ng a single
caboose appeared. Even before it had come to a pause a tall figure in
spotless uniform leaped to the ground and strode to the waiting
coaches. It was Luis Longorio. He waved a signal to the conductor, then
swung aboard the north-bound train.

The general was all smiles as he came down the and bowed low over
Alaire's hand.

Dolores gasped and stiffened in her seat like a woman of stone.

"God be praised! You are safe and well!" said the new-comer. "I have
blamed myself for allowing you to take this abominable journey! I have
been in torment lest something befall you. Every night I have prayed
that you might be spared all harm. When I received word that you were
coming I made all speed to meet you."

"Dolores and I are greatly in your debt," Alaire told him.

"But you stayed so long!"

"There was more work than I thought. General, you have ruined me."

Longorio was pained; his face became ineffably sad. "Please! I beg of
you," he entreated. "I have arranged for reparation of that miserable
mistake. You shall see what I have done. With your own eyes you shall
read the furious correspondence I have carried on with the minister.
Together you and I shall manage a settlement, and you will find that I
am a friend indeed!"

"I hope so."

"Have I not proved it? Am I not ready to give you my life?" the general
queried, earnestly. "Fix the damages at your own figure and I shall see
that you receive justice. If the government will not pay, I will. I
have means; I am not a poor man. All I possess would be too little to
buy your happiness."

"You embarrass me. I'm afraid you don't realize what you say." Alaire
remained cool under the man's protestations. "I have lost more than a
thousand head of cattle."

"We shall say two, three thousand, and the government will pay,"
Longorio asserted, brazenly. "I will vouch for your figures, and no one
will question them, for I am a man of honor."

"No! All I want--"

"It is done. Let us say no more about the affair. Senora, I have
thought of you every hour; the duties that held me in Nuevo Pueblo were
like irksome chains. I was in madness. I would have flown to La Feria
but--I could not."

"My husband will thank you for your great courtesy to me," Alaire
managed to say.

But the mention of husbands was not agreeable to one of Longorio's
sensitiveness, and his face betrayed a hint of impatience.

"Yes, yes," he agreed, carelessly. "Senor Austin and I must know eac