Thet time comes to every man like Riggs.

"'What 'd you call me?' he asked, his jaw shakin'.

"'I 'ain't called you yet,' answered Las Vegas. 'I just whooped.'

"'What d'ye want?'

"'You scared my girl.'

"'The hell ye say! Who's she?' blustered Riggs, an' he began to take
quick looks 'round. But he never moved a hand. There was somethin' tight
about the way he stood. Las Vegas had both arms half out, stretched as
if he meant to leap. But he wasn't. I never seen Las Vegas do thet, but
when I seen him then I understood it.

"'You know. An' you threatened her an' her sister. Go for your gun,'
called Las Vegas, low an' sharp.

"Thet put the crowd right an' nobody moved. Riggs turned green then. I
almost felt sorry for him. He began to shake so he'd dropped a gun if he
had pulled one.

"'Hyar, you're off--some mistake--I 'ain't seen no gurls--I--'

"'Shut up an' draw!' yelled Las Vegas. His voice just pierced holes in
the roof, an' it might have been a bullet from the way Riggs collapsed.
Every man seen in a second more thet Riggs wouldn't an' couldn't draw.
He was afraid for his life. He was not what he had claimed to be. I
don't know if he had any friends there. But in the West good men an' bad
men, all alike, have no use for Riggs's kind. An' thet stony quiet broke
with haw--haw. It shore was as pitiful to see Riggs as it was fine to
see Las Vegas.

"When he dropped his arms then I knowed there would be no gun-play. An'
then Las Vegas got red in the face. He slapped Riggs with one hand,
then with the other. An' he began to cuss him. I shore never knowed
thet nice-spoken Las Vegas Carmichael could use such language. It was a
stream of the baddest names known out here, an' lots I never heard of.
Now an' then I caught somethin' like low-down an' sneak an' four-flush
an' long-haired skunk, but for the most part they was just the cussedest
kind of names. An' Las Vegas spouted them till he was black in the face,
an' foamin' at the mouth, an' hoarser 'n a bawlin' cow.

"When he got out of breath from cussin' he punched Riggs all about the
saloon, threw him outdoors, knocked him down an' kicked him till he got
kickin' him down the road with the whole haw-hawed gang behind. An' he
drove him out of town!"

CHAPTER XVIII

For two days Bo was confined to her bed, suffering considerable pain,
and subject to fever, during which she talked irrationally. Some of this
talk afforded Helen as vast an amusement as she