Bennett's "dago," when halted by Number Four, was as limp a specimen of humanity as that drowsy young trooper had seen in all his soldier days. Bennett's dago was no stranger to the post, having occasionally come thither on errands for his employer, and semi-occasionally appeared without such semblance of authority, but, whether his mission was for master or man, it had never hitherto failed to lead to the store and monte. Small as was the garrison, and few as were the neighboring ranches, there was generally business enough to support two card rooms, one for officers and the "_gente fino_"--the trader, his partner, the chief packer, forage master, and an occasional rancher or prospector; the other, a big one, and often a riotous, for the soldiery, scouts, packers and riffraff of the frontier, and for this establishment Bennett's dago had an indescribable fascination. Here he had met and differed with Munoz, the two coming to a knife duel, promptly suppressed by the gun butts of the guard. None the less was Munoz called into requisition as interpreter, for between peril, exhaustion and defective English the "dago" could only splutter an unintelligible jargon that might have been Sicilian, Maltese, or Calabrian, but could not be Spanish. Bennett, it seems, had picked him up for dead on the Verde road, early in the spring of the year, and Mrs. Bennett had nursed the poor devil back to life. Then it turned out that he knew how to cook. Later it transpired that he had been with a Mexican "outfit," prospecting for gold; had taken mountain fever, become a burden to them, and was left to look out for himself at a tank in Dead Man's Canon. He paid for his keep in cooking and chores, said Bennett, and picked up enough English to enable him to get along about the ranch. He presently showed desire to care for the horses and mules and to ride them, and one day he disappeared with Bennett's best saddle mule and was gone forty-eight hours, and on his return gravely tendered Bennett a five-dollar gold piece in payment for his time and mule while away. He said he won it at monte, and it was proved that he had found his way to the card room, as a mule does to water, and, without knowledge of English, displayed consummate skill in the game; had played only two hours, had won twenty dollars and departed at dusk. But his winnings were in greenbacks and silver. Whence had come the gold? The trader's people said he stabled his mule; introduced himself as "Bennett's _mozo_--me," and "sat into" the game then in progress as though long accustomed; showing silver, mainly Mexican, the only credentials the players required. At sunset he quit, easy winner, and went without taking so much as a "snifter." Once having found the way, and the means, the dago came again and yet again, neither giving nor having trouble until he ran foul of Munoz, the Mexican, whom he seemed to hate at sight. Whatever his lingo, or that employed by the polyglot Mexican,