The weekly examiner., 1901-06-15
The Salvation of Jim
 By Garrard Harris.
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 Copyright, 1901, by Authors Syndicate.)

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 ly for Jim. He realized it, as he paced up and down the narrow cell in the Mesquite jail. The seedy-look- ing young lawyer the court had ap- pointed to defend him on the charge of murder also told him so, and in lieu of clearing him on the charge of- fered to write his will for him free. Jim mournfully declined.
 ''I ain't got nothin' to will away" he said. 'An I had was stole from me thatnight when the trouble happened.
 s'Well, I reckon you had better pray some, for you're about as good as gone goslin'. Shall I send the priest to you?"
 ''Naw, darn the prayin'. Is Inez bound to swear against me?"
 ''Sure. You see, when you shot Rafc Mendoza you shot her feller. She was goin' to marry him, and naturally she don't feel kindly to you. He was the best-fixed greaser in this whole coun- try. And you know how these greasers are, anyway. They just naturally hate a white man. They will make a big fiesta of the day when you are hung, and eat tamales and drink pulque, and enjoy themselves hugely"
 'T don't mind entertainin' folks gen. orally, but I swear I hate to do so at the end of rope. Wish I'd left that girl alone"
 ''It would have been better for you. That girl is the only witness against you, and her testimony will hang you sure. If she wasn't greaser, I might be able to persuade her to skip out, but nowhere ain't a bit of a chance"
 ssI don't see why she's so bent on .havin' me hanged. I've been nice to her, and she liked me. That's the reason I had to Kin Rafe Mendoza-he wns jealous as he could be, and tried to slip knife in my ribs that night when came to see her."
 "But Jim, Inez says she didn't see him with any knife, and when they picked him up, after you had gone out, those greasers say he didn't even have a pocketlsnife. What do you make of that? Inez says the first thing she saw was you drawing your gun, and that you proceeded to pump him full of lead without any warning.
 q know it looks bad, colonel, but that greaser did certainly try to knife me. I saw it in his hand, and it looked as big as a sword. Those friends of his made way with the knife when they came to pick him up."
 "Well, I'll see you tomorrow in court. Your case will come the first on the docket, and it won't take long to hear the evidence against you. I am sorry, but l can't make testimony, and what that girl will swear will hang you, surely. Good-by.'' The young lawyer left the dreary little jail think ing deeply.
 Jim went to the small window and looked out across the waste of shim- mering sand and buffalo grass, re- lieved here and there by few stunted mesquite bushes. The heat radiated in wavy zig-zags, and seemed to stifie him in his cell. He longed to be on his broncho, loping across the range after the cattle, and it pained him to think that such pleasure would never again be his. He knew that he had acted foolishly in going about Inez Gonzales-he had been warned that he would have trouble with Rafe Men doza if he did. Mendoza was a well-to- do ranchero, and the favorite with the parents of the girl. They were urging her to marry him, but she had been putting him off as long as she could.
 Old Gonzales, an evil-1ooking Mex ican with one eye, regarded Jim with distinct disfavor. So did his wife. They tried in every way to show him that his presence was unwelcome. Jim saw their game, but was unrufaed by it. He was as polite as he knew how to Rafe Mendoza. But night after he was leaving the adobe of the Con- zales', a Winchester cracked from be- hind a clump of mesquite bushes, and a. ball clipped piece out of his hat. Then he knew that henceforth it was war between him and Mendoza.
 Inez was the prettiest girl in the country. She was small, and had fig ure as 1.-the and graceful as that of a tiger. Her eyes were as bright as stars and large, and full of expression Her complexion was the purest olive and she wore her great mass of hair braided down her back. She was young, too, and she did not like to be forced into marriage with Mendoza but her parents were insisting. She could not forget Jim, and his evident admiration of her. She did not un. derstand all he said to her, but she understood enough to know that he loved her, and the thought made her very, very happy indeed. And when