are of the Big
Spurs--wait!"

The message which he had to give was his mistress's and, therefore,
nobody else's business. He rose on tiptoes to whisper it into Jack's
ear. Jack listened, with head bent to catch the words. He looked over to
Mary for an instant of intent silence and then raised his empty left
hand in signal.

"Sorry, but I must ask for a little delay!" he called to Leddy. His tone
was wonderful in its politeness and he bowed considerately to his
adversary.

"I thought it was all bluff!" Leddy answered. "You'll get it,
though--you'll get it in the old way if you haven't the nerve to take it
in yours!"

"Really, I am stubbornly fond of my way," Jack said. "I shall be only a
minute. That will give you time to steady your nerves," he added, in the
encouraging, reassuring strain of a coach to a man going to the bat.

He was coming toward Mary with his easy, languid gait, radiant of casual
inquiry. The time of his steps seemed to be reckoned in succeeding
hammer-beats in her brain. He was coming and she had to find reasons to
keep him from going back; because if it had not been for her he would be
quite safe. Oh, if she could only be free of that idea of obligation to
him! All the pain, the confusion, the embarrassment was on her side. His
very manner of approach, in keeping with the whole story of his conduct
toward her, showed him incapable of such feelings. She had another
reaction. She devoutly wished that she had not sent for him.

Had not his own perversity taken his fate out of her hands? If he
preferred to die, why should it be her concern? Should she volunteer
herself as a rescuer of fools? The gleaming sand of the _arroyo_ rose in
a dazzling mist before her eyes, obscuring him, clothing him with the
unreality of a dream; and then, in physical reality, he emerged. He was
so near as she rose spasmodically that she could have laid her hand on
his shoulder. His hat under his arm, he stood smiling in the bland,
questioning interest of a spectator happening along the path, even as he
had in her first glimpse of him on the pass.

"I don't care! Go on! Go on!" she was going to say. "You have made sport
of me! You make sport of everything! Life itself is a joke to you!"

The tempest of the words was in her eyes, if it did not reach her
tongue's end. It was halted by the look of hurt surprise, of real pain,
which appeared on his face. Was it possible, after all, that he could
feel? The thought brought