Page:November Joe.pdf/75

 warm for him till he came back from the funeral. I gave him ten days to get through with his spree. Well, it was along about four o'clock when I paid him off, and I made no doubt he'd sleep the night in the camp and get away at dawn; but that is just what he did n't do. Something I'd said annoyed him, and after telling the cook his opinion of me, and saying he would n't sleep another night in a camp where I was boss, he legged out for the settlement."

"By himself?"

"Yes, alone. Next morning, bright and early, he was back again, and this was the yarn he slung me. He'd made about eight miles when it came on darkish, and he decided to camp just beyond where we did the most of our timber cut last year. The night was fine, and he had only his turkey (bundle) and a blanket with him, so he went to the side of the trail at Perkins's Clearing, and lay down beside a fire which he built against a rock with spruces behind it. He slept at once, and remembers nothing more until he was started awake by a voice shouting at him. He sat up blinking, but the talk he heard soon fetched his eyes open.