WHAT I HAVE DONE WITH BIRDS 



me. Some had merely tolerated me, letting me shift for myself, 

 others had closed their premises against me and others had charged 

 me an enormous price for driving down a lane they used every 

 day themselves. 



But among the oil-men it always had been different. Whether 

 I came in contact with a millionaire lease-owner or a ditcher in a 

 trench, the mere fact that I was a woman and trying to do some- 

 thing about which they could help had been sufficient. Some of 

 them had understood my work and some had not, but in no single 

 instance had one of them ever failed to do anything in his power 

 or show me royal courtesy, and of them all Bob was king. 



Without a word of salutation or apparent notice he walked 

 straight to the little black and began knotting the hitching strap 

 around the tree. As his hands moved a big diamond gleamed in 

 the light. I knew Bob, but you never could tell about an oil-man 

 if you didn't. An elegantly dressed individual might be a pro- 

 moter with capital so nearly atmospheric that he lacked the price 

 of his dinner, and a begrimed creature in jumpers and sweater 

 might be a capitalist whose automobile waited in the stubble of the 

 next field while he inspected his holdings. 



"Is there something for me?" I asked. 



"There is," replied Bob. 



He lifted the camera, picked up the tripod, ordered Gypsy to 

 remain with the rig and led the way down the path, through the 

 boiler house, where the exhaust pipe uttered deafening shrieks 

 and the ground trembled with the throbbing of the big black 

 monster, past his brooding Quail and Wood Robin, past his Blue 

 Finch and Song Sparrow down to the nest of his Black-masked 

 Warbler. 



182 



