nipa-shack, at the outer edge, a sound of music came softly forth. Some
native was playing one of the queer Filipino mandolins. The Train
pushed on, without Cairns and Bedient. All the famine and foulness and
fever lifted from these two. They forgot blood and pain and glaring
suns. The early stars changed to lily-gardens, vast and white and
beautiful, and their eyes dulled with dreams.

They did not guess, at least Cairns did not, that the low music brought
tears that night--because they were in dreadful need of it, because
they were filled with inner agony for something beautiful, because they
had been spiritually starved. And all the riding hard, shooting true
and dying game--those poor ethics of the open--had not brought a crumb,
not a crumb, of the real bread of life. Nor could mountains of mere
energy nor icebergs of sheer nerve! In needing the bread of life--they
were different from the others, and so they lingered, unable to speak,
while a poor little Tagal--"one of the niggers"--all unconsciously
played. "Surely," they thought, "his soul is no dead, dark thing when
he can play like that."

* * * * *

... So often, Bedient watched admiringly while Cairns wrote. The
correspondent didn't know it, but he was bringing a good temporal fame
to Thirteen and himself in these nights. He had a boy's energy and
sentiment; also a story to tell for every ride and wound and shot in
the dark. The States were attuned to boyish things, as a country always
is in war, and a boy was better than a man for the work.... Often
Bedient would bring him a cup of coffee and arrange a blanket to keep
the wind from the sputtering candles. The two bunks were invariably
spread together; and Bedient was ever ready for a talk in the dark,