"Thank you for an additional act of kindness and thoughtfulness."  He
adjusted his overseas cap, snugged his blouse down over his hips,
flipped from it the wet sand deposited there by the paws of the
hound-pack, and said, "Let's go."

Where the avenue debouched into the ranch-yard, Pablo and Carolina
awaited them.  The old majordomo was wrapped in aboriginal dignity.
His Indian blood bade him greet Don Mike as casually as if the latter
had merely been sojourning in El Toro the past two years, but the faint
strain of Spanish in him dictated a different course as Don Mike
stepped briskly up to him with outstretched hand and greeted him
affectionately in Spanish.  Off came the weather-stained old sombrero,
flung to the ground beside him, as Pablo dropped on his knees, seized
his master's hand, and bowed his head over it.

"Don Miguel," he said, "my life is yours."

"I know it, you blessed old scalawag!" Don Mike replied in English, and
ruffled the grizzled old head before passing on to the expectant
Carolina, who folded him tightly in her arms and wept soundlessly when
he kissed her leathery cheek.  While he was murmuring words of comfort
to her, Pablo got up on his feet and recovered his hat.

"You see," he said to Kay, in a confidential tone, "Don Miguel José
Maria Federico Noriaga Farrel loves us.  Never no woman those boy kees
since hees mother die twenty year before.  So Carolina have the great
honor like me.  Yes!"

"Oh, but you haven't seen him kiss his sweetheart," Kay bantered the
old man--and then blushed, in the guilty knowledge that her badinage
had really been inspired by a sudden desire to learn whether Don Mike
had a sweetheart or not.  Pablo promptly and profanely disillusioned
her.

"Those boy, he don' have some sweethearts, mees lady.  He's pretty
parteecular."  He paused a moment and looked her in the face meaningly.
"Those girls in thees country--pah!  Hee's pretty parteecular, those
boy."

His childish arrogance and consuming pride in his master stirred the
girl's sense of humor.

"I think your Don Mike is _too_ particular," she whispered.
"Personally, I wouldn't marry him on a bet."

His slightly bloodshot eyes flickered with rage.  "You never get a
chance," he assured her.  "Those boy is of the _gente_.  An' we don'
call heem 'Don Mike' now.  Before, yes; but now he is 'Don Miguel,'
like hees father.  Same, too, like hees gran'father."

Throughout this colloquy, Carolina had been busy exculpating herself
from possible blame due to her failure to have prepared for the
prodigal the sort of food she knew he preferred.

Farrel had quite a task pacifying her.  At length he succeeded in
gently dismissing both servants, and followed Kay toward the patio.

The girl entered first, and discovered that her family and their guest
were not on the veranda, whereat she turned and gave her hand to Farrel.

"The butler will bring you some dinner to your room.  We breakfast at
eight-thirty.  Good-night."

"Thank you," he replied.  "I shall be deeper in your debt if you will
explain to your father and mother my apparent lack of courtesy in
failing to call upon them this evening."

He held her hand for a moment.  Then he bowed, gracefully and with
studied courtesy, cap in hand, and waited until she had turned to leave
him before he, in turn, betook himself to his room.

IX

It was as he had left it.  He smiled sadly as he noted his civilian
clothes laid out on the bed.  However, he would not wear them to-night.
A little later, while he was hanging them in the clothes-press, a
propitiatory cough sounded at the door.  Turning, he beheld the
strangest sight ever seen on the Rancho Palomar--a butler, bearing a
tray covered with a napkin.

"Good-evening," quoth Don Miguel civilly.  "Set it down on the little
table yonder, please.  May I inquire why you bear the tray on your left
hand and carry a pistol in your right?"

"Your servant, the man Pablo, has threatened my life, sir, if I dared
bear your dinner to you, sir.  He met me a moment ago and demanded that
I surrender the tray to him, sir.  Instead, I returned to the kitchen,
possessed myself of this pistol, and defied him, sir."

"I apologize for Pablo, and will see to it that he does not disturb you
again--er--"

"Murray, sir."

"Thank you, Murray."

The butler was about to advance into the room and set the tray on the
table as directed, when an unexpected _contretemps_ occurred.  A
swarthy hand followed by a chambray-clad arm was thrust in the door,
and the pistol snatched out of Murray's hand before the latter even
knew what was about to transpire.  Pablo Artelan stepped into the room.

"_Vamos_!  Go!" he ordered, curtly, and relieved the astonished butler
of the tray.  Murray glanced at Don Miguel.

"Perhaps you'd better go," Don Miguel suggested, weakly.  "Pablo is a
trifle jealous of the job of waiting on me.  We'll iron everything out
in the morning.  Good-night, Murray."

"_Buenas noches, mono mio_," Pablo grunted.

"I have a slight knowledge of the Spanish tongue, sir," Murray
protested.  "This blackamoor has insulted me, sir.  Just now he said,
in effect, 'Good-night, monkey mine.'  Earlier in the evening, he
attempted to murder Mr. Parker's guest, Mr. Okada."

"It's a pity he didn't succeed," Don Miguel replied, and drew a dollar
from his pocket.  "You are very kind, Murray, but hereafter I shall not
require your attendance.  Pablo, give Murray his pistol."

Pablo returned the weapon.

"She ees one of those leetle lady-pistols, Don Miguel.  She can't kill
somebody if she try," he declared, contemptuously.  Murray pouched the
dollar gratefully and beat a hurried retreat.

From under his denim jumper, Pablo brought forth a pint of claret.

"When the damned proheebeetion she's come, you father hee's sell fifty
cow and buy plenty booze," he explained.  He broke off into Spanish.
"This wine, we stored in the old bakery, and your father entrusted me
with the key.  It is true.  Although it is not lawful to permit one of
my blood to have charge of wines and liquors, nevertheless, your
sainted father reposed great confidence in me.  Since his death, I have
not touched one drop, although I was beset with temptation, seeing that
if we did not drink it, others would.  But Carolina would have none of
it, and, as you know, your father, who is now, beyond doubt, an
archangel, was greatly opposed to any man who drank alone.  How often
have I heard him declare that such fellows were not of the _gente_!
And Carolina always refused to believe that you were dead.  As a
result, the years will be many before that wine is finished."

"My good Pablo, your great faith deserves a great reward.  It is my
wish that, to-night, you and Carolina shall drink one pint each to my
health.  Have you given some of this wine to the Parkers?"

Pablo shook his head vigorously.

"That fellow, _El Mono_, was desirous of serving some to his master,
and demanded of me the key, which I refused.  Later, Señor Parker made
the same demand.  Him I refused also.  This made him angry, and he
ordered me to depart from El Palomar.  Naturally, I told him to go to
the devil.  Don Miguel, this gringo grub appears to be better than I
had imagined."

Farrel had little appetite for food, but, to please Pablo, he drank the
soup and toyed with a piece of toast and a glass of wine while the
majordomo related to him the events which had taken place at El Palomar
since that never-to-be-forgotten day when Tony Moreno had ridden in
with the telegram from Washington.

"Your beloved father--may the smile of Jesus warm him!--said nothing
when he read this accursed message, Don Miguel.  For three days, he
tasted no food; throughout the days he sat beside me on the bench under
the catalpa tree, gazing down into the San Gregorio as if he watched
for you to ride up the road.  He shed no tears--at least, not in the
presence of his servants--but he was possessed of a great trembling.
At the end of the third day, I rode to the mission and informed Father
Dominic.  Ah, Don Miguel, my heart was afflicted tenfold worse than
before to see that holy man weep for you.  When he had wept a space, he
ordered Father Andreas to say a high mass for the repose of your soul,
while he came up to the hacienda to remind your father of the comforts
of religion.  Whereat, for the first time since that vagabond Moreno
came with his evil tidings, your father smiled.  'Good Father Dominic,'
said he, 'I have need of the comfort of your presence and your
friendship, but I would not blot out with thoughts of religion the
memory of the honor that has come upon my house.  God has been good to
me.  To me has been given the privilege of siring a man, and I shall
not affront him with requests for further favors.  To-morrow, in El
Toro, a general will pin on my breast the medal for gallantry that
belongs to my dead son.  As for this trembling, it is but a palsy that
comes to many men of my age.'"

"He had a slight touch of it before I left," Don Miguel reminded Pablo.

"The following day," Pablo continued, "I assisted him to dress, and was
overjoyed to observe that the trembling had abated by half.  By his
direction, I saddled Panchito with the black carved-leather saddle, and
he mounted with my aid and rode to El Toro.  I followed on the black
mare.  At El Toro, in the plaza, in the presence of all the people, a
great general shook your father's hand and pinned upon his breast the
medal that belongs to you.  It was a proud moment for all of us.  Then
we rode back to the San Gregorio.  At the mission, your father
dismounted and went into the chapel to pray for your soul.  For two
hours, I waited before entering to seek him.  I found him kneeling with
his great body spread out over the _prie-dieu_ where the heads of your
house have prayed since the Mission de la Madre Dolorosa was built.
His brain was alive, but one side of him was dead, and he smiled with
his eyes.  We carried him home in Father Dominic's automobile, and, two
weeks later, he died in sanctity.  The _gente_ of San Marcos County
attended his funeral.

"In February came _Señor_ Parker, with great assurance, and endeavored
to take possession.  He showed me a paper, but what do I know of
papers?  I showed him your rifle, and he departed, to return with Don
Nicolás Sandoval, the sheriff, who explained matters to me and warned
me to avoid violence.  I have dwelt here since in sorrow and
perplexity, and because I have ridden the fences and watched over the
stock, there has been no great effort made to disturb me.  They have a
cook--a Japanese, and two Japanese women servants.  Also, this evening,
Señor Parker brought with him as a guest another Japanese, whom he
treats with as much consideration as if the fellow were your sainted
father.  I do not understand such people.  This Japanese visitor was
given this room, but this honor I denied him."

"My father's business affairs are greatly tangled, Pablo.  I shall have
quite a task to place them in order," Don Miguel informed him, sadly.

"If it is permitted an old servant to appear curious, Don Miguel, how
long must we submit to the presence of these strangers?"

"For the present, Pablo, I am the master here; therefore, these people
are my guests.  It has never been the custom with my people to be
discourteous to guests."

"I shall try to remember that," Pablo replied, bitterly.  "Forgive me,
Don Miguel, for forgetting it.  Perhaps I have not played well my part
as the representative of my master during his absence."

"Do not distress yourself further in the matter, Pablo.  What food have
we at the ranch?  Is there sufficient with which to enable Carolina to
serve breakfast?"

"To serve it where, Don Miguel?"

"Where but in my home?"

"Blood of the devil!"  Pablo slapped his thigh and grinned in the
knowledge that the last of the Farrels, having come home, had decided
to waste no time in assuming his natural position as the master of the
Rancho Palomar.  "We have oranges," he began, enumerating each course
of the forthcoming meal on his tobacco-stained fingers.  "Then there is
flour in my possession for biscuits, and, two weeks ago, I robbed a
bee-tree; so we have honey.  Our coffee is not of the best, but it is
coffee.  And we have eggs."

"Any butter, sugar, and cream?"

"Alas, no, Don Miguel!"

"Saddle a horse at once, go down to the mission, and borrow some from
Father Dominic.  If he has none, ride over to the Gonzales rancho and
get it.  Bacon, also, if they have it.  Tell Carolina I will have
breakfast for five at half after eight."

"But this Japanese cook of _Señor_ Parker's, Don Miguel?"

"I am not in a mood to be troubled by trifles tonight, Pablo."

"I understand, Don Miguel.  The matter may safely be entrusted to me."
He picked up the tray.  "Sweet rest to you, sir, and may our Saviour
grant a quick healing to your bruised heart.  Good-night."

"Good-night, Pablo."  Farrel rose and laid his hand on the old
retainer's shoulder.  "I never bothered to tell you this before, Pablo,
but I want you to know that I do appreciate you and Carolina
tremendously.  You've stuck to me and mine, and you'll always have a
home with me."

"Child," Pablo queried, huskily, "must we leave the rancho?"

"I'm afraid we must, Pablo.  I shall know more about our plans after I
have talked with Señor Parker."

X

That night, Miguel Farrel did not sleep in the great bed of his
ancestors.  Instead, he lay beneath his grandmother's silk crazy-quilt
and suffered.  The shock incident to the discovery of the desperate
straits to which he had been reduced had, seemingly, deprived him of the
power to think coherently.  Along toward daylight, however, what with
sheer nervous exhaustion, he fell into a troubled doze from which he was
awakened at seven o'clock by the entrance of Pablo, with a pitcher of hot
water for his shaving.

"Carolina will serve breakfast, Don Miguel," he announced.  "The Japanese
cook tried to throw her out of the kitchen; so I have locked him up in
the room where of old I was wont to place vaqueros who desired to settle
their quarrels without interference."

"How about food, Pablo?"

"Unfortunately, Father Dominic had neither sugar nor cream.  It appears
such things are looked upon at the mission as luxuries, and the padres
have taken the vow of poverty.  He could furnish nothing save half a ham,
which is of Brother Flavio's curing, and very excellent.  I have tasted
it before.  I was forced to ride to the Gonzales rancho for the cream and
sugar this morning, and have but a few moments ago returned."

Having deposited the pitcher of hot water, Pablo retired and, for several
minutes, Miguel Farrel lay abed, gazing at the row of portraits of
Noriagas and Farrels.  His heart was heavy enough still, but the first
benumbing shock of his grief and desperation had passed, and his natural
courage and common sense were rapidly coming to his aid.  He told himself
that, with the dawning of the new day, he would no longer afford the
luxury of self-pity, of vain repining for the past.  He had to be up and
doing, for a man's-sized task now confronted him.  He had approximately
seven months in which to rehabilitate an estate which his forebears had
been three generations in dissipating, and the Gaelic and Celtic blood in
him challenged defeat even in the very moment when, for all he knew to
the contrary, his worldly assets consisted of approximately sixty
dollars, the bonus given him by the government when parting with his
services.

"I'll not give up without a battle," he told his ancestors aloud.
"You've all contributed to my heavy load, but while the pack-straps hold
and I can stand and see, I'll carry it.  I'll fight this man Parker up to
the moment he hands the county recorder the commissioner's deed and the
Rancho Palomar has slipped out of my hands forever.  But I'll fight fair.
That splendid girl--ah, pooh!  Why am I thinking of her?"

