“Don Martin Amador? But, yes. I am Don Martin Amador. You come from Don Justino?” He smiled indulgently. His most _estimable primo_. What a pity there were no more cattle to sell. Raquel was aghast. He had no cattle to sell? She put the question incredulously. “But I came only because I was assured by Don Justino that you were waiting here for the purchaser he would send.” “_Si, si._ Yes, yes.” The _comprador_ he had sent had arrived three days before and it was already two days now since the cattle, one thousand head, had been driven away, down to the railroad. One could see for oneself the corrals were empty. “_El Americano_ who bought them, Don Señor Meyers, was a most estimable gentleman, and he had the most estimable whiskey.” There was no doubt about it. Her father’s enemy had been there first. He had beaten her. He couldn’t have been told about the cattle by Esquibal this time. It must have been by Don Justino himself, in whom she had always believed. At her evident distress Don Martin felt at once most sympathetic. If they would but wait till his son returned from El Paso, where he had accompanied Don Señor Meyers with the cattle, in order to collect the balance of the money and deposit it in his bank there, his son would escort them to a large _rancho_ to the south where there were hundreds--thousands of head of fine cattle. “When will that be?” Raquel caught at a ray of hope. A week, maybe two. Don Martin was comfortably soothing, stretched out again in his chair, with a whiskey at his elbow. One knew how it was with a young man, getting to the city from this so dry _rancho_. Things to drink, and see, and beautiful ladies. Georgie rolled his eyes lugubriously, and heaved an eloquent groan. But Raquel was thinking rapidly. Here they were. Why go back empty handed, if there were other cattle that she could get? Could not Don Martin direct them himself to the _rancho_ of which he spoke? Their time was limited; they had expected to be back in the city in not more than ten days. Considering that they had had Don Justino’s word of honor as to the cattle, and the disappointment----? “But, yes,” said Don Martin, “myself, I no longer ride. But I can give directions where easily you will find _El Rancho del Desierto_ (the Ranch of the Desert), where one Faustino Mirabal has upwards of two thousand head of very good cattle.” Twenty leagues from that place, it was. They could not miss it “Very well, then,” Raquel decided at once. It occurred to Don Martin to offer his callers some refreshment. He suddenly bellowed forth, and finally from the rear of the casa appeared a very ancient old woman who set about laying a table. A boy came to water their horses and turn them into a corral.