Rowdy cursed him companionably and told him to go along, if he wanted to,
and to look out he didn't throw up his own hands; and Pink grumbled and
swore and did go along. But when they got there, Miss Conroy greeted him
like a very good friend; which sent Rowdy sulky, and kept him so all the
evening. It seemed to him that Pink was playing a double game, and when they
started home he told him so.

But Pink turned in his saddle and smiled so that his dimples showed plainly
in the moonlight. "Chappyrones that set in a corner and look wise are the
rankest kind uh fakes," he explained. "When she was talking to me, she was
letting you alone--see?"

Rowdy accepted the explanation silently, and stored it away in his memory.
After that, by riding craftily, and by threats, and by much vituperation, he
managed to reach Rodway's unchapperoned at least three times out of
five--which was doing remarkably well, when one considers Pink.



CHAPTER 5

At Home at Cross L.

In two days Rowdy was quite at home with the Cross L. In a month he found
himself transplanted from the smoke-laden air of the bunk-house, and set off
from the world in a line camp, with nothing to do but patrol the boggy banks
of Milk River, where it was still unfenced and unclaimed by small farmers.
The only mitigation of his exile, so far as he could see, lay in
the fact that he had Pink and the Silent One for companions.