any asked him of his intentions concerning Number One. He put off his
questioners with a pleasantry when they pressed him, but there was such
a tenderness in his eyes as he looked at his pale, bald brother, old in
honest ways before his time, that it was the same as spoken words.

So it will be seen that a great deal depended on Claim Number One, not
alone among the pleasant little company of ours, but in the calculations
of every man and woman out of the forty-seven thousand who would
register, ultimately, for the chance and the hope of drawing it.

At Casper a runner for the Hotel Metropole had boarded the train. He was
a voluble young man with a thousand reasons why travelers to the end of
the world and the railroad should patronize the Hotel Metropole and no
other. He sat on the arms of passengers' seats and made his argument,
having along with him a great quantity of yellow cards, each card
bearing a number, each good for an apartment or a cot in the open. By
payment of the rate, a person could secure his bed ahead of any need for
it which, said the young man, was the precaution of a wise ginny who was
on to his job. The train conductor vouched for the genuineness of the
young man's credentials, and conditions of things at Comanche as he
pictured them.

It was due to Sergeant Jake Schaefer that the company organized to mess
together. The hotel representative fell in with the idea with great
warmth. There was a large tent on the corner, just off Main Street,
which the company could rent, said he. A partition would be put in it
for the privacy of the ladies, and the hotel would supply the guests
with a stove and utensils. June's mother liked the notion. It relieved
her of a great worry, for with a stove of her own she could still
contrive those dainties so necessary to the continued existence of the
delicate child.

So the bargain was struck, the sergeant was placed in charge of the
conduct and supply of the camp, and everybody breathed easier. They had
anticipated difficulty over the matter of lodging and food in Comanche,
for wild tales of extortion and crowding, and undesirable conditions
generally, had been traveling through the train all day.

Comanche was quiet when the train arrived, for that was the part of the
day when the lull between the afternoon's activities and the night's
frantic reaping fell. Everyone who had arrived the day previous
accounted himself an old-timer, and all such, together with al