MAKES TWENTY MEN ASK AN APOLOGY.
In a few weeks after the killing of Thompson, Bill again visited Ellsworth, and during this visit he met with an episode in which his influence among the desperado element was clearly evidenced. Reaching the town late in the evening, he had gone direct to the house kept by the woman just referred to, and after taking supper and playing a few games of cards with her, he retired to bed. About eleven o’clock at night, loud and boisterous noises, coupled with threats to tear the house down if admittance were refused, awakened everyone in the house. One of the girls raised a front window and asked the crowd what they wanted. The reply came that they intended to clean out the house, and to open the door quick, or they would break it down. The crowd numbered twenty of the worst men Ellsworth could produce, and as they were two-thirds drunk, everyone in the building except Bill became very much alarmed, and fearful that some fatal consequences would be the result. Bill arose from bed, and telling everyone in the house to leave the settlement of the trouble to him, descended the stairs in his night clothes, with his two derringers in his hands. A light was burning in the hall, and while the men were pounding on the door, and swearing that they would burn the house and everyone in it, Bill unlocked the door and threw it open. As he did so, he placed himself upon the threshold, and told the crowd that he would give them just ten seconds to leave the place, adding: “Or I’ll turn this place into a great big slaughter-house.” The surprise depicted on the faces of those twenty men was a fit subject for a painter. They all tried to apologize at once. Said the leader: “I’ll take my oath, Bill, if I’d a-knowed you was here I never would a-come; we never meant any harm, and as you are a gentleman, and we’re drunk, we owe you an apology. We’ll leave this minute.” They all added in chorus: “That’s so, Bill, and we beg your pardon a thousand times.”
“Then get out of here!” responded Bill.
And they went at once.