262 THE HORSE AND HIS RIDER 



Felix, " it is your business to know, and I paid you 

 as my book-keeper to know, and if you don't know 

 you must jest return with me and find out, that's all 

 so come, let us be movin'." Well, Sassy larfed 

 right out in his face. " Why, you cussed fool," sais 

 he, " don't you know I can't be taken out o' this 

 colony state but only for crime ? What a rael soft- 

 horn you must be to have done so much business and 

 not know that ! " "I guess I got a warrant that'll take 

 you out, tho'," sais Felix; "read that," a handin' 

 the paper to him. " Now I shall swear to that agin, 

 and send it to governor, and down will come the 

 marchin' order in quick stick. I'm soft, I know, but 

 I ain't sticky, for all that ; I generally come off clear, 

 without leavin' no part behind." The moment Sassy 

 saw the warrant his face fell, and the cold perspira- 

 tion rose out like rain-drops, and his colour went and 

 came, and his knees shook like anythin'. " Hoss- 

 stealin' ! " sais he aloud to himself " hoss-stealin' ! 

 heavens and airth, what perjury ! Why, Felix," 

 sais he, "you know devilish well I never stole your 

 hoss, man ; how could you go and swear to such an 

 infarnal lie as that?" "Well, I'm nothin' but a 

 f cussed fool' and a rael ' soft-horn' you know," 

 sais Felix, "as you said just now; and if I had 

 gone and sworn to the debt, why you'd a-kept the 

 money, gone to jail, and swore out, and I'd a-had my 

 trouble for my pains. So you see I swore you stole 

 my hoss, for that's a crime, though absquotolatin* 



