"Whoop!" he roared.
There was a scattering of the loungers. It was plain that they knew the man. The boys resumed their writing.
"Whoopee! I'm the Bad Man from Smoky Creek! Higher up the creek you go, the bigger they grow, and I'm right off the headwaters!"
"Bang, bang, bang!"
"Turn the coyotes loose! Fer I'm out fer blood and a genwine killing! Whoope-e-e-e!"
"Bang, bang, bang!"
The crack of the six-shooter was almost wholly drowned by the yells of the fellow, but through all this the Pony Rider Boys wrote on as calmly as if nothing out of the ordinary were occurring, though Stacy gave the bad man a glance out of the corners of his eyes now and then. Stacy was ready to run if, perchance, the fellow should turn a gun in his direction. The lads had met with such characters before, and knew that it was not usually the man who indulged in such loud boasts who was to be feared. Still, it was a nerve-racking situation.
Professor Zepplin and Jim Abs had appeared at the door at the first sound of the uproar, but they beat a quick retreat when they saw who and what was the cause of the disturbance.
"Is—is there any danger to the boys?" stammered the Professor.
"Not unless they stir him up. That's Smoky Griffin, one of the meanest bullies in the whole Blue Ridge. Everybody's afraid of him and I reckon they've got good reason fer being afraid. The kids don't seem to mind him, do they?" wondered Abs.