Goree knew that the sheriff had
just won a pot, for the subdued whoop with which he always greeted
a victory floated across the square upon the crinkly heat waves.
Beads of moisture stood on Goree's brow. Stooping, he drew the
wicker-covered demijohn from under the table, and filled a tumbler
from it.
"A little corn liquor, Mr. Garvey? Of course you are joking about--
what you spoke of? Opens quite a new market, doesn't it? Feuds.
Prime, two-fifty to three. Feuds, slightly damaged--two hundred, I
believe you said, Mr. Garvey?"
Goree laughed self-consciously.
The mountaineer took the glass Goree handed him, and drank the whisky
without a tremor of the lids of his staring eyes. The lawyer
applauded the feat by a look of envious admiration. He poured his own
drink, and took it like a drunkard, by gulps, and with shudders at the
smell and taste.
"Two hundred," repeated Garvey. "Thar's the money."
A sudden passion flared up in Goree's brain. He struck the table with
his fist. One of the bills flipped over and touched his hand. He
flinched as if something had stung him.
"Do you come to me," he shouted, "seriously with such a ridiculous,
insulting, darned-fool proposition?"
"It's fa'r and squar'," said the squirrel hunter, but he reached out
his hand as if to take back the money; and then Goree knew that his
own flurry of rage had not been from pride or resentment, but from
anger at himself, knowing that he would set foot in the deeper depths
that were being opened to him.
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