"Driver," said he to Billy, as the brakes set for another plunge, "were you ever held up?"
Billy had been deluged with questions like this for the last two hours. Usually he looked straight in front of him, spat accurately between the tail of the wheel-horse and the whiffle-tree, and answered in monosyllables. The tenderfoot did not know that asking questions was not the way to induce Billy to talk.
"Held up?" replied Billy, with scorn. "Young feller, I is held up thirty-seven times in th' last year."
"Thunderation!" exclaimed the tenderfoot. "What do you do? Do you have much trouble getting away? Have you had much fighting?"
"Fight nothin'. I ain't hired to fight. I'm hired to drive stage."
"And you just let them go through you?" cried the tenderfoot.
Billy was stung by the contempt in the stranger's tone.
"Go through nothin'," he explained. "They isn't touchin' me none whatever. Put her down fer argument that I'm damn fool enough to sprinkle lead 'round some, and that I gets away. What happens? Nex' time I drives stage some of these yere agents massacrees me from behind a bush. Whar do I come in? Nary bit!"
The tenderfoot, struck by the logic of this reasoning, fell silent. After an interval the sun set in a film of yellow light; then the afterglow followed; and finally the stars pricked out the true immensity of the prairies.
"He's the feller hired to fight," observed the shadowy Billy, jerking his thumb backward.