“Twenty-fi’ south-west,” he said.
McFardell nodded.
“Maybe I’ll get a look around that way when I’m through seeding.”
“Mebbe it’ll pay you—feelin’ the way you do.”
Lightning picked up his reins, and his horse raised its head. Then he nodded at the dark-faced man he disliked even more intensely than any cattle rustlers.
“So long,” he grated, and swung his horse about.
“So long.”
McFardell watched the queer figure as it rode out of his clearing. Then he went back to his fire, and the work of sorting his machinery was no longer considered. Instead, he sat pondering the thing which Lightning had just put into his head. So the afternoon passed, and he prepared his supper. Then he hurriedly attended his horses and cows, and, when the barest necessities had been seen to, he returned again to his shanty.
Before he turned into his blankets that night, which remained just as he had arisen from them that morning, his brain was seething with the new idea. There was a chance, as Lightning had suggested. There was hope. And the moment he admitted it the prospect grew to the proportions of certainty.
Yes. He would certainly look into this thing up at Quinlan’s, and then—and then—God, how he hated the prospect of breaking another fifty acres!