"Do you live around here?" sez he. "Not very much," sez I, "but I 'm minded to try it a while, if there 's room in your burrow for two."

"Got any tobacco?" sez he.

"Plenty," sez I.

"You're welcome," sez he.

We took the burro over to a clump of pine woods an' turned him loose, an' then I crawled in through the tunnel to Sloc.u.m's fire. It was in a cave which had a natural chimney runnin' up the hill, an' it looked considerable much like Paradise to me. We ate an' smoked together for a week, an' then one day our fire went out an' a flood of water poured down through the chimney. We worked like beavers for a while, gettin'

our stuff outdoors, an' it was as hot as summer outside.

"That's the only drawback to this cave," said Sloc.u.m. "It will be all to the good when the winter settles in earnest, but it will be some bother while it's still snowin' an' thawin'."

I told him that I agreed with him to such an extent that if I could locate the burro I'd rather risk gettin' back to humanity than to dyin'

there of rheumatiz. I was wringin' wet through.

"n.o.body can't die of rheumatiz around me," sez Sloc.u.m, an' he went to one of his packs an' got out a piece of root.

"Chew this," sez he, "an' it will drive the rheumatiz out of your system."

Anybody would have trusted those eyes, so I chewed the root for about a minute, an' then I chewed snow an' mud an' tobacco an' red pepper for an hour, tryin' to get rid of the taste. Drive the rheumatiz out of your system? Why, the blame stuff would drive out your system too if you chewed it long enough. It was the tarnationest stuff 'at ever a human man met up with.

"It's most too strong to take pure," sez Sloc.u.m, "but if you grind it an' put a shall pinch in a quart of alcohol it makes a fine remedy.

Don't throw the rest o' that root away. There is enough there to do you a lifetime."

"Yes," sez I, "there is, an' more."

A feller once told me that man was a slave to his envirament--envirament is anything around you, scenery, books, evil companions, an' sech; well, a burro ain't no slave to his envirament 'cause he generally eats it. My burro was fat, an' the clump of pine trees had mostly disappeared. I loaded up my stuff, shook hands with Sloc.u.m, and started down the mountain. Just as I got fully started Sloc.u.m sez to me, "I 'm sure sorry to see you go. I don't generally get much friendly with folks any more, but I took to you from the first, an' any time I can do you a favor, all you got to do is to wink."

"What's your general plan of occupation, Sloc.u.m?" sez I.

"All that I ever expect to do for the remainder of my days," sez he, "is to search for my Rheumatiz Remedy."

"Well," sez I, "any time you get to do me a favor in that line, it'll be when I'm too weak to wink." So we parted the best o' friends, an' I went on to a lumber camp where I put in the winter bossin' a gang. I didn't know much about lumber, but the men there was just the same as anywhere else, an' we got along fine.

I was bossin' a little ranch up in Idaho next June when I heard tell of a big strike in the Esmeralda range--not such a great distance from where I had spent the week with Sloc.u.m. The report had it that a feller named Sloc.u.m had located the big ace of gold mines, an' I was some et up with curiosity to see if it was the same Sloc.u.m; but I was needed at the ranch that winter, an' as I took a likin' for the young feller who was tryin' to make it go, I stuck to him, an' it wasn't until the followin' July that I pulled out an' floated down that way.

Well, it was the same old Sloc.u.m sure enough. He was the most onlucky cuss 'at ever breathed, I reckon. Every time he had made up his mind to do something, Fate had stepped up an' voted again it. He had wasted the best part of his life locatin' gold mines 'at wouldn't hang out, until at last even he got disgusted an' went to huntin' for his Injun root to cure rheumatiz with. First thing he knew, he had stumbled on a bonanza lode in the Esmeralda range. This here lode was a peach. Ten-foot face on top, just soggy with gold an' silver, an' copper an' tin enough to pay expenses. It just looked as if they's said, "Now then, there's Sloc.u.m; he been hammered so long he's got callous to it. Let's jus' see how he'd act if we switched his luck on him." An' they sure done it.

Sloc.u.m, he scratched around until he see that it wasn't no joke, an'

then he set bait for a couple o' capitalists. He trapped two beauties, an' they put up the a.s.sets an' went in, equal partners. They sunk shafts an' built stamp mills an' smelters an' retorts; oh, they sure made plans to get the metal wholesale. As soon as it began to flow in they built stores an' shacks an' a big hotel--they wasn't timorous about puttin' their coin into circulation, you bet your life, an' it looked as if they was going to flood the market.

Well, Sloc.u.m, he owned a third of everything, mind, an' his expression flopped square over like a dry moon, an' stayed points up. He forgot all those years 'at he'd been havin' the muddy end of it, an' after a time he got 'em to call the mine "Sloc.u.m's Luck." The' wasn't no call to hurl such an insult as that into the mouth of an honest, hard-workin' mine, an' naturally, as soon as it was done, the mine laid down in its tracts an' refused to give up another ounce.

They came to a break in the lode an' couldn't find the beginnin' again.

The same twist that had hove one edge out of the ground had unjointed the other. But they had got out a tidy sum already, an' they knew the'

must be a loose end somewhere, so they was anxious to keep their outfit in good order.

Sloc.u.m hadn't swelled clear out of shape with his new fortune, an' when I made myself known to him he had give me a purty tol'able decent sort of a job, where there was more bossin' an' responsibility than brute labor; an' I felt kindly toward him. Winter lasted full four months out there. It was a good ninety miles to the railroad, an' so when the mornin's begun to get frosty every one else scooted for humanity, an'

I, bein' more or less weak-minded, took the job o' watchman, at forty a month an' my needin's. I always was a hog for litachure, so I got a bushel o' libraries an' started in to play it alone.

