While he was debating the wisdom of writing a detailed description of yesterday's tragedy while it was still fresh in his mind and stowing it away for future “color,” Park Holloway rode into the yard and on to the stables. He nodded at Thurston and grinned without apparent cause, as the cook had done. Thurston followed him to the corral and watched him pull the saddle off his horse, and throw it carelessly to one side. It looked cumbersome, that saddle; quite unlike the ones he had inspected in the New York shops. He grasped the horn, lifted upon it and said, “Jove!” “Heavy, ain't it?” Park laughed, and slipped the bridle down over the ears of his horse and dismissed him with a slap on the rump. “Don't yuh like the looks of it?” he added indulgently. Thurston, engaged in wondering what all those little strings were for, felt the indulgence and straightened. “How should I know?” he retorted. “Anyone can see that my ignorance is absolute. I expect you to laugh at me, Mr. Holloway.” “Call me Park,” said he of the tawny hair, and leaned against the fence looking extremely boyish and utterly incapable of walking calmly down upon a barking revolver and shooting as he went. “You're bound to learn all about saddles and what they're made for,” he went on. “So long as yuh don't get swell-headed the first time yuh stick on a horse that side-steps a little, or back down from a few hard knocks, you'll be all right.” Thurston had not intended getting out and actually living the life he had come to observe, but something got in his nerves and his blood and bred an impulse to which he yielded without reserve. “Park, see here,” he said eagerly. “Graves said he'd turn me over to you, so you could--er--teach me wisdom. It's deuced rough on you, but I hope you won't refuse to be bothered with me. I want to learn--everything. And I want you to find fault like the mischief, and--er--knock me into shape, if it's possible.” He was very modest over his ignorance, and his voice rang true. Park studied him gravely. “Bud,” he said at last, “you'll do. You're greener right now than a blue-joint meadow in June, but yuh got the right stuff in yuh, and it's a go with me. You come along with us after that trail-herd, and you'll get knocked into shape fast enough. Smoke?” Thurston shook his head. “Not those.” “I dunno I'm afraid yuh can't be the real thing unless yuh fan your lungs with cigarette smoke regular.” The twinkle belied him, though. “Say, where did you pick them bloomers?” “They were made in New York.” Thurston smiled in sickly fashion. He had all along been uncomfortably aware of the sharp contrast between his own modish attire and the somewhat disreputable leathern chaps of his host's foreman.