Pete learned this, and much more, about Blue Smoke’s disposition while the men ate and joked with Mrs. Bailey.  And Mrs. Bailey, good woman, was no less eloquent than the men in describing the outlaw’s unenviable temperament, never dreaming that the men would allow a boy of Pete’s years to ride the horse.  Pete, a bit embarrassed in this lively company, attended heartily to his plate.  He gathered, indirectly, that he was expected to demonstrate his ability as a rider, sooner or later.  He hoped that it would be later.

After dinner the men loafed out and gravitated lazily toward the corral, where they stood eying the horses and commenting on this and that pony.  Pete had eyes for no horse but Blue Smoke.  He admitted to himself that he did not want to ride that horse.  He knew that his rise would be sudden and that his fall would be great.  Still, he sported the habiliments of a full-fledged buckaroo, and he would have to live up to them.  A man who could not sit the hurricane-deck of a pitching horse was of little use to the ranch.  In the busy season each man caught up his string of ponies and rode them as he needed them.  There was neither time nor disposition to choose.

Pete wished that Blue Smoke had a little more of Rowdy’s equable disposition.  It was typical of Pete, however, that he absolutely hated to leave an unpleasant task to an indefinite future.  Moreover, he rather liked the Concho boys and the foreman.  He wanted to ride with them.  That was the main thing.  Any hesitancy he had in regard to riding the outlaw was the outcome of discretion rather than of fear.  Bailey had said there was no work for him.  Pete felt that he had rather risk his neck a dozen times than to return to the town of Concho and tell Roth that he had been unsuccessful in getting work.  Yet Pete did not forget his shrewdness.  He would bargain with the foreman.

“How long kin a fella stick on that there Blue Smoke hoss?” he queried presently.

“Depends on the man,” said Bailey, grinning.

“Bailey here stayed with him fifteen seconds onct,” said a cowboy.

Pete pushed hack his hat.  “Well, I ain’t no bronco-twister, but I reckon I could ride him a couple o’ jumps.  Who’s keepin’ time on the dog-gone cayuse?”

“Anybody that’s got a watch,” replied Bailey.

Pete hitched up his chaps.  “I got a watch and I’d hate to bust her.  If you’ll hold her till I git through”—­and he handed the watch to the nearest cowboy.  “If you’ll throw my saddle on ’im, I reckon I’ll walk him round a little and see what kind of action he’s got.”

“Shucks!” exclaimed Bailey; “that hoss would jest nacherally pitch you so high you wouldn’t git back in time for the fall round-up, kid.  He’s bad.”

“Well, you said they wa’n’t no job till fall, anyhow,” said Pete.  “Mebby I’d git back in time for a job.”

Bailey shook his head.  “I was joshin’—­this mornin’.”