"Warmish," he said.
"That's what, right warmish," the proprietor replied affably, and now the man with the ear-rings, having apparently come to the end of his meditations, stepped lightly off into the loose sand and Laughlin jogged me with his elbow and nodded to me, rolling his eyes toward the departing man as though to say, "Take a good look at him, and when he is out of earshot I shall tell you of him." This was precisely the proprietor's meaning.
"That's Apache Kid," he said softly at last, and when Apache Kid had gone from sight he turned again to me and remarked, with the air of a man making an astounding disclosure:
"That's Apache Kid, and he's in this here story of the Lost Cabin. Yap, that's what they call him, though he ain't the real original, of course. The real original was hanged down in Lincoln County, New Mexico, about twenty-five year back. Hanged at the age of twenty-one he was, and had killed twenty-one men, which is an interesting fact to consider. That's the way with names. I know a fellow they call Texas Jack yet, but the real original died long ago. I mind the original. Omohundro was his correct name; as quiet a man as you want to see, Jack B. Omohundro, with eyes the colour of a knife-blade. But I 'm driftin' away. What you want to get posted up on is the Lost Cabin Mine."
He jerked his chair closer to me, tapped me on the knee, and cleared his throat; but I seemed fated not to hear the truth of that mystery yet, for Mrs. Laughlin stood again on the verandah.
"Abraham," she said in an aggrieved tone, "there ain't nobody in the bar."
Up jumped Abraham, his whole bearing, from his bowed head to his bent knees, apologetic.
"I was just tellin' this gentleman a story," he explained.
"I 'm astonished at you then," she said. "An old man like you a-telling your stories to a young lad like that! You 'd be doin' better slippin' into the bar and takin' a smell at that there barkeep's breath."
Mr. Laughlin turned to me.