Then they put
the body on top, and the women of the family cut their hair off
and threw it on. After that they set fire to the outfit, and,
when the poles bad burned through, the whole business fell into
the trench of its own accord. It was the neatest, automatic,
self-cocking, double-action sort of a funeral I ever saw. There
wasn't any ceremony--only crying.
The ferry business flourished at prices which were sometimes hard
to collect. But it was a case of pay or go back, and it was a
tur'ble long ways back. We got us timbers and made a scow; built
a baile and saloon and houses out of adobe; and called her
Yuma, after the Injins that had really started her. We got our
supplies through the Gulf of California, where sailing boats
worked up the river. People began to come in for one reason or
another, and first thing we knew we had a store and all sorts of
trimmings. In fact we was a real live town.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
THE SAILOR WITH ONE HAND
At this moment the heavy beat of the storm on the roof ceased
with miraculous suddenness, leaving the outside world empty of
sound save for the DRIP, DRIP, DRIP of eaves. Nobody ventured
to fill in the pause that followed the stranger's last words, so
in a moment he continued his narrative.
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