his lips for a moment.

"If I had the price," he said, "we'd have another drink."

"I ain't drinkin'," answered the giant monotonously.

"Then I'll go up and bum one off'n Pale Annie. About time he come
through with a little charity."

So he unfurled his length and stalked through the crowd up to the bar.
Here he leaned and confidentially whispered in the ear of Pale Annie.

"Partner, I been sprinklin' dust for a long time in here, and there
ain't been any reward. I'm dry, Annie."

Pale Annie regarded him with grave disapproval.

"My friend," he said solemnly, "liquor is the real root of all evil. For
my part, I quench my thirst with water. They's a tub over there in the
corner with a dipper handy. Don't mention it."

"I didn't thank you," said Haw-Haw Langley furiously. "Damn a tight-wad,
say I!"

The long hand of Pale Annie curled affectionately around the neck of an
empty bottle.

"I didn't quite gather what you said?" he remarked courteously, and
leaned across the bar--within striking distance.

"I'll tell you later," remarked Haw-Haw sullenly, and turned his
shoulder to the bar.

As he did so two comparatively recent arrivals came up beside him. They
were fresh from a couple of months of range-finding, and they had been
quenching a concentrated thirst by concentrated effort. Haw-Haw Langley
looked them over, sighed with relief, and then instantly produced Durham
and the brown papers. He paused in the midst of rolling his cigarette
and offered them to the nearest fellow.

"Smoke?" he asked.

Now a man of the mountain-desert knows a great many things, but he does
not know how to refuse. The proffer of a gift embarrasses him, but he
knows no way of avoiding it; also he never rests easy until he has made
some return.

"Sure," said the man, and gathered in the tobacco and papers. "Thanks!"

He covertly dropped the cigarette which he had just lighted, and stepped
on it, then he rolled another from Haw-Haw's materials. The while, he
kept an uneasy eye on his new companion.

"Drinkin'?" he asked at length.

"Not jest now," said Haw-Haw carelessly.

"Always got room for another," protested the other, still more in
earnest as he saw his chance of a return disappearing.

"All right, then," said Haw-Haw. "Jest one more."

And he poured a glass to the brim, waved it gracefully towards the
others without spilling a drop, and downed it at a gulp.

"Ben in town long?" he asked.

"Not long enough to f