“Back at college we all knew Mary Marchland, a beautiful Louisiana girl who visited in Washington and New England, and all of us were in love with her.  When our life-lines crossed again Clarenden had come to St. Louis.  About that time his two older brothers and their wives died suddenly of yellow fever, leaving you and Beverly alone.  It was Felix Narveo who brought you up to St. Louis to your uncle.”

“I remember that.  The steamboat, and the Spanish language, and Felix Narveo’s face.  I recalled that when I saw him years ago,” I exclaimed.

“You always were all eyes and ears, remembering names and faces, where Beverly would not recall anything,” Jondo declared.

“And what became of your Fred Ramer?” I asked.

“He is Ferdinand Ramero here.  He married Narveo’s sister later.  She is not the mother of Marcos, but a second wife.  She owned a tract of land inherited from the Narveo estate down in the San Christobal country.  There is a lonely ranch house in a picturesque canon, and many acres of grazing-land.  She keeps it still as hers, although her stepson, Marcos, claims it now.  It is for her sake that Narveo doesn’t dare to move openly against Ramero.  And in his masterful way he has enough influence with a certain ring of Mexicans here, some of whom are Narveo’s freighters, to reach pretty far into the Indian country.  That’s why I knew those Mexicans were lying to us about the Kiowas at Pawnee Rock.  I could see Ramero’s gold pieces in their hands.  He joined the Catholic Church, and plays the Pharisee generally.  But the traits of his young manhood, intensified, are still his.  He is handsome, and attractive, and rich, and influential, but he is also cold-blooded, and greedy for money until it is his ruling passion, villainously unscrupulous, and mercilessly unforgiving toward any one who opposes his will; and his capacity for undying hatred is appalling.”

And this was the man who was seeking to control the life of Eloise St. Vrain.  I fairly groaned in my anger.

“The failure to win Mary Marchland’s love was the first time in his life that Fred Ramer’s will had ever been thwarted, and he went mad with jealousy and anger.  Gail, they are worse masters than whisky and opium, once they get a man down.”

Jondo paused, and when he spoke again he did it hurriedly, as one who, from a sense of duty, would glance at the dead face of an enemy and turn away.

“When Fred lost his suit with Mary, he determined to wreck her life.  He came between her and the man she loved with such adroit cruelty that they were separated, and although they loved each other always, they never saw each other again.  Through a terrible network of misunderstandings she married Theron St. Vrain.  He, by the way, was the other college chum I spoke of just now.  He and his foster-brother, Bertrand, were wards of Fred Ramer’s father.  But their guardian, the elder Ramer, had embezzled most of their property and there was bitter enmity