Then, too, there was another pleasant fact. The
trip as a trip had been unusual; never before had
he, or any one else, made it under two days -- one
for loading and driving into town, and a
second for getting rid of the wood and making
the return. Yet he himself had been out now
only the one day, and he was on his way home.
He had whipped and crowded his horses since
midnight to just this end. Yet was he not stalled
now till morning? And would not this delay set
him back the one day he had gained over his
fellow-townsmen? And would not these same
fellow-townsmen rejoice in this opportunity to
overtake him -- worse, to leave him behind? They
would!

"Oh, well," he concluded, philosophically,
stretching out upon his back and drawing his
worn and ragged sombrero over his eyes, "soon
is comin' a _potrillo_." With this he deliberately
courted slumber.

Out of the stillness rattled a wagon. Like
Felipe's, it was a lumber rigging, and the driver,
a fat Mexican with beady eyes, pulled up his horses
and gazed at the disorder. It was but a perfunctory
gaze, however, and revealed to him nothing
of the true situation. All he saw was that Felipe
was drunk and asleep, and that before dropping
beside the trail he had had time, and perhaps
just enough wit, to unhitch one horse. The other,
true to instinct and the law of her underfed and
overworked kind, had lain down. With this conclusion,
and out of sheer exuberance of alcoholic

[[6]]

p005 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p006w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p007

v?