this wire hack to
town and send it off," he snapped, preparing to write. "Sure, I'll send
that set of prints! Happy, you can go to the head of the class. Now
it's only a case of sit tight till the money comes. The prints are
packed and in the bank vault, so I'll just get them out and send them
C.O.D. to Mr. Crittenden, along with the states rights contract. How's
that for luck, boys?"

"Pretty good--for Luck," grinned Andy meaningly. "Fly at it, you coming
millionaire!"

"Just a case of sit tight, boys. _Adios!"_ cried Luck jubilantly as he
hurried away.

Once start along a smooth trail, and everything seems to conspire toward
a pleasant trip. To prove it, Luck found another telegram waiting for him
in Albuquerque. This was from Martinson, and might be interpreted as an
apology more or less abject. Certainly it was an urgent request that he
return immediately to Los Angeles and to his old place at the Acme, and
produce Western pictures under no supervision whatever.

Luck gave a little chuckle when he pocketed that message, but he did not
send any answer. He meant to wait and talk it over with the boys first.
"Better proposition than before," Martinson said. Well, perhaps it would
be best to look into it; Luck was too experienced to believe that one
success means permanent success; there are too many risks for the free
lance to run when a single failure means financial annihilation. If the
Acme would come to his terms, it might be to his advantage to take his
boys back and accept this peace-offering. At any rate, he appreciated to
the full the triumph they had scored.

Next, by some twist of the red tape in the Philadelphia express
office,--or perhaps R.J. Crittenden was a good fellow and asked them to
do it,--the two thousand dollars came by wire, just three days after Luck
had received notice that his shipment of positive film was being held for
him at the express office in Albuquerque. Also came other offers, mostly
by wire, for states rights to _The Phantom Herd._ And when the Happy
Family realized what those offers meant, they didn't care how hard or how
long Luck worked them in the little house which he had turned into a
laboratory.

Being human, intensely so in some ways, the first set of prints they
turned out Luck sent to Los Angeles with a mental godspeed and a hope
that Bently Brown and Martinson would see it and "get wise to what a
_real_ Western picture looked like." There were other orders ahead of