"He told me all about them as we were riding in this evening." Both Parker and his wife raised interrogatory eyebrows. "Indeed!" Mrs. Parker murmured. "So he's honoring you with his confidences already?" The girl ignored her mother's bantering tones. "No, he didn't tell me in confidence. In fact, his contemplated procedure is so normal and free from guile that he feels there is no necessity for secrecy. I suppose he feels that it would be foolish to conceal the trap after the mouse has been caught in it." "Well, little daughter, I haven't been caught--yet. And I'm not a mouse, but considerable of an old fox. What's he up to?" "He's going to sell you his equity in the ranch." Her father stared hard at her, a puzzled little smile beginning to break over his handsome face. "That sounds interesting," he replied, dryly. "What am I going to pay for it?" "Half a million dollars." "Nonsense." "Perhaps. But you'll have to admit that his reasoning is not so preposterous as you think." And she went on to explain to Parker every angle of the situation as Don Mike viewed it. Both Parker and his wife listened attentively. "Well, John," the good soul demanded, when her daughter had finished speaking: "What's wrong with that prescription?" "By George, that young man has a head on his shoulders. His reasoning is absolutely flawless. However, I am not going to pay him any half-million dollars. I might, in a pinch, consider paying him half that, but--" "Would a quit-claim deed be worth half a million to you, Dad?" "As a matter of cold business, it would. Are you quite certain he was serious?" "Oh, quite serious." "He's a disappointment, Kay. I had hoped he would prove to be a worth-while opponent, for certainly he is a most likable young man. However--" He smothered a yawn with his hand, selected a cigar from his case, carefully cut off the end and lighted it. "Poor devil," he murmured, presently, and rose, remarking that he might as well take a turn or two around the farmyard as a first aid to digestion. Once outside, he walked to the edge of the mesa and gazed down the moon-lit San Gregorio. Half a mile away he saw a moving black spot on the white ribbon of road. "Confound you," he murmured, "you're going to get some of my tail feathers, but not quite the handful you anticipate. You cannot stand the acid test, Don Mike, and I'm glad to know that." CHAPTER XXIII As Farrel approached the Mission de la Madre Dolorosa, a man in the rusty brown habit of a Franciscan friar rose from a bench just outside the entrance to the Mission garden. "My son," he said, in calm, paternal accents and speaking in Spanish, "I knew you would come to see your old friends when you had laid aside the burdens of the day. I have waited here to be first to greet you; for you I am guilty of the sin of selfishness."