"I reckon you'll change yer mind before I git done with you. Anybody
with you?"
"No, not exactly here," answered Ned quickly, a sudden line of conduct
occurring to him. "Unfortunately for me, and fortunately for you,
I am all alone. But when my friends do find out what has happened
you'd better look out. You'll be riddled so full of holes that the
wind will sigh through your body as if it were a sieve."
"How's Captain Billy?" demanded the man sharply.
"Captain Billy?" wondered Ned.
"Yes. You needn't pretend you don't know what I'm talking about."
"I most certainly do not. Who is Captain Billy?"
"Know Joe Withem?"
"I do not. Some friend of yours, I suppose?"
An angry exclamation escaped the lips of the mountaineer.
"I reckon they're no friends of mine. I reckon, too, that you'll be
answering my questions or you'll be hiking for the Happy Hunting
Grounds in about ten minutes from now. I haven't got all night to sit
here talking with you. I've got to git through with you; then I'm
going to finish the rest of your crowd. You fellows thought you'd play
a sharp trick on me, eh?"
"You are mistaken. We did not even know of your existence until you
began shooting at us. Why did you do that?"
"If you don't know, I reckon you'll have to guess. Bill McKay must
think we're easy down here, to try a game like that."
"I'll tell him when I see him," nodded Ned.
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