ear to see that
the snowflakes don't strike fire again. They burned up a couple years
ago when I hed thirty ton of as fine hay as they ever get in this yere
Park. I had all the stock that was bein' wintered, and some of the other
fellows up the river had hay but no stock. The range had closed, so they
had no chans't to get any stock. Well, my hay ketched fire and, of
course, I wouldn't see them horses starve, so I had to buy them fellers'
hay. A good ba'r trap would have ketched something besides ba'r that
winter if I had set a few out. While I'm tendin' to the corral Bill will
tell you about that hole in the door frame," pointing to a badly mangled
orifice about as big as an orange.

"Shotgun?" queried Jack.

"Yes," said Bill; "shotgun--kingdom cum," and he had to straighten out
his vocal impediments and tell it slowly, although it was a hard task
for him, and his red whiskers and hair would rise up in their wrath,
seemingly, as he stuttered along:

"Yer see, Dick Bradner came along one day over from Rattlesnake, and
said he wanted a good jack-rabbit shoot. The snow was just right and he
was gone all afternoon. He got half a wagonload, I guess. Along about
dark he steps in on the way to the corral and sets his gun up aside the
fireplace with the other guns. I was just beginning to get grub and had
a pan of flour mixin' up some sour-dough bread, the lamp standin' in
front of the pan and me at the other end of the table from the door
frame. I was puttin' in some good licks on that bread, for sour dough
needs a lot of punchin', and guess I had my head leanin' out pretty well
toward the door. I heard some one step in from the outside, but didn't
look up to see who it was, when there came a flash, and kingdom cum, I
thought my head had caved in. The splinters flew into the bread and the
powder smoke choked me clean up. All I could see was that crazy fool
Irish Mike, his face as white as it will be when he's gone over the
range, standin' there with Dick's gun pintin' to the roof. That idjit
never sees a new gun standin' round but he must pull it up and aim it at
somethin'. You know how he shoots. Dick must have left the gun at full
cock, as he allus does. It was lucky it went off before he got the
barrel on a level with the lamp, or we'd all been in kingdom cum."

"You got some of the powder in your face," remarked Jack, noticing the
blue pits sprinkled here and there in Bill's forehead.

"Yes," said Bill, energetically