THE REFERENDUM 



473 



mighty little to kill 'em an' again it looks like 

 nothin' would do it. 



"Here was this great, big beast lyin' there 

 an' th' whole bunch of us gathered 'round 

 lookin' at him. J. Henry was makin' plans as 

 to which particular fireplace at home he was 

 goin' to decorate with Mister Lion's hide, 

 when along comes one of them fool hounds 

 an' begins smellin' th' remains. 



"First thing anybody knew th' corpse afore- 

 said gives a little sort of a quiver an' th' next 

 thing that happens is a real, genooine sur- 

 prise ! 



"That dead lion gives a wiggle an' a spring 

 an' lands clear outside of everybody an' hikes 

 off down this canon like he was shot out of 

 a gun ! 



"Well, th' next few minutes was spent, by 

 each of us explainin' to th* others how it hap- 

 pened that nobody tried to stop him, an' don't 

 you know — come to find out there wasn't a 

 gun in that whole blame crowd 'ceptin' J. 

 Henry's, an' that was plumb empty ! 



"Of course th' dogs flew after that ani- 

 mated coroner's inquest, but this particular 

 breed of canines ain't sufficiently robust to do 

 business with a nine-foot lion, 'specially if 

 he's wounded an' some scared an' mad clear 

 through, though I will say that a couple of 

 th' brashest of 'em tried to stop him. 



"They're th' ones you was askin' about. 



"Mebbyso they're still some brave an' 

 they're sure got aheap more sense, but they 

 haven't lost any lions ! 



"After th' boys got through tellin' how it 

 happened an' everybody'd gone to bed again, 

 J. Henry among th' rest, things sort of cooled 

 off, but next mornin' it was a cinch that 

 we'd got to have a lion hunt. 



"So, 'long- 'bout sun-up everybody saddled 

 his horse an' off we starts. 



"J. Henry was th' worst worried man you 

 ever saw, an' kept tryin' to figger out how 

 many times you had to kill a fool beast like 

 that before he was dead. 



"Th' dogs got th' trail easy enough, an' 

 we spent a whole lot of time haulin' our 

 horses over th' country where it was too 

 steep to ride, an' ridin' wherever we could, 

 till finally th' trail led into a crack in th' rock 

 which looked like home — for th' lion — an' 

 like — well, not homelike to th' rest of us. 



"Nobody was makin' any volunteers to go 

 in an' poke him out, an' th' dogs was pretty 

 considerable bashful, too, an' it began to look 

 like J. Henry'd have to be content with just 

 plain bare floors in front of his domestic 

 hearths, when, up on top of th' mesa, 'bout a 

 mile or two away, we see a cuss come ridin' 

 towards us like somethin' was chasin' 

 him. 



"When he got close enough to see it turned 

 out to be th' sixteen-year-old kid of one of 

 my Mexicans. 



"He rode up an' stopped his horse an' we 

 could see he was excited quite a few lines. 



" 'El leon, senors !' says he. 'Yo la muerte ! 

 El leon !' 



"'Where?' says I. 



" 'Back under that beeg pinon, senor. I 

 was coming under th' tree an' I see th' leon 

 — muy grande ! — on limb, ofer me. I pull my 

 gun an' shoot heem queek!' 



" 'Well,' says I, 'if it's th' same lion, that's 

 two "muertes" for him ; let's go an' see !' 



"So off we went, an' sure enough, there 

 he was, stretched out under th' pinon, 'par- 

 ently just as dead as he was th' night be- 

 fore. 



"Havin' experienced his ability to resurrect 

 them remains of his, th' boys weren't quite 

 so anxious to take his hide off right then, but 

 waited till I put a rifle-bullet through his 

 ear an' as he didn't act like that disturbed 

 him any, we went up an' counted th' holes 

 in him. 



"We found one high up on his neck that 

 had just creased him, an' as sure's you're a 

 foot high that's th' only place J. Henry'd hit 

 him at all ! 



"Then there was my bullet through his ear, 

 but as he'd been pretty dead when that hit 

 him I didn't take any particular credit for th' 

 shot. 



"Then we looked for th' kid's shot — an' 

 couldn't find it ! 



"He insisted, though, that he had killed 

 him, an' as it was a cinche that th' lion was 

 dead (so far as we could see) when we got 

 there, we sized it up that th' kid had some- 

 how scared him to death. 



"He got mad at this an' insisted that he 

 had shot him an' then somebody asked him 

 what with? 



"Well, sir, when he produced th' evidence 

 everybody sure laughed ! 



"Why, it was one of them little, cheap, 

 Fourth of July guns, shootin' a bullet I could 

 catch in my teeth an' then not know I had it ! 



"When th' laugh went up th' kid just 

 pitched an' snorted ! 



" 'Skeen heem, senor! Skeen heem!' he 

 hollered — 'an' you w r eel find dat bulleet in 

 hees heart!" 



"A couple of th' boys started in an' had 

 th' hide off in mighty short order. 



"Sure enough, right where it ought to be, 

 was a little hole 'bout as big as a pencil, so 

 they cut out th' heart, an' sure's you an' I 're 

 sittin' here, there was that kid's minute slug 

 square in th' middle of it ! 



"Well, as I was sayin', it sometimes don't 

 take much of a circumstance to achieve re- 

 sults when you happen to hit th' right 

 spot ! 



"What's that?" 



"Anything in th' ole jug?" 



"Why, sure, son !" 



