Mr. Masterson, ignoring Mr. Peacock and honouring Mr. Updegraffe as the element perilous, opened on the latter. The bullet drove before it a piece of rib, and sent the splinter of bone through Mr. Updegraffe’s lungs. The death-blindness upon him, and never a notion of what he was about, he slowly walked a pace or two, and fell dead. As Mr. Updegraffe went down, Mr. Peacock, who had not fired a shot, took refuge behind a little building that stood in the plaza and was both calaboose and Court House. This discreet disposition of himself by Mr. Peacock was doubtless allowable. None the less it smelled of an unspeakable meanness, impossible to any Bayard of the guns. Thus to take cover is the caste-mark of a mongrel. So contemptible did this move for safety seem to Mr. Masterson that he would have walked away, leaving Mr. Peacock to enjoy his ignoble security. Mr. Peacock, however, inched his desperate nose around the corner and fired on Mr. Masterson. The bullet broke a third-story window one hundred yards away. Mr. Masterson’s rancorous interest was rearoused in Mr. Peacock by these tactics. When that gentleman again protruded his nose, Mr. Masterson shot twice at that feature like the ticking of a clock. The lead guttered the side of the building within an inch of the target. Mr. Masterson charged Mr. Peacock, who thereupon took to his heels, and escaped into Gallon’s, which hostelry lay open in his rear. Mr. Masterson would have followed, but it was here that Mr. Webster, all a-tremble, ran up with a shotgun. At this Mr. Masterson’s eyes shifted viciously to Mr. Webster. That the latter was shaking as with an ague did not lessen Mr. Masterson’s interest in him. Mr. Webster saw that he had attracted the whole of Mr. Masterson’s attention, and was in no wise reassured. “What are you going to do with that shotgun, Web?” asked Mr. Masterson, tones low and steady but with a deadly focus on Mr. Webster. “Well,” stammered Mr. Webster, “I’m Mayor, Bat, an’ this shootin’ ’s got to stop.” “I’ve been reckoned a judge,” returned Mr. Masterson, coming closer to Mr. Webster, watching him the while with constant and forbidding eye; “I’ve been reckoned a judge, and I should say it had stopped unless you begin it again.” “I shan’t begin it!” hastily asserted Mr. Webster. “Then let me hold your shotgun,” returned Mr. Masterson, voice iron and syrup. “It doesn’t become your office.” And Mr. Webster gave Mr. Masterson his gun. What Mr. Masterson next beheld was as though he saw a ghost. There across the plaza came Jim. Mr. Masterson stared. “Aren’t you dead?” he whispered. “Dead?” echoed Jim, in wide surprise. “I was asleep over in the Wright House until your guns woke me up!” Mr. Masterson never understood; Jim never understood; Dodge never understood! Not a soul came forward as the “A” of that message; and the telegraph man said he didn’t know!