When he was almost midway of the bridge the big wires that held it began to shriek out of the old posts that held them--though I had not touched them--and it seemed many years that passed while the whole of it dangled in the air like a bird-nest in a storm; and the creek down below laughed at that big coward.

I still heard his hoofs thumping the planks, until the bridge dropped from under him and left him for a long second with his arms and legs flying in the air.

Yes; it was very horrible to see.

And then his great body went down, down--God! It was a very dreadful way for a wicked man to die." And Oscar brushed his hat with his sleeve and looked away at the purple and gray ridges and their burden of stars.
"Yes, it must have been terrible," said Claiborne.
"But now he can not be left to lie down there on the rocks, though he was so wicked and died like a beast.

I am a bad Catholic, but when I was a boy I used to serve mass, and it is not well for a man to lie in a wild place where the buzzards will find him." "But you can not bring a priest.