It took a long ten minutes to bring Solano back, chafing, but owning
Jack's mastery--for the time being, at least. He returned to a sullen
audience, save where the Americans cheered him from their side of the
corral.
"He is a devil--that blue-eyed one!" the natives were saying grudgingly
to one another; but they were stubborn and would not cheer. "Saw you
ever a riata thrown as he threw it? Not Jose Pacheco himself ever did so
impossible a thing; truly the devil is in that gringo." So they muttered
amongst themselves when he came back to the corral and slipped,
laughing, from Solano's sweat-roughened back.
"You can have your Surry!" he cried boastfully to Dade, who was the
first to reach him. "Give me a month to school him, and this yellow
horse will be mighty near as good as your white one. I'd rather have him
than forty gold medals!"
"Senor,"--it was Jose, his neck wrapped in a white handkerchief, coming
forward from where he had sat with Don Andres--"Senor, I am sorry that I
did not kill you; but yet I admire your skill, and I wish to thank you
for your generosity; the medalla is not mine, even though you refuse it.
Since I have found one better than I, Don Andres shall keep the medalla
until I or some other caballero has won it fairly. For my life, which
you also refused to take, I--cannot thank you."
Jack looked at him intently. "You will thank me," he said grimly, "later
on.
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