“It’s many years now,” said he in a low, sad tone, “since I left home, and—but that’s nothin’ to do wi’ the pint,” he added quickly. “You see, March, when I first came to this part o’ the world I fell in with a comrade—a trapper—much to my likin’. This trapper had been jilted by some girl, and came away in a passion, detarminin’ never more to return to his native place. I never know’d where he come from, nor the partic’lars of his story, for that was a pint he’d never speak on. I don’t believe I ever know’d his right name. He called himself Adam; that was the only name I ever know’d him by.
“Well, him an’ me became great friends. He lived wi’ a band of Pawnee Injuns, and had married a wife among them; not that she was a pure Injun neither, she was a half-breed. My Mary was their only child; she was a suckin’ babe at that time. Adam had gin her no name when we first met, an’ I remember him askin’ me one day what he should call her; so I advised Mary—an’ that’s how she come to git the name.
“Adam an’ me was always together. We suited each other. For myself, I had ta’en a skunner at mankind, an’ womankind, too; so we lived wi’ the Pawnees, and hunted together, an’ slep’ together when out on the tramp. But one o’ them reptiles took a spite at him, an’ tried by every way he could to raise the Injuns agin’ him, but couldn’t; so he detarmined to murder him.
“One day we was out huntin’ together, an’, being too far from the Pawnee lodges to return that night, we encamped in the wood, an’ biled our kettle—this iron one ye see here. Adam had a kind o’ likin’ for’t, and always carried it at his saddle-bow when he went out o’ horseback. We’d just begun supper, when up comes the Wild-Cat, as he was called—Adam’s enemy—an’ sits down beside us.
“Of course, we could not say we thought he was up to mischief, though we suspected it, so we gave him his supper, an’ he spent the night with us. Nixt mornin’ he bade us good-day, an’ went off. Then Adam said he would go an’ set beaver traps in a creek about a mile off. Bein’ lazy that day, I said I’d lie a bit in the camp. So away he went. The camp was on a hill. I could see him all the way, and soon saw him in the water settin’ his traps.
“Suddenly I seed the Wild-Cat step out o’ the bushes with a bow an’ arrow. I knew what was up. I gave a roar that he might have heard ten miles off, an’ ran towards them. But an arrow was in Adam’s back before he could git to the shore. In a moment more he had the Injun by the throat, an’ the two struggled for life. Adam could ha’ choked him easy, but the arrow in his back let out the blood fast, an’ he could barely hold his own. Yet he strove like a true man. I was soon there, for I nearly burst my heart in that race. They were on the edge of the water. The Wild-Cat had him down, and was tryin’ to force him over the bank.
“I had my big sword wi’ me, an’ hewed the reptile’s head off with it at one blow, sendin’ it into the river, an’ tossin’ the body in after it.
“‘It’s too late,’ says Adam, as I laid him softly on the bank.
“I could see that. The head of the shaft was nearly in his heart. He tried to speak, but could only say, ‘Take care o’ my wife an’ Mary’—then he died, and I buried him there.”
Dick paused, and clenched both hands convulsively as the thought of that black day came back upon him. But the glare in his eye soon melted into a look of sadness.