Meat was the one thing we now sorely needed to save
the rapidly diminishing supply of hams. Fred said nothing,
but I saw by his look how this trifling accident helped to
depress him. I was ready to cry with vexation. My rifle was
my pride, the stag of my life - my ALTER EGO. It was never
out of my hands; every day I practised at prairie dogs, at
sage hens, at a mark even if there was no game. A few days
before we got to Laramie I had killed, right and left, two
wild ducks, the second on the wing; and now, when so much
depended on it, I could not hit a thing as big as a donkey.
The fact is, I was the worse for illness. I had constant
returns of fever, with bad shivering fits, which did not
improve the steadiness of one's hand. However, we managed to
get a supper. While we were examining the spot where the
antelope had stood, a leveret jumped up, and I knocked him
over with my remaining barrel. We fried him in the one tin
plate we had brought with us, and thought it the most
delicious dish we had had for weeks.
As we lay side by side, smoke curling peacefully from our
pipes, we chatted far into the night, of other days - of
Cambridge, of our college friends, of London, of the opera,
of balls, of women - the last a fruitful subject - and of the
future.
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