Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1913-02-16


won had now become active and aggressive partzans
They began to shake fists at another and the battle
would have been resumed IN an instant II the trader had
not eaped out to the middle of the floor and asserted
himself.
"Stop!" he shouted "You stop this fighting in my
place. or anywhere around it! won't have it! I'm the
only officer of the law in this country and II
kill any that goes any further with it! That goes
THERE was no reconciliation the next morning
Men who had been in the habit of bidding
other goodby and exchanging that tmeworn but always
good WISH "Hope they come your way" turned and
trudged gr1nly and silently off into the forest And
grimy and silently Canada Charley took the trail with
huge pack on his back; while not out of sight, and
following, the with whom for years he had
been friends.
l think that Charley proved the better man of the
two for after he made his cabin that night and threw
his pack the floor, and lighted his fire, and cooked
his meal he again slipped his tired feet into his
thongs and took out the white. He went directly
to old Bens cabin and found the latter in bed In
spouse to Charleys insistent knocking old Ben crawed
out and opened the door.
whats up?' he said "Must be somethin pretty
gosh-awful bad"
Charley went over in front of the fireplace and pulled
off his mittens cap and mackinaw before he answered
and The Bear kicked the back log and started the fire
into blaze.
"Ben," Charley said in a low, worried voice, dive
Then he sat down and told that wise old man the
whole story. And he didn't spare himself. The Bear
listened quietly, and sensed that Canada Charley
hearsick the loss of friend but also that type
of who will fight grimy for what he considers just
He scarcely knew what to advise and for long
time and stared at the blazing log in the big stone
fireplace, and then shifting his glance, his
habit upward toward the faded picture above 1.-THE
face of the wife who still young and smiling, had left
him. With prodigious gravity he knocked the ashes
from his pipe and spoke.
at looks to me- he said "as if you two boys are
both maxim mistakes. l sort of think that down
at the traders uncalled for And sort of think
YOU agree. HUH"
Charley certain of it.
"And that you want to be friends with Dave again?
HUH"
well orter go my nearest line tomorrow; but
| won't. I'll hustle over and see Dave fust thing IN
the mornin, because faint likely he'll be startin out
Now you just go to bed and leave it to me-.
When Charley got up the next morning, long before
the had faded out of the cold northern sky The
Bear had gone but for old Ben's meditation
to prove unavailing. He got to Dawes cabin by day
light and found him in and i'll tempered. Embittered
by the fight, he insisted two things-that Charley
owed him apology and that he should take his traps
away from the disputed line Finally he agreed to
his traps if Charley apoogzed, because he
too ashamed of himself convinced that the right
was on his side and only wanting an excuse to square
himself in the eyes of those whom Kgore had aroused
to partizanship So The Bears trip about as bad
useless
When he went back across the lake Charley was wait
ing for him, and surmsed that the dispute not
ended He said he would have been willing to the
trap line but wouldn't apologize because it should have
been the other way about SO that now the traps would
stay there if he had to rifle to keep them on the
ground. He went away in huff with The Bear watch
ing him out of sight in the short light of the winter
afternoon and shaking sorrowfu head.
AND Charley didn't remove the traps Yet, as a
n concession neither did he bait them, and there
they stretched away through the forest with its winter
snow useless and idle. Dave slipped over and hem
tore one up it aside hang it in and then
seeing that it set baited put it back and
thereafter kept away from that side of his ground.
Down at the post, when men came in, they fell to
arguing each for the man he believed right. There
were dozen fist fights and one stabbng between the
middle of November and the first week in December
and men who had been speaking quit talking