"This here chloride, or whatever you call it, you sure it won't kill a
man?"

Purdy laughed: "Course it won't. It'll only put him to sleep till I've
had a chanct to win out. I'll git the stuff from Doc an' find out how
much is a dost, an' you kin' slip it in his booze."

As the cowpuncher disappeared through the door, Cinnabar Joe's eyes
narrowed. "You damn skunk!" he muttered, biting viciously upon the
stump of his cigar. "If you was drinkin' anything I'd switch glasses
on _you_, an' then shoot it out with you when you come to. From now on
it's you or me. You've got your hooks into me an' this is only the
beginnin'." The man stopped abruptly and stared for a long time at the
stove-pipe hole in the opposite wall. Then, turning, he studied his
reflection in the mirror behind the bottles and glasses. He tossed
away his cigar, straightened his necktie, and surveyed himself from a
new angle.

"This here Tex, now," he mused. "He sure is a rantankerous cuss when
he's lickered up. He'd jest as soon ride his horse through that door
as he would to walk through, an' he's always puttin' somethin' over on
someone. But he's a man. He'd go through hell an' high water fer a
friend. He was the only one of the whole outfit had the guts to tend
Jimmy Trimble when he got the spotted fever--nursed him back to good as
ever, too, after the Doc had him billed through fer yonder." Cinnabar
Joe turned and brought his fist down on the bar. "I'll do it!" he
gritted. "Purdy'll think Tex switched the drinks on me. Only I hope
he wasn't lyin' about that there stuff. Anyways, even if he was, it's
one of them things a man's got to do. An' I'll rest a whole lot easier
in my six by two than what I would if I give Tex the long good-bye