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IMON timed his arrival at the ranch for the theatrical effect that the simplest peon appreciates and introduces in the common transactions of life. It is this appreciation of the dramatic that makes political upheavals and armed revolutions so popular among the Mexican people, and from this very reason that so many of them turn out small and farcical affairs. The gravity of serious business seldom lies behind them; the passing sensation is sought, rather than the lasting effect.

It seemed that a fiesta must be going forward at Helena Sprague's place that morning. Although the sun was not yet up, and the morning was cool almost to chilliness, vestiges of the night fog still trailing across the hills, the working people of the ranch appeared to be all astir, together with the men who had come with Don Abrahan, all dressed in white shirts and holiday gear.

Some notable must have arrived, grander than Don Abrahan, Simon concluded, seeing a few green uniforms of soldiers mingled with the little crowd of household people. It was a firie setting for a man of valor to make his dramatic entrance, his prisoner bound to the back of the horse that he drove ahead of him.