave face lighted by a smile of cordial welcome.
“Let me tell you, young men,” he said while shaking hands, “that while Grace and Merle are quite at home here, you are the very first strangers who have passed through my portals.”
“Strangers no longer then,” said Dick, good-naturedly.
“Precisely,” replied Mr. Robles, “or you would not be here. But I foresee that all of us are going to be very close friends. Isn’t that so, Grace, my dear?”
“I’m sure I cannot say,” replied Grace, with a smile of demure innocence toward Mr. Munson. Then she turned to Mr. Robles with a roguish twinkle in her eye. “But I’ve news for you. Mr. Munson has resigned from the army and is looking for a job.”
“Both facts are already known to me,” answered Robles, smiling.
“Oh,” exclaimed Grace, “one can never surprise you, Mr. Robles. Although you live the life of a hermit, you seem to be always the first to learn everything that is going on.”
“A hermit, my dear, need not necessarily be out of touch with the world,” replied Robles, playfully pinching her ear. “And now, Mr. Willoughby, you came specially to see my pictures. Lead the way, Merle. Gentlemen, I say again—welcome to my mountain home.”
They lingered awhile in the patio to admire the marble columns of the cloister that ran all around, the playing fountains at each of the four comers, with groups of symbolical statuary, the wealth of beautiful shrubs and flowers. On the side opposite to the gateway rose a tall tower, fashioned like the campanile of an Old Mission and crowned with bright red tiles.
“We shall ascend there later on,” remarked Mr. Robles, following Dick’s upward glance.
Then they passed through the wide-opened French window into the living rooms.
The first was a great apartment that occupied one entire side of the building. In the centre was a large globe of the world. Here and there were glass cases displaying manuscripts and illuminated missals. Along the walls were finely-carved bookcases filled with several thousands of volumes.
“When you have the leisure you can come and browse here,” said the host, addressing both young men. “Meanwhile you may care to look at the bronzes and statuary”—this with a sweep of the hand that indicated the art treasures distributed about the apartment.
On the side of the house beneath the tower were the dining room and the billiard and smoking room. Passing through these, the visitors came to the picture gallery, a room corresponding in size to the library. Here were hung treasures of the painter’s art, masterpieces signed by names that are immortal. These, as their owner again explained, had been acquired by him during several prolonged visits to Europe.
“Count this just as a preliminary survey, Mr. Willoughby,” he said finally. “Then come again. There are guest chambers on either side of the gateway, and one of these will always be at your disposal when I am at home. I extend the same invitation to you, Mr. Munson.”
“My word, but you may feel honored,” exclaimed Grace, in unconcealed amazement.
“When I open my gates, I open my heart as well,” said Mr. Robles, with a courtly little bow to his new friends.
Next they ascended the tower. Its first floor, above the living rooms, was a delightful den filled with curios of all kinds. From this sprang a winding iron staircase, up which Mr. Robles led the way.
The upper chamber, extending on all sides some distance beyond the supporting tower, proved larger than might have been expected. Its one conspicuous article of furniture was a great terrestrial telescope. The sliding panels of glass which formed a complete window all around the room showed that the instrument could be used without obstruction in any direction.
Here a Mexican boy was on duty. When the visitors entered, his hand was resting on the telescope. A bright red sash around his waist imparted a touch of picturesqueness to his costume. He was perhaps only twelve or thirteen years of age, but wonderfully keen and alert-looking for his years. At a glance from his master, the youngster took his departure, closing the door behind him.
“Gentlemen,” remarked Mr. Robles, when they were again alone, “perhaps before I brought you here I should have exacted the promise I am now going to ask you to make. Grace and Merle know that I am a recluse and wish to live undisturbed by curiosity-mongers or tittle-tattlers. I want nobody but the friends I deliberately choose to know about my habits of living or the contents of my home. Only in this way can I hope to be left alone. Therefore, please give me your word, Mr. Willoughby and Lieutenant Munson, that you will not speak with any outsider about the things I am showing you today.”
The promise was instantly given and sealed by a hearty hand clasp.
“Now,” resumed the host in lighter tone, “perhaps you would like to view the landscape. I may explain that I had this observatory, as I call it, specially built and equipped so that I could sweep the valley from end to end. For example, I saw you two young men riding along the road this morning,” he went on, with a smile. “I saw one of you alight, about twelve miles from here—it was you, lieutenant—and tighten the girths of your saddle.”
“Great Scott!” murmured Munson, in half-incredulous surprise.
