Red Saunders | Page 4

for the horses he kind of hitched himself to the rock, and laying the rifle across it, and working the lever with his left hand, he sent a hole plumb through my hat.
"Bully boy!" says I. I snapped at him, and smashed the lock of his rifle to flinders. Then, of course, he was our meat.
As we rode up to him, my pard held dead on him. The Injun stood up straight and tall, and looked us square in the eye--say, he was a man, I tell you, red-skin or no red-skin. The courage just stuck out on him as he stood there, waiting to pass in his checks.
My pardner threw the muzzle of his gun up. "D--n it!" says he, "I can't do it--he's game from the heart out! But the Lord have mercy on his sinful soul if he and I run foul of each other on the prairie again!"
Then we shacked along down to Johnson's and had breakfast.
"What became of Frosthead and his gang?" Oh, they sent out a regiment or two, and gathered him in--'bout twenty-five soldiers to an Injun. No, no harm was done. Me and my pard were the only ones that bucked up against them. Chuck out a cigarette, Kid; my lungs ache for want of a smoke.

A Red-Haired Cupid
"How did I come to get myself disliked down at the Chanta Seechee? Well, I'll tell you," said Reddy, the cow-puncher. "The play came up like this. First, they made the Chanta Seechee into a stock company, then the stock company put all their brains in one think, and says they, 'We'll make this man Jones superintendent, and the ranch is all right at once.' So out comes Jones from Boston, Massachusetts, and what he didn't know about running a ranch was common talk in the country, but what he thought he knew about running a ranch was too much for one man to carry around. He wasn't a bad-hearted feller in some ways, yet on the whole he felt it was an honour to a looking-glass to have the pleasure of reflecting him. Looking-glass? I should say he had! And a bureau, and a boot-blacking jigger, and a feather bed, and curtains, and truck in his room. Strange fellers used to open their eyes when they saw that room. 'Helloo-o!' they'd say, 'whose little birdie have we here?' And other remarks that hurt our feelings considerable. Jonesy, he said the fellers were a rank lot of barbarians. He said it to old Neighbour Case's face, and he and the old man came together like a pair of hens, for Jonesy had sand in spite of his faults, That was a fight worth travelling to see. They covered at least an acre of ground; they tore the air with upper swats and cross swipes; they hollered, they jumped and they pitched, and when the difficulty was adjusted we found that Jonesy's coat was painfully ripped up the back and Neighbour Case had lost his false teeth. One crowd of fellers patted Jones on the back and said, 'Never mind your coat, old horse; you've licked a man twice your age,' and the other comforted Neighbour, saying, 'Never mind, Case; you can ease your mind by thinking how you headed up that rooster, and he fifty pounds lighter than you.'
"Jonesy put on airs after that. He felt he was a hard citizen. And then he had the misfortune to speak harshly to Arizona Jenkins when Old Dry Belt was in liquor. Then he got roped and dragged through the slough. He cried like a baby whilst I helped him scrape the mud off, but not because he was scared! No, sir! That little runt was full of blood and murder.
"'You mark me, now, Red,' says he, the tears making bad-land water courses through the mud on his cheeks, 'I shall fire upon that man the first time I see him--will you lend me your revolver?'
"'Lord, Jones, see here,' says I, 'don't you go making any such billy-goat play as that--keep his wages until he apologizes; put something harmful in his grub; but, as you have respect for the Almighty's handiwork as represented by your person, don't pull a gun on Arizona Jenkins--that's the one thing he won't take from nobody.'
"'D-d-darn him!' snivels Jonesy, 'I ain't afraid o-o-of him;' and the strange fact is that he wasn't. Well, I saw he was in such a taking that he might do something foolish and get hurt, so I goes to Arizona and says I, 'You ought to apologize to Jones.' What Zony replied ain't worth repeating--'and you along with him,' he winds up.
"'Now ain't that childish?' I says. 'A six-footer like you that can shoot straight with either hand, and yet ain't got generosity enough to ease