s!" he called cheerily to the straggling
herders, who came in sheepishly, one by one, their spurs rattling, their
big, limp hats twisted in their hands. They had pounded the alkali from
each other's shirt, and their red faces shone with the determined
rubbing they had received. All the wild grace of their horsemanship was
gone, and as they sidled in and squatted down along the wall they were
anything but ferocious in manner or speech.

"Ah, now, this is all right," each man said, when Curtis offered chairs.
"You take the chair, Jim; you take it, Joe--this suits me."

Lawson was interested in their cranial development, and their alignment
along the wall gave a fine opportunity for comparison. "They were, for
the most part, shapeless and of small capacity," he said
afterwards--"just country bumpkins, trained to the horse and the
revolver, but each of them arrogated to himself the judicial mind of the
Almighty Creator."

The sheriff, leaning far back in the big Morris chair, wore a smirking
smile which seemed to say: "Boys, I'm onto this luxury all right.
Stuffed chair don't get me no back-ache. Nothing's too rich for _my_
blood--if I can get it."

The young fellows were transfixed with awe of Calvin, for, though the
last to enter the house, he walked calmly past the library door on into
the dining-room, and a moment later could be heard chatting with the
girls, "sassy as a whiskey-jack."

One big, freckled young fellow nudged his neighbor and said: "Wouldn't
that pull your teeth? That wall-eyed sorrel has waltzed right into the
kitchen to buzz the women. Say, his neck needs shortening."

"Does he stand in, or is it just gall?"

"It's nerve--nothing else. We ain't onto our job, that's all."

"Oh, he knows 'em all right. I heered he stands in with the agent's
sister."

"The hell he does! Lookin' that way? Well, I don't think. It's his
brass-bound cheek. Wait till we ketch him alone."

Cal appeared at the door. "Well, fellers, come in; grub's all spread
out."

"What you got to say about it?" asked Green.

"Think you're the nigger that rings the bell, don't ye?" remarked
Galvin. "We're waitin' for the boss to say 'when.'"

Not one of them stirred till Curtis rose, saying to the sheriff, "Well,
we'll take time later to discuss that; come right out and tame the
wolf."

The fact that Curtis accepted Calvin's call impressed the crowd deeply.

"You'd think he was one o' the fambly," muttered Galvin. "Wait till w