two finger tips,
and she disposed herself placidly, as though this were the Maison Doree
and Tout Paris sauntering by. The town was beginning to stretch after
its siesta. That is to say, divers natives manifested symptoms of going
to move in the course of time.

"Look!" exclaimed Jacqueline. "Only give yourself the trouble to look!"

She was pointing to a man, of course. The Chasseur stirred uneasily. One
could never see to the end of Jacqueline's slender finger. "There,
Berthe," she cried, "it's Fra Diavolo, just strayed from the Opera."

The stranger she meant was talking darkly to another man in the door of
the Cafe. If a Fra Diavolo, he was at least not disguised in his monk's
cowl, either because the April day was too hot or because he had never
owned one. But he stood appareled in his banditti role, very picturesque
and barbaric and malevolent. And though he posed heavily, he yet had
that Satanic fascination which the beautiful of the masculine and the
sinister of the devil cannot help having. His battered magnificence of a
charro garb fitted well the diabolic character which Jacqueline assigned
him. Spurs as bright as dollars jangled on high russet heels. His
breeches closed to the flesh like a glove, so that his limbs were as
sleek as some glossy forest animal's. The cloth was of Robin-Hood green,
foxed over in bright yellow leather. From hip to ankle undulated a seam
of silver clasps. More silver, in braided scrolls, adorned his jacket,
and wrapped twice around the waist was a red banda. Jacqueline would
have preferred the ends dangling, like a Neapolitan's. The ranchero, for
such he appeared, wore two belts. One was a vibora, or serpent, for
carrying money; the other held his weapons, a long hunting knife and a
revolver, each in a scabbard of stamped leather embroidered with gold
thread. His sombrero was high pointed and heavy, of chocolate-colored
beaver encircled by a silver rope as thick as a garden hose.

"Now there's realism in those properties," Jacqueline noted with an
artist's critical eye. "See, there's dry mud on his shoes, and his
bright colors are faded by weather. That man sleeps among the rocks,
I'll wager, and he's in the saddle almost constantly too. My faith, our
Fra Diavolo is exquisite!"

The other of the two men was a withered, diminutive, gaunt and hollow
old Mexican. He quailed like a frightened miser before Fra Diavolo.

"The risk? Coming to this town a risk!" Fra Diavolo was echoi