Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 35, Number 121, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 October 1903 — LOST HIS NERVE. [ARTICLE]

LOST HIS NERVE.

Why I* Wu That Big Pete Failed to Hit the Sheriff. There were thirty mep-Tn the Whit* Wolf saloon when tbe sheriff of Silver county sauntered in to arrest big Pet* Thompson for murder. Pete was playing a hand in ja game of poker, and after nodding to him tbe sheriff stood up at the bar and called for a drink. His back was Scarcely turned when Pete laid down his cards, pulled his gun and fired six shots as fast as his finger could pull the trigger. The sheriff never moved. When the smoke had rolled out of the open door and we could see, the sheriff stood in the same position and wore the same smile. One bullet had burned his cheek; a second had grazed his ear; a third had cut through his shirt collar under the left ear. Big Pete was a dead shot, and yet he -had massed bis man at fifteen feet & “Got through, Pete?” asked the sheriff, breaking a silence that Was posttively painful. “And you—you are not heeled !” gasped Pete as bis arm sunk slowly down. v

“No; come on.” “You didn’t bring your guns?” "No; if you are through shooting, we’ll go.” Pete laid his two guns down on the table before him and * walked to the door and out into the street. His horse was tied to a post a block away. He reached the horse, mounted and then headed down the long street after the sheriff, who was giving him not the slightest attention. In five minutes the pair were out of sight. “What ailed Pete?” was asked of the barkeeper, who bad come to the door of the saloon. “Lost his nerve,” he brusquely replied. t “How do you mean?” “Why, the sheriff coming without a gun and standing there to be shot at took all his sand ..way and made a woman of him.” “Suppose the sheriff had had a gun?” The man jerked his head toward the field wheroin fifteen or twenty victims had been buried and said: “He’d ’a’ bin over thar.” “And will big Pete get clear?” “Likely; but he’ll have to leave here. The- boys have already put him down as N.' G.”