“Go on?” cried everybody except the cowboys. Nels began to nod his head as if he, as well as Monty, understood human nature. Dorothy hugged her knees with a kind of shudder. Monty had fastened the hypnotic eyes upon her. Castleton ceased smoking, adjusted his eyeglass, and prepared to listen in great earnestness.
Monty changed his seat to one where the light from the blazing logs fell upon his face; and he appeared plunged into melancholy and profound thought.
“Now I tax myself, I can’t jest decide which was the orfulest time I ever hed,” he said, reflectively.
Here Nels blew forth an immense cloud of smoke, as if he desired to hide himself from sight. Monty pondered, and then when the smoke rolled away he turned to Nels.
“See hyar, old pard, me an’ you seen somethin’ of each other in the Panhandle, more ’n thirty years ago—”
“Which we didn’t,” interrupted Nels, bluntly. “Shore you can’t make me out an ole man.”
“Mebbe it wasn’t so darn long. Anyhow, Nels, you recollect them three hoss-thieves I hung all on one cottonwood-tree, an’ likewise thet boo-tiful blond gurl I rescooed from a band of cutthroats who murdered her paw, ole Bill Warren, the buffalo-hunter? Now, which of them two scraps was the turriblest, in your idee?”
“Monty, my memory’s shore bad,” replied the unimpeachable Nels.
“Tell us about the beautiful blonde,” cried at least three of the ladies. Dorothy, who had suffered from nightmare because of a former story of hanging men on trees, had voicelessly appealed to Monty to spare her more of that.
“All right, we’ll hev the blond gurl,” said Monty, settling back, “though I ain’t thinkin’ her story is most turrible of the two, an’ it’ll rake over tender affections long slumberin’ in my breast.”