"You devil!" he exclaimed. "I believe you'd do it."

"Shore I would," she affirmed, serenely, dragging a small and ugly
derringer from its place of concealment and balancing it on a pink
palm. "I'll drill you in one blessed minute if you don't keep yore
paws to home. They's some things, Bull, you can't do to me. An' one
of them things is hurting me. I don't believe in corporal punishment,
Bull."

"I wanna know what you horned in for," he demanded, pounding the table
till the lamp danced again.

"If you only knowed what a silly fool you looked," she commented,
"you'd sit down and take it easy.... That's right, tell the
neighbours, do! Squawk out good and loud how yore bushwhackin' li'l
killing turned out a misdeal. Shore, I'd do that, if I was you. Whadda
you guess they pay Jake Rule an' Kansas Casey for, huh?"

"What did you get in front of him for?" Bull persisted in a lower
tone. "I pretty near had him, but you--Gawd, I could wring yore neck!"

"But you won't," she reminded him, sweetly. "Lookit here, Bull, if you
hadn't locked the door leading up the stairs to the Starlight's loft,
I'd 'a' come after you there and done my persuadin' of you right in
the loft. As it was when I heard what you were up to--nemmine how I
heard. I heard, that's enough--I had to go out in the street and
do what I could there. I don't believe the feller liked it much,
neither."