I've nearly sprained
my tongue answerin' questions. 'Is it true that snakes shed their skin,
and do the hot pools in the Yellowstone Park freeze in winter?' I'm
goin' to drift pretty pronto--I can't stand visitin'."

"Do you like the East, Mr. Fripp?" inquired Wallie, formally.

"I'm glad they's a West," Pinkey replied, cryptically.

"You and Miss Spenceley are from the same section, I take it?"

"Yep--Wyomin'."

"Er--by the way"--Wallie's tone was elaborately casual--"what did she
mean yesterday when she called me 'Gentle Annie'?"

Pinkey moved uneasily.

"Could you give me the precise significance?" persisted Wallie.

"I could, but I wouldn't like to," Pinkey replied, drily

"Oh, don't spare my feelings," said Wallie, loftily, "there's nothing
_she_ could say would hurt them."

"If that's the way you feel--she meant you were 'harmless'."

"I trust so," Wallie responded with dignity.

"I'd ruther be called a--er--a Mormon," Pinkey observed.

Shocked at the language, Wallie demanded:

"It is, then, an epithet of opprobrium?"

"I can't say as to that," replied Pinkey, judicially, "but she meant you
were a 'perfect lady'."

"It's more than I can say of her!" Wallie retorted, reddening.

Pinkey merely grinned and shrugged a shoulder.

He arose a moment later as if the conversation and company alike bored
him.

"Well--I'm goin' to pack my war-bag and ramble. Why don't you come West
and git civilized? With your figger you ought to be good fer somethin'.
S'long, feller!"

Naturally, Wallie was not comforted by his conversation with Pinkey. Now
he knew himself to have been insulted, and resented it, but along with
his indignation was such a feeling of dissatisfaction with his life as
he had never known. His brow contracted while he thought of the monotony
of it. Just as this summer would be a duplicate of every other summer so
the winter would be a repetition of the many winters he had spent in
Florida with Aunt Mary. After a few months at home they would migrate
with the robins. He would meet the same people he had seen all summer.
They would complain of the Southern cooking and knit and tat while they
babbled amiably of themselves and the members of their family and their
doings. The men would smoke and compare business experiences when they
had finished flaying the Administration. Discontent grew within him as
he reviewed it. Why couldn't he and Aunt Mary do something different for
the winter? By Ge