Disgusted with himself for having entertained, for a fleeting instant, a
slight sentimental consideration for the daughter of his enemy--for as
such he now regarded this man who planned to colonize the San Gregorio
with Japanese farmers--he got out of bed and under the cold shower-bath
he had installed in the adjoining room years before.  It, together with
the tub-bath formerly used by his father, was the only plumbing in the
hacienda, and Farrel was just a little bit proud of it.  He shaved,
donned clean linen and an old dressing-gown, and from his closet brought
forth a pair of old tan riding-boots, still in an excellent state of
repair.  From his army-kit he produced a boot-brush and a can of tan
polish, and fell to work, finding in the accustomed task some slight
surcease from his troubles.

His boots polished to his satisfaction, he selected from the stock of old
civilian clothing a respectable riding-suit of English whip-cord,
inspected it carefully for spots, and, finding none, donned it.  A clean
starched chambray shirt, set off by a black-silk Windsor tie, completed
his attire, with the exception of a soft, wide, flat-brimmed gray-beaver
hat, and stamped him as that which he had once been but was no longer--a
California rancher of taste and means somewhat beyond the average.

It was twenty-five minutes past eight when he concluded his leisurely
toilet; so he stepped out of his room, passed round two sides of the
porched patio, and entered the dining-room.  The long dining-table, hewed
by hand from fir logs by the first of the Noriagas, had its rough defects
of manufacture mercifully hidden by a snow-white cloth, and he noted with
satisfaction that places had been set for five persons.  He hung his hat
on a wall-peg and waited with his glance on the door.

Promptly at eight-thirty, Carolina, smiling, happy, resplendent in a
clean starched calico dress of variegated colors, stepped outside the
door and rang vigorously a dinner-bell that had called three generations
of Noriagas and an equal number of generations of Farrels to their meals.
As its musical notes echoed through the dewy patio, Murray, the butler,
appeared from the kitchen.  At sight of Farrel, he halted, puzzled, but
recognized in him almost instantly the soldier who had so mysteriously
appeared at the house the night before.  _El Mono_ was red of face and
obviously controlling with difficulty a cosmic cataclysm.

"Sir," he announced, respectfully, "that Indian of yours has announced
that he will shoot me if I attempt to serve breakfast."

Farrel grinned wanly.

"In that event, Murray," he replied, "if I were you, I should not attempt
to serve breakfast.  You might be interested to know that I am now master
here and that, for the present, my own servants will minister to the
appetites of my guests.  Thank you for your desire to serve, but, for the
present, you will not be needed here.  If you will kindly step into the
kitchen, Carolina will later serve breakfast to you and the maids."

"I'm quite certain I've never heard of anything so extraordinary," Murray
murmured.  "Mrs. Parker is not accustomed to being summoned to breakfast
with a bell."

"Indeed?  I'm glad you mentioned that, Murray.  Perhaps you would be good
enough to oblige me by announcing breakfast to Mr. and Mrs. Parker, Miss
Parker, and their guest, Mr. Okada."

"Thank you, sir," Murray murmured, and departed on his errand.

The first to respond to the summons was Kay.  She was resplendent in a
stunning wash-dress and, evidently, was not prepared for the sight of
Farrel standing with his back to the black adobe fireplace.  She paused
abruptly and stared at him frankly.  He bowed.

"Good-morning, Miss Parker.  I trust that, despite the excitement of the
early part of the night, you have enjoyed a very good rest."

"Good-morning, Don Miguel.  Yes; I managed rather well with my sleep, all
things considered."

"You mustn't call me 'Don Miguel,'" he reminded her, with a faint smile.
"I am only Don Miguel to the Indians and _pelados_ and a few of my
father's old Spanish friends who are sticklers for etiquette.  My father
was one of the last dons in San Marcos County, and the title fitted him
because he belonged to the generation of dons.  If you call me, 'Don
Miguel,' I shall feel a little bit alien."

"Well, I agree with you, Mr. Farrel.  You are too young and modern for
such an antiquated title.  I like 'Don Mike' better."

"There is no further need for that distinguishing appellation," he
reminded her, "since my father's death."

She looked at him for several seconds and said:

"I'm glad to see you've gotten a firm grip on yourself so soon.  That
will make it ever so much nicer for everybody concerned.  Mother and
father are fearfully embarrassed."

"I shall endeavor to relieve them of their embarrassment the instant I
meet them."

"Here they come now," Kay warned, and glanced at him appealingly.

Her mother entered first, followed by the potato baron, with Parker
bringing up the rear.  Mrs. Parker's handsome face was suffused with
confusion, and, from the hesitant manner in which she entered, Farrel
realized she was facing an ordeal.

"Mother, this is Mr. Miguel Farrel," Kay announced.

"You are welcome to my poor house, Mrs. Parker," Farrel informed her,
gravely, as he crossed the room and bent over her hand for a moment,
releasing it to grasp the reluctant hand of her husband.  "A double
welcome, sir," he said, addressing Kay's father, who mumbled something in
reply and introduced him to the potato baron, who bowed ceremoniously.

"Won't you please be seated?" Farrel pleaded.  He gently steered Kay's
mother to the seat on his right, and tucked her chair in under her, while
Parker performed a similar service for his daughter.  With the assurance
of one whose right to do was unquestioned, Farrel took his seat at the
head of the table and reached for the little silver call-bell beside his
plate, while Parker took an unaccustomed seat opposite the potato baron.

"Considering the distressing circumstances under which I arrived," Farrel
observed, addressing himself to Mrs. Parker, and then, with a glance,
including the rest of the company, "I find myself rather happy in the
possession of unexpected company.  The situation is delightfully
unique--don't you think so, Mrs. Parker?"

"It isn't the least bit delightful, Mr. Farrel," the lady declared
frankly and forcibly; "but it's dear of you to be so nice about it."

Mr. Parker's momentary embarrassment had passed, and with the feeling
that his silence was a trifle disconcerting, he rallied to meet Miguel
Farrel's attempt at gaiety.

"Well, Mr. Farrel, we find ourselves in a unique position, as you say.
Kay informs me, however, that you are conversant with the circumstances
that have conspired to make us your guests."

"Pray do not mention it.  Under the peculiar conditions existing, I quite
realize that you followed the only logical and sensible course."

Mrs. Parker heaved a small sigh of relief and gazed upon Farrel with new
interest.  He returned her gaze with one faintly quizzical, whereat,
emboldened, she demanded,

"Well, what do you think of us for a jolly little band of usurpers, Mr.
Farrel?"

"Why, I think I'm going to like you all very much if you'll give me half
a chance."

"I'd give you almost anything rather than be kicked out of this house,"
she replied, in her somewhat loud, high-pitched voice.  "I love it, and I
think it's almost sinful on your part to have bobbed up so unexpectedly."

"Mother!" Kay cried reproachfully.

"Tut, tut, Kay, dear!  When an obnoxious heir is reported dead, he should
have the decency to stay dead, although, now that our particular nuisance
is here, alive and well, I suppose we ought to let bygones be bygones and
be nice to him--provided, of course, he continues to be nice to us.  Are
you inclined to declare war, Mr. Farrel?"

"Not until every diplomatic course has been tried and found wanting," he
replied.

Carolina entered, bearing five portions of sliced oranges.

"O Lord, forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass
against us," Mrs. Parker cried.  "Where is Murray?"

Farrel glanced down at his oranges and grinned.

"I'm afraid I excused Murray," he confessed.

Mrs. Parker burst into shrill laughter.

"John," she demanded of her husband, "what do you think of this young
man?"

"Pick up the marbles, Mr. Farrel," Parker replied, with poorly assumed
good humor.  "You win."

"I think this is a jolly adventure," Kay struck in, quick to note the
advantage of her outspoken mother's course.  "Here you have been more
than two months, mother, regarding yourself as the mistress of the Rancho
Palomar, retinting rooms, putting in modern plumbing, and cluttering up
the place with a butler and maids, when--presto!--overnight a stranger
walks in and says kindly, 'Welcome to my poor house!'  After which, he
appropriates pa's place at the head of the table, rings in his own cook
and waitress, forces his own food on us, and makes us like it.  Young
man, I greatly fear we're going to grow fond of you."

"You had planned to spend the summer here, had you not, Mrs. Parker?"

"Yes.  John Parker, have you any idea what's going to become of us?"

"We'll go to Santa Barbara and take rooms at a hotel there for the
present," he informed her.

"I loathe hotels," she protested.

"I think I informed you, Mrs. Parker, that you are welcome to my poor
house," Farrel reminded her.  "I shall be happy to have you remain here
until I go away.  After that, of course, you can continue to stay on
without any invitation from me."

Parker spoke up.

"My dear Mr. Farrel, that is charming of you!  Indeed, from all that we
have heard of you, it is exactly the course we might expect you to take.
Nevertheless, we shall not accept of your kindness.  Now that you are
here, I see no reason why I should impose the presence of my family and
myself upon your hospitality, even if the court has given me the right to
enter upon this property.  I am confident you are competent to manage the
ranch until I am eliminated or come into final possession."

"John, don't be a nut," his wife implored him.  "We'll stay here.  Yes,
we shall, John.  Mr. Farrel has asked us in good faith.  You weren't
trying to be polite just to put us at our ease, were you?" she demanded,
turning to Farrel.

"Certainly not, Mrs. Parker.  Of course, I shall do my level best to
acquire the legal right to dispossess you before Mr. Parker acquires a
similar right to dispossess me, but, in the interim, I announce an
armistice.  All those in favor of the motion will signify by saying
'Aye.'"

"Aye!" cried Kay, and "Aye!" shrilled her mother.

"No!" roared her husband.

"Excess of sound has no weight with me, Mr. Parker," their host
announced.  "The 'Ayes' have it, and it is so ordered.  I will now submit
a platform for the approval of the delegates.  Having established myself
as host and won recognition as such, the following rules and regulations
will govern the convention."

"Hear!  Hear!" cried Mrs. Parker, and tapped the table with her spoon.

"The rapid ringing of a bell will be the signal for meals."

"Approved!" cried Kay.

"Second the motion!" shrilled her mother.

"My cook, Carolina, is queen of the kitchen, and Spanish cuisine will
prevail.  When you weary of it, serve notice, and your Japanese cook will
be permitted to vary the monotony."

"Great!" Mrs. Parker almost yelled.  "Right as a fox!"

"Murray shall serve meals, and--"

Pablo appeared in the door leading to the kitchen and spoke to Farrel in
Spanish.

"Pardon, folks.  Pablo has a telegram for me.  Bring it here, Pablo."

The master of Palomar excused himself to his guests long enough to read
the telegram, and then continued the announcement of his platform.

"My old battery commander, to whom I had promised Panchito, wires me
that, for his sins, he has been made a major and ordered to the Army of
Occupation on the Rhine.  Therefore, he cannot use Panchito, and forbids
me to express the horse to him.  Consequently, Miss Parker, Panchito is
_almost_ yours.  Consider him your property while you remain my guest."

"You darling Don Miguel Farrel!"

"Exuberant, my dear," her curious mother remarked, dryly, "but, on the
whole, the point is well taken."  She turned to Farrel.  "How about some
sort of nag for mother?"

"You may ride my father's horse, if that animal is still on the ranch,
Mrs. Parker.  He's a beautiful single-footer."  He addressed Parker.  "We
used to have a big gray gelding that you'd enjoy riding, sir.  I'll look
him up for you after breakfast."

"Thank you, Mr. Farrel," Parker replied, flushing slightly, "I've been
riding him already."

"Fine!  He needed exercising.  I have a brown mare for Mr. Okada, and you
are all invited out to the corral after luncheon to see me bust
Panchito's wild young brother for my own use."

"Oh, splendid!" Kay cried, enthusiastically.

"The day starts more auspiciously than I had hoped," her mother declared.
"I really believe the Rancho Palomar is going to develop into a regular
place with you around, Mr. Farrel."

XI

"I am convinced," said Miguel Farrel, as he followed his guests out of
the dining-room onto the veranda, "that the Parkers' invasion of my
home is something in the nature of a mixed misfortune.  I begin to feel
that my cloud has a silver lining."

"Of all the young men I have ever met, you can say the nicest things,"
Mrs. Parker declared.  "I don't think you mean that last remark the
least bit, but still I'm silly enough to like to hear you say it.  Do
sit down here awhile, Mr. Farrel, and tell us all about yourself and
family."

"At the risk of appearing discourteous, Mrs. Parker, I shall have to
ask you to excuse me this morning.  I have a living to make.  It is now
a quarter past nine, and I should have been on the job at seven."

"But you only got home from the army last night," Kay pleaded.  "You
owe yourself a little rest, do you not?"

"Not a minute.  I must not owe anything I cannot afford.  I have
approximately seven months in which to raise approximately a quarter of
a million dollars.  Since I am without assets, I have no credit;
consequently, I must work for that money.  From to-day I am Little
Mike, the Hustler."

"What's your program, Mr. Farrel?" Parker inquired, with interest.

"I should be grateful for an interview with you, sir, if you can spare
the time.  Later, I shall ride out over the ranch and make an inventory
of the stock.  Tomorrow, I shall go in to El Toro, see my father's
attorney, ascertain if father left a will, and, if so, whom he named as
executor.  If he died intestate, I shall petition for letters of
administration."

"Come, Kay, dear," Mrs. Parker announced; "heavy business-man stuff!  I
can't bear it!  Will you take a walk with us, Mr. Okada?"

"Very much pleased," the potato baron replied, and flashed his fine
teeth in a fatuous grin.

Farrel smiled his thanks as the good lady moved off with her convoy.
Parker indicated a chair and proffered a cigar.

"Now then, Mr. Farrel, I am quite at your service."

Miguel Farrel lighted his cigar and thoughtfully tossed the burnt match
into a bed of pansies.  Evidently, he was formulating his queries.

"What was the exact sum for which the mortgage on this ranch was
foreclosed, Mr. Parker?"

"Two hundred and eighty-three thousand, nine hundred and forty-one
dollars, and eight cents, Mr. Farrel."

"A sizable wad.  Mortgage covered the entire ranch?"

