The waiting was a little awkward.  The ringing idlers were good-natured but curious.  Ormsby stood by and answered questions multiform, diverting curiosity from the lady to the machine.  Presently the spokesman said: 

“Is this here the steam-buggy that helped a crowd of you fellers to get away from Jud Byers and his posse one day a spell back?”

“No,” said Ormsby.  Then he remembered the evening of small surprises—­the racing tally-ho with the Inn auto-car to help; and, more pointedly now, the singular mirage effect in the lengthening perspective as the east-bound train shot away from Agua Caliente.

“What was the trouble that day?” he asked, putting in a question on his side.

“A little ruction up at the Twin Sisters.  There was a furss, an’ a gun went off, accidintally on purpose killin’ Jim Harkins,” was the reply.

The machinist was come from the Blue Jay, and Ormsby helped Elinor out of her seat while the repairs were making.  The town office of the Blue Jay was just across the street, and he took her there and begged house-room and a chair for her, making an excuse that he must go and see to the brake-mending.

But once outside he promptly stultified himself, letting the repairs take care of themselves while he went in search of one Jud Byers.  The deputy sheriff was not hard to find.  Normally and in private life he was the weigher for the Blue Jay; and Ormsby was directed to the scale shanty which served as the weigher’s office.

The interview was brief and conclusive; was little more than a rapid fire of question and answer; and for the greater part the sheriff’s affirmatives were heartily eager.  Yes, certainly; if the thing could be brought to pass, he, Byers, would surely do his part.  All he asked was an hour or two in which to prepare.

“You shall have all the time there is,” was the reply.  “Have you a Western Union wire here?”

“No; nothing but the railroad office.”

“That won’t do; they’d stop the message.  How about the Inn?”

“Breezeland has a Western Union all right; wire your notice there, and I’ll fix to have it ’phoned over.  I don’t believe it can be worked, though,” added the deputy, doubtfully.

“We can’t tell till we try,” said Ormsby; and he hurried back to his car to egg on the machinist with golden promises contingent upon haste.

Miss Brentwood found her companion singularly silent on the five-mile race to Breezeland; but the lightning speed at which he drove the car put conversation out of the question.  At the hotel he saw her into the lift with decent deliberation; but the moment she was off his hands he fairly ran to the telegrapher’s alcove in the main hall.

“Have you a Western Union wire to the capital direct?” he inquired.

The young man snapped his key and said he had.

“It has no connection with the Trans-Western railroad offices?”