The red-headed man, drawing serenely at his cigarette, went about
unharnessing his horses.

"Bein' as how I ain't et for some right smart time," he was saying as
he came back from staking out his horses, "I'm goin' to chaw real
soon. Has you gents et yet?"

They assured him that they had not.

"Then if you've got any chuck you want to warm up you can sling it in
my fryin'-pan." He dragged a soap-box to the tail end of the buckboard
and began taking out several packages.

"We didn't bring anything with us," Conniston told him. "We didn't
think--"

The new-comer dropped his frying-pan, put his two hands on his hips,
and stared at them. "You ain't sayin' you started out for the Half
Moon, which is close on a hundred mile, an' never took nothin' along
to chaw!"

Conniston nodded. The red-headed man stared at them a minute,
scratched his head, removing his hat to do so, and then burst out:

"Which I go on record sayin' folks all the way from Noo York has got
some funny ways of doin' business. Bein' as you've slipped me your
name, frien'ly like, stranger, I don't min' swappin' with you. It's
Pete, an' folks calls me Lonesome Pete, mos'ly. An' you can tell
anybody you see that Lonesome Pete, cow-puncher from the Half Moon,
has made up his min' at las' as how he ain't never goin' any nearer