It made him think, somehow, of Miss Bridger and the way she had forced him to take his gun with him when he had meant to leave it.  She was like Dill in that respect:  nice and good-natured and smiling—­only Dill smiled but seldom—­and yet always managing to make you give up your own wishes.  He wished vaguely that the wanderings of Dill would bring them back to the Double-Crank country, instead of leading them always farther afield.  He did not, however, admit openly to himself that he wanted to see Miss Bridger again; yet he did permit himself to wonder if she ever played coon-can with any one else, or if she had already forgotten the game.  Probably she had, and—­well, a good many other things that he remembered quite distinctly.

Later, when they had reached town, were warmed and fed and when even Billy was thinking seriously of sleep, Dill came over and sat down beside him solemnly, folded his bony hands upon knees quite as bony, regarded pensively the generously formed foot dangling some distance before him and smiled his puckered smile.

“I have been wondering, William, if you had not some plan of your own concerning this cattle-raising business, which you think is better than mine but which you hesitate to express.  If you have, I hope you will feel quite free to—­er—­lay it before the head of the firm.  It may interest you to know that I have, as you would put it, ’failed to connect’ with Mr. Robinson.  So, if you have any ideas—­”

“Oh, I’m burning up with ’em,” Charming Billy retorted in a way he meant to be sarcastic, but which Mr. Dill took quite seriously.

“Then I hope you won’t hesitate—­”

“Now look here, Dilly,” expostulated he, between puffs.  “Recollect, it’s your money that’s going to feed the birds—­and it’s your privilege to throw it out to suit yourself.  Uh course, I might day-dream about the way I’d start into the cow-business if I was a millionaire—­”

“I’m not a millionaire,” Mr. Dill hastened to correct.  “A couple of hundred thousand or so, is about all—­”

“Well, a fellow don’t have to pin himself down to just so many dollars and cents—­not when he’s building himself a pet dream.  And if a fellow dreams about starting up an outfit of his own, it don’t prove he’d make it stick in reality.”  The tone of Billy, however, did not express any doubt.

Mr. Dill untangled his legs, crossed them the other way and regarded the other dangling foot.  “I should like very much,” he hinted mildly, “to have you tell me this—­er—­day-dream, as you call it.”

So Charming Billy, tilted back in his chair and watching with half-shut eyes the intangible smoke-wreath from his cigarette, found words for his own particular air-castle which he had builded on sunny days when the Double-Crank herds grazed peacefully around him; or on stormy nights when he sat alone in the line-camp and played solitaire with the mourning wind crooning accompaniment; or on long rides alone, when the trail was plain before him and the grassland stretched away and away to a far sky-line, and the white clouds sailed sleepily over his head and about him the meadowlarks sang.  And while he found the words, he somehow forgot Dill, long and lean and lank, listening beside him, and spoke more freely than he had meant to do when Dill first opened the subject a few minutes before.