"Certain sure; I've another," returned the ranger, curtly.
It was hardly more than sunrise as they mounted their ponies and started
on their trail, which led sharply upward after they left the canon. The
wind was strong and stinging cold. Over the high peaks the gray-black
vapor was rushing, and farther away a huge dome of cloud was advancing
like an army in action. It was all in the day's work of the ranger, but
the plainsman behind him turned timorous eyes toward the sky. "It looks
owly," he repeated. "I didn't know I was going so high--Gregg didn't say
the camp was so near timber-line."
"You've cut out a lonesome job for yourself," Ross assured him, "and if
you can find anything else to do you'd better give this up and go back."
"I'm used to being lonesome," the stranger said, "but I can't stand the
cold and the wet as I used to. I never was a mountaineer."
Taking pity on the shivering man, Cavanagh turned off the trail into a
sheltered nook behind some twisted pine-trees. "How do you expect to take
care of your sheep a thousand feet higher than this?" he demanded as they
entered the still place, where the sun shone warm.
"That's what I'm asking myself," replied Edwards. He slipped from his
horse and crouched close to the rock. "My blood is mostly ditch-water,
seems like. The wind blows right through me."
"How do you happen to be reduced to herding sheep? You look like a man who
has seen better days."
Edwards, chafing his thin fingers to warm them, made reluctant answer:
"It's a long story, Mr. Ranger, and it concerns a whole lot of other
people--some of them decent folks--so I'd rather not go into it."
"John Barleycorn was involved, I reckon."
"Sure thing--he's generally always in it."
"You'd better take my gloves--it's likely to snow in half an hour. Go
ahead--I'm a younger man than you are."
The other made a decent show of resistance, but finally accepted the
offer, saying: "You certainly are white to me. I want to apologize for
making that attempt to sneak away that night--I had a powerful good reason
for not staying any longer."