Page:J Allan Dunn--The Girl of Ghost Mountain.djvu/88

70 Mebbe he smell those doughnuts. Annyway, I shoot him, back of the ear."

They bent over to examine the bullet-hole, fingering it, looking at her as they might have gazed at an actual Amazon.

"Mebbe that other one come along," she said. "Then I shoot heem, too. I think that flesh bane not much good, but that skeen, he make a pritty good rug. I set heem where it bane cool while I figger out best way to skeen heem."

"I'll skin him for you, Miss, if you'll give me a sharp knife," said the man, who had spoken of hearing the lion. "I'm a dab at that."

"All right." She picked up the great cat once more without effort and bore it off to the outer room where the volunteer skinner followed her.

"Where'd you learn to shoot, Miss—or Marm?" queried Hollister as Thora came back, leaving the door open after handing the man a lantern. "We figgered you was tenderfeet."

"Shoot? Any one can shoot if they got a good eye an' a steady hand. I can do anything a man can do," replied Thora with absolute statement.

"I believe you," said Jackson, quietly. Thora gave him a friendly look and turned again to Hollister. Her instinct recognized in him the really "bad man" of the crowd, aside from what Sheridan had suggested.

"You bane pritty strong?" she asked. "Did you ever try thees?"

She set her arm down on the table close to where he sat, extending it in a straight line from elbow to