Laughlin broke off here to nod his head sagaciously. "From what has transpired since, I guess Canlan was kind o’ sorry he fell in with them two, and I reckon he wondered if there was no kind of an excuse he could put up for rejecting their offer o’ service and continuin’ to pack the feller down himself. Anyways, they got the man into the Apache’s waggon, and my house bein’ the nighest to the waggon road and the mountain, they pulled up at my door and we all carries the fellow up to a room. I was at the door. Canlan was sitting on the bed-foot. Apache Kid and Larry Donoghue was laying him out comf’able. The fellow groans and mumbles something, and Canlan gave a bit of a start forward, and says he: ’There, there now, that ’ll do; you ’ve got him up all right. I reckon that’s all that’s wanted. You can go for a doctor, now, if you want to help at all.’ There was something kind o’ strained in his voice, and I think Apache Kid noticed it the way he looks round. ’Why,’ he says, ’I think, seein’ as you,’ and he stops and looks Canlan plumb in the eye, ’seein’ as you _found_ the man, you had better fetch the doctor and finish your job. My partner and I will sit by him till the doctor comes.’ Canlan looked just a little bit rattled when Apache Kid says, lookin’ at the man in the bed: ’He seems to have got a kind o’ a knock on the head here.’ ’Yes,’ says Canlan, ’I got him where he had fallen down. I reckon he got that punch then.’ And then Apache Kid looks at Larry Donoghue, and Larry looks at him, and they both smile, and Canlan cries out: ’Oh, if that’s what you think, why I ’ll go for the doctor without any more ado!’" Laughlin paused, and, "You savvy the idea?" he asked. "Not quite," I said. He tapped me on the knee, and, bending forward, said: "Don’t you see, Apache Kid and Larry hed no suspicions o’ foul play at all, but they was wanting to get alone in the room with the feller, and this was just Apache’s bluff to get a move on Canlan. Canlan was no sooner gone than Apache Kid asks me to fetch a glass o’ spirits. It was only thinkin’ it over after that I saw through the thing; anyhow, I come down for the glass, and when I got up, derned if they did n’t hev the man propped up in bed, and him mumblin’ away and them bendin’ over him listening eager to him. They gave him the liquor, and he began talking a trifle stronger, and took two-three deep gusts o’ breath. Then he began mumblin’ again." Mr. Laughlin looked furtively round and then, leaning forward again, thrust his neck forward and with infinite disgust in his voice said: "And damn me if that wife o’ mine did n’t come to the stair-end right then and start yellin’ on me to come down."