she sighed in
heartfelt contentment. "Mena is--is the best sister in all the whole
world. But it's doubly nice to have a brother like you. Isn't it, just?"

She snuggled her head against Lennon's right shoulder. He reached across
and stroked her silky hair without looking away from the valley.

"I am glad you like me, Blossom. You know, Carmena brought me to help
her get you away from this place."

"Me--and Dad, Jack. Don't forget Dad. Mena never does. And Dad won't
ever give up the Hole, 'cause he said so. That's why Mena shot your
burro to make you fight Cochise."

Lennon chuckled.

"Carmena came along after the Apache shot my burro."

"Oh, but that's the joke," tittered the girl, in her turn. "Mena was the
'Pache. She shot your hat off and your burro to see how you'd behave,
and when you didn't scare, she rode 'round to make you come with her."

The enlarged version struck Lennon as just so much the more
preposterous.

"To be sure," he made mock agreement. "Only, by the way, what was the
point of the joke?"

"You mean, why did she do it?"

"Yes. Why ruin a twelve-dollar sombrero and a ten-dollar burro?"

"So's you'd get mad and fight Cochise, of course. She was desp'rit, so
she told him she'd get another man into the Basin to be caught and made
to pay. But she planned, when she signalled them, to warn you and slip
away while you fought them."

"Ripping!" praised Lennon. "Wonderful flight of fancy. And after the
fight?"

"Oh, that depends. You'd prob'ly been dead. But if you'd killed all that
part of the bunch, Mena would have brought you into the Hole to shoot up
the rest and make Slade quit."

"I see. Quite in keeping with the burro. But why, then, did she help me
run away?"

Elsie's playful tone sobered.

"Why, 'cause you couldn't fight, of course. After she signalled Cochise
you went and got bit by the Gila monster and saved her life. Course she
had to save you then."

"Saved!" bantered Lennon. "A fact--a solid fact at last, in this sea of
fiction. What a slip! I was beginning to fancy you quite a consistent
fairy-tale tinker, Blossom. Take that last touch about her signalling
Cochise. She sent a message by wireless, I presume."

"Wireless? Is that what you call smoke signalling?"

"Smoke?"--Before Lennon's mental vision flashed a vivid picture of the
puffs of smoke rising into the noontime desert sky from the ridge near
the waterhole--"Smoke signalling!"

What a dupe he had been! Even n