She permeated the life of Granados just as the soft veil enwrapped the far hills, and she had seemed almost as far away if not so mysterious. Not once had he crossed her trail, and he heard she was no longer permitted to ride south of the line. The vaqueros commented on this variously according to their own point of view. Some of the Mexicans resented it, and in one way or another her name was mentioned whenever problems of the future were discussed. Singleton was regarded as temporary, and Conrad was a salaried business manager. But on a day to come, the señorita, as her mother’s daughter, would be their mistress, and the older men with families showed content at the thought.
Rhodes never could think of her as the chatelaine of those wide ranges. She was to him the “meadow-lark child” of jests and laughter, heard and remembered but not seen. She was the haunting music of youth meeting him at the gateway of a new land which is yet so old!
Some such vagrant thought drifted through his mind as the sweet calls of the drowsy birds cut the warm silence, now from some graceful palo verde along a barranca and again from the slender pedestal of an occotilla.
“Lucky you, for you get an answer!” he thought whimsically. “Amble along, Pardner, or the night witches get us!”
And then he circled a little at the north of the cañon, and the black horse, champing and fidgeting, was held there across the trail by its rider.
“We are seeing things in broad daylight, Pardner, and there ain’t no such animal,” decided Rhodes, but Pardner whinnied, and the girl threw up her hand.
“This time I am a highwayman, the far-famed terror of the ranges!” she called.
“Sure!” he conceded. “I’ve been thinking quite a while that your term must be about up.”
She laughed at that, and came alongside.
“Didn’t you suppose I might have my time shortened for good behavior?” she asked. “You never even ride our way to see.”