Presently Chico Miguel appeared with the pony.  Sundown mounted, hesitated, and then nodded farewell to the Senora and the almost tearful Anita who stood in the doorway.  Things were not as Sundown would have had them.  He was long of arm and vigorous, but to cast a bouquet of hastily gathered and tied flowers from the gateway to the hand of the Senorita would require a longer arm and a surer aim than his.  “Gee Gosh!” he exclaimed, dismounting hurriedly.  “What’s that on his hind foot?”

He referred to the horse.  Chico Miguel, at the gate, hastened to examine the pony, but Sundown, realizing that the Senorita still stood beside her mother, must needs create further delay.  He stepped to the pony and, assuming an air of experience, reached to take up the horse’s foot and examine it.  The horse, possibly realizing that its foot was sound, resented Sundown’s solicitude.  The upshot—­used advisedly—­of it was that Sundown found himself sitting in the road and Chico Miguel struggling with the pony.

With a scream Anita rushed to the gateway, wringing her hands as Sundown rose stiffly and felt of his shirt front.  The flowers that he had picked for his adored, were now literally pressed to his bosom.  He wondered if they “were mushed up much?” Yet he was not unhappy.  His grand climax was at hand.  Again he mounted the pony, turned to the Senorita, and, drawing the more or less mangled blossoms from his shirt, presented them to her with sweeping gallantry.  Anita blushed and smiled.  Sundown raised his hat.  “Adios!  Adios!  Mucha adios!  Senorita!  For you sure are the lindaest little linda rosa of the whole bunch!” he said.

And with Anita standing in rapt admiration, Chico Miguel wondering if the kick of the horse had not unsettled the strange caballero’s reason, and the Senora blandly aware that her daughter and the tall one had become adepts in interpreting the language of the eyes, Sundown rode away in a cloud of dust, triumphantly joyous, yet with a peculiar sensation in the region of his heart, where the horse had kicked him.  When he realized that admiring eyes could not follow him forever, he checked the horse and rubbed his chest.

“It hurts, all right! but hoss-shoes is a sign of luck—­and posies is a sign of love—­and them two signs sure come together this mornin’.  ‘Oh, down in Arizona there’s a—­’ No, I reckon I won’t be temptin’ Providence ag’in.  This hoss might have some kind of a dislikin’ for toad-lizards and po’try mixed, same as the other one.  I can jest kind o’ work the rest of that poem up inside and keep her on the ice till—­er—­till she’s the right flavor.  Wonder how they’re makin’ it at the Concho?  Guess I’ll stir along.  Mebby they’re waitin’ for me to show up so’s they can get busy.  I dunno.  It sure is wonderful what a lot is dependin’ on me these here days.  I’m gettin’ to be kind of a center figure in this here country.  Lemme see.  Now I bruk jail—­hopped the Limited, took out me homesteader papers, got thrun off a hoss, slumped right into love with that sure-enough Linda Rosa, and got kicked by another hoss.  And they say I ain’t a enterprisin’ guy!  Gee Gosh!”