Tucker Jibbey was rapid only in his attitude toward the world of decency; the rapidity did not extend to his mental processes. The suburb street had become a country road, the bridge over the torrenting Gloria had thundered under the flying wheels, and a great butte, black in its foresting from foot to summit, was rising slowly among the western stars before his small brain had grasped the relation of cause to effect. "Say, here, Monty--dammit all, you hold on! Verda isn't with Old Moneybags; she's staying at the hotel in town. I wired and found out before I left Denver. Where in Sam Hill are you taking me to?" Smith made no reply other than to open the cut-out and to put his foot on the accelerator. The small car leaped forward at racing speed and Jibbey clutched wildly at the wheel. "Stop her--stop her!" he shrilled. "Lemme get out!" Smith had one hand free and it went swiftly to his hip pocket. A second later Jibbey's shrilling protest died away in a gurgle of terror. "For--for God's sake, Monty--don't kill me!" he gasped, when he saw the free hand clutching a weapon and uplifted as if to strike. "Wh--what've I done to you?" "I'll tell you--a little later. Keep quiet and let this wheel alone, if you want to live long enough to find out where you're going. Quiet down, I say, or I'll beat your damned head off!--oh, you would, would you? All right--if you _will_ have it!" * * * * * It lacked only a few minutes of midnight when Smith returned the borrowed runabout for the second time that night, sending it jerkily through the open door of Benkler's garage and swinging stiffly from behind the steering-wheel to thrust a bank-note into the hand of the waiting night man. "Wash the car down good, and be sure it's all right before Mr. Maxwell sends around in the morning," he commanded gruffly; and then: "Take your whisk and dust me off." The night man had seen the figure of his tip and was nothing loath. "Gosh!" he exclaimed, with large Western freedom; "you sure look as if you'd been drivin' a good ways, and tol'able hard. What's this on your sleeve? Say! it looks like blood!" "No; it's mud," was the short reply; and after the liberal tipper had gone, the garage man was left to wonder where, on the dust-dry roads in the Timanyoni, the borrower of Mr. Maxwell's car had found mud deep enough to splash him, and, further, why there was no trace of the mud on the dust-covered car itself. XXI At Any Cost