I got the hang of it after a while, and one grand day my cash balanced. That was a moment to remember. I don't recall that it ever happened again. The store made most of my trouble. We handled all kinds of truck, from kerosene oil to a jews'-harp, through rough clothes and the hardware department. My helper was the lunkheadest critter God ever trusted outdoors. You'd scarcely believe one man's head could be so foolish. At the same time the poor devil was kind and polite, and he needed the job so bad, I couldn't fire him. But he took some of the color out of my hair, all right. He was a Mexican who talked English, so he was useful that way, anyhow. But Man! What the stuff cost was marked in letters--"Washington" was our cost-mark word. If the thing cost a dollar fifty, it was marked WIN, then you tacked on the profit. Well, poor Pedro used to forget all about the father of his country, if there came a rush, and as he didn't have any natural common sense, you could expect him to sell a barrel of kerosene for two bits and charge eight dollars for a paper of needles. Whenever I heard wild cries of astonishment and saw the arms a-flying, I could be sure that Pedro had lost track of American history. He'd make a statue of William Penn get up and cuss, that feller. I tried everything--wrote out the prices, gave him lists, put pictures of our George all over the store, swore at him till I was purple and him weeping in his pocket-handkerchief, calling the saints to witness how the memory of the G-r-r-eat Ouash-eeng-tong would never depart from his mind again, and in three minutes he'd sell a twenty-five dollar Stetson hat for eighty-seven cents. It took a good deal of my time rushing around the country getting those sales back. Then, when the confinement of the store told too much on my nerves and the gangs had all been looked up, I went to the corral and took a fall out of Archibald. Or, more properly speaking, I took a fall off Archibald. That horse was a complete education in the art of riding. I never since have struck anything, bronco, cayuse, or American horse, that didn't seem like an amateur 'longside of him. He'd pitch for a half hour in a space no bigger than a dining-room table; then he'd run and buck for another half hour. If you stuck so much out, he'd kick your feet out of the stirrups, stick his ears in the ground, and throw a somersault. No man living could think up more schemes than that mustang, and you might as well try to tire a steam-engine. At the end of the first hour Archie was simply nice and limber; the second hour saw him getting into the spirit of it; by the third hour he was warmed up and working like a charm. I'm guessing the third hour. Two was my limit.