"Hey, Walt!" burbled one of them, a beardless youth on one end of the line. "Still want to play with that badge?"
"If you do," jeered the man in the middle, laughing again, "better rustle, _pronto_, ’cause I’m buyin’ its boss a drink."
Walt grinned expansively, shoved the money into Whiskey Jim’s clutching fingers, took hold of the quiet marshal, and turned toward the hotel. "You come along with me, officer," he said. "I’ll pertect you. That fool says he’s buyin’ you a drink--mebby he is, but I’m payin’ for th’ first one. Yo’re about th’ best he-man I’ve seen since I looked into a lookin’-glass. I’m obliged to you for not losin’ yore valuable temper." He waved a hand at the unbelieving Jim, who doubted his reeling senses. Five whole dollars, all at once! Gosh, but the new marshal was a hummer. "Now don’t you lay for me, Jim," laughed the puncher. "We’re square, all ’round, ain’t we?"
The cheerful three in the door grabbed the marshal of Windsor and hauled him in to the bar, where he pushed free and surveyed them.
"Four cheerful imbeciles," he murmured sadly. "Don’t you reckon you better quit drinkin’, or else empty them guns?"
"Now don’t you be too hard on us, Marshal," chuckled the eldest. "We’re so dry we rattles, an’ th’ dust, risin’ out of our throats gets plumb into our eyes. Here," he said, dragging out his gun and gravely emptying it, "these are shore heavy. I’ll carry ’em in my pocket for a change," and he made good his words. The others laughingly followed his. example, Tex’s smile growing broader all the time.
"This ain’t nothin’ personal, boys," he said. "It’s only that th’ law has come to town. Knowin’ you’ll leave ’em empty till after you get out, I’ll have one drink an’ go about my business." He made no threats and his voice was friendly and pleasant; and it did not have to be otherwise. He had made four friends, and they knew that he would go through with any play he started. "Know Tommy Watkins?" he asked as he put down his glass.
"Shore!" answered Walt. "He’s workin’ with my outfit--C Bar. Ain’t seen him for a month, him bein’ off somewhere when we rode in for our pay. Marshal, shake hands with another C Bar rider--Wyatt Holmes. These two tramps is Double S punchers--Lefty Rowe, an’ Luke Perkins. My name’s Butler--Walt Butler. What’s Tommy up an’ done?" he finished somewhat anxiously.