the
genuine guilty parties. Then it occurred to me that mebbe it would be
wise to see if Piker was worth botherin' with. First thing I did though
was to see where he had helt his gun when he fired beneath the table.
The' wasn't no gun on the floor, an' I couldn't nowise savvy it.

He had one gun in his holster, but he couldn't have pulled it out
without bein' seen, an' he couldn't have put it back, nohow. I was
plumb mystified, an' had about give it up when I came across it. I own
up it was a clever dodge, but snakish to an extreme. He had fashioned a
rig just above his knee, an' when he had sat down the gun had been
pointin' at Dick all through the game, an' nothin' but Jabez makin'
Dick move had saved him. It was a blood-thirsty scheme, an' I felt like
stampin' his face into a jelly.

His head was still bent over an' he was black in the face; but when I
straightened him out an' soused a lot o' water over him, he came out of
it, an' I fair itched to make him eat his gun--knee-riggin' an' all! He
sat up an' began to tell what a low-down, sneakin' cuss Dick had allus
been. I let him sing a couple o' verses, an' then I sez: "Now, you look
here, you slimy spider. Dick's too busy just now to attend to your case
an' if you don't swaller them few remarks instant I'll be obliged to
prepare you for the coroner myself. I've knowed Dick sometime, an' I've
knowed several other men; an' I know enough to know that such a
dust-eatin' lizard as you never could know enough to know what such a
man as Dick was thinkin' out or plannin' to do. An' furthermore, you're
a liar in your heart, an' still further more, I don't like your face;
an' one other furthermore--the longer I look at you the madder I get!
My advice to you, an' I give it in the name o' peace an' sobriety, an'
because the' 's a lady present, is to start right now to a more
salubrious climate--you an' your knee-gun an' your black lies an' your
marked decks. Do you hear what I say? Are you goin' to go?"

I was surely losin' my temper; the' was a blood taste in my throat, an'
when I asked him the question I kicked him gently in the chest, just to
let him know 'at I was ready for his verdict.

He was a coward. He just lunched himself away from me on his back an'
whined somethin' about only tryin' to show us the truth an' not wantin'
any trouble, an' a lot o' such foolishness; but I soon wearied of it,
an' grabbed him by the collar an' yanked him to his feet, an' sez, "Now
ans