It was a common saying in that part of the country that "Gil Steele was as hard as his name." He was an ambitious and an active man, and regarded every dollar wrung out of the ranch for its owner as a sort of triumph for himself.
There are men who are successful only when working for others; whose every independent effort is a failure.

Steele was such a man, and that made him bitter, but none the less energetic.

He acted not only as manager, but as foreman of the ranch, which included two sections, twelve hundred and eighty acres.

And he had many enemies.
Perhaps you have wondered at that queer audience in the barn, and why threshing-time should bring it together.

In those days in the West threshing-time was an era of prosperity, and twenty-five or thirty men would band together and buy a threshing-machine.