MERLE paused at the foot of the stairway leading up to one of the towers where Tia Teresa had her room. She deliberated for a moment, consulted the tiny watch on her wrist, then turned to retrace her footsteps.

“There will be plenty of time,” she murmured to herself. “I shall be best able to manage Tia Teresa when I know still more than I do now.” She repaired to her own room and put on her automobile cloak, cap, and veil. Without telling anyone of her plan, she left the house, went to the garage, selected a runabout that was specially her own, and was soon speeding along the highway in the direction of the cluster of hills amid which the little Mexican cemetery was nestled.

She had been there just once before, several years ago, and she knew that her machine would have no difficulty in ascending the trail. Within less than an hour, indeed, she was at her destination.

In the grey evening twilight the place looked very dismal and desolate. The tiny adobe chapel in one corner was falling into ruins because of disuse and neglect. A tall rank growth of weeds overran most of the graves. But there were two that showed marks of loving attention, and toward these Merle advanced. Here she found the fresh wreaths around the headstones, and her own roses scattered on the turf.

“Hermana”—she read the single word on the white marble cross adorned with spotless arum lilies. “Sister,” Merle murmured, translating the word.

Then she turned to the big gravestone close at hand, and moved the wreaths of red carnations so that she might read the words inscribed. From these she soon knew that this was the family burial place of the de Valencias—that here rested the former owners of the San Antonio Rancho, the beloved parents of two children, Manuel and Rosetta.

“Manuel,”

“Rosetta”—she repeated the names. The latter awakened no memory, but when she filled out the former to “Don Manuel de Valencia,” she instantly recalled the old-time bandit of whom she had heard many a tale.

“The White Wolf,” she murmured eagerly.

“Yes, yes. His father once owned the rancho, and that was the cause of the deadly feud—the Vendetta of the Hills. But I thought all that was forgotten. Yet here are the beautiful fresh flowers.”

Seating herself on a flat monument near by, Merle pondered, piecing things together. “Sister”—the cross must mark the grave of the girl Rosetta, and have been erected by her brother, Don Manuel. Then whose hand had strewn the roses? Mr. Robles! In a flash she knew that Mr. Robles was Don Manuel.

And her father, too! The further thought came with such suddenness, with such absolute conviction of certainty, that for a moment she felt appalled. Her father the notorious robber chief, the desperado on whose head a price had been set, the outlaw who had defied the whole state of California to arrest him. Somehow she felt no shame—Don Manuel de Valencia had been a sort of heroic knight-errant in all the stories she had heard—his hand only against the rich, his heart always for the poor and oppressed, his attitude toward the intrusive gringos quite justified by the sharp practice whereby he had been robbed of his patrimonial acres. It was this very story of wrong which had been one of the reasons that had from the first predisposed the household at La Siesta to despise the Thurston family at the Rancho San Antonio.

Then from thinking of Don Manuel, Merle’s mind passed to Ricardo Robles—the courteous, dignified, generous, lovable man she had known all her life, the very man whom she had rejoiced that day to call her own father. Don Manuel could be judged only by this standard, and her heart went out again to Mr. Robles, whatever the name which he had formerly worn.

The shadows were closing around her, the night air bit sharply, and Merle arose. Two or three of the rose blooms had fallen beyond the lines of white stones that marked the graves. Merle advanced, and picking these up gently, placed them on the breasts of the sleeping dead. Her own kith and kin! Now she realized how she came to have brown eyes and raven tresses—the blood of Spain was in her veins. With this thought throbbing in her heart, she left the cemetery and hurried away for home.

Tia Teresa was the only Roman Catholic at La Siesta, a devout member of the faith of her fathers and of her childhood days with which no one around her had ever sought to interfere. Her room was her private chapel, a curtained recess at one end being fitted up with a crucifix, a small altar, and a prie-dieu.

Here Tia Teresa was kneeling and praying, the only light in the apartment coming from the altar candles, when Merle softly tiptoed in, still wearing her automobile cloak. She hesitated to advance, and momentarily turned to withdraw. But Tia Teresa had seen her, and by a gesture had bidden her to remain. For a few moments the old duenna’s lips continued to move, then she told another bead on her rosary, arose from her knees, crossed herself devoutly, and with a final prostration before the crucifix, terminated her devotional exercises.

“What brought you here, my child?” she asked, approaching Merle.

“Why are you engaged in prayer tonight?” asked Merle, answering question with question.

“You know I often pray,” replied Tia Teresa. “You have seen me many, many times.”

“Yes, but not at this hour, when you are always with my mother.”

