He put
unspoken sentences upon every tongue, and the sentences were those he
had heard so often from his uncle and his uncle's sons.
"Too big to be any good."
"Bull's got the size of a hoss, and as a hoss he'd do pretty well, but
he ain't no account as a man."
His life had been paved with such burning remarks as these. Many an
evening had been long agony to him as the three sat about and baited
him. He hurried down the street, the pulverized sand squirting up
about his heavy boots and drifting in a mist behind him. When he was
gone an old man came out and measured those great strides with his eye
and then stretched his legs vainly to cover the same marks. But this,
of course, Bull did not see, and he would not have understood it, had
he seen, except as a mockery.
He paused in front of the hotel veranda, an awful figure to behold.
His canvas coat was rolled and tied behind his sweating shoulders; his
too-short sleeves had bothered him and they were now cut off at the
elbow and exposed the sun-blackened forearms; his overalls streamed in
rags over his scarred boots.
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