his hand upon his shoulder.

"Muy hidalgamente, Clarence," he said pleasantly. "Yes, we shall make
something of you!"




CHAPTER X


Then followed to Clarence three uneventful years. During that interval
he learnt that Jackson Brant, or Don Juan Robinson--for the tie of
kinship was the least factor in their relations to each other, and after
the departure of Flynn was tacitly ignored by both--was more Spanish
than American. An early residence in Lower California, marriage with a
rich Mexican widow, whose dying childless left him sole heir, and some
strange restraining idiosyncrasy of temperament had quite denationalized
him. A bookish recluse, somewhat superfastidious towards his own
countrymen, the more Clarence knew him the more singular appeared
his acquaintance with Flynn; but as he did not exhibit more
communicativeness on this point than upon their own kinship, Clarence
finally concluded that it was due to the dominant character of his
former friend, and thought no more about it. He entered upon the new
life at El Refugio with no disturbing past. Quickly adapting himself to
the lazy freedom of this hacienda existence, he spent the mornings
on horseback ranging the hills among his cousin's cattle, and the
afternoons and evenings busied among his cousin's books with equally
lawless and undisciplined independence. The easy-going Don Juan, it is
true, attempted to make good his rash promise to teach the boy Spanish,