"At that he took his pistol from his pocket and handed it. 'Take that,'
he said. 'It will make you safer with me, and I'll ride ahead of you,
and we shall reach there by sundown, I hope.'

"And I would not take his pistol, but, shamed a little, showed him the
one Sir Duke Lawless gave me. 'That's right,' he said, 'and, maybe, it's
better that I should carry mine, for, as I said, there are anxious
gentlemen lookin' for me, who wish to give me a quiet but dreary home.
And see,' he added, 'if they should come you will be safe, for they sit
in the judgment seat, and the statutes hang at their saddles, and I'll
say this for them, that a woman to them is as a saint of God out here
where women and saints are few.'

"I do not speak as he spoke, for his words had a turn of French; but I
knew that, whatever he was, I should travel peaceably with him. Yet I
saw that he would be runnin' the risk of his own safety for me, and I
told him that I could not have him do it; but he talked me lightly down,
and we started. We had gone but a little distance, when there galloped
over a ridge upon us, two men of the party I had left, and one, I saw,
was the man I hated; and I cried out and told Pretty Pierre. He wheeled
his horse, and held his pistol by him. They said that I should come with
them, and they told a dreadful lie--that I was a runaway wife; but Pierre
answered them they lied. At this, one rode forward suddenly, and
clutched me at my waist to drag me from my horse. At this, Pierre's
pistol was thrust in his face, and Pierre bade him cease, which he did;
but the other came down with a pistol showin', and Pierre, seein' they
were determined, fired; and the man that clutched at me fell from his
horse. Then the other drew off; and Pierre got down, and stooped, and
felt the man's heart, and said to the other: 'Take your friend away, for
he is dead; but drop that pistol of yours on the ground first.' And the