can't lick him," says Ben--"I've proved that three
times; but having to do it every so often, which is beneath the dignity
of a high railroad official. I might as well be a common rowdy and be
done with it, by doggie! And no telling what will happen if he don't get
his mind back. The little devil is an awful scrapper. I noticed it more
than ever this last time. One of these times he might get me. He might
get me good."

"You better let him, then," I says, "and have it over. That's the only
thing which will ever stop him. You take a man that says he was licked
fair, but still keeps at it, and he's deadly. Next time he comes along
you lay down after making a decent resistance. Then he'll probably be
your friend for life, especially if you tell him you been thinking about
his accident and it now seems like the most horrible accident that ever
happened to man."

It was the most encouragement I could give and he went off gloomy. Ben
was certainly one conscientious objector.

Nothing come from Ed for over a year. Then he writes that he has give up
the cattle business for good, because Mexico is in a state of downright
anarchy and he has been shot through the shoulder. He put it well. He
said he had been shot from ambush by a cowardly Mexican and I wouldn't
believe how lawless that country was. So now he was going to take up
mining in God's own country, where a man could get a square deal if he
kept out of railroading. And was Ben keeping up his exercise?

He stayed under the surface for about three years. Neither Ben nor I
heard a word from him. I told Ben it was many chances to one that he had
gone under at the hands of someone that wanted to keep his cattle or his
mine or something. Ben looked solemn and relieved at this suggestion. He
said if the Grim Reaper had done its work, well and good! Life was full
of danger for the best of us, with people dropping off every day or so;
and why should Ed have hoped to be above the common lot?

But the very next week comes a letter from the deceased wanting to know
whether Ben has been promoted some more and how he is looking by this
time. Is he vigorous and hearty, or does office work seem to be sapping
his vitality? It was the same old Ed. He goes on to say that the reason
he writes is that the other night in Globe, Arizona, he licked a man in
the Miners' Rest saloon that looked enough like Ben to be his twin; not
only looked the image of him but had his style of infighting. And