Sproatly pointed to a couple of big boxes in the bottom of the waggon. "Anything from cough cure to hair restorer, besides a general purpose elixir that's specially prepared for me. It's adaptable to any complaint and season. All you have to do"—and he lowered his voice confidentially—"is to put on a different label."
Winifred, who had not felt like it a little earlier, laughed when she met his eyes.
"What happens to the people who buy it?" she asked.
"Most of them are bachelors, and tough. They've stood their own cooking so long that they ought to be, and if anybody's really sick I hold off and tell him to wait until he can get a doctor. A sensitive conscience," he added reflectively, "is quite a handicap in this business."
"You have always been in it?" asked Winifred, who was amused at him.
"No," said Sproatly, "although you mightn't believe it, I was raised with the idea that I should have my choice between the Church and the Bar. The idea, however, proved—impracticable—which, in some respects, is rather a pity. It has seemed to me that a man who can work off cough cures and cosmetics on to healthy folks with a hide like leather, and talk a scoffer off the field, ought to have made his mark in either calling."
He looked at her as if for confirmation of this view, but Winifred, who laughed again, glanced at the two waggons that moved on, perhaps, two miles away across the grey-white sweep of prairie.
"Will we overtake them?" she asked.
"We'll probably come up with Gregory. I'm not sure about Wyllard."
"He drives faster horses?"