A blank leaf from the little memorandum book he always carried, and a bullet for pencil—­perforce, the note was brief; but it told what he wanted:  gold to buy a riding outfit, his pistols which Perkins had taken from him, and news of Bill’s well-being.  When the paper would hold no more and hold it legibly, he folded it carefully so that it would not smudge, and gave it to his host.

“What if the Committee catches you with that buckskin, Manuel?” he asked abruptly.  The risk Manuel would run had not before occurred to him.  “Dade he’s liable to get into trouble, if they catch him with that horse; let’s turn the darned thing loose.”

“Me, I shall not ride where the gringos will see me,” broke in Manuel briskly.  “The senors need not be alarmed.  I shall keep away from El Camino Real.  At the Mission I will buy what the senor desires, and I will bring it to him at the hacienda.”

“Get the best they’ve got,” Jack adjured him.  “An outfit better than Dade’s, if you can find one.  Bill Wilson has got about twelve hundred dollars of mine; get the best if it cleans the sack.”  He grinned at Dade.  “If you’re going to bully me into turning vaquero again, I’m going to have the fun of riding in style, anyway.  You’ve set the pace, you know.  I never saw you so gaudy.  Er—­what did you say her name is?”

“I didn’t say.”

“Must be serious.  Too bad.”  Jack shook his head dolefully.  “Say, Manuel, do you know a good riata, when you see one lying around loose?”

“Si, Senor.  Me, I have braided the riatas and bridles since I was so high.”  From the height of his measuring hand from the beaten clay beneath the oak, he proclaimed himself an infant prodigy; but Jack did not happen to be looking at him and so remained unamazed.

“Well, you ought to know something about them.  Get the best riata you can find.  I leave it to your judgment.”

“Si, Senor.  To-morrow I will bring them to you.”  He hesitated, his eyes dwelling curiously upon the coppery hair of this stranger, whose presence he was not quite sure that he did not resent vaguely.  Dade he had come to accept as a man whose innate kindliness, which was as much a part of him as the blood in his veins, wiped out any stain of alien birth; but this blue-eyed one—­“The senor himself is perhaps a judge of riatas?” he insinuated, politely veiling the quick jealousy of his nature.

“We-el-l—­you bring me one ready to fall all to pieces, and I reckon I could tell it was poor, after it had stranded.”

Dade laughed.  “Judge of riatas?  You wait till you see him with one in his hand!”

Manuel’s teeth shone briefly, but the smile did not come from his heart.  “Me, I shall surely bring the senor a riata worthy even of his skill,” he declared sententiously, as he walked away with his bridle slung over his arm and his back very straight.