LITMIR.BIZ

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if needed."

      "Thanks; no news?"

      "None. Who could have given us any?"

      "That is true; and have you not met your friend Marksman?"

      "No."

      "¡Cuerpo de Cristo! That is annoying; for, if my presentiment do not deceive me, we shall soon have to play at knives."

      "We will do so."

      "I know it, Brighteye. I have long been acquainted with your courage; but you, Ruperto your comrade, and myself, are only three men, after all."

      "What matter?"

      "What matter? you say, when we shall have to fight thirty or forty hardened hunters! On my word, Brighteye, you will drive me mad with your notions. You doubt about nothing; but remember, that this time we have not to contend against badly-armed Indians, but white men, thorough game for the galleys, who will die without yielding an inch, and to whom we must inevitably succumb."

      "That is true; I did not think of that; they are numerous."

      "If we fall, what will become of her?"

      "Good, good," the hunter said, with a shake of his head. "I repeat to you that I did not think of that."

      "You see, then, that it is indispensable for us to come to an understanding with Marksman and the men he may have at his disposal."

      "Yes; but where are you going to find in the desert the trail of a man like Marksman? Who knows where he is at this moment? He may be within gunshot of us, or five hundred miles off."

      "It is enough to drive me mad."

      "The fact is, that the position is grave. Are you, at least, sure this time that you are not mistaken, but are in the right trail?"

      "I cannot say with certainty, though everything leads me to suppose that I am not mistaken. However, I shall soon know what I have to depend on."

      "Besides, it is the same trail we have followed ever since leaving Monterey; the chances are it is they."

      "What do we resolve on?"

      "Hang it! I do not know what to say!"

      "On my word, you are a most heart breaking fellow! What! cannot you suggest any way?"

      "I must have a certainty, and then, as you said yourself, it would be madness for us thus to try a sudden attack."

      "You are right. I will return to the camp; tomorrow night we will meet again, and I shall be very unlucky if this time I do not discover what it is so important for us all to know. Do you, in the meanwhile, ransack the prairie in every direction, and, if possible, bring me news of Marksman."

      "The recommendation is unnecessary. I shall not be idle."

      Don Stefano seized the old hunter's hand, and pressed it between his own.

      "Brighteye," he said to him, with considerable emotion,

      "I will not speak of our old friendship, nor of the services which I have been several times so fortunate as to render you; I will only repeat, and I know it will be sufficient for you, that the happiness of my whole life depends on the success of our expedition."

      "Good, good; have confidence in me, Don José. I am too old to change my friends; I do not know who is right or wrong in this business; I wish that justice may be on your side; but that does not affect me. Whatever may happen, I will be a good and faithful companion to you."

      "Thanks, my old friend. Tomorrow night, then."

      After uttering these few words, Don Stefano, or, at least, the man who called himself so, made a move as if to withdraw; but Brighteye stopped him, with a sudden gesture.

      "What is the matter?" the stranger asked.

      The hunter laid a forefinger on his mouth, to recommend silence, and turned to Ruperto, who had remained silent and apathetic during the interview.

      "Coyote," he said to him, in a low voice.

      Without replying, Ruperto bounded like a jaguar, and disappeared in a clump of cottonwood trees, which was a short distance off. After a few moments, the two men who had remained, with their bodies bent forward in the attitude of listeners, without uttering a syllable, heard a rustling of leaves, a noise of broken branches, followed by the fall of a heavy body on the ground, and after that nothing. Almost immediately the cry of the owl rose in the night air.

      "Ruperto calls us," Brighteye then said, "all is over

      "What has happened?" Don Stefano asked anxiously.

      "Less than nothing," the hunter replied, making him a sign to follow. "You had a spy at your heels; that is all."

      "A spy?"

      "By Jove! you shall see."

      "Oh, oh! that is serious."

      "Less than you suppose, as we have him."

      "In that case, though, we must kill the man."

      "Who knows? That will probably depend on the explanation we may have with him. At any rate, there is no great harm in crushing such vipers."

      While speaking thus, Brighteye and his companion had entered the thicket. Domingo, thrown down, and tightly garotted by means of Ruperto's reata, was vainly struggling to break the bonds that cut into, his flesh. Ruperto, with his hands resting on the muzzle of his rifle, was listening with a grin, but no other reply, to the flood of insults and recriminations which rage drew from the half-breed.

      "¡Dios me ampare!" the latter shouted, writhing like a viper. "¡Verdugo del Demonio! Is this the way to behave between gente de razón? Am I a Redskin, to be tied like a plug of tobacco, and have my limbs fettered like a calf that is being taken to the shambles? If ever you fall into my hands, accursed dog! you shall pay for the trick you have played me."

      "Instead of threatening, my good man," Brighteye interposed, "it seems to me you would do better by frankly allowing that you are in our power, and acting in accordance."

      The bandit sharply turned his head, the only part of his person at liberty, toward the hunter.

      "What right have you to call me good man, and give me advice, old trapper of muskrats?" he said to him, irritably. "Are you white men or Indians, to treat a hunter thus?"

      "If, instead of hearing what did not concern you, Señor Domingo, for I believe that is your name," Don Stefano said, with a cunning look, "you had remained quietly asleep in your camp, the little annoyance of which you complain would not have occurred."

      "I am bound to recognize the justice of your reasoning," the bandit replied ironically; "but, hang it! what would you have? I have ever suffered from a mania of trying to find out what people sought to hide from me."

      The stranger looked at him suspiciously.

      "And have you had the mania long, my good friend?" he asked him.

      "Since my earliest youth," he answered, with effrontery.

      "Only think of that! Then you must have learned a good many things?"

      "An enormous quantity, worthy sir."

      Don Stefano turned to Brighteye.

      "My friend," he said to him, "just unloosen this man's bonds a little. There is much to be gained in his company; I wish to enjoy his conversation for a little while."

      The hunter silently executed the orders he received. The bandit uttered a sigh of satisfaction at finding himself more at his ease, and sat up.

      "¡Cuerpo de Cristo!" he exclaimed, with a mocking accent. "The position is now, at any rate, bearable. We can talk."

      "I think so."

      "My faith! yes. I am quite at your service, for anything you please, Excellency."

      "I will profit by your complaisance."

      "Profit by it! profit by it, Excellency? I can only gain in talking with you."

      "Do you believe so?"

      "I am convinced of it."

      "Indeed,

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