asked
Bedelia. For answer, Bedelia threatened to quit, declaring shrilly
that she would not work where nothing was safe under lock and key, and
a girl might work her fingers to the bone putting up jell for spoiled,
ungrateful, meddlesome Matties to waste, and so forth and so on.

Mary V wisely withdrew from the kitchen without having her question
answered. She asked no more questions of any one. In silk kimono and
Indian moccasins, one of her pet incongruities, she forthwith explored
the yard down by the corrals which the bunk house had hidden from her
view. There was no sign of Johnny Jewel's airplane anywhere. Mary V
was thorough, even to the point of looking for tracks of the little
wheels, but at last she was convinced, and returned to the porch to
digest the ominous fact of Johnny's failure to arrive.

He must have started,--she would not admit the possibility that he had
deliberately ignored her ultimatum,--but she would make sure. So she
called Tucson on the telephone and was presently in conversation with
the clerk at Johnny's hotel.

Hotel clerks are usually quite positive that they know what they are
supposed to know about their guests. This clerk interviewed somebody
while Mary V held the line, and later returned to assure her that Mr.
Jewel had been seen leaving the lobby the night before, and had not
returned. A strange young gentleman had occupied Mr. Jewel's room.
No, Mr. Jewel had not been seen since last evening. The clerk was
positive, but since Mary V's voice was young and feminine, he permitted
her to hold the line while he called the night clerk to the 'phone.
The result was disheartening. Mr. Jewel had brought in a young man,
and later had left the hotel. The young man had gone out very early
and neither had returned. Could he do anything else for her?

Mary V thanked him coldly and hung up the receiver, mentally calling
the clerk names that were not flattering. Why in the world did he keep
harping on that one fact that Johnny had gone out and had not come
back? Why didn't he know where Johnny had gone? What, for gracious
sake, was a hotel clerk for, if not to tell a person what she wanted to
know? The strange young man who had slept in Johnny's room meant
nothing at all to Mary V just then.

She had a dislike of creating unnecessary excitement, but it did seem
as though something ought to be done about Johnny. All her faith was
pinned to the fact that he had let her final wor