None but Arizona would have attempted such a feat with a horse of her description; but he must have speed if he was going to save his friend’s life, and he knew she could give it.
CHAPTER XVI
WHAT LOVE WILL DO
Daylight was breaking when the jaded Lady Jezebel and her double freight raced into the ranch. The mare had done the journey in precisely two hours and a quarter. Arizona galloped her up to the house and rounded the lean-to in which Joe slept. Then he pulled up and shouted. Just then he had no thought for the rancher or Jake. He had thought for no one but Tresler.
His third shout brought Joe tumbling out of his bed.
“Say, I’ve got a mighty sick man here,” he cried, directly he heard the choreman moving. “Git around an’ lend a hand; gentle, too.”
“That you, Arizona?” Joe, half awake, questioned, blinking up at the horseman in the faint light.
“I guess; an’ say, ’fore I git answerin’ no fool questions, git a holt on this notion. Red Mask’s bin around Willow Bluff, an’ Tresler’s done up. Savee?”