"He was and is," was the quiet reply. "I supposed everybody knew it."

"_I_ didn't," Gantry denied, adding: "You may not realize it, but what
you don't tell people about yourself would make a pretty big book if it
were printed."

Blount's smile was altogether friendly.

"What's the use, Richard?" he asked. "The world has plenty of
banalities and commonplaces without the adding of any man's personal
contribution. Why should I bore you or anybody?"

"Oh, of course, if you put it on that ground," said the railroad traffic
manager. "Just the same, there's another side to it. In an unguarded
moment, back in the college days, as I have said, you admitted to me
that you were Western-born. I always supposed afterward that you
regretted either the fact or the mention of it, since you never told me
any more."

"Perhaps I didn't tell more because there was so little to tell. I had a
boyhood like other boys--or, no, possibly it wasn't quite the usual. I
was born on the 'Circle-Bar,' when the ranch was--as it still is, I
believe--a hard day's drive for a bunch of prime steers distant from the
nearest shipping-corral on the railroad. At twelve I could 'ride line,'
'cut out,' and 'rope down' like any other healthy ranch-bred youngster,
and since the capital was at that time only in process of getting itself
surveyed and boomed into existence I had never seen a town bigger than
Painted Hat."