e construction camps packing a name like 'Nellie.'"

Waseche grinned. "Percival Lafollette, to be exact. I furnished the
Roarin' Mike O'Reilly part, along with a full an' complete outfit of
men's wearin' apparel. When he gets to where he can live up to the
Roarin' Mike name, he can discard it an' take back his own. Might's well
give the boy a chanct. Cain thought he'd put it over on me, 'count of my
movin' my office where he'd have to waller acrost the crick to it. But
I'll fool him good an' proper. The kid's a lunger, an' the first thing
to do is to git him started in to feelin' like a man. I figured they was
somethin' to him when I first seen him. If they wasn't, how did he get
up here in the middle of Alaska an' winter comin' on--an' nothin'
between him an' freezin' but them hen-skin clothes? An' I was watchin',
too, when he laid his hand on the dog's head. He was so scairt that the
sweat was jest a-bubblin' out of him--an' yet, he retch out an' done
like I done--an' believe me, I wasn't none too anxious to fool with that
brute, myself. I done it to see if he would. I'm goin' to take holt an'
make a reg'lar man out of him. I figger we kin git through the office
work by noon every day. If we don't, them birds over in the thinkers'
shack is in for more overtime. In the afternoons I'm goin' to keep him
out in the air--that's all a lunger needs--plenty air, an' good grub.
We'll tromp around the hills and hunt. We'll be a pair to draw to--him
with his busted lungs, an' me with my game laig. We was all _chechakos_
onct. They's two kinds of _chechakos_--the ones with _nerve_ an' the
ones with _brass_. The ones with the real nerve is the kind that stays
in the big country. But the other kind of _chechakos_--the ones with
brass--the bluff an' bluster--the counterfeit nerve that don't fool no
one but theirself--the luckiest thing that can happen to them is they
should live long enough to git back to the outside where they come
from--an' most of 'em's lucky if they live long enough to starve to
death."

"I guess he's the first kind," opined Connie. "When I come back I
expect he'll be a regular sourdough."

"When you're gone I reckon I'll jest have him move his traps up here. I
won't be so lonesome, an' I can keep cases on him----"

"But--" interrupted Connie.

Waseche divined his thoughts and shook his head. "No, they ain't no
danger. My lungs is made of whang leather, an' besides, he ain't no
floor spitter--I watched him