At Hand-Grips with the Demon Mose was mad.

He was flinging tinware about the kitchen with a fine disregard of the din or the dents, and whenever the blue cat ventured out from under the stove, he kicked at it viciously.

He was mad at Ford; and when a man gets mad at his foreman--without knowing that the foreman has been instructed to bear with his faults and keep him on the pay-roll at any price--he must, if he be the cook, have recourse to kicking cats and banging dishes about, since he dare not kick the foreman.

For in late November "jobs" are not at all plentiful in the range land, and even an angry cook must keep his job or face the world-old economic problem of food, clothing, and shelter.
But if he dared not speak his mind plainly to Ford, he was not averse to pouring his woes into the first sympathetic ear that came his way.

It happened that upon this occasion the ear arrived speedily upon the head of Dick Thomas.
"Matter, Mose ?" he queried, sidestepping the cat, which gave a long leap straight for the door, when it opened.