"What's the idee, Lightnin'?" he rumbled, puffing at the frayed remains of a cigar. With a gesture of calm triumph Bill pointed to the flask on the desk. "I said I had it, Zeb," he remarked, in the tone one uses when confronting and confounding a skeptic with ocular proof, "an' there it is!" "Why, so it be!" said Zeb, reaching out for the prize. But Lightnin' stopped him. "Hold on a minute, partner. The evidence ain't to be absorbed just yet. In fact, brother, we better keep it intact for future use, 'cause you're goin' on a long journey, Zeb. You an' me is goin' to hit the trail again, old-timer!" "Gosh! You mean it, Lightnin'?" Zeb showed almost human delight and anticipation. "But for why? You had a row with your old woman?" "Nope," Bill replied. "Can't call it that, exactly. You needn't worry them brains o' yours about why we're goin', Zeb. It's just that I got a notion to teach some people 'round here a lesson, an'--an' maybe I can bring poor mother to her senses," he added, gently. "When we goin'?" Zeb questioned, his eyes on the flask. "Right away--this here minute, in fact," said Bill. Zeb looked at him dazedly. "Just as we is? Where 're we hittin' fer?" "I ain't telling that just yet," said Bill, slowly. "Where we are goin' is a secret." "Oh," Zeb answered, with a nod of wisdom. "I--see. You ain't tellin' 'em you be goin'--not even your old woman, eh?" "Them brains o' yours is pickin' up a bit, ain't they, Zeb?" Bill commented, with encouraging approval. "Well, you hit it, all right! Nope, we ain't tellin' nobody. We're goin' to kinder disappear completely for a pretty good space. Mother ain't to be able to locate me a-tall. There's some others as 'll likely find out, but I ain't worryin' about them--they want to get rid o' me, an' they ain't likely to exhaust themselves any tryin' to find me. I got a object, Zeb. It ain't none o' your business what that object is--by which I merely mean to say, old-timer, that you wouldn't have no particular interest in it. Come on--let's get out now, afore they begins to gather 'round me again!" Picking up the flask and sliding it into his coat pocket, Lightnin' walked away toward the door. Nodding wisely, Zeb followed, eyes hopefully on the pleasant bulge in his old partner's coat. CHAPTER XII "Well!" Millie, appearing with a tray of late supper to take up-stairs to one of the guests' rooms along about ten o'clock that evening, almost ran into Marvin, who had returned to the hotel in the hope of seeing Bill and giving him the full reason for his not being a party to the sale of the place. The lights in the lobby were turned low and he had managed to evade the sheriff, who was sitting in his buck-board outside, waiting for Lemuel Townsend, who was to return to Reno with him.