switch to it briefly. Then it flashed
upon Kendric that he was to be attacked from behind--

But even as the thought came and before he could leap aside, the door
was jerked open and from behind he felt arms about him. He struggled
and strained in a tensing grip. Not just one man was there behind him;
two at the very least and maybe three. He heard them muttering. Then
the men in front came on in a flying body and with a dozen men piling
over him Jim Kendric at last went down. And once down, being the man
to know when he had played out his string, he lay still.

"Will _el senor_ Jim come with me?" Zoraida was above him, smiling
curiously. "Or shall I have him carried along by my men?"

"I'll come," he answered shortly. "Having no choice. Call them off
before I stifle."

Zoraida ordered, the men fell back and Kendric rose. She made a quick
signal and they filed out through a further door.

"Come," she said to him. She caught up a cloak which had slipped from
her shoulders, a thing of silken scarlet, and led the way down the hall.

He followed, ready and eager for a talk with her which would be the
last. He fully meant to make a break for the open tonight. And alone.
He was assuring himself that he drew a vast pleasure from that
consideration--that he was free from now on to play out his own hand in
his own way without reference to others. What he did not admit to
himself was that he was trumping up an explanation of the fact that,
while he was following Zoraida, he was thinking of Betty. He was
wondering where Betty had gone in such a flurry, when he should have
been asking himself where Zoraida was taking him and for what purpose
of her own.

CHAPTER XV

OF THE ANCIENT GARDENS OF THE GOLDEN TEZCUCAN

He supposed that Zoraida was conducting him to the barbaric chamber in
which she had received him the other evening. For she led, as the
little maid had done, out under the stars, along the rear corridor,
into the house again by the same door. Once more in the building they
came to that heavy door which in time was thrown open by the
evil-looking Yaqui with the sinister weapons at his belt. The man
bowed deeply as Zoraida swept by him. Another moment and Zoraida and
Jim were in the room which appeared always to be pitch black. But from
here on the way was no longer the same.

He heard Zoraida's quiet breathing at his side. She stood a long time
without moving, apparently waiting or l