a gentleman, I'm afraid I'd never pass
muster."

"Still," persisted Polly, pleasantly, "you will admit that he is
agreeable?"

"Agreeable nothing!" growled Scott. "He's a disreputable young varmint,
and no decent girl ought to speak to him."

Polly smiled and rising, gathered up her plate and cup and carried them to
the hole in the wall. Then she walked over to the window and said
confidentially:

"I think it would be fun if you would tell me some of the things he's
done. Not the yarn about the actress and the man higher up--Mr. Hard told
me that--but some other really exciting ones."

"I'm not sufficiently interested in the chap," replied Scott, gruffly.
"Perhaps you'd like to carry him his dinner and ask him to tell you
himself."

"I would," replied the girl, promptly. "I thought perhaps you were
thinking of starving him."

"No, I don't care to starve him. I want to swap him off for our horses, if
I can. He ain't worth a dozen or two good horses, but we can try."

"Well, of course, we have the car to make things square."

"Yes, we have the car, in case we have to quit in a hurry."

"Quit? You mean before Bob comes back?" the girl's face was a bit scared.

"We may get orders to close up the mine. You heard what he said--that the
state had seceded? Well, that means civil war, and civil war in Mexico can
mean a good many things. I'm not sure that I want two women on my hands
under the circumstances."

"What are you talking about, Marc Scott? Is it a Yaqui rising?" Mrs. Van
Zandt thrust her head through the hole in the wall.

"I don't know what it is. Pachuca says there's a revolution on. I'm hoping
to get more news about it when Hard comes back."

"I don't take much stock in these Yaqui yarns," said Matt, coming back
with another supply of food.

"Them Indians ain't half as bad as the greasers like to make out. Of
course, they feel like they had a right to raise thunder now and then
because they know they ain't been treated white. But you take it from me,
I've been knockin' around Mexico for some time, and nine times out of ten
there's a greaser back of everything that's laid at a Yaqui's door."

"That's true enough," nodded Mrs. Van.

"I made up my mind when I read in that El Paso paper that there was going
to be a Yaqui rising and that the gov'ment was orderin' troops into
Sonora, that the gov'ment most probably had somethin' up its sleeve."

"Most likely," acceded Scott.

"Well, I don't expect