Chapter 24 - Page 2

please, and selling his own to the government mostly--but some to the Mexicans, too, I suppose. And nobody suspecting a thing all the while, and Tex in with them and all. And if you hadn't stampeded the horses so they came back to the line, and the boys rounded them up, dad would have lost a lot more than he did. But now the whole thing is out, and really, if I hadn't caught those two greasers, there wouldn't be any evidence against the Tucker Bly outfit, or Tex either. And I just think it's awful, the way--"

She stopped abruptly. Johnny's bandaged head was leaning against the back of his big chair, and his eyes were closed. His face looked whiter than it had a few minutes ago. Mary V was scared. She should have known better than to talk of those things.

"Shall--would you like a drink, or--or something?" she asked in a small, contrite voice.

Johnny opened his eyes and looked at her.

"No, I don't want a drink; I just want somebody to give me another knock on the head that will finish me." And before Mary V could think of anything soothing to say, Johnny spoke again. "I think I'll go back and lie down awhile. I--don't feel very good."

He would not let Mary V help him at all, but walked slowly, steadying himself by the chairs, the wall, by anything solid within reach. He did not look much like the very self-assured, healthy specimen of young manhood whom Mary V could bully and tease and talk to without constraint. She felt as though she scarcely knew this thin, pale young man with the bandaged head and the somber eyes. He seemed so aloof, as though his spirit walked alone in dark places where she could not follow.

After that she did not mention stolen horses, nor thieves, nor airplanes, nor anything that could possibly lead his thoughts to those taboo subjects. Under that heavy handicap conversation lagged. There seemed to be so little that she dared mention! She would sit and prattle of school and shows and such things, and tell him about the girls she knew; and half the time she knew perfectly well that Johnny was not listening. But she could not bear his moody silences, and he sat out on the porch a good deal of the time, so she had to go on talking, whether she bored him to death or not.

Then one day, when the bandage had dwindled to a small patch held in place by strips of adhesive plaster, Johnny broke into her detailed description of a silly Western picture she had seen.

"What's become of Bland?" he asked, just when she was describing a thrilling scene.

"Bland? Oh, why--Bland's gone." Mary V was very innocent as to eyes and voice, and very uneasy as to her mind.

"Gone where? He was broke. I didn't get a chance to pay him--"

"Oh, well, as to that--I suppose dad fixed him up with a ticket and so on. And so this girl, Inez, overhears them plotting--"