The officer edged his horse away: "I'll wait till the round-up is over. Then you can't have the excuse that the Fillmore Company's doing it. But I'll have him yet, and don't you forget it!"

"Just like you got him this time!" taunted Ellhorn.

Halliday turned back a red and angry face: "I'll have him," he yelled, "if I have to kill the whole d.a.m.ned three of you to get him!"

A derisive shout of laughter was the only answer he received as he and his party galloped back to camp.

CHAPTER XI

After the round-up was finished Emerson Mead and his two friends started, with two _vaqueros_, to drive a band of cattle to Las Plumas for shipment. When they reached Juan Garcia's ranch Mead remembered that he wished to see the old Mexican, and the two cow-boys were sent on with the cattle while he and Tuttle and Ellhorn tied their horses in the shade of the cottonwoods at the foot of the hill. They found Amada Garcia leaning on her folded arms across the window-sill and making a picture in the frame of the gray adobe walls that was very good to see.

It is not often that the senorita of the southwest can lay claim to any more of beauty than glows in midnight hair and eyes. But Amada Garcia was one of the favored few. Her short, plump figure was rounded into dainty curves and her oval face, with its smooth, brown skin, its dimples, its regular features, its little, rosebud, pouting mouth, and its soft, black, heavy-lidded eyes, was alluring with sensuous beauty.

A red handkerchief tied into a saucy cap was perched on her shining, black hair, and her black dress, carelessly open a little at the neck, showed a full, soft, brown throat.

She received the three men with that dignified courtesy that is never forgotten in the humblest Mexican adobe hut, but she tempered its gravity with many coquettish glances of her great black eyes. They talked in Spanish, the only language Amada knew, which the men spoke as readily as they did their own. No, her father was not at home, she said. He had gone to Muletown and would not be back until night. But was it the wish of the senores to be seated and rest themselves from their travel and refresh themselves with a drink of cool water? Mead presented Tuttle, who had never seen the girl before, and Amada said, with many flashes of languorous light from under her heavy lids, ah, she had heard of the senor, a most brave _caballero_, a man whom all women must admire, so brave and skillful. Her carriage and the poise of her body as she stood, or sat down, or walked about the room, would have befitted a queen's approach to her throne, so unconsciously regal and graceful were they. For ever since she was old enough Amada had carried every day to the house, up the hill from the spring, in an _olla_ poised on her head, all the water for their domestic necessities. And in consequence she walked with a grace and carried her head with an air that not one American woman in a hundred thousand could equal.

She brought them water from an _olla_ which stood in the _portal_, where it would be free to the breeze and shaded from the sun, and as she handed it to one after another she smiled and dimpled, her white teeth gleamed, her black eyes shone alluringly in sudden flashes from under their long-fringed covers, and her sweet, soft voice prattled airy, beguiling flatteries and dear little complimentary nothings. As she talked, she tossed her head and swayed her body and made graceful, eloquent little gestures with her hands and arms. There was unconscious coquetry in every movement and a mischievous "you dare not" in every glance of her eyes and in every dimpling smile. She was like a plump, saucy, sweet-throated bobolink, perched on a swaying bough and singing a joyous and daring "catch me if you can."

She walked across the room to put the cup on the table and Ellhorn sprang to her side and threw his arm about her. She drew back a little, tossed her head, and looked at him with eyes gleaming "if you dare, if you dare," from under their soft lids. She faced the door as she did so and as he bent his head to take the kiss she dared, a sudden, gray horror fell over her laughing face and changed it in a second to a wide-eyed, open-mouthed, drawn thing, pitiful in its helpless, ashen fear. The sudden change stopped him with his lips close to hers, and with his hand on his gun he wheeled toward the door to see what had frightened her. The other two, looking and laughing, saw the sudden horror transform her face and they also sprang toward the open entrance, revolvers in hand. But there was nothing there. The _portal_ was empty of any living thing. And all across the gray-green plain the only sign of life was the drove of cattle far down the winding road. They turned to the girl in surprise and asked her what was the matter. She had recovered her smiling, coquettish self, and declared that Senor Ellhorn had frightened her. She scolded him prettily, in the soft, sweet, Mexican tones that are a caress in themselves, and, with a demure expression, to which only the black eyes would not lend themselves, she told him it was not right for a man to take advantage of a girl when she was all alone. If he wished to kiss her when her mother was present, ah, that was different. Yes, she would forgive him this one time if he truly were very sorry, but he must never, never frighten her so again. And her eyes flashed a smile at him that flouted every word she said.

