After a silence which might have lasted while they rode a mile, Ruth spoke.
“My ankle feels very much easier.”
“I’m glad of that, ma’am.”
“Randerson,” she said, after they had gone on a little ways further; “I beg your pardon for speaking to you the way I did, back there. But my foot did hurt terribly.”
“Why, sure. I expect I deserved to get roasted.”
Again there was a silence. Ruth seemed to be thinking deeply. At a distance that he tried to keep respectful, Randerson watched her, with worshipful admiration, noting the graceful disorder of her hair, the wisps at the nape of her neck. The delicate charm of her made him thrill with the instinct of protection. So strong was this feeling that when he thought of her pony, back at the timber, guilt ceased to bother him.
Ruth related to him the conversation she had overheard between Chavis and Kester, and he smiled understandingly at her.
“Do you reckon you feel as tender toward them now as you did before you found that out?”
“I don’t know,” she replied. “It made me angry to hear them talk like that. But as for hanging them—” She shivered. “There were times, tonight, though, when I thought hanging would be too good for them,” she confessed.
“You’ll shape up real western—give you time,” he assured. “You’ll be ready to take your own part, without dependin’ on laws to do it for you—laws that don’t reach far enough.”