“Good bye!” she said. “We shall remember each other kindly.”
“Yes, gentlemen,” said Mr. Clitheroe. “This has been quite the pleasantest episode of our journey. You must not forget us when you are roaming through this region again.”
He said this with his light, cheerful manner. They turned away. It seemed as if Death arose and parted us. We followed at a distance and watched them safe to their wagon. The night wind had risen, and went sighing over the desert reaches, bringing with it the distant howling of wolves.
“Do not speak to me,” said Brent, “I will talk to you by and by.”
He left me and went toward our horses. It had been imprudent to leave them so long at night, with bad spirits about.
I looked into the fort again. The dancers had gone. Bottery was fumbling drunkenly over his fiddle. A score of men were within the house carousing. Old Bridger’s whiskey had evidently flowed freely. In one corner Larrap had unrolled a greasy faro-cloth and was dealing. Murker backed him. They were winning largely. They bagged their winnings out of sight, as fast as they fell in. Sizzum, rather to my surprise, was a little excited with liquor, and playing recklessly, losing sovereigns by the handful. As he lost, he became furious. He struck Larrap in the face and called him a cheat. Larrap gave him an ugly look, and then, assuming a boozy indifference, caught Sizzum by the hand and vowed he was his best friend. Murker kept aloof from the dispute. The game began again. Again Sizzum and the Mormons lost. Again Sizzum slapped the dealer, and, catching the faro-cloth, tore it in two. The two gamblers saw that they were in danger. They had kept themselves sober and got the others drunk for such a crisis. They hurried out of the way. Sizzum and his brother saints chased them; but presently, losing sight of them in the dusk, they staggered off toward camp, singing uproariously. Their leader on this festival had somewhat forgotten the dignity of the apostle and captain.
This low rioting was doubly disgusting to me, after the sad evening with our friends. I found Sizzum more offensive as a man of the world than as a saint. I say man of the world, because the gambling scenes of nominal gentlemen are often just as hateful, if more decorous, than those of that night. I walked slowly off toward camp, sorrowful and sick at heart. Baseness and vulgarity had never seemed to me so base and vulgar till now.
I suddenly heard a voice in the bushes. It was Larrap. He was evidently persuading his comrade to some villany. I caught a suspicious word or two.
“Ah!” thought I, “you want our horses. We will see to that.”
I walked softly by. Brent was seated by the embers of a camp-fire, cowered in a heap, like a cold Indian. He raised his face. All the light had gone out of him. This trouble had suddenly worn into his being, like the shirt of Nessus, and poisoned his life.