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In fact, Donna was an exemplified copy of that distinctive personality with which we unconsciously invest any young woman upon whose capable shoulders must fall such multifarious duties as those already described; particularly when, as in Donna's case, they are accepted and disposed of with the gentle, kindly, interested yet impersonal manner of one who loves her little world enough to be a very distinct part of it; yet, seeing it in its true light, manages to hold herself aloof from it; unconsciously conveying to one meeting her for the first time the impression that she was in San Pasqual on her own sufferance a sort of strayling from another world who had picked upon the lonely little desert town as the scene of her sphere of action for something of the same reason that prompts other people to collect postage stamps or rare butterflies.
"Yes" she replied heedlessly. She had him with her now; the shadow of impending separation had not yet fallen upon her. "What are your plans, Donna?" he asked. "My plans?" "Yes. Is it still your intention to keep on working?" "Why not? I must do something. I must await you somewhere, so why not at San Pasqual? It is cheaper there and it will help if I can be self- supporting until you come back.
But on like the wind came the troopers in blue, never pausing to fire a shot, their leader at racing speed. Wounded though he was, Pasqual Morales was not the man to fail in the fight. Yelling orders and curses at his driver, he succeeded in getting him to control his frantic team just long enough to enable the outlaw captain to tumble out.
Hennage's profession had never even warranted recourse to his two most priceless possessions his hands. Yet, despite this fact, and the further fact that he had never accomplished anything more reprehensible than staking his coin against that of his neighbor, Mr. Hennage had acquired the reputation of being the worst man in San Pasqual.
Hearing that the country was conquered and the fighting over, the American officer had sent back about two hundred of his men, but he was afterward reinforced by Captain Gillespie and fifty men sent by Stockton to meet him. Several American officers were killed in the battle of San Pasqual, and their brave commander severely wounded.
It was even as they were pointing this out to Pasqual and urging that he consent to be lifted into the ambulance and driven away southward before the return of the cavalry, that Moreno himself appeared. Slipping out of his western window, dropping to the ground and making complete circuit of the corral, he suddenly joined in the excited conference.
Who could have dreamed that a band of Apaches, cut off from their native wilds by detachments from Bowie, Lowell, and Crittenden, and forced to make a wide détour to the southwest, had sought refuge in the very gorge of the Cababi whither Pasqual with all speed was urging his men? "We rest when we reach the cave."
Donna's hot tears fell fast on his face as she leaned over and kissed the death-damp from his brow. "Oh-thank you" he gasped. "Bob take off my shoes I don't want to die with my boots on. New gaiters too give 'em to Sam Singer. Good Injun that." The sun had set behind the Tehachapis now, and twilight was stealing over San Pasqual. It was time for Mr. Hennage to be on his way.
That was a gay Christmas at Monterey, despite the barricades in the street. News had come of the defeat of Kearney at San Pasqual, and the Montereños, inflated with hope and pride, gave little thought to the fact that his forces were now joined with Stockton's at San Diego.
Between his sobs, the young civilian told him that the outlaws had hitched in both teams and taken also the spare mules and the buck-board. They had lifted the Harvey girls into the Concord, the safe and Pasqual Morales into the paymaster's ambulance, while the wounded men and Moreno's people probably were put on the open wagon.
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