"Say, now, Fee, war that yer cow?" cried Beckett, the man under the insufficient protection of the "bobtailed flush." Perhaps the fact of being a helpless object of pity to his opponents both at cards and at arms quickened his sense of expedients, and lubricated his clumsy tongue. "We-uns didn't know it. Durned ef we don't pay ye fur it," with an air of unctuous sympathy.
"Naw, ye won't," retorted Guthrie—"ye won't, now. I won't tech yer lyin', thievin', black-hearted money!"
A sudden anxiety crossed the face of Derridge, who still stood by the horse's side. "It's jes' ez well ye don't want our money, fur we ain't got none," he said, flashing a significant glance at the card-player, who was still mechanically holding his cards well together, although his opponent's hand lay scattered on the saddle that served as board. "Pete means we'd gin ye a beastis fur the one we tuk. But ef ye don't want her, go lackin'." He sarcastically waved his hand, and the gesture in a measure shielded the other hand as he slyly cocked the rifle. "Steve Yates hev got inter a sorter difficult with the law, an' axed we-uns ter take him in," continued Derridge, recovering his reasoning faculties from the chaos of his fear and surprise, and adding to them the protean influences of imagination. "We-uns stop by hyar at Crazy Zeb's cell whenst ridin' arter cattle, ter swop lies, an' take a leetle drink, an' play kyerds; leastwise the t'others, not me. Them boys air gettin' ter be tur'ble gamesters, a-bettin' thar money an' gear an' sech, an' wunst in a while hevin' a reg'lar knock-down an' drag-out fight. I ain't s'prised none ef the church folks in the cove hears o' thar goin's on an' turns 'em out; they bein' members in good standing, too; an' I wouldn't blame pa'son an' the deacons an' sech. Naw, sir, I wouldn't."
"Me nuther," said Guthrie, his vigilance relaxed, his credulity coerced. All at once the gathering of the coterie in this sequestered place, that had been so mysterious a moment ago, seemed readily explicable. Jollity, companionship, card-playing, sloth—all combined to attract the mountain loafers, expert to fend off work with any odd dallying with time. He felt the pistol in each hand a cumbrous superfluity. He did not realize why he had drawn them, why he had so quickly assumed the aggressive. He wondered that, interrupted thus in their pacific absorptions, they did not reproach him. It was no longer in suspicion, but with a sort of attempt to justify his precipitancy, that he demanded, "What hev Steve Yates been a-doin' of ter run him off from home an' be searched fur ez dead?"
He had unconsciously moved several paces from the wall; the weapons in his hands were lowered and hung listlessly; the fire-light slanted athwart the place; the monstrous elongated shadows of the men extended across the floor and up the side of the niche; a bee went booming by; the river sang; and the entrance behind him was so noiseless that these trivial sounds he heard, and not Cheever's step.
The leader of the gang wore an excited face as he suddenly came in. It turned pale in the moment. He threw his arm across his eyes with a wild, hoarse cry, while the others stared in amazement, until Bob Millroy, also entering, his superstition always on the alert, was reminded of that strange intruder here revealed once before to Cheever, then visible to none else.
"Thar, now! the extry man!" he cried out, hardly less discomposed.
Guthrie, a trifle shaken by the uncomprehended commotion, reverted to the instinct of self-defence. He perceived, with a flutter of fear and a pang of self-reproach, that his remitted watchfulness had permitted him to be surrounded. They had all drawn their pistols in the interval. He spoke upon his impulse. "Lemme git out'n this!" he growled, half articulately, advancing upon Cheever, intending to push by to the only exit. Cheever, restored by the sight of the revolvers and the sudden recognition of the young mountaineer's face, laid a hand upon Guthrie's shoulder, grinding his teeth, and with a concentrated fury in his eyes.
"So ye hev fund out whar we-uns war, ye peekin', pryin' sneak; she tole ye ez Steve war along o' we-uns—the leetle Pettingill she-devil, that frazzle-headed vixen of a Letishy!"
Her name stunned Guthrie in some sort; he stood wide-eyed, quiescent, in amazed dismay, hearing naught of the babel of remonstrance from the others: "Hesh! hesh! he dun'no' nuthin'. Don't tell him nuthin'! Let him be—let him be!"