"Oh, anybody is liable to run dry, out here on the desert, Holly. If all
the Secret Service men in the country, and I know of one or two that's
been nosing around, were to come and find me here, they couldn't say I
hadn't a good, legitimate reason for coming. I had to come. I didn't want
to run on to any one from that inquest, and I had to see you. I wanted to
put you wise to the stand we're taking on the Estan Medina affair. We
can't help if that somebody bumped him off, but--"

"You can fill your water bag at the well, since that is what you came
for; and I should strongly advise you to terminate your visit as soon as
it is consistent with your errand to do so."

"Oh, don't crab my meeting a pretty girl, Holly! Introduce me, and I'll
take the water and go. Be a sport!" Elfigo had picked up his
five-gallon desert bag, but he was obviously waiting for Helen May to
ride up to the house.

To Starr, crouched behind on a rock on the ridge that divided the
Sommers place from the hidden arroyo where he had first seen trace of
the automobile, Elfigo's attitude of waiting for Helen May was too
obvious to question. A little, weakling offspring of Hope died then in
his heart. He had tried so hard to find some excuse for Helen May, and
he had almost succeeded. But his glasses were too strong; they
identified Elfigo Apodaca too clearly for any doubt. They were too
merciless in showing Starr that beside Elfigo stood the man who had
visited Helen May the day before.

Recognition of the man came with something of a shock to Starr. He had
heard of Holman Sommers often enough, though he had never seen him. He
had heard him described as a "highbrow" who wrote scientific articles,
sometimes published in obscure magazines, read by few and understood by
none. A recluse student, he had been described to Starr, who knew Todd
Sommers by sight, and who had tagged the family as being too American for
any suspicion to point their way.

As often happens, Starr had formed a mental picture of Holman Sommers
which was really the picture of a type made familiar to us mostly by our
humorists. He had imagined that Holman Sommers, being a "highbrow," was a
little, dried-up man with a bald head and weak eyes that made spectacles
a part of his face; an insignificant little man well past middle life,
with a gray beard, Starr saw him mentally. He should have known better
than to let his imagination paint him a portrait of any man, in those
ticklish t