"Buenos dias, senorita," he said, and in her own tongue he added, "Miss Sarel ride all alone, huh?"
"As you see, senor," the girl replied. "I must ask you to excuse me; I am in haste."
"The senorita was not hurrying when I see her," he replied meaningly. "A lady so beautiful must also be kind-hearted and grant a few meenits to her so great admirer."
"I have no time to spare, and--I do not know you, senor," Tonia returned.
The guerrilla captain bowed low over the neck of his magnificent mount. "No?" he smiled. "Then we must--how you say?--become acquaint. In the absence of Meester Bordene I present myself, Don Luis Moraga, a caballero of Old Spain, and at your feet."
" 'In my way' would be more correct, senor," the girl retorted. "As for Mr. Bordene, I am expecting him to overtake me, and he may have friends with him."
The man laughed mockingly. "I too have friends here, senorita," he said, and tapped the butts of the silver-mounted pistols thrust through his sash.
"I must repeat, senor, that I am in haste," she said coldly. "A caballero would not detain me."
Moraga grinned hatefully as he forced his horse to her side. "The senorita is at liberty to go--when she have paid, oh, so small a ransom," he said. "One leetle kees--"
Tonia's eyes and cheeks flamed at the insult. Heedless of her helplessness, she gripped the quirt dangling by a thong from her wrist, and cried:
"Lay a finger on me, you yellow dog, and I'll thrash you."
The contemptuous epithet stung the Mexican to fury; his face became that of a devil indeed. "Dios!" he hissed, "you shall pay for that." He snatched at her wrist, but she jumped her horse aside and swung the whip. Moraga cursed as the lash seared his cheek, but before she could strike again his claw-like hands were sinking into her flesh and he was dragging her from the saddle, his snarling lips, like a ravening wolf's, close to her own. Panting for breath, she fought on, but could not loosen that iron grip, and her strength was well-nigh spent when a cold, rasping voice said:
"Put 'em up, Greaser, an' pronto!"
Moraga flashed round, his hands going to his guns, but when he saw who had spoken they went above his head instead; he knew better than to try and beat the marshal of Lawless to the draw. Green, lounging in his saddle, surveyed the ruffian sardonically.
"Gettin' whipped seems to be a habit o' yours," he commented, his gaze on the angry crimson stripe across the man's face. Green turned to the girl. "Has he hurt yu?" he asked.
"No, I'm only frightened," she replied.
"Ride on a piece, Miss Sarel," he said. "I'll be along."
She divined the menace beneath the casual request. "What are you going to do?" she questioned.
"Kill a snake," he said coolly.
"No, no," she protested. "He's a Mexican and didn't understand. Please let him go."
The marshal shrugged his broad shoulders. "I oughta wiped him out the first time," he said. "Very well, ma'am, but he's gotta have a lesson. Get off yore hoss an' stand over there," he directed the Mexican, pointing to a spot about ten paces distant, and when the command had been sullenly obeyed, he added, "An' stand mighty still if yu want to see another sunrise."
He got down himself and drawing the two pistols from the bandit's sash, stepped back. For a moment he paused, weighing the weapons, and then the gun in his right hand roared and the brooch in Moraga's sombrero was torn from its place; a second shot ripped away the bullion band, while the third left the wearer bareheaded. Livid, but a statue of stone for stillness, the victim stood while, with incredible swiftness, shot followed shot in a continual stream. The golden epaulettes dropped from his shoulders; his belt, the buckle shattered by a bullet, fell away; the great silver spurs were wrenched from his heels. Having emptied the borrowed pistols the marshal flung them down and drew his own.
"Keep still," he warned, and stepped round so that he sighted his target sideways.
This time he used both guns, firing them alternately with such speed that the reports sounded like a roll of thunder. One by one the gilt buttons of the scarlet tunic leapt off, and only when the last dropped to the ground did the devilish tattoo cease. From the Mexican's chalky-white face, eyes in which fear and hate commingled glared at this smoke-wreathed, grim-lipped man who shot like a wizard. In those few moments Moraga had died twenty times, expecting each bullet to be the last, and his nerve-racked body was shivering despite the sun blazing overhead. The marshal reloaded his guns and slid them into the holsters.
"Yu can thank the senorita for yore life, Moraga," he said sternly. "Stay yore own side o' the line; she may not be there to beg yu off next time. Vamos!"
He swung into his saddle and joined Tonia.
"How can I thank you?" she asked. "I'm not easily scared, but that fellow was--horrible!"
"Just forget it," Green smiled. "This is part o' my job as marshal; but yu didn't oughta ride alone around here--it's too near the Border."
"Andy wanted to come, but I wouldn't let him," she explained. "He's busy--he has to be, after so much misfortune. Do you believe in luck, Mr. Green?"
"Shore, I've met her," was the reply. The girl's look of surprise brought a grin to his lips. "Luck must be a lady to play the pranks she does, yu know," he explained.
Tonia laughed with him. "I don't think Andy is one of her favourites," she speculated.
"Mebbe not, just now, but I've a hunch he's goin' to be one o' the luckiest fellas in Arizona," the marshal said, and smiled when he saw the colour in his companion's cheeks.
When they reached the Double S, Reuben Sarel emerged from his favoured corner on the veranda to greet them. "Glad to see yu, marshal," he cried. "Why, Tonia, what's the matter?"
In a few words she told of her adventure, and the fat man's expression became serious. "I'm thankin' yu, marshal," he said. "We'll have to keep an eye liftin' at the Double S. By all accounts, El Diablo is a poisonous piece o' work, an' he'll move heaven an' hell to square hisself. Gosh! I'd 'a' give somethin' to see yu strippin' off his finery."
"I never saw such shooting--it was wonderful," Tonia said.
"Well, mebbe yu put a scare into him, but I doubt it," Sarel went on. "These damn Greasers have their own sneaky ways o' gettin' back at yu. Wonder if he bumped off Bordene?"
"Possible, o' course, but I got no reason to think so," the marshal replied. "Yu losin' any cows?"
The fat man opened his eyes. "Yeah, but I ain't been advertisin' it," he said. "There seems to be a steady leak--few at a time, an' I can't trace it. Any reason for askin'?"
"Just a notion," Green assured him. "Tell yu later if I get to know anythin'."
On his way back to town he pondered over the bit of information. It had been purely a shot in the dark, but it opened up a new line of investigation for the morrow. Looking at the Double S brand on the rump of Miss Sarel's mount, it had suddenly struck him how very simply it could be changed, with the aid of a wet blanket and a running iron, into a passable 88. He slapped the neck of the black horse.
"Yu ol' son of a sweep," he told it. "Things is gettin' right interestin' in this neck o' the woods."
CHAPTER XIII
Riding along the street, the marshal noticed that his appearance was creating unusual interest; men he knew greeted him boisterously, and others, though silent, looked at him curiously. It was not until he reached his quarters that he learned the reason. Barsay's chubby countenance was one broad grin.
"So yu've had another fandango with Mister Moraga?" he burst out, and the marshal swore.