Page:The Cow Jerry (1925).pdf/131

 you think you'll take the job if Ford Langley offers you one?"

"It'll be two weeks till pay-day; my case it'll come up in court and be settled befdre then. I can decide on the job after I know where I'm at. Court opens in five days from now. My lawyer says he'll bring my case to a hearin' not later than the second day."

"You can rest up till the trial, and not bother about a job. From what I hear these lily-handed aristocrats of railroad society say, section work must be a terrible strain on a man's physical and moral forces."

"It was hard at first, cruel hard," said Tom, reflectively. "But I got toughened to it so I didn't mind. If it wasn't for the remarks they pass on a man, jerryin' wouldn't be such a bad job at all."

"If you win your case, you'll sell your cattle in the fall and go back to Texas."

"I've always been aimin' to, Louise, till around here lately. I've been considerin' and plannin' on stayin' up here in the north if I can get something under my feet."

"It's bound to come right," she cheered him. "One way or another you'll come into your own again."

"I don't see how the judge can go against me when he learns the facts. There ain't one word in my father's records about a loan from Withers that stands unpaid, as far as mother has been able to find, and she's made a careful search. I believe that old rascal changed some paper bearin' my father's signature and made a note out of it."