“I’ll make the cribs myself. I’m dynamite with them old brums in the cribs,” he declared, with a satisfied, confident air. The “brass” was portioned out and they started uptown to “tell the natives how it happened.” There is no more industrious person than a half-drunk brass peddler out on the street “making a plunge” for enough coin to buy himself another micky of alcohol. The first peddler returned in an hour with his quota of “Dr. Hall” (alcohol), and the drinking began afresh. George, Johnnie, and I had enough; we drank sparingly. One by one they straggled in with their bottles till all had arrived but Gold Tooth. There was much speculation as to what had happened to him, and his “tribe” finally decided he had been “yaffled by the town whittler.” In the language of the bums “yaffled” is arrested, and the “town whittler” is the constable, so-called because he is usually found sitting in some comfortable place whittling a stick. When Gold Tooth did show up, it was evident that he would have been lucky had the town whittler got him first. Blood was running down his face from wounds on his head, his shirt was in strands, and he was raving. “Look at me,” he screamed, “this is the rankest deal I’ve got in my ten years on the road. And where do you think I got it? In Salt Chunk Mary’s. I go in her joint and drop a hoop to one of her frowsy little brums for nine dollars. I’m decent enough to buy her a bottle of beer when she pays me for my brass. When she goes out for the beer she shows the hoop to Mary. She comes in and deliberately orders me to blow back the jane’s nine bucks. I tells her there’s nothing doin’ and starts for the door. Mary hits me in the back of the head with a bottle of beer, and when I go down she puts the boots to me.” George sat up and looked at the speaker curiously. Still standing by the fire, he continued: “That’s what I get for bein’ a good bum. I’m goin’ back up there to-night and burn down her shack; the dirty, big, red-headed Amazonian battle-ax. I’ll——” “Hey, you,” said George from across the fire, “you’re a liar.” His little dead blue eyes were blazing like a wounded wild boar’s. “You was a good bum, but you’re dog meat now.” A gun flashed from beneath his coat, and he fired into Gold Tooth twice. Six feet away, I could *feel* the slugs hit him. His head fell forward and both hands went to his chest, where he was hit. He turned round, like a dog getting ready to lie down and fell on his face. His hat rolled into the fire. His hands were clawing the red-hot coals.