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were soon pattering all around me and I hinted delicately to Wallace Ollinger, Bob's brother, who was guarding me, that I wouldn't seriously object to being somewhere else. He wasn't any too comfortable himself, and he took me across the river and, skirting through the hills, brought me to the Murphy store in the other end of town. A half-dozen Murphy men were there and they put me, for safe keeping, upstairs in the same room Billy the Kid occupied later when he was a prisoner under sentence of death.

"The firing was growing heavy down at the Ellis House. Wallace Ollinger wanted to get into the fighting; he was tired of guarding me. He tossed me a six-shooter. 'Take care of yourself,' he said, and walked out of the room. When the other Murphy men asked him where I was, he said, 'Upstairs,' and some of them started up to get me. I stood at the head of the passageway with the gun Ollinger had given me and told them, if they came up, I would kill them. They decided they didn't want me bad enough to take that chance and all of them went away and joined in the battle. I strolled down street to the McSween home where I was safe among my friends.

"The battle ended with nobody killed when the Murphy forces drew off into the hills. Saunders and Bill Campbell were sent to the military hospital at Fort Stanton, where they occupied adjoining cots and had terrific quarrels every day until they recovered from their wounds."

The late spring and early summer of 1878 were busy times for Sheriff Peppin. With the moral support of the territorial government, he spent his time in strengthening his forces for the decisive battle which both sides realized was now near at hand.

His scouts kept a sharp watch on the movements of the Kid, and when they located the McSween leader with