ety all your life for my freedom--on the cross I will swear that.
I----"

"Senor, nothing is in my power, and of your traps I know nothing. I am
told you set a trap for a lady who is in grief and your own feet were
caught in it. That is all I know of traps," said Isidro.

Kit patted the old man on the shoulder for cleverness, even while he
wondered at the ravings of the would-be abductor. Then he crept nearer
the window where he could see the face of the prisoner clearly, and
without the overshadowing hat he had worn on entrance. The face gave
him something to think about, for it was that of one of the men who
had ridden up to the Yaqui spring the day he had found Tula and Miguel
in the desert. How should this rebel who rode on secret trails with
Ramon Rotil be head man at Soledad for Rotil's enemy? And what was the
trap?

"Look well at that man, Isidro," he whispered, "and tell me if such a
man rode here to Mesa Blanca with General Rotil."

"No such man was here, senor, but this man was foreman at Soledad
before the Deliverer came over the eastern range to Mesa Blanca. Also
the general and Don Jose Perez are known as enemies;--the friend of
one cannot be the friend of another."

"True enough, Isidro, but that does not help me to understand the trap
set. Call your wife and learn if I can see the Dona Jocasta."

Tula had crept up beside them, and touched him on the arm.

"She asks for you, and sadness is with her very much. She watches us
in fear, and cannot believe that the door is open for her."

"If that is her only trouble we can clear it away for her, _pronto_,"
he stated, and they entered the patio.

"It is not her only trouble, but of the other she does not speak.
Valencia weeps to look at her."

"Heavens! Is she as bad looking as that?"

"No, it is another reason," stated the girl stolidly. "She is a caged
humming bird, and her wings have broken."

Kit Rhodes never forgot that first picture of their kidnaped guest,
for he agreed with Clodomiro who saw in her the living representation
of old biblical saints.

The likeness was strengthened by the half Moorish drapery over her
head, a black mantilla which, at sound of a man's step, she hurriedly
drew across the lower part of her face. Her left arm and shoulder was
bare, and Valencia bent over her with a strip of old linen for
bandage, but the eyes of Dona Jocasta were turned half shrinking, half
appraising to the strange Americano. It was plain to he