Free The Dude Wrangler by Caroline Lockhart Page B

Canby drew in his horse, he stared in stony-eyed unfriendliness while they waved at him gaily and Mr. Stott called out that they were going to be neighbourly and visit him soon.
    The feeling of helpless wrath in which he now looked after the party was a sensation that he had experienced only a few times in his life. Pinkey had warned him that at the first openly hostile act he would "blab" the story of the Skull Creek episode far and wide. He had hit Canby in his most vulnerable spot, for ridicule was something which he found it impossible to endure, and he could well appreciate the glee with which his many enemies would listen to the tale, taking good care that it never died.
    By all the rules of the game as he had played it often, and always with success, Wallie should long since have "faded"-scared, starved out. Yet, somehow, in some unique and extraordinary way that only a "dude" would think of, he had managed to come out on top.
    But the real basis for Canby's grievance, and one which he would not admit even to himself, was that however Wallie was criticized, Helene Spenceley never failed to find something to say in his defence.
    There was not much that Canby could do in the present circumstances to put difficulties in Wallie's way, but the next day he found it convenient to turn a trainload of long-horn Texas cattle loose on the adjacent range, and posted warnings to the effect that they were dangerous to pedestrians, and persons going among them on foot did so at their own risk.
    * * *
    Pinkey took a triangular piece of glass from between the logs in the bunk-house and regarded himself steadfastly in the bit of broken mirror.
    He murmured finally:
    "I ain't no prize baby, but if I jest had a classy set of teeth I wouldn't be bad lookin'."
    He replaced the mirror in the crack and sauntered down to the cook-shack where he seated himself on the door-sill. The chef was singing as if he meant it: "Ah, I Have Sighed to Rest Me Deep in the Silent Grave."
    Pinkey interrupted:
    "How do you git to work to get teeth, Mr. Hicks, if they ain't no dentist handy?"
    Like Mr. Stott, no question could be put to Mr. Hicks for which he could not find an answer. He now replied promptly:
    "Well, there's two ways: you can send to Mungummery-Ward and have a crate sent out on approval, and keep tryin' till you find a set that fits, or you can take the cast off your gooms yourself, send it on and have 'em hammer you out some to order."
    "Is that so? What kind of stuff do they use to make the cast of your gooms of?"
    "Some uses putty, some uses clay, but I believe they generally recommend plaster of Paris. It's hard, and it's cheap, and it stays where it's put."
    A thoughtful silence followed; then Pinkey got up and joined Wallie, who was sitting on the top pole of the corral, smoking moodily.
    The "dudes" were at target practice with 22's and six-shooters, having been persuaded finally not to use Mr. Canby's range as a background. They now all walked with a swagger and seldom went to their meals without their weapons.
    Pinkey blurted out suddenly:
    "I wisht I'd died when I was little!"
    "What's the matter?"
    "Oh, nothin'."
    It was plain that he wished to be interrogated further, but Wallie, who was thinking of Helene Spenceley and her indifference to him, was in no mood to listen to other people's troubles.
    After another period of reflection Pinkey asked abruptly:
    "Do you believe in signs?"
    To which Wallie replied absently:
    "Can't say I do. Why?"
    "If there's anything in signs I ought to be turrible jealous-the way my eyebrows grow together."
    "Aren't you?" indifferently.
    "Me-jealous? Nobody could make me jealous, especially a worman."
    "You're lucky!" Wallie spoke with unnecessary emphasis. "It's an uncomfortable sensation."
    Pinkey shifted uneasily and picked a bit of bark off the corral pole.
    "Don't it look kinda funny that Miss Eyester would take any in'trist in Old Man Penrose? A girl like her wouldn't care nothin' about his money,