There were murmurs of assent.
“Look here,” said Annixter, “if this thing can by any means be settled peaceably, I say let's do it, so long as we don't give in.”
The others stared. Was this Annixter who spoke—the Hotspur of the League, the quarrelsome, irascible fellow who loved and sought a quarrel? Was it Annixter, who now had been the first and only one of them all to suffer, whose ranch had been seized, whose household possessions had been flung out into the road?
“When you come right down to it,” he continued, “killing a man, no matter what he's done to you, is a serious business. I propose we make one more attempt to stave this thing off. Let's see if we can't get to talk with the marshal himself; at any rate, warn him of the danger of going any further. Boys, let's not fire the first shot. What do you say?”
The others agreed unanimously and promptly; and old Broderson, tugging uneasily at his long beard, added:
“No—no—no violence, no UNNECESSARY violence, that is. I should hate to have innocent blood on my hands—that is, if it IS innocent. I don't know, that S. Behrman—ah, he is a—a—surely he had innocent blood on HIS head. That Dyke affair, terrible, terrible; but then Dyke WAS in the wrong—driven to it, though; the Railroad did drive him to it. I want to be fair and just to everybody.”
“There's a team coming up the road from Los Muertos,” announced Presley from the door.
“Fair and just to everybody,” murmured old Broderson, wagging his head, frowning perplexedly. “I don't want to—to—to harm anybody unless they harm me.”
“Is the team going towards Guadalajara?” enquired Garnett, getting up and coming to the door.
“Yes, it's a Portuguese, one of the garden truck men.”