A Man in the Open

to remember, nothin' to wag. Two days I been there, and the peanuts is getting few. Little gray mother, dad, the Happy Ship, just dead, that's all, dead. The tide makes and ebbs, the wind comes and goes, there's days, nights and the little waves beating time?time?time, just as if they cared, which they don't. I didn't hear the two horses come, but there's a young person behind me sort of attracting attention. When he moves there's a tinkle of iron, creaking leather, horsy smell, too, and presently he sets down along of me, cross-legged. I shoved him the peanuts, but he lit a cigarette, offering me one. Though he wasn't, he just felt same as a seafaring man, so I didn't mind him being there. "The ocean," says he, "is it allus like that?" " 'Cept when there's leather." "That's a ship?" "Was." "Dead?" "Dead." He wanted to look at my sheath knife, and when I handed it he seen the lettering "Green River" on the blade. He'd been along Green River and there's no knives like that. Then I'd got to know about them iron things on his heels?spurs. We threw peanuts, my knife agin his spurs, and he won easy. Queer how all the time he's wanting to show himself off. He'd never seen salt water before. The shipping, making the port, or clearing, foreign or coastwise, the Hellafloat Yank, the Skowogian Coffin, the family packet, liner, tramp, fisher, lumberman, geordie and greaser was all the same to him. "Sounds like injun languages," says he, "can't y...