"You said that befo'," croaked Texas. "Go it some better."

"Four hundred."

"Stranger," said Texas, after debating his chances, "it's a big thing. But
I'll do it for that."

Coronado walked away, hurried up his muleteers, exchanged a word with Mrs.
Stanley, and finally returned to Thurstane. His thin, dry, dusky fingers
trembled a little, but he looked his man steadily in the face, while he
tendered him another cigarito.

"Who is your hunter?" asked the officer. "I must say he is a devilish
bad-looking fellow."

"He is one of the best hunters Garcia ever had," replied the Mexican. "He
is one of your own people. You ought to like him."

Further journeying brought with it topographical adventures. The country
into which they were penetrating is one of the most remarkable in the
world for its physical peculiarities. Its scenery bears about the same
relation to the scenery of earth in general, that a skeleton's head or a
grotesque mask bears to the countenance of living humanity. In no other
portion of our planet is nature so unnatural, so fanciful and extravagant,
and seemingly the production of caprice, as on the great central plateau
of North America.

They had left far behind the fertile valley of the Rio Grande, and had
placed between it and them the barren, sullen piles of the Jemez
mountains. No more long sweeps of grassy plain or slope; they were amid
the _debris_ of rocks which hedge in the upper heights of the great
plateau; they were struggling through it like a forlorn hope through
_chevaux-de-frise_. The morning sun came upon them over treeless ridges of
sandstone, and disappeared at evening behind ridges equally naked and
arid. The sides of these barren masses, seamed by the action of water in
remote geologic ages, and never softened or smoothed by the gentle
attrition of rain, were infinitely more wild and jagged in their details
than ruins. It seemed as if the Titans had built here, and their works had
been shattered by thunderbolts.

Many heights were truncated mounds of rock, resembling gigantic platforms
with ruinous sides, such as are known in this Western land as _mesas_ or
_buttes_. They were Nature's enormous mockery of the most ambitious
architecture of man, the pyramids of Egypt and the platform of Baalbek.
Terrace above terrace of shattered wall; escarpments which had been
displaced as if by the explosion of some incredible mine; ramparts which
were here high and regular, and there gaping in mighty fissures, or
suddenly altogether lacking; long sweeps of stairway, winding dizzily
upwards, only to close in an impossible leap: there was no end to the
fantastic outlines and the suggestions of destruction.

Nor were the open spaces between these rocky mounds less remarkable. In
one valley, the course of a river which vanished ages ago, the power of
fire had left its monuments amid those of the power of water. The
sedimentary rock of sandstone, shales, and marl, not only showed veins of
ignitible lignite, but it was pierced by the trap which had been shot up
from earth's flaming recesses. Dikes of this volcanic stone crossed each
other or ran in long parallels, presenting forms of fortifications, walls
of buildings, ruined lines of aqueducts. The sandstone and marl had been
worn away by the departed river, and by the delicately sweeping,
incessant, tireless wings of the afreets of the air, leaving the iron-like
trap in bold projection.

Some of these dikes stretched long distances, with a nearly uniform height
of four or five feet, closely resembling old field-walls of the solidest
masonry. Others, not so extensive, but higher and pierced with holes,
seemed to be fragments of ruined edifices, with broken windows and
shattered portals. As the trap is columnar, and the columns are horizontal
in their direction, the joints of the polygons show along the surface of
the ramparts, causing them to look like the work of Cyclopean builders.
The Indians and Mexicans of the expedition, deceived by the similarity
between these freaks of creation and the results of human workmanship,
repeatedly called out, "Casas Grandes! Casas de Montezuma!"

It would seem, indeed, as if the ancient peoples of this country, in order
to arrive at the idea of a large architecture, had only to copy the
grotesque rock-work of nature. Who knows but that such might have been the
germinal idea of their constructions? Mrs. Stanley was quite sure of it.
In fact, she was disposed to maintain that the trap walls were really
human masonry, and the production of Montezuma, or of the Amazons invented
by Coronado.

