"Who're you talking for?"
"For her, for Throng, for the law."
"The law—by gosh, that's good! You, you darned gambler; you scum!" said Caleb, the brother who knew him.
Pierre showed all the intelligent, resolute coolness of a trained officer of the law. He heard a little cry behind him, and stepping sideways, and yet not turning his back on the men, he saw Lydia.
"Pierre! Pierre!" she said in a half-frightened way, yet with a sort of pleasure lighting up her face; and she stepped forward to him. One of the brothers was about to pull her away, but Pierre whipped out his commission. "Wait," he said. "That's enough. I'm for the law; I belong to the mounted police. I have come for the girl you stole."
The elder brother snatched the paper and read. Then he laughed loud and long. "So you've come to fetch her away," he said, "and this is how you do it!"—he shook the paper. "Well, by—" Suddenly he stopped. "Come," he said, "have a drink, and don't be a dam' fool. She's our sister,—old Throng stole her, and she's goin' to marry our partner. Here, Caleb, fish out the brandy-wine," he added to his younger brother, who went to a cupboard and brought the bottle.
Pierre, waving the liquor away, said quietly to the girl: "You wish to go back to your father, to Jimmy Throng?" He then gave her Throng's message, and added: "He sits there rocking in the big chair and coughing —coughing! And then there's the picture on the wall upstairs and the little ivory brush—"
She put out her hands towards him. "I hate them all here," she said.
"I never knew them. They forced me away. I have no father but Jimmy
Throng. I will not stay," she flashed out in sudden anger to the others;
"I'll kill myself and all of you before I marry that Borotte."
Pierre could hear a man tramping about upstairs. Caleb knocked on the stove-pipe, and called to him to come down. Pierre guessed it was Borotte. This would add one more factor to the game. He must move at once. He suddenly slipped a pistol into the girl's hand, and with a quick word to her, stepped towards the door. The elder brother sprang between—which was what he looked for. By this time every man had a weapon showing, snatched from wall and shelf.
Pierre was cool. He said: "Remember, I am for the law. I am not one man. You are thieves now; if you fight and kill, you will get the rope, every one. Move from the door, or I'll fire. The girl comes with me." He had heard a door open behind him, now there was an oath and a report, and a bullet grazed his cheek and lodged in the wall beyond. He dared not turn round, for the other men were facing him. He did not move, but the girl did. "Coward!" she said, and raised her pistol at Borotte, standing with her back against Pierre's.