Copper Streak Trail | Page 4

other shooting. You do right well,
too, both of you. If you'd only started at it when you was young, I
reckon you'd both have been what you might call plumb good shots
now."
He shook his head sadly and suppressed a sigh.
"Wait!" advised the Texan, and turned to confront his partner. "You
make out quite tol'lable with a gun, Billiam," he conceded. "I got to
hand it to you. I judged you was just runnin' a windy. But have you
now showed all your little box of tricks?"
"Well, I haven't missed anything--not to speak of--no more than you
did," evaded Bill, plainly apprehensive. "What more do you want?"
Jim chuckled.
"Pausin' lightly to observe that it ought to be easy enough to best you, if
we was on horseback--just because you peek at your sights when you
shoot--I shall now show you something."
A chuck box was propped against the juniper trunk. From this the
Texan produced a horseshoe hammer and the lids from two ten-pound
lard pails. He strode over to where, ten yards away, two young cedars
grew side by side, and nailed a lid to each tree, shoulder-high.
"There!" he challenged his opponent. "We ain't either of us going to
miss such a mark as that--it's like putting your finger on it. But suppose
the tree was shooting back? Time is what counts then. Now, how does
this strike you? You take the lid on the left and I'll take the other. When
the umpire says Go! we'll begin foggin'--and the man that scores six
hits quickest gets the money. That's fair, isn't it, Johnson?"

This was a slip--Johnson had not given his name--a slip unnoticed by
either of the ZK men, but not by Johnson.
"Fair enough, I should say," he answered.
"Why, Jim, that ain't practical--that ain't!" protested Bill uneasily. "You
was talking about the tree a-shootin' back--but one shot will stop most
men, let alone six. What's the good of shootin' a man all to pieces?"
"Suppose there was six men?"
"Then they get me, anyway. Wouldn't they, Mr. Umpire?" he appealed
to Peter Johnson, who sat cross-legged and fanned himself with his big
sombrero.
"That don't make any difference," decided the umpire promptly. "To
shoot straight and quickest--that's bein' a good shot. Line up!"
Bill lined up, unwillingly enough; they stuffed their cylinders with
cartridges.
"Don't shoot till I say: One, two, three--go!" admonished Pete. "All set?
One--two--three--go!"
A blending, crackling roar, streaked red and saffron, through black
smoke: the Texan's gun flashed down and up and back, as a man snaps
his fingers against the frost; he tossed his empty gun through the
sunlight to the bed under the juniper tree and spread out his hands. Bill
was still firing--one shot--two!
"Judgment!" shouted the Texan and pointed. Six bullet holes were
scattered across his target, line shots, one above the other; and poor Bill,
disconcerted, had missed his last shot!
"Jim, I guess the stuff is yours," said Bill sheepishly.
The big Texan retrieved his gun from the bed and Pete gave him the
stakes. He folded the bill lovingly and tucked it away; but he flipped
the coin from his thumb, spinning in the sun, caught it as it fell, and

glanced askant at old Pete.
"How long ago did you say it was when you began shootin'?" He
voiced the query with exceeding politeness and inclined his head
deferentially. "Or did you say?"
Pete pondered, pushing his hand thoughtfully through his white hair.
"Oh, I began tryin' when I was about ten years old, or maybe seven. It's
been so long ago I scarcely remember. But I didn't get to be what you
might call a fair shot till about the time you was puttin' on your first
pair of pants," he said sweetly. "There was a time, though, before
that--when I was about the age you are now--when I really thought I
could shoot. I learned better."
A choking sound came from Bill; Jim turned his eyes that way. Bill
coughed hastily. Jim sent the gold piece spinning again.
"I'm goin' to keep Bill's tenspot--always," he announced emotionally.
"I'll never, never part with that! But this piece of money--" He threw it
up again. "Why, stranger, you might just as well have that as not. Bill
can be stakeholder and give us the word. There's just six cartridges left
in the box for me."
Peter Johnson smiled brightly, disclosing a row of small, white, perfect
teeth. He got to his feet stiffly and shook his aged legs; he took out his
gun, twirled the cylinder, and slipped in an extra cartridge.
"I always carry the hammer on an empty chamber--safer that way," he
explained.
He put the gun back in the holster, dug up a wallet, and produced