"Those four-sided and six-sided stones look altogether too regular to be
accidental," was her conclusion. Notwithstanding her belief in a
superintending Deity, she had an idea that much of this world was made by
hazard, or perhaps by the Old Harry.

In one valley the ancient demon of water-force had excelled himself in
enchantments. The slopes of the alluvial soil were dotted with little
buttes of mingled sandstone and shale, varying from five to twenty feet in
height, many of them bearing a grotesque likeness to artificial objects.
There were columns, there were haystacks, there were enormous bells, there
were inverted jars, there were junk bottles, there were rustic seats. Most
of these fantastic figures were surmounted by a flat capital, the remnant
of a layer of stone harder than the rest of the mass, and therefore less
worn by the water erosion.

One fragment looked like a monstrous gymnastic club standing upright, with
a broad button to secure the grip. Another was a mighty centre-table, fit
for the halls of the Scandinavian gods, consisting of a solid prop or
pedestal twelve feet high, swelling out at the top into a leaf fifteen
feet across. Another was a stone hat, standing on its crown, with a brim
two yards in diameter. Occasionally there was a figure which had lost its
capital, and so looked like a broken pillar, a sugar loaf, a pear.
Imbedded in these grotesques of sandstone were fossils of wood, of
fresh-water shells, and of fishes.

It was a land of extravagances and of wonders. The marvellous adventures
of the "Arabian Nights" would have seemed natural in it. It reminded you
after a vague fashion of the scenery suggested to the imagination by some
of its details or those of the "Pilgrim's Progress." Sindbad the Sailor
carrying the Old Man of the Sea; Giant Despair scowling from a
make-believe window in a fictitious castle of eroded sandstone; a roc with
wings eighty feet long, poising on a giddy pinnacle to pounce upon an
elephant; pilgrim Christian advancing with sword and buckler against a
demon guarding some rocky portal, would have excited no astonishment here.

Of a sudden there came an adventure which gave opening for
knight-errantry. As Thurstane, Coronado, and Texas Smith were riding a few
hundred yards ahead of the caravan, and just emerging from what seemed an
enormous court or public square, surrounded by ruined edifices of gigantic
magnitude, they discovered a man running toward them in a style which
reminded the Lieutenant of Timorous and Mistrust flying from the lions.
Impossible to see what he was afraid of; there was a broad, yellow plain,
dotted with monuments of sandstone; no living thing visible but this man
running.

He was an American; at least he had the clothes of one. As he approached,
he appeared to be a lean, lank, narrow-shouldered, yellow-faced,
yellow-haired creature, such as you might expect to find on Cape Cod or
thereabouts. Hollow-chested as he was, he had a yell in him which was
quite surprising. From the time that he sighted the three horsemen he kept
up a steady screech until he was safe under their noses. Then he fell flat
and gasped for nearly a minute without speaking. His first words were,
"That's pooty good sailin' for a man who ain't used to't."

"Did you run all the way from Down East?" asked Thurstane.

"All the way from that bewt there--the one that looks most like a
haystack."

"Well, who the devil are you?"

"I'm Phineas Glover--Capm Phineas Glover--from Fair Haven, Connecticut.
I'm goin' to Californy after gold. Got lost out of the caravan among the
mountings. Was comin' along alone, 'n' run afoul of some Injuns. They're
hidin' behind that bewt, 'n' they've got my mewl."

"Indians! How many are there?"

"Only three. 'N' I expect they a'nt the real wild kind, nuther. Sorter
half Injun, half engineer, like what come round in the circuses. Didn't
make much of 'n offer towards carvin' me. But I judged best to quit, the
first boat that put off. Ah, they're there yit, 'n' the mewl tew."

"You'll find our train back there," said Thurstane. "You had better make
for it. We'll recover your property."

He dashed off at a full run for the butte, closely followed by Texas Smith
and Coronado. The Mexican had the best horse, and he would soon have led
the other two; but his saddle-girth burst, and in spite of his skill in
riding he was nearly thrown. Texas Smith pulled up to aid his employer,
but only for an instant, as Coronado called, "Go on."

