“Ah,” murmured the happy butcher, lifting his eyes to the ceiling for inspiration. “That kind o’ simplifies things. Jim Thorpe,” he pondered. “He ain’t got a heap o’ friends, as you might say. Ther’s Will Henderson,” he turned over the pages of his book. “Um, healthy, drinks a bit. Hasty temper, but good for fifty year ’less he gits into a shootin’ racket. ’Tain’t him now?” he inquired looking up.
“No, ’tain’t him. I see him this mornin’. He was soused some. Kind o’ had a heavy night. Wot about McLagan of the ‘AZ’s’?”
Again the butcher turned over the pages of his note-book. But finished by shaking his head mournfully.
“No luck,” he said. “McLagan’s ’bout forty, never sick. Only chance ‘accident on ranch.’”
The two men looked blankly at each other.
“Wot set you thinkin’?” inquired the butcher at last.
“Jest nuthin’ o’ consequence. Thorpe sed as he was givin’ a party to a dead friend. He’d got a bottle o’ whiskey.”
“Ah!” murmured Gay, with an air of relief, returning his note-book to his pocket. “That clears things. He’s speakin’ metaphoric. I’ll git goin’, kind o’ busy. I ain’t sent out the day’s meat yet, an’ I got to design a grave fixin’ fer Restless’s last kid. Y’see it’s a gratis job, I guess, Restless bein’ my pardner, as you might say. So long.”
Jim reached Peter Blunt’s hut as the carpenter was leaving it. Peter was at the door, and smiled a genial welcome. He and Jim were excellent friends. They were both men who thought. They both possessed a wide knowledge of things which were beyond the focus of the Barnriff people, and consequently they interested each other.