Well, the Diamond Dot was sure a dismal dump after that. Every one had liked Dick; but they didn't know how much until he was snuffed out like the flame of a candle. The ol' man had me make a stagger at fillin' Dick's shoes; but it wasn't what a truthful man would call a coal-ossal success. Dick had left a lot of directions, tellin' how to judge the markets an' how to make improvements without feelin' the cost, an' a dozen other things that. I had allus supposed was simply a mixture o' luck an' Providence; but it wasn't in my line to figger things out on paper. Give me the actual cattle an' I could nurse 'em along through sand-storm an' blizzard, an' round 'em up in the President's back yard; but at that time they didn't signify much to me when they was corraled up on a sheet of paper. When it cane to action I was as prepossessed as a clerk at a pie counter; but I didn't have the slightest symptom of what they call the legal mind. The' wouldn't much 'a' come of it; but one day Barbie came out of her daze an' walked into the office where I was sweatin' over some of Dick's prognostications, stuck a pencil behind her ear, an' waded into 'em; an' from that on I took off my hat to a college edication. Dick may have been on the queer all right, but he was smooth enough to hide it. Anyhow, ol' man Judson's bank account was a heap plumper'n it was when Dick had his first whack at it, an' Dick had drawn a mighty stately salery himself. But he earned it, for the ranch was in strictly modern order an' runnin' on a passenger schedule. It allus gave me a hurtin' in the chest to see either Barbie or the ol' man himself those days. The' was a set look in Barbie's eyes; cold an' unflinchin' an' defiant. I once saw the same expression in the eyes of a trapped mountain lion. The ol' man's face was all plowed up too. He reminded me of an Injun up to Port Bridger. A Shoshone he was from the Wind River country, an' he had the look of an eagle; but he got a holt of some alcohol an' upset a kettle o' boilin' grease on himself. He lived for eight days with part of his bones stickin' through, but never givin' a groan; an' I ain't got the look of his face out o' my system yet. Jabez reminded me of it a heap: an' he was just about as noisy over it too. I never supposed that the Diamond Dot could get to lookin' so much like a desert island to me. I got to feelin' like one who had been sent up for life, an' I would sure have made a break for freedom if it hadn't been for the little girl. I couldn't bear to leave her.