Once before he had camped in the same draw, a few miles west of Showdown, and Blue Smoke seemed to know the place, for he had swung from the trail of his own accord, striding straight to the water-hole.

“And if you keep on actin’ polite,” Pete told the pony as he hobbled him that evening, “you’ll get a good reputation, like Jim Owen said; which is plumb necessary, if you an’ me’s goin’ to be pals.  But if gettin’ a good reputation is goin’ to spoil your wind or legs any—­why, jest keep on bein’ onnery—­which Jim was tellin’ me is called ‘Character.’”

As Pete hardened to the saddle and Blue Smoke hardened to the trail, they traveled faster and farther each day, until, on the Blue Mesa, where the pony grazed and Pete squatted beside his night-fire in the open, they were but a half-day’s journey from the Concho.  Pete almost regretted that their journey must come to an end.  But he could not go on meandering about the country without a home and without an object in life:  that was pure loafing.

Pete might have excused himself on the ground that he needed just this sort of thing after his serious operation; but he was honest with himself, admitting that he felt fit to tackle almost any kind of hard work, except perhaps writing letters—­for he now thought well enough of himself to believe that Doris Gray would answer his letter to her from Sanborn.  And of course he would answer her letter—­and if he answered that, she would naturally answer . . .  Shucks!  Why should she write to him?  All he had ever done for her was to make her a lot of bother and hard work.  And what good was his money to him?  He couldn’t just walk into a store and buy an education and have it wrapped up in paper and take it to her and say, “Here, Miss Gray.  I got a education—­the best they had in the outfit.  Now if you’ll take it as a kind of present—­and me along with it . . .”

Pete was camping within fifty yards of the spot where old Pop Annersley had tried to teach him to read and write—­it seemed a long time ago, and Annersley himself seemed more vague in Pete’s memory, as he tried to recall the kindly features and the slow, deliberate movements of the old man.  It irritated Pete that he could not recall old man Annersley’s face distinctly.  He could remember his voice, and one or two characteristic gestures—­but his face—­

Pete stared into the camp-fire, dreaming back along that trail over which he had struggled and fought and blundered; back to the time when he was a waif in Enright, his only companion a lean yellow dog . . .  Pete nodded and his eyes closed.  He turned lazily and leaned back against his saddle.

The mesa, carpeted with sod-grass, gave no warning of the approaching horseman, who had seen the tiny fire and had ridden toward it.  Just within the circle of firelight he reined in and was about to call out when that inexplicable sense inherent in animals, the Indian, and in some cases the white man, brought Pete to his feet.  In that same lightning-swift, lithe movement he struck his gun from the holster and stood tense as a buck that scents danger on the wind.