He looked hard at the two men, so sour in his wrath, so comical in his unmatched ugliness, that Lambert could not restrain a most unusual and generous grin. Taterleg bared his head, bowing low, not a smile, not a ripple of a smile, on his face. "Mister, I take off my hat to you," he said. "Yes, and I'll take your fool head off the first time I meet you!" the man returned. He let himself back into the barber's waiting hands, a growl deep in him, surly as an old dog that has been roused out of his place in the middle of the road. "General, I wouldn't hurt you for a purty, I wouldn't change your looks for a dollar bill," said Taterleg. "Wait till I git out of this chair!" the customer threatened, voice smothered in the barber's hands. "I guess he's not a dangerous man--lucky for you," said Lambert. He drew Taterleg away; they went on. The allurements of Glendora were no more dazzling by night than by day. There was not much business in the saloon, there being few visitors in town, no roistering, no sounds of uncurbed gaiety. Formerly there had been a dance-hall in connection with the saloon, but that branch of the business had failed through lack of patronage long ago. The bar stood in the front of the long, cheerless room, a patch of light over and around it, the melancholy furniture of its prosperous days dim in the gloom beyond. Lambert and Taterleg had a few drinks to show their respect for the institutions of the country, and went back to the hotel. Somebody had taken Taterleg's place beside Alta on the green bench. It was a man who spoke with rumbling voice like the sound of an empty wagon on a rocky road. Lambert recognized the intonation at once. "It looks to me like there's trouble ahead for you, Mr. Wilson," he said. "I'll take that feller by the handle on his face and bust him ag'in' a tree like a gourd," Taterleg said, not in boasting manner, but in the even and untroubled way of a man stating a fact. "If there was any tree." "I'll slam him ag'in' a rock; I'll bust him like a oyster." "I think we'd better go to bed without a fight, if we can." "I'm willin'; but I'm not goin' around by the back door to miss that feller." They came up the porch into the light that fell weakly from the office down the steps. There was a movement of feet beside the green bench, an exclamation, a swift advance on the part of the big-nosed man who had afforded amusement for Taterleg in the barber's chair. "You little bench-leggid fiste, if you've got gall enough to say one word to a man's face, say it!" he challenged.