the insurgents proved the stronger
party, he meant to throw up his hat and shout "Viva Valdez." On the
other hand, if the government party crushed them he would show himself
fussily active in behalf of Megales. Just now he was exerting all his
diplomacy to maintain a pleasant relationship with both. Since it was
entirely possible that the big Irishman O'Halloran might be the man on
horseback within a very few days, the colonel was all suave words and
honeyed smiles to his friend the ranger.

Indeed he did him the unusual honor of a personally conducted
inspection. Gabilonda was a fat little man, with a soft, purring voice
and a pompous manner. He gushed with the courteous volubility of his
nation, explaining with great gusto this and that detail of the work.
Bucky gave him outwardly a deferent ear, but his alert mind and eyes
were scanning the prisoners they saw. The ranger was trying to find in
one of these scowling, defiant faces some resemblance to the picture his
mind had made of Henderson.

But Bucky looked in vain. If the man he wanted was among these he had
changed beyond recognition. In the end he was forced to ask Gabilonda
plainly if he would not take him to see David Henderson, as he knew a
man in Arizona who was an old friend of his, and he would like to be
able to tell him that he had seen his friend.

Henderson was breaking stone when O'Connor got his first glimpse of him.
He continued to swing his hammer listlessly, without looking up, when
the door opened to let in the warden and his guests. But something in
the ranger's steady gaze drew his eyes. They were dull eyes, and sullen,
but when he saw that Bucky was an American, the fire of intelligence
flashed into them.

"May I speak to him?" asked O'Connor.

"It is against the rules, senor, but if you will be brief--" The colonel
shrugged, and turned his back to them, in order not to see. It must be
said for Gabilonda that his capacity for blinking what he did not think
it judicious to see was enormous.

"You are David Henderson, are you not?" The ranger asked, in a low
voice.

Surprise filtered into the dull eyes. "That was my name," the man
answered bitterly. "I have a number now."

"I come from Webb Mackenzie to get you out of this," the ranger said.

The man's eyes were no longer dull now, but flaming with hatred. "Curse
him, I'll take nothing from his hands. For fifteen years he has let me
rot in hell without lifting a hand for me."

"He t