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 "I'm goin' to ship 'em to Kansas City when them lambs grow a little more. I think I'll go over to the bank at Lost Cabin and see if I can't raise a little loan on 'em. If I can, I'll hire some feller to do the work. No sheepman that herds his own sheep ever amounts to anything, Rawlins, no more than any other business man that tries to do it all himself. Look at old Clemmons, look at twenty more of 'em out there like him, dribblin' around with a handful of sheep. That's what keeps 'em down. They ain't got the brains to do the figgerin' and hire somebody to do the work."

"You're not far wrong about it, Peck," Rawlins agreed, knowing that it was true.

"That's where the old woman started off wrong with me. I was workin' at my trade before I come out here, and that ain't no secret, but I had my plans laid to branch out for myself as soon as I got a few hundred more saved up. Well, that's blowed; I busted myself on this dang fool marryin' trip out here. But I'd 'a' made it, all right, if I'd 'a' married Edith instead of that old cow. That little girl and me we'd 'a' went back to St. Joe and started us up a nice little tailorin' and cleanin' and dyein' business. She never would 'a' had to stand behind the counter and wait on the trade, neither; I'd 'a' hired help from the jump. But that's all off. I blowed that chance when I married that old cow."

Rawlins had no comment to nake on the collapsed romance, although he wondered at Peck's perverse stupidity in clinging to the delusion that he could have married Edith at pleasure. He still believed himself