in the guts of the world. They claim there's
poison air comes out o' the caves and lays low along the water. They
claim if a bear or an elk strays in from below, and the caves sets up
their coughin', which they don't regular every day, the animals die. I
have seen it come in two seconds. And when it comes that-a-way risin'
upon yu' with that fluffy kind of a sigh, yu' feel mighty lonesome, seh.

"So Hank he happened to look back and see Willomene hangin' at the aidge
o' them black rocks. And his scare made him mad. And his mad stayed
with him till they come into camp. She looked around, and when she seen
Hank's tent that him and her was to sleep in she showed surprise. And he
showed surprise when he see the bread she cooked.

"'What kind of a Dutch woman are yu',' says he, strainin' for a joke,
'if yu' can't use a Dutch-oven?'

"'You say to me you have a house to live in,' says Willomene. 'Where is
that house?'

"'I did not figure on gettin' a woman when I left camp,' says Hank,
grinnin', but not pleasant, 'or I'd have hurried up with the shack I'm a
buildin'.'

"He was buildin' one. When I left Galena Creek and come away from that
country to meet you, the house was finished enough for the couple to
move in. I hefted her brass-nailed trunk up the hill from their tent
myself, and I watched her take out her crucifix. But she would not let
me help her with that. She'd not let me touch it. She'd fixed it up
agaynst the wall her own self her own way. But she accepted some flowers
I picked, and set them in a can front of the crucifix. Then Hank he come
in, and seein', says to me, 'Are you one of the kind that squats before
them silly dolls?' 'I would tell yu', I answered him; 'but it would not
inter-est yu'.' And I cleared out, and left him and Willomene to begin
their housekeepin'.

"Already they had quit havin' much to say to each other down in their
tent. The only steady talkin' done in that house was done by the parrot.
I've never saw any go ahaid of that bird. I have told yu' about Hank,
and how when he'd come home and see her prayin' to that crucifix he'd
always get riled up. He would mention it freely to the boys. Not that
she neglected him, yu' know. She done her part, workin' mighty hard, for
she was a willin' woman. But he could not make her quit her religion;
and Willomene she had got to bein' very silent before I come away. She
used to talk to me some at first, but she dropped it. I don't know
why. I expec