"But, as I remarks yeretofore, Curly Ben is the most ornery person I
ever overtakes, an' the feelin's of the camp is in nowise laid waste
when Moon adds him to the list that time in the Red Light bar. It's
this a-way:

"It's about a month before, when Captain Moon an' his nephy, with
two 8-mule teams and four big three-an'-a-half Bain wagons, two lead
an' two trail they be, comes freightin' out of Silver City with
their eyes on Wolfville. It's the fourth night out, an' they're
camped near a Injun agency. About midnight a half dozen of the bucks
comes scoutin' 'round their camp, allowin' to a moral certainty
they'll see what's loose an' little enough for 'em to pull. The
aborigines makes the error of goin' up the wind from Moon's mules,
which is grazin' about with hobbles on, an' them sagacious anamiles
actooally has fits. It's a fact, if you want to see a mule go plumb
into the air an' remain, jest let him get a good, ample,
onmistakable smell of a Injun! It simply onhinges his reason; he
ain't no more responsible than a cimmaron sheep. No, it ain't that
the savage is out to do anything oncommon to the mule; it's merely
one of the mule's illoosions, as I've told you once before. Jest the
same, if them Injuns is comin' to braid his tail an' braid it tight,
that mule couldn't feel more frantic.

"When these yere faithful mules takes to surgin' about the scene on
two feet, Moon's nephy grabs a Winchester an' pumps a load or so
into the darkness for gen'ral results. An' he has a heap of luck. He
shorely stops one of them Apaches in his lopin' up, an' down the
land for good an' all.