ning to help, but Bland would have none
of his assistance.

"Say, f'r cat's sake, keep a watch out for Injuns and leave me alone!
I can locate the trouble all right, if I don't have to hang on to my
skelp with both hands. You got a gun?"

"Yeah. Back in Tucson I have," Johnny suppressed a grin. Bland's
ignorance, his childlike helplessness away from a town tickled him.
"But that's all right, Bland. We'll make 'em think we're gods or
something. They might make you a chief, Bland--if they don't take a
notion to offer you up as a burnt offering to some other god that's got
it in for yuh."

Bland, testing the spark plugs hastily, one after the other, dropped
the screwdriver. "Aw, f'r cat's sake, lay off that stuff," he
remonstrated nervously. "Fat chance we got of godding over Injuns this
close to a town! They're wise to white men. Quit your kiddin', bo,
and keep a watch out." And he added glumly, "Spark plugs is O.K.
Maybe it's the timer. I'll have to trace it up. Quit turning your
back on that brush! You want us both to git killed? Hand me out that
small wrench."

"Say, I know what ailed them squaws, Bland. Gods is right. You know
what they thought? They took us for their Thunder Bird lighting. I'll
bet they're making medicine right now, trying to appease the Bird's
wrath. And say, listen here, Bland. If they do come at us, all we've
got to do is start up and buzz at 'em. There ain't an Injun on earth
could face that."

Bland lifted a pasty face from his work. "Fat chance," he lamented.
"You'd oughta brought your gun. Back there at Sinkhole you was damn
generous with the artillery--there where you had no use for it. Now
you fly into Injun country without so much as a sharp idea. Bo, you
give me a pain!"

Johnny spied an Indian peering fearfully out from the branches of a
willow. He ducked behind the motor and hissed the news to Bland.
Bland nearly fell from his perch.

"Gawd!" he gasped, clinging to a strut while he stared fascinatedly in
the direction Johnny had indicated. "Git in, bo, and we'll beat it.
She may have power enough to hop us outa this death trap. We can come
down somewheres else." He clawed back and climbed in feverishly.

Johnny emitted a convulsive snort. "Death trap" sounded very funny,
applied to this particular bit of harmless landscape. Behind him,
Bland was imploring him to hurry, and Johnny climbed in.

"You let me pilot the thing," he ordered. "I know In