Parker nodded.

"When you secured control of the First National Bank of El Toro, you
found that old mortgage carried in its list of assets.  You also
discovered that it had been renewed several times, each time for a
larger sum, from which you deduced that the prospects for the ultimate
payment of the mortgage were nebulous and distant.  Your hypothesis was
correct.  The Farrels never did to-day a task that could be deferred
until to-morrow.  Well, you went out and looked over the security for
that mortgage.  You found it to be ample--about three to one, as a very
conservative appraisal.  You discovered that all of the stockholders in
the First National were old friends of my father and extremely
reluctant to foreclose on him.  As a newcomer; you preferred not to
antagonize your associates by forcing the issue upon them, so you
waited until the annual election of stockholders, when you elected your
own Board of Directors.  Then this Board of Directors sold you the
mortgage, and you promptly foreclosed it.  The shock of this unexpected
move was a severe one on my father; the erroneous report of my death
killed him, and here you are, where you have every legal right in the
world to be.  We were never entitled to pity, never entitled to the
half-century of courtesy and consideration we received from the bank.
We met the fate that is bound to overtake impractical dreamers and
non-hustlers in this generation.  The Mission Indian disappeared before
the onslaught of the earlier Californians, and the old-time
Californians have had to take a back seat before the onslaught of the
Go-get-'em boys from the Middle West and the East.  Presently they,
too, will disappear before the hordes of Japanese that are invading our
state.  Perhaps that is progress--the survival of the fittest.  _Quién
sabe_?"

He paused and smoked contemplatively.  Parker cast a sidelong glance of
curiosity at him, but said nothing, by his silence giving assent to all
that the younger man had said.

"I suppose you wanted the Rancho Palomar," Miguel Farrel suggested,
presently.  "I dare say your purchase of this mortgage was not the mere
outgrowth of an altruistic desire to relieve the First National Bank of
El Toro of an annoyance and a burden."

"I think I admire your direct way of speaking, even if I hardly relish
it," Parker answered, good-humoredly.  "Yes; I wanted the ranch.  I
realized I could do things with it that nobody else in this county
could do or would even think of doing."

"Perhaps you are right.  For the sake of argument, I will admit that
you are right.  Now then, to business.  This ranch is worth a million
dollars, and at the close of the exemption period your claim against it
will probably amount to approximately three hundred thousand dollars,
principal and interest.  If I can induce somebody to loan me three
hundred thousand dollars wherewith to redeem this property, I can get
the ranch back."

"Naturally."

"Not much use getting it back, however, unless I can raise another
hundred thousand to restock it with pure-bred or good-grade Herefords
and purchase modern equipment to operate it."  Parker nodded
approvingly.  "Otherwise," Farrel continued, "the interest would eat me
alive, and in a few years I'd be back where I started."

"Do you think you can borrow four hundred thousand dollars in San
Marcos County, Mr. Farrel?"

"No, sir.  No private loan of that magnitude can be floated in this
country.  You control the only bank in the county that can even
consider it--and you'll not consider it."

"Hardly."

"Added to which handicap, I have no additional security to offer in the
shape of previous reputation for ability and industry.  I am the last
of a long line of indolent, care-free spendthrifts."

"Yes; that is unfortunately true," Parker assented, gravely.

"Oh, not so unfortunate as it is embarrassing and inconvenient.  We
have always enjoyed life to the fullest, and, for that, only a fool
would have regret.  Would you be willing to file a satisfaction of that
old mortgage and give me a new loan for five years for the amount now
due on the property?  I could induce one of the big packing companies
to stake me to the cattle.  All I would have to provide would be the
range, and satisfy them that I am honest and know my business.  And I
can do that.  Such an arrangement would give me time to negotiate a
sale of part of the ranch and pay up your mortgage."

"I am afraid that my present plans preclude consideration of that
suggestion," the banker replied, kindly, but none the less forcibly.

"I didn't think you would, but I thought I'd ask.  As a general rule,
it pays to try anything once when a fellow is in as desperate case as I
am.  My only hope, then, is that I may be able to sell the Farrel
equity in the ranch prior to the twenty-second day of November."

"That would seem to be your best course, Mr. Farrel."

"When does the redemption period expire?"

Parker squirmed slightly.

"That is a difficult question to answer, Mr. Farrel.  It seems your
father was something of a lawyer--"

"Yes; he graduated in law.  Why, nobody ever knew, for he never had the
slightest intention of practising it.  I believe it must have been
because my grandfather, Michael Joseph I, had an idea that, since his
son was a gentleman, he ought to have a college degree and the right to
follow some genteel profession in case of disaster."

"Your father evidently kept abreast of the law," Parker laughed.
"Before entering suit for foreclosure, I notified him by registered
mail that the mortgage would not be renewed and made formal demand upon
him for payment in full.  When he received the notice from the El Toro
postmaster to call for that registered letter, he must have suspected
its contents, for he immediately deeded the ranch to you and then
called for the registered letter."

Farrel began to chuckle.

"Good old dad!" he cried.  "Put over a dirty Irish trick on you to gain
time!"

"He did.  I do not blame him for it.  I would have done the same thing
myself under the same circumstances."  And Parker had the grace to join
in the laugh.  "When I filed suit for foreclosure," he continued, "he
appeared in court and testified that the property belonged to his son,
who was in the military service, in consequence of which the suit for
foreclosure could not be pressed until after said son's discharge from
the service."

"All praise to the power of the war-time moratoriums," Farrel declared.
"I suppose you re-entered the suit as soon as the report of my death
reached you."

Parker chuckled.

"I did, Mr. Farrel, and secured a judgment.  Then I took possession."

"Aren't you the picture of bad luck?  Just when everything is shaping
up beautifully for you, I appear in the flesh as exhibit A in the
contention that your second judgment will now have to be set aside,
because, at the time it was entered, it conflicted with the provisions
of that blessed moratorium."  Don Miguel smiled mirthlessly.

"There's luck in odd numbers," Parker retorted, dryly.  "The next time
I shall make that judgment stick."

"Well, at any rate, all these false starts help me out wonderfully,"
Don Miguel reminded him.  "As matters stand this morning, the mortgage
hasn't been foreclosed at all; consequently, you are really and truly
my guests and doubly welcome to my poor house."  He rose and stretched
himself, gazing down the while at Parker, who regarded him quizzically.
"Thank you for the interview, Mr. Parker.  I imagine we've had our
first and last business discussion.  When you are ready to enter your
third suit for foreclosure, I'll drop round to your attorney's office,
accept service of the summons, appear in court, and confess judgment."
Fell a silence.  Then, "Do you enjoy the study of people, sir?" Don
Miguel demanded, apropos of nothing.

"Not particularly, Mr. Farrel.  Of course, I try to know the man I'm
doing business with, and I study him accordingly, but that is all."

"I have not made myself explicit," his host replied.  "The racial
impulses which I observed cropping out in my father--first Irish, then
Spanish--and a similar observance of the raised impulses of the peons
of this country, all of whom are Indian, with a faint admixture of
Spanish blood--always interested me.  I agree with Pope that 'the
proper study of mankind is man.'  I find it most interesting."

"For instance?" Parker queried.  He had a feeling that in any
conversation other than business which he might indulge in with this
young man he would speedily find himself, as it were, in deep water
close to the shore.

"I was thinking of my father.  In looking through his effects last
night, I came across indubitable evidence of his Celtic blood.
Following the futile pursuit of an enemy for a quarter of a century, he
died and left the unfinished job to me.  Had he been all Spanish, he
would have wearied of the pursuit a decade ago."

"I think every race has some definite characteristics necessary to the
unity of that race," Parker replied, with interest.  "Hate makes the
Irish cohesive; pride or arrogance prevents the sun from setting on
British territory; a passionate devotion to the soil has solidified the
French republic in all its wars, while a blind submission to an
overlord made Germany invincible in peace and terrible in war."

"I wonder what spiritual binder holds the people of the United States
together, Mr. Parker?" Don Miguel queried naively.

"Love of country, devotion to the ideals of liberty and democracy,"
Parker replied promptly, just as his daughter joined them.

Farrel rose and surrendered to her his chair, then seated himself on
the edge of the porch with his legs dangling over into a flower-bed.
His face was grave, but in his black eyes there lurked the glint of
polite contempt.

"Did you hear the question and the answer, Miss Parker?" he queried.

She nodded brightly.

"Do you agree with your father's premise?" he pursued.

"Yes, I do, Don Mike."

"I do not.  The mucilage in our body politic is the press-agent, the
advertising specialist, and astute propagandist.  I wonder if you know
that, when we declared war against Germany, the reason was not to make
the world safe for democracy, for there are only two real reasons why
wars are fought.  One is greed and the other self-protection.  Thank
God, we have never been greedy or jealous of the prosperity of a
neighbor.  National aggrandizement is not one of our ambitions."

Kay stared at him in frank amazement.

"Then you mean that we entered the late war purely as a protective
measure?"

"That's why I enlisted.  As an American citizen, I was unutterably
weary of having our hand crowded and our elbow joggled.  I saw very
clearly that, unless we interfered, Germany was going to dominate the
world, which would make it very uncomfortable and expensive for us.  I
repeat that for the protection of our comfort and our bank-roll we
declared war, and anybody who tells you otherwise isn't doing his own
thinking, he isn't honest with himself, and he's the sort of citizen
who is letting the country go to the dogs because he refuses to take an
intelligent interest in its affairs."

"What a perfectly amazing speech from an ex-soldier!" Kay protested.

He smiled his sad, prescient smile.

"Soldiers deal with events, not theories.  They learn to call a spade a
spade, Miss Parker.  I repeat: It wasn't a war to make the world safe
for democracy.  That phrase was just a slogan in a business
campaign--the selling of stock in a military enterprise to apathetic
Americans.  We had to fight or be overrun; when we realized that, we
fought.  Are not the present antics of the Supreme Council in Paris
sufficient proof that saving democracy was just another shibboleth?  Is
not a ghastly war to be followed by a ghastly peace?  The press-agents
and orators popularized the war with the unthinking and the hesitant,
which is proof enough to me that we lack national unity and a definite
national policy.  We're a lot of sublimated jackasses, sacrificing our
country to ideals that are worn at elbow and down at heel.  'Other
times, other customs.'  But we go calmly and stupidly onward, hugging
our foolish shibboleths to our hearts, hiding behind them, refusing to
do to-day that which we can put off until to-morrow.  That is truly an
Anglo-Saxon trait.  In matters of secondary importance, we yield a
ready acquiescence which emboldens our enemies to insist upon
acquiescence in matters of primary importance.  And quite frequently
they succeed.  I tell you the Anglo-Saxon peoples are the only ones
under heaven that possess a national conscience, and because they
possess it, they are generous enough to assume that other races are
similarly endowed."

"I believe," Parker stuck in, as Don Miguel ceased from his passionate
denunciation, "that all this is leading quite naturally to a discussion
of Japanese emigration."

"I admit that the sight of Mr. Okada over in the corner of the patio,
examining with interest the only sweet-lime tree in North America,
inspired my outburst," Farrel answered smilingly.

"You speak of our national shibboleths, Don Mike Farrel," Kay reminded
him.  "If you please, what might they be?"

"You will recognize them instantly, Miss Parker.  Let us start with our
Declaration of Independence: 'All men are created equal.'  Ah, if the
framers of that great document had only written, 'All men are created
theoretically equal!'  For all men are not morally, intellectually, or
commercially equal: For instance, Pablo is equal with me before the
law, although I hazard the guess that if he and I should commit a
murder, Pablo would be hanged and I would be sentenced to life
imprisonment; eventually, I might be pardoned or paroled.  Are you
willing to admit that Pablo Artelan is not my equal?" he challenged
suddenly.

"Certainly!" Kay and her father both cried in unison.

"Very well.  Is Mr. Okada my equal?"

"He is Pablo's superior," Parker felt impelled to declare.

"He is not your equal," Kay declared firmly.  "Dad, you're begging the
question."

"We-ll, no," he assented, "Not from the Anglo-Saxon point of view.  He
is, however, from the point of view of his own nationals."

"Two parallel lines continued into infinity will never meet, Mr.
Parker.  I am a believer in Asia for Asiatics, and, in Japan, I am
willing to accord a Jap equality with me.  In my own country, however,
I would deny him citizenship, by any right whatsoever, even by birth, I
would deny him the right to lease or own land for agricultural or other
purposes, although I would accord him office and warehouse space to
carry on legitimate commerce.  The Jap does that for us and no more,
despite his assertions to the contrary.  I would deny the right of
emigration to this country of all Japanese, with certain exceptions
necessary to friendly intercourse between the two countries; I would
deny him the privilege of economic competition and marriage with our
women.  When a member of the great Nordic race fuses with a member of a
pigmented race, both parties to the union violate a natural law.  Pablo
is a splendid example of mongrelization."

"You are forgetting the shibboleths," Kay ventured to remind him.

"No; I am merely explaining their detrimental effect upon our
development.  The Japanese are an exceedingly clever and resourceful
race.  Brilliant psychologists and astute diplomatists, they have taken
advantage of our pet shibboleth, to the effect that all men are equal.
Unfortunately, we propounded this monstrous and half-baked ideal to the
world, and a sense of national vanity discourages us from repudiating
it, although we really ought to.  And as I remarked before, we possess
an alert national conscience in international affairs, while the Jap
possesses none except in certain instances where it is obvious that
honesty is the best policy.  I think I am justified, however, in
stating that, upon the whole, Japan has no national conscience in
international affairs.  Her brutal exploitation of China and her
merciless and bloody conquest of Korea impel that point of view from an
Anglo-Saxon.  When, therefore, the Tokyo government says, in effect, to
us: 'For one hundred and forty-four years you have proclaimed to the
world that all men are equal.  Very well.  Accept us.  We are a
world-power.  We are on a basis of equality with you,' and we lack the
courage to repudiate this pernicious principle, we have tacitly
admitted their equality.  That is, the country in general has, because
it knows nothing of the Japanese race--at least not enough for
moderately practical understanding of the biological and economic
issues involved.  Indeed, for a long time, we Californians dwelt in the
same fool's paradise as the remainder of the states.  Finally, members
of the Japanese race became so numerous and aggressive here that we
couldn't help noticing them.  Then we began to study them, and now,
what we have learned amazes and frightens us, and we want the sister
states to know all that we have learned, in order that they may
cooperate with us.  But, still, the Jap has us _tiron_ in other ways."

