"Well, by that time everybody had cleared out of the saloon, because
they knowed that them sort of words meant bullets comin'. But Mac Strann
jest stood there watchin', and grinnin' in his ugly way--damn his soul
black!--and never sayin' a word back. By God, Fatty, he looked sort of
hungry. When he grinned, his upper lip went up kind of slow and you
could see his big teeth. I expected to see him make a move to sink 'em
in the throat of Fitz. But he didn't. Nope, he didn't make a move, and
all the time Fitz ravin' and gettin' worse and worse. Finally Fitz made
the move. Yep, he pulled his gun and had it damned near clean on Mac
Strann before that devil would stir. But when he _did_, it was jest a
flash of light. Both them guns went off, but Mac's bullet hit Fitz's
hand and knocked the gun out of it--so of course his shot went wild.
But Fitz could see his own blood, and you know what that does to the
Scotch-Irish? Makes _some_ people quit cold to see their own blood. I
remember a kid at school that was a whale at fightin' till his nose got
to bleedin', or something, and then he'd quit cold. But you take a
Scotch-Irishman and it works just the other way. Show him his own colour
and he goes plumb crazy.
"That's what happened to Fitz. When he saw the blood on his hand he made
a dive at Mac Strann. After that it wasn't the sort of thing that makes
a good story. Mac Strann got him around the ribs and I heard the bones
crack. God! And him still squeezin', and Fitz beatin' away at Mac's face
with his bleedin' hand.
"Will you b'lieve that I stood here and was sort of froze? Yes, Fatty, I
couldn't make a move. And I was sort of sick and hollow inside the same
way I went one time when I was a kid and seen a big bull horn a
yearlin'.
"Then I heard the breath of Fitz comin' hoarse, with a rattle in it--and
I heard Mac Strann whining like a dog that's tasted blood and is
starvin' for more. A thing to make your hair go up on end, like they say
in the story-books.
"Then Fitz--he was plumb mad--tried to bite Mac Strann. And then Mac let
go of him and set his hands on the throat of Fitz. It happened like a
flash--I'm here to swear that I could hear the bones crunch. And then
Fitz's mouth sagged open and his eyes rolled up to the ceiling, and Mac
Strann threw him down on the floor. Just like that! Damn him! And then
he stood over poor dead Fitz and kicked him in those busted ribs and
turned over to the bar and says to me: 'Gimme!'
"Like a damned beast! He wanted to drink right there with his dead man
beside him. And what was worse, I had to give him the bottle. There was
a sort of haze in front of my eyes. I wanted to pump that devil full of
lead, but I knowed it was plain suicide to try it.
"So there he stood and ups with a glass that was brimmin' full, and
downs it at a swallow--gurglin'--like a hog! Fatty, how long will it be
before there's an end to Mac Strann?"
But Fatty Matthews shrugged his thick shoulders and poured himself
another drink.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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