"I never said I did," retorted the young man, heatedly. "I said I had

nothing else to eat where I live. I am not a delicatessen store-
keeper."

"Then why," pursued Hetty, inflexibly, "were you going to eat a raw
onion?"

"My mother," said the young man, "always made me eat one for a cold.
Pardon my referring to a physicalinfirmity; but you may have noticed

that I have a very, very severe cold. I was going to eat the onion
and go to bed. I wonder why I am standing here and apologizing to you

for it."
"How did you catch this cold?" went on Hetty, suspiciously.

The young man seemed to have arrived at some extremeheight of
feeling. There were two modes of descent open to him--a burst of rage

or a surrender to the ridiculous. He chose wisely; and the empty hall
echoed his hoarse laughter.

"You're a dandy," said he. "And I don't blame you for being careful.
I don't mind telling you. I got wet. I was on a North River ferry a

few days ago when a girl jumped overboard. Of course, I--"
Hetty extended her hand, interrupting his story.

"Give me the onion," she said.
The young man set his jaw a trifle harder.

"Give me the onion," she repeated.
He grinned, and laid it in her hand.

Then Hetty's infrequent, grim, melancholy smile showed itself. She
took the young man's arm and pointed with her other hand to the door

of her room.
"Little Brother," she said, "go in there. The little fool you fished

out of the river is there waiting for you. Go on in. I'll give you
three minutes before I come. Potatoes is in there, waiting. Go on

in, Onions."
After he had tapped at the door and entered, Hetty began to peel and

wash the onion at the sink. She gave a gray look at the gray roofs
outside, and the smile on her face vanished by little jerks and

twitches.
"But it's us," she said, grimly, to herself, "it's us that furnishes

the beef."
THE HIDING OF BLACK BILL

A lank, strong, red-faced man with a Wellington beak and small, fiery
eyes tempered by flaxen lashes, sat on the station platform at Los

Pinos swinging his legs to and fro. At his side sat another man, fat,
melancholy, and seedy, who seemed to be his friend. They had the

appearance of men to whom life had appeared as a reversible coat--
seamy on both sides.

"Ain't seen you in about four years, Ham," said the seedy man. "Which
way you been travelling?"

"Texas," said the red-faced man. "It was too cold in Alaska for me.
And I found it warm in Texas. I'll tell you about one hot spell I

went through there.
"One morning I steps off the International at a water-tank and lets it

go on without me. 'Twas a ranch country, and fuller of spite-houses
than New York City. Only out there they build 'em twenty miles away

so you can't smell what they've got for dinner, instead of running 'em
up two inches from their neighbors' windows.

"There wasn't any roads in sight, so I footed it 'cross country. The
grass was shoe-top deep, and the mesquite timber looked just like a

peach orchard. It was so much like a gentleman's private estate that
every minute you expected a kennelful of bulldogs to run out and bite

you. But I must have walked twenty miles before I came in sight of a
ranch-house. It was a little one, about as big as an elevated-

railroad station.
"There was a little man in a white shirt and brown overalls and a pink

handkerchief around his neck rolling cigarettes under a tree in front
of the door.

"'Greetings,' says I. 'Any refreshment, welcome, emoluments, or even
work for a comparative stranger?'

"'Oh, come in,' says he, in a refined tone. 'Sit down on that stool,
please. I didn't hear your horse coming.'

"'He isn't near enough yet,' says I. 'I walked. I don't want to be a
burden, but I wonder if you have three or four gallons of water

handy.'
"'You do look pretty dusty,' says he; 'but our bathing arrangements--'

"'It's a drink I want,' says I. 'Never mind the dust that's on the
outside.'

"He gets me a dipper of water out of a red jar hanging up, and then
goes on:

"'Do you want work?'
"'For a time,' says I. 'This is a rather quiet section of the

country, isn't it?'
"'It is,' says he. 'Sometimes--so I have been told--one sees no human

being pass for weeks at a time. I've been here only a month. I
bought the ranch from an old settler who wanted to move farther west.'

"'It suits me,' says I. 'Quiet and retirement are good for a man
sometimes. And I need a job. I can tend bar, salt mines, lecture,

float stock, do a little middle-weight slugging, and play the piano.'
"'Can you herd sheep ?' asks the little ranch-man.

"'Do you mean have I heard sheep?' says I.
"'Can you herd 'em--take charge of a flock of 'em ?' says he.

"'Oh,' says I, 'now I understand. You mean chase 'em around and bark
at 'em like collie dogs. Well, I might,' says I. 'I've never exactly

done any sheep-herding, but I've often seen 'em from car windows
masticating daisies, and they don't look dangerous.'

"'I'm short a herder,' says the ranchman. 'You never can depend on
the Mexicans. I've only got two flocks. You may take out my bunch of

muttons--there are only eight hundred of 'em--in the morning, if you
like. The pay is twelve dollars a month and your rations furnished.

You camp in a tent on the prairie with your sheep. You do your own
cooking, but wood and water are brought to your camp. It's an easy

job.'
"'I'm on,' says I. 'I'll take the job even if I have to garland my

brow and hold on to a crook and wear a loose-effect and play on a pipe
like the shepherds do in pictures.'

"So the next morning the little ranchman helps me drive the flock of
muttons from the corral to about two miles out and let 'em graze on a

little hillside on the prairie. He gives me a lot of instructions
about not letting bunches of them stray off from the herd, and driving

'em down to a water-hole to drink at noon.
"'I'll bring out your tent and camping outfit and rations in the

buckboard before night,' says he.
"'Fine,' says I. 'And don't forget the rations. Nor the camping

outfit. And be sure to bring the tent. Your name's Zollicoffer,
ain't it?"

"'My name,' says he, 'is Henry Ogden.'
"'All right, Mr. Ogden,' says I. 'Mine is Mr. Percival Saint

Clair.'
"I herded sheep for five days on the Rancho Chiquito; and then the

wool entered my soul. That getting next to Nature certainly got next
to me. I was lonesomer than Crusoe's goat. I've seen a lot of

persons more entertaining as companions than those sheep were. I'd
drive 'em to the corral and pen 'em every evening, and then cook my

corn-bread and mutton and coffee, and lie down in a tent the size of a
table-cloth, and listen to the coyotes and whippoorwills singing

around the camp.
"The fifth evening, after I had corralled my costly but uncongenial

muttons, I walked over to the ranch-house and stepped in the door.
"'Mr. Ogden,' says I, 'you and me have got to get sociable. Sheep