Violence of the Mountain Man. William W. Johnstone

tell Andrew to draw one for me while I shoot Mr. Keno in the back of his head for not dropping his pistol when I told him to.”

      “No! No!” Keno said. “I’m dropping it, I’m dropping it. Don’t shoot!” He opened his hand and the pistol fell to the floor with a loud thump.

      “Damn,” Sheriff Carson said. “I walked all the way down here. Now I have to put Keno in jail before I can even have a beer.”

      “Darlin’, pick up Keno’s gun and bring it to me,” Smoke said.

      Stepping around Keno, Sally reached down to pick up his pistol; then she took it over to the table. The wooden pistol grip was still shattered from the impact of the bullet when Smoke had shot it a few days earlier. Smoke held it out toward Keno.

      “Damn, you haven’t gotten that fixed yet?” he asked. “I thought you were supposed to be so all-fired good with a gun. Nobody who is good with a gun would let one stay in such a bad condition as this.”

      Smoke removed the cylinder and slipped it into his pocket. Then, using his pocketknife, he extracted the firing pin. After that, he walked over and dropped the gun into a half-full spittoon.

      “No need to put him in jail, Sheriff, he didn’t actually do anything,” Smoke said, handing the empty cylinder to Carson. “Suppose you hold on to this for a couple of days.”

      “All right,” Carson said, taking the cylinder from Smoke.

      “You don’t have to be doin’ me no damn favors,” Keno said.

      “Oh, don’t get me wrong, Keno, I’m not doing you any favors,” Smoke said. “I’m just telling you straight out to get out of my sight and stay out of my sight. Because next time I see you, I’ll kill you.”

      Smoke delivered the words in an even, calm, and cool voice. That had the effect of making the threat much more frightening and believable than if he had spoken the words in anger.

      Keno stood in the door for a moment longer, as if trying to digest the words.

      “What?” Keno said. “Sheriff, did you hear that? This man just threatened to kill me.”

      “Yes, I heard the man,” Sheriff Carson said. He made a dismissive motion with his hand. “Get out of here, now, before I kill you myself.”

      “I ain’t goin’ nowhere without my pistol.”

      Carson pointed to the spittoon where Smoke had deposited Keno’s pistol.

      “There it is,” Sheriff Carson said. “Fish it out, and it’s yours.”

      Keno walked over to the spittoon, looked down into it, hesitated for a moment, then, making a face of disgust and revulsion, stuck his hand down into the little brass pot. A few seconds later, he pulled his pistol without the cylinder out, and with it, and his hand, dripping a brown, slimy oozing liquid, walked quickly out of the saloon.

      Keno was chased from the saloon by the laughter of nearly a dozen customers.