"We'd been sent after as mean a man as ever infested the Border--and there were some mighty mean men along the Rio Grande in those days. He had slipped across the Border to escape us; but in those times we didn't pay much attention to the line between the States and Mexico. "We went after him just the same. He was with a crowd of regular bandits, we found out. And they were aiming to clean up Señor Milo Morales' _hacienda_. "We got onto their plans, and we rode hard to the _hacienda_ to head them off. We knew the old Spaniard--as fine a Castilian gentleman as ever stepped in shoe-leather. "We stopped with him a while, beat off the bandits, and captured our man. After everything quieted down (as we thought) we started for the Border with the prisoner. Señor Morales was an old man, without chick or child, and not a relative in the world to leave his wealth to. His was one of the few Castilian families that had run out. Neither in Mexico nor in Spain did he have a blood tie. "His vast estates he had already willed to the Church. Such faithful servants as he had (and they were few, for the _peon_ is not noted for gratitude) he had already taken care of. "Lon and I had saved his life as well as his personal property, he was good enough to say, and he showed us this treasure chest and what was in it. When he passed on, he said, it should be ours if we were fixed so we could get it before the Mexican authorities stepped in and grabbed it all, or before bandits cleaned out the _hacienda_. It was a toss-up in those days between the two, which was the most voracious! "Well, Frances, that's how it stood when we rode away with Simon Hawkins lashed to a pony between us. Before we reached the river we heard of a big band of outlaws that had come down from the Sierras and were trailing over toward Morales'. "We hurried back, leaving Simon staked down in a hide-out we knew of. But Lon and I were too late," said the old Captain, shaking his head sadly. "Those scoundrels had got there ahead of us, led by the men we had first beaten off, and they had done their worst. "The good old Señor--as harmless and lovely a soul as ever lived--had been brutally murdered. One or two of his servants had been killed, too--for appearance's sake, I suppose. The others, especially the _vaqueros_, had joined the outlaws, and the _hacienda_ was being looted. "But Lon and I took a chance, stole in by night, found the treasure chest, and slipped away with it. I went back alone before dawn, found a six-mule team already loaded with household stuff and drove off with it, thus stealing from the thieves. "A good many of these fine old things we have here were on that wagon. I decided that they belonged to me as much as to anybody. Get them once over the boundary into God's country and the thieving Mexican Government--only one degree removed at that time from the outlaws themselves--would not dare lay claim to them.