“Garcia is very good, and so are you, Coronado,” said Clara, very thankful and profoundly astonished.  “How can I ever repay you both?  I shall always be your debtor.”

“My dear cousin!” protested Coronado, bowing and smiling.  “Well, it is settled.  We will start as soon as may be.  The train will be ready in a day or two.”

“I have no money,” stammered Clara.  “The estate is not settled.”

“Our good old Garcia has thought of everything.  He will advance you what you want, and take your draft on the executors.”

“Your uncle is one of nature’s noblemen,” affirmed Aunt Maria.  “I must call on him and thank him for his goodness and generosity.”

“Oh, never!” said Coronado.  “He only waits your permission to visit you and pay you his humble respects.  Absence has prevented him from attending to that delightful duty heretofore.  He has but just returned from Albuquerque.”

“Tell him I shall be glad to see him,” smiled Aunt Maria.  “But what does he say of the San Juan route?”

“He advises it.  He has been in the overland trade for thirty years.  He is tenderly interested in his relative Clara; and he advises her to go by way of the San Juan.”

“Then so it shall be,” declared Aunt Maria.

“And how do you go, Lieutenant?” asked Coronado, turning to Thurstane.

“I had thought of travelling with you,” was the answer, delivered with a grave and troubled air, as if now he must give up his project.

Coronado was delighted.  He had urged the northern and circuitous route mainly to get rid of the officer, taking it for granted that the latter must join his new command as soon as possible.  He did not want him courting Clara all across the continent; and he, did not want him saving her from being lost, if it should become necessary to lose her.

“I earnestly hope that we shall not be deprived of your company,” he said.

Thurstane, in profound thought, simply bowed his acknowledgments.  A few minutes later, as he rose to return to his quarters, he said, with an air of solemn resolution, “If I can possibly go with you, I will.”

All the next day and evening Coronado was in and out of the Van Diemen house.  Had there been a mail for the ladies, he would have brought it to them; had it contained a letter from California, he would have abstracted and burnt it.  He helped them pack for the journey; he made an inventory of the furniture and found storeroom for it; he was a valet and a spy in one.  Meantime Garcia hurried up his train, and hired suitable muleteers for the animals and suitable assassins for the travellers.  Thurstane was also busy, working all day and half of the night over his government accounts, so that he might if possible get off with Clara.