pulled out. Now will you born fools stop, or will I give you another surge? Land save us! What's that light?'
Somebody was yelling off towards the settlement, and I was aware of a pecooliar glow which didn't come from sech torches as was still burning. And here come Medina Kirby, one of Bill's gals, yelping like a Comanche.
'Our cabin's burnin'!' she squalled. 'A stray bullet went through the winder and busted Miss Margaret's ile lamp!'
With a yell of dismay I abandoned the fray and headed for Bill's cabin, follered by everybody which was able to toller me. They had been several wild shots fired during the melee and one of 'em must have hived in Miss Margaret's winder. The Kirbys had dragged most of their belongings into the yard and some was toting water from the creek, but the whole cabin was in a blaze by now.
'Where's Miss Margaret?' I roared.
'She must be still in there,' shrilled Miz Kirby. 'A beam fell and wedged her door so we couldn't open it, and--'
I grabbed a blanket one of the gals had rescued and plunged it into the rain barrel and run for Miss Margaret's room. They wasn't but one door in it, which led into the main part of the cabin, and was jammed like they said, and I knowed I couldn't never get my shoulders through either winder, so I jest put down my head and rammed the wall full force and knocked four or five logs outa place and made a hole big enough to go through.
The room was so full of smoke I was nigh blinded but I made out a figger fumbling at the winder on the other side. A flaming beam fell outa the roof and broke acrost my head with a loud report and about a bucketful of coals rolled down the back of my neck, but I paid no heed.
I charged through the smoke, nearly fracturing my shin on a bedstead or something, and enveloped the figger in the wet blanket and swept it up in my arms. It kicked wildly and fought and though its voice was muffled in the blanket I catched some words I never would of thought Miss Margaret would use, but I figgered she was hysterical. She seemed to be wearing spurs, too, because I felt 'em every time she kicked.
By this time the room was a perfect blaze and the roof was falling in and we'd both been roasted if I'd tried to get back to the hole I'd knocked in the oppersite wall. So I lowered my head and butted my way through the near wall, getting all my eyebrows and hair burnt off in the process, and come staggering through the rooins with my precious burden and fell into the arms of my relatives which was thronged outside.
'I've saved her!' I panted. 'Pull off the blanket! Yo're safe, Miss Margaret!'
'--!' said Miss Margaret.
Uncle Saul groped under the blanket and said: 'By golly, if this is the schoolteacher she's growed a remarkable set of whiskers since I seen her last!'
He yanked off the blanket--to reveal the bewhiskered countenance of Uncle Jeppard Grimes!
'Hell's fire!' I bellered. 'What you doin' here?'
'I was comin' to jine the lynchin', you blame fool!' he snarled. 'I seen Bill's cabin was afire so I clum in through the back winder to save Miss Margaret. She was gone, but they was a note she'd left. I was fixin' to climb out the winder when you grabbed me, you cussed maneyack!'
'Gimme that note!' I bellered, grabbing it. 'Medina! Come here and read it for me.'
That note run:
'Dear Breckinridge. I am sorry, but I can't stay on Bear Creek any longer. It was tough enough anyway, but being expected to marry you was the last straw. You've been very kind to me, but it would be too much like marrying a grizzly bear. Please forgive me. I am eloping with J. Pembroke Pemberton. We're going out the back window to avoid any trouble, and ride away on his horse. Give my love to the children. We are going to Europe on our honeymoon. With love, Margaret Devon.'
'Now what you got to say?' sneered Uncle Jeppard.
'Where's my hoss?' I yelled, gomg temporarily insane. 'I'll foller 'em! They cain't do me this way! I'll have his sculp if I have to foller 'em to Europe or to hell! Git outa my way!'
Uncle Saul grabbed me as I plunged through the crowd.
'Now, now, Breckinridge,' he expostulated, trying to brace his laigs as he hung on and was dragged down the road. 'You cain't do nothin' to him. She done this of her own free will. She made her choice, and--'
'Release go of me!' I roared, jerking loose. 'I'm ridin' on their trail, and the man don't live which can stop me! Life won't be worth livin' when Glory McGraw hears about this, and I aim to take it out on that Britisher's hide! Hell hath no fury like a Elkins scorned! Git outa my way!'
