“Sure!  Going to Antelope?”

“Nope—­not first.  I got business over to Chico Miguel’s place.  I’m goin’ to call on a lady.”

“Oh, I see!  Anita?”

“Well, I sure ain’t goin’ to call on her ma—­she’s married a’ready.”

Despite himself, Corliss smiled.  “So that’s what you wanted that new bed and table and the chairs for.  Did they get marked up much coming in?”

“The legs some.  I rubbed ’em with that hoss-liniment you give me.  You can hardly tell.  It kind of smelled like turpentine, and I didn’t have nothin’ else.”

“Well, anything you want—­”

“I know, boss.  But this is goin’ to be a quiet weddin’.  No brass-bands or ice-cream or pop-corn or style.  Just me and her and—­and I reckon a priest, seein’ she was brung up that way.  I ain’t asked her yet.”

“What?  About getting married, or the priest?”

“Nothin’.  We got kind of a eye-understandin’ and her ma and me is good friends.  It’s like this.  Bein’ no hand to do love-makin’ stylish, I just passes her a couple of bouquets onct or twict and said a few words.  Now, you see, if I get that buckboard and a couple of hosses—­I sure would like the white ones—­and drive over lookin’ like business and slip the ole man a box of cigars I bought, and Mrs. Miguel that there red-and-yella serape I paid ten dollars for in Antelope, and show Anita me new contract with the Concho for pumpin’ water for seventy-five bones a month, I reckon the rest of it’ll come easy.  I’m figurin’ strong on them white hosses, likewise.  Bein’ white’ll kind of look like gettin’ married, without me sayin’ it.  You see, boss, I’m short on the Spanish talk and so I have to do some figurin’.”

“Well, Sun, you have come along a lot since you first hit the Concho!  Go ahead, and good luck to you!  If you need any money—­”

“I was comin’ to that.  Seein’ as you kind of know me—­and seein’ I’m goin’ to git hitched—­I was thinkin’ you might lend me mebby a hundred on the contrac’.”

“I guess I can.  Will that be enough?”

“Plenty.  You see I was figurin’ on buyin’ a few head of stock to run with yourn on the water-hole range.”

“Why, I can let you have the stock.  You can pay me when you get ready.”

“That’s just it.  You’d kind of give ’em to me and I ain’t askin’ favors, except the buckboard and the white hosses.”

“But what do you want to monkey with cattle for?  You’re doing pretty well with the water.”

“That’s just it.  You see, Anita thinks I’m a rarin’, high-ridin’, cussin’, tearin’, bronco-bustin’ cow-puncher from over the hill.  I reckon you know I ain’t, but I got to live up to it and kind of let her down easy-like.  I can put on me spurs and chaps onct or twict a week and go flyin’ out and whoopin’ around me stock, and scarin’ ’em to death, pertendin’ I’m mighty interested in ridin’ range.  If you got a lady’s goat, you want to keep it.  ‘Course, later on, I can kind o’ slack up.  Then I’m goin’ to learn her to read American, and she can read that piece in the paper about me.  I reckon that’ll kind of cinch up the idea that her husband sure is the real thing.  But I got to have them cows till she can learn to read.”