“Oh, that will be fine!” exclaimed Dick.  “I declare I’d forgotten Thorne....How is Miss Castaneda?  I hope—­”

“She’s all right, Gale.  Been up and around the patio for two days.  Like all the Spanish—­the real thing—­she’s made of Damascus steel.  We’ve been getting acquainted.  She and Nell made friends at once.  I’ll call them in.”

He closed the door leading out into the yard, explaining that he did not want to take chances of Mercedes’s presence becoming known to neighbors.  Then he went to the patio and called.

Both girls came in, Mercedes leading.  Like Nell, she wore white, and she had a red rose in her hand.  Dick would scarcely have recognized anything about her except her eyes and the way she carried her little head, and her beauty burst upon him strange and anew.  She was swift, impulsive in her movements to reach his side.

“Senor, I am so sorry you were ill—­so happy you are better.”

Dick greeted her, offering his left hand, gravely apologizing for the fact that, owing to a late infirmity, he could not offer the right.  Her smile exquisitely combined sympathy, gratitude, admiration.  Then Dick spoke to Nell, likewise offering his hand, which she took shyly.  Her reply was a murmured, unintelligible one; but her eyes were glad, and the tint in her cheeks threatened to rival the hue of the rose she carried.

Everybody chatted then, except Nell, who had apparently lost her voice.  Presently Dick remembered to speak of the matter of getting news to Thorne.

“Senor, may I write to him?  Will some one take a letter?...I shall hear from him!” she said; and her white hands emphasized her words.

“Assuredly.  I guess poor Thorne is almost crazy.  I’ll write to him....No, I can’t with this crippled hand.”

“That’ll be all right, Gale,” said Belding.  “Nell will write for you.  She writes all my letters.”

So Belding arranged it; and Mercedes flew away to her room to write, while Nell fetched pen and paper and seated herself beside Gale’s bed to take his dictation.

What with watching Nell and trying to catch her glance, and listening to Belding’s talk with the cowboys, Dick was hard put to it to dictate any kind of a creditable letter.  Nell met his gaze once, then no more.  The color came and went in her cheeks, and sometimes, when he told her to write so and so, there was a demure smile on her lips.  She was laughing at him.  And Belding was talking over the risks involved in a trip to Casita.

“Shore I’ll ride in with the letters,” Ladd said.

“No you won’t,” replied Belding.  “That bandit outfit will be laying for you.”

“Well, I reckon if they was I wouldn’t be oncommon grieved.”

“I’ll tell you, boys, I’ll ride in myself with Carter.  There’s business I can see to, and I’m curious to know what the rebels are doing.  Laddy, keep one eye open while I’m gone.  See the horses are locked up....Gale, I’m going to Casita myself.  Ought to get back tomorrow some time.  I’ll be ready to start in an hour.  Have your letter ready.  And say—­if you want to write home it’s a chance.  Sometimes we don’t go to the P. O. in a month.”