"Look, Mister; there it comes again; an' it don't tip back at all. I shall ignore it, deliberate an' cold. But when it tips back, lifelike an' natural, like a' honest hat should, then I'll pay attention to it, me an' my little Sharp's Special.
"Oh, I've done made a study of appearin' hats. I'm a reg'lar he-milliner. It was Red Connors an' Hoppy that directed my great intelligence to that important science. Tex Ewalt knowed about it, too. Tex was eddicated, he was. He said it is in th' little things that genius showed. He said somethin' about genius payin' attention to details, an' havin' infernal patience. Now, Ladies an' Gents, a hat is a detail; an' right now I've got th' infernal patience. Lookee! There she comes again! Level as a table. So, you see; I'm a genius. An' ain't he a persistent cuss? He's got infernal patience, too; but he ain't no genius. He ain't strong on details."
He looked around and grinned. Another hat, to the west of him, was in plain sight.
"Huh! Two hats in sight are two corners of a triangle; an' sometimes th' most dangerous corner is th' third, where there ain't no hat. Somewhere east of me there's a feller sneakin' up; an' he's th' feller I got to ventilate with my long-distance ventilator. An' mebby th' second hat's boss is circlin' around bare-headed; but it is still a triangle. Mebby it's a four or five or six cornered triangle. An' me, I'm all alone; so I'll crawl east an' hunt for company."
He dropped the monologue and took up the science of wriggling swiftly and silently; and when he stopped he was in the middle of a nest of rocks and bowlders at the base of a great pile of them.
The second hat still could be seen, but he gave most of his attention to the opposite direction.
"If I'm wrong, why did Number Two stick up his hat? I'll bet a peso that him, or Red Shirt, or their friends are stalkin' me from th' east. An' I'll bet two pesos that I'll cure him of such pranks. There's only two ways of explainin' that second hat. One is that th' owner is loco. Th' other is that he left his sign hangin' up to show me where he ain't. Th' other is that he left it so I'd think he wasn't there, but he is. An' th' other is that he figgered I'd think he left it to show me where he ain't an' that I'd think he was, so he moved on an' ain't there at all. Jumpin' mavericks! It makes my head ache. Havin' settled it with only four ways left to guess, I'll stay pat, right here, an' let them do th' openin'."
The shadows were growing longer and reaching out from bowlders and brush like dark fingers of destiny, and the sun hung over the western buttes and set them afire with brilliant colors. A lizard flashed around a rock, regarded the prone and motionless figure with frank suspicion until a slight movement sent it scurrying back again.
To the left a bush trembled slightly and he covered a rain-worn crease which cut through the top of a ditch bank. To the right a pebble clicked and behind him came the faint snapping of a twig.