"Well, now, I calc'late my prope'ty is might' nigh as important as Luck's
pitcher-making," Applehead contended with a selfishness born of his newly
awakened hunger for the far distances. "And he ain't sent ary word that he's
coming, or will need you boys immediate. The chances is we could go and git
back agin before Luck shows up. And if we don't," he argued speciously, "he
can't blame nobody for not wantin' to set around on their haunches all spring
waiting for 'im. I'd do a lot fer luck; I've DONE a lot fer 'im. But it ain't
to be expected I'd set around waitin' on him and let them danged Mexicans
rustle my calves. They'll do it if they git half a show--now I'm tellin' yuh!"

Pink did not say anything at all, either in assent or argument; but old
Applehead, now that he had established a plausible reason for his sudden
impulse, went on arguing the case while he unsaddled his horse. By the time he
turned the animal loose he had thought of two or three other reasons why he
should take the boys and start out as soon as possible to round up his cattle.
He was still dilating upon these reasons when Andy Green rode slowly down the
slope to the corral.

"Annie-Many-Ponies come back yet?" he asked of Pink, as he swung down off his
horse. "Annie? No; ain't seen anything of her. Shunky's been sitting out there
on the hill for the last hour, looking for her."

"Fer half a cent," threatened old Applehead, in a bad humor because his
arguments had not quite convinced him that he was not meditating a disloyalty,
"I'd kill that danged dawg. And if I was runnin' this bunch, I'd send that
squaw back where she come from, and I'd send her quick. Take the two of 'em
together and they don't set good with me, now I'm tellin' yuh! If I was to say
what I think, I'd say yuh can't never trust an Injun--and shiny hair and eyes
and slim build don't make 'em no trustier. They's something scaley goin' on
around here, and I'd gamble on it. And that there squaw's at the bottom of it.