About eleven o’clock while the others had deserted camp temporarily for some reason or other, I was lounging upon an odorous bed of pine needles.  The sun shone warmly, the sky gleamed bright azure through the openings of the great trees, a dry west breeze murmured through the forest.  I was lying on my bed musing idly and watching a yellow woodpecker when suddenly I felt a severe bite on my shoulder.  I imagined an ant had bitten me through my shirt.  In a moment or so afterward I received, this time on my breast, another bite that left no room for imagination.  There was some kind of an animal inside my shirt, and one that made a mosquito, black-fly, or flea seem tame.

Suddenly a thought swept on the heels of my indolent and rather annoying realization.  Could I have gotten from the Navajo what Jim and Jones so characteristically called “’em”?  I turned cold all over.  And on the very instant I received another bite that burned like fire.

The return of my companions prevented any open demonstration of my fears and condition of mind, but I certainly swore inwardly.  During the dinner hour I felt all the time as if I had on a horsehair shirt with the ends protruding toward my skin, and, in the exaggerated sensitiveness of the moment, made sure “’em” were chasing up and down my back.

After dinner I sneaked off into the woods.  I remembered that Emett had said there was only one way to get rid of “’em,” and that was to disrobe and make a microscopical search of garments and person.  With serious mind and murderous intent I undressed.  In the middle of the back of my jersey I discovered several long, uncanny, gray things.

“I guess I got ’em,” I said gravely.

Then I sat on a pine log in a state of unadorned nature, oblivious to all around, intent only on the massacre of the things that had violated me.  How much time flew I could not guess.  Great loud “Haw-haws!” roused me to consternation.  There behind me stood Jones and Emett shaking as if with the ague.

“It’s not funny!” I shouted in a rage.  I had the unreasonable suspicion that they had followed me to see my humiliation.  Jones, who cracked a smile about as often as the equinoxes came, and Emett the sober Mormon, laughed until they cried.

“I was—­just wondering—­what your folks would—­think—­if they—­saw you—­now,” gurgled Jones.

That brought to me the humor of the thing, and I joined in their mirth.

“All I hope is that you fellows will get ’em’ too,” I said.

“The Good Lord preserve me from that particular breed of Navvy’s,” cried Emett.

Jones wriggled all over at the mere suggestion.  Now so much from the old plainsman, who had confessed to intimate relations with every creeping, crawling thing in the West, attested powerfully to the unforgettable singularity of what I got from Navvy.

I returned to camp determined to make the best of the situation, which owing to my failure to catch all of the gray devils, remained practically unchanged.  Jim had been acquainted with my dilemma, as was manifest in his wet eyes and broad grin with which he greeted me.