Strangely, the failure of his impromptu elopement troubled him the least of all.  It had been a crazy idea, born of Mary V’s presence in the airplane and his angry impulse to spite old Sudden.  He had known all along that it was a crazy idea, and that it was likely to breed complications and jeopardize his dearest ambition, though he had never dreamed just what form the complications would take.  Even when he landed it was mostly his stubbornness that had sent him on after the marriage license.  He simply would not consider taking Mary V back to the ranch.  It was much easier for him to face the future with a wife and ten dollars and a mortgaged airplane than to face Sudden’s impassive face and maddening sarcasm.

Darkness settled muggily upon him, but he did not move from the cot where he had flung himself when the door closed behind his jailer.  He still felt the smooth hardness of the handcuffs, though they had been removed before he was left there alone.

He did not sleep that night.  He lay face down and thought and thought, until his brain whirled, and his emotions dulled to an apathetic hopelessness.  That he was tired with a long day’s unpleasant occurrences failed to bring forgetfulness of his plight.  Until the morning crept grayly in through his barred window he lay awake, and then slid swiftly down into slumber so deep that it held no dreams to soothe or to torment with their semblance of reality.

Two hours later the jailer tried to shake him awake so that he could have his breakfast and the morning paper, but Johnny swore incoherently and turned over with his face to the wall.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

JOHNNY WILL NOT BE A NICE BOY

The jailer reappeared later, and finding Johnny sitting on the edge of the cot with his tousled head between his two palms, scowling moodily at his feet, advised him not unkindly to buck up.

Without moving, Johnny told him to get somewhere out of there.

“Your girl’s father is here and wants to talk to you,” the jailer informed him, overlooking the snub.

“Tell him to go to hell,” Johnny expanded his invitation.  “If you bring him up here I’ll kick him down-stairs.  And that goes, too.  Now, get out of here before I—­”

“Aw, say, you ain’t in any position to get flossy.  Look where you are,” the jailer reminded him good-naturedly as he closed the door.

He must have repeated Johnny’s words verbatim, for Sudden did not insist upon the interview, and no one else came near him.  At noon the jailer brought him a note from Mary V, along with his lunch, but Johnny had no heart for either.  He had just finished reading the front-page account of his exploits, and his mood was blacker than ever.

No man likes to see his private affairs garbled and exaggerated and dished to the public with the sauce of a heartless reporter’s wit.  The headlines themselves struck his young dignity a deadly blow: