ay in that little cloud of dust."

"Frank!"

"Yes, professor."

"We should follow him, and bring him back to his dying partner."

"And leave Jack Burk here alone--possibly to die alone?"

"We can't do that."

"Of course not."

"What then?"

"We'll have to consider the matter. But Burk---- Look--see there,
professor! He is flat on his face in the doorway! He fell like that
after trying to shout to his partner."

Frank leaped forward, and turned the man on his back. It was a drawn,
ghastly face that the trio gazed down upon.

Professor Scotch quickly knelt beside the motionless form, feeling for
the pulse, and then shaking his head gravely.

"What is it?" anxiously asked Frank. "Has he----"

He was silent at a motion from the professor, who bent to listen for
some movement of the man's heart.

After a few seconds, Professor Scotch straightened up, and solemnly
declared:

"This is the end for him. We can do nothing more."

"He is dead?"

"Yes."

There was an awed hush.

"Now we can leave him," the professor finally said. "Pacheco, the
bandit, cannot harm him now."

They lifted the body and bore it back to the wretched bed of straw, on
which they tenderly placed it.

"The idol--the golden image?" said the professor. "You must not forget
that, Frank. You have it?"

"Little danger that I shall forget it. It is here, where it fell from my
fingers as I ran out."

He picked up the image, and placed it in one of his pockets.

Then, having covered the face of Jack Burk with his handkerchief, Frank
led the way from the hut.

Their horses had been tethered near at hand, and they were soon mounted
and riding away toward Mendoza.

The sun beat down hotly on the plain of white sand, and the sky was of a
bright blue, such as Frank had never seen elsewhere.

Outside Mendoza was a narrow canal, but a few feet in width, and half
filled with water, from which rose little whiffs of hot steam.

Along the side of the canal was a staggering rude stone wall, fringed
with bushes in strips and clumps.

Beyond the canal, which fixed the boundary of the plain of sand, through
vistas of tree trunks, could be seen glimpses of brown fields, fading
away into pale pink, violet, and green.

The dome and towers of a church rose against the dim blue; low down, and
on every side were spots of cream-white, red, and yellow, with patches
of dark green intervening, revealing bits of the town, with orange
groves all about.