Without rising from his seat in the one undamaged chair, he answered: "If it's the storekeeper you mean, I'm him." Then, as an after-thought. "Was they somethin' you wanted?"
Bill resented the implied rebuke in the storekeeper's words even more than he resented the bombardment of tobacco juice which barely missed his boots. Take it all in all he was having a rather rough time of it.
The railway people had refused to stop their fast train at Hilarity for his special benefit, and he had been compelled to get off at the nearest division point, some forty miles to the westward, and continue his journey in the evil-smelling caboose of the local freight-train which crawled jerkily over the rails, and stopped to shunt cars at every siding.
Nearly the whole day had been consumed for the trip, during which time he had sat in the stuffy, superheated car, whose foul air reeked of cheap tobacco and drying garments, and listened to the guffaws of the train-crew as they regaled each other with vile stories and long accounts of revolting personal experiences among the dives of cities.
So now, tired, grimy, and with his head aching dully from the long breathing of foul air, he was in no humor for comprehensive amiability.
He made his few purchases and replied curtly to the questions of the storekeeper. It is doubtful if he would have replied at all but for the fact that he must have information in regard to the whereabouts of Moncrossen's Blood River camp.
There was a roar of merriment, which he answered with a scowl, when he inquired the location of the hotel.
"Jest help yourself, stranger," said Burrage, with a generous sweep of the arm which included all Hilarity not within the confines of the room. "They's about fifty buildin's, cabins, an' shacks along the street, an' you can take your pick. Rent's the cheapest thing they is in Hilarity—jest kick out the rats an' spread your blankets."
It was when Bill stooped to add the gaudy-labeled cans to his pack that Daddy Dunnigan, of the twisted leg, volunteered the bit of advice that fell upon his ears unheeded.
He was openly resentful now, having detected certain smiles, winks, and nudgings with which the assembled men called each other's attention to various details of his clothing and pack.