The weekly mail had just arrived at the Flying U ranch. Shorty, who had made the trip to Dry Lake on horseback that afternoon, tossed the bundle to the “Old Man” and was halfway to the stable when he was called back peremptorily.

“Shorty! O-h-h, Shorty! Hey!”

Shorty kicked his steaming horse in the ribs and swung round in the path, bringing up before the porch with a jerk.

“Where’s this letter been?” demanded the Old Man. James G. Whitmore, cattleman, would have been greatly surprised had he known that his cowboys were in the habit of calling him the Old Man behind his back. James G. did not consider himself old, though he was constrained to admit, after several hours in the saddle, that rheumatism had searched him out—because of his fourteen years of roughing it, he said.

“This letter’s two weeks old,” stormed the Old Man. “I never knew it to fail—if a letter says anybody’s coming, or you’re to hurry up and go somewhere to meet somebody, that letter’s the one that monkeys around and comes when the last dog’s hung. A letter asking yuh if yuh don’t want to get rich in ten days sellin’ books, or something, it’ll hike along out here in no time. Doggone it!”

In addition to slow mail, in this classic western, you’ll hear confusion about a doctor’s name.