a opened the door. He was a small man, somewhat stout, with
a smooth and shiny face. He wore a frock coat that was rather dirty,
slippers, and an old yachting cap of blue cloth, with a broken leather
vizor. He was smoking a cheap cigar, very fat and black.

But instantly he recognised Vanamee. His face went all alight with
pleasure and astonishment. It seemed as if he would never have finished
shaking both his hands; and, as it was, he released but one of them,
patting him affectionately on the shoulder with the other. He was
voluble in his welcome, talking partly in Spanish, partly in English. So
he had come back again, this great fellow, tanned as an Indian, lean as
an Indian, with an Indian's long, black hair. But he had not changed,
not in the very least. His beard had not grown an inch. Aha! The rascal,
never to give warning, to drop down, as it were, from out the sky. Such
a hermit! To live in the desert! A veritable Saint Jerome. Did a lion
feed him down there in Arizona, or was it a raven, like Elijah? The good
God had not fattened him, at any rate, and, apropos, he was just about
to dine himself. He had made a salad from his own lettuce. The two would
dine with him, eh? For this, my son, that was lost is found again.

But Presley excused himself. Instinctively, he felt that Sarria and
Vanamee wanted to talk of things concerning which he was an outsider. It
was not at all unlikely that Vanamee would spend half the night before
the high altar in the church.

He took himself away, his mind still busy with Vanamee's extraordinary
life and character. But, as he descended the hill, he was startled by
a prolonged and raucous cry, discordant, very harsh, thrice repeated at
exact intervals, and, looking up, he saw one of Father Sarria's peacocks
balancing himself upon the topmost wire of the fence, his long tail
trailing, his neck outstretched, filling the air with his stupid outcry,
for no reason than the desire to make a noise.

About an hour later, toward four in the afternoon, Presley reached the
spring at the head of the little canyon in the northeast corner of the
Quien Sabe ranch, the point toward which he had been travelling since
early in the forenoon. The place was not without its charm. Innumerable
live-oaks overhung the canyon, and Broderson Creek--there a mere
rivulet, running down from the spring--gave a certain coolness to the
air. It was one of the few spots thereabouts that had survived the
dry seaso