g wrong in
the letter? I am very old; and I did not know. _Valgame Dios_! [85]
it is a very foolish world; and there is nothing in the house to
drink--nothing to drink."

[FOOTNOTE 84: Pues--(Spanish) Well then]

[FOOTNOTE 85: Valgame Dios!--(Spanish) God help me!]

Just then all that Sandridge could think of to do was to go outside
and throw himself face downward in the dust by the side of his
humming-bird, of whom not a feather fluttered. He was not a
_caballero_ by instinct, and he could not understand the niceties of
revenge.

A mile away the rider who had ridden past the wagon-shed struck up a
harsh, untuneful song, the words of which began:

Don't you monkey with my Lulu girl
Or I'll tell you what I'll do--

XII

THE SPHINX APPLE

Twenty miles out from Paradise, and fifteen miles short of Sunrise
City, Bildad Rose, the stage-driver, stopped his team. A furious snow
had been falling all day. Eight inches it measured now, on a level.
The remainder of the road was not without peril in daylight, creeping
along the ribs of a bijou range of ragged mountains. Now, when both
snow and night masked its dangers, further travel was not to be
thought of, said Bildad Rose. So he pulled up his four stout horses,
and delivered to his five passengers oral deductions of his wisdom.

Judge Menefee, to whom men granted leadership and the initiatory as
upon a silver salver, sprang from the coach at once. Four of his
fellow-passengers followed, inspired by his example, ready to explore,
to objurgate, to resist, to submit, to proceed, according as their
prime factor might be inclined to sway them. The fifth passenger, a
young woman, remained in the coach.

Bildad had halted upon the shoulder of the first mountain spur. Two
rail-fences, ragged-black, hemmed the road. Fifty yards above the
upper fence, showing a dark blot in the white drifts, stood a small
house. Upon this house descended--or rather ascended--Judge Menefee
and his cohorts with boyish whoops born of the snow and stress. They
called; they pounded at window and door. At the inhospitable silence
they waxed restive; they assaulted and forced the pregnable barriers,
and invaded the premises.

The watchers from the coach heard stumblings and shoutings from the
interior of the ravaged house. Before long a light within flickered,
glowed, flamed high and bright and cheerful. Then came running back
through the driving flakes the exuberant expl