Part 45 (1/2)
”They were pretty decent, Sallie, and both Ripley Halstead and Mr.
North were always kind. I couldn't have let them suffer for a mistake.--How is Tia Juana? You must let me see her the next time she comes.”
Sallie chuckled.
”She's buildin' a chapel to the lost souls who was drowned in that pool, and she's bought a big, bright-yeller automobile! Jose's learning from Dan how to drive it for her, when Dan gets time enough off from his work with Mr. Thode. Since you gave him that stock in the new Murdaugh-Reyes Company you can't hardly pry Dan Morrissey loose from the oil business to eat.--Say, honey!” Her tone dropped persuasively. ”There's something that's not quite clear in my mind yet. I've been bursting to ask you, but you were too sick. Where does young Mr. Thode come in on this and how did you find out that old Rosa Mendez was the one who signed Tia Juana's name to that false deed?”
”I didn't. It was Mr. Thode who found that out for me,” Willa explained. ”You see, when I met him out in Topaz Gulch I told him I was coming down here and he said he'd be here, too; his presence would have been necessary, anyway, to prove that I was really Willa Murdaugh.
Dan's sister was taking care of Tia Juana and Jose for me in Philadelphia, where those who were fighting me wouldn't think of searching.
”When I settled up my affairs out West, I wired Dan, and he brought Tia Juana and Jose down to Victoria to meet me. There I found Mr. Thode again. He had suspected trickery and fraud in connection with the making over of the lease, and when the Notary Public described the woman who had appeared before him as Tia Juana with--with Starr Wiley----” Her voice sank at mention of the name which had cast such a shadow over her for many days. ”Mr. Thode knew it was an impostor. He realized that Wiley would not have selected a woman from either Victoria or Limasito to play the part for she might have been recognized, so he scouted around in the neighborhood of the Lost Souls'
Pool itself, and found that a poor, old, half-witted creature, who had lived all her days in a wretched hovel near the Trevino hacienda, had suddenly come into money from a mysterious source, and moved away.
That was Rosa Mendez.
”When he talked to her closest a.s.sociates in the poor quarter where she lived, Mr. Thode found that Rosa had had a fair education, but all the money she could earn or sc.r.a.pe together went for hootch.”
”I remember her from the time we lived out that way,” Sallie remarked.
”I hired her to help in the cook-house when we had extra hands on for the pickin', and she stole all the pots she could carry off.”
”Mr. Thode found out, too, that for the last few days before she went away she shut herself up in her hut and wouldn't let anybody in, but one of the neighbor women peeped in through a window, and saw her writing something over and over on sc.r.a.ps of paper and burning them carefully in the stove.” Willa went on. ”That must have been Tia Juana's signature. Then when he heard that she was seen talking to a man who answered to Wiley's description, he was sure. He traced her to Palmillas and when he confronted her she broke down and confessed without a show of fight. He brought her back to Victoria and was waiting for me when I came.”
”He's a smart one!” Sallie vociferated admiringly. ”You'd go far, Billie, to find a regular he-man in all that crowd you've been traveling with that could beat him! But you might have let me in on that party over to Baggott's! He sent hot-foot for Hen, but little I thought you was in it or I'd have come, invite or no! How'd you fix that up?”
”I sent Tia Juana and Jose and Rosa Mendez on ahead to confront the others if necessary----”
”Yes, and they tried to kill each other all the way down----old Rosa and Tia Juana, I mean,” interrupted the other. ”Them Federal officers told Hen they'd rather have had charge o' two wild cats! Them and the other government fellers got there while that bunch o' robbers was out on a trip inspecting the oil well.”
Willa nodded.
”I knew they'd return that morning, and I arranged the affair with Jim Baggott and the officials. It was a terrible business, Sallie, and I wanted to get it all over with at once.”
”Well, you did it!” Sallie chuckled. ”You took the wind out o' the sails o' them relatives o' your'n, too. They've been milling around these parts like nothin' was good enough for 'em, and it give 'em a pain to hear your name mentioned, but it was different after you showed up with your powder-blast, I can fell you! When they found you was goin' to let byegones be byegones, and give 'em a chance to get back the money they'd lost, it would have done you good to see the way they came around here, trying to do something for their dear young relation!”
Willa smiled faintly.
”I wish I might have seen my cousins before they went North.”
Sallie endeavored to maintain a discreet silence, but the effort proved too much for her.
”Well, if you ask me, you're just as well off! The menfolks may be all right, but that Mrs. Halstead wouldn't have let you call your soul your own; wanted me to put ice-bags on you and all manner of outlandish things, and told me to my face that my house wasn't sanitary! I soon sent her about her business.--There! I declare if that good-for-nothin' Chevalita isn't callin' me again!”
She retired precipitately into the house, and her ruse was apparent; her quick ears had caught, not the voice of her criada, but the sound of a pinto's hoofs on the road, and she recognized its portent as did the girl in the shadows.
A pale young moon had risen, and in its light the drive lay like a curving white ribbon, the approaching figures of pony and man melting together, yet sharply distinct. Willa waited until the rider had dismounted, then bolstered herself upright and held out a thin little hand.
”Willa! It is really you, at last!”
He sank down on the steps beside her and somehow forgot to relinquish her hand.
”Yes, it is really I!” she smiled. ”Mrs. Bailey told me of your never-failing calls and inquiries. You have been very kind----”