been in jail--do you hear?--in jail, like a common felon. I've
been sent to the asylum, like a demented pauper. I've--"

"Two now, and two in the morning," continued the captain, quietly
releasing one hand only to place two enormous pills in the mouth of the
excited Catron, "thar now--a drink o' whisky--thar, that'll do--just
enough to take the taste out of yer mouth, wash it down, and belay it,
so to speak. And how are the mills running, gin'rally, over at the
Bar?"

"Captain Dick, hear me--if you ARE my friend, for God's sake hear me!
An hour ago I should have been a dead man--"

"They say that Sam Bolin hez sold out of the Excelsior--"

"Captain Dick! Listen, for God's sake; I have suffered--"

But Captain Dick was engaged in critically examining his man. "I guess
I'll ladle ye out some o' that soothin' mixture I bought down at
Simpson's t' other day," he said, reflectively. "And I onderstand the
boys up on the Bar think the rains will set in airly."

But here Nature was omnipotent. Worn by exhaustion, excitement, and
fever, and possibly a little affected by Captain Dick's later potion,
Roger Catron turned white, and lapsed against the wall. In an instant
Captain Dick had caught him, as a child, lifted him in his stalwart
arms, wrapped a blanket around him, and deposited him in his bunk.
Yet, even in his prostration, Catron made one more despairing appeal
for mental sympathy from his host.

"I know I'm sick--dying, perhaps," he gasped, from under the blankets;
"but promise me, whatever comes, tell my wife--say to--"

"It has been lookin' consid'ble like rain, lately, hereabouts,"
continued the captain, coolly, in a kind of amphibious slang,
characteristic of the man, "but in these yer latitudes no man kin set
up to be a weather sharp."

"Captain! will you hear me?"

"Yer goin' to sleep, now," said the captain, potentially.

"But, Captain, they are pursuing me! If they should track me here?"

"Thar is a rifle over thar, and yer's my navy revolver. When I've
emptied them, and want you to bear a hand, I'll call ye. Just now your
lay is to turn in. It's my watch."

There was something so positive, strong, assuring, and a little awesome
in the captain's manner, that the trembling, nervously-prostrated man
beneath the blankets forbore to question further. In a few moments his
breathing, albeit hurried and irregular, announced that he slept. The
captain then arose, for a moment critically examine