said aloud, "and this must be it."
Campaigner in an unfamiliar country, he had informed himself, and it was
with confidence that he led his little party into the bridlepath. But he
looked anxiously at the forest behind. He did not doubt but that
Rodrigo, if it were he back there, would terrify Murguia into betraying
their destination, or their supposed destination, which was Valles.

"Can't you hurry 'em up a bit?" he called back.

"We do try," protested Jacqueline, holding aloft a broken switch, "but
they only smile at us."

Driscoll got down and undid the spurs from his boots. One of the immense
saw-like discs he adjusted to mademoiselle's high heel, passing the
strap twice around the silk-clad ankle. Jacqueline gazed down on the
short-cropped, curly head, and she saw that the back of his neck was
suddenly red. But the discovery awakened nothing of the coquette in her.
Quite the contrary, there was something grateful, even gravely maternal,
in the smile hovering on her lips for the rough trooper who took fright
like a girl over a revealed instep. Still, the interest was not
altogether maternal as she watched him doing the same service for
Berthe. Perhaps he was too far away, or perhaps practice brought
indifference, but at any rate, his neck was no longer tinged in that
fiery way.

"Now dig 'em!" said he. "We want to make that clump of mesquite yonder,
now pretty quick."

The trees he pointed to were two or three miles away, but the travelers
covered the distance at an easy lope. Driscoll kept an eye on the road
they had just left, and once hidden by the mesquite he called a halt. As
he expected, a number of horsemen appeared at a trot from the direction
of the forest. They did not pause at the cross trail, however, but kept
to the highway in the direction of Valles. The American and the two
girls could now safely continue their journey along the bridlepath.

"Monsieur," Jacqueline questioned demurely, and in her most treacherous
way, "how much longer do we yet follow you up and down mountains?"

"W'y, uh--_I'm_ going to the City of Mexico."

"And we others, we may tag along, n'est-ce pas? But the city is far,
far. And, to-night?"

"Of course," said Driscoll, "if you should happen to know of a good
hotel----" He paused and gazed inquiringly over hills covered with
banana and coffee to the frost line. He would not have tried a frailer
temper so, but to provoke hers was incense to his own.

"You others, the