pped and waited for him with
apology written in the very droop of his ears. When he had remounted, and
the horse had settled again to his straight-backed, shuffling fox-trot,
Starr would frequently think of something else to say upon the subject of
fool horses and snakes and long, dry miles and the interminable desert;
but since none of the things would bear repeating, we will let it go at
that. The point is that Starr was no saint.

He knew of a spring where the water was sweet and cold, and where a
lonesome young fellow lived by himself and was always glad to see some
one ride up to his door. The young fellow was what is called a good
feeder, and might be depended upon to have a pot of frijoles cooked, and
sourdough bread, and stewed fruit of some kind even in his leanest times,
and call himself next door to starvation. And if he happened to be in
funds, there was no telling; Starr, for instance, had eaten canned plum
pudding and potted chicken and maraschino cherries and ginger snaps, all
at one sitting, when he happened to strike the fellow just after selling
a few sheep. Thinking of these things, Starr clucked to Rabbit and told
him for gosh sake to pick his feet off the ground and not to take root
and grow there in the desert like a several-kinds of a so-and-so cactus.

Rabbit twitched back his ears to catch the drift of Starr's remarks,
rattled his teeth in a bored yawn, and shuffled on. Starr laughed.

"Durn it, why is it you never take me serious?" he complained. "I can
name over all the mean things you are, and you just waggle one ear, much
as to say, 'Aw, hell! Same ole tune, and nothing to it but noise.' Some
of these days you're going to get your pedigree read to you--and read
right!" He leaned forward and lovingly lifted Rabbit's mane, holding it
for a minute or two away from the sweaty neck. "Sure's hot out here
to-day, ain't it, pardner?" he murmured, and let the mane fall again into
place. "Kinda fries out the grease, don't it? If young Calvert's got any
hoss-feed in camp, I'm going to beg some off him. Get along, the faster
you go, the quicker you'll get there."

The desert gave place to scattered, brown cobblestones of granite. Rabbit
picked his way carefully among these, setting his feet down daintily in
the interstices of the rocks. He climbed a long slope that proved itself
to be a considerable hill when one looked back at the desert below. The
farther side was more abrupt, and he took it in pati