r cared for with no one. He
added, "His heart is good and kind, as kind a heart as ever beat. He's
a great enemy of his own, but he's been living pretty quietly for the
last four years." At the door of his den I took leave of Birdie, who
had been my faithful companion for more than 700 miles of traveling,
and of Evans, who had been uniformly kind to me and just in all his
dealings, even to paying to me at that moment the very last dollar he
owed me. May God bless him and his! He was obliged to return before I
could get off, and as he commended me to Mr. Nugent's care, the two men
shook hands kindly.[21]

[21]Some months later "Mountain Jim" fell by Evans's hand, shot from
Evans's doorstep while riding past his cabin. The story of the
previous weeks is dark, sad, and evil. Of the five differing versions
which have been written to me of the act itself and its immediate
causes, it is best to give none. The tragedy is too painful to dwell
upon. "Jim" lived long enough to give his own statement, and to appeal
to the judgment of God, but died in low delirium before the case
reached a human tribunal.

Rich spoils of beavers' skins were lying on the cabin floor, and the
trapper took the finest, a mouse-colored kitten beaver's skin, and
presented it to me. I hired his beautiful Arab mare, whose springy
step and long easy stride was a relief after Birdie's short sturdy
gait. We had a very pleasant ride, and I seldom had to walk. We took
neither of the trails, but cut right through the forest to a place
where, through an opening in the Foot Hills, the Plains stretched to
the horizon covered with snow, the surface of which, having melted and
frozen, reflected as water would the pure blue of the sky, presenting a
complete optical illusion. It required my knowledge of fact to assure
me that I was not looking at the ocean. "Jim" shortened the way by
repeating a great deal of poetry, and by earnest, reasonable
conversation, so that I was quite surprised when it grew dark. He told
me that he never lay down to sleep without prayer--prayer chiefly that
God would give him a happy death. He had previously promised that he
would not hurry or scold, but "fyking" had not been included in the
arrangement, and when in the early darkness we reached the steep hill,
at whose foot the rapid deep St. Vrain flows, he "fyked" unreasonably
about me, the mare, and the crossing generally, and seemed to think I
could not get through, for