“Miss Linda got to him and she made sure he had brathin’ space and he wasn’t hurt bad, and then she told him he had got to stand it, because, sittin’ where she did, she faced the cliff and she thought she had seen someone. She took the talescope and started climbin’, and I took the axe and I started climbin’ after her.”
Katy broke down and emitted a weird Irish howl. Linda instantly braced herself, threw her arms around Katy, and drew her head to her shoulder. She looked at Judge Whiting and began to talk.
“I can show you where she followed me, straight up the face of the canyon, almost,” she said. “And she never had tried to climb a canyon side for a yard, either, but she came up and over after me, like a cat. And up there on a small ledge Oka Sayye came down directly above us. I couldn’t be mistaken. I saw him plainly. I know him by sight as well as I do any of you. We heard the stones coming down before him, and we knew someone was going to be on us who was desperate enough to kill. When he touched our level and turned to follow the ledge we were on, I pushed him over.”
Katy shook off Linda’s protecting arm and straightened suddenly.
“Why, ye domned little fool, ye!” she screamed. “Ye never told a lie before in all your days! Judge Whiting, I had the axe round me neck by the climbin’ strap, and I got it in me fingers when we heard the crature comin’, and against his chist I set it, and I gave him a shove that sint him over. Like a cat he was a-clingin’ and climbin’, and when I saw him comin’ up on us with that awful face of his, I jist swung the axe like I do when I’m rejoocin’ a pace of eucalyptus to fireplace size, and whack! I took the branch supportin’ him, and a dome’ good axe I spoiled doin’ it.”
Katy folded her arms, lifted her chin higher than it ever had been before, and glared defiance at the Judge.
“Now go on,” she said, “and decide what ye’ll do to me for it.”
The Judge reached over and took both Katherine O’Donovan’s hands in a firm grip.
“You brave woman!” he said. “If it lay in my power, I would give you the Carnegie Medal. In any event I will see that you have a good bungalow with plenty of shamrock on each side of your front path, and a fair income to keep you comfortable when the rheumatic days are upon you.”
“I am no over-feeder,” said Katy proudly. “I’m daily exercisin’ me muscles enough to kape them young. The rheumatism I’ll not have. And nayther will I have the house nor the income. I’ve saved me money; I’ve an income of me own.”