How about it, Bill ?" "How about what ?" countered Billy, his teeth close together.
"The girl, and the dawg, and the fight--but more especially the girl.
The Pilgrim--" "_Damn_ the Pilgrim! I wisht I'd a-killed the lying -- -- The girl's a lady, and he ain't fit to speak her name.

She come here last night because her hoss fell and got crippled, and there wasn't a hoss I'd trust at night with her, it was storming so hard, and slippery--and at daylight I put her on the gentlest one we had, and took her home.
That's all there is to it.

There's nothing to gabble about, and if the Pilgrim goes around shooting off his face--" Billy clicked his teeth ominously.
"Well, that ain't _just_ the way he told it," commented the foreman, stooping to expectorate into the hearth and stopping to regard surprisedly its unwonted emptiness.

"He said--" "I don't give a damn what he said," snapped Billy.

"He lied, the low-down cur." "Uh-huh--he said something about you shooting that dawg of his.