to the spot where they were aimed, stood and stared fixedly over his
rifle sights at the red-blanketed figure squatted in the sand and kept
his finger crooked upon the trigger. Beside him Applehead fidgeted and
grumbled and called Luck names for being so dang slow, and wondered if
those two out there meant to sit and chew the rag all day.

The Indian leaned and traced Luck's trail slowly with his finger. Did
the four white men come that way? he asked in sign. And then, had Luck
seen them? Was he sure that he was following the four who had stolen
money in Albuquerque?

Come to think of it, Luck was not sure to the point of being able to
take oath that it was so. He traced again where the hoofprints had been
discovered near the stalled automobile, and signed that the six horses
they believed to have belonged to the four who had taken two horses
packed with food and blankets--and the stolen money.

Then suddenly Luck remembered that, for proof of his story, he had a
page of the Evening Herald in his pocket, torn from a copy he had bought
on the streets the evening after the robbery. He pulled the folded paper
out, spread it before the other and pointed to the article that told
of the robbery. "Call some young man of your tribe who can read," he
signed. "Let him read and tell you if I have spoken the truth."

The Indian took the paper and looked at it curiously.

Now, unless Applehead or some other hot-head spoiled things, Luck
believed that things would smooth down beautifully. There had been
some misunderstanding, evidently--else the Indiana would never have
manifested all this old-fashioned hostility.

The blanketed one showed himself a true diplomat. "Call one of your
white men, that there may be two and two," he gestured. And he added,
with the first words he had spoken since they met, "Hablo espanol?"

Well, if he spoke Spanish, thought Luck, why the deuce hadn't he done
it at first? But there is no fathoming the reticence of an Indian--and
Luck, by a sudden impulse, hid his own knowledge of the language. He
stood up and turned toward the rocks, cupped his hands around his lips
and called for the Native Son. "And leave your rifle at home," he added
as an afterthought and in the interests of peace.

The Indian turned to the rim-rock, held up the fragment of newspaper and
called for one whom he called Juan. Presently Juan's Stetson appeared
above the ledge, and Juan himself scrambled hastily down the rift and
ca