Alaire knew the Tad Lewis car, an old-style, cheap affair, which advertised its mechanical imperfections by a loud clashing of gears and a noisy complaint of loose parts; therefore, when the leafy canon walls behind her hiding-place were brilliantly illuminated and a car stole silently past at low speed, she seized Paloma by the arm and whispered: 

“That’s not Lewis.”

“Who is it?  It can’t be Ed.”

“No, he and Longorio are ahead of us.  It’s another motor entirely.”

The women got out, then breasted the high grass and brambles between their hiding-place and the pump-house road.  As soon as they were back in the trail they made all possible speed, speculating meanwhile upon the mystery of the unknown car.  Emerging into the clearing which surrounded the power-plant, they discovered the machine in question standing dark and deserted in the shadows.  Evidently the driver, whoever he was, well knew what he was about, and had not blundered upon this place by accident.  A hundred yards away they could now see the ghostly Rio Grande, its saffron surface faintly silvered by the low moon; lights gleamed from the windows of Morales’s house.  In the distance the vague outlines of the Mexican shore were resolving themselves, and far beyond winked the evidence that some belated citizens of Romero were still awake.

Paloma had brought with her the long-barreled Winchester rifle, and this she clutched nervously as she and Alaire stood whispering.  Conditions were favorable for an approach to the pump-house itself, for two ridges of earth, perhaps eight feet high, thrown up like parallel furrows from a giant plow, marked the beginning of the irrigation ditch, and in the shadow of these the women worked their way forward, unobserved.  They had nearly reached their goal when out into the clearing behind them, with metallic rattle and clang, burst another automobile, and Paloma whispered, excitedly: 

“There’s the Lewis outfit at last.”

In the Lewis car were several men.  They descended hurriedly, and when one of them ran around the front of the car to turn off its lights both women saw that he carried a rifle.  Evidently Tad Lewis had come prepared for desperate measures.

A small door gave entrance to the boiler-room, and into the lock of this Mrs. Austin fitted a key; the next moment she and Paloma were safely inside.  They found themselves in utter darkness now, with a smooth brick floor beneath their feet and a strong odor of oil and burnt fuel in their nostrils.

Alaire was agreeably surprised in Paloma Jones, for, although the girl was wrought to a pitch of hysterical excitement, she had, nevertheless, retained her wits; nor had she faltered in the slightest.  It was evident that the fighting blood of her father was aroused in her, for she said, calmly: 

“When it gets light enough to shoot, I’m going to get Tad Lewis.”

“Don’t act too quickly,” cautioned Alaire.  “Perhaps your father and Dave have come and gone.  Anyhow, we can warn them just as well by firing into the air.”