“Half Mile’s in jail. He shot three times at ‘Scenery’ Sims, and Scenery put him in jail for it. Here comes Scenery now.”
There ain’t no description to fit Scenery, except that he’s about five feet tall and his voice squeaks and his mustache only grows at the corners of his big mouth, like the whiskers on a bobcat. He continues to be our sheriff, because nobody has took the time to kill him, except some poor shot, like Half Mile.
We explains the proposition to Scenery, and asks him will he let Half Mile be a wise man.
“How about me?” asks Scenery. “Half Mile ain’t got no sense. I studied ellie-cu-shun oncet, and I’ve got a lot of natural sense about things like that.”
“We don’t give a ——,” says Dirty Shirt, “only we wants to die in good company, Scenery.”
“Bein’ the sheriff I’ll see that they don’t get rough.”
“Since when has a sheriff been able to intimidate these Yaller Rock snake hunters?” I asks. “The sight of you up there, Scenery, would be like wavin’ a red rag at a bull.”
“Nawsir,” squeaks Scenery. “And besides they ain’t goin’ to be allowed to bring in no guns, so the judge tells me.”
You can’t argue with no tin whistle like that, so we takes him with us to our cabin, where we finds Magpie, Old Testament and the judge. We explains that Half Mile is in jail and that Scenery is desirous to be wise. Magpie says:
“That’s all right, if he keeps his mouth shut, but we don’t want no wise man with a squeaky voice. We’ll let Ike speak all the words what is spoke.”