noon
Distance does n't count for much when the roads are always smooth and even . Well ; one afternoon Tom and I filled the bottom of the wagon-box with a soft bed of fresh alfalfa hay and then we piled tomatoes in on top of it till they came clean up to the edge of the top bed . Of course if the roads had been rough it ai n't likely that even a cattleman would ` a ' thought of taking such a load in that way ; as it was , I reckon there was n't a tomato smashed in transit . I did n't get quite as early a start as I 'd ` lowed to , so it was just noon when I reached the camp . '' `` I should have thought that you would lose the way , '' I said . My mind had conjured up a vivid picture of the far stretches of unfenced plains that lay between our mountain-walled valley and the great water storage system where a single lake already sparkled like a white jewel on the gray waste of plains . `` There are wolves , too , '' I added , suddenly .