“My name’s Wade.  I’m over from Meeker way, hopin’ to find a job with you,” said Wade.

“Glad to meet you,” replied Belllounds, extending his huge hand to shake Wade’s.  “I need you, sure bad.  What’s your special brand of work?”

“I reckon any kind.”

“Set down, stranger,” replied Belllounds, pulling up a chair.  He seated himself on a bench and leaned against the log wall.  “Now, when a boy comes an’ says he can do anythin’, why I jest haw! haw! at him.  But you’re a man, Wade, an’ one as has been there.  Now I’m hard put fer hands.  Jest speak out now fer yourself.  No one else can speak fer you, thet’s sure.  An’ this is bizness.”

“Any work with stock, from punchin’ steers to doctorin’ horses,” replied Wade, quietly.  “Am fair carpenter an’ mason.  Good packer.  Know farmin’.  Can milk cows an’ make butter.  I’ve been cook in many outfits.  Read an’ write an’ not bad at figures.  Can do work on saddles an’ harness, an-”

“Hold on!” yelled Belllounds, with a hearty laugh.  “I ain’t imposin’ on no man, no matter how I need help.  You’re sure a jack of all range trades.  An’ I wish you was a hunter.”

“I was comin’ to that.  You didn’t give me time.”

“Say, do you know hounds?” queried Belllounds, eagerly.

“Yes.  Was raised where everybody had packs.  I’m from Kentucky.  An’ I’ve run hounds off an’ on for years.  I’ll tell you—­”

Belllounds interrupted Wade.

“By all that’s lucky!  An’ last, can you handle guns?  We ’ain’t had a good shot on this range fer Lord knows how long.  I used to hit plumb center with a rifle.  My eyes are pore now.  An’ my son can’t hit a flock of haystacks.  An’ the cowpunchers are ’most as bad.  Sometimes right hyar where you could hit elk with a club we’re out of fresh meat.”

“Yes, I can handle guns,” replied Wade, with a quiet smile and a lowering of his head.  “Reckon you didn’t catch my name.”

“Wal—­no, I didn’t,” slowly replied Belllounds, and his pause, with the keener look he bestowed upon Wade, told how the latter’s query had struck home.

“Wade—­Bent Wade,” said Wade, with quiet distinctness.

“Not Hell-Bent Wade!” ejaculated Belllounds.

“The same....  I ain’t proud of the handle, but I never sail under false colors.”

“Wal, I’ll be damned!” went on the rancher.  “Wade, I’ve heerd of you fer years.  Some bad, but most good, an’ I reckon I’m jest as glad to meet you as if you’d been somebody else.”

“You’ll give me the job?”

“I should smile.”

“I’m thankin’ you.  Reckon I was some worried.  Jobs are hard for me to get an’ harder to keep.”

“Thet’s not onnatural, considerin’ the hell which’s said to camp on your trail,” replied Belllounds, dryly.  “Wade, I can’t say I take a hell of a lot of stock in such talk.  Fifty years I’ve been west of the Missouri.  I know the West an’ I know men.  Talk flies from camp to ranch, from diggin’s to town, an’ always some one adds a little more.  Now I trust my judgment an’ I trust men.  No one ever betrayed me yet.”