He was, indeed, lying there among the wild oats at the right of the road, but without trace of life or scarcely human appearance.  His clothes, where not torn and shredded away, were partly turned inside out; his shoulders, neck, and head were a shapeless, undistinguishable mask of dried earth and rags, like a mummy wrapping.  His left boot was gone.  His large frame seemed boneless, and, except for the cerements of his mud-stiffened clothing, was limp and sodden.

Clarence raised his head suddenly from a quick examination of the body, and looked at the men around him.  One of them was already cantering away.  Clarence instantly threw himself on his horse, and, putting spurs to the animal, drew a revolver from his holster and fired over the man’s head.  The rider turned in his saddle, saw his pursuer, and pulled up.

“Go back,” said Clarence, “or my next shot won’t miss you.”

“I was only going to inform the senora,” said the man with a shrug and a forced smile.

“I will do that,” said Clarence grimly, driving him back with him into the waiting circle; then turning to them he said slowly, with deliberate, smileless irony, “And now, my brave gentlemen,—­knights of the bull and gallant mustang hunters,—­I want to inform you that I believe that Mr. Peyton was murdered, and if the man who killed him is anywhere this side of hell, I intend to find him.  Good!  You understand me!  Now lift up the body,—­you two, by the shoulders; you two, by the feet.  Let your horses follow.  For I intend that you four shall carry home your master in your arms, on foot.  Now forward to the corral by the back trail.  Disobey me, or step out of line and”—­He raised the revolver ominously.

If the change wrought in the dead man before them was weird and terrifying, no less distinct and ominous was the change that, during the last few minutes, had come over the living speaker.  For it was no longer the youthful Clarence who sat there, but a haggard, prematurely worn, desperate-looking avenger, lank of cheek, and injected of eye, whose white teeth glistened under the brown mustache and thin pale lips that parted when his restrained breath now and then hurriedly escaped them.

As the procession moved on, two men slunk behind with the horses.

“Mother of God!  Who is this wolf’s whelp?” said Manuel.

“Hush!” said his companion in a terrified whisper.  “Have you not heard?  It is the son of Hamilton Brant, the assassin, the duelist,—­he who was fusiladed in Sonora.”  He made the sign of the cross quickly.  “Jesus Maria!  Let them look out who have cause, for the blood of his father is in him!”

CHAPTER VII.

What other speech passed between Clarence and Peyton’s retainers was not known, but not a word of the interview seemed to have been divulged by those present.  It was generally believed and accepted that Judge Peyton met his death by being thrown from his half-broken mustang, and dragged at its heels, and medical opinion, hastily summoned from Santa Inez after the body had been borne to the corral, and stripped of its hideous encasings, declared that the neck had been broken, and death had followed instantaneously.  An inquest was deemed unnecessary.