"My hand is steady, stranger." was the reply. "There is not a man on the Rio Grande border, where I came from, that can strike a center at twenty paces with a revolver as often as I. And with a rifle at one hundred yards I can most generally drop a deer with a ball between his eyes, if he is looking at me, or take a wild turkey's head without hurting his body." "Then, you are from Texas?" "Yes, sir. And you?" "From the East, sir. I have traveled in the South--all over, in fact--but my home is in the old Empire State. "If it isn't impudent, which way are you bound now?" "I haven't quite decided. I may go to the Black Hills--may remain around here awhile--it seems to be rather a pleasant place." "Yes, for them that like it. I'm off for the Black Hills, myself." "Ah! with a company?" "Not much! But there's a company going. I'm one of them that don't care much for company, and can take better care of myself alone than with a crowd about me." "So! Well, it is a good thing to be independent. Do you know the party that is going?" "Some of 'em, by sight. The captain is Sam Chichester, and he has California Joe, Cap'n Jack, and about twenty more in his party. And Wild Bill has just come on the train, and I heard him say he was going with the crowd." "Wild Bill!" cried the stranger, flushing up. "Did you say he was going?" "Yes." "Then I'd like to go, too--but I'd like to go with another party, either just before or behind that party. Do you know Wild Bill?" "_Know_ him! Who does not? Hasn't he killed more men than any other white man in the States and Territories--I'll not say _how_, but is he not a hyena, sopped in blood?" "You do not like him?" "Who says I don't?" "_You_ do! Your eyes flash hate while you speak of him." "Do they? Well, maybe I don't like him as well as I do a glass of brandy--maybe I have lost some one I loved by his hand. It isn't at all unlikely." The traveler sighed, and with an anxious look, said: "You don't bear him any grudge, do you? You wouldn't harm him?" A strange look passes like a flash over the face of the other: he seemed to read the thoughts or wishes of the traveler in a glance. "Oh, no," he said, with assumed carelessness. "Accidents will happen in the best families. It's not in me to bear a grudge, because Bill may have wiped out fifteen or twenty Texans, while they were foolin' around in his way. As to harm--he's too ready with his six-shooter, old Truth-Teller, he calls it, to stand in much danger. I'm quick, but he is quicker. You take a good deal of interest in him? Do you know him?" "Yes; that is, I know him by sight. He is thought a great deal of by an intimate friend of mine, and that is why I feel an interest in him." "And that friend is a woman?" "Why do you think so?" "It is a fancy of mine." "Well, I will not contradict you. For her sake I would hate to see any evil befall him." There was a cynical smile on the face of the young man with auburn hair.