“I cal’late she is.”
“Have you no sister?”
“May be I hev’. See here, Somers, you kin draw yer charge on that. Yer mought be a preacher, or sich like; but don’t yer draw that string on me.”
“Very well; I have nothing to say, only that, if you propose to insult a woman, I am your enemy.”
“Be you?”
Skinley took a pistol from his belt, and deliberately cocked and pointed it at Somers, to whom the act seemed to reveal his companion in a new light. It was naturally to be supposed that a man who carried such an armory of weapons on his person was a dangerous fellow; but from this moment Somers looked upon him as a bully. He had given the ruffian no cause of offence for which he could resort to desperate measures.
“If you insult a woman, I am,” replied Somers, quietly drawing a large navy revolver which he carried in his belt.
“Put up your shooter, Somers,” said Skinley, with a sickly laugh, as he lowered his pistol.
“I am not quite ready to put it up,” replied Somers, sternly; for he had made up his mind that the time to execute the task imposed upon him had come. “When a man draws a pistol upon me, he insults me.”
“I only did it to see what sort of stuff you mought be made of, Somers—that’s all,” answered Skinley.