“Muley, when I get loose I’m going to cut your rhymer square in two,” proclaims Telescope, and just then the old man leads Telescope’s bronc up, and he rides away with the posse.
We’re sad. Doggone, it sure is a sad sight to see our compatriot in the hands of the law. We smokes a while, and then I turns to Chuck—
“Where is that seven thousand, Chuck?” He looks, queer-like, at me for a moment, and shakes his head.
“Danged if I know, Hen.”
“You had it, didn’t yuh?”
“Nope. Listen; I held up that stage before it got to the ford. Sabe? I was going to chase Ricky away and drive it myself. Figured I’d have some fun with Telescope. Sabe? Well, I scared —— out of Ricky. He ain’t got no nerves anyway, and——”
“Wait!” yelps Muley. “Do you mean to set there and tell us that you scared Ricky so bad that he didn’t know your physique from Telescope’s? How about the limp?”
“Don’t rush me!” snaps Chuck. “Telescope was so cocky about that picture stuff that I figured to have some fun. Did yuh ever walk on stilts? Well, I did when I was a kid. I made me a pair that just filled my boots, and pulled a flour sack over my head. Limp?
“Of course I’d limp. I danged near fell on my face when I yelled for him to stop. I made him get out and walk back up the road, and told him if he stopped I’d perforate him. I took the box off the seat, which I figured was that shipment, and looks her over. On it in big letters she proclaims to be dynamite. I lays that box back on the seat, gets my stilt tangled in a wheel, and fell plumb off the grade.
“Well, the team ran away, that’s all I know. I figured that Ricky would stop ’em—they wasn’t running fast.”