It required no sophistication on her part to realize that this caballero was not as the vaqueros she had heretofore known.  He made no boorish jests; his eyes were not as the eyes of many that had gazed at her in a way that had tinged her dusky cheeks with warm resentment.  She felt that he was endeavoring to interest her, to please her rather than to woo.  And more than that—­he seemed intensely interested in his own brave eloquence.  A child could have told that Sundown was single-hearted.  And with the instinct of a child—­albeit eighteen, and quite a woman in her way—­Anita approved of this adventurer as she had never approved of men, or man, before.  His great height, his long, sweeping arms, moving expansively as he illustrated this or that incident, his silver spurs, his loose-jointed “tout ensemble,” so to speak, combined with an eloquent though puzzling manner of speech, fascinated her.  Warmed to his work, and forgetful of his employer’s caution in regard to certain plans having to do with the water-hole ranch, Sundown elaborated, drawing heavily on future possibilities, among which he towered in imagination monarch of rich mellow acres and placid herds.  He intimated delicately that a rancher’s life was lonely at best, and enriched the tender intimation with the assurance that he was more than fond of enchiladas, frijoles, carne-con-chile, tamales, adding as an afterthought that he was somewhat of an expert himself in “wrastlin’ out” pies and doughnuts and various other gastronomical delicacies.

A delicate frown touched the gentle Anita’s smooth forehead when her mother interrupted Sundown with a steaming cup of coffee and a plate of frijoles, yet Anita realized, as she saw his ardent expression when the aroma of the coffee reached him, that this was a most sensible and fitting climax to his glowing discourse.  Her frown vanished together with the coffee and beans.

Fortified by the strong black coffee and the nourishing frijoles, Sundown rose from his seat on the doorstep and betook himself to the back of the house where he labored with an axe until he had accumulated quite a pile of firewood.  Then he rolled up his sleeves, washed his hands, and asked permission to prepare the evening meal.  Although a little astonished, the Senora consented, and watched Sundown, at first with a smile of indulgence, then with awakening curiosity, and finally with frank and complimentary amazement as he deftly kneaded and rolled pie-crust and manufactured a pie that eventually had, for those immediately concerned, historical significance.

The “little hombre,” Chico Miguel, returning to his ’dobe that evening, was greeted with a tide of explanatory utterances that swept him off his feet.  He was introduced to Sundown, apprised of the strange guest’s manifold accomplishments, and partook of the substantial evidence of his skill until of the erstwhile generous pie there was nothing left save tender reminiscence and replete satisfaction.