Acres of Unrest by Max Brand

but now I see that I can fight it out with a crook, and that’s what I intend doing.”
    “Fighting?” Peter smiled.
    “Not with fists,” Charlie said, flushing. “I wouldn’t take any advantage of you. But we’ve heard how you can shoot. How you fanned the feathers out of the crow and then dropped it on the wing. And if you can really shoot with a Colt like that, you’ve got it all over me.”
    Peter raised himself and stood awkwardly on his steel-braced legs. When he was sitting down, one could easily forget that there was anything wrong with him. But when he stood up in this fashion, he appeared the mere wreck of a man.
    “Shooting, Charlie?” he asked. “Do you mean that?”
    “Why, curse you!” broke out Charlie. “Of course Imean it. Because I won’t live without her. You don’t want her, except for her money. She’s a fool, from your way of looking at things, and you’d never think of marrying her, except that Mike Jarvin has your back against the wall. Oh, what a lot of fools we’ve all been not to connect the Jarvin robbery with the time when you started spending your money like water. He was your rich friends in the East.”
    “You’re right,” admitted Peter. “Everything that you say is true. But I give you this warning, Charlie. I don’t want trouble with you. You’re a fine fellow. A lot cleaner, and a darned sight more honest than I am. I don’t want to spoil your life for you, but at the same time I have to tell you that I can’t let you interfere in this. I’ve put my father through eleven years of purgatory. I’ve taken it into my mind to pay him back with a little comfort and happiness. Your father stacked up money and land for you. Well, there it is for you to take. My father invested money and pain in the attempt to make a fine man of me. And I know that he failed, but I want to keep him from seeing that he failed. To gain that point, I’d kill ten men like you, Charlie. I warn you now. You’ll have no chance against me. I have no nerves. My hand is as steady now as the hour hand of a clock. And I shoot fast and straight. I’ve always loved guns. Charlie, if you force this thing through, you’re a dead man. If you’ll get out of it and let me be, why, we’ll fight things out in a different manner. The girl has a right to change her mind about you, if she pleases, hasn’t she?”
    “She has, I suppose,” Charlie said gloomily. “If I thought that she’d be happy with you, I wouldn’t step in. But you ain’t her kind. You’re too deepfor her. You’re too mean and cool for her. You’ve knocked her off balance, being so strange to her. But if you step out of the picture, she’ll forget you and remember me again. You hear me talk?”
    Peter sighed, and then a faintly cruel smile touched his lips. “I’ve stated my viewpoint from the beginning to the end,” he said. “Now you may do as you please. You have a gun at your hip, I think?”
    “I have. Are you ready?”
    “Oh, I’m ready. Though I hate this business, Charlie.”
    “Curse you and your snaky ways! I’m gonna do a good thing for the world when I rid it of you. Here’s at you, Pete.” He reached for his gun, a quick and snapping movement, which any good cowpuncher on the range must have approved of highly. It was a vital fifth of a second slower than Peter’s answering gesture. That light-triggered gun exploded, and the bullet, flying straight for the heart of Charlie, encountered on its way the Colt that Charlie Hale was jerking up to fire.
    The heavy chunk of lead, landing solidly on the weapon, tore it from the finger tips of Charlie and flung it against his face. So he staggered. The revolver landed heavily on the floor, and Charlie dropped upon one knee, his handsome face bathed in crimson, for the front sight had sliced through the skin to the bone. He was only down for an instant. There was plenty of the fighting blood of the Hales in him. He came to his feet like a leaping tiger and drove