Then we draw near the fire and I take my endless mending,
and we talk or read aloud.
Both are very intelligent, and Mr.
Buchan has very extended information and a good deal of insight
into character. Of course our circumstances, the likelihood of
release, the prospects of snow blocking us in and of our supplies
holding out, the sick calves, "Jim's" mood, the possible
intentions of a man whose footprints we have found and traced for
three miles, are all topics that often recur, and few of which
can be worn threadbare.
Letter XV
A whisky slave - The pleasures of monotony - The mountain
lion - "Another mouth to feed" - A tiresome boy - An outcast -
Thanksgiving Day - The newcomer - A literary humbug - Milking a dry
cow - Trout-fishing - A snow-storm - A desperado's den.
ESTES PARK, Sunday.
A trapper passing last night brought us the news that Mr. Nugent
is ill; so, after washing up the things after our late breakfast,
I rode to his cabin, but I met him in the gulch coming down to
see us. He said he had caught cold on the Range, and was
suffering from an old arrow wound in the lung. We had a long
conversation without adverting to the former one, and he told me
some of the present circumstances of his ruined life. It is
piteous that a man like him, in the prime of life, should be
destitute of home and love, and live a life of darkness in a den
with no companions but guilty memories, and a dog which many
people think is the nobler animal of the two.
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