Waking up an Ugly Customer
Parkins saw that it was useless to deny his identity. “Do you want to be shot?” he asked fiercely.
“Not any more than you want to be hung,” said August. “The one would follow the other in five minutes. Give back that money and I will go away.”
The gambler trembled a minute. He was fairly at bay. He took out a roll of bills and handed it to August. There was but five hundred. Smith had the other four hundred and fifty, he said. But August had a quiet German steadiness of nerve. He said that unless the other four hundred and fifty were paid at once he should call in the sheriff or the crowd. Parkins knew that every minute August stood there increased his peril, and human nature is now very much like human nature in the days of Job. The devil understood the subject very well when he said that all that a man hath will he give for his life. Parkins paid the four hundred and fifty in gold-pieces. He would have paid twice that if August had demanded it.