The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1894-11-22

anu uuols lllo llOoOi NOINNN VIM ~
sively with his short, fierce breathing
and showed he was near the limit of
his endurance. But the pair on his
| back drew off our attention at once
from the animal. Although was well
| acquainted with the Mexicans up and
down the river from the ranch for
| miles, they were both of them
strangers to me. The man was a
sinewy, good-looking, olive-colored
young fellow, with bold eyes and a
slight black down just appearing on
| his lip. He wore the customary enor-
nous high-crowned hat, the short EN-
| broidered leather jacket and the skin
tight pantaloons with broad stripes
running down them, into which the
youthful Mexican, when he desires to
look particularly spruce, manages by
some inscrutable process to insert his
! limbs. The woman, or rather the girl,
for she could not have been more than
fourteen or fifteen years of age, was
riding in front of him. She was de-
cidedly a pretty creature, and was
rather in a state of deshabille COM
pared with the smart costume of her
companion.
Her thick, black hair was flying
loose about her face and shoulders and
bright-cUiored cotton gown, but
toned in two or three places across her
bosom, half revealed and half con-
cealed that she was a woman in form
if she was but child in years. One
knee was crooked over the horn OF the
saddle and her scanty dress, drawn up
| by her position, afforded us a liberal
view of a pleasing foot and ankle,
quite innocent of the conventional
shoe and stocking.
The young fellow refined in his horse
in front of us, and, taking off his great
hat, said, politely, in the Spanish
tongue, after giving us the usual
greeting:
"Senores, do you wish to do us the
favor of giving the sonora a little of
water to drink?'
Edgeworth handed the young woman
dipperful of water from our jar that
stood in the shade Of the porch and
she drank it off seemingly quite I'M
abashed at the simplicity of her attire.
The youth declined any water, saying
that they were in great haste and,
with ''muchas gracias, adios, senores, "
drove spurs into his jaded pony and
went off to the south as fast as he had
come.
Billings took his pipe from his
mouth and watched the couple vanish
in the dust and mesquite brush.
I. L, A.
match"
This seemed a plausible hypothesis.
and we fell to wondering where they
hailed from. Edgeworth, who knew
the country better than any of us,
said he had never seen the man be-
| fore.
But that girls face" he added,
me see he continued, refectively, ad-
dressing his query to nobody in par
ticular, doesn't she belong to old Don
Mauricio's hacienda, up there the
other side of the arroyo San Juan? If
she is daughter of the old don him
self, l am not surprised at the hurry
that the chap seems to be in"
l recollected Don Mauricio. His
| place was twenty miles up the river.
He was a wealthy old fellow, as Mexi.
cans go, owned large tract of land
and focks and herds, and ruled over
his medieros and pastures in true
patriarchal fashion. We had paid
! him visit the year previous on some
stock business, but l had no recollec
ton of seeing this girl at that time.
Edgeworth's memory or his power OF
| observation was better.
While we were talking about our Wis
itors, we had brought the horses from
the corral and saddled up. Young
| Hcnsley decided to go with us, and we
| left Billings behind ito hold down the
ranch" in frontier phrase, until oIr
return. The road we took was the
same by which the runaways had gone.
We had presently forgot the romantic
apparition of the morning and had
drifted into the usual staple of stock
mems talk-the drought, the low price
of beef cattle and the eXorbitant rail.
way charges, and, warming with the
| congenial theme, were pronouncing q
general anathema upon the big buy.
ers, when we heard the sounds of fast
ridden horses behind us. The tramp.
| ing of our own animals and the loud
chatting of our leather leggings against
! the saddles had prevented us from
hearing the approach of the riders be.
hind us until they were close upon us,
and as we turned in our saddles to see
who they We're Edgeworth had hardly
time to 'exclaim: Don Mauricio, as ]
live!' before they had overtaken us.
There were two of them. One was
evidently a shepherd or vaquero of the
ordinary type; the other, as Edge.
worth had guessed, was the old Don
! himself.
He was not a reassu@ng spectacle
He must have been a very powerful
man in his prime, as his broad Shout.
ders and great, square head with its
strongly marked features, indicated.
His face had been turned by the
sixty years of Texas suns to the com
plexion of negro, the effect of which
was heightened by contrast with a
bushy white beard and long white
hair that hung down beneath his
broad hat. His eyes, which were
bloodshot from passion or mescal
were small and deeply set in his head,
and their sinister appearance was in
creased by enormous projecting eye
| brows, as white as his beard. Both he
and his Communion wore belts wi n