‘We didn’t get to stay in Mexico,’ Elbert complained after a time. ‘We had to come right back.’ Cal and Slim looked at each other, faces long and grave. ‘He didn’t get to stay,’ said Cal. ‘Only one horse went over back with him,’ said Slim. ‘Only one powder magazine blew up. Only hit by one forty-five--’ ‘Had to come right back,’ said Cal. ‘I thought I’d get to ride,’ said Elbert, ‘but I had to drive that car--’ Cal inquired after a moment: ‘Do you reckon we might take Elbert along again sometime?’ ‘I ain’t a well man. I ain’t ready to state as to that right now’,’ said Slim. ‘I need to be babied along at Heaslep’s, where they ain’t rough, and talk gentle--’ ‘He wants to hear about old hoof-and-mouth,’ Cal suggested. ‘They’re going to let me out of here to-morrow,’ said Elbert. ‘I’ll be goin’ up to Tucson--to meet my father.’ * * * * * Elbert was clear of the hospital before he began to see things straight. In fact, he was standing with Mamie in her box stall the next day in the livery stable at Nogales, on the American side, when some perfectly useless frictions and pressures fell away. In the first place, here was Mamie safe and sound, and the future opened with a new chance to begin over again at the bottom. Had he lost the mare, there could have been no real beginning over, at the bottom or anywhere else. Secondly, he hadn’t divulged his secret, even in delirium. Certain time had been lost, the fault his in deciding to stop at Heaslep’s for a friendly call on the way from San Forenso to the Border. Beyond doubt he must travel alone from now on. He was breathing easier. A bit weak on his legs--too long in bed--but ready to begin again. Queer, how it all cleared up for him standing with Mamie like this. ‘Stand around and talk to her,’ Bob Leadley had said. ‘She likes to be consulted on family affairs. It won’t do you no harm. She’s one more listening mare.’ ‘I’ll just leave you right here, Mamie,’ he whispered, ‘while I go up to Tucson for a day or two. These people seem to be treating you right--and it’s handy to the Border. Take it easy till I come back, because we’ll be losing ourselves in work after that.’ * * * * * ... A queer, embarrassed half-embrace, neither knowing just what to do or say, and a swift look into his father’s eyes after several months--really the first exchange that had the beginnings of understanding in it. Elbert finally grasped what a son is so slow to find out--that his father was not merely a parent, but a separate human being, with his own struggles, silences, dilemmas, like the rest of the world. It was Elbert’s first understanding of his own house, and the man of it, from the attitude of an outsider. Another moment of a fresh beginning in life, he realized. Meanwhile sentences like this were passing: ‘Got yourself pretty badly shot up?’ ‘It was a bad jumble for a minute--’ ‘But you saw them through--’