Page:The Road to Monterey (1925).pdf/179

 Strong hands, large for a woman, Don Abrahan made note; hands that might drive a dagger into a man's heart. Her head was bent slightly. If her heart went faster for any threat in Don Abrahan's manner, her face did not reveal it. Don Abrahan watched the thin nostrils for a betraying tremor, the calm forehead for the drawing of the brows. She remained as placid outwardly as unshaken water.

"The fact of your disloyal conduct to your country has not been published yet, Helena," Don Abrahan resumed. "Fortunately, it was not necessary to reveal to the military authorities anything that implicated or involved you in order to secure the conviction of Toberman, renegade traitor, thing of the vilest!"

"He was not a traitor," Helena denied, flashing under the charge against her dead friend, surprising Don Abrahan mightily. He had looked to see her subdued to a woman's place by this. "All he worked for, all I helped him in, was for peaceful annexation to the United States."

"It is treason, even in time of peace," Don Abrahan corrected her, magisterial, severe. "Put a guard on your tongue, Helena. Such speech in the hearing of others would lead to something that I might not be able to stop."

"It was a savage deed of personal vengeance, Don Abrahan, against a man you would not have dared to face," she said.

"We will not open again what we have discussed