And then he continued to look right over their heads and their newspapers, for tripping down the aisle all by herself at last, came the girl of his fruitless choice. His eyes, deep with dreams, met hers. She smiled upon him, radiantly, blushed a little, and hurried on through the car. He sat looking after her with a foolish grin on his face. He was pleased and shaken. So she had noticed him after all. She had been waiting for a chance, as well as he. And now that it had come, he was getting off the train in an hour. It was useless to follow her.… He turned to the window again. CHAPTER II Usually in each generation of a large and long-established family there is some one individual who stands out from the rest as a leader and as the most perfect embodiment of the family traditions and characteristics. This was especially true of the Delcasar family. It was established in this country in the year 1790 by Don Eusabio Maria Delcasar y Morales, an officer in the army of the King of Spain, who distinguished himself in the conquest of New Mexico, and especially in certain campaigns against the Navajos. As was customary at that time, the King rewarded his faithful soldier with a grant of land in the new province. This Delcasar estate lay in the Rio Grande Valley and the surrounding _mesa_ lands. By the provisions of the King’s grant, its dimensions were each the distance that Don Delcasar could ride in a day. The Don chose good horses and did not spare them, so that he secured to his family more than a thousand square miles of land with a strip of rich valley through the middle and a wilderness of desert and mountain on either side. Much of this principality was never seen by Don Eusabio, and even the four sons who divided the estate upon his death had each more land than he could well use. The outstanding figure of this second generation was Don Solomon Delcasar, who was noted for the magnificence of his establishment, and for his autocratic spirit. No Borgia or Bourbon ever ruled more absolutely over his own domain than did Don Solomon over the hundreds of square miles which made up his estate. He owned not only lands and herds but also men and women. The _peones_ who worked his lands were his possessions as much as were his horses. He had them beaten when they offended him and their daughters were his for the taking. He could not sell them, but this restriction did not apply to the Navajo and Apache slaves whom he captured in war. These were his to be sold or retained for his own use as he preferred. Adult Indians were seldom taken prisoner, as they were untameable, but boys and girls below the age of fifteen were always taken alive, when possible, and were valued at five hundred _pesos_ each. Don Solomon usually sold the boys, as he had plenty of _peones_, but he never sold a comely Indian girl.