It was a crunching of heavy feet, punctuated now
and again by the clattering of a displaced stone. As Walt finished and
looked to his wife for approval, a man came into view around the turn of
the trail. He was bareheaded and sweaty. With a handkerchief in one hand
he mopped his face, while in the other hand he carried a new hat and a
wilted starched collar which he had removed from his neck. He was a
well-built man, and his muscles seemed on the point of bursting out of
the painfully new and ready-made black clothes he wore.
"Warm day," Walt greeted him. Walt believed in country democracy, and
never missed an opportunity to practice it.
The man paused and nodded.
"I guess I ain't used much to the warm," he vouchsafed half
apologetically. "I'm more accustomed to zero weather."
"You don't find any of that in this country," Walt laughed.
"Should say not," the man answered. "An' I ain't here a-lookin' for it
neither. I'm tryin' to find my sister. Mebbe you know where she lives.
Her name's Johnson, Mrs. William Johnson."
"You're not her Klondike brother!" Madge cried, her eyes bright with
interest, "about whom we've heard so much?"
"Yes'm, that's me," he answered modestly.
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