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 so broad at the bottoms as to almost hide his feet, strapped beneath his insteps and fastened with silver buckles. He evidently had been in the saddle a long time.

"You are late on the road," said Dominguez.

"It is a habit with me," the other replied.

"Will you sit at the table, gentleman?" Dominguez put his obligation as host above the affront this coarse fellow offered himself, his family and his guests. He placed a chair beside Juan Molinero, inviting with graceful cordiality the visitor to sit to his refreshment.

"A man doesn't sit down to the business I have come for, Dominguez," the stranger replied. He snatched a pistol, with the quick movement of a man aroused to sudden passion, and presented it at Dominguez' breast. "Steady, Dominguez! One little movement and you are with the dead. So, you have not met Sebastian Alvitre? Have a good look at him, then, so you can tell the next slipfoot priest that comes to your door the color of his eyes."

Dominguez stood with shoulders squared, head erect, a little paler for the menace of the pistol, but in dignity greater than his fear.

"Alvitre, you are a coward, then, as well as a thief, to enter a man's house on this false pretense," Dominguez said.

"That will be enough, little man!" Alvitre warned, his scowl black in the threat of death. "No, sit in the chair, your hands on the table, boy,"