“‘Seems to me I do,’ says I. ‘But such things happen so often they don’t linger long in the human Texas mind. Did they overtake, overhaul, seize, or lay hands upon the despoiler?’
“‘He escaped,’ says Ogden. ‘And I was just reading in a paper to-day that the officers have tracked him down into this part of the country. It seems the bills the robber got were all the first issue of currency to the Second National Bank of Espinosa City. And so they’ve followed the trail where they’ve been spent, and it leads this way.’
“Ogden pours out some more Bourbon, and shoves me the bottle.
“‘I imagine,’ says I, after ingurgitating another modicum of the royal booze, ‘that it wouldn’t be at all a disingenuous idea for a train robber to run down into this part of the country to hide for a spell. A sheep-ranch, now,’ says I, ‘would be the finest kind of a place. Who’d ever expect to find such a desperate character among these songbirds and muttons and wild flowers? And, by the way,’ says I, kind of looking H. Ogden over, ‘was there any description mentioned of this singlehanded terror? Was his lineaments or height and thickness or teeth fillings or style of habiliments set forth in print?’
“‘Why, no,’ says Ogden; ‘they say nobody got a good sight of him because he wore a mask. But they know it was a train-robber called Black Bill, because he always works alone and because he dropped a handkerchief in the express-car that had his name on it.’
“‘All right,’ says I. ‘I approve of Black Bill’s retreat to the sheep-ranges. I guess they won’t find him.’
“‘There’s one thousand dollars reward for his capture,’ says Ogden.
“‘I don’t need that kind of money,’ says I, looking Mr. Sheepman straight in the eye. ‘The twelve dollars a month you pay me is enough. I need a rest, and I can save up until I get enough to pay my fare to Texarkana, where my widowed mother lives. If Black Bill,’ I goes on, looking significantly at Ogden, ‘was to have come down this way — say, a month ago — and bought a little sheep-ranch and—’
“‘Stop,’ says Ogden, getting out of his chair and looking pretty vicious. ‘Do you mean to insinuate—’
“‘Nothing,’ says I; ‘no insinuations. I’m stating a hypodermical case. I say, if Black Bill had come down here and bought a sheep-ranch and hired me to Little-Boy-Blue ’em and treated me square and friendly, as you’ve done, he’d never have anything to fear from me. A man is a man, regardless of any complications he may have with sheep or railroad trains. Now you know where I stand.’
“Ogden looks black as camp-coffee for nine seconds, and then he laughs, amused.
“‘You’ll do, Saint Clair,’ says he. ‘If I was Black Bill I wouldn’t be afraid to trust you. Let’s have a game or two of seven-up tonight. That is, if you don’t mind playing with a train-robber.’
“‘I’ve told you,’ says I, ‘my oral sentiments, and there’s no strings to ‘em.’
“While I was shuffling after the first hand, I asks Ogden, as if the idea was a kind of a casualty, where he was from.
“‘Oh,’ says he, ‘from the Mississippi Valley.’
“‘That’s a nice little place,’ says I. ‘I’ve often stopped over there. But didn’t you find the sheets a little damp and the food poor? Now, I hail,’ says I, ‘from the Pacific Slope. Ever put up there?’
“‘Too draughty,’ says Ogden. ‘But if you’re ever in the Middle West just mention my name, and you’ll get foot-warmers and dripped coffee.’
“‘Well,’ says I, ‘I wasn’t exactly fishing for your private telephone number and the middle name of your aunt that carried off the Cumberland Presbyterian minister. It don’t matter. I just want you to know you are safe in the hands of your shepherd. Now, don’t play hearts on spades, and don’t get nervous.’
“‘Still harping,’ says Ogden, laughing again. ‘Don’t you suppose that if I was Black Bill and thought you suspected me, I’d put a Winchester bullet into you and stop my nervousness, if I had any?’
“‘Not any,’ says I. ‘A man who’s got the nerve to hold up a train singlehanded wouldn’t do a trick like that. I’ve knocked about enough to know that them are the kind of men who put a value on a friend. Not that I can claim being a friend of yours, Mr. Ogden,’ says I, ‘being only your sheepherder; but under more expeditious circumstances we might have been.’
“‘Forget the sheep temporarily, I beg,’ says Ogden, ‘and cut for deal.’
“About four days afterward, while my muttons was nooning on the water-hole and I deep in the interstices of making a pot of coffee, up rides softly on the grass a mysterious person in the garb of the being he wished to represent. He was dressed somewhere between a Kansas City detective, Buffalo Bill, and the town dog-catcher of Baton Rouge. His chin and eye wasn’t molded on fighting lines, so I knew he was only a scout.
“‘Herdin’ sheep?’ he asks me.
“‘Well,’ says I, ‘to a man of your evident gumptional endowments, I wouldn’t have the nerve to state that I am engaged in decorating old bronzes or oiling bicycle sprockets.’
“‘You don’t talk or look like a sheepherder to me,’ says he.
“‘But you talk like what you look like to me,’ says I.
“And then he asks me who I was working for, and I shows him Rancho Chiquito, two miles away, in the shadow of a low hill, and he tells me he’s a deputy sheriff.
“‘There’s a train-robber called Black Bill supposed to be somewhere in these parts,’ says the scout. ‘He’s been traced as far as San Antonio, and maybe farther. Have you seen or heard of any strangers around here during the past month?’
“‘I have not,’ says I, ‘except a report of one over at the Mexican quarters of Loomis’ ranch, on the Frio.’
“‘What do you know about him?’ asks the deputy.
“‘He’s three days old,’ says I.
“‘What kind of a looking man is the man you work for?’ he asks. ‘Does old George Ramey own this place yet? He’s run sheep here for the last ten years, but never had no success.’
“‘The old man has sold out and gone West,’ I tells him. ‘Another sheep-fancier bought him out about a month ago.’
“‘What kind of a looking man is he?’ asks the deputy again.
“‘Oh,’ says I, ‘a big, fat kind of a Dutchman with long whiskers and blue specs. I don’t think he knows a sheep from a ground-squirrel. I guess old George soaked him pretty well on the deal,’ says I.
“After indulging himself in a lot more non-communicative information and two-thirds of my dinner, the deputy rides away.
“That night I mentions the matter to Ogden.
“‘They’re drawing the tendrils of the octopus around Black Bill,’ says I. And then I told him about the deputy sheriff, and how I’d described him to the deputy, and what the deputy said about the matter.
“‘Oh, well,’ says Ogden, ‘let’s don’t borrow any of Black Bill’s troubles. We’ve a few of our own. Get the Bourbon out of the cupboard and we’ll drink to his health — unless,’ says he, with his little cackling laugh, ‘you’re prejudiced against train-robbers.’
“‘I’ll drink,’ says I, ‘to any man who’s a friend to a friend. And I believe that Black Bill,’ I goes on, ‘would be that. So here’s to Black Bill, and may he have good luck.’