Glendon made no comments as he left the office, but Jack turned back at the threshold to call, "I'm going to get out of town as fast as I can, Judge. I've got to hustle for a job so I can pay back that fine. I'll see that the money gets to you p. d. q. So long!" "Good luck, boys," answered the Judge heartily. Then turned to his desk and papers, thinking that there was more manhood to the "gun man" than the one who accompanied him. The two walked side by side in apparent friendliness until Jack said, "Well, that was a surprise party all around, Glen. I bet I hit the bull's eye guessing it was the doctor." Glendon's eyes glinted angrily at Jack's open praise of Powell. "He certainly made a laughing-stock of you," snarled Glendon. "Threw you down, trussed you up like a Christmas turkey, loaded you in the town truck, and now you are ready to lick his boots in gratitude after he puts the last insult on you by paying your fine. Pah! You make me sick!" Jack gripped the other man's arm angrily. "See, here, Glen! I'm not such a mollycoddle that I won't fight you or any other man that talks that way to me." Jack stood glaring down at Glendon, who returned the angry stare. Then a grin started on Jack's face, and he drawled slowly, "Don't see that you've got any call over me, Glen. There was two Christmas turkeys, but you did the loudest gobbling. Don't you ever forget that!" "I'm not apt to," retorted the other. "I never would have been mixed up in it if I hadn't been trying to help you out." "And I wouldn't have started anything if it hadn't been for you egging me on. You said he was a tenderfoot. Tenderfoot! Wow! I'd like to know what kind of bad men they have where he came from, if he's a tenderfoot!" He paused to ponder over the possibilities of such an individual. "See, here, Glen, so long as Powell minds his business, I'll mind mine; and if you've got a grudge against him on account of his getting the Springs, you needn't try to get me to take it out on him for you." Glendon's face was white with rage. "I suppose that means you are going to take backwater on everything and join some Church and shout 'Hallelujah! I'm saved!' Eh?" "It means just what I said. If you've got any pick on Powell that is your own business. As far as the other plans go, the cards are dealt already, and I'll stand pat." CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE Three months after Glendon and Jack had encountered Doctor Powell in Willcox, Katherine was sitting on the porch of her home reading to Donnie. The noise of crunching wheels sounded far down the canyon long before a vehicle came into sight between the dense mesquite brush. It was Doctor Powell who had returned from a trip to Willcox. Katherine watched her husband receive his mail, but she was not aware that the eyes of the two men met with unconcealed antagonism, and the conversation was as curt as possible.