I rolls a smoke and watches him take his animile around to the back, and then open the door and walk right inside.

“Getting danged familiar,” says I to my bronc. “Going in without knocking.”

I’m glancing around the landscape, when I sees two men on hosses cut across behind me not a quarter of a mile away. Suddenlike I sees some more off to my left. They’re acting queer, so I spurs my bronc for a better place to see.

Zow-w-w-w. Flup-p-p-p.

A bullet goes past my ear, and another sticks into the ground a few feet short and fills my bronc’s eyes full of sand.

“Bronc,” says I, “somebody desires our de-mise. Let’s away.”

I sticks the spurs in his ribs, and races down the hill. That cabin is the best cover in sight and, while I may be a little ahead of time, I feels that Magpie will forgive me.

I hits that door just ahead of a handful of lead and sort of busts up the courtship. The lady looks sort of sick, and when I busts in Magpie pulls his guns.

“Everybody get down low!” I yelps.

“Who and what is it, Ike?” asks Magpie, ducking when a bullet dusts some of the mud from between the logs near his face.