Chapter XIII - WHEN BEAR CREEK CAME TO CHAWED EAR
I DUNNO how far I rode that night before the red haze cleared out from around me so's I could even see where I was. I knowed I was follering the trail to War Paint, but that was about all. I knowed Miss Margaret and J. Pembroke would head for War Paint, and I knowed Cap'n Kidd would run 'em down before they could get there, no matter how much start they had. And I must of rode for hours before I come to my senses.
It was like waking up from a bad dream. I pulled up on the crest of a rise and looked ahead of me where the trail dipped down into the holler and up over the next ridge. It was jest getting daylight and everything looked kinda grey and still. I looked down in the trail and seen the hoof prints of J. Pembroke's hoss fresh in the dust, and knowed they couldn't be more'n three or four miles ahead of me. I could run' em down within the next hour.
But thinks I, what the hell? Am I plumb locoed? The gal's got a right to marry whoever she wants to, and if she's idjit enough to choose him instead of me, why, 'tain't for me to stand in her way. I wouldn't hurt a hair onto her head; yet here I been aiming to hurt her the wust way I could, by shooting down her man right before her eyes. I felt so ashamed of myself I wanted to cuss--and so sorry for myself I wanted to bawl.
'Go with my blessin',' I said bitterly, shaking my fist in the direction where they'd went, and then reined Cap'n Kidd around and headed for Bear Creek. I warn't aiming to stay there and endure Glory McGraw's rawhiding, but I had to get me some clothes. Mine was burnt to rags, and I didn't have no hat, and the buckshot in my shoulder was stinging me now and then.
A mile or so on the back-trail I crossed the road that runs from Cougar Paw to Grizzly Run, and I was hungry and thirsty so I turnt up it to the tavern which had been built recent on the crossing at Mustang Creek.
The sun warn't up when I pulled at the hitch-rack and clumb off and went in. The bartender give a holler and fell backwards into a tub of water and empty beer bottles, and started yelling for help, and I seen a man come to one of the doors which opened into the bar, and look at me. They was something familiar about him, but I couldn't place him for the instant.
'Shet up and git outa that tub,' I told the bar-keep petulantly. 'It's me, and I want a drink.'
'Excuse me, Breckinridge,' says he, hauling hisself onto his feet. 'I rekernize you now, but I'm a nervous man, and you got no idee what a start you gimme when you come through that door jest now, with yore hair and eye-lashes all burnt off, and most of yore clothes, and yore hide all black with soot. What the hell--'
'Cease them personal remarks and gimme some whisky,' I snarled, being in no mood for airy repartee. 'Likewise wake up the cook and tell him to fry me some ham and aigs.'
So he sot the bottle onto the bar and stuck his head into the kitchen and hollered: 'Break out a fresh ham and start bustin' aigs. Breckinridge Elkins craves fodder!'
When he come back I said: 'Who was that lookin' through that door there while ago?'
'Oh, that?' says he. 'Why, that was a man nigh as famous as what you be--Wild Bill Donovan. You-all ever met?'
'I'll say we has,' I grunted, pouring me a drink. 'He tried to take Cap'n Kidd away from me when I was a ignorant kid. I was forced to whup him with my bare fists before he'd listen to reason.'
'He's the only man I ever seen which was as big as you,' said the bar-keep. 'And at that he ain't quite as thick in the chest and arms as you be. I'll call him in and you-all can chin about old times.'
'Save yore breath,' I growled. 'The thing I craves to do about chins with that coyote is to bust his'n with a pistol butt.'
This seemed to kinda intimidate the bartender. He got behind the bar and started shining beer mugs whilst I et my breakfast in gloomy grandeur, halting only long enough to yell for somebody to feed Cap'n Kidd. Three or four menials went out to do it, and being afeared to try to lead Cap'n Kidd to the trough, they filled it and carried it to him, so only one of them got kicked in the belly. It's awful hard for the average man to dodge Cap'n Kidd.
Well, I finished my breakfast whilst they was dipping the stable-hand in a hoss-trough to bring him to, and I said to the bar-keep, 'I ain't got no money to pay for what me and Cap'n Kidd et, but I'll be headin' for War Paint
