"Meet me with a pail of water," yelled Tad. "I'm hot."
Pong heard him and almost immediately emerged from the chuck wagon with a tin pail full of water.
"Throw it on me, quick," commanded the lad, leaping from his pony.
Pong tipped the pail and was about to dash it over the lad when Big-foot suddenly freed a foot from the stirrup. He gave the pail a powerful kick sending it several feet from him, its contents spilling over the ground.
"You idiot! You fool heathen!" roared Big-foot. "The Pinto didn't say he wanted boiling hot water thrown on him. He said he was hot. If you wasn't the cook of this outfit, and we'd all starve to death without you, I'd shoot you plumb full of holes, you blooming idiot of a heathen Chinee!"
"Allee same," chuckled Pong, showing his gleaming teeth.
"What! You climb into that wagon before I forget you're the cook!" fumed Big-foot, jumping his pony threateningly toward the Chinaman. Pong leaped into the protection of his wagon.
"Boys," said the big cowman, "the Pinto has come back with the crazy steers. He's rounded up the whole bunch and never lost a critter. Look at him, if you don't believe me. Ain't he a sight?"
Tad smiled proudly as he sipped the water which one of the boys had brought to him.
"Any man as says he ain't a sight has got a fight on with Big-foot Sanders. And that goes, too!" announced the cowman, glaring about him.