The man called Clint grinned some at the joke, but the grin soon faded away as he kept a looking at the old horse, and noticed the condition he was in,--then he seen the saddle-marks that was all over the pony's back, and he says: "You can never tell, that old pony might of been mighty hard to set at one time too--but the way he looks like now, them times are sure done past and gone." "Yep," agreed the other man, "it's a miracle that pony can navigate at all--I wonder how it is that this Humane Society hombre that's sticking around the rodeo grounds don't happen to notice such as this. I'd like to help hang a feller for driving a horse like that around." The conversation was held up for a spell as the two men watched the bewhiskered man come out of the hotel with an empty basket and climbed the wagon on which the old mouse colored horse was hooked. He grabbed the lines and the whip both at the same time and went to work a putting the horse into a trot. Clint was for getting up as he seen the whip land on the old pony's hide, but the other man grabbed a hold of his arm and says: "Never mind, old boy, most likely that Humane Society outfit'll fall on that bolshevik's neck before he gets very far." The man called Clint set down again, but he was boiling up inside, and he didn't at all look pleasant as the conversation was resumed and noticed how his friend turned it to other things and away from the subject of old horses and such. He wasn't for answering very quick when that same friend went on to talking about that country to the north;--how he'd heard rumors that the Rocking R might be selling out in another year or so. "I wonder why?" he asks. Clint turned to his friend and grinning at his idea of changing the subject that way, finally answered: "I guess it's because Old Tom feels the end a coming, besides he's getting crowded all around by small outfits, and his range aint holding up like it used to." "But what are you going to do when the Rocking R sells out?--you left that country quite a few times the last few years, and I notice you always go back like there was no other that suited you." "I've got that fixed," says Clint gradually taking more heart in the new subject, and there he tried to describe some;--"you know abouts where that camp is where I used to break horses when I first started working for the Rocking R? it's where the outfit used to run their stock horses. Well, I bought that camp from Old Tom Jarvis,--that is, I talked him into selling it to me, and four thousand acres of the fine range around to go with it. [Illustration: No remuda got by that Clint didn't ride thru.] "I'm thinking that this shipment I'm getting together now will be the last Old Tom'll ever buy, and by the time I get this train-load of Sonora Reds north and delivered to him, I'll have enough money to make the final payment on my place and still have enough left to buy a few head of cattle and start stocking it."