The “Kid” passed within a few feet of the end of the porch where sat John W. Poe and Kip McKinnie. The latter had raised up, when his spur rattled, which attracted the “Kid’s” attention. At the same moment Mr. Poe stood up in the small open gateway leading from the street to the end of the porch. They supposed the man coming towards them, only partly dressed, was a servant, or possibly Pete Maxwell.
The “Kid” had pulled his pistol, and so had John Poe, who by that time was almost within arm’s reach of the “Kid.”
With pistol pointing at Poe, at the same time asking in Spanish: “Quien es?” (Who is that?), he backed into Pete Maxwell’s room. He had repeated the above question several times.
On entering the room, “Billy the Kid” walked up to within a few feet of Pat Garrett, who was sitting on Maxwell’s bed, and asked: “Who are they, Pete?”
Now discovering that a man sat on Pete’s bed, the “Kid” with raised pistol pointing towards the bed, began backing across the room.
Pete Maxwell whispered to the sheriff: “That’s him, Pat.” By this time the “Kid” had backed to a streak of moonlight coming through the south window, asking: “Quien Es?” (Who’s that?)
Garrett raised his pistol and fired. Then cocked the pistol again and it went off accidentally, putting a hole in the ceiling, or wall.
Now the sheriff sprang out of the door onto the porch, where stood his two deputies with drawn pistols.
Soon after, Pete Maxwell ran out, and came very near getting a ball from Poe’s pistol. Garrett struck the pistol upward, saying: “Don’t shoot Maxwell!”
A lighted candle was secured from the mother of Pete Maxwell, who occupied a nearby room, and the dead body of “Billy the Kid” was found stretched out on his back with a bullet wound in his breast, just above the heart. At the right hand lay a Colt’s 41 calibre pistol, and at his left a butcher knife.