If ever a man looked to be "all in" it was poor little Jimmie Clayton. He threw back his coat for Thornton to see. There upon the side was the stain of blood hardly dry upon the shirt. His eyes were hollow, sunken, fever-filled, his cheeks unthinkably drawn, yellow-white and sickly, the hand which fell back weakly from the exertion of opening his coat showed the bones thrust up as though they would pierce the skin.
"You've been shot again?" demanded the cowboy.
Jimmie shook his head.
"The same ol' hole, Buck; Colt forty-five. It won't heal up, it breaks out all the time. I can't sleep with it, I can't eat, I can't set still." He had begun manfully, but now the little whimper came back into his voice, his shaking hand gripped Thornton's arm feebly, and he cried tremulously, "I wisht I was dead, Buck. Hones' to Gawd, I wisht I was dead!"
"Poor little old Jimmie," Thornton muttered just as he had muttered the words once before, gently, pityingly. "Is there anything I can do, Jimmie."
Jimmie drew back his hand and lay still for a little, his eyes seeming unnaturally large as he turned them upwards, filled at once with a sort of defiance and an abject, cringing terror.
"Nothin'," he said a little sullenly. His eyes dropped and ran to the fingers of his hand which were plucking nervously at his coat. He parted his lips as though he would say something else and then closed them tightly; even his eyes shut tight for a moment. Thornton watched him, waiting. It was easy to see that Jimmie Clayton had upon the tip of his tongue something he wished to say, and that he hesitated … through fear?
"What is it, Jimmie?" Thornton asked after a while.
Jimmie lifted his head quickly, his eyes flew open with a look in them almost of defiance as he blurted out:
"Do you know who shot you … that time down in Juarez?"