CHAPTER VIII.

CONCERNING BRANDS.


A few days after Jim Reid's evening visit to the Dean two cowboys from
the Diamond-and-a-Half outfit, on their way to Cherry Creek, stopped at
the ranch for dinner.

The well-known, open-handed Baldwin hospitality led many a passing rider
thus aside from the main valley road and through the long meadow lane to
the Cross-Triangle table. Always there was good food for man and horse,
with a bed for those who came late in the day; and always there was a
hearty welcome and talk under the walnut trees with the Dean. And in all
that broad land there was scarce a cowboy who, when riding the range,
would not look out for the Dean's cattle with almost the same interest
and care that he gave to the animals bearing the brand of his own
employer.

So it was that these riders from the Tonto Flats country told the Dean
that in looking over the Cross-Triangle cattle watering at Toohey they
had seen several cases of screwworms.

"We doped a couple of the worst, and branded a calf for you," said
"Shorty" Myers.

And his companion, Bert Wilson, added, as though apologizing, "We
couldn't stop any longer because we got to make it over to Wheeler's