"Dear Cupid," it run, "ast Mister Sewell not to come down too hard on me account of what I'm goin' to do fer Macie. The little gal says she wants a singin' chanst more'n anythin' else. Wal, I'm goin' to give it to her. You'll find a' even five hunderd in green-backs over in Silverstein's safe. It's hern. Tell her I want she should use it to go to Noo York on and buck the op'ra game." Wal, y' see, the ole man 'd been right all along--Up-State _was_ sidin' with Mace. Somehow though, _I_ couldn't feel hard agin him fer it. I knowed that she'd go--help 'r _no_ help. But Sewell, he didn't think like me, and I never _seen_ a man take on the way he done. _Crazy_ mad, he was, swore blue blazes, and said things that didn't sound so nice when a feller remembered that Up-State was face up and flat on his back fer keeps--and goin' home in the baggage-car. I tell you, the boys was nice to me that day. "The little gal won't fergit y', Cupid," they says, and "Never you mind, Cupid, it'll all come out in the wash." I thanked 'em, a-course. But with Macie fixed to go (far's money went), and without makin' friends with me, neither, what under the shinin' sun could chirk _me_ up? Wal, _nothin'_ could. CHAPTER SEVEN THE BOYS PUT THEY FOOT IN IT "WAL, Hairoil," I says, "I shore am a' unlucky geezer! Why, d' you know, I don't hardly dast go from one room to another these days fer fear I'll git my lip pinched in the door." Hairoil, he clawed thoughtful. "You and the boss had a talk oncet on the marryin' question," he begun. "It was out at the Bar Y." (We was settin' on a truck at the deepot again, same as that other time.) "A-course, I don't want t' throw nothin' up, but--you tole him then that when it come you' _own_ time, _you_ wouldn't have no trouble. Recollect braggin' that-a-way?" "Yas," I answers, meeker'n Moses. "But Hairoil, that was 'fore I met Macie." "So it was," he says. Then, after a minute, "I s'pose nothin' could keep her in Briggs much longer." I shook my haid. "The ole man won't let her fetch a dud offen the ranch, and so she's havin' a couple of dresses made. I figger that when _they_ git done, she'll--she'll go." "How long from now?" "About two weeks--accordin' to what Mollie Brown tole me." "Um," says Hairoil, and went on chawin' his cud. Fin'lly, he begun again, and kinda like he was feelin' 'round. "Don't you think Mace Sewell is took up with the _ro_mance part of this singin' proposition?" he ast. "That's _my_ idear. And _I_ think that if she was showed that her and you was _also_ a _ro_mance, why, she'd give up goin' to Noo York. Now, it _might_ be possible to--to git her t' see things right--if they was a little scheme, say." I got up. "No, Hairoil," I says, "no little scheme is a-goin' t' be played on _Macie_. A-course, I done it fer Rose and Billy; but Macie,--wal, Macie is diff'rent. I want t' win her in the open. And I'll be jiggered if I stand fer any underhand work."