"What the super said about Grattan trying to get back at you, Matt, for what you did in the old sugar camp, near Purling, sounded to me like it had a lot of good horse sense mixed up in it."
"What I told the super had a little horse sense in it, too, didn't it, Joe?"
"You mean about Grattan having so much to do to keep out of the clutches of the law that he won't find any time to hit up your trail?"
"Yes."
"I don't know about that. Grattan is a tinhorn who is in a class all by himself. He seems to have all kinds of nerve, and to be willing to take all sorts of chances. That moving-picture deal gives us a pretty good line on him."
When the boys got to the hotel, McGlory stumbled into a chair on the veranda.
"Gee, man, but I'm tired!" he exclaimed. "A cowboy is built for riding, and not for this footwork. It sure gets me going. Sit down here for a while, Matt, and let's palaver about New York, and what the chances are for our getting there."
"They're pretty slim, I guess," answered Matt, dropping into a seat at his chum's side, "if we're to wait until Grattan is captured. Tsan Ti says, in his letter, that he won't come on until Grattan is behind the bars, or safely off his trail."
"Which means to hang on here until—we don't know when. We're rid of Bunce, but there'll be something else to hit us between the eyes before we're many minutes older. You can bet your moccasins on that. As long as we're tangled up with that ruby, we'll find hard luck flagging us all along the pike."
At that moment the clerk emerged from the hotel office and crossed the veranda. He wore a troubled look, as though something had happened to worry him.