and
went his way, leaving happiness behind.

"Shore I was a sick man," Ladd said, "an' darn near a dead one, but I'm
agoin' to get well. Mebbe I'll be able to ride again someday. Nell, I
lay it to you. An' I'm agoin' to kiss you an' wish you all the joy
there is in this world. An', Dick, as Yaqui says, she's shore your
Shower of Gold."

He spoke of Gale's finding love--spoke of it with the deep and wistful
feeling of the lonely ranger who had always yearned for love and had
never known it. Belding, once more practical, and important as never
before with mining projects and water claims to manage, spoke of Gale's
great good fortune in finding of gold--he called it desert gold.

"Ah, yes. Desert Gold!" exclaimed Dick's father, softly, with eyes of
pride. Perhaps he was glad Dick had found the rich claim; surely he
was happy that Dick had won the girl he loved. But it seemed to Dick
himself that his father meant something very different from love and
fortune in his allusion to desert gold.

That beautiful happy day, like life or love itself, could not be wholly
perfect.

Yaqui came to Dick to say good-by. Dick was startled, grieved, and in
his impulsiveness forgot for a moment the nature of the Indian. Yaqui
was not to be changed.

Belding tried to overload him with gifts. The Indian packed a bag of
food, a blanket, a gun, a knife, a canteen, and no more. The whole
household went out with him to the corrals and fields from which
Belding bade him choose a horse--any horse, even the loved Blanco
Diablo. Gale's heart was in his throat for fear the Indian might
choose Blanco Sol, and Gale hated himself for a selfishness he could
not help. But without a word he would have parted with the treasured
Sol.

Yaqui whistled the horses up--for the last time. Did he care for them?
It would have been hard to say. He never looked at the fierce and
haughty Diablo, nor at Blanco Sol as he raised his noble head and rang
his piercing blast. The Indian did not choose one of Belding's whites.
He caught a lean and wiry broncho, strapped a blanket on him, and
fastened on the pack.

Then he turned to these friends, the same emotionless, inscrutable dark
and silent Indian that he had always been. This parting was nothing to
him. He had stayed to pay a debt, and now he was going home.

He shook hands with the men, swept a dark fleeting glance over Nell,
and rested his strange eyes upon Mercedes's beautiful and agitate