At last, Sandy McGill broke the silence. "Yuh a stranger?" Toothpick remarked easily: "I sure am--an' I'm hopin' yuh gents will join me in a little liquor." The twins made no answer to this request. Their expressions grew bleaker, their eyes colder. In spite of Toothpick's laughing eyes, they read the challenge that lay within them. It was not the challenge of a gunman--simply that of a brave man who would die rather than back down, even if faced by a thousand enemies. Simultaneously, remembrance came to both the twins of something that had happened the night before. It was too soon to kill again. They relaxed. Mac McGill reached for the bottle and filled both their glasses. Silently they raised them to Toothpick and all drank. The twins nodded to the bartender, who refilled the four glasses and they again drank in silence. The twins then turned and commenced to talk to each other in a low voice. They thus gave notice that they wished to be alone. Later, Toothpick and the hostler crossed the street toward the hotel dining room. As they stepped up on the raised sidewalk on the farther side, the hostler shivered and cast an admiring look at his companion. "Feller, yuh was sure born lucky. I'm tellin' yuh them twins is worser than wolves, rattlers, an' grizzlies done all up together! An' yuh deliberately aggrify 'em. I figgers they is sure goin' to drop yuh pronto." "Shucks! I seen plenty like them hombres," Toothpick said, as they took their places at the dining table. "Yuh has, like Hades! Them two twins is the worst an' fastest gun slingers in this whole world," the hostler said warmly after he had ordered his meal. "Shucks! Yuh ever heard tell of the Allen twins? Them two yuh is braggin' about ain't in the same class a-tall," Toothpick said scornfully. "They ain't!" the hostler cried. "Yuh know what I saw last night right over there whar yuh got so darn salty? There was a young gent in there what thinks he is papa's bad boy, an' he has words with the McGill twins. This young gent was a nester, an' McGill starts talkin' to him, makes him go for his gun' an then drops him dead as a herrin'. An' yuh know he gets his gun out so fast an' puts it back faster, so nobody sees it an' nobody knows which of them McGills done the shootin' until I see smoke comin' from Sandy's holster." "Yuh didn't know which done the shootin'? 'Cause why--'cause yuh was pushin' sawdust with your nose huntin' a hole to hide in," Toothpick said, grinning aggravatingly. After a moment, he continued: "I'm bettin' them McGills picked a fight deliberate with that kid. There's that kind what gets a rep from shootin' kids an' old men. An' wasn't there any men in this town to take that kid's part?" "Yuh see, both them twins was there," the hostler returned weakly, "an' they sorta got this town buffaloed. I ain't sayin' they wasn't no talk about it bein' sorta like plain murder. But the kid was a no-good nester."