him
chained in a room fronting the plaza that he might see you enter
Soledad with honors."

"Ramon Rotil did that?" she mused, looking at the note thoughtfully,
"and he gives to me the evidence against Jose? Senor, in the Perez
lands we hear only evil things and very different things about Rotil.
They would say this paper was for sale, but not for a gift. And--he
gives it to me!"

Kit also remembered different things and evil things told of Rotil,
but they were not for discussion with a lady. He had wondered a bit
that it was not the padre who was given the message to transmit, yet
suddenly he realized that even the padre might have tried to make it a
question of barter, for the padre wanted help for his priestly office
in the saving of Perez' soul, and incidentally of his life.

"Yes, senora, it seems a free-will offering, and he said to tell you
it would be in the room adjoining this that Perez would be questioned
as to the war material. Rotil's men have searched, and his officers
have questioned, but Perez evidently thinks Rotil will not execute
him, as a ransom will pay much better."

"That is true, death pays no one--no one!"

Her voice was weighted with sadness, and Kit wondered what the cloud
was under which she lived. The padre evidently knew, but none of
Rotil's men. It could not be the mere irregularity of her life with
Perez, for to the peon mind she was the great lady of a great
hacienda, and wife of the padrone. No,--he realized that the sin of
Dona Jocasta had been a different thing, and that the shadow of it
enveloped her as a dark cloak of silence.

"It is true, senora, that death pays no one, except that the death of
one man may save other lives more valuable. That often happens,"
remarked Kit, with the idea of distracting her from her own woe,
whatever it was. "It might have seemed a crime if one of his nurses
had chucked a double dose of laudanum into Bill Hohenzollern's baby
feed, but that nurse would have saved the lives of hundreds of
thousands of innocents, so you never can tell whether a murderer is a
devil, or a man doing work of the angels."

"Bill?" Evidently the name was a new one to Dona Jocasta.

"That's the name of the Prussian pirate of the Huns across the water.
Your friend Conrad belongs to them."

"My friend! My _friend_, senor!" and Dona Jocasta was on her feet,
white and furious, her eyes flaming hatred. Kit Rhodes was appalled at
the spirit he had carelessly wakened. He