"Well, you see, Mr. Reade," Ferrers admitted, "my brother had a hasty temper, and he drew first—-but Gage fired the killing shot."
"So that the law would say that Gage fired in self-defense, eh?"
"That's what a coroner's jury did say," Jim admitted angrily.
"But my brother was a young fellow, and hot-headed. Gage knew
he could provoke the boy into firing, and then, when the boy missed,
Gage drilled him through the head."
"I don't want to say anything unkind, Jim," Reade went on, thoughtfully. "Please don't misunderstand me. But, as I understand the affair, if your brother hadn't been carrying a pistol he wouldn't have been killed?"
"Perhaps not," Ferrers grudgingly admitted.
"Then the killing came about through the bad practice of carrying a revolver?"
"Bad practice!" snorted Jim. "Well, if that's a bad practice more'n half the men in the state have the vice."
"Popular custom may not make a thing right," argued Reade.
"But what are you going to do when the men who have a grudge against you pack guns?" Jim queried, opening his eyes very wide.
"I've had a few enemies—-bad ones, too, some of them," Tom answered slowly. "Yet I've always refused to carry an implement of murder, even when I've been among rough enemies. And yet I'm alive. If I had carried a pistol ever since I came West I'm almost certain that I'd be dead by this time."