Page:The Prairie Flower; Or, Adventures In the Far West.djvu/41



ADVENTURES IN THE PAR WEST.

ami I knowed death was about sartain as daylight.

"'Well,' sez I to myself, 'old hoss, VOU'VP got to go under and lose your top knot, so what's the use a kickin ?'

"'Howsomever,' I answered, 'sposin I has, I reckon's best to die game, ain't it ?' and with this I pulled old Sweetlove round and commenced fodderin her as best I could. She knowed what was wanted, did Sweetlove, and looked right sassy, I'll be dog-gone ef she didn't.

"'You're a few, aint you ?' sez I, as I rammed home an all-fired charge of pow der, that made her grunt like forty.

"Well, I turned round, fetched her up to my face, and 'drawin a bead'* on to the nearest, pulled the trigger.

"Now you needn't believe it without ye take a notion, but I'll be rumfuzzled (stir that fire, Ned, or this here meat won't git toasted till midnight), ef she didn't hold shoot about a minnet, and I all the time squintin away too, afore the fire could melt the ice round the powder and let her off. That's a fact! I'll be dog-gone ef it wasn't!

"Well, she went off at last, she did, with a whoosss-k cheeesss-cup cho-bang, and 1 hope I may be dogged for a possum, ef one o' my chasers didn't hev to pile himself on a level with his moccasin right ban some. Now I thought as how this 'ud start the wind out o' t'other, and put him on the back'ard track. But it didn't. He did'nt seem to mind it no more'n's ef it was the commonest thing out.

"'Well,' thinks 1 to myself, 'maybe you'll ketch a few ef you keep foolin your time that-a-ways ;' and so 1 set to work and foddered Sweetlove agin.

"By this time poor Skinflint, I seed, was gittin top-heavy right smart, and I knowed ef I done anything, it 'ud hev to be done afore the beginnin o' next month, 01 'twouldn't b<> o' no use, not a darned bit. Well, I took squint agin, plum-center, and blazed away; but hang me up for Dar's meat, ef it made the least difference with the skunk of a Rapaho. I was par- feet dumfouzled; complete used up; for I'd never missed a target o' that size afore, ence I was big enough to shoot pop-guns

'Taking close sight.

to flies. I felt sort o' chawed up. Never felt so ail of a heap afore but once't, and that was when I axed Suke Harris to hev me, and she said 'No.'

"Now you'd better calculate I hadn't no great deal o' time to think, for thar he was the cussed Injin jest as plain as the nose on your face, and a-comin full split right at me, with his rope quirled in his hand, jest ready for a throw. Quicker as winkin, I foddered Sweetlove agin, and gin him another plum-center, which in course I spected would knock the hind sights off him. Did it? Now you ken toke my possibles, traps and muleys, ef it did. Did it? No! reckons it didn't. Thar he sot, straight up and down, a thunderin on, jest as ef the arth was made for his special purpose. I begun to git skeered in arnest, and thought maybe it was the devil deformed into a Injin; and I'd a no tion to put in a silver bullet, only I didn't happen to have none 'bout me.

"On he come, the scamp, and I bolted or tried to rayther for Skinflint had got used up, and down he pitched, sending me right plum over his noddle on to my back, whar I lay sprawlin like a bottle o' spilt whisky.

'"It's all up now, and I'm a gone pos sum,' sez I, as I seed the Injin come tearin ahead; and I drawed the old butcher, and tried to feed one o' the pups, but my fin gers was so numb I couldn't.

"Well up rides old Rapaho, lookin as savage nor a meat-axe, his black eyes shinin like two coals o' fire. Well now, what d'ye think he did? Did he shoot me? No! Did he rope (lassoo) me? No! Did he try to? No, I'll be dog-gone ef he did!"

"What did he do?" inquired I, quickly.

"Ay, ay, what did he do?" echoed Huntly.

"Howly Mary! if ye knows what he did, Misther George, spaak it, jist, and re- lave yer mind now, " put in the Irishman.

The old trapper smiled.

"Rash," he said, " ef that thar bottle isn't empty, I'll jest take another pull. "

"Taint all gone yit," answered Rash Will; " 'spect 'twill be soon; but go it, old hoss, and gin us the rest o' that .1 Rapahos affair."

The old man drank, smacked his lips, smiled, and remarked :