Jerry, realizing that formal introductions were unnecessary at a time like this, replied, “Yes, Sister Theresa. The old man was so nearly dead when we found him in an arroyo over near ‘The Dragoons’ that he could say little. However, he did give Jackie to you.”
The nun had seated herself and had motioned the others to do likewise. The boy, standing at her side, was looking up into her face with tear-filled, anxious eyes.
“Poor little fellow,” she said. “His life has been full of fear, but now, if those tormentors of his grandfather are in prison, he will be free of the constant dread of being kidnapped.”
“Sister Theresa,” Mary leaned forward to ask, “why did those cruel men wish to harm so helpless a child?”
The nun shook her head sadly. “It is a long story,” she said, “and one that causes me much pain to recall, but I will tell you. Years ago this good man, who had the largest cattle ranch in these parts, was riding over the mountains carrying about his person large sums of money. He was overtaken by two highwaymen, who, after robbing him, forced him to continue with them over a lonely mountain road. When they were at a high spot, they heard a stage coming and they forced Mr. Weston to hide with them around a curve. When the stage was almost upon them, the bandits rode out, shot the driver and stole the bags of gold they found. The frightened horses plunged over a cliff taking with it the dead driver and one man passenger. A child, that man’s sister, was thrown into the road. The bandits thought only of escape, and, for a time, they forgot their captive. Seeing a chance to get away, he turned his horse and galloped back toward his ranch. Finding the child in the road, he took time to snatch her up and take her with him. He brought her to this convent where she has been ever since.”
The listeners, who, one and all had guessed the speaker’s true identity, could hardly wait until she had finished to ask if she were the long lost Little Bodil.
Tense emotion brought tears to the woman’s kind eyes. “My dears,” she said, looking from one to another of them. “My dears, can you tell me of my brother, Sven Pedersen? I have always thought that he must have been killed when the stage plunged over the cliff. At first I hoped this was not true, but when he never came to find me—”
Mary interrupted, “Oh, Sister Theresa, your brother never stopped trying to find you.”
Jerry said, “He advertised in newspapers.”
The nun shook her head. “We do not take newspapers here and Mr. Weston, who had a nervous collapse for a long time, was not permitted to read. Yes, that accounts for it. My poor brother! How needlessly he grieved.”