The borderer now spurred after Thurstane, who had got a dozen rods the
lead of him. Coronado rapidly examined his saddle-bags and then his
pockets without finding the cord or strap which he needed. He swore a
little at this, but not with any poignant emotion, for in the first place
fighting was not a thing that he yearned for, and in the second place he
hardly anticipated a combat. The robbers, he felt certain, were only
vagrant rancheros, or the cowardly Indians of some village, who would have
neither the weapons nor the pluck to give battle.

But suddenly an alarming suspicion crossed his mind. Would Texas Smith
seize this chance to send a bullet through Thurstane's head from behind?
Knowing the cutthroat's recklessness and his almost insane thirst for
blood, he feared that this might happen. And there was the train in view;
the deed would probably be seen, and, if so, would be seen as murder; and
then would come pursuit of the assassin, with possibly his seizure and
confession. It would not do; no, it would not do here and now; he must
dash forward and prevent it.

Swinging his saddle upon his horse's back, he vaulted into it without
touching pommel or stirrup, and set off at full speed to arrest the blow
which he desired. Over the plain flew the fiery animal, Coronado balancing
himself in his unsteady seat with marvellous ease and grace, his dark eyes
steadily watching every movement of the bushwhacker. There were sheets of
bare rock here and there; there were loose slates and detached blocks of
sandstone. The beast dashed across the first without slipping, and cleared
the others without swerving; his rider bowed and swayed in the saddle
without falling.

Texas Smith was now within a few yards of Thurstane, and it could be seen
that he had drawn his revolver. Coronado asked himself in horror whether
the man had understood the words "Go on" as a command for murder. He was
thinking very fast; he was thinking as fast as he rode. Once a terrible
temptation came upon him: he might let the fatal shot be fired; then he
might fire another. Thus he would get rid of Thurstane, and at the same
time have the air of avenging him, while ridding himself of his dangerous
bravo. But he rejected this plan almost as soon as he thought of it. He
did not feel sure of bringing down Texas at the first fire, and if he did
not, his own life was not worth a second's purchase. As for the fact that
he had been lately saved from death by the borderer, that would not have
checked Coronado's hand, even had he remembered it. He must dash on at
full speed, and prevent a crime which would be a blunder. But already it
was nearly too late, for the Texan was close upon the officer. Nothing
could save the doomed man but Coronado's magnificent horsemanship. He
seemed a part of his steed; he shot like a bird over the sheets and
bowlders of rock; he was a wonder of speed and grace.

Suddenly the outlaw's pistol rose to a level, and Coronado uttered a shout
of anxiety and horror.




CHAPTER VII.


At the shout which Coronado uttered on seeing Texas Smith's pistol aimed
at Thurstane, the assassin turned his head, discovered the train, and,
lowering his weapon, rode peacefully alongside of his intended victim.

Captain Phin Glover's mule was found grazing behind the butte, in the
midst of the gallant Captain's dishevelled baggage, while the robbers had
vanished by a magic which seemed quite natural in this scenery of
grotesque marvels. They had unquestionably seen or heard their pursuers;
but how had they got into the bowels of the earth to escape them?

Thurstane presently solved the mystery by pointing out three crouching
figures on the flat cap of stone which surmounted the shales and marl of
the butte. Bare feet and desperation of terror could alone explain how
they had reached this impossible refuge. Texas Smith immediately consoled
himself for his disappointment as to Thurstane by shooting two of these
wretches before his hand could be stayed.

"They're nothin' but Injuns," he said, with a savage glare, when the
Lieutenant struck aside his revolver and called him a murdering brute.

The third skulker took advantage of the cessation of firing to tumble down
from his perch and fly for his life. The indefatigable Smith broke away
from Thurstane, dashed after the pitiful fugitive, leaned over him as he
ran, and shot him dead.

