Page:Hugh Pendexter--Tiberius Smith.djvu/19

 the town. They are expecting a president from 'Frisco. The junta was to send them down a regular fire-eater this week.'

"'That's me,' cried Tib. 'I'm on! I'm the president! I go a mile in less than nothing. I never did start a game but what something good turned up unexpectedly. Tell 'em I'm their feudal lord.'

"'Well, I'll be blasted,' gasped Banana Jones. Then he added, 'Do I get all the banana privileges between here and Sonsonate?'

"'You certainly do,' answered Tiberius, drawing his tin rapier and jolting his helmet into a jaunty position.

"Jones ran towards the mob and began a harangue in which 'Don Señor Tiberio,' and viva la libertad figured extensively, and when he was done the ragamuffins danced about us in glee, and one squint-eyed ruffian sought to encompass Mazie Adams's fair waist with his dirty paw. But Tib lunged ferociously at him with his Toledo (Ohio) blade, and the gang evidently set us down for born fighters.

"'They dope you out as High Muck-a-Muck and accept you,' said Jones, 'but they want to know if you've brought any arms and powder.'

"'Tell 'em I've brought art, music, beauty, and science, and that against that quartet prosaic explosives aren't deuce-high in a well-thumbed