cowpuncher grunted out his
impatience. Then at last, as though it were forced from him, the
latter jerked out a more modified opinion of the civilized American.
It seemed as though Tresler's very silence had drawn it from him.

"Wal," he said grumblingly, "mebbe you Noo Yorkers has points--mebbe,
I sez." Then he dismissed the subject with an impatient shrug of his
drooping shoulders, and went off at a fresh angle. "Say, I wus kind o'
wonderin' some 'bout that flea-bitten shadder, Joe Nelson. He's
amazin' queer stayin' 'round here. He's foxin' some, too. Y' ain't
never sure when you're like to strike them chewed-up features o' his
after nightfall. Y' see he's kind o' quit drinkin'--leastways, he's
frekent sober. Mebbe he can't sleep easy. Ther's suthin' worritin' his
head, sure. He 'pears ter me desp'rate restless--kind o' like an old
hoss wi' the bush-ticks. Et don't fit noways wi' the Joe Nelson I
oncet knew. Mebbe it's religion. Ther' ain't nuthin' like religion fer
makin' things oneasy in your head. Joe allus had a strain o' religion
in him."

The Southerner gazed gloomily at the saddle on the fence, while he
munched his tobacco in thoughtful silence.

"I don't think Joe's got religion," said Tresler, with a smile. "He's
certainly worried, and with reason. Jake's got his knife into him. No,
I think Joe's got a definite object in staying around here, and I
shouldn't wonder if he's clever enough to attain it, whatever it is."

"That sounds more like Joe," assented the other, cheering up at the
suggestion. "Still, Joe allus had a strain o' religion in him," he
persisted. "I see him drop a man in his tracks oncet, an' cry like a
noo-born babby 'cos ther' wa'n't a chu'ch book in Lone Brake
Settlement, an' he'd forgot his prayers, an' had ter let the feller
lie around fer the coyotes, instead o' buryin' him decent. That's a
whiles ago. Guess Lone Brake's changed some. They do say ther's a
Bible ther' now. Kind o' roped safe to the desk in the meetin'-house,
so the boys can't git foolin' wi' it. Yup," he went on, with an
abstracted look in his expressive eyes, "religion's a mighty powerful
thing when it gits around. Most like the fever. I kind o' got touched
wi' it down Texas way on the Mexican border. Guess et wer' t' do wi' a
lady I favored at the time; but that ain't here nor there. Guess most
o' the religion comes along o' the wimmin folk. 'Longside o' wimmin
men is muck."

Tresler nodded his appreciation of the s