Page:Clarence Mulford - Man from Bar-20.djvu/249

 At Bay Johnny, throwing another rock. "These are better at night than cartridges, an' they won't run out. I'll give you some real troubles. I only wish I had a bag of yellow-jackets to drop!"

Another jet of flame stabbed upward, but from a new place, farther back; and a voice full of wrath and pain described the man on the butte, and with a fertile imagination.

"What's th' matter with you? An' what's all th' hellaballoo?" indignantly demanded another and more distant voice. "How can a man sleep in such a blasted uproar?"

"Shut up!" roared Purdy with heat. "Who cares whether you sleep or not? He cut my head an' near busted my arm with his d—d rocks! Mebby you think they ain't makin' good time when they get down here! Only hope he stumbles an' follers 'em!"

"He's a lucky fool," commented Fleming, serene in the security of his new position. "Luckiest dog I ever saw."

"Lucky!" snorted Purdy. "Lucky! Anybody else would 'a' been picked clean by th' ki-yotes before now. For a cussed fool playin' a lone hand he's doin' real well. But we got th' buzzard where we want him!"

"Lone hand nothin'," grunted Fleming. "Didn't he have that drunken Long Pete helpin' him?"

Purdy growled in his throat and gently rubbed his 237