He would count these over an' over again; an' I could see a dark scowl settle on his face, that would have made me tremble if I had not known that I was his only sworn friend, an' he would mutter, "'Only seven! only seven! There ought to be eight.

There is one left.
He must not escape me.

No, no; he must die!' "An' then he would sheath his knife, an' roll himself up in his blanket, an' cry himself to sleep like a child.
"I had been with ole Bill a'most ten years--ever since I was a boy--but he had never told me the cause of his trouble.

I didn't dare to ask him, for the ole man had curious ways sometimes, an' I knowed he wouldn't think it kind of me to go pryin' into his affairs, an' I knowed, too, that some day he would tell me all about it.
"One night--we had been followin' up a bar all day--we camped on the side of a high mountain.

It was very cold.