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As he spoke Billy commenced scratching himself beneath the left arm, and then,

as though to better reach the point of irritation, he slipped his hand inside his

shirt. If Pesita noticed the apparently innocent little act, or interpreted it correctly

may or may not have been the fact. He stood looking straight into Byrne's eyes for

a full minute. His face denoted neither baffled rage nor contemplated revenge.

Presently a slow smile raised his heavy mustache and revealed his strong, white

teeth.

"You have done well, Captain Byrne," he said. "You are a man after my own

heart," and he extended his hand.

A half-hour later Billy walked slowly back to his own blankets, and to say that he

was puzzled would scarce have described his mental state.

"I can't quite make that gink out," he mused. "Either he's a mighty good loser or

else he's a deep one who'll wait a year to get me the way he wants to get me."

And Pesita a few moments later was saying to Captain Rozales:

I should have shot him if I could spare such a man; but it is seldom I find one

with the courage and effrontery he possesses. Why think of it, Rozales, he kills

eight of my men, and lets my prisoners escape, and then dares to come back and

tell me about it when he might easily have gotten away. Villa would have made

him an officer for this thing, and Miguel must have told him so. He found out in

some way about your little plan and he turned the tables on us. We can use him,

Rozales, but we must watch him. Also, my dear captain, watch his right hand

and when he slips it into his shirt be careful that you do not draw on him--unless

you happen to be behind him."

Rozales was not inclined to take his chief's view of Byrne's value to them. He

argued that the man was guilty of disloyalty and therefore a menace. What he

thought, but did not advance as an argument, was of a different nature. Rozales

was filled with rage to think that the newcomer had outwitted him, and beaten

him at his own game, and he was jealous, too, of the man's ascendancy in the

esteem of Pesita; but he hid his personal feelings beneath a cloak of seeming

acquiescence in his chief's views, knowing that some day his time would come

when he might rid himself of the danger of this obnoxious rival.

"And tomorrow," continued Pesita, "I am sending him to Cuivaca. Villa has

considerable funds in bank there, and this stranger can learn what I want to

know about the size of the detachment holding the town, and the habits of the

garrison."

215

The Mucker