"I'll bet my whole pile on the jack!" shouted Wild Bill, who had taken enough strong drink to fit him for anything.
"Do be careful, Bill–do be careful!" said a low, kind voice just behind him.
It was that of Willie Pond.
"Oh, go home and mind your business. I'll break this bank to-night, or die in the trial!" cried Bill, defiantly.
"You'll die before you break it!" shrieked out a shrill, sharp voice, and the red-haired Texan sprang forward with an uplifted bowie-knife, and lunged with deadly aim at Bill's heart, even as the person we have so long known as Willie Pond shrieked out:
"Save, oh, save my husband!"
But another hand clutched the hilt of the descending knife and the hand of a short, thickset, beetle-browed desperado, was shouted, as he drew a pistol with his other hand:
"Wild Bill is my game. No one living shall cheat me of my revenge! Look at this scar, Bill–you marked me for life and now I mark you for death!"
And even as he spoke, the man fired, and a death-shot pierced Wild Bill's heart.
The latter, who had risen to his feet, staggered toward the Texan, who struggled to free his knife-hand from the clutch of the real assassin, and with a wild laugh, tore the false hair from the Texan's head. As a roll of woman's hair came down in a flood of beauty over her shoulders, Bill gasped out: