“See me before your lease expires,” she heard Corrigan tell the men.
“Does the railroad own the town site?” asked Rosalind as they emerged from the last store.
“Yes. And leases are going to be more valuable presently.”
“You don’t mean that you are going to extort money from them—after they have gone to the expense of erecting buildings?”
His smile was pleasant. “They will be treated with the utmost consideration, Miss Benham.”
He ushered her into the bank. Like the other buildings, the bank was of frame construction. Its only resemblance to a bank was in the huge safe that stood in the rear of the room, and a heavy wire netting behind which ran a counter. Some chairs and a desk were behind the counter, and at the desk sat a man of probably forty, who got up at the entrance of his visitors and approached them, grinning and holding out a hand to Corrigan.
“So you’re here at last, Jeff,” he said. “I saw the car on the switch this morning. The show will open pretty soon now, eh?” He looked inquiringly at Rosalind, and Corrigan presented her. She heard the man’s name, “Mr. Crofton Braman,” softly spoken by her escort, and she acknowledged the introduction formally and walked to the door, where she stood looking out into the street.
Braman repelled her—she did not know why. A certain crafty gleam of his eyes, perhaps, strangely blended with a bold intentness as he had looked at her; a too effusive manner; a smoothly ingratiating smile—these evidences of character somehow made her link him with schemes and plots.
She did not reflect long over Braman. Across the street she saw the rider of the black horse standing beside the animal at a hitching rail in front of the store that Corrigan had passed without entering. Viewed from this distance, the rider’s face was more distinct, and she saw that he was good-looking—quite as good-looking as Corrigan, though of a different type. Standing, he did not seem to be so tall as Corrigan, nor was he quite so bulky. But he was lithe and powerful, and in his movements, as he unhitched the black horse, threw the reins over its head and patted its neck, was an ease and grace that made Rosalind’s eyes sparkle with admiration.
The rider seemed to be in no hurry to mount his horse. The girl was certain that twice as he patted the animal’s neck he stole glances at her, and a stain appeared in her cheeks, for she remembered the car window.