"You knew he wouldn't shoot you in the back!" "I didn't know nothin'.

I couldn't even think--and my body was numb as a dead man's all below the hips.

There I stood like I was chained to the floor--you know how it is in a nightmare when something chases you and you can't run?
That was the way with me." "Buck! And he was sitting behind you--while you stood there ?" "Ay, sitting there with my death sittin' on his trigger finger.

But I knowed that if I showed the white feather, if I let him see me shake, he'd be out of his chair and on top of me.

No gun--he don't need nothin' but his hands--and what was in front of my eyes was a death like--like Jim Silent's!" He squinted his eyes close and groaned.