I was down in the corral one day, saddling Shylock—­so named because he tried to exact a pound of flesh every time I turned my back or in other ways seemed off my guard—­and when I was looping up the latigo I discovered that the alliterative Mr. Potter was roosting on the fence, watching me with those needle-pointed eyes of his.  I wondered if he was about to prepare another report for dad.

“Do yuh want to be put on the pay-roll?” he asked, without any preamble, when he caught my glance.

“Yes, if I’m earning wages.  ‘The laborer is worthy of his hire,’ I believe,” I retorted loftily.  The fact was, I was strapped again—­and, though one did not need money on the Bay State Ranch, it’s a good thing to have around.

He grinned into his collar.  “Well,” he said, “you’ve been pretty busy the last three weeks, but I ain’t had any orders to hire a boxing-master for the boys.  I don’t know as that’d rightly come under the head of legitimate expenses; boxing-masters come high, I’ve heard.  Are yuh going on round-up?”

“Sure!” I answered, in an exact copy—­as near as I could make it—­of Frosty Miller’s intonation.  I was making Frosty my model those days.

He said:  “All right—­your pay starts on the fifteenth of next month”—­which was April.  Then he got down from the fence and went off, and I mounted Shylock and rode away to Laurel, after the mail.  Not that I expected any, for no one but dad knew where I was, and I hadn’t heard a word from him, though I knew he wrote to Perry Potter—­or his secretary did—­every week or so.  Really, I don’t think a father ought to be so chesty with the only son he’s got, even if the son is a no-account young cub.

I was standing in the post-office, which was a store and saloon as well, when an old fellow with stubby whiskers and a jaw that looked as though it had been trimmed square with a rule, and a limp that made me know at once who he was, came in.  He was standing at the little square window, talking to the postmaster and waving his pipe to emphasize what he said, when a horse went past the door on the dead run, with bridle-reins flying.  A fellow rushed out past us—­it was his horse—­and hit old King’s elbow a clip as he went by.  The pipe went about ten feet and landed in a pickle-keg.  I went after it and fished it out for the old fellow—­not so much because I’m filled with a natural courtesy, as because I was curious to know the man that had got the best of dad.

He thanked me, and asked me across to the saloon side of the room to drink with him.  “I don’t know as I’ve met you before, young man,” he said, eying me puzzled.  “Your face is familiar, though; been in this country long?”

“No,” I said; “a little over a month is all.”

“Well, if you ever happen around my way—­King’s Highway, they call my place—­stop and see me.  Going to stay long out here?”

“I think so,” I replied, motioning the waiter—­“bar-slave,” they call them in Montana—­to refill our glasses.  “And I’ll be glad to call some day, when I happen in your neighborhood.  And if you ever ride over toward the Bay State, be sure you stop.”