"Ef I on'y had had an idee that the old man's loss preyed upon you in that sor o' way we mout ha' got up some pootier trick o' war! But you've sarved him A-one and you are entitled to his scalp to hang over your fireplace."
Rejecting this trophy, and only despoiling the Indian chief of his weapons, and adding to the prize those of the other Apaches, whose hair the hunter had no scruples to remove, they climbed the mountain to the horses which came at the hacendero's calls. After spending some hours together in conversation, which they promised to renew, "who knows when?" as the Spaniards say—they parted, Oliver resuming his route.
When don Jorge returned home, his revenge sated, he found the English gentleman, who then broke away with a great effort from the entreaties of the rich widow and her family. He felt the need of loneliness on the ocean to take the edge off his acute sorrow. But the memory, thus mournfully renewed, of his youthful friendship, so fatally cut short, dwells piously cherished in "the heart of heart," and there will flourish till he, too, reposes his adventurous body in the grave.
However, as an author may anticipate as well as record, we may be allowed to suggest that there is nothing contrary to logic in the hope that, if ever doña Perla and her mother act on Mr. Gladsden's urgent invitation, often renewed by letter, for them to visit him in England, the Gladsden juniors will have to draw lots for the Mexican heiress. Sure is it that they will find nowhere a happier choice, be it for wealth, beauty, or rare goodness, than in this true "Treasure of Pearls."