"Has us what?" Parker interrupted.

"_Tiron_.  Spanish slang.  I mean he has us where the hair is short;
we're hobbled."

"How?" Kay demanded.

His bright smile was triumphant.

"By shibboleths, of course.  My friends, we're a race of sentimental
idiots, and the Japanese know this and capitalize it.  We have
promulgated other fool shibboleths which we are too proud or too stupid
to repudiate.  'America, the refuge for all the oppressed of the
earth!'  Ever hear that perfectly damnable shibboleth shouted by a
Fourth of July orator?  'America, the hope of the world!'  What kind of
hope?  Hope of freedom, social and political equality, equality of
opportunity?  Nonsense!  Hope of more money, shorter hours, and license
misnamed liberty; and when that hope has been fulfilled, back they go
to the countries that denied them all that we give.  How many of them
feel, when they land at Ellis Island, that the ground whereon they
tread is holy, sanctified by the blood and tears of a handful of great,
brave souls who really had an ideal and died for it.  Mighty few of the
cattle realize what that hope is, even in the second generation."

"I fear," quoth Parker, "that your army experience has embittered you."

"On the contrary, it has broadened and developed me.  It has been a
liberal education, and it has strengthened my love for my country."

"Continue with the shibboleths, Don Mike," Kay pleaded.  Her big, brown
eyes were alert with interest now.

"Well, when Israel Zangwill coined that phrase: 'The Melting-Pot,' the
title to his play caught the popular fancy of a shibboleth-crazy
nation, and provided pap for the fanciful, for the theorists, for the
flabby idealists and doctrinaires.  If I melt lead and iron and copper
and silver and gold in the same pot, I get a bastard metal, do I not?
It is not, as a fused product, worth a tinker's hoot.  Why, even
Zangwill is not an advocate of the melting-pot.  He is a Jew, proud of
it, and extremely solicitous for the welfare of the Jewish race.  He is
a Zionist--a leader of the movement to crowd the Arabs out of Palestine
and repopulate that country with Jews.  He feels that the Jews have an
ancient and indisputable right to Palestine, although, parenthetically
speaking, I do not believe that any smart Jew who ever escaped from
Palestine wants to go back.  I wouldn't swap the Rancho Palomar for the
whole country."

Kay and her father laughed at his earnest yet whimsical tirade.  Don
Miguel continued:

"Then we have that asinine chatter about 'America, the land of fair
play.'  In theory--yes.  In actual practice--not always.  You didn't
accumulate your present assets, Mr. Parker, without taking an
occasional chance on side-tracking equity when you thought you could
beat the case.  But the Jap reminds us of our reputation for fair play,
and smilingly asks us if we are going to prejudice that reputation by
discriminating unjustly against him?"

"It appears," the girl suggested, "that all these ancient national
brags come home, like curses, to roost."

"Indeed they do, Miss Parker!  But to get on with our shibboleths.  We
hear a great deal of twaddle about the law of the survival of the
fittest.  I'm willing to abide by such a natural law, provided the
competition is confined to mine own people--and I'm one of those chaps,
who, to date, has failed to survive.  But I cannot see any common sense
in opening the lists to Orientals.  We Californians know we cannot win
in competition with them."  He paused and glanced at Kay.  "Does all
this harangue bore you, Miss Parker?"

"Not at all.  Are there any more shibboleths?"

"I haven't begun to enumerate them.  Take, for instance, that old
pacifist gag, that Utopian dream that is crystallized in the words:
'The road to universal peace.'  All the long years when we were not
bothered by wars or rumors of wars, other nations were whittling each
other to pieces.  And these agonized neighbors, longing, with a great
longing, for world-peace, looked to the United States as the only
logical country in which a great cure-all for wars might reasonably be
expected to germinate.  So their propagandists came to our shores and
started societies looking toward the establishment of brotherly love,
and thus was born the shibboleth of universal peace, with Uncle Sam
heading the parade like an old bell-mare in a pack train.  What these
peace-patriots want is peace at any price, although they do not
advertise the fact.  We proclaim to the world that we are a Christian
nation.  _Ergo_, we must avoid trouble.  The avoidance of trouble is
the policy of procrastinators, the vacillating, and the weak.  For one
cannot avoid real trouble.  It simply will not be avoided;
consequently, it might as well be met and settled for all time."

"But surely," Parker remarked, "California should subordinate herself
to the wishes of the majority."

"Yes, she should," he admitted doggedly, "and she has in the past.  I
think that was before California herself really knew that Oriental
emigration was not solely a California problem but a national problem
of the utmost importance.  Indeed, it is international.  Of course, in
view of the fact that we Californians are already on the firing-line,
necessarily it follows that we must make some noise and, incidentally,
glean some real first-hand knowledge of this so-called problem.  I
think that when our fellow citizens know what we are fighting, they
will sympathize with us and promptly dedicate the United States to the
unfaltering principle that ours is a white man's country, that the
heritage we have won from the wilderness shall be held inviolate for
Nordic posterity and none other."

"Nevertheless, despite your prejudice against the race, you are bound
to admire the Japanese--their manners, thrift, industry, and
cleanliness."  Parker was employing one of the old stock protests, and
Don Miguel knew it.

"I do not admire their manners, but I do admire their thrift, industry,
and cleanliness.  Their manners are abominable.  Their excessive
courtesy is neither instinctive nor genuine; it is camouflage for a
ruthless, greedy, selfish, calculating nature.  I have met many
Japanese, but never one with nobility or generosity of soul.  They are
disciples of the principles of expediency.  If a mutual agreement works
out to their satisfaction, well and good.  If it does not, they present
a humble and saddened mien.  'So sorry.  I zink you no understand me.
I don't mean zat.'  And their peculiar Oriental psychology leads them
to believe they can get away with that sort of thing with the
straight-thinking Anglo-Saxon.  They have no code of sportsmanship;
they are irritable and quarrelsome, and their contractual relations are
incompatible with those of the Anglo-Saxon.  They are not truthful.
Individually and collectively, they are past masters of evasion and
deceit, and therefore they are the greatest diplomatists in the world,
I verily believe.  They are wonderfully shrewd, and they have sense
enough to keep their heads when other men are losing theirs.  They are
patient; they plan craftily and execute carefully and ruthlessly.
Would you care to graft their idea of industry on the white race, Mr.
Parker?"

"I would," Parker declared, firmly.  "It is getting to be the fashion
nowadays for white men to do as little work as possible, and half do
that."

"I would not care to see my wife or my mother or my sister laboring
twelve to sixteen hours a day as Japanese force their women to labor.
I would not care to contemplate the future mothers of our race drawn
from the ranks of twisted, stunted, broken-down, and prematurely aged
women.  Did you ever see a bent Japanese girl of twenty waddling in
from a day of labor in a field?  To emulate Japanese industry, with its
peonage, its horrible, unsanitary factory conditions, its hopelessness,
would be to thrust woman's hard-won sphere in modern civilization back
to where it stood at the dawn of the Christian era.  Do you know, Miss
Parker, that love never enters into consideration when a Japanese
contemplates marriage?  His sole purpose in acquiring a mate is to
beget children, to scatter the seed of Yamato over the world, for that
is a religious duty.  A Jap never kisses his wife or shows her any
evidences of affection.  She is a chattel, and if anybody should, by
chance, discover him kissing his wife, he would be frightfully
mortified."

"What of their religious views, Don Mike?"

"If Japan can be said to have an official religion, it is Shintoism,
not Buddhism, as so many Occidental people believe.  Shintoism is
ancestor-worship, and ascribes divinity to the emperor.  They believe
he is a direct descendant of the sun-god, Yamato."

"Why, they're a heathen nation!"  Kay's tones were indicative of
amazement.

Farrel smiled his tolerant smile.

"I believe, Miss Parker, that any people who will get down on all fours
to worship the picture of their emperor and, at this period of the
world's progress, ascribe to a mere human being the attributes of
divinity, are certainly deficient in common sense, if not in
civilization.  However, for the purpose of insuring the realization of
the Japanese national aspirations, Shintoism is a need vital to the
race.  Without it, they could never agree among themselves for they are
naturally quarrelsome, suspicious and irritable.  However, by
subordinating everything to the state via this religious channel, there
has been developed a national unity that has never existed with any
other race.  The power of cohesion of this people is marvelous, and
will enable it, in days to come, to accomplish much for the race.  For
that reason alone, our very lack of cohesion renders the aspirations of
Japan comparatively easy of fulfilment unless we wake up and attend to
business."

"How do you know all this, Mr. Farrel?" Parker demanded incredulously.

"I have read translations from editorials in Japanese newspapers both
in Japan and California; I have read translations of the speeches of
eminent Japanese statesmen; I have read translations from Japanese
official or semi-official magazines, and I have read translations from
patriotic Japanese novels.  I know what I am talking about.  The
Japanese race holds firmly to the belief that it is the greatest race
on the face of the globe, that its religion, Shintoism, is the one true
faith, that it behooves it to carry this faith to the benighted of
other lands and, if said benighted do not readily accept Shintoism, to
force its blessings upon them willy-nilly.  They believe that they know
what is good for the world; they believe that the resources of the
world were put here to be exploited by the people of the world,
regardless of color, creed, or geographical limitation.  They feel that
they have as much right in North America as we have, and they purpose
over-running us and making our country Japanese territory.  And it was
your purpose to aid in the consummation of this monstrous ambition," he
charged bluntly.

"At least," Parker defended, "they are a more wholesome people than
southern Europeans.  And they are not Mongolians."

Farrel's eyebrows arched.

"You have been reading Japanese propaganda," he replied.  "Of course
they are Mongolians.  Everybody who has reached the age of reason knows
that.  One does not have to be a biologist to know that they are
Mongolians.  Indeed, the only people who deny it are the Japanese, and
they do not believe it.  As for southern Europeans, have you not
observed that nearly all of them possess brachycephalic skulls,
indicating the influence upon them of Mongolian invasions thousands of
years ago and supplying, perhaps, a very substantial argument that, if
we find the faintly Mongoloid type of emigrant repugnant to us, we can
never expect to assimilate the pure-bred Mongol."

"What do you mean, 'brachycephalic'?" Parker queried, uneasily.

"They belong to the race of round heads.  Didn't you know that
ethnologists grub round in ancient cemeteries and tombs and trace the
evolution and wanderings of tribes of men by the skulls they find
there?"

"I did not."

Kay commenced to giggle at her father's confusion.  The latter had
suddenly, as she realized, made the surprising discovery that in this
calm son of the San Gregorio he had stumbled upon a student, to attempt
to break a conversational lance with whom must end in disaster.  His
daughter's mirth brought him to a realization of the sorry figure he
would present in argument.

"Well, my dear, what are you laughing at?" he demanded, a trifle
austerely.

"I'm laughing at you.  You told me yesterday you were loaded for these
Californians and could flatten their anti-Japanese arguments in a
jiffy."

"Perhaps I am loaded still.  Remember, Kay, Mr. Farrel has done all of
the talking and we have been attentive listeners.  Wait until I have
had my innings."

"By the way, Mr. Parker," Farrel asked, "who loaded you up with
pro-Japanese arguments?"

Parker flushed and was plainly ill at ease.  Farrel turned to Kay.

"I do not know yet where you folks came from, but I'll make a bet that
I can guess--in one guess."

"What will you bet, my erudite friend?" the girl bantered.

"I'll bet you Panchito against a box of fifty of the kind of cigars
your father smokes."

"Taken.  Where do we hail from, Don Mike?"

"From New York city."

"Dad, send Mr. Farrel a box of cigars."

"Now, I'll make you another bet.  I'll stake Panchito against another
box of the same cigars that your father is a member of the Japan
Society, of New York city."

"Send Mr. Farrel another box of cigars, popsy-wops.  Don Mike, how
_did_ you guess it?"

"Oh, all the real plutocrats in New York have been sold memberships in
that instrument of propaganda by the wily sons of Nippon.  The Japan
Society is supposed to be a vehicle for establishing friendlier
commercial and social relations between the United States and Japan.
The society gives wonderful banquets and yammers away about the
Brotherhood of Man and sends out pro-Japanese propaganda.  Really, it's
a wonderful institution, Miss Parker.  The millionaire white men of New
York finance the society, and the Japs run it.  It was some shrewd
Japanese member of the Japan Society who sent you to Okada on this
land-deal, was it not, Mr. Parker?"

"You're too good a guesser for comfort," the latter parried.  "I'm
going to write some letters.  I'm motoring in to El Toro this
afternoon, and I'll want to mail them."

"'Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof'," Don Miguel assured him
lightly.  "Whenever you feel the urge for further information about
yourself and your Japanese friends, I am at your service.  I expect to
prove to you in about three lessons that you have unwittingly permitted
yourself to develop into a very poor citizen, even if you did load up
with Liberty Bonds and deliver four-minute speeches during all of the
loan drives."

"Oh, I'm as good as the average American, despite what you say,"
retorted the banker, good-naturedly, as he left them.

The master of Palomar gazed after the retreating figure of his guest.
In his glance there was curiosity, pain, and resignation.  He continued
to stare at the door through which Parker had disappeared, until roused
from his reverie by Kay's voice.

"The average American doesn't impress you greatly, does he, Don Mike?"

"Oh, I'm not one of that supercilious breed of Americans which toadies
to an alleged European culture by finding fault with his own people,"
he hastened to assure her.  "What distresses me is the knowledge that
we are a very moral nation, that we have never subjugated weaker
peoples, that we have never coveted our neighbor's goods, that we can
outthink and outwork and outgame and outinvent every nation under
heaven, and yet haven't brains enough to do our own thinking in
world-affairs.  It is discouraging to contemplate the smug complacency,
whether it be due to ignorance or apathy, which permits aliens to
reside in our midst and set up agencies for our destruction and their
benefit.  If I--  Why, you're in riding-costume, aren't you?"

"You will never be popular with women if you do not mend your ways,"
she informed him, with a little grimace of disapproval.  "Do you not
know that women loathe non-observing men?"