"I have a great mind to blow your brains out, you beast," roared the
disgusted officer, who had followed closely. "I told you not to shoot that
man." And here he swore heartily, for which we must endeavor to forgive
him, seeing that he belonged to the army.

Coronado interfered. "My dear Lieutenant! after all, they were robbers.
They deserved punishment." And so on.

Texas Smith looked less angry and more discomfited than might have been
expected, considering his hardening life and ferocious nature.

"Didn't s'p'ose you really keered much for the cuss," he said, glancing
respectfully at the imperious and angry face of the young officer.

"Well, never mind now," growled Thurstane. "It's done, and can't be
undone. But, by Jove, I do hate useless massacre. Fighting is another
thing."

Sheathing his fury, he rode off rapidly toward the wagons, followed in
silence by the others. The three dead vagabonds (perhaps vagrants from the
region of Abiquia) remained where they had fallen, one on the stony plain
and two on the cap of the butte. The train, trending here toward the
northwest, passed six hundred yards to the north of the scene of
slaughter; and when Clara and Mrs. Stanley asked what had happened,
Coronado told them with perfect glibness that the robbers had got away.

The rescued man, delighted at his escape and the recovery of his mule and
luggage, returned thanks right and left, with a volubility which further
acquaintance showed to be one of his characteristics. He was a profuse
talker; ran a stream every time you looked at him; it was like turning on
a mill-race.

"Yes, capm, out of Fair Haven," he said. "Been in the coastin' 'n' Wes'
Injy trade. Had 'n unlucky time out las' few years. Had a schuner burnt in
port, 'n' lost a brig at sea. Pooty much broke me up. Wife 'n' dahter gone
into th' oyster-openin' business. Thought I'd try my han' at openin' gold
mines in Californy. Jined a caravan at Fort Leavenworth, 'n' lost my
reckonin's back here a ways."

We must return to love matters. However amazing it may be that a man who
has no conscience should nevertheless have a heart, such appears to have
been the case with that abnormal creature Coronado. The desert had made
him take a strong liking to Clara, and now that he had a rival at hand he
became impassioned for her. He began to want to marry her, not alone for
the sake of her great fortune, but also for her own sake. Her beauty
unfolded and blossomed wonderfully before his ardent eyes; for he was
under that mighty glamour of the emotions which enables us to see beauty
in its completeness; he was favored with the greatest earthly second-sight
which is vouchsafed to mortals.

Only in a measure, however; the money still counted for much with him. He
had already decided what he would do with the Munoz fortune when he should
get it. He would go to New York and lead a life of frugal extravagance,
economical in comforts (as we understand them) and expensive in pleasures.
New York, with its adjuncts of Saratoga and Newport, was to him what Paris
is to many Americans. In his imagination it was the height of grandeur and
happiness to have a box at the opera, to lounge in Broadway, and to dance
at the hops of the Saratoga hotels. New Mexico! he would turn his back on
it; he would never set eyes on its dull poverty again. As for Clara? Well,
of course she would share in his gayeties; was not that enough for any
reasonable woman?

But here was this stumbling-block of a Thurstane. In the presence of a
handsome rival, who, moreover, had started first in the race, slow was far
from being sure. Coronado had discovered, by long experience in flirtation
and much intelligent meditation upon it, that, if a man wants to win a
woman, he must get her head full of him. He decided, therefore, that at
the first chance he would give Clara distinctly to understand how ardently
he was in love with her, and so set her to thinking especially of him, and
of him alone. Meantime, he looked at her adoringly, insinuated
compliments, performed little services, walked his horse much by her side,
did his best in conversation, and in all ways tried to outshine the
Lieutenant.

