"Do not be over confident," said Pumpkin Jim. "Few men would have lived as I have with a rib running through the centre of the liver, and into the ground for nine or ten inches without great difficulty. The secret of my power of endurance, I will, however, confide to you, as this may be positively my last appearance. My true name is not Pumpkin Jim; that is only a _nom de plume_. My sure enough name is Jesse James--that is the secret of my longevity. I have been killed a great deal. I have lost my life in almost every State in the Union. At first it used to make me gloomy and taciturn to be killed so much; but latterly I became very much pleased and flattered by this attention. It is sad to think, however, that after being killed by some of our most prominent men, I should at last yield up the ghost in a lonely canon, at the urgent solicitation of a narrow-guage mule. But enough; it is useless to repine. All that I am kicking about is, that after dying in so many different styles, and in such desirable conditions, surrounded by all the comforts of civilization, and getting a large amount of newspaper space, and having a patent medicine portrait of myself published in the papers, I should succumb to the death-dealing jackass, in the solitude of the mountains. "I cannot die again, however, without telling you of my love. I might occupy your time by telling you of my long and glittering career of crime, but it would take too long. I have nothing to lay at your feet but my untarnished record as a highway robber, and my all consuming love. "It would ease the pain of my dying hour if you were to say to me that you returned my love." Our hero then fell back upon the mossy bank and gasped for breath, while to all appearances the last moments of Pumpkin Jim had come. It was a trying time for a young thing like Geraldine to pass through. She stooped over him and fanned him with her sun bonnet and whispered a few low musical words in his ear. That did the business. ***** CHAPTER IV.--ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL. |The magic words that Geraldine emptied into Pumpkin James' ear roused him, and his eyes opened with their old diabolical light. A slight grating sound was heard. It was the broken bone of our hero's off-limb coming back into its place and reuniting. Then his rib came back out of the ground and waltzed into him, his liver healed up, and he arose and sat in the moonlight. His first words were, "Ah, Geraldine, you have brought me back to life. Now would you please look around and see if there is any cold pie in the house, my very ownest own?" This seemed to indicate that he had not fully recovered his mental faculties, as the most accessible cold pie was 327 miles from where they then were, and in a direct line.