“Oh, you mean the girl?... Sure, I'm getting over that, except when I drink.”
“Tell us, Jim,” said Kells, curiously.
“Aw, you'll give me the laugh!” retorted Cleve.
“No, we won't unless your story's funny.”
“You can gamble it wasn't funny,” put in Red Pearce.
They all coaxed him, yet none of them, except Kells, was particularly curious; it was just that hour when men of their ilk were lazy and comfortable and full fed and good-humored round the warm, blazing camp-fire.
“All right,” replied Cleve, and apparently, for all his complaisance, a call upon memory had its pain. “I'm from Montana. Range-rider in winter and in summer I prospected. Saved quite a little money, in spite of a fling now and then at faro and whisky.... Yes, there was a girl, I guess yes. She was pretty. I had a bad case over her. Not long ago I left all I had—money and gold and things—in her keeping, and I went prospecting again. We were to get married on my return. I stayed out six months, did well, and got robbed of all my dust.”
Cleve was telling this fabrication in a matter-of-fact way, growing a little less frank as he proceeded, and he paused while he lifted sand and let it drift through his fingers, watching it curiously. All the men were interested and Kells hung on every word.
“When I got back,” went on Cleve, “my girl had married another fellow. She'd given him all I left with her. Then I got drunk. While I was drunk they put up a job on me. It was her word that disgraced me and run me out of town.... So I struck west and drifted to the border.”
“That's not all,” said Kells, bluntly.