“This settles it?”
“I said ‘’Nuf,’” he growled.
With quick movement I sprang clear of him, to my feet. He lay for a moment, baleful, and slowly scrambled up. On a sudden, as he faced me, his hand shot downward—I heard the surge and shout of men and women, to the stunning report of his revolver ducked aside, felt my left arm jerk and sting—felt my own gun explode in my hand (and how it came there I did not know)—beheld him spin around and collapse; an astonishing sight.
CHAPTER XVII
THE TRAIL FORKS
So there I stood, amidst silence, gaping foolishly, breathing hard, my revolver smoking in my fingers and my enemy in a shockingly prone posture at my feet, gradually reddening the white of the torn soil. He was upon his face, his revolver hand outflung. He was harmless. The moment had arrived and passed. I was standing here alive, I had killed him.
Then I heard myself babbling.
“Have I killed him? I didn’t want to. I tell you, I didn’t want to.”