“No!” Dade’s eyes flicked the circle of faces upon which the firelight danced.  “If the Senor Allen were here, there would be no jeering.”

“And for that will I fight them all!” Valencia twisted his arm a little, in the hope that Dade would let go his wrist.  “Ah, Senor!  Shall a man not be true to his friends?”

“Si, he shall be true, and he shall be sensible.  Is the Senor Jack a weakling, that he cannot fight for himself?”

“But he is not here!  If he were—­” The tone of him gloated over the picture of what would happen in that case.

“There shall be no fighting.”  If Dade’s voice was quiet, it did not carry the impression of weakness, or indecision.  “Come to your own fire, Valencia.  If it is necessary to fight for the Senor Allen—­I am also his friend.”

“You are right.  There shall be no fighting.”  Dade started and glanced at Jose, standing beside him.  “If the Senor Allen thinks himself the best, surely it is I, who hold the medalla that calls me el vaquero supremo, who have the right to question his boast; not you, amigos!”

“Who’s the best vaquero, the bravest and the best in California?” queried a voice—­the voice of the singer, who had come up with others to see what was going on here.  And at his elbow another made answer boldly: 

“Don Jose Pacheco!”

Jose smiled and lifted his shoulders deprecatingly at the tribute, while fifty voices shouted loyally his name.  Dade, pressing his hand upon Valencia’s shoulder, led him back into the dancing shadows that lay between the fires.

“Let it go,” he urged.  “Don Jose holds the medal, and he’s entitled to the glory.  We must keep peace, Valencia, or else I must leave the rodeo.  Personal quarrels must wait.”

“Si, Senor, personal quarrels must wait,” assented Jose, again coming up unexpectedly behind them.  “I but wish to say that I regret the bad manners of those caballeros, whose best excuse is that they are my friends.  I hope the senor does not accuse me of spreading the news of the senor’s boast.  There are others, as the senor well knows, who heard it before even it came to my ears.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Dade repeated.  “They’ll have their joke, and I don’t blame them for putting the joke on a stranger, especially when he’s a gringo—­and absent.”

“The senor is wise as he is loyal,” stated Jose and bowed himself into the shadows.  “Buenos noches, Senor.”

“Good-night,” answered Dade, speaking English to show he was not ashamed of it; and rolled himself in his blankets as a deliberate hint to Valencia that he did not want to discuss the incident, much to that one’s disappointment.

It is to be feared that Valencia did not share in Dade’s determination to keep the peace; for, before he slept, he promised himself that he would yet tell that pig-faced vaquero from Las Uvas what he thought of him.  But outwardly the incident was closed, and closed permanently.