Reckon your old don will give me a job?"
"Won't cost a peso to find out," said Dade, coming out and standing
beside him in the sun. "I've been talking to Manuel, and he thinks
we'd better pull out right away. Valencia's got an extra saddle here,
and Manuel says he'll catch a horse for you."
"I believe I'll send a letter to Bill," proposed Jack. "He'll give
Manuel enough dust to buy what I need; and I ought to let him know how
we made out, anyway."
A blank leaf from the little memorandum book he always carried, and a
bullet for pencil--perforce, the note was brief; but it told what he
wanted: gold to buy a riding outfit, his pistols which Perkins had
taken from him, and news of Bill's well-being. When the paper would
hold no more and hold it legibly, he folded it carefully so that it
would not smudge, and gave it to his host.
"What if the Committee catches you with that buckskin, Manuel?" he
asked abruptly. The risk Manuel would run had not before occurred to
him. "Dade he's liable to get into trouble, if they catch him with
that horse; let's turn the darned thing loose."
"Me, I shall not ride where the gringos will see me," broke in Manuel
briskly. "The senors need not be alarmed. I shall keep away from El
Camino Real. At the Mission I will buy what the senor desires, and I
will bring it to him at the hacienda."
"Get the best they've got," Jack adjured him. "An outfit better than
Dade's, if you can find one.
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