“Test the glass for yourself,” continued Robles, as, placing one eye at the lens, he adjusted the instrument. “Look”—and he stepped back, motioning Munson to approach.
Munson peeped through the long tube and there came from his lips a cry of mingled delight and amazement.
“Dick, Dick, there’s the store as large as life—Buck Ashley standing at the door and lighting a cigar. Geewhizz, and it must be twenty miles away.”
He rose erect and made room for Dick. The latter gazed in silence for a few moments. When he turned to Mr. Robles he said:
“It’s really wonderful—it is the most wonderful glass I ever looked through.”
There was the glimmer of an exultant smile on the face of Ricardo Robles.
“I saw you at the round-up across the valley the other day,” he remarked. “You were much nearer to me than is the store. And while I do not invite any confidence, Mr. Willoughby, you certainly engaged in a very spirited conversation, to say the least, with young Marshall Thurston. Indeed, I half expected to see you come to blows.”
“What was that?” asked Merle in some trepidation.
Willoughby had reddened.
“Nothing of consequence,” he responded, almost curtly. “I had to tell the young cub to mind his own business. That was all.”
“You certainly have the whole valley under observation,” remarked Munson, considerately diverting the conversation.
“Yes,” assented Mr. Robles, with an almost grim smile of satisfaction. “The telescope teaches one not merely to observe, but to reason from the facts observed. Tia Teresa evidently thought that she should have come along today to play duenna, eh, Merle?”
“You don’t say you guessed that?” exclaimed Merle in great astonishment.
“Guessed it! I knew it when she raised her protesting finger.”
“You are a magician, Mr. Robles,” cried Grace.
“No, only a logician,” was the sententious rejoinder.
“Please let me peep at our garden,” asked Merle. “I wonder if mother is among her roses.”
Without a word Robles swung round the instrument on its pivot and changed the focus.
“That’s about right,” he said, stepping back. “There is no one out of doors at present. Move the glass slightly and you can see over the entire garden.”
Each girl in turn made a prolonged scrutiny; they were enchanted with the clearness and marvellous detail of the picture.
“Henceforth we’ll have to be on our best behavior, Dick,” laughed Munson, as they turned toward the winding stairway. “We’ve got to remember Mr. Robles has a constant eye on us.”
“Perhaps I’ve had you under observation quite a while,” laughed the senor, tapping the young fellow on the shoulder.
Then he threw open the door, and, with a slight bow and extended hand, motioned to his visitors to descend. At the foot of the narrow, winding staircase they found the Mexican youth standing on guard. He bowed low as the ladies passed, and when Mr. Robles followed last of all, saluted, and then immediately returned to the chamber above, again without a single word of instruction from his master. Munson and Willoughby exchanged meaning looks; obviously a well-disciplined outlook was kept from the observatory all the time, as if from the conning-tower of a battleship.
Again the party was in the patio. Mr. Robles turned to Willoughby.
“I hope Grace and Merle have explained to you that at present I do not entertain. My own fare is of the simplest.”
“Mother is to have luncheon ready at one,” interposed Grace. “I caught the broiled trout myself this morning.”
“You caught them ready broiled, eh?” laughed Munson.
“Oh, you know what I mean,” rejoined Grace, with a pretty little moue.
“Broiled trout!” exclaimed Dick, appreciatively. “Then I think we’ll be hurrying down the hill, senor.” He had recognized with intuitive courtesy that the interview was at an end.
“Is he not delightful?” asked Merle, as their horses started off at a walk. “And you would never guess how sweet and kind he can be.”
“I don’t doubt it,” assented Willoughby. “A polished gentleman, but a man of mystery, isn’t he?”
“Not when you come to know him. A recluse always has his little idiosyncrasies.” As she spoke, she set her pony at a canter down the gentle incline.
After luncheon, Dick found himself tête-à-tête with Mrs. Darlington in the music room. The mystery attaching to the personality of the recluse was still uppermost in his mind. But for the present the music claimed his attention.
Merle had seated herself at the grand piano and was softly fingering the keys, striking a chord here and there, until finally she drifted into Chopin’s Fifth Nocturne. There was something almost divine in her interpretation. The music fairly rippled from her deft fingers, as they glided on from one beautiful cadence to another until at last, note by note, as if sobbing a reluctant adieu, the melody died away.
Both the visitors were generous in their tributes of congratulation.
“Thank you,” said Merle, as she arose from the piano and proceeded to unfasten the clasps of a violin case.
“What now?” exclaimed Munson.
