“Why, he told you to go ahead and win, didn’t he?”

“Yep.  And he said that it was apparent that the State needed my services more than the Service did.  That’s somethin’ like a train with a engine on each end.  You don’t know which way it’s headed.”

“I’d take it as a sincere compliment.”

“Well, I did swell up some.  Then I says to myself:  ’Bud, you ain’t no fancy office man, and even if you are doin’ good work here, you can’t put it in writin’ for them big bugs at Washington.’  Mebby John is so dog-gone busy—­like the fella with both bands full and his suspenders broke—–­ that he’d be glad to get behind ’most anything to get shut of me.”

“I think you’re mistaken.  You know you can’t keep a born politician out of politics.”

“Meanin’ me?”

“You’re the type.”

“By gravy, Bronson!  I never seen you hidin’ your watch when I come up to visit you before.”

“See here, Shoop.  Why don’t you write to Torrance and ask him point-blank if he has had a hand in getting you nominated for Senator?  Torrance is a big man in his line, and he probably knows what he is doing.”

Shoop grinned.  “You win the pot!” he exclaimed.  “That’s just what I been thinkin’ right along.  I kind of wanted somebody who wasn’t interested in this deal to say it.  Well, I reckon I bothered you long enough.  You got your alfalfa to—­I—­you got your writin’ to do.  But they’s one thing.  If I get roped in and got to run, and some new supervisor comes botherin’ around up here, puttin’ some ranger in my camp that ain’t like Lorry, all you got to do is to move over into my cabin and tell ’em to keep off the grass.  That there four hundred and eighty is mine.  I homesteaded it, and I got the papers.  It ain’t on the reserve.”

“I thought it was.”

“So do some yet.  Nope.  I’m just east of the reservation line; outside the reserve.  I aimed to know what I was doin’ when I homesteaded that piece of sky farm.”

“And yet you took exception to my calling you a born politician.”

Shoop chuckled.  “Speakin’ personal, I been thinkin’ about that job of State Senator for quite a spell.  Now, I reckon you got sense enough not to get mad when I tell you that I just been tryin’ out a little speech I framed up for my constituents.  Just a kind of little alfalfa-seed talk.  Outside of ijuts and Mexicans, it’s about what I aim to hand to the voters of this here district, puttin’ it up to them that I was roped into this hocus and been settin’ back on the rope right along.  And that’s a fact.  But you got to rub some folks’ noses in a fact afore they can even smell it.”

“And you have the nerve to tell me that you framed up all that stuff to get my sympathy?  Shoop, you are wasting time in Arizona.  Go East.  And forgive me for falling for your most natural appeal.”

The genial Bud chuckled and wiped his eyes.  “But it’s true from the start to the wire.”