a livin' out
in this yere country all his life. I'll be ninety-five now, in jist a
few weeks, an' I'm as spry now as most any o' yew fellers. I'll live
longer'n some o' ye yit. Yep, I'm feelin' mighty spry agin sence Tad's
got back. Kind o' seems like the old days afore the shanty was burned. I
ca'calate them there devils must o' injoyed that performance."

The fellows all stood at attention. Was the Road House story really
coming, and from Dad's very own lips?

"It must have been a sad sight, wasn't it, Dad, to see your home
demolished in that fashion?" quietly suggested Mr. Allen, by way of
encouragement.

"'T wan't near as sad a sight as some I have seed," replied the old man.
"'Bout the saddest sight I ever seed was of an old pard o' mine a
wanderin' over these almighty hills a sorrowin' out his life after he'd
lost his right down best friend in a mine cave-in. Poor old boy, he took
it mighty serious. He used to be the happiest prospector I ever swapped
lies with, till that devilish old tunnel caved in an' crushed the life
out o' the feller's pardner. He hain't never ben no 'count sence, till
lately. Now an' then he'd take a long, wanderin' trip back into these
yere gloomy ol' gulches, an' I've seed them as say they've heerd him away
off in the hills at night a callin' his pardner's name, an' a sobbin' an'
a carryin' on. He's a strong man--that's why he gits out into God
Almighty's hills to open his troubled heart, 'stead o' tellin' his
lonesomeness to men as would make fun o' him. That's 'bout the sorriest
sight I ever seed, an' I've seed 'bout my share on 'em--Indian killin's,
dynamite explosions, an' sech like. 'T ain't many fellers ever has as
real a friend as that!"

"What finally happened to your friend, Dad--did he get over his sorrow
after a while?"

"No, no, my boy, he never got over it. He got on top of it. I mind now
how he was gone a long spell in the timber; no grub, no duffel, no
nothin'--only his ol' gun. He lived off'n the bounty o' these yere wooded
hills, an' he let the spell o' God Almighty's woods an' crags an' streams
heal up his broken heart. Then he came back. I remember one mornin' he
come to my shanty, and a hungrier, starveder, wild-eyed feller ye never
seed in yer born days than him; but shoot me fer a pole-cat if he didn't
come back a smilin'. I was skeered he'd lost his mind. I was a pannin'
mud in the gulch up back o' the shanty when he come 'long the trail. I
jist looked, then I