"Funny," he thought, "how a girl and poetry can get a
tough nut like me. I wonder what the guys that used to hang
out in back of Kelly's 'ud say if they seen what was goin' on
in my bean just now. They'd call me Lizzy, eh? Well, they
wouldn't call me Lizzy more'n once. I may be gettin' soft in
the head, but I'm all to the good with my dukes."
Speed is not conducive to sentimental thoughts and so Billy
had unconsciously permitted his pony to drop into a lazy
walk. There was no need for haste anyhow. No one knew yet
that the bank had been robbed, or at least so Billy argued. He
might, however, have thought differently upon the subject of
haste could he have had a glimpse of the horseman in his
rear--two miles behind him, now, but rapidly closing up
the distance at a keen gallop, while he strained his eyes across
the moonlit flat ahead in eager search for his quarry.
So absorbed was Billy Byrne in his reflections that his ears
were deaf to the pounding of the hoofs of the pursuer's horse
upon the soft dust of the dry road until Bridge was little more
than a hundred yards from him. For the last half-mile Bridge
had had the figure of the fugitive in full view and his mind
had been playing rapidly with seductive visions of the
one-thousand dollars reward--one-thousand dollars Mex, perhaps,
but still quite enough to excite pleasant thoughts.
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