“Good Heavens, man, I believe it will be an hour before he can walk!”

Farrel glanced critically at his wrist-watch and seemed to ponder this.

“I fear five minutes is all I can permit, sir,” he replied.  “If he should be unable to walk from his room, Murray, who is the soul of thoughtfulness, will doubtless assist him to the waiting automobile.”

Five minutes later, the potato baron and the potato baron’s suitcase were lifted into the tonneau of the car by Murray and William.  From over by the blacksmith shop, Don Mike saw Parker bid his Japanese confrere adieu, and as the car dipped below the mesa, Parker came over and joined them.

“Thought you were going in to El Toro this afternoon,” the young man suggested.

“I had planned to, but changed my mind after beholding that Nipponese ruin.  To have driven to El Toro with him would have broken my heart.”

“Never mind, pa,” Mrs. Parker consoled him; “you’ll have your day in court, will you not?”

“I think he’s going to have several of them,” Don Mike predicted maliciously, and immediately withdrew the sting from his words by placing his hand in friendly fashion on Parker’s shoulder and shaking him playfully.  “In the interim, however,” he continued, “now that our unwelcome guests have departed and peace has been reestablished on El Palomar (for I hear Pablo whistling ‘La Paloma’ in the distance), what reason, if any, exists why we shouldn’t start right now to get some fun out of life?  I’ve had a wonderful forenoon at your expense, so I want you and the ladies to have a wonderful afternoon at mine.”  He glanced alertly from one to the other, questioningly.

“I wonder if the horses have recovered from their furious chase of this morning,” Kay ventured.

“Of course.  That was merely an exercise gallop.  How would you all like to come for a ride with me over to the Agua Caliente basin?”

“Why the Agua Caliente basin?” Parker queried casually.  “That’s quite a distance from here, is it not?”

“About seven miles—­fourteen over and back.  Suppose William follows with the car after his return from El Toro.  You can then ride back with him, and I’ll bring the horses home.  I realize fourteen miles is too great a distance for inexperienced riders.”

“Isn’t that going to considerable trouble?” Parker suggested suavely.  “Suppose we ride down the valley.  I prefer flat land to rolling country when I ride.”

“No game down that way,” Farrel explained patiently.  “We’ll take the hounds and put something up a tree over Caliente Basin way before we get back.  Besides, I have a great curiosity to inspect the dam you’re building and the artesian wells you’re drilling over in that country.”

“Confound you, Farrel!  You realized the possibilities of that basin, then?”