He supposed that he did outshine him. A man of thirty always believes that
he appears to better advantage than a man of twenty-three or four. He
trusts that he has more ideas, that he commits fewer absurdities, that he
carries more weight of character than his juvenile rival. Coronado was far
more fluent than Thurstane; had a greater command over his moods and
manners, and a larger fund of animal spirits; knew more about such social
trifles as women like to hear of; and was, in short, a more amusing
prattler of small talk. There was a steady seriousness about the young
officer--something of the earnest sentimentality of the great Teutonic
race--which the mercurial Mexican did not understand nor appreciate, and
which he did not imagine could be fascinating to a woman. Knowing well how
magnetic passion is in its guise of Southern fervor, he did not know that
it is also potent under the cloak of Northern solemnity.

Unluckily for Coronado, Clara was half Teutonic, and could comprehend the
tone of her father's race. Notwithstanding Thurstane's shyness and
silences, she discovered his moral weight and gathered his unspoken
meanings. There was more in this girl than appeared on the surface.
Without any power of reasoning concerning character, and without even a
disposition to analyze it, she had an instinctive perception of it. While
her talk was usually as simple as a child's, and her meditations on men
and things were not a bit systematic or logical, her decisions and actions
were generally just what they should be.

Some one may wish to know whether she was clever enough to see through the
character of Coronado. She was clever enough, but not corrupt enough. Very
pure people cannot fully understand people who are very impure. It is
probable that angels are considerably in the dark concerning the nature of
the devil, and derive their disagreeable impression of him mainly from a
consideration of his actions. Clara, limited to a narrow circle of good
intentions and conduct, might not divine the wide regions of wickedness
through which roved the soul of Coronado, and must wait to see his works
before she could fairly bring him to judgment.

Of course she perceived that in various ways he was insincere. When he
prattled compliments and expressions of devotion, whether to herself or to
others, she made Spanish allowance. It was polite hyperbole; it was about
the same as saying good-morning; it was a cheerful way of talking that
they had in Mexico; she knew thus much from her social experience. But
while she cared little for his adulations, she did not because of them
consider him a scoundrel, nor necessarily a hypocrite.

Coronado found and improved opportunities to talk in asides with Clara.
Thurstane, the modest, proud, manly youngster, who had no meannesses or
trickeries by nature, and had learned none in his honorable profession,
would not allow himself to break into these dialogues if they looked at
all like confidences. The more he suspected that Coronado was courting
Clara, the more resolutely and grimly he said to himself, "Stand back!"
The girl should be perfectly free to choose between them; she should be
influenced by no compulsions and no stratagems of his; was he not "an
officer and a gentleman"?

"By Jove! I am miserable for life," he thought when he suspected, as he
sometimes did, that they two were in love. "I'll get myself killed in my
next fight. I can't bear it. But I won't interfere. I'll do my duty as an
honorable man. Of course she understands me."

But just at this point Clara failed to understand him. It is asserted by
some philosophers that women have less conscience about "cutting each
other out," breaking up engagements, etc., than men have in such matters.
Love-making and its results form such an all-important part of their
existence, that they must occasionally allow success therein to overbear
such vague, passionless ideas as principles, sentiments of honor, etc. It
is, we fear, highly probable that if Clara had been in love with Ralph,
and had seen her chance of empire threatened by a rival, she would have
come out of that calm innocence which now seemed to enfold her whole
nature, and would have done such things as girls may do to avert
catastrophes of the affections. She now thought to herself, If he cares
for me, how can he keep away from me when he sees Coronado making eyes at
me? She was a little vexed with him for behaving so, and was consequently
all the sweeter to his rival. This when Ralph would have risked his
commission for a smile, and would have died to save her from a sorrow!

Presently this slightly coquettish, yet very good and lovely little
being--this seraph from one of Fra Angelica's pictures, endowed with a
frailty or two of humanity--found herself the heroine of a trying scene.
Coronado hastened it; he judged her ready to fall into his net; he managed
the time and place for the capture. The train had been ascending for some
hours, and had at last reached a broad plateau, a nearly even floor of
sandstone, covered with a carpet of thin earth, the whole noble level bare
to the eye at once, without a tree or a thicket to give it detail. It was
a scene of tranquillity and monotony; no rains ever disturbed or remoulded
the tabulated surface of soil; there, as distinct as if made yesterday,
were the tracks of a train which had passed a year before.

