“Still hyeh?” said the Virginian, without emotion.

“I guess so,” returned the boy, equally matter-of-fact. “Yu' seem to be around yourself,” he added.

They might have been next-door neighbors, meeting in a town street for the second time in the same day.

The Virginian made me known to Mr. Lin McLean, who gave me a brief nod.

“Any luck?” he inquired, but not of me.

“Oh,” drawled the Virginian, “luck enough.”

Knowing the ways of the country, I said no word. It was bootless to interrupt their own methods of getting at what was really in both their minds.

The boy fixed his wide-open hazel eyes upon me. “Fine weather,” he mentioned.

“Very fine,” said I.

“I seen your horses a while ago,” he said. “Camp far from here?” he asked the Virginian.