The half-breed’s grin disappeared, gradually to give place to an expression of amazement.
“You mean to say you come to this town and don’t know what town it is?” he demanded. “Then why you come? What you do here?”
Toppy’s brow corrugated in an expression of deep puzzlement.
“That’s another thing that’s rather puzzling, too, brother,” he replied. “Why did I come? I’d like to know that, too. Like very, very much to know that. Where am I, how did I come here, and why? Three questions I’d like very, very much to have answered.”
He sat for a moment in deep thought, then turned toward the bartender with the pleased look of a man who has found an inspiration.
“I tell you what you do, brother—you answer the first two questions and in the light of that information I’ll see if I can’t ponder out the third.”
The half-breed leaned heavily across the single-plank bar and watched Toppy closely.
“This town is Rail Head,” he said slowly, as if speaking to some one of whose mental capacity he had great doubts. “You come here by last night’s train. You bring the train-crew over to have a drink; then you fall asleep. You been sleeping ever since. Now you remember?”
“Ah!”
The puzzled look went out of Toppy’s eyes.