Clara yawned.
"Yes, he was rather a fortunate discovery," she said, "but, Jack, we really ought to take a literary magazine."
THE MAN WITHOUT A PENSION
THE MAN WITHOUT A PENSION
He was a dapper little man with a gray pointed beard, and he wore knickerbockers and russet hunting gaiters, nearly new. A jaunty Alpine hat was perched upon his head, and as he pursued his cautious way along the cañon's edge it would be hard to fancy anyone less in touch with his surroundings. He seemed uncertain of the trail, mistrustful of himself, or unaccustomed to mountain atmosphere, for within the last hundred yards of the camp he paused in every dozen steps to listen or to recover breath.
There was no sound anywhere except the moan of pine trees, and no motion but the perpetual trembling in the aspen undergrowth. The greater trees nearly met above the cañon; the lesser clung along its brink, leaning far out to catch the sun and send broken lights and colors to the water far below. Contrasting with the unchanging twilight and boundless solitude of the forest, the meadow where the tents were pitched seemed to blaze with light, and the three small shelters took on the importance of a settlement, whose visible inhabitants consisted of a pair of mountain magpies possessed of an idle spirit of investigation.