It was an old story to the district attorney.

“Tell her,” said he, “that I can do nothing.  The case comes up in the morning, and he will have to make his fight before the court.”

Nancy Derwent was not so hardened.  She was looking with sympathetic interest at Joya Trevinas and at Littlefield alternately.  The deputy repeated the district attorney’s words to the girl.  She spoke a sentence or two in a low voice, pulled her shawl closely about her face, and left the room.

“What did she say then?” asked the district attorney.

“Nothing special,” said the deputy.  “She said:  ’If the life of the one’—­let’s see how it went—­’Si la vida de ella a quien tu amas —­if the life of the girl you love is ever in danger, remember Rafael Ortiz.’”

Kilpatrick strolled out through the corridor in the direction of the marshal’s office.

“Can’t you do anything for them, Bob?” asked Nancy.  “It’s such a little thing—­just one counterfeit dollar—­to ruin the happiness of two lives!  She was in danger of death, and he did it to save her.  Doesn’t the law know the feeling of pity?”

“It hasn’t a place in jurisprudence, Nan,” said Littlefield, “especially in re the district attorney’s duty.  I’ll promise you that the prosecution will not be vindictive; but the man is as good as convicted when the case is called.  Witnesses will swear to his passing the bad dollar which I have in my pocket at this moment as ’Exhibit A.’  There are no Mexicans on the jury, and it will vote Mr. Greaser guilty without leaving the box.”

The plover-shooting was fine that afternoon, and in the excitement of the sport the case of Rafael and the grief of Joya Trevinas was forgotten.  The district attorney and Nancy Derwent drove out from the town three miles along a smooth, grassy road, and then struck across a rolling prairie toward a heavy line of timber on Piedra Creek.  Beyond this creek lay Long Prairie, the favourite haunt of the plover.  As they were nearing the creek they heard the galloping of a horse to their right, and saw a man with black hair and a swarthy face riding toward the woods at a tangent, as if he had come up behind them.

“I’ve seen that fellow somewhere,” said Littlefield, who had a memory for faces, “but I can’t exactly place him.  Some ranchman, I suppose, taking a short cut home.”

They spent an hour on Long Prairie, shooting from the buckboard.  Nancy Derwent, an active, outdoor Western girl, was pleased with her twelve-bore.  She had bagged within two brace of her companion’s score.

They started homeward at a gentle trot.  When within a hundred yards of Piedra Creek a man rode out of the timber directly toward them.

“It looks like the man we saw coming over,” remarked Miss Derwent.

As the distance between them lessened, the district attorney suddenly pulled up his team sharply, with his eyes fixed upon the advancing horseman.  That individual had drawn a Winchester from its scabbard on his saddle and thrown it over his arm.