“Ah-h-h,” drawled Nash softly, “I thought so.”
“You did?”
“Anyway, let’s hear the story. Another drink—on me, Flanders.”
“It was like this. Along about evening of yesterday Sandy was in here with a couple of other boys. He was pretty well lighted—the glow was circulatin’ promiscuous, in fact—when in comes a feller about your height, Steve, but lighter. Goodlookin’, thin face, big dark eyes like a girl. He carried the signs of a long ride on him. Well, sir, he walks up to the bar and says: ‘Can you make me a very sour lemonade, Mr. Bartender?’
“I grabbed the edge of the bar and hung tight.
“‘A which?’ says I.
“‘Lemonade, if you please.’
“I rolled an eye at Sandy, who was standin’ there with his jaw falling, and then I got busy with lemons and the squeezer, but pretty soon Ferguson walks up to the stranger.
“‘Are you English?’ he asks.
“I knew by his tone what was comin’, so I slid the gun I keep behind the bar closer and got prepared for a lot of damaged crockery.
“‘I?’ says the tenderfoot. ‘Why, no. What makes you ask?’
“‘Your damned funny way of talkin’,’ says Sandy.
“‘Oh,’ says the greenhorn, nodding as if he was thinkin’ this over and discovering a little truth in it. ‘I suppose the way I talk is a little unusual.’
“‘A little rotten,’ says Sandy. ‘Did I hear you askin’ for a lemonade?’
“‘You did.’
“‘Would I seem to be askin’ too many questions,’ says Sandy, terrible polite, ‘if I inquires if bar whisky ain’t good enough for you?’
“The tenderfoot, he stands there jest as easy as you an’ me stand here now, and he laughed.
“He says: ‘The bar whisky I’ve tasted around this country is not very good for any one, unless, perhaps, after a snake has bitten you. Then it works on the principle of poison fight poison, eh?’
“Sandy says after a minute: ‘I’m the most quietest, gentle, innercent cowpuncher that ever rode the range, but I’d tell a man that it riles me to hear good bar whisky insulted like this. Look at me! Do I look as if whisky ain’t good for a man?’
“‘Why,’ says the tenderfoot, ‘you look sort of funny to me.’
“He said it as easy as if he was passin’ the morning with Ferguson, but I seen that it was the last straw with Sandy. He hefted out both guns and trained ’em on the greenhorn.
“I yelled: ‘Sandy, for God’s sake, don’t be killin’ a tenderfoot!’
“‘If whisky will kill him he’s goin’ to die,’ says Sandy. ‘Flanders, pour out a drink of rye for this gent.’
“I did it, though my hand was shaking a lot, and the chap takes the glass and raises it polite, and looks at the colour of it. I thought he was goin’ to drink, and starts wipin’ the sweat off’n my forehead.
“But this chap, he sets down the glass and smiles over to Sandy.
“‘Listen,’ he says, still grinnin’, ‘in the old days I suppose this would have been a pretty bluff, but it won’t work with me now. You want me to drink this glass of very bad whisky, but I’m sure that you don’t want it badly enough to shoot me.
“‘There are many reasons. In the old days a man shot down another and then rode off on his horse and was forgotten, but in these days the telegraph is faster than any horse that was ever foaled. They’d be sure to get you, sir, though you might dodge them for a while. And I believe that for a crime such as you threaten, they have recently installed a little electric chair which is a perfectly good inducer of sleep—in fact, it is better than a cradle. Taking these things all into consideration, I take it for granted that you are bluffing, my friend, and one of my favourite occupations is calling a bluff. You look dangerous, but I’ve an idea that you are as yellow as your moustache.’
“Sandy, he sort of swelled up all over like a poisoned dog.
“He says: ‘I begin to see your style. You want a clean man-handlin’, which suits me uncommon well.’
“With that, he lays down his guns, soft and careful, and puts up his fists, and goes for the other gent.
“He makes his pass, which should have sent the other gent into kingdom come. But it didn’t. No, sir, the tenderfoot, he seemed to evaporate. He wasn’t there when the fist of Ferguson come along. Ferguson, he checked up short and wheeled around and charged again like a bull. And he missed again. And so they kept on playin’ a sort of a game of tag over the place, the stranger jest side-steppin’ like a prize-fighter, the prettiest you ever seen, and not developin’ when Sandy started on one of his swings.
“At last one of Sandy’s fists grazed him on the shoulder and sort of peeved him, it looked like. He ducks under Sandy’s next punch, steps in, and wallops Sandy over the eye—that punch didn’t travel more’n six inches. But it slammed Sandy down in a corner like he’s been shot.
“He was too surprised to be much hurt, though, and drags himself up to his feet, makin’ a pass at his pocket at the same time. Then he came again, silent and thinkin’ of blood, I s’pose, with a knife in his hand.
“This time the tenderfoot didn’t wait. He went in with a sort of hitch step, like a dancer. Ferguson’s knife carved the air beside the tenderfoot’s head, and then the skinny boy jerked up his right and his left—one, two—into Sandy’s mouth. Down he goes again—slumps down as if all the bones in his body was busted—right down on his face. The other feller grabs his shoulder and jerks him over on his back.
“He stands lookin’ down at him for a moment, and then he says, sort of thoughtful: ‘He isn’t badly hurt, but I suppose I shouldn’t have hit him twice.’
“Can you beat that, Steve? You can’t!
“When Sandy come to he got up to his feet, wobbling—seen his guns—went over and scooped ’em up, with the eye of the tenderfoot on him all the time—scooped ’em up—stood with ’em all poised—and so he backed out through the door. It wasn’t any pretty thing to see. The tenderfoot, he turned to the bar again.
“‘If you don’t mind,’ he says, ‘I think I’ll switch my order and take that whisky instead. I seem to need it.’
“‘Son!’ says I, ‘there ain’t nothin’ in the house you can’t have for the askin’. Try some of this!’
“And I pulled out a bottle of my private stock—you know the stuff; I’ve had it twenty-five years, and it was ten years old when I got it. That ain’t as much of a lie as it sounds.
“He takes a glass of it and sips it, sort of suspicious, like a wolf scentin’ the wind for an elk in winter. Then his face lighted up like a lantern had been flashed on it. You’d of thought that he was lookin’ his long-lost brother in the eye from the way he smiled at me. He holds the glass up and lets the light come through it, showin’ the little traces and bubbles of oil.
“‘May I know your name?’ he says.
“It made me feel like Rockerbilt, hearin’ him say that, in _that_ special voice.
“‘Me,’ says I, ‘I’m Flanders.’
“‘It’s an honour to know you, Mr. Flanders,’ he says. ‘My name is Anthony Bard.’
“We shook hands, and his grip was three fourths man, I’ll tell the world.
“‘Good liquor,’ says he, ‘is like a fine lady. Only a