The' wasn't a blessed thing to do, so I read 'em through by New Years, an' got out of tobacco by the first of February. From that on I begun to think in a circle, an' my intellect creaked like a dry axle before the bluebirds began to sing. Quiet? I could hear the shadows crawlin'

along the side of the house. The snow was seventy-five feet deep in the canyons, so you might say I was duty bound to stay there. As a general rule, I don't shirk breakin' a path, but when the snow is more than fifty feet higher than my head, I'd rather walk fourth or fifth.

When the outfit came back in the spring I was the entire reception committee; but I bet the' never was one more able to do its part.

CHAPTER TEN

A WINTER AT SLOc.u.m'S LUCK

They only brought out about half a gang that summer, an' they kept them probin' around all over the neighborhood; but though they found enough stuff to about pay expenses, they couldn't get back on the main track.

Both the Eastern capitalists showed up along toward fall to see what was doin', an' when it came time to knock off work, they tried to get me to repeat my little performance as watchman.

I thanked 'em for their trustfulness, but I politely declined the honor. I told 'em 'at I was purty tol'able quick-witted, an' it didn't take me four months to study out what I was goin' to say next. But I compromised by sayin' that if they would give me two other fellers for company I'd stay; otherwise they'd have to rustle up some poor devil 'at needed the money. They knew 'at I was reliable, so they agreed; an'

I selected out my two companions in affliction. What I mostly wanted was a heap of variety, an' when the number is limited to two, a feller has to be some choicy; but I reckon I got the best the' was.

There'd been a little light-haired feller there all season, kind o'

gettin' familiar with labor, like. He was no account to work, he couldn't even learn to tie a knot; but he talked kin' o' blotchy, an'

it was divertin' to listen to him. One day we was kiddin' him about bein' so thumby, an' he sez, "That's right, boys, laugh while you can; but I'll have you all between the covers of a book some day, an' then it will be my grin. I ain't swore no everlastin' felicity to the holy cause o' labor; I'm just gettin' local color now."

Next day he fell into a barrel of red paint he was s...o...b..n' on the hotel to keep her from warpin', an' every blessed man in camp pa.s.sed out about six jokes apiece relatin' to local color. He never saddened up none, though, just smiled sorrowful, as though he pitied us, an'

went on tanglin' up everything he touched.

An' then there was another curious speciment there; a tall thin feller, with one o' them lean, chinny faces. He claimed 'at he had been a show actor, but his lungs had given out--claimed he was a tragudian, but Great Scott! he couldn't even turn a handspring.

He said he was recuperatin', an' he sure did hit his liquor purty hard; but I never could make out what he expected to get out of a minin'

camp, 'cause he was full as useless as Local Color. About half the fellers you meet strayin' around out here are a bit one-sided, but we don't care so long as they're peaceable. When you'd guy this one a little stout, he'd fold his arms, throw back his head, an' say, "Laugh, varlets, laugh! Like the cracklin' o' thorns under a pot, is the laughter of fools." This was the brand of langwidge 'at flowed from this one, an' he wasn't no ways stingy with it.

Well, they had kept these two at boys' jobs an' boys' wages, an' when I offered 'em the position of deputy watchmen, they fair jumped at it.

Said Local Color, "It will be a golden opportunity to perpetuate the seething thoughts which crowd upon my brain." Said Hamlet, "I thank thee, sir, for this, thy proposition fair. In sooth I'll try the cold-air cure, and in the majesty of prime-evil silence, I shall make the snow-capped mountains echo to the wonderful rhapsodies of Shakespeare." Well, the' was a super-abundance of cold air an'

prime-evil silence an' snow-capped mountains, an' I didn't care a hang what he did to 'em, so long as it kept me from gettin' everlastin' sick o' my own company.

I never see any company yet 'at wasn't a shade better'n just my own. I knew I could stand these two innocents for four months, an' if they got violent I could rope an' tie 'em. When everybody begun to get ready to pull out, I took the twenty-mule team down to town to get our needin's.

I took the children along with me, an' I sez to 'em, "Now, boys, no drinkin' goes up above through the winter. We simply have to go out an'

get disgusted with it before we start back."

Well, we sure had a work-out. On the sixth day Hamlet, he throws his arm around my neck an' busts out cryin' an' sez, "Happy, it is the inflexible destiny o' the human race to weary of all things mortal, an'

I'm dog-tired o' bein' drunk--an' 'sides, I'm busted."

It turned out that he didn't have any advantage over me an' Locals in this respect, so we went to the company store an' got three bushels o'

nickle libraries, enough grub to do six men six months, enough tobacco to do twelve men a car, an' a little yeller pup 'at we give six bits for. I didn't 'low to run any risks this deal.

When we got back 'most everybody had pulled out, an' the roads was beginnin' to choke up. Sloc.u.m an' the two capitalists was there waitin'

for us, but when all their stuff was loaded on the wagon the' wasn't room for the men; so Miller, the youngest capitalist, who was a bit of a highroller, an' had been shakin' up the coast off an' on, he took off four trunks, an' sez to me, "Happy, if you run out of clothes, here's four trunks-full." Then they hopped on the wagon an' left us alone in our glory.

I reckon, take it all in all, that was about the most florid winter I ever put in, an' it purt' nigh spoilt me for hard work. I did the cookin', the innocents did the ch.o.r.es, an' we got along as bully as a fat bear for a while, livin' in the hotel. The' was a hundred rooms, but we didn't use 'em all. Locals, he wrote most of the time, when he wasn't lookin' at the ceiling an' tryin' to think. Hammy, he walked barefoot in the snow, on' hollered at the snow-capped mountains. I read nickle libraries, an' we didn't care a dang for the Czar of Russia, until along toward Christmas a spark lit in my pile of litachure, an'