“I am, if I can get in,” replied his cousin, who was by this time half way across the ford. “Come on. I want to satisfy you that you have been wrongfully accusing an honest man.”
“And I’ll show you that I haven’t,” said Archie, galloping down the bank of the creek, and into the water. “If you are bound to go on, of course I shall stick to you.”
While the boys were riding toward the rancho they kept their eyes fastened on the port-hole, and saw that the person with the spy-glass closely followed all their movements. They discovered nothing else that looked suspicious, however, and when they dashed through the gate-way and drew up in the court, the reception they met with, from the proprietor of the rancho, went a long way toward convincing Archie that he had made a great mistake.
Don Carlos was a small, slim man, with a very sallow face, a long, hooked nose, and an immense gray mustache, which covered all the lower part of his face. He called himself a Spaniard: but he looked more like a German Jew, and talked exactly like one. He was as polite as a Frenchman; and when the boys rode up to the porch, he pulled off his sombrero, and stood bowing and scraping to them until they dismounted from their horses.
“Ach! here ish my goot leetle poys!” he exclaimed, in his broken English. “I peen so glad to see you. You shall shtay mit me now all night, of course, aint it? Peppo!” he added, in a louder tone, addressing a young Mexican who stood at a little distance, looking on—“you von grand rascal! dake dis horses to dem shtables. I do so hope dem horse-dieves won’t shteal ’em pefore mornings. Valk right in de house, leetle poys.”
“The more I see of this old fellow, the more I am convinced that he is a Dutchman,” thought Archie, as he followed Frank and the Don into the rancho. “I’ve met a good many Spaniards since I have been in California, but I never heard one talk like that.”
Their host conducted them through a long wide hall, the walls of which were ornamented with old-fashioned pictures and implements of the chase, and ushered them into an elegantly-furnished room, where he left them to take care of themselves; telling them that his herdsmen were out collecting a drove of cattle to be sent to San Diego, and that it was necessary that he should superintend their operations. If the boys wanted to read, there were plenty of books on the center-table; and if they did not feel like sitting still, they might walk about the rancho, and see if they could find any thing to amuse them. Supper would be ready at sunset; he would then be back, and would pass the evening with them.
“What do you think now, Archie?” asked Frank, when the Don had gone out. “Is this the sort of a reception a robber would be likely to extend to visitors? Do you suppose that if there was any thing wrong here, he would have allowed us the freedom of the house so readily?”
“He does that merely to blind us,” replied his cousin. “He is more polite and attentive than he used to be, and that makes me suspicious. If we don’t wish ourselves a thousand miles from here before morning, I will make you a present of my horse when I get him.”
Frank recalled these words a few hours afterward, and told himself that Archie had more sense than he had ever given him credit for.