Up a Tree
Too utterly amazed either for speech or action, I stood stock-still and watched the pistol smoke curl slowly up above the tree; while Tubal Ammon, shooting forth his ugly head until it hung out like a green-framed gargoyle, surveyed me with a hideous leer. Thus for a moment there was a tense silence as we stared at one another.
"Well met!" said I at last.
"And badly aimed," quoth he, grinning as though the thing were but a jest.
"Quite well enough for me," I answered, folding my arms and frowning on him. "Another inch or so and----"
"Aye, that is true," he broke in quickly. "Yet doth an inch make all the difference betwixt a good shot and a bad one. But, verily, the leaves were in my way, nor, to tell the truth, was I very steady on this branch."
"Make no excuses," I replied: "you did your best to kill me; that is quite sufficient."
"Nay, 'twas a chancy accident," said he, bringing his monkey head a little farther out. "Look you, when you walked away just now I took a thoughtless aim--'twas habit--nothing more. Then when you swung round suddenly I started on this perch of mine and fired by accident."
"That is a lie!" I thundered.
"Nay, friend, 'tis gospel truth. If I had wished to kill you should I not have done it while you lurked beneath this tree?"