Page:Morley roberts--Painted Rock.djvu/57

 tried and acquitted, is something strange to see. He gloried in his strength and in his quickness, and took up attitudes before the little world in which he shone. And quiet men said to themselves that Windy Walker would not die in bed. But the trouble is that quiet men do not kill unless they are obliged to, and some men who looked Walker in the eyes with a savage challenge found him loath to take offence.

"I put up with a mighty lot now," said Walker; "a man with my record should. I want peace." He still held his own at the American House, where the trouble with old Dexter had begun, and he lost a few dollars regularly to the gamblers who ran the faro and keno tables. They sneered at him, but found him a paying streak in bad times. If he gassed a little they let him gas. And the citizens of the 'City' endured him. There were some (quiet men who did not talk) who wondered when his end would come. For Bill Davies said a thing or two to friends of his.

"The boy hez a right to kill him," said