A thought struck him, and he mused: Sandy's cut his foot, or p'raps it's Bunker Hill shot herself with that darned pistol she allers packs in her breeches' pocket.
"Well, an' 'ow's the Widder?" The man was getting impatient for his drink.
"It ain't the Widder at all. It's Sandy. Sandy's cut his foot—cut his foot last night a cuttin' wood in the dark. That's what's the matter."
Limber Tim pecked his head, pursed up his mouth, and for the first time in his life, perhaps, felt that he was really a man of some consequence.
"By the holy poker! thought it was the Widder."
"Not much. It's Sandy. Cut his foot, I tell yer. Blood clean up to his elbows. Blood all over the house. Bunker Hill all over blood. Hell's a poppin', I tell yer." And poor Limber Tim so excited himself by this recital, that he broke loose from the fence, and chattered his teeth together like a chipmunk with a hazel-nut.
Then the man passed on down the trail, and Limber Tim again grew on to the fence, and chattered his teeth together, and waited developments, not at all certain that he had not lied.
"'Ow's the Widder, Limber?"
Limber unloosed himself from the fence, and tried to stand straight up and tell the truth and nothing but the truth.
"Better, thank yer. That is, the blood is stopped, or most of it, you know—the most of it. Bunker Hill is hurt some too, you know. Blood all over her arm. Poor girl, poor girl! but she didn't whimper. Not she. Nary a sniff."