Then she and Ajax strolled on to the verandah, and I found myself alone with my host. He said meaningly: "Wilkins has had a tough row to hoe--eh? But he's a perfect gentleman, straight, sober, and a worker. I've been looking for a man that is a man to run things here, now that I'm getting a bit stiff in the joints. Hetty likes him first-rate too."
All this in an interrogatory tone. Of course, it was easy to fill the lacunae in the text. Silas Upham adored his daughter and his ranch. If Hetty married Wilkins, the artful Silas would gain an able- bodied, capable major-domo, and he would not lose his pet lamb. I said, rather tartly--
"Look here, Upham, you know nothing of Wilkins, and I advise you and-- er--Miss Hetty to go slow."
"I do go slow," said my host, "but Hetty likes to buzz along. She's a mover, she is."
As we rode home I told Ajax that Opportunity had thrust into Wilkins' hand a very tempting morsel. Was he going to swallow it? And ought we to ask some questions?
I think it was on the following Wednesday that Wilkins walked over to the ranch-house, and asked for a job.
"I've left Upham," he said curtly.
We had not much to offer; such as it was, Wilkins accepted it. Ajax drove to Upham's to fetch Wilkins' blankets and belongings. When he came back, he drew me aside.
"Silas offered him the billet of foreman. Wilkins refused it."
* * * * *