"It certainly was, and a monster, too. My! you should have seen the way she handled her horse when the brute was coming toward her. Some day I am going to sketch her as she looked when the horse was rearing backward. This drawing merely shows her in repose when last I saw her."
"An' what happened to the grizzly?" the old man queried.
"Oh, a bullet hit him, that was all, and he took a header into the ravine below."
"It did! An' whar did the bullet come from? Jist dropped down by accident at the right moment, I s'pose."
Reynolds merely smiled at the prospector's words, and offered no explanation.
"Modest, eh?" and Samson chuckled. "No more trouble to knock over a grizzly than it was to smash three whiskey bottles without winkin'. I like yer coolness, young man. Now, some fellers 'ud have blatted it all over camp in no time. An' that happened yesterday, so ye say?"
"Yes; toward evening."
"An' the gal was thar all alone?"
"It seems so. I wanted to go home with her, but she would not let me."
"She wouldn't! An' why not?"