He tried to answer in the same spirit. “If you’re going to call every bluff I make, I’ll be more careful. Anyhow, I didn’t study the First Reader at college. Don’t think they teach it at Massachusetts Tech.”
Later in the day he spoke to Reed on the subject. “I don’t want to make a nuisance of myself. I can put up at the Wild Horse House till I’m strong enough to go back to camp.”
Reed had come out of the old-time cattle days when there were always a plate and a bed at the ranch for whoever might want them. He still kept open house.
“Always room for one more, boy. Anyhow, if Betty’s got it fixed up that way in her mind, you’d as well make up yours to do as she says. It’ll be her say-so.” The owner of the Diamond Bar K grinned at him confidentially, as one fellow victim of feminine tyranny to another.
Forbes arrived late in the afternoon and reported heavy roads. He had brought a four-horse team, and it had been all they could do to break through. They had dragged a sled with the body of a wagon on the wide runners.
“Deep drifts below the rim in the cut the other side o’ Round Top. Be all right if the wind don’t blow to-night,” he said.
The wind blew, and was still whistling when it came time to start. But the sun was shining and the sky clear.
Betty was doubtful, on account of the patient.
“If we wrop him up good, he’ll be all right,” Lon said. The big foreman did not want to stay in the hills until the trail he had broken was filled up again with drifts.
“Yes,” agreed Reed.