like a--a--" He put the usual period to his hesitation.

"Between you an' _me_, Kenneth," he added, looking at Kent slyly, "she
ain't having none too easy a time. Man's gone back to drinkin'--I knowed
all the time he wouldn't stay braced up very long--lasted about six weeks,
from all I c'n hear. Mebbe she reely thinks it's jest headaches ails him
when he comes back from town--I dunno. You can't never tell what idees a
woman's got tacked away under her hair--from all I c'n gether. I don't
p'tend to know nothing about 'em--don't want to know--_he-he!_ But I
guess," he hinted cunningly, "I know as much about 'em as you do--hey,
Kenneth? You don't seem to chase after 'em none, yourself--_he-he!_"

"Whereabouts did Man run his guards?" asked Kent, passing over the
invitation to personal confessions.

Polycarp gave a grunt of disdain. "Just on the west rim of his coulee.
About forty rod of six-foot guard, and slanted so it'll shoot a fire right
into high grass at the head of the coulee and send it kitin' over this way.
That's supposin' it turns a fire, which it won't. Six feet--a fall like
this here! Why, I never see grass so thick on this range--did you?"

"I wonder, did he burn that extra guard?" Kent was keeping himself rigidly
to the subject of real importance.

"No, by granny! he didn't--not unless he done it since yest'day. He went
to town for suthin, and he might' nigh forgot to go home--_he-he!_ He was
there yest'day about three o'clock, an' I says to him--"

"Well, so-long; I got to, be moving." Kent gathered up the reins and went
his way, leaving Polycarp just in the act of drawing his "plug" from his