"These are the Alps of America," he observed, "so my hat is fitting."
"It doesn't even fit you," said Drinkard.
Forests of lodgepole pine and spruce lay below them. Already the resort town seemed a toy settlement at the edge of the valley, and the sagebrush world stretched away east to the horizon. To the north, the big peaks of the range tumbled in a massive, orderly row, with lakes flashing along their bases and a vast and timbered plateau rearing up beyond.
It was West, good American West, twentieth century and solid, with clean cold mountain air, yellow sunlight on the cliffs and snowfields above. As if by signal, both men turned their gazes upward. The cutback was a vantage point from which could be seen the jumble of ridges and crags surmounted by the glistening white expanse of Bighorn Glacier and, higher still, the seamed front of the eastern face of the mountain, tapering upward to the pinnacle of the peak.
The men swung up their pack-sacks and shook hands.
"Good luck, friend," said John Drinkard. "Let's go and see if our names are still on the register up there."
"Good luck," said Evers. "To-night we'll be up where the lights are. Punch me if you see one first."
"Lights, nuts," John Drinkard said. "There'll be none while we're on the peak. Five bucks says so."
Evers raised his eyebrows. "I'm not a rich man, but I love a sporting chance. Here's my five. Where'll we put 'em?"
Drinkard fumbled in his jacket pocket, brought out a tobacco tin. He poured the remaining tobacco into a pouch and held out the tin.