“I don’t want no lawyers between us; we’re old friends. I ain’t got nothin’ against you, and you ain’t got nothin’ against me; and I don’t want no trouble or nothin’. Your father was the best friend I ever had; and I jist thought I’d come like a friend, and see if we couldn’t settle things like old friends—kind of compromise, kind o’——?” He waved his hands expressively.
Jacquelin found his voice.
“Get out,” he said, quietly, with a sudden paling of his face. Still’s jaw dropped. Jacquelin rose to his feet, a gleam in his eyes.
“Get out.” There was a ring in his voice, and he took a step toward Still. But Still did not wait. He turned quickly and rushed out of the room, never stopping until he had got out of the court-green.
He went to the bar of the tavern and ordered two drinks in rapid succession.
“D—n him!” he said, as he drained off his glass the second time. “If he had touched me I’d have shot him.”
“You’re lookin’ sort o’ puny these days. Been sick?” the man at the bar asked.
“Yes—no—I don’ know,” said Still, gruffly. He went up and looked at himself in a small fly-speckled, tin-like mirror on the wall. “I ain’t been so mighty well.”
“Been ridin’ pretty hard lately ’bout your suit, I reckon?” said the bar-keeper.
“I don’ know. I ain’t afeared ’bout it. If they choose to fling away money tryin’ to beat me out o’ my property, I’ve got about as much as they have, I reckon.”