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GLORY WHEN you decided not to go with Crook,” Bartle said to No Ears.
    â€œI’d have gone myself,” Bartle added. “I consider Crook the best general left. I just didn’t much feel like wandering around being shot at by Apaches.”
    â€œYou’d have gone alone then,” Jim Ragg said. “It’s nothing against Crook. I just won’t put up with that heat.”
    No Ears had decided to travel with the mountain men for a while. The cranes were less likely to settle where three men were camping together, which meant less temptation for his soul.
    He had been thinking about his soul a lot since the encounter on Crazy Woman Creek. He wondered if perhaps his soul would grow feathers as it traveled with the birds. The business about Crook held no interest for him. He had heard of Geronimo and thought he would be a lot of trouble to catch. It would mean traveling with soldiers, something No Ears found inconvenient.
    Even traveling with the mountain men had its inconveniences, the main one being that Bartle wanted to talk all the time. Jim Ragg also seemed to find this tendency of Bartle’s annoying—he seldom said much himself and often refused to make any reply at all.
    No Ears felt it was impolite not to reply; he would generally try to make some answer to Bartle’s queries, but courtesy tookenergy, and No Ears would really rather they just all walked along quietly. That way he could apply more of his energy to thinking about his soul.
    To everyone’s disappointment the Morning Star Saloon stood abandoned when they arrived in Ten Sleep. Indeed, Ten Sleep itself—all three buildings of it—had been abandoned. The only resident was a black chicken that had apparently been left behind. The chicken lived behind the bar, and it squawked irritably when the three men arrived.
    â€œI hate a black squawker,” Bartle said. He wrung the chicken’s neck and they ate it for supper. No Ears ate the gizzard and the neck, two chicken parts he had always had a craving for. In his youth he would run down prairie hens, mainly for the pleasure of eating their tasty gizzards.
    â€œThis was once a lively town,” Jim Ragg said, depressed to find Ten Sleep abandoned. “It was more than ten years ago that we were through here, and it had three saloons. I hate to see a place dry up.”
    â€œI guess Ten Sleep just dwindled,” Bartle commented. “I kind of like it abandoned. We could capture it without a fight and have it be our town. No Ears can be the mayor, I’ll be the judge, and you can be the sheriff and arrest anybody that shows up if they displease you. We’ll hold court once a week and charge big fines for trespassing or spitting in the street. Owning a town might beat beavering or gold mining, either, as a way to get rich.”
    It was a beautiful morning, not a cloud between them and Colorado. Bartle was still resting under his blanket, snug against the rear of the Morning Star, a little frame saloon that would probably fall down in another year or two, or else be knocked apart by travelers who might see the opportunity to snatch some free lumber. It was already quite drafty inside.
    Bartle saw the abandonment of Ten Sleep as no great loss—it had flourished in the brief time that Texas cowboys were steadily pushing Texas cattle north to the Lodge Grass or farther. Those that didn’t hit the town on their way north made up for the erroron their way south. But that time was already dying—only a trickle of Texas cattle came up the trail now.
    He liked the notion of owning a town, particularly a town with no population. He also liked to lie abed late, letting his mind toy with fancies of one kind and another, a habit in stark contrast to that of his two companions, both of whom had been up for hours. Jim Ragg exhibited distinct signs of restlessness; he was determined to find something to do, even though they were in a place where it