“Where the Sam Hill are you taking my bag?” he asks, getting red in the face. “Who told you to take that valise?”
“Mister,” says I, “don’t excite yourself thataway. I’m doing all I can to make you comfortable. Sabe? I advises you to come along peaceable, and anything you may say will be used against you.”
I always thought that lawyers tried to settle things peaceably, but I don’t reckon this one runs true to form, ’cause he hit me so hard under the chin that he drove my head right up to the top of my hat. That hat always was too small, but after that wallop I has to stuff the sweat-band with paper so she’ll fit.
The train is pulling out when I wakes up, and I sees that fat feller standing on the rear platform.
“What was you aiming to do, Hen?” asks Bill McFee, our sheriff, who is setting beside me on the platform.
“That was the feller I was here to meet, Bill,” says I. “He’s sure a sudden son-of-a-gun for a lawyer.”
“He ain’t no lawyer, Henry,” says Bill. “He’s the railroad paymaster, and he thought you was trying to steal his roll.”
“Wrong man,” says I. “Seen any stranger get off the train?”
Bill shakes his head, so I pilgrims around to where I tied my rig, and there sets Telescope, Chuck and the old man. Them three acts like they was tickled stiff, and Telescope yelps at me—
“Got the telegram, did you, Henry?”