Adolfo was inclined to resist, but, thinking better of it,
he yielded with bad grace, bitterly regretting the curiosity which had
prompted him to remain to the end of this interesting affair.

Tad Lewis gave him some comfort. "Never mind, Adolfo," he said. "They
can't prove anything on you, and I'll go your bail. Ed Austin knows
where you was the day that stock was stole." He and his two remaining
men moved toward their automobile, and a moment later the vehicle went
clattering away up the thicket road.

So ended the attempt to foil the return of Ricardo Guzman's body to
Texas soil.

When Alaire came to look for her husband he was gone.

XX

SUPERSTITIONS AND CERTAINTIES

The sensation caused by Ricardo Guzman's disappearance was as nothing
to that which followed the recovery of his body. By the next afternoon
it was known from Mexico to the Canadian border that the old ranchman
had been shot by Mexican soldiers in Romero. It was reported that a
party of Americans had invaded foreign soil and snatched Ricardo's
remains from under the nose of General Longorio. But there all reliable
information ceased. Just how the rescue had been effected, by whom it
had been done, what reasons had prompted it, were a mystery. With the
first story the newspapers printed a terse telegram, signed by Captain
Evans and addressed to the Governor of Texas, which read:

"Ranger force crossed Rio Grande and brought back the body of Ricardo
Guzman."

This message created tremendous enthusiasm, for the Texas Rangers have
ever stood for prompt and decisive action; but two hours after the
publication of this despatch there came a sharp inquiry from
Washington, and on the heels of that the State House at Austin denied
the receipt of any such message.

When this denial was in turn made public, the newspapers demanded to
know who had performed this sensational exploit. One rumor had it that
the sons of Ricardo Guzman had risked their lives to insure their
father Christian burial. This was amplified by a touching pen-picture
of the rancher's weeping family waiting at the bank of the Rio Grande,
and an affecting account of the grief of the beautiful Guzman girls. It
mattered not that there were no daughters.

In other quarters the expedition was credited to members of a secret
order to which Ricardo had belonged; from a third source came a
statement that the Guzman family had hired a band of Mexicans to exhume
the body, so that pro