and though he fumed inwardly while his
outer hurts healed, he resolved to wait. The rodeo would give him his
chance.

Because it is not in the nature of the normal human to keep his soul
always under the lock and key of utter silence, a little of his
hate and a little of his hope seeped into the ears of Manuel, whose
poultices of herbs were doing their work upon the bruised muscles of
Jose's shoulder, and whose epithets against the two gringos who were
responsible for his exile from the Picardo hacienda had the peculiar
flavor of absolute sincerity. Frequently he cursed them while he
changed the poultices; and Don Jose, listening approvingly, added now
and then a curse of his own, and a vague prediction of how he meant
to teach the blue-eyed one a lesson which he would weep at
remembering--if he lived to remember anything.

Manuel did not mean to tattle; he merely let fall a word or two to
Valencia, whom he met occasionally in the open and accused bitterly of
having a treacherous friendship for the gringos, and particularly for
the blue-eyed one.

"Because that mongrel whose hair is neither red nor yellow nor black
speaks praise to you of your skill, perchance, and because he makes
you laugh with the foolish tales he tells, you would turn against your
own kind, Valencia. No honest Spaniard can be a friend of the gringos.
Of the patron," he added rather sorrowfully, "I do not speak, for
truly he is in his dotage and therefore not to be judged too harshly.
But you, Valencia--you should think twice before you choose a gringo
for your friend; a gringo who speaks fair to the father that he may
cover his love-making to the daughter, who is easily fooled, like all
younglings.

"The young Don Jose will deal with that blue-eyed one, Valencia. Every
day he swears it by all the saints. He but waits for the rodeo and
until I have healed his shoulder--and then you shall see! There will
be no love-making then for the gringo. Jose will have the senorita
yet for his bride, just as the saints have desired since they played
together in the patio and I watched them that they did not run into
the corrals to be kicked in the head, perchance, by the mustangs we
had there. Jose, I tell you, has loved her too long to stand now with
the sombrero in hand while that arrogant hombre steals her away. When
the shoulder is well--and truly, it was near broken--and when they
meet at the rodeo, then you shall see what will happen to your new
grin