Joel came out of the silences and out of a maze of calculations long enough to make an offer for Royce’s share of the Dos Hermanos. The offer was as meager as was Fenno himself; but it was as reliable. Too foolishly happy to barter, Mack closed with it. Thus, in another three days, Joel Fenno was to become sole owner of the ranch.
Both men had evaded the question of Treve’s ownership. The collie belonged jointly to them. Yet he was not included in the list of land, buildings and livestock set forth in the bill of sale.
From the first, Mack had regarded the dog as his own, and had made Treve his particular chum. Joel had scoffed at such folly, and had pretended to hold the collie in utter contempt. But Treve had grown to be everything to the gnarl-souled oldster. For the first time in his sixty-odd warped years, he had learned to care about some living creature. It was with a twinge that he saw how much fonder the dog seemed to be of Mack than of Fenno’s unlovable self.
Now, at the possibility of parting with his loved dog-comrade, his heart was as sore as a boil. Wherefore, as usual, he held his peace on the theme so close to him; and he was outwardly the more savage in his comments on Treve’s worthlessness.
Treve lifted his head from between his paws, and stared down the road toward the coulée. His trained ears not only caught the rattle and chug of an approaching car, but they recognized it as a car belonging to the ranch.
Presently, the dusty runabout rounded the bend, a furlong beyond. Royce Mack was driving it. At his side sat a plump and slackly pretty figure in billowy white. Treve was too far away to catch the reek of lily-of-the-valley. But he knew it would assail and torture his keen nostrils soon enough.
The dog got to his feet, with a bark of welcome. He was about to lope forward to meet the car and escort Mack to the house, when Joel Fenno, hearing the bark, stumped out of the kitchen doorway behind him.
The old man had come from work, with Treve at his heels, a half-hour early that day. Now he reappeared from his bedroom, crossly uncomfortable in his store clothes; his neck teased by a frayed collar-edge and further girt with a ready-made tie of awesome coloring. If his bulls-eye emerald scarfpin had been genuine, it would have been worth more than the entire ranch. His new boots squeaked groaningly on the porch floor.
The collie, wondering at such change in his friend’s costume and bearing, halted in his scarce-begun journey toward the approaching car and stared, with head on one side.
“Sure!” growled Fenno. “Sure! Keep a-lookin’ at me, Trevy. I’m sure wuth it. If ’twasn’t that he’s leavin’ here for good, in a day or two, I’d ’a’ saw him in blue blazes before I’d ’a’ rigged me up like this, on a hot week-day; jes’ ’cause he took a idee to ask her over to eat supper with us, to-night. I feel like I was to a fun’ral, Trevy.”