I'll get him here--safe! And then Sally--" "If money will buy her you'll have me behind you when you bid." "When shall I start ?" "Now." "So-long, then." He rose and passed hastily from the room, leaning forward from the hips like a man who is making a start in a foot-race.
Straight up the stairs he went to his room, for the foreman lived in the big house of the rancher.

There he took a quantity of equipment from a closet and flung it on the bed.

Over three selections he lingered long.
The first was the cartridge belt, and he tried over several with conscientious care until he found the one which received the cartridges with the greatest ease.

He could flip them out in the night, automatically as a pianist fingers the scale in the dark.
Next he examined lariats painfully, inch by inch, as though he were going out to rope the stanchest steer that ever roamed the range.
Already he knew that those ropes were sound and true throughout, but he took no chances now.

One of the ropes he discarded because one or two strands in it were, or might be, a trifle frayed.