“Gawd a’mighty!” he flung out desperately, “how I want—­whisky!”

Truedale saw the wildness in the old man’s eyes—­saw the trembling and twitching of the outstretched hands, and feared what might be the result of trouble and enforced sobriety.  He pulled a large flask from his pocket and offered it.

“Here!” he said, “take a swallow of this and pull yourself together.”

Greyson, with a cry, seized the liquor and drained every drop before Truedale could control him.

“God bless yo’!” whined Greyson, sinking back into his chair, “bless and—­and keep yo’!”

Truedale dared not leave the house though his soul recoiled from the sight before him.  He waited an hour, watching the effect of the stimulant.  Greyson grew mellow after a time—­at peace with the world; he smiled foolishly and became maudlinly familiar.  Finally, Truedale approached him again.  He bent over him and shook him sharply.

“Did you tell me—­the truth—­about—­Nella-Rose?” he whispered to the sagging, blear-eyed creature.

“Yes, sir!” moaned Peter, “I sho’ did!”

And Truedale did not reflect that when Greyson was-drunk—­he lied!

Truedale never recalled clearly how he spent the hours between the time he left Greyson’s until he knocked on the door of White’s cabin; but it was broad daylight and bitingly cold when Jim flung the door open and looked at the stranger with no idea, for a moment, that he had ever seen him before.  Then, putting his hand out wonderingly, he muttered: 

“Gawd!” and drew Truedale in.  Breakfast was spread on the table; the dogs lay before the blazing fire.

“Eat!” commanded Jim, “and keep yer jaws shet except to put in food.”

Conning attempted the feat but made a pitiful showing.

“Come to stay on?”

White’s curiosity was betraying him and the sympathy in his eyes filled Truedale with a mad desire to take this “God’s man” into his confidence.

“No, Jim.  I’ve come to pack and go back to—­to my job!”

“Gosh! it can’t be much of a job if you can tackle it—­lookin’ like what you do!”

“I’ve been tramping for—­for days, old man!  Rather overdone the thing.  I’m not so bad as I look.”

“Glad to hear it!” laconically.

“I’ll put up with you to-night, Jim, if you’ll take me in.”  Truedale made an effort to smile.

“Provin’ there ain’t any hard feeling?”

“There never was, White.  I—­understood.”

“Shake!”

They got through the day somehow.  The crust was forming over Truedale’s suffering; he no longer had any desire to let even White break through it.  Once, during the afternoon, the sheriff spoke of Nella-Rose and without flinching Truedale listened.

“That gal will have Burke eatin’ out o’ her hand in no time.  Lawson is all right at the kernel, all he needed was some one ter steady him.  Once I made sure he’d married the gal, I felt right easy in my mind.”