When June was thus shut out, the woman recrossed the floor to likewise close the door of the room into which the colored maid had retired.
All the while Cimarron Bill, hat in hand, stood watching her closely with his evil eyes. For him it[Pg 189] must have been a most exceedingly strange thing to come thus into the presence of a woman whose husband was known far and wide as a money king, a woman whose every wish that wealth could serve was sure to be granted almost as quickly as expressed.
When she had closed the doors she turned about and faced him, surveying him from head to feet with her cold and penetrating eyes. He looked back at her with a sort of boldness, for this man was not one to be in the least downcast in the presence of a human being of whatever degree.
Mrs. Arlington motioned toward a chair.
"Will you sit down, sir?" she invited.
"Thank you, madam," said Bill, casting aside the rough manner of speech that he sometimes assumed and now using very decent English. "I don't care if I do."
Whereupon he placed his hat upon the table and sat upon a chair, with a certain pantherish undulation of his body, as if his muscles flowed beneath his skin.
"Mr. Dodge saw you," said the woman, remaining standing. "I directed him to inform you that he was my accredited agent and prepared to transact any business with you. I thought it better for him to attend to this affair."
"And I, madam, if you will excuse me, thought it best that we should come face to face and have our dealings thus. That is why I declined to do any business whatever with the gent with the blue nose."