“What do you know, Jard Hassock?” asked Amos, stepping from the doorway and advancing slowly upon the proprietor of Moosehead House. “You’ve found yer tongue all of a suddent, hey? Well, it’s a dirty tongue—an’ I don’t like it—an’ I’m a-goin’ to knock it down yer dirty throat, along with yer teeth.”
“Now that’s fightin’ talk,” said Jard.
“There’ll be no fightin’ here, Amos Dangler!” exclaimed the constable. “You git back there into the house, Amos—an’ you keep quiet, Jard. The law’ll do all the fightin’ that’s got to be done.”
Men closed in upon the angry voices, hoping that Amos and Jard might clash with fists and teeth despite the professional attitude of the constable. They wanted to see a fight. They saw more than enough of that sort of thing to last them a lifetime.
Pete Sledge appeared from the obscurity of the weaving snow. He had been forgotten by all. He jumped in between Jard Hassock and Amos Dangler. He had an axe in his hands. Amos retreated a step.
“My God! Didn’t I kill you once, long ago?” cried Pete.
“In yer eye,” sneered Amos, fumbling at the front of his coat with an unmittened hand. “It’s daytime, you poor nut! Run home to bed.”
“But I killed you!”
“Maybe—in yer mind.”
Pete’s arms twitched even as Amos Dangler’s right hand came away from the front of his coat. The axe flew even as the automatic pistol spat a red jab of flame. The axe struck and the pistol spat again in the same instant of time. Dangler staggered backward and screamed before he fell, but poor Pete Sledge dropped without a sound. That was the end of that old trouble—unless it has been continued elsewhere, beyond the field of vision of Forkville and Goose Creek.