bark is much worse than his bite," the girl explained to Clay,
just as though her father were not present.

"Hmp!" exploded the mining magnate a second time. "Get busy, young
fellow."

Clay told the story of the fifty-five-dollar suit that I. Bernstein had
wished on him with near-tears of regret at parting from it. The
cowpuncher dramatized the situation with some native talent for
mimicry. His arms gestured like the lifted wings of a startled
cockerel. "A man gets a chance at a garment like that only once in a
while occasionally. Which you can take it from me that when I.
Bernstein sells a suit of clothes it is shust like he is dealing with
his own brother. Qvality, my friendts, qvality! Why, I got anyhow a
suit which I might be married in without shame, un'erstan' me."

Colin Whitford was of the West himself. He had lived its
rough-and-tumble life for years before he made his lucky strike in the
Bird Cage. He had moved from Colorado to New York only ten years
before. The sound of Clay's drawling voice was like a message from
home. He began to grin in spite of himself. This man was too good to
be true. It wasn't possible that anybody could come to the big town
and import into it so naively such a genuine touch of the outdoor West.
It was not possible, but it had happened just the same. Of course
Manhattan would soon take the color out of him. It always did out of
everybody. The city was so big, so overpowering, so individual itself,
that it tolerated no individuality in its citizens. Whitford had long
since become a conformist. He was willing to bet a hat that this big
brown Arizonan would eat out of the city's hand within a week. In the
meantime he wanted to be among those present while the process of
taming the wild man took place. Long before the cowpuncher had
finished his story of hog-tying the Swede to a hitching-post with his
own hose, the mining man was sealed of the large tribe of Clay
Lindsay's admirers. He was ready to hide him from all the police in
New York.

Whitford told Stevens to bring in the fifty-five-dollar suit so that he
could gloat over it. He let out a whoop of delight at sight of its
still sodden appearance. He examined its sickly hue with chuckles of
mirth.

"Guaranteed not to fade or shrink," murmured Clay sadly.

He managed to get the coat on with difficulty. The sleeves reached
just below his elbows.

"You look like a lifer from Sing Sing," pronounced Whitfo