"I swear to God I didn't know he was blind," declared Hawksley vehemently. "When I saw him hugging my wife I went for him, as any man would. I was only going to teach him."
"Teach Derringer Jack a lesson?" drawled Broncho. "Wall, I surmise he had to be blind an' starved an' near dead o' thirst, or the rope would have been round your horns, mister."
"I'm bleeding. Ain't you got the humanity to bind up my arm?" whined the wretch, seeing his first line of argument had no effect.
"I'm shore a whole lot sorry it was your arm an' not your black heart I put a bullet through," returned Broncho sourly, without any offer to doctor the wounded member.
"Loyola, you wench," cried the exasperated Hawksley, "ain't you got no sense of duty? Would you let your husband bleed to death?"
The woman rose slowly to her feet from Jack's side, and without a word tore a strip off her skirt; then, with a look of the most utter aversion in her face, deftly bound up her husband's wound.
"What are you going to do with me?" he asked again of the silent cowboy.
"Depends on my bunkie thar," replied the latter sternly. "Mebbe string you up to the nearest cocoanut palm."
"It'd be murder!" whined Hawksley, now thoroughly cowed and frightened. "I was within my rights."