. But once his system failed. Yet--well
the man in that case was an American, and _they_ are liable to be
exceptions to any rule, to any passion. But in the end he was safe
enough too, though something else, that I can't understand, made him
so."

"And what did he do, this American?"

"He took me to Escobedo."

"And you?"

"I took Lopez. That same night Queretaro fell."

"_You?_ Now--now to what particular wrong in _your_ case,
senor, does the Republic stand thus indebted?"

Juarez put the question lightly, even patronizingly. But his steadfast
gaze had not once left his gaunt and battered visitor. By design, too,
he had not asked a second time who the Chaparrito was, because he saw,
or felt, that the old man knew, though former emissaries from that
mysterious source had not known. And Juarez meant to possess the secret.
But with his casual irony he never looked for any such kindling of
memory as then flashed deep in the cavernous sockets opposite him. The
eyes of the aged man glowed and darkened, glowed and darkened, and
seemed the very breathing of some famished beast. It was a thing to
startle even Benito Juarez, who during many, many years had learned the
meaning of civil war. The President leaped to his feet, pointing a
finger.

"You are," he cried, "yes, _you_ are the Chaparrito!--No?--Yes! Ha,
I've struck, I've struck!"

He had indeed. The colossal guile and intellect and will, the giant whom
men in awe called El Chaparrito, was only old, withered Anastasio
Murguia. But the astute Juarez _knew_ that he was right. He knew it
in that one look of consuming, conquering hate. He knew the giant in
that hate. The feeble flesh, Anastasio Murguia, was an incident. Yet
even so, only the President's tenacity held him to where his instinct
had leapt. For under discovery Murguia was changed to a huddled, abject
creature, stammering denial. Yet it must be true, it must. The
strangest, the most weird of contrasts in the same soul and body--yet it
must, it _was_ true!

And Murguia? He might have asked for reward, and had it. But his was
rankest despair. His work was not finished, his goal not attained. And
now his most potent instrument of all, the Chaparrito, was miserably
identified in his own self, was taken from him.

Juarez rose and touched his shoulder, "Come," he said, "there's much too
much tension here. Now then, sit down, so. Let me see, you said your
name was--yes, Murguia. But--why, Dios mio, that's the