“Oh, I am not the performer; I am merely the accompanist,” and she held out a beautiful old violin to Grace. As Merle sounded a key on the piano, Grace touched the strings of the Stradivarius. When all was ready she tenderly caressed the violin with her chin, and, her bow sweeping across the instrument, Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata trembled from the strings, in soft and plaintive melody, filling the room with echoing and re-echoing notes of sweetness, while Merle’s accompanying notes lent support, in blending harmony, to the rich cadences.
“Splendid! magnificent!” exclaimed the young men in unison.
Munson was now called upon to sing, and Dick felt himself at full liberty to converse with Mrs. Darlington. He broached the subject that had been occupying his thoughts.
“What is known of Senor Ricardo Robles?” he enquired. “Have you been long acquainted?”
“Oh, I have known him for many, many years,” replied Mrs. Darlington. “We used to be next door neighbors in Los Angeles. That was twenty years ago. Then we returned to England—Mr. Darlington had fallen heir to the family estates. Mr. Robles used to visit us off and on. He is, as you have seen, very fond of Grace”—she paused a moment, then went on—“and of my adopted daughter Merle as well. Merle, you know, was the child of my dearest girl friend who died a year after her baby was born.”
“Yes, Merle has told me this.”
“Well, six years ago my dear husband died, and it was Mr. Robles who persuaded me to return to California. He selected this beautiful ranch for us, near to his own home. And we have all been so happy here at La Siesta.”
“Mr. Robles is certainly a wonderful man, with all those art treasures around him.”
“He has princely tastes and princely wealth as well—this you will have seen for yourself today. He travels a great deal abroad, sometimes for a whole year at a time, and then returns quietly to his hermitage. He has taken a great fancy to you, Mr. Willoughby. You are lucky in gaining the friendship of such a man.”
“I think I’ll like him, too—when I know him better,” replied Willoughby, with cautious reserve.
IN Dick Willoughby’s presence Marshall Thurston contented himself with sullen looks. But beyond his sight and hearing he spoke truculently of what he was going to do some day to get level with “the hired hand who had had the infernal insolence to call him down in public.” So all the little world on the rancho knew, or at least believed, that a bitter feud was in progress.
Two or three of the cowboys fostered young Marshall’s feelings of animosity, partly out of sheer devilment, partly because they deemed it good policy to keep in the good graces of the heir to the rancho. Moreover, so long as old Ben Thurston knew nothing about it, they were always willing to break a bottle with the dissipated spendthrift, not only because good liquor was not to be despised at any time, but also for the sake of the amusement afforded by Marshall, in his cups, with his stories of fast life in New York and his apparently inexhaustible fund of highly spiced anecdotes. Even his braggart threats against Willoughby had an element of fun.
“Why don’t you cut him out with the girl?” one of his boon companions had suggested on an occasion of this kind.
“By gad, I will,” Marshall had responded with vehemence. “You just watch me.”
Thenceforward this thought was uppermost in his alcohol-sodden brain.
Marshall Thurston had met Mrs. Darlington and her daughter on several occasions, but, although he had been formally introduced, he had never been invited to call at La Siesta. Nor up to the present had he felt any inducement to take the initiative. Like clings to like, and these people were not of his kind—in the presence of pure and refined womanhood the human toad becomes uncomfortably conscious of his own loathsomeness.
But now there was a valid reason to egg him on. He would show Dick Willoughby who was who on the San Antonio Rancho. If the heir to all those broad acres chose to pay court to Merle Farnsworth, the girl would only be too glad to jump at him and his millions. He would tell her, too, that Willoughby was going to be fired and that the fellow was not worth a moment’s consideration.
Such was his mood one afternoon when, his motor car being in the repair shop, he had not made his usual trip to Bakersfield. “Yes, he would ride over that very day to La Siesta;” and he proceeded to fortify the resolve by opening a bottle of champagne in the solitary seclusion of his den. After gulping down the wine he felt brave enough to face the devil himself. Yet, when mounted on his horse, he still evinced sufficient discretion to make a wide detour lest Willoughby should catch sight of him and divine his intentions.
As he rode along young Thurston nursed his wrath to keep it warm. At the same time the desire to possess the girl for her own sake began to inflame his imagination. Unscrupulous passion had been bred in the very bone of this worthless degenerate. Just as his father, Ben Thurston, had thirty years before trampled on the virtue of the young Spanish beauty, Senorita Rosetta, the sister of Don Manuel, so now was the son hatching in his brain a foul plot of spoliation.
