Page:Cherokee Trails (1928).pdf/118



There was nothing unique to Tom Simpson in filling that very popular rôle of a man without a job. He frequently had played in the great drama of life as one of the supernumeraries in the same capacity before. He carried his part easily as he rode on toward the Ellison ranch to deliver the borrowed horse and gun. There was something new and diverting, however, in the experience of meeting such a supreme ass as Sid Coburn. How such a man could run at large, carrying on even the primitive business of grazing cattle, without somebody backing him up and taking everything away from him, passed all understanding.

Simpson wondered if the fellow would have the gall to come to Eudora Ellison with a demand for the return of the horse. He concluded it was altogether probable. No doubt Coburn had bought the animal from the man who stole it, without troubling over title in the case. Very likely he never had heard of Eudora's loss, or had not heeded it, a thing quite natural in a country where reports of stolen horses must have been as thick as flies.

It would be interesting to see how far he'd get with a demand on the girl for her valuable pet. Probably to the front gate in double-quick, with a flock of bullets cooing around his ears. Simpson stole a little grin from himself, and looked around apprehensively as he committed the