e,
explaining. But just that minute the Frenchman stirred, for the Cossacks
were getting into his ears, so I had to run back and turn them into
another path."

"So long as it wasn't any of your infernal farces?"

"Well, it _was_ worth a ransom, the way it turned out.--Sit still,
will you? You _know_ I take you too seriously ever to think of any
joke with _you_! Here's your artillery and cutlery. Quick now,
clear out!"

Both rose to go, each to his respective deviltry, but not six steps
ahead in the black night Tiburcio stumbled over a soft, inert mass. He
recovered himself, half cursing, half laughing.

"One of your guards, Rodrigo," he muttered. "He must have got this far
before the drug worked into his vitals."

"Your mescal probably killed him," said Rodrigo indifferently. "But a
little knife slit will look more plausible in the morning, for you it
will."

Getting to his knees on the stone walk the outlaw groped over the body
for a place to strike, holding his knife ready. But all at once he
stopped and got up hastily, without a word. He only rubbed his left hand
mechanically on his jacket.

"Well, what ails you?" asked Tiburcio.

Rodrigo gave a short, apologetic laugh. "It--it's a woman!" He quit
rubbing his hand, seeming to realize. "There's blood," he added.

"Here," said Tiburcio, "you keep back, and run if anybody comes. I'm
going to strike a match."

By the flare they saw that it was a girl and that her head was crushed.
Kneeling on either side, they peered questioningly, horrified, at each
other. Their great sombreros almost touched. Their hard faces were
yellow in the flickering light between, and the face looking up with its
quiet eyes and dark purplish cleft in the brow was white, white like
milk. With one accord the two men turned and gazed upward at the tower,
whose black outline lost itself far above in the blacker shadows of the
universe. They understood.

Tiburcio shrugged his shoulders, a silent comment on the tragedy from
its beginning to this, its end. He threw the match away and arose, but
Rodrigo still knelt, leaning over her, holding the poor battered head in
his hands, half lifting it, and trying to look again into those eyes
through the darkness. He would touch the matted hair, as if to caress,
not knowing what he did, and each time he would jerk back his hand at
the uncanny, sticky feeling. Roving thus, his fingers touched an ivory
cross, and closed over it. With no present cons