after your Army better. There was
mutiny in the midst, and you didn’t know
—you damned engine-driving, plate-laying,
missionary’s-pass-hunting hound!’ He sat
upon a rock and called me every foul name
he could lay tongue to. I was too heart-sick
to care, though it was all his foolishness
that brought the smash.

“‘I’m sorry, Dan,’ says I, ‘but there’s no
accounting for natives. This business is our
Fifty-Seven. Maybe we’ll make something
out of it yet, when we’ve got to Bashkai.’

“‘Let’s get to Bashkai, then,’ says Dan,
‘and, by God, when I come back here again
I’ll sweep the valley so there isn’t a bug in
a blanket left!’

“‘We walked all that day, and all that
night Dan was stumping up and down on
the snow, chewing his beard and muttering
to himself.

“‘There’s no hope o’ getting clear,’ said
Billy Fish. ‘The priests will have sent
runners to the villages to say that you are
only men. Why didn’t you stick on as gods
till things was more settled? I’m a dead
man,’ says Billy Fish, and he throws himself