ey'll drop no more along
here."

"Unless it gets dark," said I.

"We'll camp before that. Maybe we'll see their fire."

We did not see their fire. We descended in the chill silence, while the
mushroom rocks grew far and the sombre woods approached. By a stream we
got off where two banks sheltered us; for a bleak wind cut down over the
crags now and then, making the pines send out a great note through the
basin, like breakers in a heavy sea. But we made cosey in the tent.
We pitched the tent this night, and I was glad to have it shut out the
mountain peaks. They showed above the banks where we camped; and in the
starlight their black shapes rose stark against the sky. They, with the
pines and the wind, were a bedroom too unearthly this night. And as soon
as our supper dishes were washed we went inside to our lantern and our
game of cribbage.

"This is snug," said the Virginian, as we played. "That wind don't get
down here."

"Smoking is snug, too," said I. And we marked our points for an hour,
with no words save about the cards.

"I'll be pretty near glad when we get out of these mountains," said the
Virginian. "They're most too big."

The pines had altogether ceased; but their silence was as tremendous as
their roar had been.

"I don't know, though," he resumed. "There's times when the plains can
be awful big, too."

Presently we finished a hand, and he said, "Let me see that paper."

He sat readin, it apparently through, while I arranged my blankets to
make a warm bed. Then, since the paper continued to absorb him, I got
myself ready, and slid between my blankets for the night. "You'll need
another candle soon in that lantern," said I.

He put the paper down. "I would do it all over again," he began. "The
whole thing just the same. He knowed the customs of the country, and he
played the game. No call to blame me for the customs of the country. You
leave other folks' cattle alone, or you take the consequences, and it
was all known to Steve from the start. Would he have me take the Judge's
wages and give him the wink? He must have changed a heap from the Steve
I knew if he expected that. I don't believe he expected that. He knew
well enough the only thing that would have let him off would have been
a regular jury. For the thieves have got hold of the juries in Johnson
County. I would do it all over, just the same."

The expiring flame leaped in the lantern, and fell blue. He broke off
in his words as if t