“There was them tough _hombres_ a-settin’ around the fire playin’ _monte_. There was a pot of coffee and a bucket of beans a-boilin’ on the fire, and as Bill hadn’t had nothin’ to eat for several days, he was hungry; so he stuck his hand down in the bucket and grabbed a handful of beans and crammed ’em into his mouth. Then he grabbed the coffee pot and washed ’em down, and wiped his mouth on a prickly-pear. Then he turned to the men and said, ‘Who in the hell is boss around here, anyway?’ “‘I was,’ says a big stout feller about seven feet tall, ‘but you are now, stranger.’ “And that was the beginning of Bill’s outfit.” “But it was only the beginnin’s,” said Red; “for it wasn’t long after that that he staked out New Mexico and fenced Arizona for a calf-pasture. He built a big ranch-house and had a big yard around it. It was so far from the yard gate to the front door, that he used to keep a string of saddle hosses at stations along the way, for the convenience of visitors. Bill always was a hospitable sort of chap, and when company come, he always tried to persuade them to stay as long as he could git ’em to. Deputy sheriffs and brand inspectors he never would let leave a-tall. “One time his outfit was so big that he would have his cooks jist dam up a draw to mix the biscuit dough in. They would dump in the flour and the salt and the bakin’-powder and mix it up with teams and fresnoes. You can still see places where the dough was left in the bottom of the draw when they moved on. Alkali lakes they call ’em. That’s the bakin’-powder that stayed in the ground. “One time when there was a big drought and water got scerce on Bill’s range, he lit in and dug the Río Grande and ditched water from the Gulf of Mexico. Old man Windy Williams was water boy on the job, and he said Bill shore drove his men hard for a few days till they got through, and it kept him busy carryin’ water.” “I guess it took about all of Bill’s time to manage a ranch like that,” said Lanky. “Not all, not all,” said Joe. “That was his main vocation and callin’, but he found time for a good many other things. He was always goin’ in for somethin’ else when the cattle business got slack. “When the S. P. come through, he got a contract furnishin’ ’em wood. Bill went down into Mexico and rounded up a bunch of greasers and put ’em to cuttin’ wood. He made a contract with ’em that they was to git half the wood they cut. When the time was up, they all had big stacks of cordwood, Mex’can cords, you understand, that they don’t know what to do with. So Bill talked it over with ’em and finally agreed to take it off their hands without chargin’ ’em a cent. Bill always was liberal.