--with a twinkle at the corners,
nevertheless, which brightened them wonderfully; and although her
mouth drooped slightly with the same wistfulness, a little smile
lurked there also, as though her life had been spent largely in
longing for the unattainable, and in laughing at herself because she
knew the futility of the longing.

"I hope you've taken a good look at Jerry's face," she said, "and seen
that he ain't half as bad as he tries to make out. Jerry'll make a
fine neighbor for any man if he's let be; and we do want a home of
our own, awful bad! We was ten years paying for a little farm back
in Illinois, and then we lost it at the last minute because there was
something wrong with the deed, and we didn't have any money to go to
law about it. Jerry didn't tell you that; but it's that makes him talk
kinda bitter, sometimes. He was terrible disappointed about losing the
farm. And when we took what we had left and struck out, he said he
was going as far as he could get and be away from lawyers and law, and
make us a home on land that nobody but the Lord laid any claim to. So
he picked out this place; and then along come that Spaniard and a lot
of fellows with him and said we hadn't no right here. So I hope you
won't blame Jerry for being a little mite uppish. That Spaniard got
him kinda wrought up."

Her voice was as soft as her eyes, and winsome as her wistful little
smile. She had those four smiling with her in sheer sympathy before
she had spoken three sentences; and the two who did not understand her
words smiled just as sympathetically as the two who knew what she was
talking about.

"Tell the senora I am sorry, and she shall stay; and my mother will
give her hens and a bottle of her very good medicine, which Manuel
drinks so greedily," Teresita cried, when Dade told her what the woman
said, and leaned impulsively and held out her hand. "I would do as
the Americanos do, and shake the hands for a new friendship," she
explained, blushing a little. "We shall be friends. Senor Hunter, tell
the pretty senora that I say we shall be friends. Amiga mia, I shall
call her, and I shall learn the Americano language, that we may talk
together."

She meant every word of it, Dade knew; and with a troublesome,
squeezed feeling in his throat he interpreted her speech with
painstaking exactness.

Mrs. Jerry took the senorita's hand and smiled up at her with the
brightness of tears in her eyes. "You've got lots of friends, ho