"Maybe you mout git the money," said McCord, picking up his cards. "But your story wouldn' hang him nohow, I 'low." Here Bob laid down a half-dollar for a new game, and Dave covered it.
"Of course, if I stay he's got to swing," said Dave; and by way of proving this to Bob, he told his story of the shooting with some particularity, while he proceeded to win one half-dollar after another almost without interruption. "Now," he said, when he had told the story and answered Bob's questions, "you can see that's purty tolerable bad. I sh'd think they'd ruther I'd clear out. An' if somebody'd give you a hundred dollars an' you'd let me play three or four games of poker with you some fine day I'd make tracks, an' the prosecuting attorney'd have to get along without me."
By this time all of the five dollars that Barbara had furnished, except the last twenty-five-cent piece, had passed from Bob's reluctant hands to Dave Sovine's greedy pockets. This one quarter of a dollar Bob had prudently placed in the great pocket of his hunting-shirt, that he might have something to fill his stone jug with. For though he was devoted to the Graysons' side of the controversy, Bob McCord could hardly be called a disinterested philanthropist; and he held that even in serving one's friends one must not forget to provide the necessaries of life.
"You're awful good on a game," said Bob, with a rueful face. "You've cleaned me out, by hokey; I'll see ef I can't git you that hundred dollars, so's you kin win it. But it'll take time fer the Widder Grayson to raise it, I 'low."
"Oh! they ain't no partik'lar hurry," said Dave, cheerfully counting over his winnings and stowing the silver about in his pockets as a ship-master might distribute his ballast. "Only if I don't get the money I'll have to stay h-yer an' go to court, I guess." And Dave hitched up his trousers and walked off with the air of a man who has a master-stroke of business in view.
Lincoln came to town the next week and Bob told him the story, while Lincoln made careful notes of Dave's account of the shooting.
"He says ef Widder Grayson'll let me have a hunderd dollars, un I'll let him play draw poker fer it, he'll light out fer parts onknown."
"Oh! he wants pay, does he?" And the young lawyer sat and thought awhile. Then he turned full on Bob and said:
"Could I depend on you to be in court at the trial without fail, and without my sending a subpœna?"
"Oh, I'll be there un nowheres else," said Bob. "You needn't soopeeny me. I'll come 'thout callin', foller 'thout tollin', un stan' 'thout hitchin'."