int is, your dad is not going to support you or do a
thing for you. If you're willing to get along for a while on what I
can earn, all right. I guess you won't starve, at that."

"Well, but you said you wouldn't get married, Johnny, until you'd
paid--"

"I changed my mind. The best way is to settle the marrying part now.
I'll do the paying fast enough. Are you coming?"

Mary V climbed meekly out and permitted her abductor to lift her to the
ground, and to kiss her twice before he let her go. Events were moving
so swiftly that Mary V was a bit dazed, and she did not argue the
point, even when she remembered that a white middy suit was not her
idea of the way a bride should be dressed. The very boldness of
Johnny's proposition, its reckless disregard of the future, swept her
along with him down the sandy side street which already held curious
stragglers coming to see what new sensation the airplane could furnish.
These they passed without speaking, hurrying along, with Bland, like a
footsore dog, trailing dejectedly after.

They passed the hotel and made straight for the county clerk's office,
too absorbed in their mission to observe that their passing had brought
the three newspaper men from the hotel lobby. Bland fell into step
with one of these and gave the news. The three scented a good story
and hastened their steps.

In the county clerk's office were two strangers who glanced
significantly at each other when Johnny entered the room with Mary V
close behind him and with Bland and the three reporters following like
a bodyguard.

"Here they are," said a short, fat man whom Mary V recognized vaguely
as the sheriff. He gave a little, satisfied, nickering kind of
chuckle, and the sound of it irritated Johnny exceedingly. "Old man's
a good guesser--or else he knows these young ones pretty well. Ha-ha.
Well, son, you can get any kind of license here yuh want, except a
marriage license." Place a chuckle at the end of every sentence, and
you will wonder with me what held Johnny Jewel from doing murder.

"And who the heck are you?" Johnny inquired with a deadly sort of calm.
"You ain't half as funny as you look. Get out." With a jab of his
elbow he pushed the sheriff and his chuckle away, guessing that the man
with an indoor complexion and a pen behind his ear was the clerk. Him
he addressed with businesslike bluntness. He wanted a marriage
license, and he could see no reason why he should not have it.