“Atter we both shoot we kin drink,” rejoined his friend, with a remaining trace of judgment.  “Go take stand whar we marked the scratch.  Chardon, damn ye, carry the cup down an’ set hit on his head, an’ ef ye spill a drop I’ll drill ye, d’ye hear?”

The engage’s face went pale.

“But Monsieur Jim—­” he began.

“Don’t ‘Monsieur Jim’ me or I’ll drill a hole in ye anyways!  Do-ee-do what I tell ye, boy!  Then if ye crave fer to see some ol’-time shootin’ come on out, the hull o’ ye, an’ take a lesson, damn ye!”

“Do-ee ye shoot first, Bill,” demanded Bridger.  “The light’s soft, an’ we’ll swap atter the fust fire, to git hit squar for the hindsight, an’ no shine on the side o’ the front sight.”

“No, we’ll toss fer fust,” said Jackson, and drew out a Spanish dollar.  “Tails fer me last!” he called as it fell.  “An’ I win!  You go fust, Jim.”

“Shore I will ef the toss-up says so,” rejoined his friend.  “Step off the fifty yard.  What sort o’ iron ye carryin’, Bill?”

“Why do ye ask?  Ye know ol’ Mike Sheets in Virginia never bored a better.  I’ve never changed.”

“Ner I from my old Hawken.  Two good guns, an’ two good men, Bill, o’ the ol’ times—­the ol’ times!  We kain’t say fairer’n this, can we, at our time o’ life, fer favor o’ the old times, Bill?  We got to do somethin’, so’s to kind o’ git rested up.”

“No man kin say fairer,” said his friend.

They shook hands solemnly and went onward with their devil-may-care test, devised in a historic keel-boat man’s brain, as inflamed then by alcohol as their own were now.

Followed by the terrified clerk, Bill Jackson, tall, thin and grizzled, stoical as an Indian, and too drunk to care much for consequences, so only he proved his skill and his courage, walked steadily down to the chosen spot and stood, his arms folded, after leaning his own rifle against the door of the trading room.  He faced Bridger without a tremor, his head bare, and cursed Chardon for a coward when his hand trembled as he balanced the cup on Jackson’s head.

“Damn ye,” he exclaimed, “there’ll be plenty lost without any o’ your spillin’!”

“Air ye all ready, Bill?” called Bridger from his station, his rifle cocked and the delicate triggers set, so perfect in their mechanism that the lightest touch against the trigger edge would loose the hammer.

“All ready!” answered Jackson.

The two, jealous still of the ancient art of the rifle, which nowhere in the world obtained nicer development than among men such as these, faced each other in what always was considered the supreme test of nerve and skill; for naturally a man’s hand might tremble, sighting three inches above his friend’s eye, when it would not move a hair sighting center between the eyes of an enemy.

Bridger spat out his tobacco chew and steadily raised his rifle.  The man opposite him stood steady as a pillar, and did not close his eyes.  The silence that fell on those who saw became so intense that it seemed veritably to radiate, reaching out over the valley to the mountains as in a hush of leagues.