Collected works > Edinburgh edition, 1894-98 - Works of Robert Louis Stevenson > Volume 3, 1895 - Travels and Excursions, Volume II

THE SILVERADO SQUATTEKS
on in silence, now spitting heavily on the floor,
now putting his head back and uttering a loud,
discordant, joyless laugh. He had a tangle of shock
hair, the colour of wool ; his mouth was a grin ;
although as strong as a horse, he looked neither
heavy nor yet adroit, only leggy, coltish, and in
the road. But it was plain he was in high spirits,
thoroughly enjoying his visit ; and he laughed
frankly whenever we failed to accomplish what we
were about. This was scarcely helpful : it was
even, to amateur carpenters, embarrassing ; but it
lasted until we knocked off work and began to get
dinner. Then Mrs. Hanson remembered she should
have been gone an hour ago ; and the pair retired,
and the lady's laughter died away among the
nutmegs down the path. That was Irvine's first
day's work in my employment — the devil take
him !
The next morning he returned, and as he was
this time alone, he bestowed his conversation upon
us with great liberality. He prided himself on
his intelligence ; asked us if we knew the school
ma'am. He didn't think much of her, anyway.
He had tried her, he had. He had put a question
to her. If a tree a hundred feet high were to fall
a foot a day, how long would it take to fall right
down? She had not been able to solve the pro-
blem. * She don't know nothing,' he opined. He
told us how a friend of his kept a school with a
revolver, and chuckled mightily over that ; his friend
could teach school, he could. All the time he kept
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