ain't no parlor
loafer, neither, if I'm any judge.

Why, for two years I hadn't polished a saddle, an' I whistled like a
boy when I pictured to myself the feel of a hoss under me. The' 's
somethin' about feelin' a hoss's strength slide into your legs an' up
through your body that must be a good deal like the sensation a saint
enjoys the first fly he takes with his new wings. A little pop-eyed
drug merchant was out here on a tour oncet, an' he asked me the usual
list of blame-fool questions, about what we et an' where we washed an'
if it didn't make us ache to sleep on the hard ground, an so on. When I
had made answers to his queries accordin' to the amount of information
I thought it wise to load him with, he shakes his head solemn like an'
sez, "I do not see where you get any compensation for such a life as
this."

"We don't get any compensation," sez I, "but look at all the hoss-back
ridin' we get to make up for it."

An' there I was with the spring drippin' all about me, the plains
standin' beckonin' to me on every side, just coaxin' to be rode over,
an' me walkin' on foot with flat-heeled boots on!

I had rode out on Sam Cutler's freighter to within' twenty miles o' the
ranch house, an' I built a little fire an' unrolled my blankets; but I
couldn't sleep. I just lay lookin' up at the stars an' tryin' to
imagine what Barbie looked like an' whether Starlight was still at the
ranch, an' every now an' again I tried to decide as to whether I'd grin
or he haughty when I first spied Jabez. I was some anxious to come upon
Barbie first. I knew she'd be glad to see me, but I was rather leery
about Jabez. He would 'a' welcomed a projical son of his own as often
as occasion offered, but he wasn't just the sort of a man to be a
public welcomer. I couldn't picture him puttin' up a sign sayin',
"Projical sons turn to the left. If chicken is proferred to veal, shoot
in the air twice when you get within a mile of the house."

But I was too much elated to worry much, an' along about one o'clock I
rolled up my blankets, kicked out my fire, an' started to drill. When
the sun rose I was in sight of the ranch house, an' the sun seemed to
throw an arm around my shoulder an' go skippin' along by my side--an' I
did skip now an' again.

When I got about a mile from the house I came upon Jabez, walkin' slow
an' lookin' down-hearted. He hadn't changed a mite in the five
years--in fact from what I could see he hadn't even changed his
cl