e, I've a
suspicion it's a _Her_! Never fear a known enemy, Brydges! It's the
unknown factors you want to look out for! F'r instance, there is this
sot of a drunken Shanty Town Irishman? What's become of him? Did he
burn himself, when he set fire to the slash?"

They had paused opposite that fallen giant which bridged the Gully
where Wayland had laid the saplings to cross to the Rim Rocks.

"That's a fine one; the fire didn't bring that one down! Been cheesy
heart wood! Wonder who placed the saplings for a bridge? Think I'll
cross and go down to the ranch by the Rim Rocks, Brydges!"

"Then, excuse me, Mr. Senator! I go back _this_ way! Napoleon had
aversion to mice! I've an aversion to wire walking."

He saw Moyese, hands in pockets, stroll along the great log bridging
the Gully. Mid-way, he paused as if in contempt of Brydges' timidity.
"Bark gives a little," he said, pressing his whole weight up and down
flexibly.

"I wish you wouldn't do that, Senator," called Brydges. "Trunk looks
to me as if the fire had run through the punk!"

Even as he spoke, he saw it happen, Calamity glide on the far end of
the log, utter a maniacal laugh, throw her shawl to the winds and bound
forward.

"Go back, you she-devil! Look out, Senator! That log won't stand the
weight of two--"

There was the flash of a knife in her hand. Moyese had jumped from the
stabbing onslaught--when he lost his balance: the tree crunched, bent,
doubled like a jack knife, and plunged in a swirl of smoke and dust to
the bottom of the Gully. It had been burnt through to the green mossed
outer bark. When Brydges looked fearfully over the bank, the Indian
woman had crushed below the log; and Moyese lay very still, his face to
the sky, his left hand in his pocket, his right hand thrown out as if
to ward a blow, gashed and bloody, whether from rock or knife cut, one
could not tell.

I do not intend to repeat the "Smelter City Herald's" flare head
announcement of "the deplorable and tragical accident that cut short
one of the most promising political careers in the United States."
"Senator Moyese had long been accustomed to search the mountains in
autumn for seeds and roots of specimen flowers for his herbarium, of
which he had made a hobby. That reckless disregard of danger for which
he was famous, etc., etc." You'll find the salient features of it all
in "Who's Who." Pad that out with Mr. Bat Brydges' imagination and
devotion; and y