or else filled with dismay, perhaps taking a lesson.
“Here, you go slow there,” he finally felt it his duty to say, warningly; “that’s got to last you for some time, you know, because we’re meaning to leave you here when we ride away. Don’t gobble so, you pig! I eat a lot, but I do it decent-like, and not like a starving dog bolting his grub. Let up, I say, and get the good out of what you’re swallowing!”
“You are the Sherwood boy, ain’t you?” suddenly demanded the tall leader, as Adrian handed him his last allowance of coffee in the tin cup.
“Well, I suppose there’s no use in my denying it, because I’ve managed to remember you now,” remarked Adrian. “You used to ride for my father years ago; your name is Tad Whiffles; and you had to get away from Bar-S Ranch on account of your quarrelsome disposition. Yes, I’m the Sherwood kid you speak of; and I’ve come up from the Arizona ranch of my friend Donald Mackay, to find out what’s all the matter with things up here.”
The puncher called Tad Whiffles looked him over from head to foot; then he turned deliberately to the other stampeder, and nodding his head, was heard to say:
“D’ye hear that, Corney? Tell me, won’t there be high jinks to pay in these parts right soon now? I can see a warm session at Bar-S when the boy
owner comes acrost Josie, that was a Walker onct! Say, I’d give a heap tuh be there on the spot tuh see that same meetin’, b’lieve me, Corney.”
“Oh! things will all be straightened out after a bit,” Adrian assured him in a confident fashion that caused the man to elevate his eyebrows, and mutter half under his breath:
“Blame me if I don’t more’n harf think as how ye kin do the trick, if anybody kin, kid. The way ye follered us hyar, and took the hull crowd in makes me feel cheap. I don’t know what ther ole man’ll hev tuh say tuh us when he gets on tuh the story. But wait an’ see how he comes out when he rubs up aginst yuh. But I sure would like tuh be at Bar-S for a bit when yuh arrives with all them steers. Wow! ain’t thar agoin’ tuh be somebody surprised, though?”
He shook his head, and relapsed into silence, as though the matter might be too big for him to grasp all at once.