Page:RidersOfSilences - Max Brand.djvu/307

Rh "You can't move, my friend. I understand. It's fear that stiffened your back. It's fear that sends the chill up and down your blood. It's fear that makes you think back to your murders, one by one. McGurk, you're done for. You're through. You're ready for the discard. I'm not going to kill you. I've thought of a finer hell than death, and that is to live as you shall live. I've beaten you, McGurk, beaten you fairly on the draw, and I've broken your heart by doing it. The next time you face a man you'll begin to think — you'll begin to remember how one other man beat you at the draw. And that wonder, McGurk, will make your hand freeze to your side, as you've made the hands of other men before me freeze. D'you understand?"

The lips of McGurk parted. The whisper of his dry panting reached Pierre, and the devil in him smiled.

"In six weeks, McGurk, you'll take water from a Chinaman. Now get out!"

And pace by pace McGurk drew back, with his face still toward Pierre.

The latter cried: "Wait. Are you going to leave your gun?"

Only the steady retreat continued.

"And go unarmed through the mountains? What will men say when they see McGurk with an empty holster?"

But the outlaw had passed out of view beyond the corner of one of the monster boulders. After him went the white horse, slowly, picking his steps,