“My other name?  I ain’t got none.  I’m Pete.”

Annersley shook his head.  “Well, pardner, you’ll be Pete Annersley now.  Watch out that hoss don’t jerk you out o’ your jacket.  This here hill is a enterprisin’ hill and leads right up to my place.  Hang on!  As I was sayin’, we’re pardners, you and me.  We’re goin’ up to my place on the Blue and tend to the critters and git washed up and have supper, and mebby after supper we’ll mosey around so you kin git acquainted with the ranch.  Where’d you say your pop come from?”

“I dunno.  He ain’t my real pop.”

Annersley turned and looked down at the lean, bright little face.  “Yon hungry, son?”

“You bet!”

“What you say if we kill a chicken for supper—­and celebrate.”

“G’wan, you’re joshin’ me!”

“Nope.  I like chicken.  And I got one that needs killin’; a no-account ole hen what won’t set and won’t lay.”

“Then we’ll ring her doggone head off, eh?”

“Somethin’ like that—­only I ain’t jest hatin’ that there hen.  She ain’t no good, that’s all.”

Young Pete pondered, watching Annersley’s grave, bearded face.  Suddenly he brightened.  “I know!  Nobody kin tell when you’re joshin’ ’em, ’cause your whiskers hides it.  Guess I’ll grow some whiskers and then I kin fool everybody.”

Old man Annersley chuckled, and spoke to the horses.  Young Pete, happier than he had ever been, wondered if this good luck would last—­if it were real, or just a dream that would vanish, leaving him shivering in his tattered blanket, and the horse-trader telling him to get up and rustle wood for the morning fire.

The buckboard topped the rise and leveled to the tree-girdled mesa.  Young Pete stared.  This was the most beautiful spot he had ever seen.  Ringed round by a great forest of spruce, the Blue Mesa lay shimmering in the sunset like an emerald lake, beneath a cloudless sky tinged with crimson, gold, and amethyst.  Across the mesa stood a cabin, the only dwelling in that silent expanse.  And this was to be his home, and the big man beside him, gently urging the horse, was his partner.  He had said so.  Surely the great adventure had begun.

Annersley glanced down.  Young Pete’s hand was clutched in the old man’s coat-sleeve, but the boy was gazing ahead, his bright black eyes filled with the wonder of new fortunes and a real home.  Annersley blinked and spoke sharply to the horse, although that good animal needed no urging as he plodded sturdily toward the cabin.

CHAPTER II

FIREARMS AND NEW FORTUNES

For a few days the old man had his hands full.  Young Pete, used to thinking and acting for himself, possessed that most valuable but often dangerous asset, initiative.  The very evening that he arrived at the homestead, while Annersley was milking the one tame cow out in the corral, Young Pete decided that he would help matters along by catching the hen which Annersley had pointed out to him when he drove into the yard.  Milking did not interest Young Pete; but chasing chickens did.