"So do I.  Stodgy devils!  Sooner or later, the fool-killer gets them
all.  Please do not judge me to-day, Miss Parker.  Perhaps, after a
while, I may be more discerning.  By Jupiter, those very becoming
riding-togs will create no end of comment among the natives!"

"You said Panchito was to be mine while I am your guest, Don Mike."

"I meant it."

"I do not relish the easy manner in which you risk parting with him.
The idea of betting that wonder-horse against a box of filthy cigars!"

"Oh, I wasn't risking him," he retorted, dryly.  "However, before you
ride Panchito, I'll put him through his paces.  He hasn't been ridden
for three or four months, I dare say, and when he feels particularly
good, he carries on just a little."

"If he's sober-minded, may I ride him to-day?"

"We shall quarrel if you insist upon treating yourself as company.  My
home and all I possess are here for your happiness.  If your mother and
father do not object--"

"My father doesn't bother himself opposing my wishes, and mother--by
the way, you've made a perfectly tremendous hit with mother.  She told
me I could go riding with you."

He blushed boyishly at this vote of confidence.  Kay noted the blush,
and liked him all the better for it.

"Very well," he answered.  "We'll ride down to the mission first.  I
must pay my respects to my friends there--didn't bother to look in on
them last night, you know.  Then we will ride over to the Sepulvida
ranch for luncheon.  I want you to know Anita Sepulvida.  She's a very
lovely girl and a good pal of mine.  You'll like her."

"Let's go," she suggested, "while mother is still convoying Mr. Okada.
He is still interested in that sweet-lime tree.  By the way," she
continued, as they rose and walked down the porch together, "I have
never heard of a sweet-lime before."

"It's the only one of its kind in this country, Miss Parker, and it is
very old.  Just before it came into bearing for the first time, my
grandmother, while walking along the porch with a pan of sugar in her
hands, stubbed her toe and fell off the porch, spilling her pan of
sugar at the base of the tree.  The result of this accident is
noticeable in the fruit to this very day."

She glanced up at him suspiciously, but not even the shadow of a smile
hovered on his grave features.  He opened the rear gate for her and
they passed out into the compound.

"That open fireplace in the adobe wall under the shed yonder was where
the cowboys used to sit and dry themselves after a rainy day on the
range," he informed her.  "In fact, this compound was reserved for the
help.  Here they held their bailies in the old days."

"What is that little building yonder--that lean-to against the main
adobe wall?" Kay demanded.

"That was the settlement-room.  You must know that the possessors of
dark blood seldom settle a dispute by argument, Miss Parker.  In days
gone by, whenever a couple of peons quarreled (and they quarreled
frequently), the majordomo, or foreman of the ranch, would cause these
men to be stripped naked and placed in this room to settle their row
with nature's weapons.  When honor was satisfied, the victor came to
this grating and announced it.  Not infrequently, peons have emerged
from this room minus an ear or a nose, but, as a general thing, this
method of settlement was to be preferred to knife or pistol."

Farrel tossed an empty box against the door and invited the girl to
climb up on it and peer into the room.  She did so.  Instantly a
ferocious yell resounded from the semi-darkness within.

"Good gracious!  Is that a ghost?" Kay cried, and leaped to the ground.

"No; confound it!" Farrel growled.  "It's your Japanese cook.  Pablo
locked him in there this morning, in order that Carolina might have a
clear field for her culinary art.  Pablo!"

His cry brought an answering hail from Pablo, over at the barn, and
presently the old majordomo entered the compound.  Farrel spoke sternly
to him in Spanish, and, with a shrug of indifference, Pablo unlocked
the door of the settlement-room and the Japanese cook bounded out.  He
was inarticulate with frenzy, and disappeared through the gate of the
compound with an alacrity comparable only to that of a tin-canned dog.

"I knew he had been placed here temporarily," Don Miguel confessed,
"but I did think Pablo would have sense enough to let him out when
breakfast was over.  I'm sorry."

"I'm not.  I think that incident is the funniest I have ever seen," the
girl laughed.  "Poor outraged fellow!"

"Well, if you think it's funny, so do I.  Any sorrow I felt at your
cook's incarceration was due to my apprehension as to your feelings,
not his."

"What a fearful rage he is in, Don Mike!"

"Oh, well, he can help himself to the fruit of our famous lime-tree and
get sweet again.  Pablo, you russet scoundrel, no more rough stuff if
you know what's good for you.  Where is Panchito?"

"I leave those horse loose in the pasture," Pablo replied, a whit
abashed.  "I like for see if those horse he got some brains like before
you go ride heem.  For long time Panchito don' hear hees boss call
heem.  Mebbeso he forget--no?"

"We shall see, Pablo."

XII

They walked out to the barn.  In a little green field in the
oak-studded valley below, a dozen horses were feeding.  Farrel whistled
shrilly.  Instantly, one of the horses raised his head and listened.
Again Farrel whistled, and a neigh answered him as Panchito broke from
the herd and came galloping up the slope.  When his master whistled
again, the gallop developed into a furious burst of speed; whereat
Farrel slipped inside the barn and shut the door, while round and round
the barn Panchito galloped, seeking the lost master.

Suddenly Don Miguel emerged and, with little affectionate nickerings,
the beautiful animal trotted up to him, ran his head over the master's
shoulder, and rubbed his sleek cheek against the man's.  Farrel nuzzled
him and rubbed him lovingly between the ears before producing a lump of
sugar.  Upon command, Panchito squatted on his hind quarters like a dog
and held his head out stiffly.  Upon his nose Farrel balanced the lump
of sugar, backed away, and stood in front of him.  The horse did not
move.  Suddenly Farrel snapped his fingers.  With a gentle toss of his
head, Panchito threw the lump of sugar in the air and made a futile
snap at it as it came down.  Then he rose, picked the lump up
carefully, and, holding it between his lips, advanced and proffered his
master a bite.

"Oh, you eat it yourself!" Farrel cried, and reached for the horse's
unkempt mane.  With the ease of long practice, he swung aboard the
horse and, at the touch of his heels, Panchito bounded away.  Far down
the mesa he raced, Farrel guiding him with his knees; then back and
over the six-foot corral-fence with something of the airy freedom of a
bird.  In the corral, Farrel slid off, ran with the galloping animal
for fifty feet, grasping his mane, and sprang completely over him, ran
fifty feet more and sprang back, as nimbly as a monkey.  Panchito was
galloping easily, steadily, now, at a trained gait, like a circus
horse, so Farrel sat sideways on him and discarded his boots, after
which he stood erect on the smooth, glossy back and rode him, first on
one foot, then on the other.  Next he sat down on the animal again and
clapped his hands.

"Panchito, my boots!" he ordered.  But Panchito only pinned his ears
and shook his head.  "You see," Farrel called to Kay, "he is a
gentleman, and declines to perform a menial service.  But I shall force
him.  Panchito, you rebel, pick up my boots and hand them to me."

For answer, Panchito threw his hind end aloft half a dozen times, and
Kay's silvery laugh echoed through the corral as Farrel, appearing to
lose his seat, slid forward on the horse's withers and clung with arms
and legs round Panchito's neck, emulating terror.  Thereupon, Panchito
stood up on his hind legs, and Farrel, making futile clutchings at the
horse's mane, slid helplessly back; over his mount's glossy rump and
sat down rather solidly in the dust of the corral.

"Bravo!" the girl cried.  "Why, he's a circus horse!"

"I've schooled him a little for trick riding at rodeos, Miss Parker.
We've carried off many a prize, and when I dress in the motley of a
clown and pretend to ride him rough and do that silly slide, most
people enjoy it."

Farrel got up, recovered his boots, and put them on.

"He'll do, the old humorist," he announced, as he joined her.  "He
hasn't forgotten anything, and wasn't he glad to see me again?  You use
an English saddle, I dare say, and ride with a short stirrup?"

Panchito dutifully followed like a dog at heel to the tack-room, where
Farrel saddled him and carefully fitted the bridle with the
snaffle-bit.  Following a commanding slap on the fore leg, the
intelligent animal knelt for Kay to mount him, after which, Farrel
adjusted the stirrup leathers for her.

In the meantime, Pablo was saddling a splendid, big dappled-gray
gelding.

"One of the best roping-horses in California, and very fast for half a
mile.  He's half thoroughbred," Farrel explained.  "He was my father's
mount."  He caressed the gray's head.  "Do you miss him, Bob,
old-timer?" he queried.

Kay observed her companion's saddle.  It was of black, hand-carved
leather, with sterling-silver trimmings and long _tapaderas_--a saddle
to thrill every drop of the Castilian blood that flowed in the veins of
its owner.  The bridle was of finely plaited rawhide, with fancy
sliding knots, a silver Spanish bit, and single reins of silver-link
chain and plaited rawhide.  At the pommel hung coiled a well-worn
rawhide riata.

When the gray was saddled, Farrel did not mount, but came to Kay and
handed her the horsehair leading-rope.

"If you will be good enough to take the horses round in front," he
suggested, "I'll go back to the kennels and loose the hounds.  On our
way over to the Sepulvida rancho, we're liable to put up a panther or a
coyote, and if we can get our quarry out into the open, we'll have a
glorious chase.  I've run coyotes and panthers down with Panchito and
roped them.  A panther isn't to be sneezed at," he continued,
apologetically.  "The state pays a bounty of thirty dollars for a
panther-pelt, and then gives you back the pelt."

Five minutes later, when he came round the north corner of the old
hacienda, his hounds frisking before him, he met Kay riding to meet him
on Panchito, but the gray gelding was not in sight.  The girl was
excited.

"Where is my mount, Miss Parker?" he demanded.

"Just as I rode up in front, a man came out of the patio, and started
that automobile hurriedly.  He had scarcely gotten it turned round when
one of his front tires blew out.  This seemed to infuriate him and
frighten him.  He considered a minute or two, then suddenly ran over to
me, snatched the leading-rope out of my hand, mounted, and fled down
the avenue at top speed."

"'The wicked flee when no man pursueth'," the master of Palomar
replied, quietly, and stepped over to the automobile for an examination
of the license.  "Ah, my father's ancient enemy!" he exclaimed, "André
Loustalot has been calling on your father, and has just learned that I
am living.  I think I comprehend his reason for borrowing my horse and
dusting out of here so precipitately."

"There he goes now!" Kay cried, as the gray burst from the shelter of
the palms in the avenue and entered the long open stretch of white road
leading down the San Gregorio.

Don Mike's movements were as casual as if the theft of a horse in broad
daylight was an every-day occurrence.

"Unfortunately for that stupid fellow, he borrowed the wrong horse," he
announced, gravely.  "The sole result of his action will be to delay
our ride until tomorrow.  I'm sorry, but it now becomes necessary for
me to ask you for Panchito."

She slid silently to the ground.  Swiftly but calmly he readjusted the
stirrups; then he faced the girl.

"Want to see some fun?" he demanded.

"Why--yes," she replied, breathlessly.

"You're a good little sport.  Take your father's car and follow me.
Please bring Pablo with you, and tell him I said he was to bring his
rifle.  If Loustalot gets me, he is to follow on Panchito and get
Loustalot.  Thank you, Miss Parker."

He swung lightly into the unaccustomed flat saddle and, disdaining to
follow the road, cut straight across country; Panchito taking the
fences easily, the hounds belling lustily as they strung out behind
him.  Kay did not wait to follow his flight, but calling for William to
get out the car, she ran round to the barn and delivered Farrel's
message to Pablo, who grunted his comprehension and started for his
cabin at a surprising rate of speed for an old man.  Five minutes after
Farrel had left the Rancho Palomar, Kay and Pablo were roaring down the
valley in pursuit.

Half a mile beyond the mission they came upon Don Mike and his father's
enemy.  In the first mile, the latter had ridden the gray out; spent,
gasping, the gallant animal was proceeding at a leg-weary, lumbering
gallop when Miguel Farrel, following on Panchito at half that gallant
animal's speed, came up with Loustalot.  Straight at the big gray he
drove, "hazing" him off the road and stopping him abruptly.  At the
same time, he leaped from Panchito full on top of Loustalot, and bore
the latter crashing to the ground.

The chase was over.  Half-stunned, the enemy of Don Miguel José Farrel
II lay flat on his back, blinking up at Don Miguel Farrel III as the
latter's knees pressed the Loustalot breast, the while his fingers
clasped the hairy Loustalot throat in a grip that was a promise of
death if the latter struggled.

As Kay drew up in the car and, white-faced and wondering, gazed at the
unwonted spectacle, Miguel Farrel released his captive and stood erect.

"So sorry to have made a brawl in your presence, Miss Parker, but he
would have ruined our old Bob horse if I hadn't overtaken him."  He
turned to the man on the ground.  "Get up, Loustalot!"  The latter
staggered to his feet.  "Pablo," Farrel continued, "take this man back
to the ranch and lock him up in your private calaboose.  See that he
does not escape, and permit no one to speak with him."

Prom the gray's saddle he took a short piece of rope, such as vaqueros
use to tie the legs of an animal when they have roped and thrown it.

"Mount!" he commanded.  Loustalot climbed wearily aboard the spent
gray, and held his hands behind him with Farrel bound them securely.
Pablo thereupon mounted Panchito, took the gray's leading-rope, and
started back to the ranch.

"How white your face is!" Farrel murmured, deprecatingly, as he came to
the side of the car.  "So sorry our ride has been spoiled."  He glanced
at his wrist-watch.  "Only ten o'clock," he continued.  "I wonder if
you'd be gracious enough to motor me in to El Toro.  Your father plans
to use the car after luncheon, but we will be back by twelve-thirty."

"Certainly.  Delighted!" the girl replied, in rather a small,
frightened voice.

"Thank you."  He considered a moment.  "I think it no less than fair to
warn you, Miss Parker, that my trip has to do with a scheme that may
deprive your father of his opportunity to acquire the Rancho Palomar at
one-third of its value.  I think the scheme may be at least partially
successful, but if I am to succeed at all, I'll have to act promptly."

She held out her hand to him.

"My father plays fair, Don Mike.  I hope you win."

And she unlatched the door of the tonneau and motioned him to enter.

