"If you want 'em to know, why don't you speak the piece yourself? You recall it, don't you?"
"Better talk, Tom," Riley advised.
"I don't know what this is all about; I don't know what difference what I said to Hepburn can make to the rest of you, but I respect your opinions, Riley, and if he's willing for you to know what I said, I sure am willing to repeat it.
"Hepburn and I've had a little argument. It's been goin' on for some time. He'd be pleased to have me move on, I take it, but I sort of like this outfit."
"Go on," Hepburn said impatiently.
"I told you, Hepburn, and I'll tell you again that this ranch is gettin' a little small to hold both of us. It seems to shrink every day and I don't get good elbow room any more, but so far as I'm concerned I'm more or less permanent."
Webb nodded and Riley shifted uneasily, looking from Beck to Hepburn, frankly puzzled.
"Yes, that's what you said to me. Now will you tell the boys where you rode this afternoon?"
Beck eyed him a long moment and the foreman stared back, assured but not quite composed, his little eyes dark. Once he bit his chew savagely but his expression did not change.
"I rode out of here straight up Sunny Gulch, climbed out at the head, rode those little dry gulches as far down as Twenty Mile and came up the far ridge. Then I took a circle to the east and came home by the road."