Accordingly, we had richly eaten, Lin and I. He had gone out among the
sheds and caught some eggs (that is how he spoke of it), we had opened a
number of things in cans, and I had made my famous dish of evaporated
apricots, in which I managed to fling a suspicion of caramel throughout
the stew.

"Tommy'll be hot about these," said Lin, joyfully, as we ate the eggs.
"He don't mind what yu' use of his canned goods--pickled salmon and
truck. He is hospitable all right enough till it comes to an egg. Then
he'll tell any lie. But shucks! Yu' can read Tommy right through his
clothing. 'Make yourself at home, Lin,' says he, yesterday. And he showed
me his fresh milk and his stuff. 'Here's a new ham,' says he; 'too bad my
damned hens ain't been layin'. The sons-o'guns have quit on me ever since
Christmas.' And away he goes to Powder River for the mail. 'You swore too
heavy about them hens,' thinks I. Well, I expect he may have travelled
half a mile by the time I'd found four nests."

I am fond of eggs, and eat them constantly--and in Wyoming they were
always a luxury. But I never forget those that day, and how Lin and I
enjoyed them thinking of Tommy. Perhaps manhood was not quite established
in my own soul at that time--and perhaps that is the reason why it is the
only time I have ever known which I would live over again, those years
when people said, "You are old enough to know better"--and one didn't
care!

Salmon, apricots, eggs, we dealt with them all properly, and I had some
cigars. It was now that the news came back into my head.

"What do you think of--" I began, and stopped.