“No, I didn’t, Judge. When that batch of mash got to the whistlin’ point, I put in the liniment and then I—”
“No one is interested in a recipe,” interrupted Judge. “Get down to the distorted facts.”
Frijole grinned slowly. “Well, yeah—I shouldn’t expose my formula. I won’t tell yuh how me and Slim had that mash in a keg, with a anvil on top of it, and it blowed the anvil plumb through the kitchen roof, and when it hit—” Frijole whispered huskily, “that anvil was shrunk to the size of a tack-hammer. I won’t tell that part of it, ’cause it’s hard to believe. Anyway, you know how fond Bill Shakespeare, the rooster, is of mash. I was so scared of him a-gettin’ this mash and killin’ himself that I put it in a sack and hung it in a tree, aimin’ to dry it out and burn it. But do you know what happened? It leaked—and there was Bill, settin’ on his hind-end under the tree, bill open, drinkin’ in the drippin’s.
“By the time I seen him, Bill was swelled up like a balloon. His crop was plumb filled with mash-drippin’s, and he was as loaded as a lumber-jack on pay-day. He staggered away from the sack, with joy in his soul and rubber in his legs. The hens all kept away from Bill—them a-settin’ on the corral fence in executive session, while Bill goes lookin’ for what he may devour.
“Well, sir, there’s a old diamond-back, which lives in the day-wash, and I suspect he’s livin’ partly off baby chickens. He’s a old sockdolager, with about twenty rattles. Bill finds him out in the weeds behind the little chicken house, and the first thing I know, here’s that big rattler, all cocked and primed, buzzin’ his tail, a-warnin’ Bill Shakespeare to stay back.
“I know that Bill don’t like that rattler, but he ain’t never been able to figure out jist how to whip the crippled crawler. I just says to m’self, ‘Bill, yo’re a goner this time, if yuh don’t back-track real pronto.’ But Bill don’t back-track. He staggers in close, and that dog-gone rattler hits him square in the crop. Then he rears back and socks poor old Bill another. I kinda shut m’ eyes and turns away. I—I love that old featherless son-of-a-gun.” Frijole choked a little.
Henry was leaning across the desk. “So Bill died, eh?” he said.
“Nossir,” replied Frijole, “he didn’t. Bill walked away, kinda proud-like and went down to the corral—and yuh don’t have to believe me, Henry, but a few moments later that big rattler went into convulsions, and died on the spot.”
“Slim!” exclaimed Judge sharply. Slim jerked convulsively.
“Slim, did you see all this?” asked Judge.