"High, low, and the game!" answered Happy Jack wrathfully. "You ain't got no game," put in the quiet puncher. "Why don't you play yore hand out instead of makin' a grab?" "Here now!" spoke up Dixie Lee's miscreant friend, leaning half-way across the table. "You-all quit jumpin' on Happy or I'll bust you on the _cabezon_!" "Yes, you will!" sneered Buck, shoving his big head closer, as if to dare the blow. "You don't look bad to me, Hardy Atkins, and never did; and don't you never think for a moment that you can run it over me and Bill, because you cain't! Now you better pull in that ornery face of yourn while it's all together--and we're goin' to count them cards, by this-and-that, if it's the last act!" So they raged and wrangled, apparently on the very verge of a personal conflict; but as the play wore on Bowles became increasingly aware of a contemptuous twinkle that dwelt in the eyes of the man called Hardy Atkins. Then it came over him suddenly that other eyes were upon him; and instantly the typical Western scene was wrecked, and he saw himself made the fool. No burst of ruffianly laughter gave point to the well-planned jest--it passed over as subtly as a crisis in high society--but as he turned away from the game Bowles found himself in possession of a man-sized passion. Back where he came from an open, personal hatred was considered a little _outre_; but the spirit of the wilds had touched him already, and Hardy Atkins, the green-eyed, familiar friend of Dixie Lee, was the man that he hoped would choke. As interest in the pitch game languished and a scuffle made the bunk untenable, stray cowboys began to drift outside again, some to seek out their beds beneath the wagon-sheds and others to foregather about the fire. First among these was the red-headed man called Brigham; and when Bowles, after sitting solitary for a while, followed after them, he found Brigham the center of attraction. Perched upon an upturned box, and with one freckled hand held out to keep the firelight from his eyes, he was holding forth with a long story which had everybody listening. "And I says to this circus feller," he was saying, "'Well, I ain't never done no bareback work, but if you cain't git no one else to jump through them hoops I'll guarantee to take the pretty outer _one_ of 'em. But you be mighty p'ticular to pop that whip of yourn, pardner,' I says to the ring-master, 'or that ol' rockin'-hawse will git away from me.'" He cocked one eye up to see if Bowles was listening, and then indulged in a reminiscent chuckle.