“She will be wondering where I am. I had better go to her now.”

“No,” rejoined Merle. “I wish to speak to you. Come here, Tia Teresa; sit down by my side, and treat me once again as the little girl of the long ago whom you used to pet and fondle.”

“That’s very easily done,” responded Tia Teresa, with a pleased smile, seating herself on the low sofa close to Merle. “Come to my heart, my darling, as in the long ago.”

And the duenna drew the girl to her loving, protecting bosom. She noticed now that Merle was trembling under the influence of some deep emotion.

“What is wrong with you, my dear?” she asked anxiously.

“I have learned many things today, Tia Teresa,” replied Merle, taking her old nurse’s hands and softly stroking them. “First, that Mr. Robles is my father”—the duenna started, but Merle went quietly on—“and that he is really Don Manuel de Valencia, the famous outlaw.”

“Whoever told you that?” fairly gasped Tia Teresa.

“No one. I found everything out for myself. After I had looked into Mr. Robles’ eyes at our parting this afternoon, I knew the truth. It was impossible for mother to deny it, but it is not she who has told me anything. I have just returned from the little Mexican cemetery on the hillside where Mr. Robles, my father, had taken the flowers for which he asked me.”

“And you saw his flowers—and my flowers, too?” faltered the duenna, realizing now how Merle had gleaned her knowledge.

“Yes; I inferred that the wreaths were yours, and of course I knew that the scattered roses were from my father. He is Don Manuel. But I want you to tell me a little about Rosetta.” It was Merle now who put her arms around Tia Teresa and drew her affectionately to her.

“You have always loved me, you know, my dear,” the girl went on coaxingly. “Now I understand why you were so deeply attached to Mr. Robles, for you told me once that you had nursed Don Manuel. And that is why I have been, perhaps, just a little closer to you than Grace”—the pressure of Tia Teresa’s arms told that Merle had correctly divined—“because I was of the blood of your old master. But why has there been all this secrecy toward me?”

“Don Manuel’s name could not be revealed—he had been outlawed.”

“And Rosetta—tell me about Rosetta?”

“She was the real cause of the feud between Mr. Thurston and Don Manuel.”

The duenna had spoken the words before she had realized how much they told. With unfaltering intuition Merle guessed their meaning.

“You mean to tell me that Thurston wronged Rosetta—betrayed her?”

Tia Teresa nodded assent—she was too deeply agitated to speak another word.

“And this day—the eleventh of October—the day when you decorate her grave?” enquired Merle, in a tone and with a look that compelled an answer.

“Is the day she was found dead on the rocks below Comanche Point,” replied Tia Teresa.

At the same moment the duenna started to her feet. A wonderful and terrible transition came over her usually placid countenance. Her eyes fairly blazed with mingled fury and hatred. Her fists were clenched by her side. Her whole frame trembled.

“Murdered by Ben Thurston!” she added, the words hissing like hot lava from her lips.

“Murdered?” cried Merle, incredulously. She too, had risen.

“Yes, pushed over the cliff by his coward hands. His torn coat, one of the buttons between her dead fingers, proclaimed his guilt before God and man. But there was no justice in the land in those days—the days when the gringos broke up our Spanish homes. Now you know everything—that was the real reason of the Vendetta of the Hills.”

Tia Teresa was calm again—it was Merle who was deeply agitated, too deeply agitated for a moment to speak.

The duenna went on triumphantly. “But the vendetta once sworn will always be fulfilled. Tonight at Comanche Point—”

Then she stopped short, as she saw the look of terror and horror on Merle’s pale face.

“Tonight?” queried the young girl tremulously. “They meet tonight? Then that is where Mr. Robles is going—that is why he bade us all that sad good-bye? My father, oh, my dear father!” And dropping down again on the sofa, she burst into a passion of weeping.

Tia Teresa sought to soothe her. But Merle was not to be comforted. Yet while she sobbed she was thinking, for suddenly she rose again and dashed away her tears.

“At what hour tonight?” she asked.

“I do not know,” answered the duenna.

“Then he is in danger—perhaps at this very moment he is in danger. Don Manuel’s life—my father’s life is worth a hundred lives of such a man as Ben Thurston. Quick, quick, Teresa. Get your mantilla and cloak. My runabout is in readiness. There, let me help you.”

Merle was speaking with swift insistence.

“Where are you going?” whispered Tia Teresa, as the girl’s fingers were buttoning her cloak.

“To Comanche Point. We may not be too late to save him.”

A minute later the two women had stolen down the narrow stairway of the tower and were speeding through the gathering darkness of the night.