There were a few details which Sudden, being only human, could not
possibly give his friends. He could not know that Mary V went back down
the hill, sneaked into the bunk house and got Johnny's coat, and sewed
the sleeve lining in very neatly, and took the coat back without being
seen. Nor did he know that she violently regretted the deed of kindness,
when she discovered that Johnny remained perfectly unconscious of the
fact that his coat sleeve no longer troubled him.




CHAPTER TWO

ONE FIGHT, TWO QUARRELS, AND A RIDDLE


Rolling R ranch lies down near the border of Mexico--near as distances
are counted in Arizona. Possibly a hawk could make it in one flight
straight across that jagged, sandy, spiney waste of scenery which the
chance traveler visions the moment you mention southern Arizona, but if
you wanted to ride to the Border from the Rolling R corrals, you would
find the trip a half-day proposition. As to the exact location, never
mind about that.

The Selmer Stock Company had other ranches where they raised other
animals, but the Rolling R raised horses almost exclusively, the few
hundred head of cattle not being counted as a real ranch industry, but
rather an incidental by-product. Rolling R Ranch was the place Sudden
Selmer called home, although there was a bungalow out in the Wilshire
District in Los Angeles about which Sudden would grumble when the tax