He meant to say it to himself, but the words burst from him.
“Air ye sorry ye come?” exclaimed a voice near by.
Perhaps a half hundred persons were grouped about the station. Leather belts and plainsmen’s hats distinguished nearly all. Leaning against the platform rail were three Indians. Roy looked for the speaker. He proved to be a man just past middle age, wearing tan shoes, a rusty blue suit much in need of cleaning and pressing, a dust-covered, soft black hat, a soiled white shirt with a celluloid collar showing a glassy looking shirt stud and a thin black string necktie. His face, widened with a smile, was gaunt, red and newly shaven.
“I’ve got to get acquainted in Dolores,” he said with boyish familiarity, “and if you don’t mind, I’ll begin with you. My name’s Osborne, Roy Osborne, of Newark, New Jersey.”
“Do-_lores_, not _Dol_-ores,” replied the stranger with a still wider smile. “But that’s neither hyar nor thar, as the feller says alludin’ to the muskeeter. Glad to meet ye, Mr. Osborne. My name is Weston, A. B. Weston--some o’ the time Colonel Weston. Permit me,” and before Roy could stop him, Mr. Weston had taken charge of the suit case.
“You don’t run a hotel, do you?” asked Roy, amused at his new friend’s assurance.
The man took no offense, but pointed across the open ground beyond the station to a block of frame buildings.
“My office is just over thar--real estate is my line. Don’t git skeered. As a member o’ the Dolores Commercial Club, ye air welcome to step over and git yer bearin’s.”
“I don’t know that I have time--” began Roy, thinking of all he wanted to do at once--“although it’s very good of you.”
But in the meantime they were advancing toward Mr. Weston’s office. Roy looked again, and was able to make out the sign: Real Estate--A. B. Weston. Dealer in Ranches, Mines and Farms.
“Ye ain’t a drummer?” exclaimed Mr. Weston.
“I didn’t think ye was. Out fer yer health?”
“Assumin’ ye didn’t drop off here fur fun, I give it up,” went on the genial agent. “I’ll bet a ten-spot ye need information. Don’t be skeered. I got apple land fur sale all right, but I ain’t agoin’ to chloroform ye. Come in and git started right.”
Unable longer to resist the breezy impulsiveness of the stranger, Roy climbed the stairs and found himself in a dusty little office scented with tobacco and littered with papers. Before he sat down and while Mr. Weston threw off his coat and filled a smoke begrimed cob pipe, Roy saw a large map of the county in which Dolores was situated hanging on the wall.