“Whose danged head is this? Yuh won’t tell anything, and yuh crabs when a feller wants to see something for himself. What for kind of a way is that to act? Are we with yuh, or just one of your party?”
“I wants to find Mary Jane first of all,” says Windy, sad-like. “I’m gettin’ worried.”
“Yeah, and get wrinkled like a Siwash squaw,” grunts Hashknife. “Whoa, Blaze!”
Hashknife points at a jumble of rocks farther up on the hill. We sees the figure of a man, humped over, crawling along like a big lizard. Comes the whang of a gun, and the man collapses in the rocks. But he ain’t dead. We sees him shoot twice, and then he drops lower and begins crawling.
“Shall I wing him?” asks Windy.
“Nope,” grunts Hashknife. “Dunno who he is yet. Got a idea, but ain’t sure.”
“This is a lot of fun for us, Sleepy,” says Windy. “The general won’t let us privates shoot until he sees the whites of their eyes.”
We sneaked along behind boulders, working up higher all the time. I ain’t got no knees left in my pants, the same of which makes ’em match in front and rear. We rounds the corner of a pinnacle, and Hashknife stops.
“I’m foreman of the Circle Dot,” says Windy, peevish-like, “and I do admire to know why they comes up here and shoots up my nice li’l rocks. Goin’ to put up signs today, warnin’ folks to keep off my grass, y’betcha.”
I sticks my head over the top. Zowie! A bullet spings off the rock beside my ear and goes buzzing off down among the cliffs.