"Murderer! Murderer!"
Down came my fist on his head and at the jar his rifle fell from his grasp. The next stroke took him on the lips, sending him backwards. I pounded him till my arms were weary, he lying there with his faded, pock-marked face and his colourless eyes dancing in pain and crying out: "Let up! Let up, you fool! We ain't hostile. It's Canlan!" he cried, between blows. "Mike Canlan."
At last I did "let up" and stood back from him.
He sat up and wiped the blood from his mouth and spat out a tooth.
"Ah, lad," he said. "Here's a fine way to repay me for savin' your life. Think I could n't have laid you out stark and stiff there aside them two?"
My gorge rose to hear him talk thus.
"Easy I could have done it," he went on, "but I didn't. And why?"
He sidled to me on his hams without attempting to rise, and held up a finger to me.
"Why, lad, you saved my life once, so I spared yours this blessed night. That's me, that's Mike Canlan. And see here, lad, you and me now——"
"Silence!" I cried, drawing back from his touch, as he crept nearer.