"I"d rather not talk business here," replied Westerfelt. He rose and coolly looked Wambush in the face. "If you say so, we"ll walk across to the stable."
"No," sneered Wambush, "this heer"s good enough fur me; I hain"t got no secrets frum them mount"in men out thar nur this young lady. I jest want ter know now--right _now_, by Glory! ef you ever give sech orders."
"Do you think this is a proper place to settle such a matter?" calmly asked Westerfelt.
"D----d you; you are a coward; you are afeerd to say so!"
Harriet Floyd, with a white, startled face, tried to slip between the two men, but Wambush roughly pushed her aside.
"You _are_ afeerd!" he repeated, shaking his fist in Westerfelt"s face.
"No, I"m not," replied Westerfelt. The corners of his mouth were drawn down and his chin was puckered. "I have fought some in my life, and sometimes I get as mad as the next one, but I still try to be decent before ladies. This is no place to settle a difficulty."
"Will you do it outside, then?" sneered Wambush.
Westerfelt hesitated, and looked at the crowd that filled the door and stood peering in at the window. Mrs. Floyd was running up and down in the hall, excitedly calling for Harriet, but the crowd was too anxious to hear Westerfelt"s reply to notice her.
"If nothing else will suit you, yes," answered Westerfelt, calmly. "I don"t think human beings ought to spill blood over a matter of business, and I don"t like to fight a man that"s drinking, but since you have behaved so in this lady"s presence, I"m really kinder in the notion."
"Come on, then," bl.u.s.tered Wambush. "I"m either yore meat or you are mine." He turned to the door and pushed the crowd before him as he stamped out of the hall into the street.
Harriet ran between Westerfelt and the door. She put her hands on his shoulders and looked at him beseechingly. "Don"t go out there," she pleaded; "stay here and let him cool off; he is drinking! He"s a dangerous man."
He took her hands and held them for an instant and then dropped them.
"I"m afraid he"s been humored too much," he smiled. "I"d never have any respect for myself if I was to back down now. I"ve known his kind to be cured by a good, sound thrashing, when nothing else would do any good."
She raised her hands again, but he avoided her gently and went out into the street. Wambush stood on the sidewalk a few yards from the door, one booted foot on the curbstone, the other on the ground. He had thrown his broad-brimmed hat on the ground, and tossed his long hair back over his shoulders. His left hand rested on his raised knee, his right was in the pocket of his short coat.
"Come on, if you ain"t too weak-kneed," he jeered, as Westerfelt appeared on the veranda.
Westerfelt advanced towards Wambush, but when he was within a few feet of him, Wambush suddenly drew a revolver, c.o.c.ked it, and deliberately raised it. Westerfelt stopped and looked straight into Wambush"s eyes.
"I"m unarmed," said he; "I never carry a pistol; is that the way you do your fighting?"
"That"s yore lookout, not mine, d----n you!"
Just then Luke Bradley ran up the sidewalk and out on the veranda near Westerfelt. He had a warning on his lips, but seeing the critical situation he said nothing. A white, tigerish look came into the face of Westerfelt. The cords of his neck tightened as he leaned slowly towards Wambush. He was about to spring.
"Don"t be a fool, John," cautioned Bradley. "Be ashamed o" yorese"f, Toot! Drap that gun, an" fight like a man ur not at all!"
Wambush"s eye ran along the revolver, following every movement of Westerfelt"s with the caution of a panther watching dangerous prey.
"One more inch and you are a dead man!" he said, slowly.
Mrs. Floyd, who was on the veranda, cried out and threw her arms round Harriet, who seemed ready to run between the two men. No one quite saw how it happened, but Westerfelt suddenly bent near the earth and sprang forward. Wambush"s revolver went off over his head, and before he could c.o.c.k it again, Westerfelt, with a swift sweep of his arm, had sent it spinning through a window-pane in the hotel.
"Ah!" escaped somebody"s lips in the silent crowd, and the two men, closely on the alert, faced each other.
"Part "em, men; what are you about?" cried Mrs. Floyd.
"Yes, part "em," laughed a man on the edge of the crowd; "somebody "ll get his beauty spiled; Toot kin claw like a pant"er; I don"t know what t"other man kin do, but he looks game."
