"That's right," he agreed. "Well, I shouldn't wonder but it can be fixed up some way."
They had been driving across a flat cactus country, and for some time had been approaching the grove of willows into which she now turned. Some wooden barns, a corral, an adobe house, and outhouses marked the place as one of the more ambitious ranches of the valley.
An old Mexican came forward with a face wreathed in smiles.
"Buenos, Doña Maria," he cried, in greeting.
"Buenos, Antonio. This gentleman is Mr. Richard Muir."
"Buenos, señor. A friend of Doña Maria is a friend of Antonio."
"The older people call me 'doña,'" the girl explained. "I suppose they think it strange a girl should have to do with affairs, and so they think of me as 'doña,' instead of 'señorita,' to satisfy themselves."
A vague suspicion, that had been born in the young man's mind immediately after his rescue from the river now recurred.
His first thought then had been that this young woman must be Valencia Valdés; but he had dismissed it when he had seen the initial M on her kerchief, and when she had subsequently left him to infer that such was not the case.
He remembered now in what respect she was held in the home hacienda; how everybody they had met had greeted her with almost reverence. It was not likely that two young heiresses, both of them beautiful orphans, should be living within a few miles of each other.