None of my party dared make the ride, so I had to come."

What was Plummer to do? He didn't want to rouse the sergeant. This
wasn't going back to Ceralvo's, but riding northward to the rescue of
imperilled beauty. He simply couldn't refuse, especially when Donovan
and others were eager to go. From Mr. Harvey he learned that his
father had married into an old Spanish Mexican family at Havana, had
been induced by them to take charge of certain business in Matamoras,
and that long afterwards he had removed to Guaymas and thence to
Tucson. The children had been educated at San Francisco, and the
sisters, now seventeen and fifteen years of age respectively, were
soon to go to Cuba to visit relatives of their mother, but were
determined once more to see the quaint old home at Tucson before so
doing; hence this journey under his charge. The story seemed straight
enough. Plummer had never yet been to Tucson, but at Drum Barracks and
Wilmington he had often heard of the Harveys, and Donovan swore he
knew them all by sight, especially the old man. The matter was settled
before Plummer really knew whether to take the responsibility or not,
and the cavalry corporal with five men rode back into the fiery heat
of the Arizona day and was miles away towards the Gila before Feeny
awoke to a realizing sense of what had happened. Then he came out and
blasphemed. There in that wretched little green safe were locked up
thousands enough of dollars to tempt all the outlawry of the Occident
to any deed of desperation that might lead to the capture of the
booty, and with Donovan and his party away Feeny saw he had but half a
dozen men for defence.

At his interposition the major had at least done one thing,--warned
Moreno not to sell a drop of his fiery mescal to any one of the men;
and, when the Mexican expressed entire willingness to acquiesce,