CHAPTER XXVII—“FORTUNE FOREVERMORE” CHAPTER XXVII—“FORTUNE FOREVERMORE” LONESOME TOWN LONESOME TOWN CHAPTER I—SOME PLACE LIKE HOME The trail spilled into a pool of shadows at the bottom of the gorge. As if doubtful of following it, the lone rider in chaps and a flannel shirt drew up for a “breathing.” This was gratefully advantaged by his mount. Evidently they had come at speed, whatever the distance, for the reins were lathered and foam flecked the bit corners. The man removed his white sombrero and mopped his brow with a purple bandanna. The fingers with which he combed back his moist thatch nicely matched the hair in color—sunburn brown. His head bulged slightly at the back, but was balanced on a neck and shoulders splendidly proportioned. His rather plain face was not covered with stubble or mustache—cheek bones high, jaw sloping in at an angle, nose straight, lips thin by contrast with their width. While he rests in his saddle, every pore of him exuding healthfully to the midsummer heat of an unusual spring, meet “Why-Not” Pape, of Hellroaring Valley, Montana. But don’t expect to understand—not at first hand grasp—how one christened Peter Stansbury Pape some thirty-odd years before, had come by his interrogatory sobriquet. No more could you have seen in his expression excuse for the pace to which he had put his horse. His eyes—the best of his features—looked pleased and told of peace with the world; gray, with dark lashes and irises, they scanned the granite wall rising sheer from the trail-side. Sighting a bull snake that peered down at him from its crevasse, both of them smiled and one amiably winked. You must have been something of a psychoanalyst—able to go below the surface of day-time and sleep-time dreams—to have realized the unreliability in this case of surface indications. Only by such super-sight could you have seen that Why-Not Pape merely appeared to be peaceful and pleased. As a matter of fact, his head and his heart were heavy with disappointment. But then, a subject so deep and personal shouldn’t be broached at this first formal
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