Thus eliminated as a conversationalist, and defeated in his effort to cast discredit upon her, Calumet maintained a sneering silence.
But when they rode up to the Diamond K ranchhouse, he flung a parting word at her.
"I reckon you can go an' talk cattle to your man, Kelton," he said. "I'm afraid that if he goes gassin' to me I'll smash his face in."
He rode back to the horse corral, which they had passed, to look again at a horse inside which had attracted his attention.
The animal was glossy black except for a little patch of white above the right fore-fetlock; he was tall, rangy, clean-limbed, high-spirited, and as Calumet sat in the saddle near the corral gate watching him he trotted impudently up to the bars and looked him over. Then, after a moment, satisfying his curiosity, he wheeled, slashed at the gate with both hoofs, and with a snort, that in the horse language might have meant contempt or derision, cavorted away.
Calumet's admiring glance followed him. He sat in the saddle for half an hour, eyeing the horse critically, and at the end of that time, noting that Betty had returned to the ranchhouse with Kelton, probably having looked at some of the stock she had come to see—Calumet had observed on his approach that the cattle corral was well filled with white Herefords—he wheeled Blackleg and rode over to them.
"Mr. Kelton has offered me four hundred head of cattle at a reasonable figure," Betty told him on his approach. "All that remains is for you to confirm it."
"I reckon you're the boss," said Calumet. He looked at Kelton, and evidently his fear that he would "smash" the tatter's face had vanished—perhaps in a desire to possess the black horse, which had seized him.
"I reckon you ain't sellin' that black horse?" he said.
"Cheap," said Kelton quickly.