“I don’t want your medal,” he said.  “Let some Californian fight you for it, if he likes.  That is not for a gringo.”

Perhaps there was a shade of the theatrical element in his speech and his manner, but he was perfectly innocent of any such intention; and the people before him were nothing if not dramatic.  He got his response in the bravos and the applause that followed the silence of sheer amazement.  “Gracias!” they cried, in their impulsive appreciation of his generosity.

“The horse which you offered for a prize, Don Andres, I will claim,” Jack went on, when he could be heard—­and he did not wait long, for short-lived indeed is the applause given to an alien.  “And I will ride him as soon as you desire.”

“Yes!  Let us see him ride that caballo!” cried the fickle mass of humanity.  “By a trick of chance he won the duelo, and the medalla he refused because he knows it was not won fairly.  Where is that yellow caballo which no man has ridden?  Let him show us what he can do with that yellow one!”

Dade, pushing his way exultantly toward him, saw the blaze of anger at their fickleness leap into Jack’s eyes.

“Si, I will show you!” he called out.  “It is well that you should see some horsemanship!  Bring the yellow caballo, then.  Truly, I will show you what I can do.”

“Come, Surry,” called Dade, and the white horse walked up to him and nibbled playfully his bearskin chaparejos.  “Solano’s in the little corral, off this big one.  I’ll bring your saddle—­”

“I don’t want any saddle.  I’m going to ride him bareback, with a rope over his nose.  Let me have your spurs, will you?  Did you hear them say I won the duel with luck?  I’ll show these greasers what a gringo can do!” He spoke in Spanish, to show his contempt of their opinion of him, and he curled his lip at the jibes they began to fling down at him; the jibes and the taunts—­and vague threats as well, when those who had wagered much upon the duelo began to reckon mentally their losings.

In the adobe corral he stood with his riata coiled in his hand and Dade’s spurs upon his heels, and waited until Solano, with a fling of heels into the air, rushed in from the pen where the big bull had waited until he was let out to fight the grizzly.

“Bareback he says he will ride that son of Satanas!” jeered a wine-roughened voice.  “Boaster that he is, look you how he stands!  He is afraid even to lasso that yellow one!”

Jack was indeed deliberate in his movements.  He stood still while the horse circled him twice with head and tail held high.  When Solano brought up with a flourish on the far side of the corral, Jack turned to Dade and Valencia standing guard at the main gate, their horses barring the opening.

“See that it’s kept clear out in front,” he told them.  “I’ll come out a-flying when I do come, most likely.”

Whereat those who heard him laughed derisively.  “Never to the gate will you ride him, gringo—­even so you touch his back!  Not twice will the devil give you luck,” they yelled, while they scrambled for the choicest positions.