"No, no, please don't trouble." Joe paused curiously.

"Any friend of Mr.Baldwin's is welcome to anything on the Burnt Ranch, Stranger." "But I--ah--I--have never met Mr.Baldwin," explained the other lamely.
"Oh, that's all right," returned the cowboy heartily.

"You're a-goin' to, an' that's the same thing." Again he started toward the gate.
"But I--pardon me--you are very kind--but I--I prefer to walk." Once more Joe halted, a puzzled expression on his tanned and weather-beaten face.

"I suppose you know it's some walk," he suggested doubtfully, as if the man's ignorance were the only possible solution of his unheard-of assertion.
"So I understand.

But it will be good for me.