The two men soon became quite friendly, owing to their isolated condition, and told each other all their family secrets. Henry told Obejoyful how his grandfather was hung; and Obejoyful told Henry how he loved a girl in Ohio, named Oleander McTodd, and how he was going to send for her, and marry her as soon as he could raise the scads to bring her west.

Time flew on, and at last Obejoyful had saved up the collateral necessary to send for his soul's idol. He wrote to her, enclosing a post office money order for the amount necessary to pay emigrant fare to the railroad terminus, and also to buy lignum vito cookies, and fire-proof pie, at the lunch counters along the road.

About the day on which Oleander McTodd would naturally arrive at the ranche, Obejoyful was sent up on Stinking Water to round up a bunch of sheep that had escaped, and bring them back to the fold.

Then Henry Ward Beecher shaved' himself, put warm tallow on his boots, swept out the cabin for the first time in nineteen years, and waited for events to shape themselves.