still hate him?”
“More ’n ever. Most o’ the time. He just laughs. He’s bound an’ determined to marry me whether or not. He will, too.”
Bob looked at her, surprised. It was the first time she had ever admitted as much. June’s slim body was packed with a pantherish resilience. Her spirit bristled with courage. What had come over her?
“He won’t if you don’t want him to.”
“Won’t he?” June was lying on a warm flat rock. She had been digging up dirt at the edge of it with a bit of broken stick. Now she looked up at him with the scorn of an experience she felt to be infinitely more extensive than his. “A lot you know about it.”
“How can he? If you an’ Mr. Tolliver don’t want him to.”
“He just will.”
“But, June, that don’t listen reasonable to me. He’s got you buffaloed. If you make up yore mind not to have him—”
“I didn’t say I’d made up my mind not to have him. I said I hated him,” she corrected.
“Well, you wouldn’t marry a fellow you hated,” he argued.
“How do you know so much about it, Bob Dillon?” she flared.
“I use what brains I’ve got. Women don’t do things like that. There wouldn’t be any sense in it.”
“Well, I’ll prob’ly do it. Then you’ll know I haven’t got a lick o’ sense,” she retorted sullenly.
“You ce’tainly beat my time,” he said, puzzled. “I’ve heard you say more mean things about him than everybody else put together, an’ now you’re talkin’ about marryin’ him. Why? What’s yore reason?”
She looked up. For a moment the morose eyes met his. They told nothing except a dogged intention not to tell anything.
But the boy was no fool. He had thought a good deal about the lonely life she and her father led. Many men came into this country three jumps ahead of the law. It was not good form to ask where any one came from unless he volunteered information about antecedent conditions. Was it possible that Jake Houck had something on Tolliver, that he was using his knowledge to force June into a marriage with him? Otherwise there would be no necessity for her to marry him. As he had told her, it was a free land. But if Houck was coercing her because of her fears for Tolliver, it was possible this might be a factor in determining June to marry him.
“Don’t you do it, June. Don’t you marry him. He didn’t look good to me, Houck didn’t,” Dillon went on. He was a little excited, and his voice had lifted.
A man who came at this moment round the bend of the creek was grinning unpleasantly. His eyes focused on Dillon.
“So I don’t look good to you. Tha’s too bad. If you’ll tell me what you don’t like about me I’ll make myself over,” jeered Houck.
Bob was struck dumb. The crooked smile and the stab of the eyes that went with it were menacing. He felt goose quills running up and down his spine. This man was one out of a thousand for physical prowess.
“I didn’t know you was near,” the boy murmured.
“I’ll bet you didn’t, but you’ll know it now.” Houck moved toward Dillon slowly.
“Don’t you, Jake Houck! Don’t you touch him!” June shrilled.
“I got to beat him up, June. It’s comin’ to him. D’you reckon I’ll let the flunkey of a telephone camp interfere in my business? Why, he ain’t half man-size.”
Bob backed away warily. This Colossus straddling toward him would thrash him within an inch of his life. The boy was white to the lips.
“Stop! Right now!” June faced Houck resolutely, standing between him and his victim.
The big fellow looked at the girl, a slim, fearless little figure with undaunted eyes flinging out a challenge. He laughed, delightedly, then brushed her aside with a sweep of his arm.
Her eyes blazed. The smouldering passion that had been accumulating for weeks boiled up. She dragged out the six-shooter from its holster.
“I won’t have you touch him! I won’t! If you do I’ll—I’ll—”
Houck stopped in his stride, held fast by sheer amazement. The revolver pointed straight at him. It did not waver a hair’s breadth. He knew how well she could shoot. Only the day before she had killed a circling hawk with a rifle. The bird had dropped like a plummet, dead before it struck the ground. Now, as his gaze took in the pantherish ferocity of her tense pose, he knew that she was keyed up for tragedy. She meant to defend the boy from him if it resulted in homicide.
It did not occur to him to be afraid. He laughed aloud, half in admiration, half in derision.
“I b’lieve you would, you spunky li’l wild cat,” he told her in great good humor.
“Run, Bob,” called June to the boy.
He stood, hesitating. His impulse was to turn and fly, but he could not quite make up his mind to leave her alone with Houck.
The cowman swung toward the girl.
“Keep back!” she ordered.
Her spurt of defiance tickled him immensely. He went directly to her, his stride unfaltering.
“Want to shoot up poor Jake, do you? An’ you an’ him all set for a honeymoon. Well, go to it, June. You can’t miss now.”
He stood a yard or so from her, easy and undisturbed, laughing in genuine enjoyment. He liked the child’s pluck. The situation, with its salty tang of danger, was wholly to his taste.
But he had disarmed the edge of June’s anger and apprehension. His amusement was too real. It carried the scene from tragedy to farce.
June’s outburst had not been entirely for the sake of Bob. Back of the immediate cause was the desire to break away from this man’s dominance. She had rebelled in the hope of establishing her individual freedom. Now she knew this was vain. What was the use of opposing one who laughed at her heroics and ignored the peril of his position? There was not any way to beat him.
She pushed the six-shooter back into its holster and cried out at him bitterly. “I think you’re the devil or one of his fiends.”
“An’ I think you’re an angel—sometimes,” he mocked.
“I hate you!” she said, and two rows of strong little white teeth snapped tight.
“Sho! Tha’s just a notion you got. You like me fine, if you only knew it, girl.”
She was still shaken with the emotion through which she had passed. “You never were nearer death, Jake Houck, than right now a minute ago.”
His back to Dillon, the cowman gave a curt command. “Hit
