“No, ye don’t, Sam!” said the other, who was first of those who came up running.

Even as a lank woman stooped to raise the head of Molly Wingate the sinewy arm back of the hand whirled Woodhull around so that he faced Banion, who had not made a move.

“Will ain’t got no weapon, an’ ye know it,” went on the same cool voice.  “What ye mean—­a murder, besides that?”

He nodded toward the girl.  By now the crowd surged between the two men, voices rose.

“He struck me!” broke out Woodhull.  “Let me go!  He struck me!”

“I know he did,” said the intervener.  “I heard it.  I don’t know why.  But whether it was over the girl or not, we ain’t goin’ to see this other feller shot down till we know more about hit.  Ye can meet—­”

“Of course, any time.”

Banion was drawing on his glove.  The woman had lifted Molly, straightened her clothing.

“All blood!” said one.  “That saddle horn!  What made her ride that critter?”

The Spanish horse stood facing them now, ears forward, his eyes showing through his forelock not so much in anger as in curiosity.  The men hustled the two antagonists apart.

“Listen, Sam,” went on the tall Missourian, still with his grip on Woodhull’s wrist.  “We’ll see ye both fair.  Ye’ve got to fight now, in course—­that’s the law, an’ I ain’t learned it in the fur trade o’ the Rockies fer nothin’, ner have you people here in the settlements.  But I’ll tell ye one thing, Sam Woodhull, ef ye make one move afore we-uns tell ye how an’ when to make hit, I’ll drop ye, shore’s my name’s Bill Jackson.  Ye got to wait, both on ye.  We’re startin’ out, an’ we kain’t start out like a mob.  Take yer time.”

“Any time, any way,” said Banion simply.  “No man can abuse me.”

“How’d you gentlemen prefer fer to fight?” inquired the man who had described himself as Bill Jackson, one of the fur brigaders of the Rocky Mountain Company; a man with a reputation of his own in Plains and mountain adventures of hunting, trading and scouting.  “Hit’s yore ch’ice o’ weapons, I reckon, Will.  I reckon he challenged you-all.”

“I don’t care.  He’d have no chance on an even break with me, with any sort of weapon, and he knows that.”

Jackson cast free his man and ruminated over a chew of plug.

“Hit’s over a gal,” said he at length, judicially.  “Hit ain’t usual; but seein’ as a gal don’t pick atween men because one’s a quicker shot than another, but because he’s maybe stronger, or something like that, why, how’d knuckle and skull suit you two roosters, best man win and us to see hit fair?  Hit’s one of ye fer the gal, like enough.  But not right now.  Wait till we’re on the trail and clean o’ the law.  I heern there’s a sheriff round yere some’rs.”

“I’ll fight him any way he likes, or any way you say,” said Banion.  “It’s not my seeking.  I only slapped him because he abused me for doing what he ought to have done.  Yes, I rode his horse.  If I hadn’t that girl would have been killed.  It’s not his fault she wasn’t.  I didn’t want her to ride that horse.”