The elements had picked clean the bones of the crumbling tenement ere they should finally absorb it.
A withered old peon woman, who in dress, complexion, and fibrous hair might have been an animated fragment of the debris, rustled out of a low vaulted passage and welcomed them with a feeble crepitation.

Following her into the dim interior Mrs.Tucker was surprised to find some slight attempt at comfort and even adornment in the two or three habitable apartments.

They were scrupulously clean and dry, two qualities which in her feminine eyes atoned for poverty of material.
"I could not send anything from San Bruno, the nearest village, without attracting attention," explained Poindexter; "but if you can manage to picnic here for a day longer, I'll get one of our Chinese friends here," he pointed to the slough, "to bring over, for his return cargo from across the bay, any necessaries you may want.

There is no danger of his betraying you," he added, with an ironical smile; "Chinamen and Indians are, by an ingenious provision of the statute of California, incapable of giving evidence against a white person.

You can trust your handmaiden perfectly--even if she can't trust YOU.