"Oh, if it should prove true, after all!" he murmured over and over again.
"That I really have some folks at last!"
As they rode Mr. Bellmore briefly told how, as a boy of about ten, he wanted to swim in the stream that ran near his home.
"This was in Missouri, too," he said, "so that adds to the assurance I have that we are brothers, since it was in Missouri that you were found by Mr. Carson. I made that life preserver out of a design from my own head. I know I had to beg and borrow corks from all the neighbors before I had enough. But with that on I simply could not sink, and so I learned to swim.
"I wanted to take it East with me, but my folks persuaded me to leave it at home. And poor mother or father must have fastened it on you when the flood came. Oh, I'm sure it's the same one. We are brothers!"
Once more they clasped hands and looked into each other's eyes.
It was two excited individuals who burst into the ranch house of Bar U a little later. Fairly leaping from their steeds Dave and Mr. Bellmore sought Mr. Carson.
"Dad, where is that cork life-preserver?" asked the young cowboy. The use of the word "Dad" seemed perfectly proper under the circumstances.
"The life-preserver?" repeated the ranchman, wonderingly.
"Yes, Mr. Bellmore—Benjamin," said Dave, using the name for the first time, "Benjamin thinks it's one he made, and if it is I'm his brother!"
"His brother?" Mr. Carson looked from one to the other, as if doubting whether he had heard aright.