Along the remoter avenues and cross-streets dwellings were deserted, people sat upon their doorsteps or in chairs upon the sidewalks, fearful of the houses they had built with their own hands, and doubtful even of this blue arch above them that smiled so deceitfully; of those far-reaching fields beyond, which they had cut into lots and bartered and sold, and which now seemed to suddenly rise against them, or slip and wither away from their very feet. It seemed so outrageous that this dull, patient earth, whose homeliness they had adorned and improved, and which, whatever their other fortune or vicissitudes, at least had been their sure inheritance, should have become so faithless. Small wonder that the owner of a little house, which had sunk on the reclaimed water front, stooped in the speechless and solemn absurdity of his wrath to shake his clenched fist in the face of the Great Mother. The real damage to life and property had been so slight and in such pronounced contrast to the prevailing terror, that half an hour later only a sense of the ludicrous remained with the greater masses of the people. Mr. Dumphy, like all practical, unimaginative men, was among the first to recover his presence of mind with the passing of the immediate danger. People took confidence when this great man, who had so much to lose, after sharply remanding his clerks and everybody else back to business, re-entered his office. He strode at once to his desk. But the envelope was gone! He looked hurriedly among his papers--on the floor--by the broken window--but in vain. Mr. Dumphy instantly rang his bell. The clerk appeared. "Was that draft paid?" "No, sir; we were counting the money when"---- "Stop it!--return the draft to me." The young man was confiding to his confrères his suspicions of a probable "run" on the bank as indicated by Mr. Dumphy's caution, when he was again summoned by Mr. Dumphy. "Go to Mr. Poinsett's office and ask him to come here at once." In a few moments the clerk returned out of breath. "Mr. Poinsett left a quarter of an hour ago, sir, for San Antonio." "San Antonio?" "Yes, sir--they say there's bad news from the Mission." CHAPTER VII. IN WHICH BOTH JUSTICE AND THE HEAVENS FALL. The day following the discovery of the murder of Victor Ramirez was one of the intensest excitement in One Horse Gulch. It was not that killing was rare in that pastoral community--foul murder had been done there upon the bodies of various citizens of more or less respectability, and the victim in the present instance was a stranger and a man who awakened no personal sympathy; but the suspicion that swiftly and instantly attached to two such important people as Mr. and Mrs. Conroy, already objects of severe criticism, was sufficient to exalt this particular crime above all others in thrilling interest. For two days business was practically suspended.