Ned Castleton looked caressingly at the slender, graceful figure of his wife, erect upon her horse, and smiled broadly. "Fanny, I'm in that condition right now, from unassuaged curiosity. Please knock me down with a feather and then go on and tell me this deep, dark secret." She tickled his cheek with her quirt. "Why, Ned, I've been telling you all about it for the last five minutes, but you won't understand what I mean. It's all because she's immensely taken with your handsome superintendent, and she's deeply interested in the cattle business because she wants him to explain it to her!" Castleton gave an incredulous laugh. "Nonsense, Francisquita! You are a clever woman, my dear, especially when it comes to divining what your dearly beloved sister-in-law is planning to do year after next. But you two women do get most remarkable notions about each other sometimes." Mrs. Castleton shrugged her shoulders, tapped her horse, and bounded ahead. They raced for a mile before she allowed him to regain his place at her side. "Granting that you're right, Francisquita," he said, "what makes you think so?" "Why, Ned, it's perfectly plain. I've seen Lena pave the way for too many flirtations not to know exactly what she's doing now. And she's preparing to have a perfectly furious affair with Mr. Conrad." Castleton kept discreet silence for some moments and studied the horizon. When he turned again to his wife he asked, "Well, dear, what are you going to do about it?" Francisquita Castleton was half Mexican, and on her mother's side could trace descent through a long line of dons back to a valiant governor and captain-general of the province who had done great deeds nearly two hundred years before. Her heritage had dowered her well with the instinctive coquetry, the supple, unconscious grace, the feminine, artless art that are the birthright of the women of Spanish blood. All of it was in the movement of her arm, the turn of her neck, and the poise of her head as she raised her veil and lifted her face toward her husband. Her voice was as soft as velvet and as caressing as an infant's palm as she exclaimed: "Do anything? I? Why, Ned Castleton, how you surprise me! Why should I interfere with Lena's whims?" Castleton laughed. "Ask me something easy, Fanny! I'm sure I don't know why you should, but I've noticed that Lena's plans sometimes shrivel up like a stuck balloon. Of course, it may be mere chance." "No, Ned; it isn't chance at all. It's only because Lena doesn't plan carefully enough." He took time for reflection. "I say, Francisquita," he presently broke out, "if you're right about this--and I must admit you don't often miss it about Lena--it may be a serious matter."