"Sit down--" Rennie nodded to the seat in front of the table. "Smoke?" He pushed forward a silver box holding the long cigarillos of the border country. Drew shook his head.
"Whisky? Wine?" He gestured to a tray with waiting glasses.
"Sherry." Drew automatically answered without thought.
"What do you think of the stock you saw down in the corral?" _Don_ Cazar poured a honey-colored liquid from the decanter into a small glass.
As the Kentuckian raised it to sip, the scent of the wine quirked time for him, making this for a fleeting moment the dining room at Red Springs during a customary after-dinner gathering of the men of the household. The talk there, too, had been of horses--always horses. Then Drew came back in a twitch of eyelid to the here and now, to Hunt Rennie watching him with a measuring he did not relish, to Bartolomé's round face with its close-to-hostile expression. Deliberately Drew sipped again before answering the question.
"I'd say, suh, if they're but a sample of Range stock, the breed is excellent. However----"
"However what, _señor_?" Bartolomé's eyes challenged Drew. "In this territory, even in Sonora, there are none to compare with the horses of this hacienda."
"That is not what I was about to say, _Señor_ Rivas. But if _Don_ Cazar wishes to try the eastern methods of training, these horses are too old. You begin with a yearling colt, not three-year-olds."
"To break a foal! What madness!" Now Bartolomé's face expressed shock.
"Not breaking," Drew corrected, "training. It is another method altogether. One puts a weanling on a rope halter, accustoms him to the feel of the hackamore, of being with men. Then he grows older knowing no fear or strangeness."
The Mexican looked from Drew to _Don_ Cazar, his shock fading to puzzlement. Rennie nodded.
"_Sí, amigo_, so it is done--in Kentucky and Virginia. But this time we must deal with the older ones. Can you modify those methods, gentle without breaking? A colt with the fire still in him, but saddle-broke, is worth much more--"
"I can try. But you have already said, suh, that you don't allow rough breakin' here." Drew's half suspicion crystallized into belief. _Don_ Cazar had not really wanted another wrangler at all; he had wanted Shiloh--and his foals. Well, perhaps he would find he did have a wrangler who could deliver the goods into the bargain.