Pete’s eye was always keen to take up a "sure thing." The men with him fell into a dispute concerning the respective merits of Jim versus Cash Hawkins. Meanwhile, seated at a table in the centre of the room were Shorty, Andy, and Grouchy. They had heard nothing of Pete’s and the Parson’s conversation. They were intent on a mild game and were awaiting Big Bill, who was to meet them at the saloon. None of them saw Big Bill coming towards them until they heard the slow, deep voice saying: "Boys, Cash Hawkins is in town. The boss asks as a special favor to him that you will avoid Cash and his gang and try to get out of town without a collision." Bill was a giant, over six feet tall, with a great, leonine head. He had a strong face with piercing eyes. The mouth, "a large gash," as Shorty described it, could at times give vent to loud guffaws of laughter, and at others frighten one as it straightened into two lines of grim determination. For two years he had been Jim’s right-hand man, and his devotion to the boss was the most beautiful side of Bill’s life. Forty years ago he had been born in a prairie saloon; the woman who bore him died the night of his birth. He never knew who his father was, and the upbringing he received was from a handful of miners who had adopted him. As soon as he could toddle he began to try to do for himself. Little errands he volunteered, and long before most boys even on a ranch were anything but a nuisance, Bill was contributing gravely his share to the big game of life. Save once, to Jim, he never spoke of the past. He had drifted to Maverick twenty years ago, and except at intervals, when he took a notion to better himself, he was usually at the cow town. On one of these occasions when he was trailing the country he met Jim, who was looking for a man to direct the practical side of his affairs. Bill had never met a gentleman who treated him as Jim did, and in return he gave his body’s strength and all the scheming devotion of his brain in his endeavor to benefit Jim’s complicated affairs. The three men looked up at Bill, who slid into a chair at their table and started a new game with them. "Say, Bill," Shorty began, "if Cash has his war-paint on there ain’t no use distributin’ tracts on love one another." "Und, Bill," Andy added, "und say for peace—dot’s me, Andy. But say, Bill, rustlin’—cattle stealing—you know. Particular when it’s our cattle, Cash has got a lot wit’ a circle-star brand which original is a big C for Carston. Say," he wildly went on, becoming more incoherent as his temper rose, "und if we stand for it—you know—und say—we got to git out of de business." Grouchy leaned over to Bill and shook his head. "Say, I wouldn’t work for a man that would stand for it." Still Bill said nothing, but listened gravely to the storm of protests that the message from Jim to the boys had provoked.