say, is agin it," he continued in the same tone of
voice,--"the whiskey is agin it--a few cuss words that dropped from
him, accidental like, may have been agin it. All the same they mout
have been only the little signs and tokens that it was him."

But Mrs. Baxter's ready laugh somewhat rudely dispelled the infection
of Patterson's gloom. "I reckon the only spirit was that which you and
Spencer consumed," she said, cheerfully. "I don't wonder you're a
little mixed. Like as not you've misunderstood his plans."

Patterson shook his head. "He'll turn up yet, alive and kicking! Like
as not, then, Poindexter knows where he is all the time."

"Impossible! He would have told me," said Mrs. Tucker, quickly.

Mrs. Baxter looked at Patterson without speaking. Patterson replied by
a long lugubrious whistle.

"I don't understand you," said Mrs. Tucker, drawing back with cold
dignity.

"You don't?" returned Mrs. Baxter. "Bless your innocent heart! Why was
he so keen to hunt me up at first, shadowing my friends and all that,
and why has he dropped it now he knows I'm here, if he didn't know
where Spencer was?"

"I can explain that," interrupted Mrs. Tucker, hastily, with a blush of
confusion. "That is--I"--

"Then mebbe you kin explain too," broke in Patterson with gloomy
significance, "why he has bought up most of Spencer's debts himself,
and perhaps you're satisfied it _is n't_ to hold the whip hand of him
and keep him from coming back openly. Pr'aps you know why he's movin'
heaven and earth to make Don Jose Santierra sell the ranch, and why the
Don don't see it all."

"Don Jose sell Los Cuervos! Buy it, you mean?" said Mrs. Tucker. "_I_
offered to sell it to him."

Patterson arose from the chair, looked despairingly around him, passed
his hand sadly across his forehead, and said: "It's come! I knew it
would. It's the warning! It's suthing betwixt jim-jams and doddering
idjiocy. Here I'd hev been willin' to swear that Mrs. Baxter here told
me _she_ had sold this yer ranch nearly two years ago to Don Jose, and
now you"--

"Stop!" said Mrs. Tucker, in a voice that chilled them.

She was standing upright and rigid, as if stricken to stone. "I command
you to tell me what this means!" she said, turning only her blazing
eyes upon the woman.

Even the ready smile faded from Mrs. Baxter's lips as she replied
hesitatingly and submissively: "I thought you knew already that Spencer
had given this ranch to me. I sold it to Do