"Waitin' for you, an' meditatin' mos'ly." He cast away his cigarette, sighed deeply, and began a search for his paper and tobacco. "I was wantin' to ask you a question, Con."
Conniston said, "Go ahead, Pete," and made himself a cigarette.
"It's this-a-way." The cowboy lighted a match and let it burn out without applying the flame to his brown paper. For a moment he hesitated, and then blurted out: "You've knowed some considerable females in your time, I take it. Huh, Con?"
"Well?" Conniston repeated.
"I gotta be hittin' the trail back to the Half Moon real soon. I wanted to ask you a question firs'." Again he hesitated, again broke out suddenly: "I take it a lady ain't the same in no particulars as a man. Huh, Con?"
Conniston, thinking of Argyl, said "No," fervently.
"If a man likes you real well you can tell every time, can't you? An' if he ain't got no use for you, you can tell that, too, can't you?"
Conniston nodded, thinking that he began to guess Pete's troubles.
"Don't you know—can't you tell—how Miss Jocelyn feels toward you, Pete? Is that it?"
"That's it, only how in blazes you guessed it gets me! Con, I tell you, I can't tell nothin' for sure. It's worse 'n gamblin' on the weather. One day I'm thinkin' she likes me real well, an' she shows me things about grammar an' stuff, an' we git on fine. An' then—maybe it's nex' day an' maybe it's only two minutes later—she's all diff'rent somehow, an' she jest makes fun of the way I talk, an' you'd suppose she wouldn't wipe her feet on me if I laid down an' begged her to."