Page:Patches (1928).pdf/54

 for every man at the rude table entered into it with all his soul.

When the sound of the last vigorous verse had died away, the company slowly dispersed and the cow-punchers made their way to the bunk house, two or three of the older men stopping to slap Pony on the back and to tell him that he was a good old sky pilot and they would rather hear him preach than any of the sky pilots down at Wyanne.

The bunk house was very much like the ranch house in construction, a long low building with a row of army cots on either side and an aisle in the middle. At the head of each cot was a chair that had seen better days.

Laughing and joking about the weather and the day's work ahead, the cow-punchers stripped off coats, breeches, and chaps and piled them upon the chairs and stood their tall boots by the cots, then shot into their cots like prairie dogs into their holes. In five minutes time the entire company were between the sheets.

It seemed to Larry that the men fell asleep as soon as their heads touched the pillows, for soon nearly the entire crowd was snoring prodigiously. It seemed to the young tenderfoot that he had never heard such snores before.

He lay awake for several minutes listening to the