go the limit for you any time I can do so. You’re the real thing; and if I can ever return the favor, you bet your life I’ll do it.”
“What was that cow-puncher’s name?” asked Vuyning, “who used to catch a mustang by the nose and mane, and throw him till he put the bridle on?”
“Bates,” said Emerson.
“Thanks,” said Vuyning. “I thought it was Yates. Oh, about that toggery business—I’d forgotten that.”
“I’ve been looking for some guy to put me on the right track for years,” said Emerson. “You’re the goods, duty free, and half-way to the warehouse in a red wagon.”
“Bacon, toasted on a green willow switch over red coals, ought to put broiled lobsters out of business,” said Vuyning. “And you say a horse at the end of a thirty-foot rope can’t pull a ten-inch stake out of wet prairie? Well, good-bye, old man, if you must be off.”
At one o’clock Vuyning had luncheon with Miss Allison by previous arrangement.
For thirty minutes he babbled to her, unaccountably, of ranches, horses, cañons, cyclones, round-ups, Rocky Mountains and beans and bacon. She looked at him with wondering and half-terrified eyes.
“I was going to propose again to-day,” said Vuyning, cheerily, “but I won’t. I’ve worried you often enough. You know dad has a ranch in Colorado.
[227]
