“He is?” Peter pulled down his heavy, black brows and the corners of his lips. “I’ve spent a good deal of time wondering about that. There’s Nevada--and one-eighth Indian. Is that--” “Oh, what the devil difference does that make?” Rawley gave a flounce that made him groan. But in the midst of it he managed to growl, “You said it yourself; Nevada’s--Nevada.” CHAPTER ELEVEN RAWLEY THINKS THINGS OUT At intervals of fevered wakefulness during that night, Rawley went over and over the astonishing state of affairs. The hour and the temperature that was almost inevitable conspired to twist and exaggerate the truth, to give him an intolerable sense of kinship with the slovenly, platter-faced Gladys, the stolid obesity of the old squaw, and of a hopeless abyss between himself and Nevada. They were related, somehow. They must be, since her Uncle Peter was also his uncle. Uncle Peter, he thought, had been terribly wronged, and he must somehow make amends, must remove the handicap of that savage blood. In the morning he must tell Gladys that he was her cousin; why, that made him Indian, too! No wonder his hair was so black, and he loved the wilderness with such a passion. He was part Indian, that was why. Johnny Buffalo was some relation; how Rawley’s mother would hate that! What he did not know was that he talked about it, with Johnny Buffalo awake and listening in the bed against the farther wall, and with Peter awake, too, in a bed he had made for himself on the porch. He remembered that Peter came and gave him a drink, and that it did not seem to matter so much, after that. He slept late into the morning, after the opiate, and awoke to a saner point of view. As before, Nevada and her grandmother brought trays of food and helped the two helpless ones to eat. With the knowledge Peter had given him, Rawley looked with more interest at the old lady, covertly trying to see the slim little half-caste Spanish girl whom Grandfather King had found “the joy of his heart.” On the whole, Rawley could not feel that his grandfather would have gone on loving, in any case. And he could not get away from the fact that Anita had consoled herself with considerable expedition. “You aren’t such a hero, after all,” Nevada bantered him, bringing him out of his revery with a laugh. “You’re looking abominably well, this morning, for a young man who was brought in dead only yesterday. And after all, you did not kill Queo. Uncle Jess and Uncle Peter went up to the spot last evening, just before dark, to identify him beyond all doubt, and--he’d disappeared. They found where he had lain behind the rock, and they knew he was wounded, by the blood.” She shivered involuntarily. “But he wasn’t anywhere to be found. Uncle Peter feels quite put out. He looked at Queo when he went up after you, and he felt sure the man was dead. So now, if he lives, he’ll be more venomous than ever.”