n--so there'd come to be what was called the Hen's Lot out in the
cemetery on the mesa, as I've mentioned before. The Committee put her
in their list because they knowed for a fact there was bound to be
ructions in Palomitas as long as she stayed there; and so they found
'emselves in a deepish hole when she said plump Palomitas suited her,
and she didn't mean to be fired. The Hen knowed as well as they did
she had a cinch on 'em. If they didn't like her staying, she said,
they could yank her up to the next telegraph-pole to Charley's--and
then she asked 'em, kind of cool and cutting, if they didn't think
hanging a lady would give a nice name to the town!

The Committee was in session in the waiting-room at the deepo while
the Hen was doing her talking, and Santa Fe--with handcuffs on, and
tied to the express messenger's safe--was in the express office, with
the door open between. Everybody seen the Hen was right, and hanging
her would be ungentlemanly, and nobody seemed to know what they'd
better do. While they was all setting still and thinking, Santa Fe
spoke up from the express office--saying he had the reputation of the
town at heart as much as anybody, and to make a real clean-up the Hen
ought to quit along with the others, and if they'd let him have five
minutes private talk with her he'd fix things so she'd go.

The Committee didn't much believe Santa Fe could deliver the goods;
but they seen it would be a way out for 'em if he did--and so they
agreed him and the Hen should have their talk. To make it private, he
was took out and hitched fast to a freight-car laying on the siding
back of the deepo--the Committee standing around in easy shooting
distance, but far enough off not to hear nothing, with their
Winchesters handy in case the Hen took it into her head to cut the
rope and give him a chance to get away. She didn't--and she and Santa
Fe talked to each other mighty serious for a while; and then they
begun to snicker a little; and they ended up in a rousing laugh.

Charley sung out they'd finished, and the Committee closed in and
unhitched him, and took him back to the express office and hitched him
to the safe again--where he was to stay till hanging-time, with
members of the Committee taking turns keeping him quiet with their
guns. He said he was much obliged to 'em, and the Hen had agreed to
quit--and everybody was pleased all round.

"I don't like not being here when Charley gets his medicine," the Hen