When we got back to the ranch, one of the first to greet us
happened to be Jim Misterton. He looked so pale and thin that I
thought for a moment his old enemy had attacked him. However, he
assured us that he was perfectly well, but unable to sleep properly.
We asked him to stay to supper, rather as a matter of form, for he had
always refused our invitations unless Angela were included. To our
surprise he accepted.
"He'll uncork himself after the second pipe," said the sage Ajax.
He did. And, oddly enough, our cousin's photograph in Court dress
moved him as it had moved his wife.
"Boys," he said, "I'm the biggest fool that ever came to this burnt-up
wilderness; and I'm a knave because I persuaded the sweetest girl in
England to join me."
Oil may calm troubled waters, but it feeds flames. We said something,
nothing worth repeating; then Jim stood up, trembling with agitation,
waving his briar pipe (which had gone out), cursing himself and the
brazen skies, and the sterile soil, and the jack-rabbits, and barb-
wire, and his spring, now a pool of stagnant mud. When he had
finished--and how his tongue must have ached!--Ajax said quietly--
"Were you any good as a clerk?"
Jim nodded sullenly.
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