Pierce laughed.  “It’s the result of a good example.  A fellow was decent to me just now.”

“This is the kind of work that gives a man dead babies,” groaned the stranger.  “And these darned trail-hogs!” He ground his teeth vindictively. “‘Get out of the way!’ ‘Hurry up, old man!’ ’Step lively, grandpa!’ That’s what they say.  They snap at your heels like coyotes.  Hurry?  You can’t force your luck!” The speaker struggled into a sitting posture and in an apologetic tone explained:  “I dassent lay down or I’ll get rheumatism.  Tough guys--frontiersmen—­Pah!” He spat out the exclamation with disgust, then closed his eyes again and sank back against his burden.  “Coyotes!  That’s what they are!  They’d rob a carcass, they’d gnaw each other’s bones to get through ahead of the ice.”

Up out of the chasm below came a slow-moving file of Indian packers.  Their eyes were bent upon the ground, and they stepped noiselessly into one another’s tracks.  The only sound they made came from their creaking pack-leathers.  They paused briefly to breathe and to take in their surroundings, then they went on and out of sight.

When they had disappeared the stranger spoke in a changed tone.  “Poor devils!  I wonder what they’ve done.  And you?” he turned to Phillips.  “What sins have you committed?”

“Oh, just the ordinary ones.  But I don’t look at it that way.  This is a sort of a lark for me, and I’m having a great time.  It’s pretty fierce, I’ll admit, but—­I wouldn’t miss it for anything.  Would you?”

“Would I?  In a minute!  You’re young, I’m old.  I’ve got rheumatism and—­a partner.  He can’t pack enough grub for his own lunch, and I have to do it all.  He’s a Jonah, too—­born on Friday, or something.  Last night somebody stole a sack of our bacon.  Sixty pounds, and every pound had cost me sweat!” Again the speaker ground his teeth vindictively.  “Lord!  I’d like to catch the fellow that did it!  I’d take a drop of blood for every drop of sweat that bacon cost.  Have you lost anything?”

“I haven’t anything to lose.  I’m packing for wages to earn money enough to buy an outfit.”

After a brief survey of Phillips’ burden, the stranger said, enviously:  “Looks like you wouldn’t have to make more than a trip or two.  I wish I could pack like you do, but I’m stove up.  At that, I’m better than my partner!  He couldn’t carry a tune.”  There was a pause.  “He eats good, though; eats like a hired man and he snores so I can’t sleep.  I just lie awake nights and groan at the joints and listen to him grow old.  He can’t even guard our grub-pile.”

“The Vigilantes will put a stop to this stealing,” Pierce ventured.

“Think so?  Who’s going to keep an eye on them?  Who’s going to strangle the Stranglers?  Chances are they’re the very ones that are lifting our grub.  I know these citizens’ committees.”  Whatever the physical limitations of the rheumatic Argonaut, it was plain that his temper was active and his resentment strong.