"Well, what will happen to me then?" said Tom, after waiting for his companion to finish what he had on his mind.
"You'll go plumb crazy; that's what will happen to you. You will be set to riding the line——"
"What's that?" interrupted Tom.
"Why, riding up and down a fence, or rather where the fence ought to be, to see that none of your cattle break away. It will take you two days to make a trip, and you will get so tired of it that you will finally skip out and leave the line to take care of itself. But all right. You go to bed and sleep on it, and if it doesn't look better in the morning, I'll say no more about it. I will go by myself."
With something like a sigh of regret Elam turned over and prepared to go to sleep. There was no undressing, no handling of blankets, but just as he was he was all ready to go to slumber. Tom felt sorry for him, and, besides, he knew how Mr. Parsons and the cowboys would look upon such a proceeding if it should once get to their ears. And he didn't see any way to prevent it. If Elam's story was able to travel for two hundred miles, the idea that he was afraid to face the Red Ghost would travel, too, and then what would be his prospect of getting employment with Mr. Parsons? And, besides, there was a chance for him to go "plumb crazy" while riding the line and seeing that the cattle did not break through. That was another thing that was against Tom.
"I am afraid I am unlucky, after all," thought he, once more arranging his bunch of furs. "I am sent out into the mountains to prospect for gold, when there isn't any gold in sight except what belongs to Elam, here, and have the promise that when summer comes I shall be given a chance." Then aloud: "Say, Elam, does a fellow have to ride this line at first, and before he can call himself a full-fledged cowboy?"
"Sure," said Elam; "he must get used to everything that is done on the ranch. He must begin at the lowest round of the ladder and work his way up."
"Well," said Tom to himself, "I just aint a-going to do it. I'll just go to sleep on it now, and if the thing looks better to me to-morrow than it does to-night, I'll stick to your heels."
While Tom was thinking about it, he fell asleep. When he awoke the next morning, it was broad daylight, but he was alone. Elam must have moved with stealthy footsteps while he was getting breakfast; but there was everything on the table just as he found it on the previous morning, and the pictures which Elam had drawn, and which Tom had placed on the wall so that they could be easily seen, had been taken down and put where he had seen them the day before.
"I hope to goodness that I will get through with my sleep after a while," thought Tom, as he proceeded to put on his moccasons. "He has gone out to gather the rest of his traps, and I am left to decide whether or not I will go with him. Well, I will go. If that fellow is not afraid of the ghost, I'm not, either. I know it isn't a ghost, but he thinks it is, and we'll see who will show the most pluck."