“‘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.’

“And both of us drank.

“About two weeks later comes shearing-time.  The sheep had to be driven up to the ranch, and a lot of frowzy-headed Mexicans would snip the fur off of them with back-action scissors.  So the afternoon before the barbers were to come I hustled my underdone muttons over the hill, across the dell, down by the winding brook, and up to the ranch-house, where I penned ’em in a corral and bade ’em my nightly adieus.

“I went from there to the ranch-house.  I find H. Ogden, Esquire, lying asleep on his little cot bed.  I guess he had been overcome by anti-insomnia or diswakefulness or some of the diseases peculiar to the sheep business.  His mouth and vest were open, and he breathed like a second-hand bicycle pump.  I looked at him and gave vent to just a few musings.  ‘Imperial Caesar,’ says I, ’asleep in such a way, might shut his mouth and keep the wind away.’

“A man asleep is certainly a sight to make angels weep.  What good is all his brain, muscle, backing, nerve, influence, and family connections?  He’s at the mercy of his enemies, and more so of his friends.  And he’s about as beautiful as a cab-horse leaning against the Metropolitan Opera House at 12.30 A.M. dreaming of the plains of Arabia.  Now, a woman asleep you regard as different.  No matter how she looks, you know it’s better for all hands for her to be that way.