"Did Blaze tell you how he came to meet the Stranges?"

"No. He only said they had brought him bad luck from the start."

Dave grinned; then, in treacherous disregard of his promise to Jones, he recounted the tale of that disastrous defeat on the beach at Galveston. When he had finished the story, which he ingeniously elaborated, Alaire was doubled over her saddle. It was the first spontaneous laugh she had had for days, and it seemed to banish her worries magically. Alaire was not of a melancholy temperament; gaiety was natural to her, and it had required many heartaches, many disappointments, to darken her blithe spirit.

Nor was Dave Law a person of the comic type; yet he was a gloom-dispeller, and now that Alaire was beginning to know him better she felt a certain happy restfulness in his company.

The ride was long, and the two proceeded leisurely, stopping now and then to talk or to admire the banks of wild flowers beside the road. No country is richer in spring blooms than is South Texas. The cactus had nearly done blooming now, and its ever-listening ears were absurdly warted with fruit; gorgeous carpets of bluebonnets were spread beside the ditches, while the air above was filled with thousands of yellow b.u.t.terflies, like whirling, wind-blown petals of the p.r.i.c.kly-pear blossom. Montrose and Montrosa enjoyed the journey also; it was just the mode of traveling to please equine hearts, for there were plenty of opportunities to nibble at the juicy gra.s.s and to drink at the little pools. Then, too, there were mad, romping races during which the riders laughed and shouted.

It was Law who finally discovered that they had somehow taken the wrong road. The fact that Alaire had failed to notice this gave him a sudden thrill. It aroused in his mind such a train of dizzy, drunken speculations that for some time following the discovery he jogged silently at his companion's side.

It was early dusk when they reached Las Palmas; it was nearly midnight when Dave threw his leg across his saddle and started home.

Alaire's parting words rang sweetly in his ears: "This has been the pleasantest day I can remember."

The words themselves meant little, but Dave had caught a wistful undertone in the speaker's voice, and fancied he had seen in her eyes a queer, half-frightened expression, as of one just awakened.

Jose Sanchez had beheld Dave Law at the Las Palmas table twice within a few days. He spent this evening laboriously composing a letter to his friend and patron, General Luis Longorio.

XXI

AN AWAKENING

Time was when Phil Strange boasted that he and his wife had played every fair-ground and seaside amus.e.m.e.nt-park from Coney Island to Galveston. In his battered wardrobe-trunks were parts of old costumes, sc.r.a.pbooks of clippings, and a goodly collection of lithographs, some advertising the supernatural powers of "Professor Magi, Sovereign of the Unseen World," and others the accomplishments of "Mlle. Le Garde, Renowned Serpent Enchantress." In these gaudy portraits of "Magi the Mystic" no one would have recognized Phil Strange. And even more difficult would it have been to trace a resemblance between Mrs.

Strange and the blond, bushy-headed "Mlle. Le Garde" of the posters.

Nevertheless, the likenesses at one time had been considered not too flattering, and Phil treasured them as evidences of imperishable distinction.

But the Stranges had tired of public life. For a long time the wife had confessed to a lack of interest in her vocation which amounted almost to a repugnance. Snake-charming, she had discovered, was far from an ideal profession for a woman of refinement. It possessed unpleasant features, and even such euphemistic t.i.tles as "Serpent Enchantress" and "Reptilian Mesmerist" failed to rob the calling of a certain odium, a suggestion of vulgarity in the minds of the more discriminating. This had become so distressing to Mrs. Strange's finer sensibilities that she had voiced a yearning to forsake the platform and pit for something more congenial, and finally she had prevailed upon Phil to make a change.

The step had not been taken without misgivings, but a benign Providence had watched over the pair. Mrs. Strange was a natural seamstress, and luck had directed her and Phil to a community which was not only in need of a good dressmaker, but peculiarly ripe for the talents of a soothsayer. Phil, too, had intended to embrace a new profession; but he had soon discovered that Jonesville offered better financial returns to a man of his accepted gifts than did the choicest of seaside concessions, and therefore he had resumed his old calling under a slightly different guise. Before long he acknowledged himself well pleased with the new environment, for his wife was far happier in draping dress goods upon the figures of her customers than in hanging python folds about her own, and he found his own fame growing with every day. His mediumistic gifts came into general demand. The country people journeyed miles to consult him, and Blaze Jones's statement that they confided in the fortune-teller as they would have confided in a priest was scarcely an exaggeration. Phil did indeed become the repository for confessions of many sorts.

