“Ah—has departed to that mysterious country from whose bourne no traveler returns.”
“Return! I reckon not. Why, pard, he’s dead!”
“Yes, I understand.”
“Oh, you do? Well I thought maybe you might be getting tangled some more. Yes, you see he’s dead again——”
“Again! Why, has he ever been dead before?”
“Dead before? No! Do you reckon a man has got as many lives as a cat? But you bet you, he’s awful dead now, poor old boy, and I wish I’d never seen this day. I don’t want no better friend than Buck Fanshaw. I knowed him by the back; and when I know a man and like him, I freeze to him—you hear me. Take him all round, pard, there never was a bullier man in the mines. No man ever knowed Buck Fanshaw to go back on a friend. But it’s all up, you know, it’s all up. It ain’t no use. They’ve scooped him.”
“Scooped him?”
“Yes—death has. Well, well, well, we’ve got to give him up. Yes, indeed. It’s a kind of a hard world, after all, ain’t it? But pard, he was a rustler! You ought to see him get started once. He was a bully boy with a glass eye! Just spit in his face and give him room according to his strength, and it was just beautiful to see him peel and go in. He was the worst son of a thief that ever drawed breath. Pard, he was on it! He was on it bigger than an Injun!”
“On it? On what?”
“On the shoot. On the shoulder. On the fight, you understand. He didn’t give a continental for any body. Beg your pardon, friend, for coming so near saying a cuss-word—but you see I’m on an awful strain, in this palaver, on account of having to cramp down and draw everything so mild. But we’ve got to give him up. There ain’t any getting around that, I don’t reckon. Now if we can get you to help plant him——”