ned a smudgy "jumper,"
opened his tool-box, and, with a glance at his wrist-watch which told
him it was three o'clock, threw up the monster's hood and went bitterly
to work.

At half past three the investigation had got as far as the lubricator.
At four o'clock the bulldog had given it up and gone nosing afield. At
half past four John Valiant lay flat on his back like some disreputable
stevadore, alternately tinkering with refractory valves and cursing the
obdurate mechanism. Over his right eye an ooze of orange-colored oil
glowered and glistened and indefatigably drip-dripped into his shrinking
collar. A sharp stone gnawed frenziedly into the small of his back
and just as he made a final vicious lunge, something gave way and
a prickling red-hot stab of pain shot zigzagging from his smitten
crazy-bone through every tortured crevice of his impatient frame. Like
steel from flint it struck out a crisp oath that brought an answering
bovine snort from the fence-corner.

Worming like a lizard to freedom, his eyes puckered shut with the
wretched pang, John Valiant sat up and shook his grimy fist in the air.
"You silly loafing idiot!" he cried. "Thump your own crazy-bone and see
how you like it! You--oh, lord!"

His arm dropped, and a flush spread over his face to the brow. For
his eyes had opened. He was gesturing not at the bull but at a girl,
who fronted him beside the road, haughtiness in the very hue of her
gray-blue linen walking suit and, in the clear-cut cameo face under her
felt cavalry hat, myrtle-blue eyes, that held a smolder of mingled
astonishment and indignation. The long ragged stems of two crimson roses
were thrust through her belt, a splash of blood-red against the pallid
weave. An instant he gazed, all the muscles of his face tightened with
chagrin.

[Illustration]

"I--I beg your pardon," he stammered. "I didn't see you. I really
didn't. I was--I was talking to the bull."

The girl had been glancing from the flushed face to the thistly
fence-corner, while the startled dignity of her features warred with
an unmistakable tendency to mirth. He could see the little rebellious
twitch of the vivid lips, the tell-tale flutter of the eyelids, and the
tremor of the gauntleted hand as it drew the hat firmly down over her
curling masses of red-bronze. "What hair!" he was saying to himself.
"It's red, but _what_ a red! It has the burnish of hot copper! I never
_saw_ such hair!"

He had struggled to his feet, n