ther
to thank you some day."

"All ready!" cried the mate.

"My name is Cowles," I began, "and sometime, perhaps--"

"All aboard!" cried the mate; and so the oars gave way.

So I did not get the name of the girl I had seen there in the firelight.
What did remain--and that not wholly to my pleasure, so distinct it
seemed--was the picture of her high-bred profile, shown in chiaroscuro
at the fireside, the line of her chin and neck, the tumbled masses of
her hair. These were things I did not care to remember; and I hated
myself as a soft-hearted fool, seeing that I did so.

"Son," said old Auberry to me, after a time, as we trudged along up the
bank, stumbling over roots and braided grasses, "that was a almighty
fine lookin' gal we brung along with us there."

"I didn't notice," said I.

"No," said Auberry, solemnly, "I noticed you didn't take no notice; so
you can just take my judgment on it, which I allow is safe. Are you a
married man?"

"Not yet," I said.

"You might do a heap worse than that gal," said Auberry.

"I suppose you're married yourself," I suggested.

"Some," said Auberry, chuckling in the dark. "In fact, a good deal, I
reckon. My present woman's a Shoshone--we're livin' up Horse Creek,
below Laramie. Them Shoshones make about the best dressers of 'em all."

"I don't quite understand--"

"I meant hides. They can make the best buckskin of any tribe I know." He
walked on ahead in the dark for some time, before he added irrelevantly,
"Well, after all, in some ways, women is women, my son, and men is men;
that bein' the way this world is made just at these here present times.
As I was sayin', that's a powerful nice lookin' gal."

I shuddered in my soul. I glanced up at the heavens, studded thick with
stars. It seemed to me that I saw gazing down directly at me one cold,
bright, reproving star, staring straight into my soul, and accusing me
of being nothing more than a savage, nothing better than a man.

CHAPTER XIV

AU LARGE

At our little village on the following morning, Auberry and I learned
that the _River Bell_ would lie up indefinitely for repairs, and that at
least one, perhaps several days would elapse before she resumed her
journey up stream. This suited neither of us, so we sent a negro down
with a skiff, and had him bring up our rifles, Auberry's bedding, my
portmanteaus, etc., it being our intention to take the stage up to
Leavenworth. By noon our plans were changed aga