Wilbur's stare was cool. He was feeling the icy muck about his numbed legs.
"I was the one that struck at you. Too many elbows in the way and I flubbed it." He noted his brother start and stiffen in his chair. "And I didn't try to get you down. When I saw it was you I got you up and shot you out where you could run—if you wanted to. And I wasn't drunk, and I'm not a rowdy."
Merle gazed with horror upon the apparently uncontrite fratricide. Twice he essayed to speak before he found the words.
"Do you think that was a brave thing to do?"
"No—but useful. I've been brave a lot of times where it didn't do as much good as that."
"Useful!" breathed Merle, scathingly. "Useful to brutalize a lot of brave souls who merely sought—" he broke off with a new sense of outrage. "And not a policeman there to do his duty!" he finished resentfully.
Wilbur Cowan sat in a carven chair near a corner of the beautiful desk, hitching it forward to rest his arms on the desk's top. He was newly appraising this white-faced brother.
"Whining!" he suddenly snapped. "Get up and boast that you're outlaws, going to keel the Government off its pins. Then you get the gaff, and the first thing you do is whine for help from that same Government! You say it's rotten, but you expect it to watch over you while you knock it down. If you're going to be an outlaw, take an outlaw's chance. Don't squeal when you get caught. You say the rules are rotten, then you fall back on them. What kind of sportsmanship is that?"
Wearily but with a tolerant smile Merle pushed back the fallen lock with one white hand.
"What could you understand of all this?" he asked, gently. "We merely claim the right of free speech."