“No. It belongs to her.” Thady Shea rose to his feet. “We need not prolong this——”
“Oh, don’t be in a rush!” soothed Mackintavers, cordially. “Now, I’ll have your team attended to, and you’d better stay overnight with us, eh? We’ll have a talk, and we’ll get squared up on the trouble between you and Dorales——”
Thady Shea looked down at him. Under those eyes Mackintavers fell silent.
“Sir, you are an infernal villain,” said Thady Shea calmly. “I want none of your hospitality. There is no trouble whatever, save in your own greed and covetous rapacity. You are an arrant rogue, a caitiff vile; there can be naught between us. Sir, farewell!”
Thady Shea strode from the room and slammed the door after him.
Sandy Mackintavers sat motionless, completely astounded by this outburst. He looked down at the check in his hand, then looked out the window; he could see Thady Shea climbing into the buckboard and driving off.
“Aiblins, yes; the man’s mad!” he reflected. A slow chuckle came to his lips. “And to think I never so much as said thank’ee! If the check’s good, now—h’m! Better find out about it. A fool, that’s what the fellow is. A loose-brained fool.”
He sought the telephone and spoke with the Silver City bank. The check was good.
Later in the afternoon came the first word of the actual thief who had made off with the seven stone gods. One of the men brought in a report that he had found signs of a camp on the creek a mile distant. Mackintavers and Old Man Durfee went out to investigate. They were good at reading signs; they discovered that a man had spent the previous night in this spot, and that he had presumably been an Indian. The tracks of his unshod horse showed a cracked off hind hoof. A few tiny shreds of gray wool showed where his saddle blanket had been laid.
Over the supper table that evening Sandy Mackintavers recounted these results to the archæologist. Abel Dorales had not yet returned from Socorro.