"1 guess we've earned a holiday," he said. "We'll slick up to-night an' give the town a treat." Accordingly, the evening found them mixing with the stream of humanity which thronged the sidewalks, shouting noisy greetings in a medley of tongues, singing raucous songs, jostling one another as they entered or left the various places of entertainment. Again Sudden experienced one of those incidents which he was quite unable to explain. A roistering miner staggered out of a saloon, barged into him and went down. With an oath he picked himself up and was feeling for his gun when a shaft of light from the swinging door lit up the cowboy's countenance. The man stared, his hand fell to his side, and with a mumbled apology, he turned away.
Sudden looked at his companion in bewilderment.
"What do yu know about that?" he asked. "The fella was goin' to perforate me an' the sight of my face scared him cold." This was too good an opening. "What surprises me is that it surprises yu," Mason grinned. "Ain't yu never used a mirror? Yore face would make a grizzly turn tail."
"Yu chatterin' chump," Sudden said. "Let's go in here."
"Pull yore hat well down, we don't want to start a stampede," Gerry retorted.
The Paris Saloon was packed with people. Most of those present were men but there was a sprinkling of the other sex, women of various ages, whose expensive attire displayed their charms with some freedom, who drank and gambled with their male escorts and laughed with their painted lips and never with their eyes.
One half of the floor space in front of the long bar was devoted to games of chance, of which a roulette board attracted most attention. The other half contained the customary tables and chairs. Threading a way through the latter, the cowboys arrived at the bar and at once a dapper little man with twinkling eyes, dark crinkly hair, and a pointed beard, stepped up.
"Gentlemen, I am pleas' to welcome you," he greeted. "I have live wit' de cow, yes, bien sur, I, Jean Bizet, when I cook for de Cross T on de Canadian Border. Ah, dose sacre mule, dey nearly pull de arm out. You dreenk wit' me?" He chattered on, recalling incidents of the range. "Ah, it was de good days," he said. "Sometimes I regret, but a man must move, not so? If he stay one place all de while he get--how you say--ver' rusty." They returned his hospitality and Sudden told him they must get on--they were looking for someone. The little man's face sobered.
"Dat soun' bad," he said. "What he done?" Sudden laughed. "He's just a friend; we ain't on the warpath," he explained.
Bizet laughed too. "I mak' mistake. I am glad. W'en a man look for another it sometime mean trouble. You come again?"
"Shore we will," Sudden said heartily.
They had almost reached the door when it swung back to admit a man who would have attracted attention in any gathering. Over six feet in height, with a perfectly proportioned frame, he moved with the ease and grace of an athlete. The yellowish hair which reached to his shoulders, pale blue eyes, long drooping moustache, and clean-cut features were offset by a calm confidence and dignity of bearing which stamped their possessor as no ordinary individual.
His attire added to the impression. A tailed cutaway coat of dark cloth, wide trousers narrowing towards the feet, a fancy vest, high-heeled boots, and a "boiled" shirt with a narrow black tie. Buckled round his middle was a leather belt with two white-handled Colt's revolvers.
The hum of conversation ceased at his appearance and every eye followed him as he stepped quietly, with a nod here and there, to where Bizet was standing. The little Frenchman hurried to meet him.
"Who is that?" Sudden asked a bystander.
The man's eyebrows lifted. "Say, friend, where you been hidin'?" he asked. "It's Wild Bill, o' course--thought everybody knowed him."
"I'm a stranger here," Sudden explained, and led the way to the street.
For a while he was silent, his mind full of the man they had just seen. Wild Bill, the most famous gunman in the West. Sudden found himself dwelling on the big man's draw, wondering if he himself could beat it. Then he laughed; Sudden, the gunfighter, had been left behind; here, he was just Jim Green, a cowpuncher and miner. Mason's voice broke in:
"Yu'd never take him for a killer, would yu? Looked just an ordinary fella."
"An' why not? D'yu expect every man who shoots another in self-defence to have the brand o' Cain burned on his forehead?" Sudden retorted, with unusual bitterness.
"I've seen some what didn't need no brand," Mason answered, and changed the subject. "Wonder why that s'loonkeeper hombre was so dern glad to see us?"
"One cattleman is allus pleased to meet up with another," his friend said. "I've a hunch he's white. Here's another big joint; let's go in an' see if we can scare up a Waysider." The Monte--like the opposition establishment--was full and with the same class of customer. It was a replica of the other on a rather larger and more showy scale. Despite the crowded state of the room, they experienced no difficulty in reaching the bar--people seemed almost eager to make way for them--and Sudden again had the uneasy feeling that he was the object of general interest. Mason was grinning.
"Yu might be Wild Bill hisself these toughs is so perlite," he remarked.
"And yu might be King Solomon if yu had any brains a-tall," Sudden told him. "Lesurge an' Angel-face seem to have got themselves some friends." They were sitting at a table in a far corner and with them were several others, notably a fat, blond fellow, flashily dressed, with a heavy watch-guard made of gold nuggets slung across his vest. Interested as he was in the conversation, his pig-like eyes roamed restlessly round the room and he saw all that was taking place.
"Reuben Stark, the owner o' this shebang," Sudden informed. "Dunno the others but I'll gamble they ain't cyphers in this city o' sin. Mister Lesurge don't waste his time an' he's whirlin' a wide loop. I'm goin' to buck the tiger." They strolled over to the roulette table and again they had no trouble in getting near to it though there were plenty of eager speculators. The puncher won about forty dollars in a few careless throws and to the surprise of his companion, cashed in and turned away.
"But, Jim, luck's tannin' yore way," he protested.
"That's when to stop," the other replied.
He had fully expected to hear jeers at his lack of nerve from some of the coarse-faced, half-intoxicated men around him, but not even a shoulder was shrugged.
"You got this town tamed," Mason remarked, and hid a smile. "Yu oughta be in a show, puttin' the lions through their tricks."
"It has me beat," Sudden said. "Wonder where Snowy is?" They met him outside and he greeted them with boisterous expressions of goodwill. He reeked of whisky, but there was no slur in his speech, no unsteadiness in his gait. It was Snowy's boast that he was never drunk until his back teeth were submerged.
"Paul about?" he asked, when he had informed Mason that Miss Ducane was "fighting fit. "
"He's inside, with Stark an' some others," Sudden told him. Snowy nodded. "One smart guy, Paul," he said. "Won't be long afore he's runnin' thisyer burg an' it's shorely time somebody took a holt, the killin's an' robberies is gittin' too mighty prevalent."
"Found yore mine yet, Snowy?" Gerry inquired.
"No, young fella, an' I ain't going to look for it till we got some sort o' protection. It'll keep; I ain't in no hurry."
"Some other jasper may light on it," Gerry persisted. "'Tain't likely, but if it did happen that way I'd get me another; I can allus find gold--I smell it." With a wild laugh he pushed open the door of the saloon, turned and whispered, "Keep handy," and vanished.