“
Well, boys,” said Swift, the next day after breakfast, “I wisht ye could stay longer with me, but I reckon ye got to be on your way, so I’ll just wish ye well and go about my planting.”
“So long, friend,” said Uncle Dick, as they parted. “We’ll see you from time to time. When the railroad gets through we’ll all be neighbors in here.”
“Sure,” said the old man, none too happily. “It’s a fright how close things has got together sence I packed north from the Columby thirty year ago. Well, I hope you’ll get some trout where you camp to-night. You’d ought to go up on my mountain and ketch some of them lake-trout. I dun’ no’ where they come from, for there ain’t nothing like ’em in no other lake in these mountains. But I reckon they was always in there, wasn’t they?”
“Certainly they were,” answered Uncle Dick. “I know about those trout. They tell me they are just like the lake-trout of the Great Lakes. But we can’t stop for them to-day. I’ll promise the camp some rainbow-trout for supper, though—at least for to-morrow night.”
“I know where ye mean,” said the old man, smiling; “it’s that little lake off the Miette trail. Plenty o’ rainbows in there.”
“We’ll camp opposite that lake to-night.”
“And pass my town site this morning, eh? Wish it well for me. If I’ve got to be civilized I’m going to be plumb civilized. Well, so long.”
They all shook hands, and the little pack-train turned off up the north-bound trail.