“The deuce you—­”

“So I had quite a distance to go, and I did not want to worry any one by being gone long.  So I—­er—­didn’t like to wake Bill up—­”

“Hunh!” from Bill, this time.

“I really intended to take Tango as usual,” Mary V explained with dignity.  “I had no thought of intruding on a person’s piggishness with their old race horse, but Jake came right up and put his nose in the feed pan, and—­and acted so—­sort of eager—­and I knew he just suffers for exercise, standing in that old corral, so it was very wrong, but I yielded to him.  I rode him down to Sinkhole, and I found him a perfectly gentle lady’s horse.  So there now, Mr. Bill.  You just—­”

“And what did you find at Sinkhole?” Sudden led her firmly back to the subject.

“I found that the beans were sour, and the bread was hard as a rock, and there wasn’t one thing to show that a meal had been cooked in that camp for two days, at least.  And Johnny’s bedding was gone—­or some of it, anyway.  And so was Sandy.  So I came back, and changed horses, and took Tango.  I knew, of course, how stingy a person can be about a horse.  And as I was riding away, behind that line of rocks so Mr. Stingy wouldn’t see me, I saw a certain person come sneaking up to the corral and turn his horse inside.  It was just barely daylight then, but it was the same person I saw meet the Mexican.

“And I hurried hack to Snake Ridge, so I got there quite early in the morning.  And I saw two men ride off toward the eastern line of Sinkhole range, and they were not Johnny Jewel at all, which would be perfectly impossible.  Because soon afterwards I saw something very queer being hauled by mules, and that was Johnny bringing home his airplane, perfectly innocent.”

“Who’s the fellow—­” Sudden and Bill spoke together, the question which harried the minds of both.

“Of course,” said Mary V, “I understand that some one from the ranch would have to put them up to distracting Johnny’s attention by letting him have that airplane.  I can see that they would want to keep him busy so he wouldn’t pay so much attention to the horses down there, and would not notice a few horses gone now and then.  So somebody had heard about the airplane, and told them that Johnny was perfectly mad about aviation, and—­”

Sudden turned, and took her by the shoulders.  “Mary V, who was that man?  Don’t try to shield him, because I shall—­”

“The very idea!  I don’t want to shield him at all.  I merely want Jake, without any strings on him whatever.  Because he can go like the very dickens, and I want to keep an eye on Tex myself.  He won’t pay any attention—­”

“Tex!  Good Lord!  Bill, you—­”

“Listen, dad, I think I deserve to have Jake.  You know I can ride him, and you’re so short-handed, and I can watch Tex—­”

“Go saddle him up for her, Bill, will you?  I guess the kid’s done enough to put her on a par with the rest of us.”