“Senorita Ewold is not at home!” he announced, before Jack had spoken.

“Not even in the garden?”

“No, senor.”

“But she will be back soon?”

“I do not think so.”

Ignacio’s face was as blank as a wall, but knowingly, authoritatively blank.  His brown eyes glistened with cold assurance.  He seemed to have become the interpreter of a message in keeping with Mary’s flight from the pass and her withdrawal from the porch when she had seen Jack approaching.  Here was a new barrier which did not permit even banter across the crest.  She must know that he was going, for the news of his approaching departure had already spread through the town.  She had chosen not to see him again, even for a farewell.

For a little time he stood in thought, while Ignacio remained steadfast on the path, watchful, perhaps, for the devil in Senor Don’t Care to appear.  Suddenly Jack’s features glowed with action; he took a step as if he would sweep by Ignacio on into the garden.  But the impulse instantly passed.  He stopped, his face drawn as it had been when he fell limp against the hedge stricken by the horror of his seeming brutality to Pedro Nogales, and turned away into the street with a mask of smiles for the greetings and regrets of the friends whom he met.

Worth twenty millions or twenty cents, he was still Jack to Little Rivers; still the knight who had come over the range to vanquish Pete Leddy; still a fellow-rancher in the full freemasonry of calloused hands; still the joyous teller of stories.  The thought of losing him set tendrils in the ranchers’ hearts twitching in sympathy with tendrils in his own, which he found rooted very deep now that he must tear them out.

That afternoon at the appointed hour for his departure every man, woman, and child had assembled at the end of the main street, where it broke into the desert trail.  The principal found an excuse for dismissing school an hour earlier than usual.  That is, everyone was present except Mary.  The Doge came, if a little late, to fulfil his function as chosen spokesman for all in bidding Jack Godspeed on his journey.

“Senor Don’t Care, you are a part of the history of Little Rivers!” he said, airily.  “You have brought us something which we lacked in our singularly peaceful beginning.  Without romance, sir, no community is complete.  I have found you a felicitous disputant whom I shall miss; for you leave me to provide the arguments on both sides of a subject on the same evening.  Our people have found you a neighbor of infinite resources of humor and cheer.  We wish you a pleasant trail.  We wish you warm sunshine when the weather is chill and shade when the weather is hot, and that you shall ever travel with a singing heart, while old age never overtakes the fancy of youth.”

Every one of the familiar faces grouped around the fine, cultured old face of the Doge expressed the thoughts to which he had given form.