Muggy all day but interesting light and colors this evening.

Sometimes Mr. Dobie reminds me of Bob Dylan or Woodie Guthrie, and sometimes of John Steinbeck. Not his writing style, but his writing spirit.

from the chapter Within the Code
One night while I was standing in the lobby of the Bluebonnet Hotel in Kerrville a stranger introduced himself to me as fireman of the hotel. Since I wrote stories about his kind of people, he said, he'd like to tell me one on Hen Baker. Hen had quit horsebacking much, was getting along in years and was taking on odd jobs when the Kerr County grand jury indicted him for killing a man with a pocketknife. at the trial he took the witness stand in his own defense. His testimony, spoken tojurymen as his equals, follows.
"You all know about the picnic and barbecue on the river. A big crowd was coming from town and all the ranches around. Somebody had to show the drivers where to put their buggies and wagons and tie the teams and saddle horses too, so as to keep the grounds clear. The boss asked me to take charge of this business.

"I took my place right where the road goes between two big trees and showed everybody that drove u how to pull off to one side or the other and find a good place to tie up. The underbrush has been cleared away out there, you know. After the crowd gathered, some fellers were sashaying around considerable on horses when this man from Bandera rode up. He was purty well lit, and I could see he was packing a gun on his hip. He got down and says, 'I'm the Bull of the Bandera Woods and I hear you're the King of the Kerrville Cedarbrakes. Let's see who's the best man.'

"I says to him, 'I'm busy here. Over there right now a horse some fool didn't tie up right is setting back. I got to tend him. Go on off.' I stepped over and tied the horse right, but the Bull of the Bandera woods kept on pestering me. Finally I got rid of him before he started any real trouble. I think he got with a couple of Bandera companeros.

"The crowd didn't break up till late, and I stayed till the last vehicle had cleared out. It was clost to sundown when I got back to town, and I was plenty leg weary. I stepped into the Mint Julep and was leaning against the bar taking my drink easy when Bandera came in the door. He was three sheets to the wind and his eyes looked like a pair of calf nuts floating in a bag of blood. But he was purty steady too.

"'Uh, I see you're here,' he says.
"'Come over and have a drink,' I says

He comes over and stands up to the bar beside me. I had straightened up and moved a little so that he was to my left. The barkeeper pours him a drink. He swallers it at one gulp and puts the glass on the bar. Then he folds his arms and roosters me in the ribs just like that.

" Here Hen Baker folded his arms and jabbed his right elbow into the ribs of an imaginary target.
Then he ended his testimony: "I didn't have my six-shooter and so I had to cut his throat.

" Hen Baker grew up where and when it was considered unbecoming any man to use fist or knife in combat. In saying "I didn't have my six-shooter and so I had to cut his throat," he was apologizing for a breach of etiquette. . .
Cow People, J. Frank Dobie