wisted around as far as his safety
belt would permit, that he might glare at Johnny. His tone was the
long of stern authority.

"Can't be done! The Thunder Bird's took the bit in her teeth. I'm
just riding' and whippin' down both sides!" Johnny laughed aloud,
Cliff's tone releasing within him a sudden, reckless mood that gloried
in the sport of the chase and forgot for a moment its grim meaning.
"Whoo-ee! Go to it, old girl! They gotta go some to put salt on
_your_ tail--whoo-ee!"

"Are you crazy, man? Those are government planes! They're probably
armed. They'll get us wherever we cross the line--turn back, I tell
you! You're under orders from me, and you'll fly where I tell you!
This is no child's play, you fool. If they get me with what
papers--it'll be a firing squad for you if they catch you--don't forget
that! Damn you, don't you realize--"

"Sit down!" roared Johnny. "And shut up!"

"I won't shut up!" Cliff's eyes, as Johnny saw them facing the moon,
looked rather wild. "You're working for me, and I order you to take me
back to Schwab's. You better obey--it will go as hard with you as it
will with me if those planes get in their work. Why, you fool, they--"

"What the heck do I care about them? I'm working for a bigger man than
you are right now. Sit down!"

"Stop at Tia Juana then and let me out. But I warn you--"

"Shut up!"

"I will not! You'll do as I tell you, or I'll--"

"Now will you shut up?" Johnny swung his gun, a heavy, forty-four
caliber Colt, of the type beloved of the West. Its barrel came down
fairly on the top of Cliff's leathern helmet and all but cracked his
skull. Cliff shut up suddenly and completely, sliding limply down into
his seat.

"By gosh, you had it coming!" Johnny muttered as he settled back into
his seat. He had never knocked a man cold before, and his natural
soft-heartedness needed bracing. He had let Cliff rave as long as he
dared, dreading the alternative. But now that it was done he felt a
certain relief to have it over. He could turn his mind wholly to the
accomplishment of another feat which would take all his nerve.

That other thing had looked simple enough in contemplation, but the
actual doing of it presented complications. The simplicity of the plan
vanished with the sighting of those two scouting planes that persisted
in paralleling his course and herding him away from the line he fain
would cross.

Tia Juana with its flat-roofe