He helped himself to the one which the little man had occupied so short a while before.
“You-all was at the jubilee to-night,” he said, running his eyes over them; “and so know what happened ter break up the gin’ral hilarity o’ that festive occasion. Because o’ which I’m hyer, when I ought ter be thar with my blushin’ bride this minute. I believe that the town gin’rally thinks that the only mistake I made was in not gittin’ the coyote I shot at; which you heerd me say was Tim Benson, the road agent.”
“Er, waugh! We heerd yer!” Nomad told him.
“You know somethin’ about Benson?”
“Not so much but thet our cur’osity is ixcited ter hear more.”
Juniper Joe turned to Buffalo Bill.
“I reckon you’re hyer trailin’ somebody. It’s considered lately that you aire, when you pike into a town like this.”
“I might be traveling for my health, you know,” Buffalo Bill observed, with a smile.
“When already yer has got ther health o’ a grizzly? Nobody’d think it. No; you come hyer fer somebody; and I’ve been figgerin’ that it must be you’re lookin’ for Benson, because he’s known to have been in this section recent, doin’ hold-up work, as I said thar at my house.”
“Have you known him well?”