“Nothing but the best for you, Lloyd.”

Lloyd burst into a big belly laugh. “Yeah, me and everybody else you sell horses to! Hell, I’m just glad nobody else up this way has discovered you yet! If they do, it’ll dang sure make this competition a whole lot harder than it is right now.”

“You flatter me, Lloyd.”

“Why hell, Jess, flattery is about the only thing I got going for me these days!” He patted his protruding belly with both hands and let out another big laugh. Lloyd’s laugh was contagious, and Jessie couldn’t help but chuckle along with him.

“Well, you’re sure getting a couple of real nice babies this year,” Jessie said, opening the door of the pickup and climbing out. “The little stud colt is a beauty, but the filly is going to be something special. She’s out of one of my best mares. I think you’re really going to like her.”

“Why hell, let us just go take a look, then!”

Jessie grabbed two lead ropes off the seat next to her and she and Lloyd made their way to the back of the trailer, where they were met by two of Lloyd’s ranch hands. One was a young boy no more than seventeen, with a black, flat-brimmed hat held on his head by a long stampede string, his faded jeans tucked into his tall, high-topped boots and just the wisp of a moustache growing on his upper lip. The other was an older cowboy Jessie had seen before out at the ranch. He never talked much, always had a large chew of tobacco in his cheek and seemed to have a nice quiet way with horses.

As Jessie went to open the trailer gate, she suddenly stopped dead in her tracks. Seemingly out of nowhere, a picture of the front of the 4-H pavilion she had just passed flashed into her mind. She had been so fixated on trying to find the building on the way that all she focused on when she finally saw it were the words 4-H PAVILION. But now, in her mind’s eye, she could see very clearly that there were other words on the building, as well. All together, the sign, which had been spelled out in big green letters, read “Josh McBride Memorial 4-H PAVILION.”

“Is it stuck?” Lloyd asked, bringing Jessie’s mind back to the task at hand.

“Oh…no,” Jessie smiled, lifting the latch, which freed the gate. Still thinking about the sign, she went into the twenty-eight-foot stock trailer, which was much larger than was needed to haul two yearling horses, and snapped a lead rope on each of their halters. Holding the filly’s lead rope, she tossed the other over the colt’s neck and sent him by himself to the back of the trailer, where the young ranch hand took the rope and led him out of the trailer. Jessie followed with the filly, and getting to the back of the trailer, she handed the rope to the older cowboy who was waiting there.