I do not think that a microscope could have discerned a change in his face. “Oh,” he commented, holding the paper, and fixing it with a critical eye. “You mean this is the one you lent Steve, and he wanted to give me to give back to you. And so them are your own marks.” For a moment more he held it judicially, as I have seen men hold a contract upon whose terms they were finally passing. “Well, you have got it back now, anyway.” And he handed it to me. “Only a piece of it!” I exclaimed, always lightly. And as I took it from him his hand chanced to touch mine. It was cold as ice. “They ain’t through readin’ the rest,” he explained easily. “Don’t you throw it away! After they’ve taken such trouble.” “That’s true,” I answered. “I wonder if it’s Pounds or Ounces I’m indebted to.” Thus we made further merriment as we rode down into the great basin. Before us, the horse and boot tracks showed plain in the soft slough where melted snow ran half the day. “If it’s a paper chase,” said the Virginian, “they’ll drop no more along here.” “Unless it gets dark,” said I. “We’ll camp before that. Maybe we’ll see their fire.” We did not see their fire. We descended in the chill silence, while the mushroom rocks grew far and the sombre woods approached. By a stream we got off where two banks sheltered us; for a bleak wind cut down over the crags now and then, making the pines send out a great note through the basin, like breakers in a heavy sea. But we made cosey in the tent. We pitched the tent this night, and I was glad to have it shut out the mountain peaks. They showed above the banks where we camped; and in the starlight their black shapes rose stark against the sky. They, with the pines and the wind, were a bedroom too unearthly this night. And as soon as our supper dishes were washed we went inside to our lantern and our game of cribbage. “This is snug,” said the Virginian, as we played. “That wind don’t get down here.” “Smoking is snug, too,” said I. And we marked our points for an hour, with no words save about the cards. “I’ll be pretty near glad when we get out of these mountains,” said the Virginian. “They’re most too big.” The pines had altogether ceased; but their silence was as tremendous as their roar had been. “I don’t know, though,” he resumed. “There’s times when the plains can be awful big, too.” Presently we finished a hand, and he said, “Let me see that paper.” He sat reading it apparently through, while I arranged my blankets to make a warm bed. Then, since the paper continued to absorb him, I got myself ready, and slid between my blankets for the night. “You’ll need another candle soon in that lantern,” said I.