t's because
I'm glad to be in this camp."

"P'r'aps you found the last place you was in jes' a leetle too warm,
eh?" was Bent's retort.

Muirhead's face flushed, and for a second he stood as if he had been
struck. Then, while the crowd moved aside, he sprang towards Bent,
exclaiming, "Take that back--right off! Take it back!"

"What?" asked Bent coolly, as if surprised; at the same time, however,
retreating a pace or two, he slipped his right hand behind him.

Instantly Muirhead threw himself upon him, rushed him with what seemed
demoniac strength to the open door and flung him away out on his back
into the muddy ditch that served as a street. For a moment there was a
hush of expectation, then Bent was seen to gather himself up painfully
and move out of the square of light into the darkness. But Muirhead did
not wait for this; hastily, with hot face and hands still working with
excitement, he returned to the bar with:

"That's how I act. No one can jump me. No one, by God!" and he glared
round the room defiantly. Reggitt, Harrison, and some of the others
looked at him as if on the point of retorting, but the cheerfulness
was general, and Bent's grumbling before a stranger had irritated them
almost as much as his unexpected cowardice. Muirhead's challenge was not
taken up, therefore, though Harrison did remark, half sarcastically:

"That may be so. You jump them, I guess."

"Well, boys, let's have the drink," Charley Muirhead went on, his manner
suddenly changing to that of friendly greeting, just as if he had not
heard Harrison's words.

The men moved up to the bar and drank, and before the liquor was
consumed, Charley's geniality, acting on the universal good-humour,
seemed to have done away with the discontent which his violence and
Bent's cowardice had created. This was the greater tribute to his
personal charm, as the refugees of Garotte usually hung together, and
were inclined to resent promptly any insult offered to one of their
number by a stranger. But in the present case harmony seemed to be
completely reestablished, and it would have taken a keener observer than
Muirhead to have understood his own position and the general opinion.
It was felt that the stranger had bluffed for all he was worth, and that
Garotte had come out "at the little end of the horn."

A day or two later Charley Muirhead, walking about the camp, came
upon Dave Crocker's claim, and offered to buy half of it and work as a
partner,