Bull considered, as though there were few other wishes that he could express.  “I haven’t any money,” he apologized.  “D’you think maybe you could pay me a little something outside of food and a place to sleep?”

Bridewell blinked, and then prepared himself to become angry, when it dawned on him that this was not intended for sarcasm.  He found that Bull was searching his face eagerly, as though he feared that he were asking too much.

“What would do you?” suggested Bridewell tentatively.

“I dunno,” said Bull, sighing with relief.  “Anything you think.”

It was plain that the big man was half-witted—­or nearly so.  Bridewell kept the sparkle of exultation out of his eyes.

“You leave it to me, then, and I’ll do what’s more’n right by you.  When d’you want to start work?”

“Right now.”

CHAPTER 15

When Bull left the dining room that night after supper, Mrs. Bridewell looked across the table at her husband with horror in her eyes.

“Did you see?” she gasped.  “He ate the whole pot of beans!”

“Sure I seen him,” and he grinned.

“But—­he’ll eat us out of house and home!  Why, he’s like a wolf!”

Bridewell chuckled with superior knowledge.  “He’s ate enough for three,” he admitted, “but he’s worked enough for six—­besides, most of his wages come in food.  But work?  I never seen anything like it!  He handled more timbers than a dozen.  When it come to spiking them in place he seen me swinging that twelve-pound sledge and near breaking my back.  ‘I think it’s easier this way,’ he says.  ’Besides you can hit a lot faster if you use just one hand.’  And he takes the hammer, and sends that big spike in all the way to the head with one lick.  And he wondered why I didn’t work the same way!  Ain’t got any idea how strong he is.”

Mrs. Bridewell listened with wide eyes.  “The idea,” she murmured.  “The idea!  Where’s he now?”

Her husband went to the back door.  “He’s sitting over by the pump talking to Tod.  Sitting talking like they was one age.  I reckon he’s sort of half-witted.”

“How come?” sharply asked Mrs. Bridewell.  “Ain’t Tod got more brains than most growed-up men?”

“I reckon he has,” admitted the proud father.

And if they had put the same question to Bull Hunter, the giant would have agreed with them emphatically.  He approached the child tamer of Diablo with a diffidence that was almost reverence.  The freckle-faced boy looked up from his whittling when the shadow of Bull fell athwart him, with an equal admiration; also with suspicion, for the cowpunchers, on the whole, were apt to make game of the youngster and his grave, grown-up ways.  He was, therefore, shrewdly suspicious of jests at his expense.

Furthermore, he had seen the big stranger heaving the great timbers about and whirling the sledge with one hand; he half suspected that the jokes might be pointed with the weight of that heavy hand.  His amazement was accordingly great when he found the big man actually sitting down beside him, cross-legged, and he was absolutely stupefied when Bull Hunter said, “I’ve been aiming at this chance to talk to you, Tod, all day.”