t worry me! You don't worry me!" now screamed Uncle Hughey.

Already I had forgotten my trunk; care had left me; I was aware of the
sunset, and had no desire but for more of this conversation. For it
resembled none that I had heard in my life so far. I stepped to the door
and looked out upon the station platform.

Lounging there at ease against the wall was a slim young giant,
more beautiful than pictures. His broad, soft hat was pushed back; a
loose-knotted, dull-scarlet handkerchief sagged from his throat; and one
casual thumb was hooked in the cartridge-belt that slanted across his
hips. He had plainly come many miles from somewhere across the vast
horizon, as the dust upon him showed. His boots were white with it. His
overalls were gray with it. The weather-beaten bloom of his face shone
through it duskily, as the ripe peaches look upon their trees in a dry
season. But no dinginess of travel or shabbiness of attire could tarnish
the splendor that radiated from his youth and strength. The old man
upon whose temper his remarks were doing such deadly work was combed and
curried to a finish, a bridegroom swept and garnished; but alas for age!
Had I been the bride, I should have taken the giant, dust and all. He
had by no means done with the old man.

"Why, yu've hung weddin' gyarments on every limb!" he now drawled, with
admiration. "Who is the lucky lady this trip?"

The old man seemed to vibrate. "Tell you there ain't been no other! Call
me a Mormon, would you?"

"Why, that--"

"Call me a Mormon? Then name some of my wives. Name two. Name one. Dare
you!"

"--that Laramie wido' promised you--'

"Shucks!"

"--only her doctor suddenly ordered Southern climate and--"

"Shucks! You're a false alarm."

"--so nothing but her lungs came between you. And next you'd most got
united with Cattle Kate, only--"

"Tell you you're a false alarm!"

"--only she got hung."

"Where's the wives in all this? Show the wives! Come now!"

"That corn-fed biscuit-shooter at Rawlins yu' gave the canary--"

"Never married her. Never did marry--"

"But yu' come so near, uncle! She was the one left yu' that letter
explaining how she'd got married to a young cyard-player the very day
before her ceremony with you was due, and--"

"Oh, you're nothing; you're a kid; you don't amount to--"

"--and how she'd never, never forgot to feed the canary."

"This country's getting full of kids," stated the old man, witheringly.
"It's do