The Return of the Mucker | Page 9

travel double, then," said the poetical one. "My name's Bridge."
"And mine's Billy. Here, shake," and Byrne extended his hand.
"Until one of us gets wearied of the other's company," said Bridge.
"You're on," replied Billy. "Let's turn in."
"Good," exclaimed Bridge. "I wonder what's keeping James. He should

have been here long since to turn down my bed and fix my bath."
Billy grinned and rolled over on his side, his head uphill and his feet
toward the fire. A couple of feet away Bridge paralleled him, and in
five minutes both were breathing deeply in healthy slumber.
CHAPTER III
"FIVE HUNDRED DOLLARS REWARD"
"'WE KEPT a-rambling all the time. I rustled grub, he rustled rhyme,'"
quoted Billy Byrne, sitting up and stretching himself.
His companion roused and came to one elbow. The sun was topping the
scant wood behind them, glinting on the surface of the little creek. A
robin hopped about the sward quite close to them, and from the branch
of a tree a hundred yards away came the sweet piping of a song bird.
Farther off were the distance-subdued noises of an awakening farm.
The lowing of cows, the crowing of a rooster, the yelping of a happy
dog just released from a night of captivity.
Bridge yawned and stretched. Billy rose to his feet and shook himself.
"This is the life," said Bridge. "Where you going?"
"To rustle grub," replied Billy. "That's my part o' the sketch."
The other laughed. "Go to it," he said. "I hate it. That's the part that has
come nearest making me turn respectable than any other. I hate to ask
for a hand-out."
Billy shrugged. He'd done worse things than that in his life, and off he
trudged, whistling. He felt happier than he had for many a day. He
never had guessed that the country in the morning could be so
beautiful.
Behind him his companion collected the material for a fire, washed
himself in the creek, and set the tin can, filled with water, at the edge of

the kindling, and waited. There was nothing to cook, so it was useless
to light the fire. As he sat there, thinking, his mind reverted to the red
mark upon Billy's wrist, and he made a wry face.
Billy approached the farmhouse from which the sounds of awakening
still emanated. The farmer saw him coming, and ceasing his activities
about the barnyard, leaned across a gate and eyed him, none too
hospitably.
"I wanna get something to eat," explained Billy.
"Got any money to pay for it with?" asked the farmer quickly.
"No," said Billy; "but me partner an' me are hungry, an' we gotta eat."
The farmer extended a gnarled forefinger and pointed toward the rear
of the house. Billy looked in the direction thus indicated and espied a
woodpile. He grinned good naturedly.
Without a word he crossed to the corded wood, picked up an ax which
was stuck in a chopping block, and, shedding his coat, went to work.
The farmer resumed his chores. Half an hour later he stopped on his
way in to breakfast and eyed the growing pile that lay beside Billy.
"You don't hev to chop all the wood in the county to get a meal from
Jed Watson," he said.
"I wanna get enough for me partner, too," explained Billy.
"Well, yew've chopped enough fer two meals, son," replied the farmer,
and turning toward the kitchen door, he called: "Here, Maw, fix this
boy up with suthin' t'eat--enough fer a couple of meals fer two on 'em."
As Billy walked away toward his camp, his arms laden with milk,
butter, eggs, a loaf of bread and some cold meat, he grinned rather
contentedly.
"A year or so ago," he mused, "I'd a stuck 'em up fer this, an' thought I
was smart. Funny how a feller'll change--an' all fer a skirt. A skirt that

belongs to somebody else now, too. Hell! what's the difference,
anyhow? She'd be glad if she knew, an' it makes me feel better to act
like she'd want. That old farmer guy, now. Who'd ever have taken him
fer havin' a heart at all? Wen I seen him first I thought he'd like to sic
the dog on me, an' there he comes along an' tells 'Maw' to pass me a
hand-out like this! Gee! it's a funny world. She used to say that most
everybody was decent if you went at 'em right, an' I guess she knew.
She knew most everything, anyway. Lord, I wish she'd been born on
Grand Ave., or I on Riverside Drive!"
As Billy walked up to his waiting companion, who had touched a
match to the firewood as he sighted the numerous packages in the
forager's arms, he was repeating, over and