The judge hesitated. It was obvious that he was of two minds. He chose the safer course—for the present.
"There is a law in this country—" he began.
Billy Wingo leaned forward, his chin jutting out. His eyes were unpleasantly cold. They matched his voice when he spoke.
"Don't talk to me of the law," he said. "It's you and your friends that have made the law in Crocker County a spectacle for decent men. Law! You've dragged the statutes in the mud till you can't tell 'em apart from the turnips underground. Law! You've prostituted your office for a little filthy money here, there and everywhere, till it's a wonder you're able to live with yourself. How do you do it? Don't you ever get tired of your own stink, you polecat?"
This was too much. The judge was, after all, a human being. He had his pride, such as it was, and courage of a kind. He threw himself sidewise, and at the same time his right hand flipped up under his coat tail, flipped up and flipped out.
There was a flash and a roar and a spirtle of smoke. The judge's six-shooter was wrenched from his fingers and sent spinning across the room. The judge remained upon the floor. There was no feeling in his right hand. But his right arm felt as if it had been struck with a spike-maul.
The acrid smoke rose slowly toward the ceiling.
"You can get up, Judge," Billy Wingo said calmly.
The judge rose slowly and collapsed into the chair he had so abruptly vacated. He held his right hand before his face and waggled it. Stupidly he looked at it. The flesh of the trigger finger was slightly torn. It bled a little.
"The bullet didn't touch you," said Billy. "The trigger guard did that when the gun was twiddled out of your hand. The lead hit the frame in front of the cylinder. Wait, I'll show you." He crossed the room to where the judge's six-shooter lay, picked it up and brought it to the judge for his inspection.