free speaker looked at Vizcarra with a smile of
intelligence. The latter frowned at the observation.

"You lost a good sum, did you not?" inquired the cura of Vizcarra.

"Not to him," replied the Comandante, "but to that vulgar fellow who
seems his friend. The worst of it is, when one bets with these low
people there is no chance of getting a _revanche_ at some other time.
One cannot meet them in the ordinary way."

"But who is the fellow?" again inquired one.

"Who? Why, a cibolero--that's all."

"True, but is there nothing about his history? He's a _gilero_, and
that is odd for a native! Is he a Criollo? He might be a Biscayan."

"Neither one nor the other. 'Tis said he's an Americano."

"Americano!"

"Not exactly that--his father was; but the padre here can tell all about
him."

The priest thus appealed to entertained the company with some facts in
the history of the cibolero. His father had been an Americano, as it
was supposed--some stray personage who had mysteriously found his way to
the valley and settled in it long ago. Such instances were rare in the
settlements of New Mexico; but what was rarer still, in this case the
"Americano" was accompanied by an "Americana"--the mother of Carlos--and
the same old woman who attracted so much attention on the day of San
Juan. All the efforts of the padres to christianise either one or the
other had been in vain. The old trapper--for such he was--died as he
had lived--a blaspheming "heretico;" and there was a general belief in
the settlement that his widow held converse with the devil. All this
was a scandal to the Church, and the padres would long since have
expelled the guero family, but that, for some reason or other, they were
protected by the old Comandante--Vizcarra's predecessor--who had
restrained the zealous priests in their good intention.

"But, caballeros!" said the padre, glancing towards Vizcarra, "such
heretics are dangerous citizens. In them lie the seeds of revolution
and social disturbance; and when this guero is at home, he is seen only
in the company of those we cannot watch too closely: he has been seen
with some of the suspected Tagnos, several of whom are in his service."

"Ha! with them, indeed!" exclaimed several. "A dangerous fellow!--he
should be looked after."

The sister of the cibolero now became the subject of conversation; and
as remarks were made more or less complimentary to her beauty, the
expression upon the f