"The one they call the Dutchman's there, and Drumm——"
"Drumm?" Fred and his father spoke like a chorus, both of them jumping to alertness.
"And some others of that gang Mr. Morgan drove out of town. They were setting the hotel afire when I left!"
Stilwell did not wait for all of it. He was in the house at a jump, reaching down his guns which hung beside the door. Close after him Fred came rushing in, snatching his weapons from the buffalo horns on the wall.
"I'm goin' to git service on that man!" Stilwell said. "Are you goin' with us, Cal?"
But Cal Morgan did not reply. He went to the bedroom where he had slept, took up his gun, stood looking at it a moment as if considering something, snatched his hat from the bedpost and turned back, buckling his belt. Mrs. Stilwell and Violet were struggling with husband and brother to restrain them from rushing off to this battle, raising a turmoil of pleading and protesting at the door.
As Morgan passed Stilwell, who was greatly impeded in his efforts to buckle on his guns by his wife's clinging arms and passionate pleadings to remain at home, Fred broke away from his sister and ran for the kitchen door.
"Let Drumm go—let all of them go—let the cattle go, let everything go! none of it's worth riskin' your life for!" Stilwell's affectionate good wife pleaded with him.
"Now, Mother, I'm not goin' to git killed," Morgan heard Stilwell say, his very assurance calming. But the poor woman, who perhaps had recollections of past battles and perils which he had gone through, burst out again, weeping, and clung to him as if she could not let him go.