"Aw, go on away," he said. "D'ye think I want to _box_ with you? No, if you git into a fight with me you're liable to stop 'most anythin'--I'll hit you over the coco with _this_!" He laid his hand on the heavy Colt's which he always wore in his shaps, and gazed upon Bowles insolently. "You can't run no blazer over me, Mr. Willie-boy," he went on, as Bowles put down his hands. "You're out West now, where everythin' goes. If you'd happen to whip me in a fist-fight I'd git my gun and shoot you, so keep yore mouth shut unless you want to go the limit. And while we're talkin'," he drawled, "I think you might as well drift--it's goin' to be mighty onhealthy around hyer if I ketch you with Dixie again." "I asked you to leave her name out of this," suggested Bowles, trying bravely to keep his voice from getting thin. "If you've got a quarrel with me, well and good, but certainly no gentleman----" "Aw, go on away from me," sneered Hardy Atkins, waving him wearily aside. "You seem to think you're the only gentleman in the outfit! Go chase yoreself--you make me tired!" The sight of grinning faces about the corral recalled Bowles to the presence of an audience and, choking with anger and chagrin, he went off to saddle his horse. Ever since his arrival Hardy Atkins had ignored him, glancing at him furtively or gazing past him with supercilious scorn. Now for the first time they had met as man to man, and in that brief minute the ex-twister had shown his true colors. He was a man of treachery and violence, and proud of it. He did not pretend to fair play nor subscribe to the rules of the game. He did not even claim to be a gentleman! There was the crux, and Bowles labored in his mind to find the key. How could he compete--in either love or war--with a man who was not a gentleman? It was Brigham who gave the answer, and to him it was perfectly simple. "Well," he said, as they rode back together from the circle, "he's warned you out of camp--what ye goin' to do about it?" "Why, what can I do?" faltered Bowles, whose soul was darkened with troubles. "Fight or git out," replied Brigham briefly. "But he won't fight fair!" cried Bowles. "He hits me when I'm not looking; then when I offer to fight him with my hands he threatens me with a pistol. What can a man do?" "Threaten 'im with yourn!" returned Brigham. "He won't shoot--he's one of the worst four-flushers in Arizona! He's jest runnin' it over you because he thinks you're a tenderfoot." "How do you know he won't shoot?" inquired Bowles, to whom the whole proposition was in the nature of an enigma. "What does he carry that pistol for, then?"