"I'm glad to hear he's got a string out somewhere, then," Rob remarked. "Suppose you tell us what you mean by that?"
"Why, he knows General Villa real well," Tubby went on. "Fact is, he met him some years ago when he was only a bandit, fighting against the Diaz Government, because they'd gone and set a price on his head. It's too long a story to tell you now, Rob, but the fact is that my uncle, who used to be a pretty fine surgeon once on a time before he got this exploring bee in his head, saved the life of Villa!"
"He did, eh?" exclaimed the patrol leader, apparently beginning to take new interest in the matter. "That sounds as though there might be a slim chance for those herds to be left alone. Go on and tell us some more, Tubby."
"Villa was badly hurt, and uncle took him to his house and nursed him back to life again, knowing who he was all the while; because, as I said before, uncle didn't have any too much love for the party that was in power just then. And Villa told him he would never forget what uncle had done for him; that if he could do him a favor any time all uncle had to do was to speak. So that is what he's hoping will turn out in his favor; that General Villa, remembering how he was treated so well at the ranch, would put a guard over the place and keep his men from raiding it, under the belief that uncle must return home before long. Oh, Uncle Mark is building big hopes on the gratitude of the man whose life he saved long ago!"
"I must say it does look some hopeful," Rob mused, as though trying to convince himself along those lines; for a trip to the South did look mighty alluring to him, if only he could believe it was not a foolish errand that took them to the sorely troubled land of the Montezumas.
"And I forgot to tell you this," Tubby continued breathlessly. "Just as you read so often in stories of the old-time days, the bandit Villa gave my uncle a queer ring which he wears all the time, and told him that if that ring was ever brought to him he would go far out of his way to help the person who fetched it!"
When Tubby burst out with this new bombardment, Rob threw up his hands as if he must capitulate on the spot.
"That seems to clinch matters like a nail driven through a board, Tubby," he went on to say.
"Oh! then you mean you'll go; is that it, Rob?" exclaimed the fat boy, scrambling out of the easy-chair, and landing on his feet with his short legs spread out as though they were a letter A.
Rob smiled.