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 lieve, that Sebastian Alvitre, the bandit, will come again tonight," Padre Mateo answered.

"In the hope?" Gertrudis repeated, incredible that she had understood.

"He is dissatisfied with the fiasco we made of it when he left Alvitre in our hands for a moment," Padre Mateo replied, a little laugh at his own disgrace in his words. "Yes, if Alvitre shows his head tonight it will be a long time before he runs away again."

She would have from Padre Mateo's tongue the story of Juan Molinero, of his coming to the kitchen door at San Fernando in the night, clothed in the skins of wild beasts, bearded like a patriarch, his long hair on his shoulders. She exclaimed in resentful wonder to hear that his life was forfeit under the king's decree which closed California to foreign feet; she protested like a defender of the oppressed when told of Captain del Valle's demand for his surrender on the charge that he was a spy.

"What romance! what a figure for romantic adventure! He is like Alvarado of the Noche Triste, another gallant gentleman with golden hair."

Her ardent sympathy, expressed in voice tuneful on the ear as the scented breeze was pleasant to breathe, was sweet in the ears of Padre Mateo. As for Guillermo, his father's disappointment in this young woman was not his own. Guillermo's thoughts were with his desires, and they were not in the patio that night. There was another, perhaps thought unworthy for a son of a family, with slow