re."

I was glad we didn't have any liquor there, or like as not we'd 'a'
burned the hotel down just for a lark. We was so full of that doggone
Monte Cristo book that we believed our own lies as easy as Artie did,
an' begun to talk to each other like we was society folks at a banquet.

But Artie was a good, decent sort of a chap, as common as we were, when
we got to know him. He never kicked none on the grub, an' his appetite
was a thing to make preparations for; but, as Locals said, his high
descent came out the minute he was brought face to face with work--he
didn't recognize it. Now he didn't try to dodge it, nor he didn't
apologize for not doing it; he just didn't seem to know the' was such a
thing. It never occurred to him that the only way to have clean dishes
was to wash dirty ones. Hammy and Locals, those freeborn sons of
Independence, was glad an' proud to have the chance to wait on him; but
I must confess that the day he sat by the fire with a pile of wood
within reachin' distance, an' let the fire go out, I grew a trifle
loquacious about it.

Hammy overheard me mutterin' to myself in a voice 'at could be heard
anywhere in the hotel, an' he drew me to one side an' sez, "Hush,
presumptuous peasant; for all you know the blood of Alfred flows within
his veins."

"That ain't my fault," sez I; "but some of it will flow down this
mountain side if he don't begin stayin' awake daytimes."

Still, all in all, he was a likeable young feller an' the' ain't no
doubt but what he saved us from bein' lonesome any more. He said 'at
this balloon had been exhibited in Los Angeles, an' he had got into it
just for fun; but the rope had parted an' he had been fifteen hours on
the way. It was only by luck 'at he had happened to have his overcoat
along.

He had four or five newspapers, which he had tied around his feet to
keep 'em warm, but nare a library; so after we had lied our
imaginations sore for a week or so, we fell back on draw, settlin' by
checks at night. By a dazzling piece of luck Artie had his money in the
same New York bank 'at Miller had, so he could use our checks, an'
things began to brighten. Three of us were playin' for real money, an'
the other feller thought he was--it was genuine poker, an' the stiffest
game I ever sat in.

Time didn't drag none now. Artie knew the game, an' it kept me in a
sweat to beat him. White chips was a hundred dollars apiece; but we bet
colored ones mostly, to keep from litteri