Page:Triangles of life, and other stories.djvu/258

 came to cotton to him. I ain't goin' to ask neither, but if it goes much farther it'll be a case of either him or me."

"You wait, Jim," said Bob, quietly. "I've got my reasons, and I might tell you afterwards."

"Oh, orlright. I don't want to know."

They said little all day, except a word or two, now and again, with reference to matches, the direction, and the distance to water, for they were on the outside track from the river, and they were very quiet by the camp-fire, and turned in early. Cooney made his camp some distance from the fire, and Jim some distance from—Bob they lay as at the points of a triangle, as it happened; a common triangle of life.

Next day it was much the same, but that night, while Bob was walking up and down, as he often did, even after a long day's tramp, Jim, tired of silence, stretched himself, and said to the silent Cooney—

"Well, Cooney! What'yer got on your mind? Writin' poetry, eh? What's the trouble all this time, old horse?"

And Cooney answered quietly, and the reverse of offensively—

"Wotter yer care?"

"Wotyer say?"

"Wotter yer care?"

"Wotyer say that for?"

"Oh, it's only a sayin' I have."

That hopelessly widened the breach, if there could be said to have been a breach, between Jim and Cooney, and increased Jim's irritability towards his