"'Some distance' Ben says I was thrown. I should think it was some distance! I'll bet it's farther than any other man was ever thrown on their whole rotten system. And 'Not serious'! Great Jeeminetty! What would have to happen to a person before he'd call it serious? Oh, I'll make him take that back if ever I get to be the man I once was! The only trouble with Ben is, he hasn't anything here and he hasn't anything here"—Ed put his hand first on his head and next on his heart, to show me where Ben hadn't got anything—"and that kind of trash may make fine railroad men, but they hadn't ought to be classed with human beings. Just wait till I get firmly knitted together again! You'll see! I'll certainly interfere with that man's career a-plenty. 'Not serious!' He won't make any such report about himself when I get through fussing with him. He certainly does need handling—that Ben Steptoe."
And so on for half an hour at a time, while he might be stitching G. W. G. in purple letters on a strip of yellow satin ribbon. I used to stop on purpose to hear some more about what he was going to do to Ben when he got to be the man he once was.
Pretty soon he had identified all the hats in Red Gap; so he moved over to Colfax with his Home Queen, and then on to other towns. It was spring again before he seemed to be the man he once was. He wrote me from Tekoa that if I read in the papers about something sad happening to Ben I wasn't to be alarmed, because, though it would be serious enough, it would probably not prove fatal if he had skilled nursing. So I watched the papers, but couldn't find any crime of interest. And a few days later Ed come over to Red Gap again. He looked pretty good, except for an overripe spot round his left eye.
"Well, did you lick Ben?" I says.
"No; Ben licked me," he says.
I'd never heard such a simple and astounding speech from any man on earth before. I started to find out what his excuse was—whether he wasn't in good shape yet, or his foot slipped, or Ben took a coupling pin to him, or something. But he didn't have a single word of excuse. He ought to of been locked up in a glass case in a museum right there. He said he was in fine shape and it had been a fair fight, and Ben had nearly knocked his head off.
I says what is he going to do now; and he says oh, he'll wait a while and give Cousin Ben another go.
I says: "Mebbe you can't lick Ben."
He says: "Possibly so; but I can keep on trying. I have to protect my honour, don't I?"
That's how it seemed to the poor fish by this time—his honour! And I knew he was going to keep on trying, like he had said. If he had made the usual excuses that men put up when they've had the worst of it I'd of known he'd been well licked, and once would be a-plenty. But, seeing that he was probably the only man who had been honest under such conditions since the world began, I had a feeling he would keep on. He was sure going to annoy Ben from time to time, even if he didn't panic him much. He was just as turbulent as ever. Now he went off and joined a circus, being engaged to lecture in front of the side show about the world's smallest midget, and Lulu the snake empress, and the sheep-headed twins from Ecuador. And Ben could devote the whole summer to his career without worry. I saw him over at Colfax one day.