“Shame!” cried voices, mine among them. “That’s tall language.”
Strangely, and yet not strangely, sentiment had veered. We were Americans—and had we been English that would have made no difference. It was the Anglo-Saxon which gave utterance.
She crimsoned, defiant; laughed scornfully.
“You would not dare bait a man that way, sir. Blood on my hands? Not blood; oh, no! He couldn’t pan out blood.”
“You killed him, woman?”
“Not yet. He’s likely fleecing the public in the Big Tent at this very moment.”
“And what did you expect here, in my train?”
“A little manhood and a little chivalry, sir. I am going to Salt Lake and I knew of no safer way.”
“She jumped off a railway train, paw,” bawled Daniel. “I seen her. An’ she axed for Mister Jenks, fust thing.”
“I’ll give you something to stop that yawp. Come mornin’, we’ll settle, young feller,” my friend Jenks growled.