Page:Owen Wister - The Virginian.djvu/504

Rh usin' the Bible that way, it will mix you up mighty quick, seh."

"My friend," the bishop urged, and all his good, warm heart was in it, "my dear fellow—go away for the one night. He'll change his mind."

The Virginian shook his head. "He cannot change his word, seh. Or at least I must stay around till he does. Why, I have given him the say-so. He's got the choice. Most men would not have took what I took from him in the saloon. Why don't you ask him to leave town?"

The good bishop was at a standstill. Of all kicking against the pricks none is so hard as this kick of a professing Christian against the whole instinct of human man.

"But you have helped me some," said the Virginian. "I will go and tell her. At least, if I think it will be good for her, I will tell her."

The bishop thought that he saw one last chance to move him.

"You're twenty-nine," he began.

"And a little over," said the Virginian.

"And you were fourteen when you ran away from your family."

"Well, I was weary, yu' know, of havin' elder brothers lay down my law night and mawnin'."

"Yes, I know. So that your life has been your own for fifteen years. But it is not your own now. You have given it to a woman."

"Yes; I have given it to her. But my life's not the whole of me. I'd give her twice my life—fifty—a thousand of 'em. But I can't give her—her nor anybody in heaven or earth—I can't give my—my—we'll never get at it, seh!