XIII

The return of Pablo Artelan to the hacienda with his employer's
prisoner was a silent and dignified one up to the moment they reached
the entrance to the palm avenue.  Here the prisoner, apparently having
gathered together his scattered wits, turned in the saddle and
addressed his guard.

"Artelan," he said, in Spanish, "if you will permit me to go, I will
give you five thousand dollars."

"If you are worth five thousand dollars to me," the imperturbable Pablo
replied, calmly, "how much more are you worth to Don Miguel Farrel?"

"Ten thousand!  You will be wealthy."

"What need have I for wealth, Loustalot?  Does not Don Miguel provide
all things necessary for a happy existence?"

"I will give you twelve thousand.  Do not be a fool, Artelan.  Come; be
sensible and listen to reason."

"Silence, animal!  Is not the blood of my brother on your head?  One
word--"

"Fifteen thousand, Artelan.  Quick.  There is little time to--"

Pablo rode up beside him and quite deliberately smote the man heavily
across the mouth with the back of his hand.

"There will be no more talk of money," he commanded, tersely.

John Parker had finished writing his letters and was standing, with his
wife and the potato baron, in front of the hacienda when Pablo and his
prisoner rode into the yard.  Thin rivulets of blood were trickling
from the Basque's nose and lips; his face was ashen with rage and
apprehension.

"Why, Loustalot, what has happened?" Parker cried, and stepped out to
intercept the gray gelding, but Pablo, riding behind, struck the gray
on the flank, and the animal bounded forward.  But Parker was not to be
denied.  He, too, leaped, seized the reins, and brought the animal to a
halt.  Pablo glared at him hatefully; then, remembering that this man
was no longer an interloper, but an honored guest of the house of
Farrel, he removed his sombrero and bowed courteously.

"Señor Parker," he explained, "thees man, Loustalot, have made the beeg
meestake to steal thees horse from Don Miguel Farrel.  For long time
since Don Miguel he's beeg like leetle baby, thees Basque he cannot set
the foot on the Rancho Palomar, but to-day, because he theenk Don
Miguel don' leeve, theese fellow have the beeg idea she's all right for
come to theese rancho.  Well, he come."  Here Pablo shrugged.  "I think
mebbeso you tell theese Loustalot Don Miguel have come back.
_Car-ramba_!  He is scared like hell.  Queeck, like rabbeet, he run for
those automobile, but those automobile she have one leak in the wheel.
_Señor_, thees is the judgment of God.  Myself, I theenk the speerit of
Don Miguel's father have put the nail where thees fellow can peeck heem
up.  Well, when hee's nothing for do, hee's got for do sometheeng, eh?
_Mira_!  If Don Miguel catch thees coyote on the Rancho Palomar, hee's
cut off hees tail like that"--and Pablo snapped his tobacco-stained
fingers.  "Queeck!  Hee's got for do something for make the vamose.
The Señorita Parker, she rides Panchito and holds the gray horse for
Don Miguel, who has gone for get the dogs.  Thees animal, Loustalot,
hee's go crazy with the fear, so he grab thees gray horse from the
Señorita Parker and hee's ride away fast like the devil just when Don
Miguel arrive with the hounds.  Then Don Miguel, hee's take Panchito
and go get thees man."

"But where are Don Miguel and Miss Parker now?"

"Mees Parker, she take the automobile; the señorita and Don Miguel go
to El Toro.  Me, I come back with thees Basque for put heem in the
calaboose."

"But, Pablo, you cannot confine this man without a warrant."

Pablo, too polite to argue with a guest, merely bowed and smiled
deprecatingly.

"My boss, hee's tell me put thees fellow in the calaboose.  If trouble
come from thees--well, Don Miguel have the fault, not Pablo Artelan.
If the _señor_ please for let go the gray horse--no?"

"Farrel has gone to El Toro to attach my bank-account and my sheep,"
the Basque explained in a whisper, leaning low over the gray's neck.
"His father had an old judgment against me.  When I thought young
Farrel dead, I dared do business--in my own name--understand?  Now, if
he collects, you've lost the Rancho Palomar--help me, for God's sake,
Parker!"

Parker's hand fell away from the reins.

"I have no sympathy for you, Loustalot," he replied, coldly.  "If you
have stolen this horse, you must pay the penalty.  I shall not help
you.  This is no affair of mine."  And he stepped aside and waved
Loustalot back into Pablo's possession, who thanked him politely and
rode away round the hacienda wall.  Three minutes later, Loustalot, his
hands unbound, was safe under lock and key in the settlement-room, and
Pablo, rifle in lap, sat on a box outside the door and rolled a
brown-paper cigarette.

Throughout the preceding colloquy, Mrs. Parker had said nothing.  When
Pablo and his prisoner had disappeared, she asked her husband:

"What did that man say to you?  He spoke in such a low tone I couldn't
hear him."

Parker, without hesitation, related to her, in the presence of Okada,
the astonishing news which Loustalot had given him.

"Good!" the lady declared, emphatically.  "I hope that delightful Don
Mike collects every penny."

"Very poor business, I zink," Mr. Okada opined, thoughtfully.

"At any rate," Parker observed, "our host isn't letting the grass grow
under his feet.  I wonder if he'll attach Loustalot's automobile.  It's
new, and worth about eight thousand dollars.  Well, we shall see what
we shall see."

"I zink I take little walk.  'Scuse me, please," said Okada, and bowed
to Parker and his wife.  He gave both the impression that he had been
an unwilling witness to an unhappy and distressing incident and wished
to efface himself from the scene.  Mrs. Parker excused him with a brief
and somewhat wintry smile, and the little Oriental started strolling
down the palm-lined avenue.  No sooner had the gate closed behind them,
however, than he hastened back to Loustalot's car, and at the end of
ten minutes of furious labor had succeeded in exchanging the deflated
tire for one of the inflated spare tires at the rear of the car.  This
matter attended to, he strolled over to the ranch blacksmith shop and
searched through it until he found that which he sought--a long, heavy
pair of bolt-clippers such as stockmen use for dehorning young cattle.
Armed with this tool, he slipped quietly round to the rear of Pablo's
"calaboose," and went to work noiselessly on the small iron-grilled
window of the settlement-room.

The bars were an inch in diameter and too thick to be cut with the
bolt-clippers, but Okada did not despair.  With the tool he grasped the
adobe window-ledge and bit deeply into it.  Piece after piece of the
ancient adobe came away, until presently the bases of the iron bars lay
exposed; whereupon Okada seized them, one by one, in his hands and bent
them upward and outward, backward and forward, until he was enabled to
remove them altogether.  Then he stole quietly back to the blacksmith
shop, restored the bolt-clippers, went to the Basque's automobile, and
waited.

Presently, Loustalot appeared warily round the corner.  A glance at his
automobile showed that the flat tire had been shifted; whereupon he
nodded his thanks to the Japanese, who stared impassively while the
Basque climbed into his car, threw out his low gear, let go his brakes,
and coasted silently out of the yard and into the avenue.  The hacienda
screened him from Pablo's view as the latter, all unconscious of what
was happening, dozed before the door of the empty settlement-room.
Once over the lip of the mesa, Loustalot started his car and sped down
the San Gregorio as fast as he dared drive.

XIV

Following his illuminating interview with Pablo and Loustalot, John
Parker returned to a chair on the porch patio, lighted a fresh cigar,
and gave himself up to contemplating the tangle in his hitherto
well-laid plans.  An orderly and methodical man always, it annoyed him
greatly to discover this morning that a diabolical circumstance over
which he had no control and which he had not remotely taken into
consideration should have arisen to embarrass and distress him and,
perchance, plunge him into litigation.  Mrs. Parker, having possessed
herself of some fancy work, took a seat beside him, and, for the space
of several minutes, stitched on, her thoughts, like her husband's,
evidently bent upon the affairs of Miguel Farrel.

"Who is this gory creature Pablo just brought in?" she demanded,
finally.

"His name is André Loustalot, Kate, and he is a sheep-man from the San
Carpojo country--a Basque, I believe.  He hasn't a particularly good
reputation in San Marcos County, but he's one of the biggest sheepmen
in the state and a heavy depositor in the bank at El Toro.  He was one
of the reasons that moved me to buy the Farrel mortgage from the bank."

"Explain the reason, John."

"Well, I figured that eventually I would have to foreclose on old Don
Miguel Farrel, and it would require approximately two years after that
before my irrigation system would be completed and the valley lands
ready for colonization.  I was tolerably certain I would never restock
the range with cattle, and I knew Loustalot would buy several thousand
young sheep and run them on the Palomar, provided I leased the
grazing-privilege to him for two years at a reasonable figure.  I was
here, under authority of a court order, to conserve the estate from
waste, and my attorney assured me that, under that order, I had
authority to use my own judgment in the administration of the estate,
following the order of foreclosure.  Now young Farrel shows up alive,
and that will nullify my suit for foreclosure.  It also nullifies my
lease to Loustalot."

"I'm quite certain that fiery Don Mike will never consent to the lease,
John," his wife remarked.

"If he declines to approve the lease, I shall be quite embarrassed I
fear, Kate.  You see, dear, Loustalot bought about fifteen thousand
sheep to pasture on the Palomar, and now he's going to find himself in
the unenviable position of having the sheep but no pasture.  He'll
probably sue me to recover his loss, if any."

"It's too bad you didn't wait ten days before signing that lease, John."

"Yes," he replied, a trifle testily.  "But we all were convinced that
young Farrel had been killed in Siberia."

"But you hadn't completed your title to this ranch, John?"

"You wouldn't murder a man who was going to commit suicide, would you?
The ranch was as good as mine.  If I had waited to make absolutely
certain Farrel was dead, the wait might have cost me fifty thousand
dollars.  I rented the ranch at fifty cents per acre."

"One hundred thousand acres, more or less, for two years, at fifty
cents per acre per annum.  So, instead of making fifty thousand you've
lost that sum," his wife mused aloud.

"I've lost one hundred thousand," he corrected.  "A one-year lease is
not desirable; Loustalot was my sole client, and I've lost him for
good."

"Why despair, John?  I've a notion that if you give Don Mike fifty
thousand dollars to confirm Loustalot in the lease, he will forget his
enmity and agree to the lease.  That would, at least, prevent a
law-suit."

Parker's face brightened.

"I might do that," he assented.  "The title will remain in Farrel's
name for another year, and I have always believed that half a loaf was
better than none at all.  If young Farrel subscribes to the same
sentiments, all may yet go nicely."

"Fifty thousand dollars would be rather a neat sum to save out of the
wreck," she observed, sagely.  "He seems quite a reasonable young man."

"I like him," Parker declared.  "I like him ever so much."

"So do I, John.  He's an old-fashioned gentleman."

"He's a he man--the sort of chap I'd like to see Kay married to some
day."

Mrs. Parker looked searchingly at her husband.

"He told Kay he was half greaser, John.  Would you care to have our
little daughter married to that sort of man?"

"How like a woman!  You always take the personal viewpoint.  I said I'd
like to see Kay married to a he man like Miguel Farrel.  And Farrel is
not half greaser.  A greaser is, I take it, a sort of mongrel--Indian
and Spanish.  Farrel is clean-strain Caucasian, Kate.  He's a white
man--inside and out."

"His financial situation renders him impossible, of course."

"Naturally."

"I wish it were otherwise, Johnny.  Perhaps, if you were a little easy
with him--if you gave him a chance--"

"Kate, I'd always be afraid of his easy-going Latin blood.  If I should
put him on his feet, he would, in all probability, stand still.  He
might even walk a little, but I doubt me if he'd ever do a Marathon."

"John, you're wrong," Mrs. Parker affirmed, with conviction.  "That
young man will go far.  What would you do if Kay should fall in love
with him?"

"I'm sure I do not know, Kate.  What would you do?"

"I do not know, John.  Nevertheless, it is interesting to contemplate
the situation.  If he should win this ranch back from you, he could
have her with my blessing."

"Likewise with mine.  That would put him right up in the go-getter
class, which is the class I want to see Kay marry into.  But he will
not win back this ranch, Kate."

"How do you know he will not?"

"Because I'm going to do everything in my power to keep him from
redeeming it--and I'm neither a mental nor a financial cripple."

"Where did the potato baron go?" Mrs. Parker queried, suddenly changing
the conversation.

"Down into the valley, I imagine, to look over the land."

"His presence here is not agreeable to Mr. Farrel, John.  I think you
might manage to indicate to Mr. Okada that now, Mr. Farrel having
returned so unexpectedly, your land deal must necessarily be delayed
for a year, and consequently, further negotiations at this time are
impossible."

"Yes; I think I had better give him a strong hint to go away.  It
irritates Farrel to have him in the house, although he'd never admit it
to us."

"I wonder, John, if it irritates him to have us in the house?"

"I wanted to leave to-day, but when he invited us to stay, you wouldn't
permit me to consider leaving," he reminded her.

"But, John, his manner was so hearty and earnest we had to accept.
Really, I think, we might have hurt his feelings if we had declined."

"Kay seemed happy to stay."

"That is another reason for accepting his invitation.  I know she'll
enjoy it so here."

"I wouldn't be at all surprised," Parker replied, dryly.  "She has
helped herself to the car and driver in order to aid Farrel at my
expense."

His humorous wife smiled covertly.  Parker smoked contemplatively for a
quarter of an hour.  Then,

"Here comes the smiling son of Nippon, John," Mrs. Parker remarked.

The potato baron entered the secluded patio and sat down beside them on
the porch.  With a preliminary whistling intake of breath, he remarked
that it was a beautiful day and then proceeded, without delay, to
discuss the subject closest to his heart--the fertile stretches of the
San Gregorio valley.

Parker squirmed a trifle uneasily.

"As I explained to you this morning, Mr. Okada," he began, "our deal
has become a trifle complicated by reason of the wholly unexpected
return of Mr. Miguel Farrel."

"Very great misfortune," Okada sympathized.  "Very great
disappointment."

Mrs. Parker favored him with a look of violent dislike and departed
abruptly, much to Okada's relief.  Immediately he drew his chair close
to Parker's.

"You zink Mr. Farrel perhaps can raise in one year the money to redeem
property?" he demanded.

"I haven't the slightest information as to his money-raising ability,
other than the information given me by that man Pablo has just locked
up.  If, as Loustalot informed me, Farrel has a judgment against him,
he is extremely liable to raise a hundred thousand or more to-day, what
with funds in bank and about fifteen thousand sheep."

