A THING THAT SETS LIKE A HAWK Six days are not many when they are lived with companions and the numberless details of one's everyday occupation.

They may seem a month if you pass them in jail, or in waiting for some great event,--or at Sinkhole Camp, down near the Border.
Three days of the six Johnny spent in familiarizing himself with the two or three detached horse herds that watered along the meager little stream that sunk finally under a ledge and was seen no more in Arizona.

He counted the horses as best he could while they loitered at their watering places, and he noticed where they fed habitually--also that they ranged far and usually came in to water in the late afternoon or closer to dusk, when the yellow-jackets that swarmed along the muddy banks of the stream did not worry them so much, nor the flies that were a torment.
He reported by telephone to his employer, who seemed relieved to know that everything was so quiet and untroubled down at that end of his range.

And once, quite inadvertently, he reported to Mary V; or was going to, when he recognized a feminine note in the masculine gruffness that spoke over the wire.

And when she found he had discovered her: "Oh, Johnny! I've thought of another verse!" she began animatedly.
Johnny hung up, and although the telephone rang twice after that he would not answer.