"'To live,' says he, 'in the great peace of these enormous spaces--to spread God's clean sky above you and pass into a sleep where this sweet air shall hush me through the night, like the wind from angels' wings. With what a sick longing have I looked for this! "'That's it!' says I. 'Pardner, you've struck it. There ain't one man in a thousand thinks of tuckin' the sky around him when he turns in, but many a time when I've shoveled the last batch of centipedes and tarantulas into the fire, petted a side-winder good-night, and fired a farewell shot at a scalplock vanishin' over the hill, I've thought that same thing. Oh! the soothin' gooley-woo of windin' yourself up in a bright-colored sunset and lyin' down to peaceful dreams! I sleep too hard to remember about the angels' wings.' "I spoke so earnest he swallowed me whole. 'Centipedes and tarantulas,' says he, musin' (evidently he hadn't figured on 'em); 'an' what is a "side-winder," Mr. Scraggs?' "'A "side-winder," sir,' says I, 'is a rattlesnake who travels on the bias, as I've heard my wife remark about her clothes--he's a kind of Freemason; he lets you in on the level and out on the queer." "'Rattlesnake?' says he; 'ha--hum--rattlesnake, yes, yes, yes--not dangerous, I hope?' "'Oh, no!' says I. 'He bites you up somewhat, but it's only play.' "Right here he got off a joke. It took some time--I see it comin.' "Rather dangerous _play_, that, Mr. Scraggs, heh?' says he. 'Ha, ha, ha!' "Well, I reckon I enjoyed that joke as much as he did--the two of us laughed for five minutes. But, somehow, he looked so simple and innocent and foolish, my heart bucked on guyin' him. There wasn't no bad pretensions about him; it was only that the old ladies had told him he was a wonder so long, he'd been more'n a man if he hadn't come to believe it--it's pretty medium hard to keep to cases under them conditions. That's what made him cough so deep and important, and stand there with a frown on his brow, lookin' as if he knew a heap more than he could understand. "I side-stepped. 'I gather,' says I, 'you want to go campin',' and you want me to pilot you?' "He just beamed on having the puzzle solved so simple, 'That's it exactly,' says he. "'I guessed it almost from the first,' says I. 'Well, we want a team and blankets and a camp kit; that'll cost something.' "'It isn't a question of cost,' said he, pulling out a cucumber and skinnin' much money off the top of it. 'You take that and secure what we need.' "'I'll do what's right by you,' says I, and meant it. That afternoon the Rev. Percival Mervin and Mr. E. G. W. Scraggs pulled out with a team of mules for parts unknown. I had no more idee what kind of land we were runnin' into than Percival himself; howsomever, one country's a great deal like another, after all. But I gave him the history as we journeyed--oh, sure! Hadn't he come out for pleasure?