He reached out both hands and laid them on her shoulders. “Why?” he asked, his tones husky with eagerness.
Her long eyelashes shaded her eyes. The red mounted to her cheeks. Falcon the Flunky waited for no other answer, but folded her in his arms and searched with his lips for hers. Again and again he kissed her, his heart singing with gladness.
Then a step. The kitchen door opened. Squawtooth Canby stood looking at them, slowly stroking his patriarchal beard.
“Pa Squawtooth!” Manzanita’s eyes were tragic.
“Yes, daughter.” Canby stepped farther into the room, his stern glance bent on The Falcon.
The younger man was now recovering from the surprise. He smiled in his unobtrusive way and stepped boldly to meet the cattleman, who remained silent.
“Mr. Canby,” he said, “you surprised us. But I’ll tell you now what I would have told you the next time we met, anyway. I love Manzanita. I think I’ve loved her since the first day I saw her. I’ve just learned, through a rather peculiar happening, that she loves me. She hasn’t even told me so in words, but I know it’s true”—his brown eyes shone with the lover’s triumph—“and—and—well, that’s all, I guess. Except that, of course, I want your consent to marry her.”
Like a storm brewing over the mountains evidences of anger almost uncontrollable were growing in Squawtooth’s eyes.
“Manzanita,” he said in a loud voice, “go to your room!”
“Pa!”