tfall came to them. A timid voice broke into
their conversation.

"May I see _Dona_ Valencia--alone--for just a minute?"

Miss Valdes turned. A girl was standing shyly in the doorway. Her soft
brown eyes begged pardon for the intrusion.

"You are Juanita, are you not?" the young woman asked.

"_Si, Dona_."

Pesquiera eliminated himself by going in to get his mail.

"What is it that I can do for you?" asked Valencia.

The Mexican girl broke into an emotional storm. She caught one of her
hands in the brown palm of the other with a little gesture of despair.

"They have gone to kill him. Dona. I know it. Something tells me. He
will never come back alive." The feeling she had repressed was finding
vent in long, irregular sobs.

Valencia felt as if she were being drowned in icy water. The color
washed from her cheeks. She had no need to ask who it was that would
never come back alive, but she did.

"Who, child? Whom is it that they have gone to kill?"

"The American--_Senor_ Gordon."

"Who has gone? And when did they go? Tell me quick."

"Sebastian and Pablo--maybe others--I do not know."

Miss Valdes thought quickly. It might be true. Both the men mentioned
had asked for a holiday to go to Santa Fe. What business had they there
at this time of the year? Could it be Pablo who had shot at Gordon from
ambush? If so, why was he so bitter against the common enemy?

"Juanita, tell me everything. What is it that you know?"

The sobs of the girl increased. She leaned against the door jamb and
buried her face in the crook of her arm.

The older girl put an arm around the quivering shoulders and spoke
gently. "But listen, child. Tell me all. It may be we can save him yet."

A name came from the muffled lips. It was "Pablo."

Valencia's brain was lit by a flash of understanding. "Pablo is your
lover. Is it not so, _nina_?"

The dark crown of soft hair moved up and down in assent. "Oh, _Dona_, he
was, but--"

"You have quarreled with him?"

Miss Valdes burned with impatience, but some instinct told her she could
not hurry the girl.

"_Si, Senorita_. He quarreled. He said--"

"Yes?"

"----that ... that _Senor_ Gordon ..."

Again, groping for the truth, Valencia found it swiftly.

"You mean that Pablo was jealous?"

"Because I had nursed _Senor_ Gordon, because he was kind to me,
because----" Juanita had lifted her face to answer. As she spoke the
color poured into her cheeks even to her throat, convic