"That's him," Slim sighed, with relief. "This yere feed not being up to grade, Prod he 'lows he'd pull his freight back home, square himself with the old man and start a new deal—"
Sage-brush was deeply interested in the story. Its charm had attracted him as it had scholars and outcasts alike since first told two thousand years ago on the plains of Old Judea.
"Did he stand for it?" he interrupted.
"He sure did," eloquently replied Slim, who was surprised and delighted with the great impression he was making with his experience at church. "Oh, he was a game old buck, he was. Why, the minute he sighted that there prodigious son a-limpin' across the mesa, he ran right out an' fell on his neck—"
"An' broke it," cried Fresno, slapping Sage-brush with his hat in his delight at getting at the climax of the story before Slim reached it.
The narrator cast a glance of supreme disgust at the laughing puncher. "No, what the hell!" he shouted. "He hugged him. Then he called in the neighbors, barbecued a yearlin' calf, an' give a barn-dance, with fireworks in the evenin'."
"That's all right in books," observed Sage-brush, "but if I'd made a break like that when I was a kid my old man would a fell on my neck for fair."
"That was a good story, Parson—it's straight, ain't it?" asked Slim, as a wave of doubt swept over him.
"It's gospel truth," answered the minister. "Do you know the moral of the story?"
"Sure," replied Slim. With a confidence born of deep self-assurance, Slim launched the answer: "Don't be a fatted calf."