“If he’d drawn you’d have give him a pill, I reckon, lady. I know yore kind. But he won’t bother you ag’in; not he.”
“Oh, what a terrible scene!”
To all this I paid scant attention. I heard her, as she sat composedly, scarcely panting. The little pistol had disappeared.
“The play has been made, ladies and gentlemen,” she said. And to me: “Thank you. Yes,” she continued, with a flash of lucent eyes and a dimpling smile, “Jim has lost his whiskey and has a chance to sober up. He’ll have forgotten all about this before we reach Benton. But I thank you for your promptness.”
“I didn’t want you to shoot him,” I stammered. “I was quite able to tend to him myself. Your pistol is loaded?”
“To be sure it is.” And she laughed gaily. Her lips tightened, her eyes darkened. “And I’d kill him 47 like a dog if he presumed farther. In this country we women protect ourselves from insult. I always carry my derringer, sir.”
The brakeman returned with a broom, to sweep up the chips of broken bottle. He grinned at us.
“There’s no wind in him now,” he communicated. “Peaceful as a baby. We took his gun off him. I’ll pass the word ahead to keep him safe, on from Cheyenne.”
“Please do, Jerry,” she bade. “I’d prefer to have no more trouble with him, for he might not come out so easily next time. He knows that.”
“Surely ought to, by golly,” the brakeman agreed roundly. “And he ought to know you go heeled. But that there tanglefoot went to his head. Looks now as if he’d been kicked in the face by a mule. Haw haw! No offense, friend. You got me plumb buffaloed with that fivespot o’ yourn.” And finishing his job he retired with dust-pan and broom.