English.  The Mexican boy had but one answer to all queries:  “No sa-a-abe.”  Other occupants there were, but these even Feeny’s sense of duty could not prompt him to disturb.  Somewhere in the depths of the domestic portion of the ranch, where the brush on the flat roof was piled most heavily and the walls were jealously thick, all scouting-parties or escorts well knew that Moreno’s wife and daughter were hidden from prying eyes, and rumor had it that often there were more than two feminine occupants; that these were sometimes joined by three or four others,—­wives or sweethearts of outlawed men who rode with Pasqual Morales, and all Arizona knew that Pasqual Morales had little more Mexican blood in his veins than had Feeny himself.  He was an Americano, a cursed Gringo for whom long years ago the sheriffs of California and Nevada had chased in vain, who had sought refuge and a mate in Sonora, and whose swarthy features found no difficulty in masquerading under a Mexican name when the language of love had made him familiar with the Mexican tongue.

Slow to action, slow of speech as was the paymaster, he was not slow to see that Sergeant Feeny was anxious and ill at ease, and if a veteran trooper whom his captain had pronounced the coolest, pluckiest, and most reliable man in the regiment, could be so disturbed over the indications, it was high time to take precaution.  What was the threatened danger?  Apaches?  They would never assault the ranch with its guard of soldiers, whatsoever they might do in the canons in the range beyond.  Outlaws?  They had not been heard of for months.  He had inquired into all this at Yuma, at the stage stations, by mail of the commanding officers at Lowell and Bowie and Grant.  Not for six months had a stage been “held up” or a buck-board “jumped” south of the turbid Gila.  True, there was rumor of riot and lawlessness among the miners at Castle Dome and the customary shooting scrape at Ehrenberg and La Paz, but these were river towns, far behind him now as he looked back over the desert trail and aloft into the star-studded, cloudless sky.  Nothing could be more placid, nothing less prophetic of peril or ambush than this exquisite summer night.  Somewhere within the forbidden region of Moreno’s harem a guitar was beginning to tinkle softly.  That was all very well, but then a woman’s voice, anything but soft, took up a strange, monotonous refrain.  Line after line, verse after verse it ran, harsh, changeless.  He could not distinguish the words,—­he did not wish to; the music was bad enough in all conscience, whatsoever it might become when sung by youth or beauty.  As it fell from the lips of Senora Moreno the air was a succession of vocal nasal disharmonies, high-pitched, strident, nerve-wracking.

[Illustration:  Music]