THE FIGHTING SHEPHERDESS
“This banany belt's gittin' colder every winter." The
stranger broke off an icicle and laid it on the stove to hear
it sizzle.
" I was jest fixin' to turn in," Teeters hinted. " Last night I didn't sleep good. I tossed and thrashed around until half-past eight 'fore I closed my eyes."
" I won't keep you up, then. I come over on business. Bowers's my name. I'm a-workin' for Miss Prentice. I'm a sheepherder myself by perfession."
Teeters received the announcement with equanimity, so he continued :
" Along about two o'clock this afternoon I got an idea that nigh knocked me over. I bedded my sheep early and took a chance on leavin' them, seein' as it was on her account I wanted to talk to you. You're a friend of her'n, ain't you? "
" To the end of the road," Teeters replied soberly.
Bowers nodded.
" So somebody told me. Are you goin' to town any- ways soon? "
" To-morrow."
" Good 1 Will you take a message to Lingle? "
Teeters assented.
" Tell him for me that the night of the murder there was a onery breed-lookin' feller that smelt like a piece of Injun-tanned buckskin a settin' in Doc Fussel's drug store. He acted oneasy, as I come to think it over, and he went out jest before the killin'. I never thought of it at the time, but he might have been the feller that done it."
" I'll tell Lingle, but I don't think there's anythinir in it."
" Why? "
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