"I zink Farrel not very lucky to-day wiz sheep, Mr. Parker."

"Well, whether he's lucky or not, he has our deal blocked for one year.
I can do nothing now until title to this ranch is actually vested in
me.  I am morally certain Farrel will never redeem the property,
but--well, you realize my predicament, Mr. Okada.  Our deal is
definitely hung up for one year."

"Very great disappointment!" Okada replied sadly.  "Next year, I zink
California legislature make new law so Japanese people have very much
difficulty to buy land.  Attorneys for Japanese Association of
California very much frightened because they know Japanese
treaty-rights not affected by such law.  If my people can buy this
valley before that law comes to make trouble for Japanese people, I
zink very much better for everybody."

"But, my dear Mr. Okada, I cannot make a move until Miguel Farrel fails
to redeem the property at the expiration of the redemption period, one
year hence."

"Perhaps that sheeps-man kill Mr. Farrel," Okada suggested, hopefully.
"I hoping, for sake of Japanese people, that sheeps-man very bad luck
for Mr. Farrel."

"Well, I wouldn't care to have him for an enemy.  However, I dare say
Farrel knows the man well enough and will protect himself accordingly.
By the way, Farrel is violently opposed to Japanese colonization of the
San Gregorio."

"You zink he have prejudice against Japanese people?"

"I know it, Mr. Okada, and, for that reason, and the further reason
that our deal is now definitely hung up for a year, I suggest that you
return to El Toro with me this afternoon.  I am no longer master here,
but I shall be delighted to have you as my guest at the hotel in El
Toro while you are making your investigations of the property.  I wish
to avoid the possibility of embarrassment to you, to Mr. Farrel, and to
my family.  I am sure you understand our position, Mr. Okada."

The potato baron nodded, scowling slightly.

XV

At a point where the road, having left the valley and climbed a grade
to a mesa that gave almost an air-plane view of the San Gregorio,
Miguel Farrel looked back long and earnestly.  For the first time since
entering the car, at Kay Parker's invitation, he spoke.

"It's worth it," he announced, with conviction, "worth a fight to a
finish with whatever weapons come to hand.  If I--  By the holy
poker!  Sheep!  Sheep on the Rancho Palomar!  Thousands of them.  Look!
Over yonder!"

"How beautiful they look against those green and purple and gold
hillsides!" the girl exclaimed.

"Usually a sheep is not beautiful to a cow-man," he reminded her.
"However, if those sheep belong to Loustalot, they constitute the
fairest sight mine eyes have gazed upon to date."

"And who might he be?"

"That shaggy thief I manhandled a few minutes ago.  He's a sheep-man
from the San Carpojo, and for a quarter of a century he has not dared
set foot on the Palomar.  Your father, thinking I was dead and that the
ranch would never be redeemed after foreclosure of the mortgage, leased
the grazing-privilege to Loustalot.  I do not blame him.  I do not
think we have more than five hundred head of cattle on the ranch, and
it would be a shame to waste that fine green feed."  Suddenly the sad
and somber mien induced by his recent grief fled his countenance.  He
turned to her eagerly.  "Miss Parker, if I have any luck worth while
to-day, I think I may win back my ranch."

"I wish you could win it back, Don Mike.  I think we all wish it."

"I hope you all do."  He laughed joyously.  "My dear Miss Parker, this
is the open season on terrible practical jokes.  I'm no judge of sheep
in bulk, but there must be not less than ten thousand over on that
hillside, and if the title to them is vested in André Loustalot to-day,
it will be vested in me about a month from now.  I shall attach them;
they will be sold at pub-lie auction by the sheriff to satisfy in part
my father's old judgment against Loustalot, and I shall bid them
in--cheap.  Nobody in San Marcos County will bid against me, for I can
outbid everybody and acquire the sheep without having to put up a cent
of capital.  Oh, my dear, thoughtful, vengeful old dad!  Dying, he
assigned that judgment to me and had it recorded.  I came across it in
his effects last night.

"What are sheep worth, Don Mike?"

"I haven't the slightest idea, but I should say that by next fall,
those sheep should be worth not less than six dollars a head, including
the wool-clip.  They will begin to lamb in February, and by the time
your father dispossesses me a year hence, the increase will amount to
considerable.  That flock of sheep should be worth about one hundred
thousand dollars by the time I have to leave the Palomar, and I _know_
I'm going to collect at least fifty thousand dollars in cash in
addition."

He drew from his vest pocket a check for that sum, signed by André
Loustalot and drawn in favor of John Parker, Trustee.

"How did you come by that check?" Kay demanded.  "It belongs to my
father, so, if you do not mind, Mr. Farrel, I shall retain it and
deliver it to my father."  Quite deliberately, she folded the check and
thrust it into her hand-bag.  There was a bright spot of color in each
cheek as she faced him, awaiting his explanation.  He favored her with
a Latin shrug.

"Your father will not accept the check, Miss Parker.  Loustalot came to
the hacienda this morning for the sole purpose of handing him this
check, but your father refused to accept it on the plea that the lease
he had entered into with Loustalot for the grazing-privilege of the
ranch was now null and void."

"How do you know all this?  You were not present."

"No; I was not present.  Miss Parker, but--this check is present; those
sheep are present; André Loustalot was present, then absent, and is now
present again.  I deduce the facts in the case.  The information that I
was alive and somewhere around the hacienda gave Loustalot the fright
of his unwashed existence; that's why he appropriated that gray horse
and fled so precipitately when he discovered his automobile had a fiat
tire.  The scoundrel feared to take time to shift wheels."

"Why?"

"He had the promise of a Farrel that a great misfortune would overtake
him if he ever get foot on the Rancho Palomar.  And he knows the tribe
of Farrel."

"But how did you secure possession of that check, Don Mike?"

"Miss Parker, when a hard-boiled, unconvicted murderer and grass-thief
borrows my horse without my permission, and I ride that sort of man
down, upset him, sit on him, and choke him, the instincts of my
ancestors, the custom of the country, common sense, and my late
military training all indicate to me that I should frisk him for deadly
weapons.  I did that.  Well, I found this check when I frisked
Loustalot back yonder.  And--if a poor bankrupt like myself may be
permitted to claim a right, you are not so well entitled to that check
as I am.  At least, I claim it by right of discovery."

"It is worthless until my father endorses it, Don Mike."

"His clear, bold chirography will not add a mite to its value, Miss
Parker.  Checks by André Loustalot on the First National Bank of El
Toro aren't going to be honored for some little time.  Why?  I'll tell
you.  Because Little Mike the Hustler is going to attach his
bank-account this bright April morning."

She laughed happily.

"You haven't wasted much time in vain regret, have you?" she teased
him.  "When you start hustling for a living, you're a man what hustles,
aren't you?"

"'Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty,'" he quoted.  "Those sheep
weren't visible to us from the floor of the valley; so I take it I was
not visible to Loustalot's shepherds from the top of those hills when I
redeemed my father's promise to their employer.  They'd never suspect
the identity of either of us, I dare say.  Well, Pablo will hold him
_incomunicado_ until I've completed my investigations."

"Why are you incarcerating him in your private bastile, Don Mike?"

"Well, I never thought to profane my private bastile with that fellow,
but I have to keep him somewhere while I'm looking up his assets."

"But he may sue you for false imprisonment, kidnapping, or--or
something."

"Yes; and I imagine he'd get a judgment against me.  But what good
would that do him?  I haven't any assets."

"But you're going to acquire some rather soon, are you not?"

"I'll give all my money to my friend, Father Dominic, to do with as he
sees fit.  He'll see fit to loan it all back to me."

"But can you hide ten thousand sheep?"

"If that fellow tries to levy on my sheep, I'll about murder him,"
Farrel declared.  "But we're crossing our bridges before we come to
them."

"So we are, Don Mike.  Tell me all about this ancient feud with André
Loustalot."

"Certainly.  Twenty-five-odd years ago, this county was pestered by a
gang of petty cow-thieves.  They'd run lots of from ten to twenty fat
steers off the range at a time, slaughter them in El Toro, and bury the
hides to conceal the identity of the animals--the brands, you
understand.  The meat they would peddle to butchers in towns along the
railroad line.  The ringleader owned a slaughter-house in El Toro, and,
for a long time, nobody suspected him--the cattle were driven in at
night.  Well, my father grew weary of this form of old-fashioned
profiteering, and it seemed to him that the sheriff of San Marcos
County was too great a simpleton to do anything about it.  So my father
stood for the office as an independent candidate and was elected on a
platform which read, 'No steers' taken off this ranch without
permission in writing from the owner.'  Within six months, dad had half
a dozen of our prominent citizens in San Quentin Penitentiary; then he
resigned the office to his chief deputy, Don Nicolás Sandoval, who has
held it ever since.

"Now, during that political campaign, which was a warm and bitter one,
André Loustalot permitted himself the privilege of libeling my father.
He declared in a public address to a gathering of voters in the San
Carpojo valley that my father was a crook, the real leader of the
rustlers, and merely seeking the office of sheriff in order to protect
the cow-thieves.  When the campaign ended, my father swore to a warrant
charging Loustalot with criminal libel and sued him for one hundred
thousand dollars damages.  A San Marcos County jury awarded my father a
judgment in the sum prayed for.  Loustalot appealed the case to the
Supreme Court, but inasmuch as there wasn't the slightest doubt of his
guilt, the higher court affirmed the decision of the Superior Court.

"Loustalot was a poor man in those days.  He was foreman of a sheep
outfit, with an interest in the increase of the flock, and inasmuch as
these Basques seldom reduce their deals to writing, the sheriff could
never satisfy himself that Loustalot had any assets in the shape of
sheep.  At any rate, the Basque and his employer and all of his Basque
friends denied that Loustalot had any assets.

"For twenty-five years, my father has, whenever the statute of
limitations threatened to kill this judgment, revived it by having
Loustalot up on an order of court to be questioned regarding his
ability to meet the judgment; every once in a while my father would sue
out a new writ of execution, which would be returned unsatisfied by the
sheriff.  Six months ago, my father had the judgment revived by due
legal process, and, for some reason best known to himself, assigned it
to me and had the assignment recorded.  Of course, when I was reported
killed in Siberia, Loustalot's attorneys naturally informed him that my
judgment had died with me unless I had left a will in favor of my
father.  But when my father died intestate and there were no known
heirs, Loustalot doubtless felt that at last the curse had been lifted
and probably began doing business in his own name.  He's a thrifty
fellow and, I dare say, he made a great deal of money on sheep during
the war.  I hope he has.  That old judgment has been accumulating
interest at seven per cent.  for more than a quarter of a century, and
in this state I believe the interest is compounded."

"But why did Loustalot hate your father so?" the girl queried.

"We had good fences on our ranch, but somehow those fences always
needed repairing whenever André Loustalot's flock wandered over from
the San Carpojo.  In this state, one cannot recover for trespass unless
one keeps one's fences in repair--and Loustalot used to trespass on our
range quite frequently and then blame his cussedness on our fences.  Of
course, he broke our fences to let his sheep in to water at our
waterholes, which was very annoying to us, because sheep befoul a range
and destroy it; they eat down to the very grass-roots, and cattle will
not drink at a water-hole patronized by sheep.  Well, our patience was
exhausted at last; so my father told Pablo to put out saltpeter at all
of our water-holes.  Saltpeter is not harmful to cattle but it is death
to sheep, and the only way we could keep Loustalot off our range
without resorting to firearms was to make his visits unprofitable.
They were.  That made Loustalot hate us, and one day, over in the Agua
Caliente basin, when Pablo and his riders found Loustalot and his sheep
there, they rushed about five hundred of his sheep over a rocky bench
and dropped them a sheer two hundred feet into a cañon.  That started
some shooting, and Pablo's brother and my first cousin, Juan Galvez,
were killed.  Loustalot, wounded, escaped on the pack-mule belonging to
his sheep outfit, and after that he and my father didn't speak."

Kay turned in her seat and looked at Farrel curiously.

"If you were not so desperately situated financially," she wanted to
know, "would you continue to pursue this man?"

He smiled grimly.

"Certainly.  My father's honor, the blood of my kinsman, and the blood
of a faithful servant call for justice, however long delayed.  Also,
the honor of my state demands it now.  I am prepared to make any
sacrifice, even of my life, and grasp eagerly at all legal means--to
prevent your father putting through tins monstrous deal with Okada."

She was troubled of soul.

"Of course," she pleaded presently, "you'll play the game with dad as
fairly as he plays it with you."

"I shall play the game with him as fairly as he plays it with this land
to which he owes allegiance," he corrected her sternly.

XVI

It was eleven o'clock when the car rolled down the main street of El
Toro.  From the sidewalk, sundry citizens, of diverse shades of color and
conditions of servitude, observing Minuet Farrel, halted abruptly and
stared as if seeing a ghost.  Don Mike wanted to shout to them glad words
of greeting, of affectionate badinage, after the fashion of that
easy-going and democratic community, but he feared to make the girl at
his side conspicuous; so he contented himself by uncovering gravely to
the women and waving debonairly to the men.  This constituting ocular
evidence that he was not a ghost or a man who bore a striking physical
resemblance to one they mourned as dead, the men so saluted returned his
greeting.

The few who had recognized him as he entered the town, quickly, by their
cries of greeting, roused the loungers and idle conversationalists along
the sidewalks further down the street.  There was a rush to shop doors, a
craning of necks, excited inquiries in Spanish and English; more shouts
of greeting.  A gaunt, hawk-faced elderly man, with Castilian features,
rode up on a bay horse, showed a sheriff's badge to William, the
chauffeur, and informed him he was arrested for speeding.  Then he
pressed his horse close enough to extend a hand to Farrel.

"Miguel, my boy," he said in English, out of deference to the girl in the
car, "this is a very great--a very unexpected joy.  We have grieved for
you, my friend."

His faint clipped accent, the tears in his eyes, told Kay that this man
was one of Don Miguel's own people.  Farrel clasped the proffered hand
and replied to him in Spanish; then, remembering his manners, he
presented the horseman as Don Nicolás Sandoval, sheriff of the county.
Don Nicolás bent low over his horse's neck, his wide gray hat clasped to
his gallant heart.

