And I've got to have time to size him up. Where do
you keep him when he ain't in the show window?" He swung into
step with Pink. "I'll tell you the truth," he confided
engagingly. "Any man that'll wear chaps like he's got--even
leaving out the extra finish you fellows have given 'em--had
ought to be taught a lesson he'll remember. He sure must be a
tough proposition, if the whole bunch of yuh have had to give him
up. By gracious--"
"We haven't tried," Pink defended. "It kinda looked to us as if
he was aiming to make us guy him; so we didn't. We've left him
strictly alone. To-day"--he glanced over his shoulder to where
the becurled chaps swung comically from the willow
branch--"to-day's the first time anybody's made a move. Unless,"
he added, as an afterthought, "you count yesterday in the 'doby
patch--and even then we didn't tell him to ride into it; we just
let him do it."
"And kinda herded him over towards it," Cal amended slyly.
"Can he ride?" asked Andy, going straight to the main point, in
the mind of a cowpuncher.
"W-e-ell-he hasn't been piled, so far. But then," Pink qualified
hastily, "he hasn't topped anything worse than Crow- hop. He
ain't hard to ride. Happy Jack could--"
"Aw, I'm gittin' good and sick of' hearin' that there tune,"
Happy growled indignantly.
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