"Search 'em," commanded the 'Piker.'
This was done effectively. A Derringer doesn't take up much room in a
man's pocket, but it has been known to turn the tables upon larger
weapons. Ransom and Smoky, however, were unarmed; but the squatter who
ran his hand over Smoky's pockets encountered a small cylinder, which
he held up to the public gaze.
It was an empty cartridge.
To understand fully what this meant one must possess a certain
knowledge of Western ways and sentiment. Pistols and rifles belonging
to the pioneers, for example, often exhibit notches, each of which
bears silent witness to the shedding of blood. The writer knew
intimately a very mild, kindly old man who had a strop fashioned out
of several thicknesses of Apache skins. The Apaches had inflicted
unmentionable torments upon him and his, and the strop was his dearest
possession. The men and women of the wilderness are primal in their
loves and hates.
The big 'Piker' examined the long brass cylinder, small of bore and
old-fashioned in shape. He slipped it into the Sharp rifle, and
laughed grimly as he said--
"A relic!"
Ransom's face was impassive; Smoky Jack exhibited a derisive defiance.
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