“Oh, as soon as we saw your tenderfoot riding togs––!” she rejoined. “Seriously, though, you must not mind if the men poke a little fun at you. Most of them are more farmhands than cowboys, but Kid will be apt to lead off. I do so want you to be agreeable to Kid. He is almost a member of the family, not a hired man.”
“I shall try to be agreeable to him,” replied Ashton, a trifle stiffly.
The puncher had seen them probably before they saw him. He was riding at a pace that brought him to the horse corral a few moments ahead of them. When they came up he nodded carelessly in response 65 to Ashton’s studiously polite greeting, “Good day, Mr. Gowan,” and turned to loosen the cinch of his saddle.
“You’ve been riding some,” remarked the girl, looking at the puncher’s heaving, lathered horse.
“Jumped that wolf––ran him,” replied Gowan, as he lifted off his saddle and deftly tossed it up on the top rail of the corral.
“You’re in luck,” congratulated Miss Isobel. She explained to Ashton: “The cattlemen in this county pay fifteen dollars for wolf scalps. That’s in addition to the state bounty.”
Ashton sprang off to offer her his hand. But she was on the ground as soon as he. Gowan stared at him between narrowed lids, and replied to the girl somewhat shortly: “I didn’t get him this time, Miss Chuckie.”
“You didn’t? That’s too bad! You don’t often miss. I wish you had been with me, to run down the scoundrel who tried to murder Mr. Ashton.”
Gowan burst into the harsh, strained laughter of one who seldom gives way to mirth. He checked himself abruptly and cast a hostile look at Ashton. “By––James, Miss Chuckie, you don’t mean to say you let a tenderfoot string you?”
“How about this?” asked the girl. She held out the silver flask, which she had not returned to Ashton.