"Bully," said he, relapsing into weighty absorption.

"What'd you do?" I inquired with almost the certainty of appearing
insistent.

"Don't you never read the papers?" he inquired, with such evident
compassion that Kink Martin and the other boys snickered. This from
"Bitter Root," who scorns literature outside of the "Arkansas
Printing," as he terms the illustrations!

"Guess I'll have to show you my press notices," and from a hip pocket
he produced a fat bundle of clippings in a rubber band. These he
displayed jealously, and I stared agape, for they were front pages of
great metropolitan dailies, marred with red and black scare heads, in
which I glimpsed the words, "Billings, of Montana," "'Bitter Root' on
Arbitration," "A Lochinvar Out of the West," and other things as
puzzling.

"Press Notices!" echoed Kink scornfully. "Wouldn't that rope ye? He
talks like Big Ike that went with the Wild West Show. When a puncher
gets so lazy he can't earn a livin' by the sweat of his pony, he
grows his hair, goes on the stage bustin' glass balls with shot
ca'tridges and talks about 'press notices.' Let's see 'em, Billings.
You pinch 'em as close to your stummick as though you held cards in a
strange poker game."

"Well, I _have_ set in a strange game, amongst aliens," said
Billings, disregarding the request, "and I've held the high cards,
also I've drawed out with honours. I've sailed the medium high seas