“’Dear Mr. Perris,

“’I know you don’t like to hire out.  But this is a job where you won’t have a boss.  The chestnut horse that nearly killed Manuel Cordova—­ Alcatraz—­has come to my ranch and stolen half a dozen valuable mares.  Will you come up and try to get rid of him for me?  The job seems to be too big for my men.  Name your own terms.

“’Cordially yours,

“‘Marianne Jordan.’

“I hands him back the letter while he rakes in his winnings.  ’I wouldn’t go as far as she does about the men she’s got,’ I says, ’but the hoss is sure a fast thinking, fast moving devil.’

“‘Well,’ says he, ’it sort of sounds good to me.  Soon as this game busts up we’ll start.  They’s only four of us.  Won’t you take a hand?’

“Well, that game run on forty hours.  Every time I got busted he staked me agin like a millionaire.  But finally we was both flat.

“‘All right,’ says he, ’I got a purse light enough for travel now.  Let’s start.’

“‘Without no sleep?’ says I.

“‘Have it your own way,’ says he.  ‘We’ll have a snooze and then start.’

“We didn’t have the price of another room.  He took me up to his room and makes me take the bed while he curls up on the floor.  The next minute he’s snoring while I was still arguing about not wanting to take the bed.

“Minute later I was asleep, but didn’t seem my eyes were more’n close when he gives me a shake.

“‘Five o’clock,’ says he, ‘and time to start.’

“We’d gone to bed about twelve but I wasn’t going to let him put anything over on me.  He bums a breakfast off the hotel, stalls ’em on his bill, and then we hit the road, him singing every step of the way and me near dead for sleep.  I got so mad I couldn’t talk.  That damn singing sure was riding my nerves.  I tried to take it out on a squirrel that run across the road but I missed him.

“‘Tell you what, partner,’ says Perris, ’for a quick shot, shooting from the hip is the only stuff.’

“‘Shooting from the hip at squirrels?’ says I.  ’I’ve read about that sort of stuff in a book, but it never was done out of print.’

“‘Just a matter of practice,’ says he.

“‘Huh,’ says I, ‘I’m here to see and do my talking afterwards.’

“Just then another squirrel pops across the trail dodging like a yearling trying to get back to the herd.  Quick as a wink out comes Red’s gun.  It just does a flip out of the holster and bang!  The dust jumped right under the squirrel’s belly.  Bang! goes the gat again and Mister Squirrel’s tail is chopped plumb in two and then he ducks down his hole by the side of the trail and we hear him squealing and chattering cusswords at us.

“I never see such shooting in my life.  But Perris puts up his gun and gets red as a girl when two gents ask her for the same dance.

“‘I’m plumb out of practice,’ he says.  ’Anyways, I guess I been talking too much.  You’ll have to excuse me, Shorty!’