"Shall we take a gallop?" said Coronado. "No danger of ambushes here."

Clara's eyes sparkled with youth's love of excitement, and the two horses
sprang off at speed toward the centre of the plateau. After a glorious
flight of five minutes, enjoyed for the most part in silence, as such
swift delights usually are, they dropped into a walk two miles ahead of
the wagons.

"That was magnificent," Clara of course said, her face flushed with
pleasure and exercise.

"You are wonderfully handsome," observed Coronado, with an air of thinking
aloud, which disguised the coarse directness of the flattery. In fact, he
was so dazzled by her brilliant color, the sunlight in her disordered
curls, and the joyous sparkling of her hazel eyes, that he spoke with an
ingratiating honesty.

Clara, who was in one of her unconscious and innocent moods, simply
replied, "I suppose people are always handsome enough when they are
happy."

"Then I ought to be lovely," said Coronado. "I am happier than I ever was
before."

"Coronado, you look very well," observed Clara, turning her eyes on him
with a grave expression which rather puzzled him. "This out-of-door life
has done you good."

"Then I don't look very well indoors?" he smiled.

"You know what I mean, Coronado. Your health has improved, and your face
shows it."

Fearing that she was not in an emotional condition to be bewildered and
fascinated by a declaration of love, he queried whether he had not better
put off his enterprise until a more susceptible moment. Certainly, if he
were without a rival; but there was Thurstane, ready any and every day to
propose; it would not do to let _him_ have the first word, and cause the
first heart-beat. Coronado believed that to make sure of winning the race
he must take the lead at the start. Yes, he would offer himself now; he
would begin by talking her into a receptive state of mind; that done, he
would say with all his eloquence, "I love you."

We must not suppose that the declaration would be a pure fib, or anything
like it. The man had no conscience, and he was almost incomparably
selfish, but he was capable of loving, and he did love. That is to say, he
was inflamed by this girl's beauty and longed to possess it. It is a low
species of affection, but it is capable of great violence in a man whose
physical nature is ardent, and Coronado's blood could take a heat like
lava. Already, although he had not yet developed his full power of
longing, he wanted Clara as he had never wanted any woman before. We can
best describe his kind of sentiment by that hungry, carnal word _wanted_.

After riding in silent thought for a few rods, he said, "I have lost my
good looks now, I suppose."

"What do you mean, Coronado?"

"They depend on my happiness, and that is gone."

"Coronado, you are playing riddles."

"This table-land reminds me of my own life. Do you see that it has no
verdure? I have been just as barren of all true happiness. There has been
no fruit or blossom of true affection for me to gather. You know that I
lost my excellent father and my sainted mother when I was a child. I was
too young to miss them; but for all that the bereavement was the same;
there was the less love for me. It seems as if there had been none."

"Garcia has been good to you--of late," suggested Clara, rather puzzled to
find consolation for a man whose misery was so new to her.

Remembering what a scoundrel Garcia was, and what a villainous business
Garcia had sent him upon, Coronado felt like smiling. He knew that the old
man had no sentiments beyond egotism, and a family pride which mainly, if
not entirely, sprang from it. Such a heart as Garcia's, what a place to
nestle in! Such a creature as Coronado seeking comfort in such a breast as
his uncle's was very much like a rattlesnake warming himself in a hole of
a rock.

"Ah, yes!" sighed Coronado. "Admirable old gentleman! I should not have
forgotten him. However, he is a solace which comes rather late. It is only
two years since he perceived that he had done me injustice, and received
me into favor. And his affection is somewhat cold. Garcia is an old man
laden with affairs. Moreover, men in general have little sympathy with
men. When we are saddened, we do not look to our own sex for cheer. We
look to yours."

Almost every woman responds promptly to a claim for pity.

"I am sorry for you, Coronado," said Clara, in her artless way. "I am,
truly."

"You do not know, you cannot know, how you console me."

