tell her of my adventure. She’ll say right off quick that I need a guardian, and bawl me out for not waiting for her to take me to the ranch as she promised.”

Still, he was troubled over what he had heard, and made up his mind that if he didn’t get a letter from his father soon he would write him all about it, or better still, take a trip East to warn him that Ricker was a desperate character.

He was fast getting on to the ways of the West, and feeling the red blood flowing swiftly through his veins, he felt like getting into action on any trouble that might involve his father in peril.

He meant to take Josephine into his confidence as soon as he got home, and Scotty, too, whom he felt sure he could trust. Thus musing to himself he was covering ground at a slow canter.

Again his thoughts would travel Eastward to his old friends, and the hope of getting his car soon raised his spirits high. Then he remembered Roy Purvis to whom he had said good-bye just before he had started for the West.

Roy had been a keen and enthusiastic automobile racer along with Mason, and had just gone in for aviation. He had several bad spills in learning, but was keener for flying than he ever had been for automobile racing. He had laughingly made the remark to Mason that he might expect a birdman to visit him in his chosen god-forsaken country.

“Just the thing,” he said aloud to Sport, who was so startled that he broke into a swift run. “Steady, old boy,” he called softly, slowing him down. “When I get to Trader’s Post I will telegraph for Roy to come on, and send in a hurry order for my car at the same time.”

It was an ideal day with a gentle wind blowing, and Mason drank in deep breaths of the pure air for his brain was still whirling with the adventures of the past hour. He could not connect his father’s past with Ricker’s life, try as he would. Then he remembered his father never had taken him into his confidence to any great extent, for he was a man of few words.

Mason knew that he held vast holdings in coal, and in the iron industry, besides holding the controlling interest in his New York bank. As for himself, he never had questioned his father on business affairs, being content to follow his own usual mad pursuits.

Now, he wished he had taken more interest in his father’s affairs, as he was getting old. The two weeks he had been away from home had given him time to think over some 

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