A giggle behind the counter disturbed them both, but the sharp young lady was only dusting. The Governor at once paid haughtily for Tennyson’s expensive works, and the cow-puncher pushed his discountenanced savings back into his clothes. Making haste to leave the book department of this shop, they regained a mutual ease, and the Governor became waggish over Lin’s concern at being too rich. He suggested to him the list of delinquent taxpayers and the latest census from which to select indigent persons. He had patients, too, whose inveterate pennilessness he could swear cheerfully to—“since you want to bolt from your own money,” he remarked.
“Yes, I’m a green horse,” assented Mr. McLean, gallantly; “ain’t used to the looks of a twenty-dollar bill, and I shy at ’em.”
From his face—that jocular mask—one might have counted him the most serene and careless of vagrants, and in his words only the ordinary voice of banter spoke to the Governor. A good woman, it may well be, would have guessed before this the sensitive soul in the blundering body; but Barker saw just the familiar, whimsical, happy-go-lucky McLean of old days, and so he went gayly and innocently on, treading upon holy ground. “I’ve got it!” he exclaimed; “give your wife something.”
The ruddy cow-puncher grinned. He had passed through the world of woman with but few delays, rejoicing in informal and transient entanglements, and he welcomed the turn which the conversation seemed now to be taking. “If you’ll give me her name and address,” said he, with the future entirely in his mind.
“Why, Laramie!” and the Governor feigned surprise.
“Say, Doc,” said Lin, uneasily, “none of ’em ’ain’t married me since I saw you last.”
“Then she hasn’t written from Laramie?” said the hilarious Governor; and Mr. McLean understood and winced in his spirit deep down. “Gee whiz!” went on Barker. “I’ll never forget you and Lusk that day!”