“I’ll get even with Willoughby, by God, in the very way that will hurt his pride the most. Women!—pshaw, they’re all alike. And she’s a peacherino all right—those flashing dark eyes—she sure looks good to me.” This was now the tenor of his musing as his pony cantered up the slope to La Siesta.
He advanced on foot to the portico with a swagger and a smile, and there, as luck would have it, he found Merle seated in a rocker, reading, and alone. She rose with quiet courtesy and returned his greeting.
“I am sorry,” she said, “mother is not at home. She and my sister Grace have driven over to the dairy. We have a model dairy, you know, on La Siesta,” she went on, anxious to make conversation that would not prove embarrassing. For already she divined some particular object in the young man’s visit, knowing as she did that he and Willoughby had recently exchanged angry words.
“Won’t you show me your famous rose gardens?” asked Thurston, boldly.
“With pleasure,” she replied, assenting with a sweet smile of politeness, although there was sore reluctance in her heart, as she stepped from under the portico.
But, unknown to herself, she did not go unattended, for as Merle and her visitor passed round the house and through the shrubberies there glided after them the figure of a woman, clothed in black, wearing over her head and shoulders a Spanish mantilla. It was Tia Teresa, the ever watchful duenna.
The roses of La Siesta, as Marshall Thurston had said, were indeed famous. Here were all the finest varieties, growing in the perfection to which only care and scientific skill applied under ideal climatic conditions can attain. Merle was glad to point out the different blooms and give them their names—the topic was certainly an innocuous one, and she smiled at the thought as they strolled along. She was vaguely wondering, too, whether Dick Willoughby would approve even this slight measure of courtesy toward the visitor to her home. Although she had as yet not the remotest conception that the quarrel at the round-up had been in any way connected with her name, she knew that the two young men were at daggers drawn, and toward Dick there was the instinctive loyalty in her heart that prompted her to count his enemies as her enemies, his friends as her friends.
The young girl was too unversed in the ways of the world to notice that Marshall Thurston was under the influence of wine. He was too experienced a toper to show any signs of unsteadiness on his feet, but all the same there was undoubted tipsiness in his leering side-glances and occasional slurring of his words. Of this Merle in her maidenly innocence was supremely unconscious, nor did she dream that the very sparkle of her eyes was completing the intoxication of wine fumes.
Once she cast a look up the hill and asked herself whether the wizard of the red-tiled tower had his spy-glass on La Siesta and was even then quietly surveying the scene in the gardens. The thought made her uncomfortable; she felt sure that her kind friend, Mr. Robles, would not look with favor on her condescending to show even the slightest attention to one whose evil ways of living were notorious.
Suddenly she came to a halt, close beside a little clump of oleander trees laden with rich blossoms.
“I am sorry I must leave you now,” she said, quite abruptly.
“Leave me?” stammered Thurston. “What for?”
“I have other things to attend to,” she replied.
“Oh, I say, Miss Farnsworth”—the inebriate as he spoke made a gesture of appeal—“I hope you are not angry with me. If that scalawag of a fellow Willoughby told you I said anything disrespectful of you the other day, he is a demed liar—that’s what he is, a derned liar, and a poor penniless beggar as well, whom my father’s going to fire off the ranch.”
Merle stood speechless. She stepped back when Thurston advanced with outstretched hands.
“The truth of the whole matter is,” he rambled on, with growing incoherence, “I am madly in love with you myself. That’s what I am, and I’m going to have you, too.” And he grabbed her fiercely and attempted to draw her to him.
Merle screamed both in fear and in repulsion as she tried to push him away.
Just then, from among the oleanders, rushed Tia Teresa. The old duenna came like a cyclone. Her eyes blazed with anger. Grasping the young libertine by the collar of his coat, she pulled him madly from the now half-fainting girl. Then, whirling him around, she rushed him, with the strength and ferocity of a tigress defending her whelps, down the gravelled path and flung him bodily over the low retaining wall along the embankment that separated the rose gardens from the public road. She spat upon his prostrate figure below and rained down on him a torrent of imprecations in the Spanish tongue.
It was all over in one brief minute. When young Thurston picked himself up, it was to see the aged fury half-leading, half-carrying Merle away in the direction of the house.
“The hell cat,” he murmured.
Then he brushed the dirt from his coat and straightened out his tumbled appearance as best he could. His horse was tied to the gate post a hundred yards along the road. He slunk toward it, climbed into the saddle, and rode slowly away in the falling twilight. He had been thoroughly sobered by the incident, yet continued somewhat dazed, for his horse was headed toward the woods and hills and not in the direction of home.