“There aint no need for you-all to saddle a horse, long as you’re around the ranch, here, ma’am,” he protested as he led a “plumb gentle” sorrel outside the Footstool corral. “They’s most always some of the boys about, that’s willin’ to he’p you if you say the word.”

Mariel, who had equipped herself with a quirt belonging to Margaret Carr, her school chum who had induced her to pay a visit to the Footstool ranch in Wyoming, frowned slightly and attempted to slap her boot, as if she had held a riding-crop. The quirt, however, was too limber, and refused to slap.

“I understand, but that’s just why I want to learn,” she insisted with some little spirit. “What if I’d be out somewhere alone, and have to saddle—”

“I bet you-all wont be ridin’ around alone, ma’am—not’s long as young Mr. Otis is here,” remarked Simple with assurance. He hadn’t failed to use his eyes during the week that Mariel had been a guest of the ranch, and his years gave him certain privileges which the other “boys” lacked.

Mariel flushed slightly, and then laughed.

“But he isn’t here today,” she challenged, as if seeking to elicit further information concerning Otis.

“No, ma’am,” Simple replied, his eyes narrowing as he looked away southward toward the Gros Ventre range, “I reckon he’s out there somewheres lookin’ over the range. First thing, ma’am, don’t go swishin’ that quirt around these broomtails. They’re liable to think yore in earnest. Old Dynamite, here, he’s plumb peace-lovin’ an’ reasonable, but even he’s got some right funny idees about quirts.

“Step up an’ gentle him some, ma’am, so he’ll know yore intentions is honorable. Not from that end, ma’am, or he may kick yore slats out—beg pardon, ma’am, I mean he mayn’t see it the right way. Go at him from the head end. That’s right.

“Naow fold yore saddle-blanket—so. Keep on the nigh side, an’ ease it over his spine. Slide it back with the grain of the hair. Fine. I bet that saddle’s a purty big heft for you-all, aint it, ma’am? Naow reach under his bel—I mean, reach under him an’ grab that cinch. Run the latigo through the ring—like this. Naow pull—hard.”

Mariel turned to her instructor, sorely puzzled.

“Very well. But what do you do when he swells all up, like this?”

“Kick him in the slats, ma’am. Kick him in the slats. Leastways, that’s what I’d do, seein’ as how you-all ast 

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