It allus riles me some, to be called "me good man." It seems to give me a curious, itchy feelin' in the right hand, an' I have had to make several extra peculiar speciments dance a few steps for no other reason; but this little cuss never batted an eye. He looks me square in the face, an' sez, "It is perfectly obvious that I could be addressin' nobody else. I am out in the West hunting for a place to study the most pronounced types of American citizens, an' I am very favorable impressed with your appearance."
Did you ever have a stranger brace you like that? I suppose the fat lady an' the livin' skeleton gets used to it, but I allus feel a trifle too big for my background. I stand six foot two an' dress easy an' comfortable, an' some o' the guys on the trains allus seem to think 'at I'm part of the show, out for an airin'.
"Well, to tell you the truth, honey," I sez to the little feller, "I ain't fully maychured yet. We get hair on our faces pretty young out here, but we don't get our growth till we're twenty-five. I'm water-boy to the E. Z. outfit. If you want to see somethin' worth lookin' at, you ought to come out where the men are. You'll find American citizens out there, a darn sight harder type to pronounce than what I am. They sent me to town on an errant."
He examined me, but I never blinked a winker, an' then his face lit up, like as if he'd found a whole plug of tobacco, when he thought his last chew was gone. Finally he gave a wink an' a chuckle, an' sez, "Here, smoke a cigar on me, an' tell me if I can get board out your way. I think you'll make copy."
He was just what I needed as a time-killer, so I spun him a yarn about the lovely life me an' Kid Porter was livin'. We jerked out his trunk just before the train left, bought a month's grub, an' came along out to our shack. His name was William Sinclair Hammersly, an' the' never was a squarer boy on the face o' the earth, after he'd shed off those spectator ways. He won my affections, as the storybooks say, before we was out o' sight o' Danders.
He said he had relations scattered all over the British Empire, an' owned up that he had just come back from a long visit to England, where he had picked up the "good man" habit. I told him that it might suit that climate all right, but that out our way I couldn't recommend it to a peace-lovin' man for every-day use. He thanked me an' said he was ashamed to know so little about his own country, this bein' the first time he had ever been west of Philadelphia. He said that he was minded to become an author, an' had come out to study the aboriginal types an' get the true local color. Whenever I hear this little bunch o' sounds, I know I got a nibble. Any time a man goes nosin' around after local color, you can bet your saddle he's got several zigzags in his think-organ.
These fellers is a breed to themselves. I wouldn't exactly call 'em wise—wordy'd come a sight nearer fittin' these local-color fellers without wrinklin'. The''s a ringin' in my ears yet from the time that I was penned up with Hammy an' Locals, an' this one had a good many o' the same outward an' visible signs, but more o' the inward an' spiritual grace, as Friar Tuck sez.
Bill slid right into our mode of livin' like a younger brother, but it took us some consid'able time to savvy his little private oddities. The' was one wide bunk in the shack an' one narrow one. Me an' Bill took the wide one, but it wasn't so eternal wide that a feller could flop around altogether accordin' to the dictates of his own conscience. When she was carryin' double we had to hold a little consultation of war, to see whether we'd turn over or not.
We used to start out early in the mornin', an' if the' wasn't much fixin' to be done we got back long before dark. About seven-thirty was our perchin' time before Bill took a hand, but after that we got so convivual that sometimes we'd sit up till purt' nigh half-past nine, playin' cut-throat an' swappin' tales. Sleep allus was a kind of a nuisance to Bill. Purt' nigh every night when me an' the Kid would stretch ourselves out, Bill would speak a piece about "God bless the man what first invented sleep"; but he was only joshin', an' all the time he was sayin' it he'd be buildin' up the fire an' changin' his clothes. He had one suit which he never wore for nothin' except just to sleep in. Pajamers, he called 'em, an' they sure was purty.
Well, he'd put on this suit an' a pair o' red-pointed slippers, light his pipe, pick his guitar, an' saw his fiddle till along toward mornin', all the while singin' little batches o' song an' speakin' pieces. Then he'd heave a sigh an' lay down alongside o' me; but in about fifteen minutes he'd jump out o' bed, sayin', "That's good! That's great! I mustn't lose that!" an' he'd get out a book an' write something into it. Sometimes he'd laugh over it an' sometimes he'd cry.