“What's up, Bill?”
“Not a blank lynch pin in the whole blank coach,” was the answer.
There was a dead silence. Yuba Bill executed a wild war dance of helpless rage.
“Blank the blank ENCHANTED thing to blank!”
(I beg here to refer the fastidious and cultivated reader to the only adjective I have dared transcribe of this actual oath which I once had the honor of hearing. He will I trust not fail to recognize the old classic daemon in this wild western objurgation.)
“Who did it?” asked Thatcher.
Yuba Bill did not reply, but dashed up again to the box, unlocked the “boot,” and screamed out:
“The man that stole your portmantle,—Wiles!”
Thatcher laughed:
“Don't worry about that, Bill. A 'biled' shirt, an extra collar, and a few papers. Nothing more.”