"I reckon you're cleverer than me," Johnson said, "but you ain't awake to me yet. Turn over. You're on your back." Without concerning himself further about the boss, he clambered out on to the platform and threw the borrowed rope to Reb. We saw that he was tall and big of bone, and his shoulders had an indolent droop. Although he could not have been over twenty-five, his hair was plentifully flecked with gray. Presently Buffalo Jim, who was keeping tally of the cattle going through the chute, lost count and admitted frankly that he could not say whether there were thirty-seven or forty in the car. He tried to appear grave in confessing this, but was unable to repress a snigger. Everything would have gone smoothly, he contended, had he not chanced to recall a story Uncle Hi Millet had told him the previous night. "If that feller could count up to fifty," said Johnson, in an aside to the buyer, "he would be back in Texas still, a-teaching school." "Hello, Lafe!" the other exclaimed. "Where did you drop from? Want a job? Seventy a month?" "Eighty." "No, sir; seventy." "Eighty. I got a lot of unfinished business down the line unless." "Have it your own way. Eighty it is. Fly at it." Johnson replaced Buffalo Jim and sat on a board between two posts, dangling his legs, staring at everything but the plunging steers. Yet he never once failed to tally. The boss's wife rode up to the corrals. With her was Mrs. Tracey. "Who's them there ladies?" Lafe whispered to a cowboy who wielded a prodpole. "That pretty one's Miz Floyd. I cain't rightly see the other. Oh, yes. Shore. She's a widow woman--owns a flock of mines way up in them mountains." "The pretty one's the one I meant," said Lafe. We sealed the door of the last car, and a brakeman waved to the engineer to pull forward. The buyer grabbed Lafe by the shoulder and jabbered instructions into his ear. Then he caught the caboose rail as it sped by, and Johnson informed the amazed Floyd that he had been commissioned to receive the other herds when gathered. "And he don't even know your name? Oh, he does? All the same, that's sure rushing it. Glad to do business with you, anyhow. I want you to be acquainted with my wife. Shake hands with Mr. Johnson, Sally." Mrs. Floyd came down the platform, striding like a man. She was wearing a divided skirt, very useful-looking spurs on her high-heeled boots, and a man's felt hat. All the cowboys stopped work to eye her. She was only twenty-two and had an amazingly trim figure. With that meaningless smile of polite welcome with which a woman greets her husband's friends, Mrs. Floyd drew off a glove to give Johnson her hand. "Lafe Johnson! Lafe!" she squealed. And with that she was pumping the big fellow's arm up and down, her cheeks red with excitement. "Why, it's li'l Sally!" "I take it you two know each other," said her husband mildly. "Do we? Why, we were raised together, Tom. Lafe was one of my best beaux. Weren't you, Lafe?"