As the three men rode away Tuttle asked:

"Emerson, did she really mean what she said about Nick's frightening her?"

Mead looked at him with an indulgent smile: "Tom Tuttle, you're the biggest maverick I ever saw. I reckon havin' a man want to kiss her ain't such an unusual thing that it's goin' to frighten Amada Garcia into a conniption fit."

"What in thunder was the matter with her then?" said Ellhorn, a bit nettled over the outcome of his gallantry. "It couldn't have been because she didn't want me to kiss her."

Mead broke into a loud, hearty roar, Tuttle grinned broadly, and Ellhorn regarded the two of them with an angry look. Mead leaned over and slapped his shoulder.

"Nick, you're a devil of a fellow with the women, and I know it as well as you do. I guess Amada's not very different from the rest of 'em, if she did stop your performance. She looked as if she saw a ghost, and maybe she thought she did. These Mexicans are a superst.i.tious lot. Maybe she's kissed one too many some time and happened to think of it just when it spoiled your fun."

"She's a stunner, anyway!" said Ellhorn enthusiastically, his good humor restored. "I say, Emerson, is she straight?"

"I guess so. Yes, I sure reckon she must be, or Juan Garcia would have made trouble. Old Juan and his wife are fine old people, and any man who wronged Amada would have to answer for it to her father. He'd have to either kill the old man or be killed himself in mighty short order.

Oh, yes, Amada's a good girl, but she's an awful little flirt."

As soon as the cattle were secured in the pens at the railroad station, ready to be transferred to the cars, Emerson Mead put spurs to his horse and rode off alone to the northward without a word to his friends. Nick and Tom, perched on the high fence of a cattle-pen, watched him gallop away with amazement. His action was unusual and surprising, for when the three were together where one went the others went also, or, at least, knew all about it. The two left behind discussed what it might mean. Nick watched him until, half a dozen blocks away, he turned off toward the mountains from which they had just come. Then a light broke upon Ellhorn and he slapped his knee with his palm and broke into a laugh.

"Tom Tuttle, I reckon I'm onto his curves! He's goin' to strike the mountain road back of town a ways and come in alone, past Frenchy Delarue's place, as if he'd just come to town!"

"Frenchy Delarue! Does he mean to have it out with Frenchy for the way he talked at that ma.s.s-meetin'? Say, Nick, we ought to be handy, for he'll sure need us. Come on, let's ride out that way." And Tuttle began to climb down from his high perch. Ellhorn stopped him with another roar of laughter.

"Tommy, sometimes I think you sure ain't got any more sense than a two-year-old! Emerson don't care anything about Frenchy Delarue, or what he said at a dozen ma.s.s-meetings. He don't hold things against a man that way." Ellhorn ended with another laugh and sat there chuckling while Tom looked at him resentfully.

"I don't see what you want to make a fool of a fellow for," he said sulkily. "If you-all don't want to tell me what it's all about, say so, and I won't ask any more questions."

Ellhorn slapped him on the shoulder. "That's all right, Tommy. It was such a good joke I couldn't help it. Don't you remember that stunning pretty girl we saw on the street with the kid the day Emerson came into town, that I told you was Frenchy Delarue's daughter?"

"What? Emerson! You don't mean--say, Nick! I don't--Emerson?" And Tuttle stopped, from sheer inability to express his mingled feelings, and stared at his companion, his face the picture of mystified amazement.

Ellhorn nodded. "I don't know anything about it, but two or three times I've seen things about Emerson that made me think he must be gettin' into that sort of trouble somewhere, and if he is I sure think it can't be anybody but Miss Delarue."

