"Time I was hearing from them spurs I sent for." Andy silently went through his pockets and produced what mail he had gleaned from the post-office, and led his horse into the shade of the stable and pulled off the saddle. Every movement betrayed the fact that he was in the grip of unpleasant emotions, but to the Happy Family he said not another word.
The Happy Family did not notice his silence at the time. But afterwards, when the Kid had stopped crying and Silver had gotten to his feet and wobbled back to the stable, led by Chip, who explained briefly and satisfactorily the cause of the uproar at the house, and the boys had started up to their belated dinner, they began to realize that for a returned traveler Andy Green was not having much to say.
They asked him about his trip, and received brief answers.
Had he been anyone else they would have wanted to know immediately what was eatin' on him; but since it was Andy Green who sat frowning at his toes and smoking his cigarette as though it had no comfort or flavor, the boldest of them were cautious. For Andy Green, being a young man of vivid imagination and no conscience whatever, had fooled them too often with his lies. They waited, and they watched him covertly and a bit puzzled.
Silence and gloom were not boon companions of Andy Green, at any time. So Weary, having the most charitable nature of any among them, sighed and yielded the point of silent contention.
"What was all that you started to tell us about the dry-farmers, Andy?" he asked indulgently.
"All straight goods. But there's no use talking to you bone-heads. You'll set around chewing the rag and looking wise till it's too late to do anything but holler your heads off."
He got up from where he had been lounging on a bench just outside the mess house and walked away, with his hands thrust deep into his pockets and his shoulders drooped forward.
The Happy Family looked after him doubtfully.
"Aw, it's just some darned josh uh his," Happy Jack declared.
"I know HIM."
"Look at the way he slouches along--like he was loaded to the ears with trouble!" Pink pointed out amusedly. "He'd fool anybody that didn't know him, all right."
"And he fools the fellows that do know him, oftener than anybody else," added the Native Son negligently. "You're fooled right now if you think that's all acting. That HOMBRE has got something on his mind."
"Well, by golly, it ain't dry-farmers," Slim asserted boldly.
"If you fellows wouldn't say it was a frame-up between us two, I'd go after him and find out. But . . ."
"But as it stands, we'd believe Andy Green a whole lot quicker'n what we would you," supplemented Big Medicine loudly. "You're dead right there."
"What was it he said about it?" Weary wanted to know. "I wasn't paying much attention, with the Kid yelling his head off and old Silver gaping like a sick turkey, and all. What was it about them dryfarmers?"
"He said," piped Pink, "that he'd got next to a scheme to bring a big bunch of dry-farmers in on this bench up here, with stock that they'd turn loose on the range. That's what he said. He claims the agent wanted him to go in on it."
"Mamma!" Weary held a match poised midway between his thigh and his cigarette while he stared at Pink. "That would be some mixup--if it was to happen." His sunny blue eyes--that were getting little crow's-feet at their corners--turned to look after the departing Andy. "Where's the josh?" he questioned the group.
"The josh is, that he'd like to see us all het up over it, and makin' war-talks and laying for the pilgrims some dark night with our six-guns, most likely," retorted Pink, who happened to be in a bad humor because in ten minutes he was due at a line of post-holes that divided the big pasture into two unequal parts. "He can't agitate me over anybody's troubles but my own. Happy, I'll help Bud stretch wire this afternoon if you'll tamp the, rest uh them posts."
"Aw, you stick to your own job! How was it when I wanted you to help pull the old wire off that hill fence and git it ready to string down here? You wasn't crazy about workin' with bob wire then, I noticed. You said--"
"What I said wasn't a commencement to what I'll say again,"
Pink began truculently, and so the subject turned effectually from Andy Green.
Weary smoked meditatively while they wrangled, and when the group broke up for the afternoon's work he went unobtrusively in search of Andy. He was not quite easy in his mind concerning the alleged joke. He had looked full at the possibilities of the situation--granting Andy had told the truth, as he sometimes did--and the possibilities had not pleased him. He found Andy morosely replacing some broken strands in his cinch, and he went straight at the mooted question.
Andy looked up from his work and scowled. "This ain't any joke with me," he stated grimly. "It's something that's going to put the Flying U out of business if it ain't stopped before it gets started. I've been worrying my head of[, ever since day before yesterday; I ain't in the humor to take anything off those imitation joshers up there--I'll tell yuh that much"
"Well, but how do you figure it can be stopped?" Weary sat soberly down on the oats box and absently watched Andy's expert fingers while they knotted the heavy cotton cord through the cinch-ring. "We can't stand 'em off with guns."
Andy dropped the cinch and stood up, pushing back his hat and then pulling it forward into place with the gesture he used when he was very much in earnest. "No, we can't. But if the bunch is game for it there's a way to block their play--and the law does all our fighting for us. We don't have to yeep.