But Barry Elder did not spring to the duties of his hostship. He did not even move aside to permit Johnny Byrd to spring to his own assistance—which Johnny showed every symptom of doing. He continued to stand obstructingly in the middle of his log doorstep, one hand on the knob of the half closed door behind him, his eyes fixed very curiously on Johnny's flushed disorder.
"What kind of an 'any one' are you looking for?" said Barry slowly.
"Oh—a—well, I guess you've got to help me out on this. You know the country. There's no use stalling. It's a girl—a foreign-looking girl."
"And what are you doing at six in the morning looking for a foreign-looking girl?"
"It's the darndest luck," Johnny broke out explosively. "We—we got lost last night going to a picnic on Old Baldy—and then we got separated——"
"How?"
"How?" Johnny stared back at Barry Elder and found something oddly fixed and challenging in that young man's eyes.
"Why how—how does any one get separated?" he threw back querulously.
"I can't imagine—especially when one is responsible for a girl."
"Gosh, Barry, you're talking like a grandmother. Aren't you going to give me anything to eat? What's the matter with you, anyway? You act devilish queer——"