“Shure, gintlemen, I don’t want to escyape,” asseverates he, shivering at the sight of a score of angry faces, and the same number of gun-barrels bearing upon his person; “I had no such intinshuns. I was only goin’ to—”
“Run off, if ye’d got the chance. Ye’d made a good beginning. Here, Dick Tracey! half-a-dozen turns of your trail-rope round him. Lend a hand, Shelton! Damned queer-looking curse he is! Surely, gentlemen, this can’t be the man we’re in search of?”
“No, no! it isn’t. Only his man John.”
“Ho! hilloa, you round there at the back! Keep your eyes skinned. We havn’t got him yet. Don’t let as much as a cat creep past you. Now, sirree! who’s inside?”
“Who’s insoide? The cyabin div yez mane?”
“Damn ye! answer the question that’s put to ye!” says Tracey, giving his prisoner a touch of the trail-rope. “Who’s inside the shanty?”
“O Lard! Needs must whin the divvel dhrives. Wil, then, thare’s the masther for wan—”
“Ho! what’s this?” inquires Woodley Poindexter, at this moment, riding up, and seeing the spotted mare. “Why—it—it’s Looey’s mustang!”
“It is, uncle,” answers Cassius Calhoun, who has ridden up along with him.
“I wonder who’s brought the beast here?”