"No, let "em fight it out fa"r an" squar"," suggested red-faced Buck Hillhouse, the bar-keeper, in the autocratic tone he used in conducting c.o.c.k-fights in his back yard.
The blood had left Westerfelt"s face. Wambush"s eyes gleamed desperately; disarmed, he looked less a man than an infuriated beast.
Westerfelt was waiting for him to make the attack, but, unlike his antagonist, was growing calmer every second. All at once Wambush sent his right arm towards Westerfelt"s face so quickly that the spectators scarcely saw it leave his side, but it was not quicker than Westerfelt"s left, which skilfully parried the thrust. Then, before Toot could shield himself, Westerfelt struck him with the force of a battering-ram squarely in the mouth.
Wambush whined in pain, spat blood from gashed lips, and shook his head like a lion wounded in the mouth. He ran backward a few feet to recover himself, and then, with a mad cry, rushed at Westerfelt and caught him by the throat. Westerfelt tried to shake him off, but he was unsuccessful. He attempted to strike him in the face, but Wambush either dodged the thrusts or caught them in his thick hair. It seemed that Westerfelt"s only chance now was to throw his a.s.sailant down, but his strength had left him, Wambush"s claws had sunk into his neck like p.r.o.ngs of steel. He could not breathe.
"Hit "im in the bread-basket, John!" cried Luke Bradley.
It was a happy suggestion. Westerfelt struck Wambush in the stomach.
With a gasp and an oath, Wambush doubled up and released Westerfelt"s throat. The two men now clinched breast to breast, and, with arms round each other"s bodies, each began to try to throw the other down.
They swung back and forth and from side to side, but they were well mated.
Westerfelt suddenly threw his left leg behind Wambush"s heels and began to force him backward. In an instant Wambush would have gone down, but seeing his danger he wriggled out of Westerfelt"s grasp, drew something from his coat pocket, and sprang towards him.
"Knife! knife! knife!" cried Luke Bradley in alarm. "Part "em!"
"Yes, part "em!" echoed the bar-keeper with an oath, as if the edge of his pleasure had been taken off by the more serious turn of affairs.
Several men ran towards Wambush, but they were not quick enough. He had stabbed Westerfelt once in the breast and drawn back his arm for another thrust, when Luke Bradley caught his wrist. Wambush struck at Bradley with his left hand, but the bar-keeper caught it, and between him and Bradley, Wambush was overpowered.
"The sheriff"s coming!" a voice exclaimed, as a big man rode up quickly and dismounted.
"h.e.l.lo!" he cried, "I summon you, Buck Hillhouse, and Luke Bradley, in the name o" the law to "rest Wambush. Take that knife from "im!"
"Arrest the devil!" came from Wambush"s b.l.o.o.d.y lips. He made a violent effort to free himself, but the two men held him.
"I"ll he"p yer, whether you deputize me or not!" grunted Bradley, as he hung to the hand which still held the knife, "I"ll he"p yer cut "is d----d throat, the cowardly whelp!"
"I"ve got nothin" "gin nuther party," said the bar-keeper, "but I reckon I"ll have to obey the law."
"He"s attempted deliberate murder on a unarmed man," Bradley informed the sheriff; "fust with a gun an" then with a knife. Ef you don"t jail "im, Bale Warlick, you"ll never hold office in Cohutta Valley agin."
The sheriff stepped up to Wambush.
"Drap that knife!" he ordered. "Drap it!"
"Go to h----!" Toot ceased his struggling and glared defiantly into the face of the sheriff.
"Drap that knife!" The sheriff was becoming angered. He grasped Wambush"s hand and tried to take the knife away, but Toot"s fingers were like coils of wire.
"I"ll see you d.a.m.ned fust!" grunted Wambush, and, powerless to do anything else, he spat in the sheriff"s face.
"d----n you, I"ll kill you!" roared Warlick, and he struck Wambush on the jaw. Wambush tried to kick him in the stomach, but Bradley prevented it by jerking him backward. It now became a struggle between three men and one, and that one really seemed equal in strength to the other three.
"Drap the knife!" yelled Warlick again, and he drew a big revolver, and with the b.u.t.t of it began to hammer Toot"s clinched fingers. As he did this, Bradley and Hillhouse drew Wambush backward and down to the ground.