But no house greeted our eyes,--just a big camp-fire. A lean old man sat on a log-end and surveyed us indifferently. On the ground lay a large canvas-covered pack, apparently unopened. An old saddle lay up against a cedar-trunk. Two old horses grazed near. I was powerfully disappointed. You know misery loves company; so I ventured to say, "Good-evening." He didn't stir, but he grunted, "Hello." I knew then that he was not a fossil, and hope began to stir in my heart. Soon he asked, "Are you goin' somewheres or jist travelin'?" I told him I had started somewhere, but reckoned I must be traveling, as I had not gotten there. Then he said, "My name is Hiram K. Hull. Whose woman are you?" I confessed to belonging to the house of Stewart. "Which Stewart?" he persisted,--"C.R., S.W., or H.C.?" Again I owned up truthfully. "Well," he continued, "what does he mean by letting you gad about in such onconsequential style?"
_Sometimes_ a woman gets too angry to talk. Don't you believe that? No? Well, they do, I assure you, for I was then. He seemed grown to the log. As he had made no move to help me, without answering him I clambered out of the wagon and began to take the horses loose. "Ho!" he said; "are you goin' to camp here?" "Yes, I am," I snapped. "Have you any objections?" "Oh, no, none that won't keep," he assured me. It has always been a theory of mine that when we become sorry for ourselves we make our misfortunes harder to bear, because we lose courage and can't think without bias; so I cast about me for something to be glad about, and the comfort that at least we were safer with a simpleton than near a drunken Mexican came to me; so I began to view the situation with a little more tolerance.
After attending to the horses I began to make the children comfortable. My unwilling host sat silently on his log, drawing long and hard at his stubby old pipe. How very little there was left of our lunch! Just for meanness I asked him to share with us, and, if you'll believe me, he did. He gravely ate bread-rims and scraps of meat until there was not one bit left for even the baby's breakfast. Then he drew the back of his hand across his mouth and remarked, "I should think when you go off on a ja'nt like this you'd have a well-filled mess-box." Again speech failed me.