number eight head
any day you can find in the almanac.' And I'm with Smithy. This
knowing so much it makes you sick ain't any better than being so
healthy you don't know nothing, besides being square miles less
fun. Another thing about the Eastern folks is they're so sot in
their views, and it don't matter to them whether the facts bear out
their idees or not.

"'Here, take a cigar,' says one of the Board of Directors to me--a
little fat old man, who had to draw in his breath before he could
cross his legs--'them cigarettes'll ruin your health,' says he.
Mind you, he was always kicking and roaring about his liver or
stummick, or some of his works. I'm a little over six-foot-three
in my boots when I stand up straight, and I stood up straight as
the Lord would let me and gazed down at that little man.
'Pardner,' says I, 'I was raised on cigarettes. When I was two
years old I used to have a pull at the bottle, and then my
cigarette to aid digestion. It may be conceit on my part,' I says,
'but I'd rather be a wreck like me than a prize-fighter like you.'
They're queer; you'd think that that little fat man would have
noticed the difference without my pointing it out to him.

"Well, I don't have to mention that Loys stirred things up
considerable around the Chanta Seechee and vicinity. Gee! What a
diving into wannegans and a fetching out of good clothes there was.
And trading of useful coats and things for useless but decorating
silk handkerchers and things! And what a hair cutting and whisker
trimming!

"But Kyle was the man from the go in. And it was right it should
be so. If ever two young people were born to make trouble for each
other it was Kyle and Loys.

"A nice, decent fellow was Kyle. Nothing remarkable, you could
say, and that was one of his best points. Howsomever, he had a
head that could do plain thinking, a pair of shoulders that
discouraged frivoling, and he was as square a piece of furniture as
ever came out of a factory. More'n that; he had quite a little
education, saved his money, never got more than good-natured
loaded, and he could ride anything that had four legs, from a
sawhorse to old tiger Buck, who would kick your both feet out of
the sturrups and reach around and bite you in the small of the back
so quick that the boys would be pulling his front hoofs out of your
frame before you'd realize that the canter had begun. Nice horse,
Buck. He like to eat Jonesy up one morning befor