door of Ponk's garage.

"Have you a good little runabout that I could hire this morning? I want
to go out into the country," she said to the proprietor.

"Why, yes, Miss Swaim, but I 'ain't got no shofer this morning. York
Macpherson, he took my last man and soared up the country, and they
won't be back for a couple of days. I'm sorry, but could you wait till,
say, about a-Thursday, or mebby a-Friday?"

Ponk's cheerful grin always threatened to eclipse his eyes, but this
morning there was something anxious back of his cheerfulness. Nature had
made him in a joking mood, round eyed, round headed, round bodied,
talkative, and pompous in an inverse ratio to his size. But there was
something always good and reliable about Ponk, and with all his
superficiality, too, there was a real depth to the man, and a keener
insight than anybody in New Eden, except York Macpherson, ever gave him
credit for having.

"I'm sorry I've got no shofer. There was a run on the livery business
this morning for some reason. That's why I'm office-boy here now, 'stead
of runnin' the office next door," Ponk explained, as blandly and
conclusively as possible.

"I don't want a chauffeur at all. I drive myself," Jerry declared.

"You say you do?" Ponk stared at her little hands in their close-fitting
white gauntlets.

"Now I'd never thought that. Yes," weakly, "I've got a dandy car for
them that can use it, which is mostly me. It's the little gray gadabout
we come up from the station in the other evening. There ain't another
one like it this side of the Mississippi River--S'liny, Kansas, anyhow.
You see, I have to be awful particular. I don't want it smashed against
a stone wall or run off of some bridge."

"I've never done that with a car yet. And I used to drive our big
eight-cylinder machine over all kinds of Pennsylvania roads."

The blue eyes were full of pathos as the memory of her home and all its
luxuries swept over Jerry. And Ponk understood.

"We don't have no stone walls out here, and there ain't no bridges,
either, except across the Sage Brush in a few places, because there
ain't never water enough out here to bridge over. Yes, you may take the
gadabout. I just know you'll be careful. That little car's just like a
colt, and noways bridle-wise under a woman's hand."

"Thank you. I'll take no risks."

When Jerry was seated in the shining gray car, with her hand on the
wheel, she turned to Mr. Ponk.

"By the way, do you know who