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The Rival Dance-Halls
171

for the teeth. But I won't have it. I'm goin' to need Jerry down further on the quicksand fords of the Canadian; an', as I explains, them teeth is a wreck by now, an' no good if he get's 'em ag'in; Jerry munchin' of his food powerful.

"After a while I rounds up the Colonel an' herds him back to camp. Jerry has shore sawed off a sore affliction on that tenderfoot when he takes in them teeth; I can see that. His lip hangs like a blacksmith's apron, an' he can't talk a little bit; jest makes signs or motions, like he's Injun or deef.

"It's mebby two weeks later when Jerry gets another shot at the Colonel. It's the evenin' after the night Jerry sneaks into camp, soft-foot as a coyote, noses open the grub-box, an' eats five bottles of whiskey; all we has. We've pitched camp, an' I've hobbled this Jerry mule an' his mate—the other wheeler—an' throwed 'em loose, an' is busy hobblin' my nigh-swing mule, when trouble begins fomentin' between my tenderfoot an' Jerry.

"The fact is it's done fomented. This Colonel, bein' some heated about that whiskey, an' plumb sore on Jerry on account of them teeth, allows to himse'f he'll take a trace-chain an' warp Jerry once for luck.

"If this yere tenderfoot had been free with me, an' invited me into his confidence touchin' his designs, I'd took a lariat an' roped an' throwed