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Murphy rested on his back in the midst of a thicket of ide

awake, yet not quite ready to ford the Fourche and plunge into the

dense shadows shrouding the northern shore Crouched behind a log, he

had so far yielded unto teht his pipe

Murphy had been amid just such unpleasant environrown somewhat prosaic He realized

fully the i the next two hundred er was not wholly unwelcome to his peculiar temperament; rather it

was an incentive to hih somehow, as he had done a hundred tienerates into a commonplace at last So Murphy

puffed contentedly at his old pipe Whatever h his taciturnity, and he reclined

there

waters of the Fourche, and the occasional starass

But suddenly there was the faint crackle of a branch to his left, and

one hand instantly closed over his pipe bowl, the other grasping the

heavy revolver at his hip Crouching like a startled tiger, with not a

, he peered anxiously into the darkness, his ar to breathe There carass,--so coyote, probably;

then his tenseso startled, yet he continued to grasp the "45" in his right

hand, his eyes alert