had put into that pocket two weeks before.

As he held it in his hands Marguerite Delarue came running over the
hill. Her sunbonnet hung by its strings around her neck, her hair had
come down and was streaming over her shoulders, her dress hung in rags
and tatters, and she was panting and almost breathless. She had
hurried on behind Mead as rapidly as she could walk, until she heard
the first pistol shot. Then, fearful of trouble, she had run as fast
as possible, stopping at nothing, her anxiety giving speed to her feet
and endurance to her muscles.

The look of savage triumph on Mead's face made her shrink back for an
instant, awed and frightened. But her comprehension quickly took in
what had happened and her heart rose in sympathetic exultation.

"You are just in time," said Mead, "and I'm mighty glad. I'll have to
ask you to sit on this man's chest and hold him down while I tie him
fast to that mesquite."

Marguerite sat down on the Mexican's breast while Mead tied his wrists
tightly together and then began fastening them to the stocky stem of
the bush beside which he had fallen. Antone struggled and tried to
throw her off, and Mead said:

"I think, Miss Delarue, you'd better put your thumbs on his windpipe
and press a little, just to keep him from fighting too hard. We've got
no time to waste on him."

Marguerite gasped and hesitated, but her eye fell on little Paul's
unconscious figure, and she did as he asked her.

"There," said Mead. "Now get up and jump quickly away."

The prostrate Mexican struggled and rolled about, but he could not
rise. Marguerite ran to the child and with her ear to his breast she
called to Mead.

"His heart is beating! He is still alive!"

Mead caught Antone's horse, and with Marguerite behind him and the
child on one arm started off on the gallop. A long, straggling line of
searchers stretched across the mesa, the nearest at least four miles
away. As Mead came nearer he dropped the bridle on the horse's neck
and waved his hat and shouted again and again. At last he attracted
the attention of the nearest ones, and two or three came running
toward him. "Water! Water!" he called, at the top of his voice. They
understood, and one ran back to the nearest horseman, who galloped off
to a group of people still farther away.

Almost instantly the great throng, like a huge organism, animated by
one thought, started off across the mesa toward the galloping horse,
every atom in it mo