“Perhaps,” he said gently, “it might be more useful if you hoped I’d prove a false prophet—perhaps you’ll remember that one day, and some poor devil may have reason to thank me for the suggestion.”
“Aren’t those the lights of the camp?” she asked.
“Yes,” he said, “and I’m sorry to see them. Please take that as it’s meant, and don’t spoil it by being nasty.”
“Very well,” she said quietly, “I have enjoyed it too.”
They drove into the camp and separated, she to her tent and he to snatch an hour’s sleep on the ground, without further word than a simple “Good night.”
But Ess lay long that night and thought of their talk. And always her thoughts came back to the one point, and over and over she asked herself “Would I be hard—would I be hard if....”
CHAPTER VII.
In the morning the sun was up before Ess was, and she came from her tent to find the sheep out of sight over the horizon, and the plains empty and silent. Two or three of the men had just finished their breakfast, and were mounting to ride on and overtake the mob, and Blazes told her he had been feeding them in relays for the past three hours. Ess found him in the full flight of one of his outbursts of rage.
“I’m sick o’ the ’ole thing,” he declared, “expeck a man to cook chops, and bile gallons o’ tea, an’ wood as scarce as snowballs in ’ell—beg pardon, Miss—” and he subsided as suddenly as a pricked toy balloon.