"Blame my hide!" shouted Dad, running out into the street. "It is a G-string! He ’s gone an’ got one of ’em! He ’s gone an’ got a ’Pache! Good boy, Kid! An’ how ’d you do it?" Carter plodded through the dust with Bill close behind. "_Where’d_ you do it?" demanded the proprietor eagerly. To Carter location meant more than method. He was plainly nervous. When he reached the crowd he, in turn, examined the trophies. They were genuine, and on the G-string was a splotch of crimson, muddy with dust. "What’s in the war-bag, Kid?" demanded Lefty, preparing to see for himself. Jimmy snatched it from his hands. "You never mind what’s in it, Freckle-face!" he snapped. "That’s my bag, _now_. Want to spoil my luck?" "How’d you do it?" demanded Dad breathlessly. "_Where_ ’d you do it?" snapped Carter. He glanced hurriedly around the horizon and repeated the question with vehemence. "Where ’d you get him?" "In th’ groin, first. Then through th’—" "I don’t mean where, I mean _where_—near here?" interrupted Carter. "Oh, fifteen mile east," answered Jimmy. "He was crawlin’ down on a bunch of cattle. He saw me just as I saw him. But he missed an’ I did n’t," he gloated proudly. "I met a Pawnee scout just afterward an’ he near got shot before he signaled. He says hell’s a-poppin’. Th’ ’Paches are raidin’ all over th’ country, down—" "I knowed it!" shouted Carter. "Yessir, I knowed it! I felt it all along! Where you finds one you finds a bunch!" "We’ll give ’em blazes, like th’ last time!" cried Dad, hurrying away to the harness shop where he had left his rifle. "I ’ve been needin’ some excitement for a long time," laughed Dawson. "I shore hope they come." Carter paused long enough to retort over his shoulder: "An’ I hopes you drop dead! You never did have no sense! Not nohow!" Bill smiled at the sudden awakening and watched the scrambling for weapons. "Why, there ’s enough men here to wipe out a tribe. I reckon we ’ll stay an’ see th’ fun. Anyhow, it ’ll be a whole lot safer here than fightin’ by ourselves out in th’ open somewhere. What you say?" "You could n’t drag me away from this town right now with a cayuse," Jimmy replied, gravely hanging the medicine-bag around his neck and then stuffing the gory G-string in the folds of the slicker he carried strapped behind the cantle of the saddle. "We ’ll see it out right here. But I do wish that ’Pache owned a better gun than this thing. It’s most fallin’ apart an’ ain’t worth nothin’." Bill took it and examined the rifling and the breech-block. He laughed as he handed it back. "You oughta be glad it was n’t a better gun, Kid. I don’t reckon he could put two in the same place at two hundred paces with this thing. I ain’t even anxious to shoot it off on a bet."