Page:Honore Willsie--Judith of the godless valley.djvu/133

. It was, it seemed, easily the first child ever born in Lost Chief, not excepting Little Marion who had been a wonderful baby herself.

Douglas listened, eating his breakfast grimly the while, filled with an embarrassed consternation at last beholding his mentor with, as Peter had said, his outer skin off. This, then, was what Charleton really wanted; not whiskey, or promiscuous women, or wild horses, or Omar Khayham. What he wanted was a son, bone of his bone, flesh of his flesh, to carry on his name. And yet what had Charleton ever done to that name except to besmirch it? For Douglas now in his heart had no illusions about the proper nomenclature for his mentor's mysterious little deals.

"Charleton," he demanded suddenly, "do you want the kid to grow up to be just like you?"

Charleton looked at Douglas in astonishment. "Like me? Listen, Doug, old-timer, I'm going to spend the rest of my life licking out of him anything I see in him like me!"

Douglas gave up in despair and went out to finish the chores.

It was a disjointed day, of course. In the afternoon Charleton went to a choice gathering of spirits at the post-office; and Douglas, feeling particularly lonely and unsettled, rode up the south trail after three of Charleton's young mules which had strayed. He felt somehow that, with the dereliction of Charleton, the last hold he had on reality had gone.