said quietly. "But you're some reckless with the
English language when you're calling him my friend. Maybe he'll be proving
that he didn't mean to skin me on that deal."

He smiled again and then left the bar and strode toward Blanca. The latter
continued his card playing, apparently unaware of Dakota's approach, but
at the sound of his former victim's voice he turned and looked up slowly,
his face wearing a bland smile.

It was plain to Moulin that Blanca had known all along of Dakota's
presence in the saloon--perhaps he had seen him enter. The other card
players ceased playing and leaned back in their chairs, watching, for some
of them knew something of the calf deal, and there was that in Dakota's
greeting to Blanca which warned them of impending trouble.

"Blanca," said Dakota quietly, "you can pay for those calves now."

It pleased Blanca to dissemble. But it was plain to Moulin--as it must
have been plain to everybody who watched Blanca--that a shadow crossed his
face at Dakota's words. Evidently he had entertained a hope that his
duplicity had not been discovered.

"Calves?" he said. "What calves, my frien'?" He dropped his cards to the
table and turned his chair around, leaning far back in it and hooking his
right thumb in his cartridge belt, just above the holster of his pistol.
"I theenk it mus' be mistak'."

"Yes," returned Dakota, a slow, grimly humorous smile reaching his face,
"it was a mistake. You made it, Blanca. Duncan found it out. Duncan took
the calves--they belonged to him. You're going to pay for them."

"I pay for heem?" The bland smile on Blanca's face had slowly faded with
the realization that his victim was not to be further misled by him. In
place of the smile his face now wore an expression of sneering contempt,
and his black eyes had taken on a watchful glitter. He spoke slowly: "I
pay for no calves, my frien'."

"You'll pay," said Dakota, an ominously quiet drawl in his voice,
"or----"

"Or what?" Blanca showed his white teeth in a tigerish smirk.

"This town ain't big enough for both of us," said Dakota, his eyes cold
and alert as they watched Blanca's hand at his cartridge belt. "One of us
will leave it by sundown. I reckon that's all."

He deliberately turned his back on Blanca and walked to the door, stepping
down into the street. Blanca looked after him, sneering. An instant later
Blanca turned and smiled at his companions at the table.

"It ain't my funeral," said one o