FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   172   173   174   175   176   177   178   179   180   181   182  
183   184   185   186   187   188   189   190   191   192   193   194   195   196   197   198   199   200   201   202   203   204   205   206   207   >>   >|  
r relief to the work that had become so familiar to him. She watched him while he released the steer, and drove the animal away over the ridge, where he permitted it to escape into the wild haunts where it lived with its outlaw companions. When he rode back to the little camp Stanford had returned. For an hour they talked together as old friends. But Helen, while she offered now and then a word or a remark, or asked a question, and laughed or smiled with them, left the talk mostly to the two men. Stanford, when the first shock of learning of Helen's narrow escape was over, was gaily enthusiastic and warm in his admiration for his old friend, who had, for no apparent reason but the wish to assert his own manhood, turned his back upon the ease and luxury of his wealth to live a life of adventurous hardship. And Patches, as he insisted they should call him, with many a laughing jest and droll comment told them of his new life and work. He was only serious when he made them promise to keep his identity a secret until he himself was ready to reveal his real name. "And what do you propose to do when your game of Patches is played out?" Stanford asked curiously. For an instant they saw him smiling mockingly at himself; then he answered lightly, "Try some other fool experiment, I reckon." Stanford chuckled; the reply was so like the cowboy Patches, and so unlike his old friend Larry Knight. "As for that, Stan," Patches continued, "I don't see that the game will ever be played out, as you say. Certainly I can never now go back altogether to what I was. The fellow you used to know in Cleveland is not really I, you see. Fact is, I think that fellow is quite dead--peace be to his ashes! The world is wide and there is always work for a man to do." The appearance of Phil Acton on the ridge, at the spot where the steer, followed by Patches, had first appeared, put an end to their further conversation with Lawrence Knight. "My boss!" said that gentleman, in his character of Patches the cowboy, as the Cross-Triangle foreman halted his horse on the brow of the hill, and sat looking down upon the camp. "Be careful, please, and don't let him suspect that you ever saw me before. I'll sure catch it now for loafing so long." "I know him," said Stanford. Then he called to the man above, "Come on down, Acton, and be sociable." Phil rode into camp, shook hands with Stanford cordially, and was presented to Mrs. Manning
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   172   173   174   175   176   177   178   179   180   181   182  
183   184   185   186   187   188   189   190   191   192   193   194   195   196   197   198   199   200   201   202   203   204   205   206   207   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

Stanford

 

Patches

 

friend

 

fellow

 

played

 

escape

 

cowboy

 

Knight

 

reckon

 

experiment


chuckled

 

continued

 
Certainly
 

unlike

 

Cleveland

 
altogether
 

suspect

 

careful

 

loafing

 
sociable

cordially

 

presented

 

called

 

appeared

 
Manning
 

appearance

 

conversation

 
Triangle
 

foreman

 

halted


character

 

gentleman

 
Lawrence
 

laughed

 

smiled

 

question

 

remark

 
offered
 
enthusiastic
 

admiration


narrow

 

learning

 

friends

 

released

 

animal

 

watched

 

relief

 
familiar
 

permitted

 

returned