“The cayuses are yours,” continued the sheriff. “I’ll settle with Sneed if he has the gall to ask about them. Now git!”
Tex stared first at the sheriff and then at The Orphan and Bill as if doubting his ears. He was ten years nearer the grave than he had been before The Orphan had interrupted his counting. In less than half an hour he had gone through hell, and now he suddenly burst into tears from the reaction and staggered to his horse, which he finally managed to mount, a nervous wreck. “Oh, God!” he moaned, “Oh, God!”
The others stared at him in amazement until he had turned the bend, and then his companions slowly followed him and were lost to sight.
“D––n near dead from fright!” ejaculated the sheriff. “I never saw anybody go to pieces so bad!”
“He shore lost his nerve all right, all right,” responded The Orphan. Then he turned to where Bill stood looking after them: “Bill, you’re all right–you can fight like h–l!”
Bill slowly turned and grinned through the blood: “Oh, that wasn’t nothing–you should oughter see me when I get real mad!”
·····
Two men rode side by side after a lurching coach on their way toward the Limping Water, both buried in thought at what the driver had told them. As they emerged from the defile and left the Backbone behind, the elder looked keenly, almost affectionately, at his companion and placed a kindly hand on the shoulder of the man who had turned the balance, breaking the long silence.
“Son, why don’t you get a job punching cows, or something, and quit your d––d foolishness?” he bluntly asked.
The younger man thought for a space, and a woman’s words directed his reply: