Stephens bent toward him with savage quietness, and with the same set, twisted smile.
“I told you that I would kill you on sight,” he said, “wherever and whenever that might be, and I am here to do it.”
He raised the revolver as he spoke. A great sob stuck in my throat. Through my head went a roaring noise.
I looked from the one man to the other in such a sickening ague of fear, that I could not have uttered a sound to save my life. I waited in this suspense for the report that would shut out the cheerful quiet of the day, like a black blot. In that second of deathly silence between the men, the whispering of the breeze and the clanking of the harness of the distant horses seemed loud sounds.
Already I saw poor, honest, drunken Tommy lying still upon the ground, looking with dead eyes at the blue above.
But I saw a change come over his face, and before I had time to wonder at it he spoke:
“Stephens!” he said, “don’t move fur yer life! There’s a rattler widin’ a foot of yer lift elbow!”
A contemptuous smile parted Stephens’ lips at what he considered a silly ruse, and then it stopped frozen, leaving him with a face like a mask, and sitting as rigidly motionless as Tommy had stood but a moment ago, for at that instant the devil of the prairie sounded his whirring warning of sudden death at hand.
For a while all three of us were paralyzed—then,
“Oh, thayre he comes! He’s comin’ in front of yer! Oh Lordy! Lordy! what’ll I do!” shrieked Tommy.