"Doin' tiptop; we've got about one hundred and twenty head of horses winterin' now. Mike brought in a lot of forty soon after you went down trappin'. I keep a good watch on them haystacks this year to see that the snowflakes don't strike fire again. They burned up a couple years ago when I hed thirty ton of as fine hay as they ever get in this yere Park. I had all the stock that was bein' wintered, and some of the other fellows up the river had hay but no stock. The range had closed, so they had no chans't to get any stock. Well, my hay ketched fire and, of course, I wouldn't see them horses starve, so I had to buy them fellers' hay. A good ba'r trap would have ketched something besides ba'r that winter if I had set a few out. While I'm tendin' to the corral Bill will tell you about that hole in the door frame," pointing to a badly mangled orifice about as big as an orange.
"Shotgun?" queried Jack.
"Yes," said Bill; "shotgun—kingdom cum," and he had to straighten out his vocal impediments and tell it slowly, although it was a hard task for him, and his red whiskers and hair would rise up in their wrath, seemingly, as he stuttered along:
"Yer see, Dick Bradner came along one day over from Rattlesnake, and said he wanted a good jack-rabbit shoot. The snow was just right and he was gone all afternoon. He got half a wagonload, I guess. Along about dark he steps in on the way to the corral and sets his gun up aside the fireplace with the other guns. I was just beginning to get grub and had a pan of flour mixin' up some sour-dough bread, the lamp standin' in front of the pan and me at the other end of the table from the door frame. I was puttin' in some good licks on that bread, for sour dough needs a lot of punchin', and guess I had my head leanin' out pretty well toward the door. I heard some one step in from the outside, but didn't look up to see who it was, when there came a flash, and kingdom cum, I thought my head had caved in. The splinters flew into the bread and the powder smoke choked me clean up. All I could see was that crazy fool Irish Mike, his face as white as it will be when he's gone over the range, standin' there with Dick's gun pintin' to the roof. That idjit never sees a new gun standin' round but he must pull it up and aim it at somethin'. You know how he shoots. Dick must have left the gun at full cock, as he allus does. It was lucky it went off before he got the barrel on a level with the lamp, or we'd all been in kingdom cum."
"You got some of the powder in your face," remarked Jack, noticing the blue pits sprinkled here and there in Bill's forehead.
"Yes," said Bill, energetically, with several powder-burned adjectives; "he leaves his mark everywhere he goes. Pity the foolkiller don't git him."
Tracy had joined the party again just in time to hear Bill's bouquet of choice epithets.
"Tain't so much coz he means to do anything harmin', but the big brute is so allfired strong and clumsy that when he sets out to do anything he busts everything he teches. Why, he went to pitchin' hay off the far stack and must have thought the fork handle would hold up the whole five ton, fer he snapped it like a ginger cake just outen the oven. Then he was helpin' put up logs on the barn. We had the top logs most up on the skids when she fotched up again' the cross log that the skid was leanin' again'. He reaches the ax up and sets the blade under the log and pulls on the handle, and away went my dollar-and-a-half handle. He broke it square off. Took me nigh onto a week to dress another out. But he's a good worker. All he needs is a sledge and a big enough drill so he won't miss the head on't and he can pound that 'til jedgment day if the feller turnin' the drill keeps a good lookout for his hand from bein' hit when the Irishman misses the drill."
"I see he left his rifle," remarked Jack.
"Yes; said he didn't want it at the mines, an' he allows he'll come back afore the range opens to pick out a hundred and sixty acres somewhere in the Park. Likely as not he'll see you in Georgetown, but yer got some snow climbin' to do. Thar ain't many goin' out now, and I heerd Bill Redmon say he'd have to use 'skis' pretty soon and drag the mail on a sled. When yer goin' out?"