Contrary to Blaze's belief, however, Strange was no Prince of Darkness, and took little joy in some of the secrets forced upon him. Phil was a good man in his way--so conscientious that certain information he acquired weighed him down with a sense of unpleasant responsibility.

Chancing to meet Dave Law one day, he determined to relieve himself of at least one troublesome burden.

But Dave was not easily approachable. He met the medium's allusions to the occult with contemptuous amus.e.m.e.nt, nor would he consent to a private "reading," Strange grew almost desperate enough to speak the ungarnisned truth.

"You'd better pay a little attention to me," he grieved; "I've got a message to you from the 'Unseen World.'"

"Charges 'collect,' I reckon," the Ranger grinned.

Strange waved aside the suggestion. "It came unbidden and I pa.s.s it on for what it's worth." As Dave turned away he added, hastily, "It's about a skeleton in the chaparral, and a red-haired woman."

Dave stopped; he eyed the speaker curiously. "Go on," said he.

But a public street, Strange explained, was no place for psychic discussions. If Dave cared to come to his room, where the surroundings were favorable to thought transference, and where Phil's spirit control could have a chance to make itself felt, they would interrogate the "Unseen Forces" further. Dave agreed. When they were alone in the fortune-telling "parlor," he sat back while the medium closed his eyes and prepared to explore the Invisible. After a brief delay Phil began:

"I see a great many things--that woman I told you about, and three men.

One of 'em is you, the other two is Mexicans. You're at a water-hole in the mesquite. Now there's a shooting sc.r.a.pe; I see the body of a dead man." The speaker became silent; evidently his cataleptic vision was far from perfect. But he soon began to drone again. "Now I behold a stranger at the same water-hole. He's alone--he's looking for something. He rides in circles. He's off his horse and bending over--What? A skeleton! Yes, it's the skeleton of one of them other Mexicans." Strange's voice became positively sepulchral as his spirit control took fuller possession of his earthly sh.e.l.l and as his visions resolved themselves into clearer outline. "See! He swears an oath to avenge. And now--the scene changes. Everything dissolves. I'm in a mansion; and the red-haired woman comes toward me. Over her head floats that skeleton--"

Dave broke in crisply. "All right! Let's get down to cases. What's on your mind, Strange?"

The psychic simulated a shudder--a painful contortion, such as any one might suffer if rudely jerked out of the spirit world.

"Eh? What was I--? There! You've broke the connection," he declared.

"Did I tell you anything?"

"No. But evidently you can."

"I'm sorry. They never come back."

"Rot!"

Phil was hurt, indignant. With some stiffness he explained the danger of interrupting a seance of this sort, but Law remained obdurate.

"You can put over that second-sight stuff with the Greasers," he declared, sharply, "but not with me. So, Jose Sanchez has been to see you and you want to warn me. Is that it?"

"I don't know any such party," Strange protested. He eyed his caller for a moment; then with an abrupt change of manner he complained: "Say, Bo! What's the matter with you? I've got a reputation to protect, and I do things my own way. I'm getting set to slip you something, and you try to make me look like a sucker. Is that any way to act?"

"I prefer to talk to you when your eyes are open. I know all about--"

"You don't know nothing about anything," snapped the other. "Jose's got it in for Mrs. Austin."

"You said you didn't know him."

"Well, I don't. He's never been to see me in his life, but--his sweetheart has. Rosa Morales comes regular."

"Rosa! Jose's sweetheart!"

"Yes. Her and Jose have joined out together since you shot Panfilo, and they're framing something."

"What, for instance?"

The fortune-teller hesitated. "I only wish I knew," he said, slowly.

"It looks to me like a killing."

Dave nodded. "Probably is. Jose would like to get me, and of course the girl--"

"Oh, they don't aim to get you. You ain't the one they're after."

"No? Who then?"

"I don't know nothing definite. In this business, you understand, a fellow has to put two and two together. Sometimes I have to make one and two count four. I have to tell more'n I'm told; I have to shoot my game on the wing, for n.o.body tells me any more'n they dast. All the same, I'm sure Jose ain't carving no epitaph for you. From what I've dug out of Rosa, he's acting for a third party--somebody with pull and a lot of coin--but who it is I don't know. Anyhow, he's cooking trouble for the Austins, and I want to stand from under."

Now that the speaker had dropped all pretense, he answered Dave's questions without evasion and told what he knew. It was not much, to Dave's way of thinking, but it was enough to give cause for thought, and when the men finally parted it was with the understanding that Strange would promptly communicate any further intelligence on this subject that came his way.