[CHAPTER NINETEEN]
"NEXT TIME, REMEMBER—BUTCH PACKS TWO GUNS!"
Bob came out fairly licking his chops over the enormous supper he had just gorged; took in the situation at a glance, hovered there helplessly for a space and announced that he was going back in and have a game or two of high-five with the boys. He kicked Bud's foot in passing; a hint which Bud could interpret as he pleased, though what Bob meant to signal was his intention to guard against treachery from the house.
Kid asked Bud how he felt, received a mumbled assurance that he was all right, and rolled and lighted another cigarette. A tactful companion was Kid Kern upon occasion; one who knew the Indian art of absolute passivity. It shamed Bud a bit to know that if he had been really suffering as he pretended to be, Kid would have sat right there all night if necessary, with never a complaint.
Then it came—the far-off clupet-clupety-clupet of a shod horse loping up the lane. Bud moved his long body a bit, drawing up one knee for leverage when the moment came to spring erect, and shifting his forehead so that his left hand pressed palm downward on the ground.
"How's she comin', Bud?" Kid poised his cigarette between two stained fingers while he peered down at Bud through the bright starlight. "Worse? Better let me get yuh that powder."
"No use—it's easing up—by spells." In the pauses Bud was listening, gauging the swiftness of the approach. Kid, he could see, had not yet caught the sound that had come clearly to Bud's ear pressed against the sod. His heart began to thump heavily, high in his chest. He could feel his face grow hot with the uprush of blood, and knew it was not fear that rioted within his body, but battle fever instead; the excitement that sends hot young blood leaping when conflict is near.
"Somebody comin'. Butch, I guess." Kid ground his cigarette stub under his heel as he rose.
The action and the announcement together gave Bud the excuse to rise also to a half-crouching position, poised on the balls of his feet like a runner waiting for the signal to go; a posture that would pass in the starlight as the squatting of a man whose interest is not sufficient to bring him to his feet. A full minute they listened to the nearing hoof beats, then the dim outline of a horseman showed in the lane.