"All I have."
I handed him my cigar case, and the roll of dulcissimus. He snatched the latter from me, and bit into it with the furious eagerness of a wolf.
"Ah, the right sort this!" muttered he to himself. "Ah, young man, or old man—you're an old man, ain't you? How old are you?"
"Two-and-twenty."
He shook his head doubtingly.
"Can hardly believe that. But four days in the prairie, and nothin' to eat. Well, it may be so. But, stranger, if I had had this bit of tobacco only ten days ago—A bit of tobacco is worth a deal sometimes. It might have saved a man's life!"
Again he groaned, and his accents became wild and unnatural.
"I say, stranger!" cried he in a threatening tone. "I say! D'ye see yonder live oak? D'ye see it? It's the Patriarch, and a finer and mightier one you won't find in the prairies, I reckon. D'ye see it?"
"I do see it."
"Ah! you see it," cried he fiercely. "And what is it to you? What have you to do with the Patriarch, or with what lies under it? I reckon you had best not be too curious that way. If you dare take a step under that tree."—He swore an oath too horrible to be repeated.