them
Government cockroaches got against my bullies? Wait till the wheat
clocks[1] get started and the clothes[2] begins. We ain't forgot what
we knew when they tried to draft us. We're free men now, same as in
Russia and Germany."

He laughed again and again at the vast humor of this situation as it
lay before him, exulting in the mystification his thieves' jargon would
create. His liquor made him reckless.

"It's a rough road, up Tepee Creek," said he, "but nobody comes. This
is a Government car--the Cossacks would think I'm going up to work.
They got to mark some trees. I'll mark 'em--so they can tell, when
they come to saw 'em, heh?"

He said little more, but one hand cast over her shoulder was his answer
to her panting silence, every time she edged over in the impulse to
fling herself out of the car. He was a man of enormous strength.

Continually the jolting of the car grew worse and worse. She began to
hear the rush of water. Twice she felt the logs of a rude bridge under
the wheels as they crossed some stream. They were winding their way up
the valley of a stream, into a higher country? Yes. As they climbed
now, she could catch the scent of the forest as the wind changed from
time to time. The profanity of her captor grew as the difficulty of
the trail increased. They were climbing at a gradient as steep as the
laboring car could negotiate.

At last, after interminable time, they seemed to strike a sandier soil,
more level country--indeed, the trail was following the contour of a
high sandy ridge among the pines.

On ahead she heard a shout. "Halt! Stop there! Who are you?"

"Don't shoot, John," replied the driver of the car, laughing. "It's
Aleck."

"Well, I'll be damned!" was the reply. "Time you was back, Aleck.
Who's that with you?"

"That's a friend of mine I brought along! She's come up to see how us
wobblies lives!"

Again his coarse laugh, which made her shudder. Then more broken
laughs, whispered words. She was obliged to take the arm of her rough
captor to descend from the car.

"She don't see very well," said Aleck in explanation. "Maybe just as
well she don't, heh?"

She stood looking about her vaguely, helpless. She could hear the high
moaning of the wind above her, in the tops of pine trees. Some one led
her to the front of a tent--she could hear the flapping of the fly in
the wind. She sank down by chance upon a blanket roll. Her captor
threw down the fr