must pass coming north towards
the border, also that was a very small pueblo to support a padre, and
perhaps----

"Padre," she said after a moment, "but for the Americano you would be
a dead man. Think you what Ramon would have done to a priest who let a
vaquero carry me to the ranges! Also I came back to Soledad because
the Americano told me it was only duty and justice that I come for
your sake as Ramon has no liking for priests. You see, senor, our
American capitan of Soledad is not so bad;--he had a care of you."

"Too much a care of me!" retorted the priest. "Know you not that the
door of my sleeping room is bolted each night, and unbolted at dawn?
He laughs with a light heart, and sings foolishly,--your new
Americano; but under that cloak of the simple his plotting is not
idle!"

"As to that, I think his light heart is not so light these days," said
Dona Jocasta. "Two days now the Indian girl and Marto Cavayso could
have been back in Soledad, and he is looking, looking ever over that
empty trail. Before the sun was above the sierra today he was far
there coming across the mesa."

"A man does not go in the dark to look for a trail," said Padre
Andreas meaningly. "He unbolted my door on his return, and to me he
looked as a man who has done work that was heavy. What work is there
for him to do alone in the hills?"

"Who knows? A horse herd is somewhere in a canon beyond. There are
colts, and the storm of yesterday might make trouble. The old father
of Elena says that storm has not gone far and will come back! And
while the Americano rides to learn of colts, and strays, he also
picks the best mules for our journey to the border."

"Does he find the best mules with packs already on their backs in the
canons?" demanded the padre skeptically. "From my window I saw them
return."

"I also," confessed Dona Jocasta amused at the persistence of
suspicion, "and the load was the water bags and _serape_! Does any but
a fool go into the wilderness without water?"

"You cover him well, senora, but I think it was not horses he went in
the night to count," said the priest sarcastically. "Gold in the land
is to him who finds it,--and I tell you the church will hear of that
red gold belt from me! Also there will be a new search for it! If it
is here the church will see that it does not go with American
renegades across the border!"

"Padre, all the land speaks peace today, yet you are as a threatening
cloud over Soledad!