Bien, then he was sorry to have to tell him, said the Spanish stranger in suave reply. He was the mayordomo, and this was the patron’s land, and the coyote (half-breed) that killed all the deer must seek some other spot. Far he must go, too, for the patron’s land was far-reaching, and he pointed with his willow wand to the Sierra rising above, and the plain rolling far away below. On all sides far as the eye could see was the patron’s land. His it was by virtue of a Spanish grant.
The coyote giant laughed in scorn. “I’ve heerd of them thar grants. What good are they? Squatters’ rights and squatters’ rifles rules in this here free country, I reckon. Go back, little Mr. Mexican, to your patron, and tell him that here I’ve took up my homestead, and here I’ll stay, and you uns may do your do!”
As he spoke he threw his rifle on his hollowed arm, and looked black thunder from his beetling brow upon the burro-rider. Perhaps had he been less haughty in his defiance, he would have fared better at the mayordomo’s hands. For when the corn was yellow, and he returned from one of his periodical prospects to gather it, he found only the bare stubble field awaiting him.
Thus it was that Cherokee Sam, hunter, prospector and squatter, despite his triad of trades, was now at Christmas without a “corn-pone,” and this state was likely to continue through the winter.
Returning home at sunset with the legs of a doe tied across his breast, and her slender head, with its big ears trailing behind against the muzzle of the eager hound, the hunter strode from the timber on the slope, and struck the snow from his frozen leggins and moccasons as he paused on the Shut-in. A lofty upheaved ledge of red sandstone was this, which arose from the slopes on either hand, and shut in the gulch from the plain below, leaving only a narrow portal for the passage of the stream.
Above him, as he stood, were the foot-hills, and his wild home all snow-covered and cold in the shadow of the Sierra. But below the snow had not fallen, and the plain shone brown and warm in the lingering light of the setting sun. There, softened by the distance, with a saffron shimmer about its dark outlines, lay the gray adobe plaza, sleeping by the silver stream.
There were gathered corn and oil, the fat of the land; and he would have nothing but the deer on his shoulders for Christmas cheer. A bad gleam came in the half-breed’s eyes as he thought of his harried corn-patch, and gazed at the abode of his enemy.
As if in sympathy with his master, the hound put up his bristles, and growled savagely. Looking down, the hunter was astonished to see a small figure standing motionless at the foot of the Shut-in, and gazing up at him.
The stranger was a young boy. He was very richly and somewhat fantastically dressed in a silken jacket, and silken pantalones, much be-buttoned about the outer seams, and confined at the waist by a silken sash. On his feet were buckskin zapatos, soled with raw-hide, and tied with drawstrings of ribbon, and over his long and flowing hair a white sombrero with gay silk tassels.
This he reverentially removed as the hunter descended, and resting on him his soft black eyes, said: