"There are no rattlesnakes about in the dead of winter on this
Range," Tom declared positively.
"That one has been keeping hisself warm in the bottom of the wood-box,"
insisted Alf.
Click-ick-ick!
"There, didn't you hear it?" quivered the cigarette fiend.
"I heard no rattler," declared Tom, innocently. "Did you, Leon?"
The cook thought, to be sure that he had heard one, but he caught
the cue from Reade and answered in the negative.
"Go and turn the wood-box out, Leon, to show the young man that
there's no snake there," Tom requested.
Just then that task was hardly welcome to the cook, but he was
a man of nerve, and, in addition, he reasoned that Reade must
know what he was talking about. So Leon crossed the room with
an air of unconcern.
"Here's your rattlesnake, I reckon," growled the cook, picking
up Alf's dropped cigarette and tossing it toward the boy.
"That's the only rattlesnake on the Range," Tom pursued. "I've
been trying to tell Alf that cigarettes are undermining his nerves
and making him hear and see things.
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