The bartender, grasping the mallet even more firmly, arose on his toes and peered over the bar, not quite sure of what he might discover. He had read of infernal machines although he had never seen one. “What the blazes!” he exclaimed in almost a whisper; and then his face went hard. “You get out of here, quick! You've had too much already! I've seen drunks, but—G'wan! Get out!”
“But we ain't begun yet,” Hopalong interposed hastily. “You see—”
“Never mind what I see! I'd hate to see what you'll be seeing before long. God help you when you finish!” rather impolitely interrupted the bartender. He waved the mallet and made for the end of the counter with no hesitancy and lots of purpose in his stride. “G'wan, now! Get out!”
“Come on, Johnny; I'd shoot him only we didn't put no powder with the shot,” Hopalong remarked sadly, leading the way out of the saloon and towards the hardware store.
“You better get out!” shouted the man with the mallet, waving the weapon defiantly. “An' don't you never come back again, neither,” he warned.
“Hey, it leaked,” Hopalong said pleasantly as he closed the door of the hardware store behind him, whereupon the clerk jumped and reached for the sawed-off shotgun behind the counter. Sawed-off shotguns are great institutions for arguing at short range, almost as effective as dynamite in clearing away obstacles.
“Don't you come no nearer!” he cried, white of face. “You git out, or I'll let this leak, an' give you all shot, an' more than you can carry!”
“Easy! Easy there, pardner; we want them wedges,” Hopalong replied, somewhat hurriedly. “The others ain't no good; I choked on the very first screw. Why, I wouldn't hurt you for the world,” Hopalong assured him, gazing interestedly down the twin tunnels.
Johnny leaned over a nail keg and loosed the shot and screws into it, smiling with childlike simplicity as he listened to the tintinnabulation of the metal shower among the nails. “It does drop when you let go of it,” he observed.
“Didn't I tell you it would? I allus said so,” replied Hopalong, looking back to the clerk and the shotgun. “Didn't I, stranger?”