He did not lift his voice but about his manner was a defined swagger, the boasting of the craven who, for once, is beyond fear of retribution. A slow shadow crossed between them as the buzzard wheeled, waiting, lazily impatient.... Beck delayed a brief interval before asking: "Right here, Sam? You going to kill me right here?" "Right here, you--!" He spat out the unforgiveable epithet with a curl to his lip. For once he had this man where he wanted him; Beck's life was in his hands ... right in his _palm_.... "I'm goin' to kill you like I'd kill a snake! I've took a lot off you; I've stood for a lot from you, but you've gone too fur, you've played your hand too high!" He began to feel a greater sense of his importance. He was dominating and it was sweet. "I've waited a long time, Beck; I ain't forgot a thing you've done to me; I've been waitin' for just this chance! "Now I'm goin' to kill you, you--!" Again the word, with even great conviction. The man's lips trembled with rage, but as he glared down at the other he saw the level, mocking eyes studying his. He had not yet impressed Tom Beck, had not made him fear! It was disconcerting. "What you goin' to kill me with, Sam?" "With your own gun, by God!"--spinning the cylinder. A moment of silence while Sam looked at the dull barrel, a queer, quick hesitancy coming over him, something he did not understand, something he did not will. When, a moment before, he felt that the situation would take a course exactly as he willed! "With my own gun!" Beck repeated. McKee cocked the weapon and looked about. "When you goin' to do this killing, Sam?" The level, mocking tone infuriated the other. "Now!" he cried, shaken by hate. "Now, by God!" He screamed the curse, threw the gun up to position and glared into Beck's face, moving forward a step, standing poised as though he would shoot and then fling himself upon his victim to vent his festering rage with his fists. But he had failed to reckon throughout on one fact: The human eye is a stronger weapon than the inventive genius of man has ever devised, and he was meeting the gaze from an eye that was as steady, as fearless, as collected as any he had ever seen. His courage was the courage bred of cowardly impulses and it could not stand before fearlessness.... "Right now, Sam?" The question was low, gentle, and with another shade of inflection might have been a plea. But it was no plea. It was subtle, stinging mockery which penetrated McKee's understanding and gave full life to that desire to hesitate which had shaken him a moment before. "You ain't goin' to kill me right off, are you Sam?" And at that McKee's irresolution became full blown. His body swung backward from its menacing poise, the gun hand dropped just a degree; his gaze, an instant before fixed and red with hate, now wavered. "No, you ain't going to kill me now, Sam. You ain't got the guts!"