“We’re winding up our stay in Arizona with a lot of blue fire and tremelo trimmings,” went on Frank. “If it’s going to do anybody any good, though, I don’t see how I can have any kick coming.”
“You’d like a heap to see Lenning and the colonel on good terms before you leave, wouldn’t you?”
“Nothing would suit me better, Barzy.”
“What luck did you have with the colonel at the golf grounds?”
“None at all. He’s bitter against Lenning.”
“Reckon I told you we’d have our trouble for our pains if we tried to put in a good word for Lenning, didn’t I? Hawtrey is a crabbed old proposition, and when he fastens himself to an idea you can’t pry him loose with a crowbar. It may be a fool idea, too, but that don’t count.”
“He said he’d like to oblige me by being friends with Lenning, but that I was asking him to break through a principle—which was something he wouldn’t do for anybody.”
“The colonel doesn’t take any stock in Lenning’s trying to act square with everybody. He’d rather watch a game of baseball than eat, but he’d never let himself get carried away to the extent that he’d overlook a grouch or forget an injury. He’s a pretty fine old fellow, too, if you come at him on the right side.”
Talking occasionally, but more often pounding along the trail in silence, the boys at last came to Dolliver’s lonely little cabin. They had hardly drawn rein before the rancher stepped through his front door.
“Put up yore critters, boys,” said he, “an’ then come into the house. It won’t take me long to tell ye what I left out in palavering over the phone.”