"You will forgive the emotion of a foolish old man, Miss Parker," he
said, "but we of San Marcos County love this boy."

Other friends now came running; in a few minutes perhaps a hundred men,
boys, and women had surrounded the car, struggling to get closer, vying
with each other to greet the hero of the San Gregorio.  They babbled
compliments and jocularities at him; they cheered him lustily; with
homely bucolic wit they jeered his army record because they were so proud
of it, and finally they began a concerted cry of; "Speech!  Speech!
Speech!"

Don Mike stood up in the tonneau and removed his hat.  Instantly silence
settled over the crowd, and Kay thought that she had never seen a more
perfect tribute of respect paid anyone.  He spoke to them briefly, with a
depth of sentiment only possible in a descendant of two of the most
sentimental races on earth; but he was not maudlin.  When he had
concluded his remarks, he repeated them in Spanish for the benefit of
those who had never learned English very well or at all.

And now, although Kay did not understand a word of what he said, she
realized that in his mother tongue he was infinitely more tender, more
touching, more dramatic than he could possibly be in English, for his
audience wagged approving' heads now and paid him the tribute of many a
furtive tear.

Don Nicolás Sandoval rode his horse through the crowd presently and
opened a path for the car.

"I'm afraid this has been a trifle embarrassing for you, Miss Parker,"
Farrel remarked, as they proceeded down the street.  "I shall not
recognize any more of them.  I've greeted them all in general, and some
day next week I'll come to town and greet them in detail.  They were all
glad I came back, though, weren't they?" he added, with a boy's
eagerness.  "Lord, but I was glad to see them!"

"I can hardly believe you are the same man I saw manhandling your enemy
an hour ago," she declared.

"Oh," he replied, with a careless shrug, "fighting and loving are the
only two worth-while things in life.  Park in front of the court-house,
William, please."

He excused himself to Kay and ran lightly up the steps.  Fifteen minutes
later, he returned.

"I have a writ of execution," he declared.  "Now to find the sheriff and
have him serve it."

They located Don Nicolás Sandoval at the post-office, one leg cocked over
the pommel of his saddle, and the El Toro _Sentinel_ spread on his knee.

"Father's old business with the Basque, Don Nicolás," Farrel informed
him.  "He has money deposited in his own name in the First National Bank
of El Toro."

"I have grown old hunting that fellow's assets, Miguel, my boy," quoth
Don Nicolás.  "If I can levy on a healthy bank-account, I shall feel that
my life has not been lived in vain."

He folded his newspaper, uncoiled his leg from the pommel, and started up
the street at the dignified fast walk he had taught his mount.  Farrel
returned to the car and, with Kay, arrived before the portals of the bank
a few minutes in advance of the sheriff, just in time to see Andre
Loustalot leap from his automobile, dash up the broad stone steps, and
fairly hurl himself into the bank.

"I don't know whether I ought to permit him to withdraw his money and
have Don Nicolás attach it on his person or not.  Perhaps that would be
dangerous," Miguel remarked.  He stepped calmly out of the car, assisted
Kay to alight, and, with equal deliberation, entered the bank with the
girl.

"Now for some fun," he whispered.  "Behold the meanest man in
America--myself!"

Loustalot was at the customers' desk writing a check to cash for his
entire balance in bank.  Farrel permitted him to complete the drawing of
the check, watched the Basque almost trot toward the paying-teller's
window, and as swiftly trotted after him.

"All--everything!" Loustalot panted, and reached over the shoulders of
two customers in line ahead of him.  But Don Miguel Farrel's arm was
stretched forth also; his long brown fingers closed over the check and
snatched it from the Basque's hand as he murmured soothingly:

"You will have to await your turn, Loustalot.  For your bad manners, I
shall destroy this check."  And he tore the signature off and crumpled
the little slip of paper into a ball, which he flipped into Loustalot's
brutal face.

The Basque stood staring at him, inarticulate with fury; Don Mike faced
his enemy with a bantering, prescient little smile.  Then, with a great
sigh that was in reality a sob, Loustalot abandoned his primal impulse to
hurl himself upon Farrel and attempt to throttle; instead, he ran back to
the customers' desk and started scribbling another check.  Thereupon, the
impish Farrel removed the ink, and when Loustalot moved to another
ink-well, Farrel's hand closed over that.  Helpless and desperate,
Loustalot suddenly began to weep; uttering peculiar mewing cries, he
clutched at Farrel with the fury of a gorilla.  Don Mike merely dodged
round the desk, and continued to dodge until out of the tail of his eye,
he saw the sheriff enter the bank and stop at the cashier's desk.
Loustalot, blinded with tears of rage, failed to see Don Nicolás; he had
vision only for Don Mike, whom he was still pursuing round the customers'
desk.

The instant Don Nicolás served his writ of attachment, the cashier left
his desk, walked round in back of the various tellers' cages, and handed
the writ to the paying teller; whereupon Farrel, pretending to be
frightened, ran out of the bank.  Instantly, Loustalot wrote his check
and rushed again to the paying-tellers window.

"Too late, Mr. Loustalot.  Your account has been attached," that
functionary informed him.

Meanwhile, Don Nicolás had joined his friend on the sidewalk.

"Here is his automobile, Don Nicolás," Farrel said.  "I think we had
better take it away from him."

Don Nicolás climbed calmly into the driver's seat, filled out a blank
notice of attachment under that certain duly authorized writ which his
old friend's son had handed him, and waited until Loustalot came
dejectedly down the bank steps to the side of the car; whereupon Don
Nicolás served him with the fatal document, stepped on the starter, and
departed for the county garage, where the car would be stored until sold
at auction.

"Who let you out of my calaboose, Loustalot?" Don Mike queried amiably.

"That high-toned Jap friend of Parker's," the Basque replied, with
malicious enjoyment.

"I'm glad it wasn't Mr. Parker.  Well, you stayed there long enough to
serve my purpose.  By the way, your sheep are trespassing again."

"They aren't my sheep."

"Well, if you'll read that document, you'll see that all the sheep on the
Rancho Palomar at this date are attached, whether they belong to you or
not.  Now, a word of warning to you, Loustalot: Do not come on the Rancho
Palomar for any purpose whatsoever.  Understand ?"

Loustalot's glance met his unflinchingly for fully ten seconds, and, in
that glance, Kay thought she detected something tigerish.

"Home, William," she ordered the driver, and they departed from El Toro,
leaving Andre Loustalot standing on the sidewalk staring balefully after
them.

They were half-way home before Don Mike came out of the reverie into
which that glance of Loustalot's had, apparently, plunged him.

"Some day very soon," he said, "I shall have to kill that man or be
killed.  And I'm sorry my guest, Mr. Okada, felt it incumbent upon
himself to interfere.  If, between them, they have hurt Pablo, I shall
certainly reduce the extremely erroneous Japanese census records in
California by one."

XVII

John Parker and his wife, with the unsuspecting Okada, were lingering
over a late luncheon when Kay and Don Mike entered the dining-room.

"Well, you bold Spanish cavalier, what do you mean by running away with
my little girl?" Mrs. Parker demanded.

Before Farrel could reply, Kay answered for him.

"We've had quite a wild and woolly Western adventure, mother dear.
Have you seen Pablo since we left together?"

"I have," the lady replied.  "He had Monsieur Loustalot in charge, and
related to us the details of the adventure up to the moment you and Mr.
Farrel left him with the prisoner while you two continued on to El
Toro.  What happened in El Toro?"

"Don Mike succeeded in attaching Loustalot's bank-account," Kay
informed the company.  "The loot will probably amount to something over
fifty thousand dollars."

"I should say that isn't a half-bad stipend to draw for your first
half-day pursuit of the nimble cart-wheel of commerce," Parker
suggested.

Mrs. Parker pursed her lips comically.

"The boy is clever, John.  I knew it the moment I met him this morning.
Felicitations, Don Miguel.  John intends to strip you down to your
birthday suit--fairly, of course--so keep up the good work, and
everything may still turn out right for you.  I'll cheer for you, at
any rate."

"Thank you, dear Mrs. Parker."  Don Miguel slipped into his seat at the
head of the table.  "I have also attached Loustalot's new automobile,"

"You Shylock!  What else?" Mrs. Parker demanded eagerly.

"About ten thousand sheep, more or less.  I attached these on
suspicion, although the burden of proving that Loustalot owns them will
be upon me.  However," he concluded, with a bright glance at Parker, "I
believe that can readily be accomplished--with your aid."

"I shall be the poorest witness in the world, Mr. Farrel."

"Well, I shall see to it, Mr. Parker, that you are given an opportunity
to tell the judge of the Superior Court in El Toro why Loustalot called
on you this morning, why a great band of sheep is trespassing on the
Rancho Palomar, why Loustalot drew a check in your favor for fifty
thousand dollars, why you declined to take it, what you said to
Loustalot this morning to cause him to steal one of my horses in his
anxiety to get off the ranch, why your attorneys drew up a certain
lease of the grazing-privilege to Loustalot, and why the deal fell
through."

Parker flushed.

"Can you produce that fifty-thousand-dollar check?  I happen to know it
has not been cashed."

"No, I cannot, Mr. Parker."

Kay opened her purse and tossed the check across to her father.

"It was drawn in your favor, dad," she informed him; "so I concluded it
was your property, and when Mr. Farrel came by it--ah, illegally--and
showed it to me, I retained it."

"Good girl!  Mr. Farrel, have you any objection to my returning this
check?"

"Not the slightest.  It has served its purpose.  However, you will have
to wait until you meet Loustalot somewhere outside the boundaries of
the Rancho Palomar, sir.  I had comforted myself with the thought that
he was safe under lock and key here, but, to my vast surprise, I met
him in the bank at El Toro making futile efforts to withdraw his cash
before I could attach the account.  The confounded ingrate informs me
that Mr. Okada turned him loose."

There was no mistaking the disapproval in the glance which Parker
turned upon Okada.

"Is this true, Mr. Okada?"

"It is not true," Okada replied promptly.  "I know nozzing about.
Nozzing."

"Well, Pablo thinks it is true, Mr. Okada."  Don Miguel's voice was
unruffled, his manner almost benignant.  "The old man is outside, and
absolutely broken-hearted.  His honor appears to be quite gone.  I
imagine," Don Mike continued, with a fleeting and whimsical glance at
the potato baron, "that he has evolved some primitive plan for making
his honor whole again.  Direct methods always did appeal to Pablo."

"Mr. Farrel," John Parker began, "I regret this incident more than I
can say.  I give you my word of honor I had nothing to do with it
directly or indirectly--"

"John, for goodness' sake, old dear, give Mr. Farrel credit for some
common sense.  He knows very well you wouldn't break bread with him and
then betray him.  Don't you, Mr. Farrel?" Mrs. Parker pleaded.

"Of course, Mr. Parker's assurance is wholly unnecessary, Mrs. Parker."

"Mr. Okada is leaving this afternoon," Parker hastened to assure him.

"Mr. Okada shows commendable prudence."  Don Mike's tones were
exceedingly dry.

Okada rose and bowed his squinch-owl bow.

"I very sorry," he sputtered.  "I zink that man Pablo one big liar.
'Scuse, please; I go."

"If he hadn't called Pablo a liar," Don Mike murmured plaintively, "I
should have permitted him to march out with the honors of war.  As the
matter stands now, however, I invite all of you to listen attentively.
In a few minutes you're going to hear something that will remind you of
the distant whine of a sawmill.  After all, Pablo is a poor old fellow
who lives a singularly humdrum existence."

"Ah, yes; let the poor fellow have his simple little pleasures," Mrs.
Parker pleaded.  "'All work and no play'--you know, Don Miguel."

"My dear," Parker answered testily, "there are occasions when your
sense of humor is positively oppressive."

"Very well, John; I'll be serious."  His wife turned to Farrel.  "Mr.
Farrel," she continued, "while you were away, I had a very bright idea.
You are much too few in the family for such a large house, and it
occurred to me that you might care to lease the Palomar hacienda to us
for a year.  I'm so weary of hotels and equally weary of a town house,
with its social obligations and the insolence of servants--particularly
cooks.  John needs a year here, and we would so like to remain if it
could be arranged.  Your cook, Carolina, is not the sort that leaves
one's employ in the middle of a dinner-party."

"Would five hundred dollars a month for the house and the use of
Carolina and three saddle-horses interest you, Mr. Farrel?  From our
conversation of this morning, I judge you have abandoned hope of
redeeming the property, and during the year of the redemption period,
six thousand dollars might--ah--er--"

"Well, it would be better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick,"
Don Miguel replied genially.  "I need the money; so I accept--but with
certain reservations.  I like Carolina's cooking, too; I have a couple
of hundred head of cattle to look after, and I'd like to reserve one
room, my place at this table, and my position as master of Palomar.  Of
course, I'm not so optimistic as to think you folks would accept of my
hospitality for a year, so I suggest that you become what our British
cousins call 'paying guests,' albeit I had never expected to fall low
enough to make such a dastardly proposition.  Really, it abases me.
It's never been done before in this house."

"I declare you're the most comfortable young man to have around that I
have ever known.  Isn't he, Kay?" Mrs. Parker declared.

"I think you're very kind," the girl assured him.  "And I think it will
be very delightful to be paying guests to such a host, Don Mike Farrel."

"Then it's settled," Parker announced, much relieved.

"And let us here highly resolve that we shall always be good friends
and dwell together in peace," Kay suggested.

"I made that resolve when you met me at the gate last night, Miss
Parker.  Hark!  Methinks I hear a young riot.  Well, we cannot possibly
have any interest in it, and, besides, we're talking business now.  Mr.
Parker, there isn't the slightest hope of my earning sufficient money
to pay the mortgage you hold against this ranch of mine, so I have
resolved to gamble for it whenever and wherever I can.  You have agreed
to pay me six thousand dollars, in return for which I guarantee to feed
you and your family and servants well, and house you comfortably and
furnish three saddle-horses, with saddles and bridles, for a period of
one year.  Understand?"

"Understood."

Don Miguel Farrel took two dice out of his pocket and cuddled them in
his palm.

"I'll roll you the bones, one flop, twelve thousand dollars or nothing,
sir," he challenged.