“I should say,” Mr. Wilde interrupted, and in the process of lighting another cigar, chuckled: “Quite a contrast in the type of these bandits from their predecessors of ’Forty-nine. They weren’t even considerate enough then to leave them with a sore head. They were so greedy they took scalp and all along home to remember their victims by, they thought so much of them. Then in after years when amusements were hard to find and time hung heavy on their hands, they could look at these rare mementos of a bright, hilarious past and shake venerable beards in gestures betokening their great longing for the return of the good old days, when scalps could be had for the asking. No, sir, I can’t for the life of me see what the engineer has to kick about at that. He ought to thank the present-day generation for turning out such nice, considerate gunmen.”
They went on, passing hamlet after hamlet, town after town, and back into the open prairie again. A perfect summer day!
“I’d like to go into Unk’s business,” Rip said suddenly, “when I get older.”
“How’s that?” answered Westy. “I thought you said you’d like to be a fireman on the A. T. and S. F!”
“I thought I would at first, but I’ve changed my mind.”
“Why?”
“Aw, because they have to work nights sometimes!”
CHAPTER VII—IMAGINATION
At the start Westy and Rip’s interest was keenly aroused. They were stopping at places often and long enough to keep them from getting bored. Places that were rich in tradition failed to strike them very forcibly, it seemed. Helping out here and there it filled in time and they also posed at intervals to make the scenes abound with the human touch.
To boys craving adventure, it was just a daily routine of shooting scenes along a highway that occasionally ran through towns and hamlets of various sizes and descriptions. Nothing exciting about it, Westy mused. An old trail, it might have been once, but a plain, everyday, modern-looking highway now. Time had indeed spoiled everything for him, that was certain.