"Why, nicely, thank you to hell," says I. "What's doin'? Horse race?"
"Probably," says he; then kind of yawning: "We're not expectin' company
this morning."
"Well," I answered, "it's the unexpected always happens, except the
exceptions. You talk like a man that's got something on his mind."
Don't think I'd lost my wits and was pickin' a row to no advantage.
I'll admit the gent riled me some, but the point I had in view was what
old Judge Hinky used to call "shifting the issue." I wanted to make
one stab at just one man--not the whole party--on grounds that the rest
of the crowd, who was plainly all good two-handed punchers, would see
was perfectly fair. And I intended to land that stab so's they'd see I
was no trifler. It was my bad luck that not a soul in the crowd knew
me--even by reputation, or my hair would have made it easy for me. So
I put a little ginger in the tone of my voice.
"My friend," says the tall lad, "I wouldn't advise you to get gay with
us. I would advise you to move right on--or I'll move you."
He played to me, you see. If he'd said, "_We_'ll move you," I'd had to
chaw with him some more. Now I had him. Right under the harmless
bundle of old clothes dangling from the saddle horn was the gun I'd
borrowed from Ike--Mary Ann's twin sister, full of cartridges loaded by
Ike himself--no miss-fire government issue. The next second that gun
had its cold, hard eye upon Long Jim in front of me.
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