The Lonesome Trail. John G. Neihardt

was the last word that day. Up to this time the weather had been rather too warm for winter—an ominous sort of a warm, you know. A mist hung over the country, drifting with a light wind from the southeast. During the night the wind whipped into the northwest, and in the morning we had a genuine frank old blizzard howling around us; one of those fierce old boys that nobody cares to face. We had camped in a wooded nook on the south side of the river bluffs and were pretty well protected, so I decided to lay up there until things brightened up a bit.

      The man, for I had not yet learned his name, which was not necessary, as the mail I carried attended to that, volunteered to gather wood; and so I lay in the tent near the fire that roared in front, smoking my pipe and swapping cusses with myself on account of the delay.

      After a while the man came in with a big arm load of wood, whistling merrily. “Well, you beat ’em all,” I said. “I say a man who can whistle like that on his last trip is a game one. What’s your name and who are you? Here, want to smoke?”

      I gave him my pipe. He took it and blew rings meditatively for a while. “Well,” said he, “the name doesn’t matter much, and I’m the fellow who’s elected to be elevated!”

      We both laughed strangely, and I began to open my stock of yarns, truthful and otherwise, to relieve the tedium of the day. I had told a number of stories when the man seemed to brighten up all at once. His eyes became on a sudden unusually brilliant.

      “I know a story that’s a fact,” said he. “It’s about a friend of mine—one of the best friends I ever had, I reckon. At least he never went back on me. Shall I tell it?”

      “Go ahead,” said I.

      And this is the story he told me:

      “My friend’s name is Narcisse. I knew him when he was just a little shaver. I knew his mother and his father. In fact I was, at one time, just like one of the family.

      “Narcisse was a wild sort of a boy always, though I do think his heart was in the right place, as they say. Never betrayed a friend, never stole, and never knuckled to an enemy. But he was a wild boy and didn’t stay at home much after he was in his first ’teens. Knocked about the world considerable, Narcisse did, and wound up out here in this God-forsaken end of creation. Worked on a cordelle gang, handled mackinaws, hammered pack mules, fought Indians, starved and feasted, froze and toasted, like all the others who come out here. Entered the fur trade as engagé of the Company, and was sent to a post up river.

      “Now if there was a weak spot in Narcisse, it was his leaning toward womenfolks. None of your fooling, though! Narcisse loved just like he’d fight—pretty serious, you know. When he said a thing, Narcisse he meant that; and when he wanted to do something real bad, he did that—O, spite of hell he did that! You know the breed? Well, that was Narcisse.

      “There was an old French trader living at a post further up—old man Desjardins. He had a daughter—Paulette—by an Indian woman who died when the girl was just a baby, and the old man raised her somehow—God knows how—till she grew to be about the prettiest girl you’d see anywhere in a year’s tramp, being a good walker. Old man doted on the girl, and until she was full-grown there wasn’t anybody could come nigh enough to her to make a sweet grin effective. But once Narcisse and his friend, Jacques Baptiste, got snowed in there on one of their trips.

      “Now them two, Jacques and Narcisse, was about the best friends you ever saw, I reckon. They never had any secrets from one another; and many’s the time they had split the last bit of grub on long winter trails, and made a feast of that little; because there isn’t any feast better than a little grub split between friends, is there?

      “Now Paulette was a slender little creature with black eyes and lots of black hair. Lots of hair! That makes a woman fetching, don’t you think so? Well, Narcisse and Jacques sang old French songs during the blizzard, and kind of got into the old man’s heart like. Nothing like old-time songs to fetch a man when he’s got to that place where there isn’t any way to look but back. So the old man made ’em welcome and said for ’em to come back when they could.

      “On the trip from old man Desjardins’ place to Pierre, them two friends talked pretty frank, like they always did. Both of ’em was in love, and neither of ’em was ashamed of it. Told each other so.

      “When they camped the first night they talked it all over and Narcisse said: ‘Jacques, we’ve always split even, but here’s where we can’t. It’s for one of us all right, but one of us has to go without. How about this?’

      “And Jacques puffed at his pipe a long time, and after a while he said: ‘Let’s agree that we’ll always go up there together, and let her take her pick.’ And Narcisse agreed; so that’s the way they fixed it.

      “Managed to drop in pretty often after that. But there wasn’t any way of telling which was it. One visit she’d smile more at Jacques than at Narcisse, and they’d think it was settled; and then next time it was t’other way.

      “It was a game, and both of ’em played it like a game. They were too good friends to slip a bower or ace up their sleeves. They let Paulette deal the hands and they played ’em the best they could, same as honest poker, you know. And all the time old man Desjardins looked on like the man that runs the game, a-raking in the ante, which was the singing and the laughing they did and the things they brought up with ’em, for they never came empty-handed.

      “Well, the next fall came; the game was still on and neither of ’em had stole a hand nor a chip that wasn’t his. And along about the first of September the factor of Pierre sent the two friends on a trip to Benton. They went up on the last boat and were to drop down again in a maciknaw before the winter set in, after doing a little business for the Company.

      “On the trip up Narcisse and Jacques had a quiet little game, which was poker. They didn’t play for money—played for Paulette. Sort of made a jackpot out of the girl, and it took Jacks or better to open. One deal and a draw and the high hand could go to see the old man by himself and close the game that had hung on so long.

      “Narcisse insisted on having Jacques deal.

      “‘Well,’ said Jacques, after the draw, ‘the jackpot’s mine!’

      “Narcisse throws down three aces. Jacques gasps a little gasp and throws his cards face up on the table, turns white and walks away. He had two pairs—kings and queens!

      “There wasn’t anything more said about it; but Jacques wasn’t the same man at all. Acted like he was thinking, thinking all the time. Face got that peaked look that comes of too much thinking; eyes always looking a long ways off.

      “How do I know this? W’y, Narcisse told me.

      “Hurt Narcisse like everything to see this; but hadn’t he won fair? Friends can split even on grub and follow the same trail for years, but there comes a time when they must smoke their last pipe together at the forks. But it’s all part of the game and a man oughtn’t to grumble if he don’t get a pat hand, as long as the deal’s fair.

      “Narcisse and Jacques got to Benton, and when they got ready to start back, the river had frozen up, because the winter came down early that year. So they had another winter trail to follow together before they reached the forks. The factor at Benton gave ’em a couple of good dogs to carry their bedding and they started out afoot.

      “Jacques didn’t have much to say. With that peaked, set look on his face he went a-trudging on in the snow from sunup to sundown. Narcisse couldn’t help feeling a little happy, because Paulette was the prettiest girl that ever haunted these parts since the river was dug. It wasn’t any more than human, and he’d won fair.

      “Well, they passed Union and they passed Les Mandanes and they passed Roubideaux’, and then there was a long stretch of lonesome country ahead of ’em till they got to Brown’s Landing, about two hundred miles above Pierre.

      “One day it came on to blow and snow, and they made a camp in the bluff just like we did here. That’s what reminded me of the story. Jacques made camp while