Talpers flushed angrily, and then grinned, until his alkali-cracked lips glistened in the lamplight.
"That's the spirit!" he exclaimed. "I never seen a more spunky woman, and that's the kind I like. But there ain't many humans that can call me a coward. I guess you don't know how many notches I've got on the handle of this forty-five, do you?" he asked, touching the gun that swung in a holster at his hip under his coat. "Well, there's three notches on there, and that don't count an Injun I got in a fair fight. I don't count any coups unless they're on white folks."
"I'm not interested in your record of bloodshed." The girl's voice was low, but it stung Bill to anger.
"Yes, you are," he retorted. "You're goin' to be mighty proud of your husband's record. You'll be glad to be known as the wife of Bill Talpers, who never backed down from no man. That's what I come over here for, to have you say that you'll marry me. If you don't say it, I'll have to give that letter over to the authorities at White Lodge. It sure would be a reg'lar bombshell in the case right now."
The trader's squat figure, in his black suit, against the white background made by the lamp, made the girl think of a huge, grotesque blot of ink. His broad, hairy hand rested on the table. She noticed the strong, thick fingers, devoid of flexibility, yet evidently of terrific strength.
"Now you and me," went on Talpers, "could get quietly married, and I could sell this store of mine for a good figger, and I'd be willin' to move anywheres you want—San Francisco, or Los Angeles, or San Diego, or anywheres. And I could burn up that letter, and there needn't nobody know that the wife of Bill Talpers was mixed up in the murder that is turnin' this here State upside down. Furthermore, jest to show you that Bill Talpers is a square sort, I won't ever ask you myself jest how deep and how wide you're in this murder, nor why you wrote that letter, nor what it was all about. Ain't that fair enough?"
The girl laughed.
"It's too fair," she said. "I can't believe you'd hold to such a bargain."
"You try me and see," urged Bill. "All you've got to do is to say you'll marry me."
"Well, I'll never say it."