While he spoke, Firio mounted Wrath of God and, with Jag Ear's bells
jingling, the supply division set out on the road. Jack and Mary
followed, this time riding side by side, pony nose to pony nose, in an
intimacy of association impossible in the narrow mountain trail. It was
an intimacy signalized by silence. There was an end to the mighty
transports of the heights; the wells of whimsicality had dried up. The
weight of the silence seemed balancing on a brittle thread. All the
afternoon's events aligned themselves in a colossal satire. In the half
light Jack became a gaunt and lonely figure that ought to be confined in
some Utopian kindergarten.

Mary could feel her temples beating with the fear of what was waiting for
him in Little Rivers, now a dark mass on the levels, just dark, without
color or any attraction except the mystery that goes with the shroud of
night. She knew how he would laugh at her fears; for she guessed that he
was unafraid of anything in the world which, however, was no protection
from Pete Leddy's six-shooter.

"I--I have a right to know--won't you tell me how you are going to defend
yourself against Pete Leddy?" she demanded, in a sudden outburst.

"I hadn't thought of that. Certainly, I shall leave it to Pete himself to
open hostilities. I hadn't thought of it because I have been too busy
thinking out how I was going to break a piece of news to Firio. I have
been an awful coward about it, putting it off and putting it off. I had
planned to do it on my birthday two weeks ago, and then he gave me these
big silver spurs--spent a whole month's wages on them, think of that! I
bought this cowboy regalia to go with them. You can't imagine how that
pleased him. It certainly was great fun."