So the bargain was made, the money paid, and in fifteen minutes the stranger was gone with a little Bear in each pannier of his horse.
Jill was surly and silent; Jack kept up a whining that smote on Lan's heart with a reproachful sound, but he braced himself with, "Guess they're better out of the way; couldn't afford another storeroom racket," and soon the pine forest had swallowed up the stranger, his three led horses, and the two little Bears.
"Well, I'm glad he's gone," said Lan, savagely, though he knew quite well that he was already scourged with repentance. He began to set his shanty in order. He went to the storehouse and gathered the remnants of the provisions. After all, there was a good deal left. He walked past the box where Jack used to sleep. How silent it was! He noted the place where Jack used to scratch the door to get into the cabin, and started at the thought that he should hear it no more, and told himself, with many cuss-words, that he was "mighty glad of it." He pottered about, doing—doing—oh, anything, for an hour or more; then suddenly he leaped on his pony and raced madly down the trail on the track of the stranger. He put the pony hard to it, and in two hours he overtook the train at the crossing of the river.
"Say, pard, I done wrong. I didn't orter sell them little B'ars, leastwise not Jacky. I—I—wall, now, I want to call it off. Here's yer yellow."
"I'm satisfied with my end of it," said the stranger, coldly.
"Well, I ain't," said Lan, with warmth, "an' I want it off."
"Ye're wastin' time if that's what ye come for," was the reply.
"We'll see about that," and Lan threw the gold pieces at the rider and walked over toward the pannier, where Jack was whining joyfully at the sound of the familiar voice.
"Hands up," said the stranger, with the short, sharp tone of one who had said it before, and Lan turned to find himself covered with a .45 navy Colt.