Satisfied with the results of his experiment in boring for sympathy, he
tried another, a dangerous one, it would seem, but very potent when it
succeeds.

"This lack of affection has had sad results. I have searched everywhere
for it, only to meet with disappointment. In my desperation I have
searched where I should not. I have demanded true love of people who had
no true love to give. And for this error and wrong I have been terribly
punished. The mere failure of hope and trust has been hard enough to bear.
But that was not the half. Shame, self-contempt, remorse have been an
infinitely heavier burden. If any man was ever cured of trusting for
happiness to a wicked world, it is Coronado."

In spite of his words and his elaborately penitent expression, Clara only
partially understood him. Some kind of evil life he was obviously
confessing, but what kind she only guessed in the vaguest fashion.
However, she comprehended enough to interest her warmly: here was a
penitent sinner who had forsaken ways of wickedness; here was a struggling
soul which needed encouragement and tenderness. A woman loves to believe
that she can be potent over hearts, and especially that she can be potent
for good. Clara fixed upon Coronado's face a gaze of compassion and
benevolence which was almost superhuman. It should have shamed him into
honesty; but he was capable of trying to deceive the saints and the
Virgin; he merely decided that she was in a fit frame to accept him.

"At last I have a faint hope of a sure and pure happiness," he said. "I
have found one who I know can strengthen me and comfort me, if she will. I
am seeking to be worthy of her. I am worthy of her so far as adoration can
make me. I am ready to surrender my whole life--all that I am and that I
can be--to her."

Clara had begun to guess his meaning; the quick blood was already flooding
her cheek; the light in her eyes was tremulous with agitation.

"Clara, you must know what I mean," continued Coronado, suddenly reaching
his hand toward her, as if to take her captive. "You are the only person I
ever loved. I love you with all my soul. Can your heart ever respond to
mine? Can you ever bring yourself to be my wife?"




CHAPTER VIII.


When Coronado proposed to Clara, she was for a moment stricken dumb with
astonishment and with something like terror.

Her first idea was that she must take him; that the mere fact of a man
asking for her gave him a species of right over her; that there was no
such thing possible as answering, No. She sat looking at Coronado with a
helpless, timorous air, very much as a child looks at his father, when the
father, switching his rattan, says, "Come with me."

On recovering herself a little, her first words--uttered slowly, in a tone
of surprise and of involuntary reproach--were, "Oh, Coronado! I did not
expect this."

"Can't you answer me?" he asked in a voice which was honestly tremulous
with emotion. "Can't you say yes?"

"Oh, Coronado!" repeated Clara, a good deal touched by his agitation.

"Can't you?" he pleaded. Repetitions, in such cases, are so natural and so
potent.

"Let me think, Coronado," she implored. "I can't answer you now. You have
taken me so by surprise!"

"Every moment that you take to think is torture to me," he pleaded, as he
continued to press her.

Perhaps she was on the point of giving way before his insistence. Consider
the advantages that he had over her in this struggle of wills for the
mastery. He was older by ten years; he possessed both the adroitness of
self-command and the energy of passion; he had a long experience in love
matters, while she had none. He was the proclaimed heir of a man reputed
wealthy, and could therefore, as she believed, support her handsomely.
Since the death of her father she considered Garcia the head of her family
in New Mexico; and Coronado had had the face to tell her that he made his
offer with the approval of Garcia. Then she was under supposed obligations
to him, and he was to be her protector across the desert.

She was as it were reeling in her saddle, when a truly Spanish idea saved
her.

"Munoz!" she exclaimed. "Coronado, you forget my grandfather. He should
know of this."

Although the man was unaccustomed to start, he drew back as if a ghost had
confronted him; and even when he recovered from his transitory emotion, he
did not at first know how to answer her. It would not do to say, "Munoz is
dead," and much less to add, "You are his heir."

"We are Americans," he at last argued. "Spanish customs are dead and
buried. Can't you speak for yourself on a matter which concerns you and me
alone?"

