“And then, all of a sudden, when you’d have thought he was soft that way clean through,” she went on, her eyes blazing now at the memory of it, “them Bedloe boys come over lookin’ for trouble.  An’ Buck sure gave it to them!”

“Tell me about it,” the girl said quickly.  “Who are the Bedloe boys?  What did they do?”

“The Bedloe boys,” Mrs. Smith ran on, eager in the recounting, “belong over to the Corners.  Or the Corners belongs to them, I don’t know which you’d say.  Never heard of them boys?  Well, most folks has.  There used to be lots like the Bedloe boys when I was a girl, Miss, but thank gracious they’re getting thinned out powerful fast.  First an’ last an’ all the time they’re rowdies an’ gunfighters an’ bad men.  There’s more of their kind in Hill’s Corners, but these are the worst of the outfit.  They keep close in to the Corners, seeing it’s right on the state line, where they can dodge from one state to another when it comes handy.  Which is right often.

“There’s three of ’em.  Charley an’ Ed an’ the youngest one everybody calls the Kid.  That’s three an’ I guess there’s a good many more would be glad of the chance to shoot Buck up.  I guess the Bedloes heard that time that John was sick.  Anyway, they come over, all three of ’em, hunting trouble.  Buck was out in the barn, feeding the horses, an’ they didn’t know he was on the ranch.  The Kid, he’s the youngest of the mess an’ the worst an’ the han’somest, with them little yeller curls, an’ his daredevil blue eyes, come on ahead, riding his horse right up to the door, yelling like a drunk Injun an’ cussing so it made a woman wonder how any woman could ever have a son like him.  He tried to ride his horse right in the door, an’ when it got scared of me an’ John lyin’ in bed, an’ rared up, the Kid hit it over the head with the gun in his hand, an’ slipped out’n the saddle, laughin’ at it stagger.

“But he come on in an’ Charley come in, too.  Ed Bedloe was out in the far corral, gettin’ ready to throw the gate open an’ turn out the cows an’ stampede ’em off’n the ranch.  What for?” She lifted her bony shoulders.  “Oh, nothin’.  They’d jus’ had trouble with my John about six months before, an’ was taking a good chance to smash up things in general about the ranch.  They swore they was going to burn the cabin an’ the barn an’ scatter the stock an’ do anything else they could put their hands to.  An’ while they was in here, cussing an’ abusing my John, who couldn’t even get up an’ grab his shotgun in the corner, an’ insulting me all they could lay their dirty tongues to, there’s a step at the door right behind ’em, light as a cat, an’ here’s Buck come in from the barn.