I reckon you saved a big row. You just
put a scare into that hellion with a word, like you had a thousand devils
in you!" said Jim.

"It's all over!" Jack answered, looking more hurt than pleased over the
congratulations. "Very fortunately over."

"But," Jim observed, tensely, "Pedro is not only Leddy's bitter
partisan and ready to do his bidding, Pedro's a bit loco, besides--the
kind that hesitates at nothing when he gets a grudge. You've got to
look out for him."

"Oh, no!" said Jack, in the full swing of a Senor Don't Care mood.

Jim and Bob began to entertain the feelings of Mary on the pass, when she
thought of Jack as walking over precipices regardless of danger signs.
After all, did he really know how to shoot? If he would not look after
himself, it was their duty to look after him. Jim suggested that the rule
which Jack had made for Leddy should have universal application. No one
whosoever should wear arms in Little Rivers without a permit. The new
ordinance had the Doge's approval; and Jim and Bob, both of whom had
permits, kept watch that it was enforced, particularly in the case of
Pedro Nogales.

Meanwhile, Jack kept the ten-hour-a-day law. His alfalfa was growing
with prolific rapidity, but Firio had the air of one who waits
between journeys.

"Never the trail again?" he asked temptingly, one day.

"Never the trail again!" Jack declared firmly.

"_Si, si, si_--the trail again!"

"You think so? Then why do you ask?"

"To make a question," answered Firio. "The big sadness will be too
strong. It will make you move--_si_!"

"The big sadness!" Jack exclaimed. He seized Firio by the shoulders and
looked narrowly at him, and Firio met the gaze with soft, puzzling lights
in his eyes. "Ho! ho! A big sadness! How do you know?" he laughed.

"I learn on the trail when I watch you look at the stars. And Senorita
Ewold, she know; but she think the big sadness a devil. She--" and he
paused.

"She--yes?" Jack asked.

"She--" Firio started again.

Jack suddenly raised his hands from Firio's shoulders in a gesture of
interruption. It was not exactly Firio's place to hazard opinions about
Mary Ewold.

"Never mind!" he said, rather sharply.

But Firio proceeded fixedly to finish what he had to say.

"She has a big sadness, which makes her ride to the pass. She rides out
so she can ride back smiling."

"Firio, don't mistake your imagination for divination!" Jack warned him.

As Firio did not understan