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 one hand on his hip, his bridle reins held high in the other.

"Who sent you?" Roberto demanded with all the sternness of his privileged class.

"A man with fingers on his hands, and money in them to pay for what he wanted. That's enough for me to know; it will have to be enough for you."

"Where do you come from? impertinent scoundrel!"

"Have you heard of Monterey, little man?" the vaquero asked, patronizingly insolent, as a free man who knows his strength and despises that of another. "Well then, I come from Monterey. I bring letters for the young lady. Whether they are from a lover, that is another thing. Now let go my bridle— permit me."

The vaquero leaned as he spoke, laying hold of Roberto's wrist to remove his hand from the rein. His cool insolence, his impertinent disregard of any force that his challenger might use to prevent his going, seemed to Roberto a mighty insult to his new manhood, as it doubtless was intended to be.

"Get down!" Roberto commanded, presenting his pistol at the rider's ribs.

"Presently—at the lady's door," the messenger replied, his teeth white in the moonlight as he laughed.

With the words he set spur to his horse, waking in the agany of the cruel thrust the spirit that