elding will make you a proposition
presently. The future smiles, old friend. If this rebel business was
only ended!"

"Dick, you're going to be my savior twice over.... Well, now, listen to
me." His gay excitement changed to earnest gravity. "I want to marry
Mercedes at once. Is there a padre here?"

"Yes. But are you wise in letting any Mexican, even a priest, know
Mercedes is hidden in Forlorn River?"

"It couldn't be kept much longer."

Gale was compelled to acknowledge the truth of this statement.

"I'll marry her first, then I'll face my problem. Fetch the padre,
Dick. And ask our kind friends to be witnesses at the ceremony."

Much to Gale's surprise neither Belding nor Ladd objected to the idea
of bringing a padre into the household, and thereby making known to at
least one Mexican the whereabouts of Mercedes Castaneda. Belding's
caution was wearing out in wrath at the persistent unsettled condition
of the border, and Ladd grew only the cooler and more silent as
possibilities of trouble multiplied.

Gale fetched the padre, a little, weazened, timid man who was old and
without interest or penetration. Apparently he married Mercedes and
Thorne as he told his beads or mumbled a prayer. It was Mrs. Belding
who kept the occasion from being a merry one, and she insisted on not
exciting Thorne. Gale marked her unusual pallor and the singular depth
and sweetness of her voice.

"Mother, what's the use of making a funeral out of a marriage?"
protested Belding. "A chance for some fun doesn't often come to
Forlorn River. You're a fine doctor. Can't you see the girl is what
Thorne needed? He'll be well to-morrow, don't mistake me."

"George, when you're all right again we'll add something to present
congratulations," said Gale.

"We shore will," put in Ladd.

So with parting jests and smiles they left the couple to themselves.

Belding enjoyed a laugh at his good wife's expense, for Thorne could
not be kept in bed, and all in a day, it seemed, he grew so well and so
hungry that his friends were delighted, and Mercedes was radiant. In a
few days his weakness disappeared and he was going the round of the
fields and looking over the ground marked out in Gale's plan of water
development. Thorne was highly enthusiastic, and at once staked out
his claim for one hundred and sixty acres of land adjoining that of
Belding and the rangers. These five tracts took in all the ground
necessary for their opera