"A tin box? Yes; you had it in your hands when Manuel brought you out. They could hardly pry your fingers from it."
"Would you mind having that box brought to me, Miss Valdés? I want to be sure the present hasn't been injured by fire."
"Of course not. I don't just know where it is, but it must be somewhere about the place."
She was stepping toward the door, with that fine reaching grace of a fawn that distinguished her, when his voice stopped her. She stopped, delicate head poised and half turned, apparently waiting for further directions.
"Not just this minute, please. I've been lying here all day, with nobody but Steve. Finally he got so restless I had to turn him out to pasture. It wouldn't be right hospitable to send you away so soon. That box can wait till you have had all of me you can stand. What I need is good nursing, and I need it awful bad," he explained plaintively.
"Has Mrs. Corbett been neglecting you?"
"Mrs. Corbett--no!" he shouted with a spirit indomitable, but a voice still weak. "She's on earth merely to cook me chicken broth and custard. It's you that's been neglecting me."
The gleam of a strange fire was in her dark, bright eyes; in her cheeks the soft glow of beating color.
"And my business on earth is to fight you, is it not? But I can't do that till you are on your feet again, sir."
He gave her back her debonair smile.
"I'm not so sure of that. Women fight with the weapons of their sex--and often win, I'm told."
"You mean, perhaps, tears and appeals for pity. They are weapons I cannot use, sir. I had liefer lose."
"I dare say there are other weapons in your arsenal. I know you're too game to use those you've named."
"What others?" she asked quietly.
He let his eyes rest on her, sweep over her, and come back to the meeting with hers. But he did not name them. Instead, he came to another angle of the subject.
"You never know when you are licked, do you? Why don't you ask me to compromise this land grant business?"
"What sort of a compromise have you to offer, sir?" she said after a pause.
"Have your lawyers told you yet that you have no chance?"
"Would it be wise for me to admit I have none, before I go to discuss the terms of the treaty?" she asked, and put it so innocently that he acknowledged the hit with a grin.
"I thought that, if you knew you were going to lose, you might be easier to deal with. I'm such a fellow to want the whole thing in my bargains."