This description takes no account of a deep-seated cough, occasional flashes of red in the pale face, and a fear expressed by friends that he was taking a desperate means of escaping the fate that had overtaken his dear mother but four months previously. It takes no account of his life up to the time of his departure on the long journey, not yet ended; though in the natural order of worldly things, the day is near at hand. I might add that he had been a "call boy" at a big railroad terminal, had advanced to a desk as a way-bill clerk, and when advised to seek a dry climate and there live out-of-doors, was earning a man's wage. We will pass over briefly an encounter with one of the best men that ever lived--S. H. H. Clark--in his office at Omaha. When asked for a pass to Sherman, Wyoming, he said gruffly: "Haven't you got any money?" This was the reply: "Yes, sir, and I'll pay my fare, too, if you don't want to give me a pass." "Well," he said, turning to look out of a window, "maybe I'll give you an order for a half-fare ticket," which brought forth this: "I don't want to be impolite, Mr. Clark, because you are a friend of good friends of mine--Mr. Hughitt and Mr. Cuyler--but I must say you don't know me as well as you might--I'm no half-fare fellow. Good-bye." And then Mr. Clark laughed, and said he was not in earnest and gave the pass freely and willingly. There was a nice chat after that between the pale-faced youth and the big railroader, during which The Boy discovered that Mr. Clark liked his nerve but questioned his physical ability to stand the rough knocks that were coming. Later, after a season in a division railroad office The Boy, carried away with the spirit of adventure that was everywhere about him, and carrying out a plan he had made to live in the open, went to Cheyenne, signed up with a bull-train, and began the life of out-of-doors. The "train" was loaded and ready to leave Camp Carlin, at Fort Russell, for Fort Laramie on the North Platte, but it was for a while impossible to employ men enough to drive the teams. There had been an outbreak among the Sioux, and things looked dark when The Boy asked for a job driving bulls; and when he was hired by Nate Williams, the Missourian wagon boss, it was almost a joke to Nate, who said afterward that he took one chance in a million when he employed The Boy and took him to camp. Both The Boy and Nate won on the long shot. A year later The Boy was driving a lead team, looked after the manifests, kept the accounts, and shirked no duty, fair weather or foul. All this time the pale and flushed cheeks were giving place to bronze, the thin arms and skinny legs were toughening and filling out, and the cough had disappeared--weight after first year, 155.