"Coronado, I think it would not be right," she replied, holding firmly to
her position. "It is probable that my grandfather would be better pleased
to have this matter referred to him. I ought to consider him, and you must
let me do so."

"I submit," he bowed, seeing that there was no help for it, and deciding
to make a grace of necessity. "It pains me, but I submit. Let me hope that
you will not let this pass from your mind. Some day, when it is proper, I
shall speak again."

He was not wholly dissatisfied, for he trusted that henceforward her head
would be full of him, and he had not much hoped to gain more in a first
effort.

"I shall always be proud and gratified at the compliment you have paid
me," was her reply to his last request.

"You deserve many such compliments," he said, gravely courteous and quite
sincere.

Then they cantered back in silence to meet the advancing train.

Yes, Coronado was partly satisfied. He believed that he had gained a
firmer footing among the girl's thoughts and emotions than had been gained
by Thurstane. In a degree he was right. No sensitive, and pure, and good
girl can receive her first offer without being much moved by it. The man
who has placed himself at her feet will affect her strongly. She may begin
to dread him, or begin to like him more than before; but she cannot remain
utterly indifferent to him. The probability is that, unless subsequent
events make him disagreeable to her, she will long accord him a measure of
esteem and gratitude.

For two or three days, while Clara was thinking much of Coronado, he gave
her less than usual of his society. Believing that her mind was occupied
with him, that she was wondering whether he were angry, unhappy, etc., he
remained a good deal apart, wrapped himself in sadness, and trusted that
time would do much for him. Had there been no rival, the plan would have
been a good one; but Ralph Thurstane being present, it was less
successful.

Ralph had already become more of a favorite than any one knew, even the
young lady herself; and now that he found chances for long talks and short
gallops with her, he got on better than ever. He was just the kind of
youngster a girl of eighteen would naturally like to have ride by her
side. He was handsome; at any rate, he was the handsomest man she had seen
in the desert, and the desert was just then her sphere of society. You
could see in his figure how strong he was, and in his face how brave he
was. He was a good fellow, too; "tendir and trew" as the Douglas of the
ballad; sincere, frank, thoroughly truthful and honorable. Every way he
seemed to be that being that a woman most wants, a potential and devoted
protector. Whenever Clara looked in his face her eyes said, without her
knowledge, "I trust you."

Now, as we have already stated, Thurstane's eyes were uncommonly fine and
expressive. Of the very darkest blue that ever was seen in anybody's head,
and shaded, moreover, by remarkably long chestnut lashes, they had the
advantages of both blue eyes and black ones, being as gentle as the one
and as fervent as the other. Accordingly, a sort of optical conversation
commenced between the two young people. Every time that Clara's glance
said, "I trust you," Thurstane's responded, "I will die for you." It was a
perilous sort of dialogue, and liable to involve the two souls which
looked out from these sparkling, transparent windows. Before long the
Lieutenant's modest heart took courage, and his stammering tongue began to
be loosed somewhat, so that he uttered things which frightened both him
and Clara. Not that the remarks were audacious in themselves, but he was
conscious of so much unexpressed meaning behind them, and she was so ready
to guess that there might be such a meaning!

It seems ridiculous that a fellow who could hold his head straight up
before a storm of cannon shot, should be positively bashful. Yet so it
was. The boy had been through West Point, to be sure; but he had studied
there, and not flirted; the Academy had not in any way demoralized him. On
the whole, in spite of swearing under gross provocation, and an
inclination toward strictness in discipline, he answered pretty well for a
Bayard.

His bashfulness was such, at least in the presence of Clara, that he
trembled to the tips of his fingers in merely making this remark: "Miss
Van Diemen, this journey is the pleasantest thing in my whole life."

Clara blushed until she dazzled him and seemed to burn herself.
Nevertheless she was favored with her usual childlike artlessness of
speech, and answered, "I am glad you find it agreeable."

Nothing more from Ralph for a minute; he was recovering his breath and
self-possession.