er of fact, his offence was
being almost forgiven, and the six days' sentence was merely a bit of
discipline applied by the judge because Johnny sulked and scowled and
scarcely deigned to answer when he was spoken to.

The judge had a boy of his own, and it seemed to him that Johnny needed
time to think, and to recover from his sulks. Six days, in his
opinion, would be about right. The first two would be spent in
revilings; the third and fourth in realizing that he had only himself
to blame for his predicament, and the fifth and sixth days would
stretch themselves out like months and he would come out a considerably
chastened young man.

Another thing Johnny did not know was that, thanks to Mary V's father,
he was not herded with the other prisoners, where the air was bad and
the company was worse. He went back to his room under the roof, where
the jailer presently visited him and brought fruit and magazines and a
great box of candy, sent by Mary V with a doleful little note of
good-by as tragic as though he were going to be hanged.

Johnny was sulkier than ever, but his stomach ached from fasting. He
ate the fruit and the candy and gloomed in comparative comfort for the
rest of that day.

The next day, when the jailer invited him down into the jail yard for a
half hour or so, Johnny experienced a fresh shock. Somewhere, high in
the air, he heard the droning hum of his airplane. Bland was not
neglecting the opportunity Johnny had inadvertently given him, then.

Johnny craned his neck, but he could not see the plane in the patch of
sky visible from the yard. He listened, and fancied the sound was
diminishing with the distance. Bland was probably leaving the country,
though Johnny could not quite understand how Bland had managed to get
the funds for a trip. Perhaps he had taken up a passenger or two--or
if not that, Bland undoubtedly had ways of raising money unknown to the
honest.

Oh, well, what did it matter? What did anything matter? All the world
was against John Ivan Jewel, and one treachery more or less could not
alter greatly the black total. Not one friendly face had he seen in
the police court--since he did not call the reporters friendly. Mary V
had not been there, as he had half expected; nor Sudden, as he had
feared. The sheriff had not been friendly, in spite of his chuckle.
Bland had not shown up--the pop-eyed little sneak!--probably because he
had already planned this treachery.

He