while of life--he had
given her love!"

"He may have made a most righteous end--since it was no longer in his
power to do evil!" commented Don Ruy--"But your pirate priest would
never have let go the nugget for masses if the breath of life had kept
him company."

"Who knows!--the high God does not give us to see in the heart of the
other man," said Padre Vicente--"In the years of his trial he was made
to feel his sins against Holy Church--and when the girl died in the
desert, another life died with her. Even men of sin do give thought to
such matters."

But Juan Gonzalvo who hated him, swore at the ill luck of his escape
by death, and no one felt any pity for that first white pilgrim across
the Indian lands. All of them however gave speech of praise to the
priest's telling of the story. Don Ruy gave him leave to tell romances
in future rather than preach sermons.

The men were vastly interested to learn at last the exact region of
their destination--and that the province where the yellow metal had
been hidden by the sun was but a matter now of a few days more of
journeying--since the people of Ah-ko had brother Queres in
settlements adjoining the settlements of the Te-huas.

So, seeing that the guard was good, and that each arquebus was near,
and in readiness if need be for dusky visitors, the company fell
asleep well content. Only Don Ruy strolled over the path through the
sand and tried to fancy how the girl and the Greek had managed the
hiding there. A little of the story had been told him in the monastery
when the great plan had been made, but no names were given, and the
telling of it this night had been a very different matter--he had so
lately crossed the desert where those two refugees had wandered, that
the story had now a life unknown before. Even the sand billows and the
rock walls of the mesa spoke as with tongues. The mate to this
wonderful Ah-ko could not, he thought, be in the world any where, and
the romance of the young priestess and the Greek adventurer fitted the
place well and he felt that the priest of the wild places had chosen
rightly in keeping the story until they had climbed to this place
where the story of the gold had its beginning.

As he retraced his steps, they took him past the sleeping place of
Jose and his wife of Mexico. Beside them was spread the blankets of
Chico, but the lad was not there,--he was standing apart, at the edge
of the sheer cliff, looking out over the desert r