ou know who did this?" Brannan asked.

"I saw it," cried one of the women. She was dressed as a Spanish dancer
and in one hand held a tambourine and castanets. "They fight," she gave
a little smirk of vanity, "about me."

Brannan recognized her as Rosa Terranza, better known as Ensenada Rose.
She had been the cause of many rivalries and quarrels.

"Dandy" Carter, the gambler, let down his sleeves and thrust the cards
into his pocket.

"Rose was dealin' faro," he explained, "and this galoot here bucks the
game.... He lose. You un'erstan'. He lose a lot o' dust ... as much as
forty ounces. Then--just like that--he stops." The gambler snapped his
fingers. "He says, 'My little gal; my partner! God Almighty! I'm
a-wrongin' them!' He starts to go, but Rose acts mighty sympathetic and
he tells her all about the kid."

"Hees little girl," the dancer finished. "I say we dreenk her health
together, and he tell me of the senorita. He draw a picture of his claim
with trees and river and a mountain--ver' fine, like an artist. And he
say, 'You come and marry me and be a mother to my child'." She laughed
grimly. "He was ver' much drunk ... and then--"

"That Sydney Duck comes in," said Dandy Carter. "He sits down at the
table with 'em. They begins to quarrel over Rose. And the fust I knows
there was a gun went off; the girl yells and the other man vamooses,
with this feller staggerin' after."

"He shot from under the table," a sailor volunteered. "'Twas murder.
Where I come from they'd a-hanged him for't."

"But who was he?" Brannan asked the question in another form. The girl
and Dandy Carter looked at one another, furtively. "I--don't know his
name," the girl said, finally.

"Don't any of you?" Brannan's tone was searching. But it brought no
answer. Several shook their heads. Ensenada Rose shivered. "It's cold. I
go back in," she said, and turned from them. Brannan stopped her with a
sudden gesture. "Wait," he ordered. "Where's the map ... the paper this
man showed you ... of his mine?"

Ensenada Rose's eyes looked into Brannan's, with a note of challenge her
chin went up. "Quien sabe?" she retorted. Brannan watched the slender,
graceful figure vanish through the lighted door. In her trail the
gambler and bartender followed. Presently a burst of music issued from
the groggery; a tap-tap-tap of feet in rhythm to the click of castanets.
Already the tragedy was forgotten. Brannan found himself face to face
with the sailor.