“Will you answer my questions?” The Mexican stared as if he did not understand, until the scout repeated the inquiry. “Si, señor,” he gurgled faintly. “You were set on by some one to do this?” “No--no, señor.” “Why did you do it? You tried to kill me!” “No--no, señor.” “Then why did you attack me? Answer me straight.” “For--for dem!” Buffalo Bill saw that the Mexican had indicated his handsomely mounted revolvers. “For my pistols? You wanted to rob me?” “Si, señor,” was the bold confession. “Well, you are cool about it!” He searched the Mexican hastily and found nothing. Standing before him he pointed the revolver and clicked the cylinder in a suggestive way. “I think you are lying. Unless you tell the truth, I shall have to shoot you!” The Mexican’s teeth chattered with fright and his face became an ashen brown. “Now,” the scout went on, “did some one tell you to attack me here?” The Mexican was so scared he could hardly speak, but he managed to stammer out another denial. “No one told you to do it?” “No, señor.” “You simply wanted my pistols?” “Si, señor.” The scout was in a measure disappointed and baffled. He had thought that perhaps this man had been ordered to assault him. Yet he knew that the lower-class Mexicans are such liars that even their most solemn statements cannot always be believed. So he was still suspicious on that point. He threw the knife to the crouching and whining scamp. “Clear out!” he said. “And if you trouble me again I shall certainly kill you. Clear out!” The Mexican grabbed the knife and bolted through the door. When Buffalo Bill had looked at his horse and had given him some hay, he left the stable. The Mexican had disappeared. On approaching the house the scout once more encountered Pizen Kate, still hunting for her husband. She fairly cackled with glee, when he asked her if she had seen anything of the Mexican servant. “Say,” she said, waving her umbrella for emphasis, “I’m believin’ that men will soon learn to fly, jedgin’ by him! He was as nigh to flyin’ as a human can git without bein’ actually a bird with wings. He went by here only hittin’ the high places. Well, he was goin’ some when I seen him! What was the matter with him?” “I told him to get, and he was getting. He tried to murder me when I went into the stables.” “You don’t mean it?” she cried. “Well, I thought mebby he’d seen the face of my lost husband lookin’ at him from some sing’lar place and imagined he’d seen a ghost. He tried to kill ye?” “He made a good attempt at it.”