Evening star., 1915-02-13

/ to mess up the tale-bearing doctor with
large and heated collection Of soft
nosed IA bullets.
So the Vest -Harwood combine went out
and bought steak about yard square
and three inches thick, all set about with
mushrooms, and pledged themselves to
an undying and eternal war of extermi-
nation upon the said medicine man. Mat
ters of armament were then discussed
and the experienced Harwood led the
way to pawnshop and secondhand
arsenal, where the alliance chose a re-
volver of large and ugly dimensions Of
the self-cocking type. Bear that point
in mind it was a self-cocker; and young
Vest had never handled one. He had
seen only the oldtime sort that You cock
by pulling back the hammer.
The doctor had a shack with two
rooms; the front his office; the rear his
bedchamber The Harwood- Vest COL
umn advanced in a highly dignified man.
ner upon the front of the shack. intent
upon bombarding the doctor on sight
The two men entered the front door. and
the doctor called out from the rear
room that he would be out in a
minute
The excitement in young Vests mind
boiled over. He had not descended from
long and distinguished line of duelists
and his fingers clutched the trigger Of
that self-cocker. Little did he know that
seif-cocker was the self-starter of the
gun world, but he soon found out
Bang! There was terrible explosion in
his rear pocket; and streak of fire shot
down his leg
He yelled. thinking he had been NOR
tally wounded, and grabbed the pistol
| trigger again, thinking the assault was
coming from without the shack: that he
had been attacked by an unknown
again. and the bullet not only grazed his
leg all the way down, but the powder set
his coattails afire.
I'm killed." shrieked Vest.
Remember your honor" yelled Har-
wood.
doctor. as he jumped through the door
into the smoke-filled room.
But Vest didn't wait. With terrific
speed for a man who had been shot
twice. he bolted the door and sailed
down the street, hitting only the ex-
tremely high spots in the thorough
fares. and the breeze famed the smol-
dering spot on his trousers into a fair
and ran. and as he sped, the flames
grew, and, incidentally. so did the heat.
And 1t may be said, in passing, that
Mr.. Vest, in telling this story, allows
And finally, after having run himself
out. kind friend grabbed him and
dumped him into conven 'ent tub of
water. The fire then subsided.
And as a morning after incident, the
mayor took the twelve-dollar self-cock-
ing false friend into tow as a fine for
disturbing the peace.
X X 4
Marshall P. Wilder, that wonderful
storyteller, who died not many days
ago. told a dozen stories at the dinner
of The Evening Star Club a year ago,
and every one of them Is cherished by
the men who heard him. He had told
stories, probably. in every neighbor-
hood in the Travelled English speaking
world, and this tale is one that he as
sured us was an actual experiences:
1t happened in one of those islands
in the South seas somewhere. 1t was
an island of the comic opera sort, where
the only real money the natives ever
saw was that brought down by the oc-
casional steamer load of tourists who
went ashore to see the wonderful trees,
the coral-lined bays and the beautiful
colors of tropical islets The island
had an army-fifty swarthies that de-
fed the comedy of the funniest min
strel show on earth. The king wore
epaulets and a high hat, and mighty
little besides and If moving-picture
firm ever got reel of his days move
ments the concern could pay divi-
dends of enormoue size on that one
feature alone.
Along the ramshackle wharf, said
Mr. Wilder, the population gathered at
every steamer arrival and fought, bit
and scratched for the purpose of diving
into the wonderfully clear water to get
the pennies which steamer passengers
tossed down from the decks. Men. wom-
en- and children were on the wharf in
hordes, and a dozen would go over