The other man had remarkable features—sharp, hard, stern, set like a rock. Down his lean brown cheeks ran deep furrows and his eyes seemed narrowed inside wrinkled folds. They were gray eyes, light and singularly piercing.

Tom had an impression that this was a real plainsman. The giant seemed a man of tremendous force. Quick to form his likes or dislikes, Tom lost no time here in declaring himself.

“My name’s Tom Doan,” he said. “I want a job with a buffalo-hunter’s outfit.”

“Glad to meet you. I’m Clark Hudnall, an’ this is my friend, Jude Pilchuck,” replied the giant.

Whereupon both men shook hands with Tom and showed the interest common to the time and place. Hudnall’s glance was a frank consideration of Tom’s stalwart form and beardless face. Pilchuck’s was a keen scrutiny associated with memory.

“Doan. Was your father Bill Doan, who rode with Quantrill?” he inquired.

“Yes—he was,” returned Tom, somewhat disconcerted by this unexpected query.

“I knew your father. You favor him, only you’re lighter complexioned. He was a hard rider and a hard shooter… . You were a boy when he got—”

“I was fifteen,” said Tom, as the other hesitated.

“Were you on your dad’s side?” asked Hudnall, curiously.

“No. I was for the North,” returned Tom.

“Well, well, them days were tough,” sighed Hudnall, as if he remembered trials of his own. Then he quickened with interest. “We need a man an’ I like your looks. Have you any hankerin’ for red liquor?”

“No.”

“Are you alone?”

“Yes.”

“Ever hunt buffalo?”

“No.”

“Can you shoot well?”

“I was always a good shot. Have hunted deer and small game a good deal.”

“What’s your idea—throwin’ in with a hide-hunter’s outfit?”

Tom hesitated a moment over that query, and then frankly told the truth about his rather complicated longings.

Hudnall laughed, and was impressed to the point of placing a kind hand on Tom’s shoulder.

“Young man, I’m glad you told me that,” he said. “Back of my own reason for riskin’ so much in this hide-huntin’ is my need to make money quick, an’ I’ve got to have a ranch. So we’re two of a kind. You’re welcome to cast in your lot with us. Shake on it.”

Then Tom felt the mighty grip of a calloused hand that had known the plow and the ax. Pilchuck likewise offered to shake hands with Tom, and expressed himself no less forcibly than Hudnall.

“Reckon it’s a good deal on both sides,” he said. “The right kind of men are scarce. I know this buffalo-huntin’. It’s a hard game. An’ if skinnin’ hides isn’t tougher than diggin’ coal, then I was a meathunter on the U. P. an’ the Santa Fe for nothin’.”

Hudnall called the two younger men from their task of shoeing the horse. Both appeared under thirty, stocky fellows, but there the resemblance ended.

“Burn, shake hands with Tom Doan,” said Hudnall, heartily.