. "Then
you won't forget me, boy, when--" He stopped short, with a suggestion of
moisture softening his fierce, dark eyes.

"Forget you! You know I shan't. But what do you mean by `when'?"

"When my well-picked, dry bones are lying out somewhere up the mountain
side, scattered here and there."

"What!" cried Marcus, laughing merrily. "Who's going to pick them and
scatter them to dry up in the mountains?"

"The wolves, boy, the wolves," said the man, bitterly, "for I suppose I
shall come to that. You asked me what I was going to do. I'll tell
you. I shall wander away somewhere right up among the mountains, for my
soldiering days are over, and I can never serve another master now, and
at last I shall lie down to die! The wolves will come, and," he added,
with a sigh, "you know what will happen then."

"Oh yes," said Marcus, with mock seriousness. "The poor wolves! I
shall be sorry for them. I know what will happen then. At the first
bite you will jump up in a rage, catch them one at a time by the tail,
give them one swing round, and knock their brains out against the
stones. You wouldn't give them much chance to bite again."

A grim smile gradually dawned once more upon the old soldier's
countenance, and, slowly raising one of his hands, he began to scratch
the side of his thickly-grizzled head, his brow wrinkling up more deeply
the while, as he gazed into the merry, mocking eyes that looked back so
frankly into his.

"You are laughing at me, boy," he said, at last.

"Of course I am, Serge. Oh my! You are down in the dumps! I say, how
many wolves do you think you could kill like that? But, oh nonsense!
You wouldn't be alone. If old Lupe saw you going off with your bundle
he'd spring at you, get it in his teeth, and follow you carrying it
wherever you went."

"Hah! Good old Lupe!" said the man, thoughtfully. "I'd forgotten him.
Yes, he'd be sure to follow me. You'd have to shut him up in the
wine-press."

"And hear him howl to get out?" cried Marcus. "No, I shouldn't, because
I shouldn't be there."

"Why, where would you be?" said Serge, wonderingly.

"Along with you, of course."

"Along o' me?"

"Yes. If you left home and went away for what was all my fault, do you
think I should be such a miserable cur as to stop behind? No; I should
go with you, Serge, and take my sword, and you and Lupe and I could
pretty well tackle as many wolves as would be likely to come up at us on
the mo