Tuttle was silent a few moments, thinking the matter over. Then he shook his head doubtfully.

"If it was you or me, Nick, I could understand it. But Emerson! Nick, I can't believe it until I know it's so!"

"I wouldn't have thought so either, but you never can tell," Nick replied oracularly. "Now, I'd kiss Amada Garcia, or any other pretty girl, every time I got a chance. You wouldn't do it unless you could sneak around behind the house where n.o.body could see, and you wouldn't say a word about it afterward. But Emerson, well, maybe Emerson would too, but I don't reckon he would even think about kissin' her unless she asked him to, and I'm dead sure he'd never think about it afterward. But that's just the sort of a man who gets knocked plumb out when a woman does. .h.i.t him. It wouldn't make any difference to you or me, or not very long anyway, because we'd go right along and love some other girl just as much the next time. Likely you've been in love as many times as I have, and I don't know how many that is, but I don't believe Emerson ever thought more'n twice about any woman before this. But I sure reckon he's knocked out now, and bad enough to last him a long time. He's just the sort that don't want any woman if he can't get the one he does want. But you and me, Tommy,--Lord-a-mighty!

We'll have a sweetheart every time we can get one!"

Tuttle blushed a still deeper crimson under his red tan at this frank account of his possible love affairs, and after a few moments of silence he nodded thoughtfully:

"I guess you-all have hit it off about right, Nick, But I never thought Emerson would be the first one of us three to go and get married! I thought likely none of us ever would!"

"He ain't married yet, and I don't know as she'd have him."

"Why not? Of course she would!" said Tom, resentful at the idea that any girl could refuse his idolized friend. He whittled the board fence despondently a few moments, and then added with a brighter look: "But he's on the wrong side of politics to suit her father, and I reckon Frenchy wouldn't have it."

The whistle of the northbound train came up the track and they climbed down from the fence and went to the depot. The telegraph operator called Tom and handed him a dispatch.

"It's from Marshal Black," said Tuttle to Ellhorn, "and he wants me to go up to Santa Fe as quick as I can get there. I reckon I'd better jump right onto this train. Emerson don't need me any more now. Tell him about it, and if he wants me for anything, or you-all think I'd better come, wire, and I'll flirt gravel in a minute. Good-bye, old man."

Emerson Mead made a detour through the northern end of the town and came into the mountain road at the lower edge of the uplands. He galloped down the street, checking his horse to a slow trot as he neared Pierre Delarue's house. With sidelong glances he keenly examined the veranda and the open doors and windows, but he could see no flutter of drapery, nor the flaxen curls of the child. With a protesting disappointment in his heart he held the horse back to a walk while he stooped over and examined the cinch. He had almost pa.s.sed the place when little Paul came around the house, trailing a subdued looking puppy at the end of a string, saw him, and ran to the gate shrieking his name. Mead turned back, a warm flood of delight surging into his breast.

"h.e.l.lo, little Bye-Bye! Do you want to ride with me? Run back to the house and ask your sister if you can go."

The child ran back to the porch and from within the house Mead heard Marguerite give permission. "Won't she come out?" he thought, anxiously.

"You must come and lift me up," said Paul, and Mead determined to buy him the finest toy in the town.

"Climb on the fence and let Mr. Mead put you on."

"She won't come. She does not want to see me," thought Mead.

"No, I want you to come," persisted Paul, who was in a naughty mood.

"No, dearie, Mr. Mead can stoop over and help you on just as well as I can."

"She is determined not to see me," thought Mead. "She never did so before."

Paul began to cry. "I can't, Daisy. Truly, I can't get on if you don't come. And then I can't have any ride."

Marguerite came out with a little, white, high-crowned sunbonnet pulled over her head. She had been arranging her hair and had put on the bonnet to conceal its disarray, when she found that the child could not be persuaded to let her remain indoors. Mead thought her face more adorable than ever as it looked out from its dainty frame.

Paul kicked his heels into the horse's shoulders, but a firm hand held the bridle and the animal did not move. Marguerite turned a smiling face upon Mead and met in his eyes the same look she always saw there.