“Get up, Jim Throng,” he said. “Holy! do you think the law moves because an old man cries? Is it in the statutes?—that’s what the law says. Does it come within the act? Is it a trespass—an assault and battery?—a breach of the peace?—a misdemeanour? Victoria—So and So: that’s how the law talks. Get on your knees to Father Corraine, not to Captain Halby, Jimmy Throng.”
Pierre spoke in a half-sinister, ironical way, for between him and Captain Halby’s Riders of the Plains there was no good feeling. More than once he had come into conflict with them, more than once had they laid their hands on him—and taken them off again in due time. He had foiled them as to men they wanted; he had defied them—but he had helped them too, when it seemed right to him; he had sided with them once or twice when to do so was perilous to himself. He had sneered at them, he did not like them, nor they him. The sum of it was, he thought them brave—and stupid; and he knew that the law erred as often as it set things right.
The Trader got up and stood between the two men, coughing much, his face straining, his eyes bloodshot, as he looked anxiously from Pierre to Halby. He was the sad wreck of a strong man. Nothing looked strong about him now save his head, which, with its long grey hair, seemed badly balanced by the thin neck, through which the terrible cough was hacking.
“Only half a lung left,” he stammered, as soon as he could speak, “an’ Duc can’t fix the boneset, camomile, and whisky, as she could. An’ he waters the whisky—curse-his-soul!” The last three words were spoken through another spasm of coughing. “An’ the blister—how he mucks the blister!”
Pierre sat back on the table, laughing noiselessly, his white teeth shining. Halby, with one foot on a bench, was picking at the fur on his sleeve thoughtfully. His face was a little drawn, his lips were tight-pressed, and his eyes had a light of excitement. Presently he straightened himself, and, after a half-malicious look at Pierre, he said to Throng:
“Where are they, do you say?”
“They’re at”—the old man coughed hard—“at Fort O’Battle.”
“What are they doing there?”
“Waitin’ till spring, when they’ll fetch their cattle up an’ settle there.”
“They want—Lydia—to keep house for them?” The old man writhed.