Bohm never ceased to regret having sold the ranch, and had never forgiven Owen for buying it and making him live up to his contract, so was only too glad of the opportunity to cause him all the trouble possible. Time after time he promised to come out and “prove up”, but he never came, so although I was most anxious to have him come, I was far from pleased to have him about when Owen was away.
Ted, however, was overjoyed; he seemed to feel that Providence had arranged Bohm’s visit to the ranch for his especial entertainment, and from the moment the old chap arrived Ted dogged his footsteps.
At first, old Bohm seemed quite flattered and laughed and joked with him, praised his shooting, told him stories of the Indian days, promised to show him the underground passage to an abandoned stage station, but later he became annoyed, for no clinging burr ever clung more closely than Ted. He scarcely allowed Bohm to get out of his sight for one moment.
How much the boy had heard of old Bohm’s history I did not know, but I concluded a few rumors had reached those ever-attentive ears, for one day he came in fairly beaming.
“Gosh! Pudge and Soapy haven’t got anything on me, they’ve only seen Buffalo Bill in a show, and I’m right in the same house with a man that’s a holy terror!”
“What do you mean, Ted?” I asked, anxious to find out how much he had heard.
“Oh, you know well enough, Mrs. Brook,” he laughed, going to the door as he saw old Bohm on his way to the barn. “You can’t fool me. Gee! I wouldn’t have missed him for the world. The fellows’ll just be sick when I tell them.”
“The fellows” were evidently “Pudge” and “Soapy”, his two chums at St. Paul’s, “Pudge” because of “his shape,” as Ted explained, and “Soapy”, whose parental millions came from the manufacturing of soap.
The game between the boy and Bohm was amusing. Clever as the old chap was, he couldn’t evade Ted’s watchful eye. If Bohm thought him miles away, he suddenly appeared with such an unconscious air of innocence he disarmed all suspicion, but he made Bohm uneasy.
“Quit campin’ on the old man’s trail, Kid,” said Bill one evening at the corral after Ted had driven Bohm to the bunk-house to escape his questions. “You’re gettin’ on his nerves; let him go and sleep on his claim and get through with it. You and me’s got to hunt horses tomorrow, anyways.”