Waterbury evening Democrat., 1904-10-06
.JIM's FETCHING WAY

SsNT ONE of the gun sooners ever got
 the drop on Nat Aiken when Nat pounded the day marshal's beat in Du- rango. Col, and Aiken held down the billet, at that, when an ombrey's life Tn l Durango wasn't held to be worth much more than buzzard tamale or pan of >friioles," said the tousle-haired man with the desert -bleached mustach, at one of those hotels on the lower avenue where summer night conversations are held out in front with all hands in tip tilted chairs and their feet against tree boxes.
 Aiken rnonsooned into Durango about six months after the boom began, and he succeeded Tim Naylor as day marshal of the camp-Tim had been so minced ilp. in a knife fight with two half-breed gfla-eaters that he had to bs hiked up to Colorado Springs to win back his strength.
 ..Nat was a taciturn, unassuming sawed-oft. He had cowlicixy auburn hair and pair of topaz eyes, ikea mountain cats, that seemed to grow darker and to spit sparks when he was getting busy
 ..'I reckon hain't a-gein' t git shot up none whilst dein' this we're camp work, Nat had remarked in accepting the day marEhal's jeb. I sure can't see no fun in this thing O 1ayin' abed with a hull lot O zig-zag holes in y'r system, I sure can't That's why ain't a-goin .t' let no gun-fannin' ombrey nthis camp stick me up an poke lead into my frame just nachully like t be swing in along on tn soles Q my boots, an don't see this yere game Q layin' back on a bunk, while tn holes are healin', an countin' eentipedes workin' their way in through th ceilin' an sides O tn 'dobe- they hain't 'nough action in that kind O work
 .sThe Durangoites who heard Nat thus express his natural objection to being lead-plugged hoped that he would get away with his determination, but nons of us had much of an idea that he would be able to make that determination stick for very long. Aiken had never shown the camp anything in the line of strategy, and so, of course, we had no way of fig- uring that he possessed any of that kind of stuff
  got his badge on a burly, green-eyed chap named Bill McShnne, who had drifted up to Durango from the Santa Anita mountains, where he had grown sulky after years of unsuccessful pros pecting, knocked off work at noon, ab- sorbed about half gallon of the jolty juniper juice into his system, and then sportively shot the right ear from the head of a Chink keeper of a feed shack. After doing this Bill strolled ont into the middle Of the street-Durango then being one-street camp-and announced that he couldn't abide any kind of grub joint that didn't provide its patrons with stewed pu1-adders, fricasseed tra- antulas and scorpions Ia Sonora, add ing that the same was the only kind of food that he cared to eat when he felt real good, az he happened to be fleeing at that moment.
 Which, if any red-headed runts that thinks they're some few on gun. breezfn' wants t dispute MT. Me. Shane wound up. obviously referrina ] to Day Marshal Nat Aiken, we're I'm a-perchin',' and he> left the middle ot : the road, leaned up n front of This Is It hoEkatonk, and. with his thumbs tucked into his gun belt, blinked booz- fly in tho sunshine
 Presently q dray, hauled by a flea. bitten and lonesome-looking mule, and driven by a greaser smoking a corn. shuck cigarette, pulled alongside tha plank sidewalk in front of the honka. tonk against which McShane was lean. ing and glooming. A large square pine box, of the sort that blankets for western shipment used to packed in, was the dray's load.
 | tMcShane gazed idly at the mule and the dray and the box. He did not observe that the top of the box was 1 missing But when the blue steel mug. 1 zles of two forty-fvcs, held by a pair of freck1ed, hairy hands, appeared over the edge of the box, and red head uncovered by any hat, followed the guns, bebbiAg up Jumping-jack-wisa Mcshane suddenly became heap olr servant
 Point both of 'em at tho buzzards, Bill Baia the day marshal of Durango | ln a- persuasive Rcrt of key, resting ; his arms on the edge of the box and l drawing a Ane bead with both of his guns on McShane.s torso--and before Aiken had got the words out the l g;easer driver, rightly experimenting that there'd be some action in that