“No,” said Jim hurriedly.  “I swear it, Clarence!  No!  Honest Injin this time.  And look.  I’ll help you.  They ain’t expectin’ you yet, and they think ye’ll come by the road.  Ef I raised a scare off there by the corral, while you’re creepin’ round by the back, mebbe you could get in while they’re all lookin’ for ye in front, don’t you see?  I’ll raise a big row, and they needn’t know but what ye’ve got wind of it and brought a party with you from Santa Inez.”

In a flash Clarence had wrought a feasible plan out of Jim’s fantasy.

“Good,” he said, wringing his old companion’s hand.  “Go back quietly now; hang round the corral, and when you see the carriage climbing the last terrace raise your alarm.  Don’t mind how loud it is, there’ll be nobody but the servants in the carriages.”

He rode quickly back to the first carriage, at whose window Mrs. Peyton’s calm face was already questioning him.  He told her briefly and concisely of the attack, and what he proposed to do.

“You have shown yourself so strong in matters of worse moment than this,” he added quietly, “that I have no fears for your courage.  I have only to ask you to trust yourself to me, to put you back at once in your own home.  Your presence there, just now, is the one important thing, whatever happens afterwards.”

She recognized his maturer tone and determined manner, and nodded assent.  More than that, a faint fire came into her handsome eyes; the two girls kindled their own at that flaming beacon, and sat with flushed checks and suspended, indignant breath.  They were Western Americans, and not over much used to imposition.

“You must get down before we raise the hill, and follow me on foot through the grain.  I was thinking,” he added, turning to Mrs. Peyton, “of your boudoir window.”

She had been thinking of it, too, and nodded.

“The vine has loosened the bars,” he said.

“If it hasn’t, we must squeeze through them,” she returned simply.

At the end of the terrace Clarence dismounted, and helped them from the carriage.  He then gave directions to the coachmen to follow the road slowly to the corral in front of the casa, and tied his horse behind the second carriage.  Then, with Mrs. Peyton and the two young girls, he plunged into the grain.

It was hot, it was dusty, their thin shoes slipped in the crumbling adobe, and the great blades caught in their crape draperies, but they uttered no complaint.  Whatever ulterior thought was in their minds, they were bent only on one thing at that moment,—­on entering the house at any hazard.  Mrs. Peyton had lived long enough on the frontier to know the magic power of possession.  Susy already was old enough to feel the acute feminine horror of the profanation of her own belongings by alien hands.  Clarence, more cognizant of the whole truth than the others, was equally silent and determined; and Mary Rogers was fired with the zeal of loyalty.