You, Don Andres, if you would permit your vaqueros to do likewise, instead of shaking hands with the gringos and bidding them welcome--" "But I do not permit it; nor do I seek counsel from the children I have tossed on my foot to the tune of a nursery rhyme." He shook his white-crowned head reprovingly.

"He was always screaming at his duenna, one child that I recollect," he smiled.
"Art thou scolding Jose again, my Andres?
He loves to play that thou and Teresita are children still, Jose; it serves to beguile him into forgetting the years upon his head! Welcome, Senors.

Teresita but told me this moment that you had come.

She is bringing the wine--" On their feet they greeted the Senora Picardo.

Like the don, her husband, honest friendliness was in her voice, her smile, the warm clasp of her plump hand.