“That won’t do.  You won’t get killed—­fellows like you never do.  Wouldn’t you rather have her know the truth than believe you to be a quitter?” Ellsworth waited a minute.  “Do you want me to tell her for you, Dave?”

Law shook his head slowly, wearily.  “No, I’ll do it.  I’m game.  I’d rather she heard it from me.”

Blaze Jones took the San Antonio paper out upon the porch and composed himself in the hammock to read the latest war news.  Invasion!  Troops!  The Stars and Stripes!  Those were words that stirred Jones deeply and caused him to neglect his work.  Now that his country had fully awakened to the necessity of a war with Mexico—­a necessity he had long felt—­he was fired with the loftiest patriotism and a youthful eagerness to enlist.  Blaze realized that he was old and fat and near-sighted; but what of that?  He could fight.  Fighting, in fact, had been one of his earliest accomplishments, and he prided himself upon knowing as much about it as any one man could learn.  He believed in fighting both as a principle and as an exercise; in fact, he attributed his good health to his various neighborly “unpleasantnesses,” and he had more than once argued that no great fighter ever died of a sluggish liver or of any one of the other ills that beset sedentary, peace-loving people.  Nations were like men—­too much ease made them flabby.  And Blaze had his own ideas of strategy, too.  So during the perusal of his paper he bemoaned the mistakes his government was making.  Why waste time with ultimatums? he argued to himself.  He had never done so.  Experience had taught him that the way to win a battle was to beat the other fellow to the draw; hence this diplomatic procrastination filled him with impatience.  It seemed almost treasonable to one of Blaze’s intense patriotism.

He was engaged in laying out a plan of campaign for the United States when he became conscious of voices behind him, and realized that for some time Paloma had been entertaining a caller in the front room.  Their conversation had not disturbed him at first, but now an occasional word or sentence forced its meaning through his preoccupation, and he found himself listening.

Paloma’s visitor was a woman, and as Blaze harkened to her voice, he felt his heart sink.  It was Mrs. Strange.  She was here again.  With difficulty Blaze conquered an impulse to flee, for she was recounting a story all too familiar to him.

“Why, it seemed as if the whole city of Galveston was there, and yet nobody offered to help us,” the dressmaker was saying.  “Phil was a perfect hero, for the ruffian was twice his size.  Oh, it was an awful fight!  I hate to think of it.”

“What made him pinch you?” Paloma inquired.

“Heaven only knows.  Some men are dreadful that way.  Why, he left a black-and-blue mark!”

Blaze broke into a cold sweat and cursed feebly under his breath.

“He wasn’t drunk, either.  He was just naturally depraved.  You could see it in his face.”