The other looked at him with quickened interest.

“You bug on the motors?”

“Well, you might call it that,” laughed Owen.

“Never tried ’em myself. Looks like a promisin’ field. Wonder if we couldn’t get jobs in the same garage?”

“Maybe we could; and then, again, maybe there isn’t a garage in Phoenix that has a place for us. I have a note for a thousand dollars that I want to collect from the proprietor of a garage in—— What’s the matter with you?” demanded Clancy, breaking off suddenly.

Fortune had come to a dead stop in the trail. He stared at his new “pard,” then craned his head forward and put a hand behind his ear.

“Otra vez!” he murmured. “Come again with that, Red. A note for—how much?”

“Thousand dollars.”

“Gee-wollops! I didn’t know there was that much dinero in the world. And here you tune up and allow you couldn’t hire me at fifty plunks a month!”

“The note doesn’t belong to me,” Clancy explained, “but to my father. The folks need the money—and I may have a hard time collecting it. You say you have been in Phoenix, Jimmie?”