His guess had been a good one. Cig had been brought up on the East River. He had served time in the penitentiaries of three States and expected to test the hospitality of others. Just now he was moving westward because the East was too hot for him. He and a pal had done a job at Jersey City during which they had been forced to croak a guy. Hence his unwilling expedition to the Rockies. Never before had he been farther from the Atlantic than Buffalo, and the vast uninhabited stretches of the West bored and appalled him. He was homesick for the fetid dumps of New York. The corner of his mouth lifted in a sneer. “Wot’ell would any one want to cross this Gawd-forsaken country fifteen times for unless he was bughouse?” “If you read the papes you’d know that travel is a lib’ral ejucation. Difference between a man an’ a tree is that one’s got legs to move around with. You ginks on the East Side act like you’re anchored to the Batt’ry an’ the Bowery. Me, I was born there, but I been batterin’ on the road ever since I was knee-high to a duck. A fellow’s got to throw his feet if he wants to learn,” York announced dogmatically. There was obvious insult in Cig’s half-closed eyes. “’S at what learned you all youse know?” he asked. “Don’t get heavy, young feller,” advised the blanket stiff. “I’ve knew guys to stay healthy by layin’ off me.” The young man cooking breakfast barked a summons. “Come an’ get it.” The tramps moved forward to eat, forgetting for the moment their incipient quarrel. Into tin cups and plates the cook poured coffee and stew. In his light clean build, slender but well-packed, was the promise of the athlete. His movements disappointed this expectation. He slouched, dragging the worn shoes through the cracks of which the flesh was visible. Of the three, he was the only one that was ragged. The coat he wore, which did not match the trousers, was at the last extremity. One might have guessed his age at twenty-three or four. If it had not been for the sullen expression in the eyes and the smoldering discontent of the face, he might have been good-looking. The reddish hair was short, crisp, and curly, the eyes blue as the Colorado summer sky above, the small head well-shaped and beautifully poised on the sloping column of the neck. Yet the impression he made on observers was not a pleasant one. His good points were marred by the spirit that found outlet in a sullen manner that habitually grudged the world a smile. He had the skin pigment of the blond, and in the untempered sun of the Rockies should have been tanned to a rich red-brown. Instead, the skin was clammily unhealthy. The eyes were dulled and expressionless. York ate wolfishly, occasionally using the sleeve of his coat for a napkin. He talked, blatantly and continuously. Cig spoke only at rare intervals, the cook not at all. Within the silent man there simmered a nausea of disgust that included himself and all the universe in which he moved.