t a long, long ways from her own range;
and so she kept sitting, and onced in a while she'd cry some more. We
got her a room in the cheap hotel where the Park drivers sleeps when
they're in at the Springs, and she acted grateful like, thanking the
boys in her tanglefoot English. Next mawnin' her folks druv off in a
private team to Norris Basin, and she seemed dazed. For I talked with
her then, and questioned her as to her wishes, but she could not say
what she wished, nor if it was East or West she would go; and I reckon
she was too stricken to have wishes.

"Our stuff for Galena Creek delayed on the railroad, and I got to know
her, and then I quit givin' Hank cause for jealousy. I kept myself with
the boys, and I played more cyards, while Hank he sca'cely played at
all. One night I came on them--Hank and Willomene--walkin' among the
pines where the road goes down the hill. Yu' should have saw that pair
o' lovers. Her big shape was plain and kind o' steadfast in the moon,
and alongside of her little black Hank! And there it was. Of course it
ain't nothing to be surprised at that a mean and triflin' man tries to
seem what he is not when he wants to please a good woman. But why does
she get fooled, when it's so plain to other folks that are not givin'
it any special thought? All the rest of the men and women at the Mammoth
understood Hank. They knowed he was a worthless proposition. And I
cert'nly relied on his gettin' back to his whiskey and openin' her eyes
that way. But he did not. I met them next evening again by the Liberty
Cap. Supposin' I'd been her brother or her mother, what use was it me
warning her? Brothers and mothers don't get believed.

"The railroad brought the stuff for Galena Creek, and Hank would
not look at it on account of his courtin'. I took it alone myself by
Yancey's and the second bridge and Miller Creek to the camp, nor
I didn't tell Willomene good-bye, for I had got disgusted at her
blindness."

The Virginian shifted his position, and jerked his overalls to a more
comfortable fit. Then he continued:

"They was married the Tuesday after at Livingston, and Hank must
have been pow'ful pleased at himself. For he gave Willomene a wedding
present, with the balance of his cash, spending his last nickel on
buying her a red-tailed parrot they had for sale at the First National
Bank. The son-of-a-gun hollad so freely at the bank, the president
awde'd the cashier to get shed of the out-ragious bird, o