"I, José de la Crux Montoya, will show you how to work him. It is a big gun for such a chico."

"Oh, I reckon I kin hold her down. When do we start the shootin' match?"

Montoya smiled.

"Mañana, perhaps."

"Then that's settled!" Pete heaved a sigh. "But how am I goin' to git them cartridges?"

"From the store."

"That's all right. But how many do I git for workin' for you?"

Montoya laughed outright. "You will become a good man with the sheep. You will not waste the flour and the beans and the coffee and the sugar, like Pedro here. You will count and not say—'Oh, I think it's so much'—and because of that I will buy you two boxes of cartridges."

"Two boxes—a hundred a month?"

"Even so. You will waste many until you learn."