eakfasted in silence. Among those who had greeted him I
now recognized a face.

"Why, that's the man you played cards with at Medicine Bow!" I said.

"Yes. Trampas. He's got a job at the ranch now." The Virginian said no
more, but went on with his breakfast.

His appearance was changed. Aged I would scarcely say, for this
would seem as if he did not look young. But I think that the boy was
altogether gone from his face--the boy whose freak with Steve had turned
Medicine Bow upside down, whose other freak with the babies had outraged
Bear Creek, the boy who had loved to jingle his spurs. But manhood had
only trained, not broken, his youth. It was all there, only obedient to
the rein and curb.

Presently we went together to the railway yard.

"The Judge is doing a right smart o' business this year," he began, very
casually indeed, so that I knew this was important. Besides bells and
coal smoke, the smell and crowded sounds of cattle rose in the air
around us. "Hyeh's our first gather o' beeves on the ranch," continued
the Virginian. "The whole lot's shipped through to Chicago in two
sections over the Burlington. The Judge is fighting the Elkhorn road."
We passed slowly along the two trains,--twenty cars, each car packed
with huddled, round-eyed, gazing steers. He examined to see if any
animals were down. "They ain't ate or drank anything to speak of," he
said, while the terrified brutes stared at us through their slats. "Not
since they struck the railroad they've not drank. Yu' might suppose
they know somehow what they're travellin' to Chicago for." And casually,
always casually, he told me the rest. Judge Henry could not spare his
foreman away from the second gather of beeves. Therefore these two
ten-car trains with their double crew of cow-boys had been given to the
Virginian's charge. After Chicago, he was to return by St. Paul over
the Northern Pacific; for the Judge had wished him to see certain of the
road's directors and explain to them persuasively how good a thing it
would be for them to allow especially cheap rates to the Sunk Creek
outfit henceforth. This was all the Virginian told me; and it contained
the whole matter, to be sure.

"So you're acting foreman," said I.

"Why, somebody has to have the say, I reckon."

"And of course you hated the promotion?"

"I don't know about promotion," he replied. "The boys have been used
to seein' me one of themselves. Why don't you come along with us far as
Plat