"No, you're rich," she said. "I'm going to give you back the mine, and then I'm going away."
"But I don't want it!" he said. "Didn't I tell you to keep it? Well, I meant it—every word."
"Ah, yes," she sighed. "You told me—I know—but to-morrow is another day. You'll change your mind then, the way you always do. You see, I know you now."
"You do not!" he denied. "I don't change my mind. I stick to one idea for years. But there's something about you—I don't know what it is—that makes me a natural-born fool."
"Yes. I make you mad," she answered regretfully. "And then you will say and do anything. But now about the mine. I left Mr. Stoddard in the office just biting his fingers with anxiety."
"Well, let him bite 'em," returned Rimrock spitefully, "I hope he eats 'em off. If it hadn't been for him, and that Mrs. Hardesty, and all the other crooks he set on, we'd be friends to-day—and I'd rather have that than all the mines in the world."
"Oh, would you, Rimrock?" she questioned softly. "But no, we could never agree. It isn't the money that has come between us. We blame it, but it's really our own selves. You will gamble and drink, it's your nature to do it, and that I could never forgive. I like you, Rimrock, I'm afraid I can't help it, but I doubt if we can even be friends."
"Aw, now listen!" he pleaded. "It was you drove me to drink. A man can get over those things. But not when he's put in the wrong in everything—he's got to win, sometimes."
"Yes, but, Rimrock, there has never been a time when you couldn't have had everything you wanted—if you wouldn't always be fighting for it. But when you distrust me and go against me and say that I've sold you out, how can a woman do anything but fight you back? And I will—I'll never give up! As long as you think I'm not as good as you are—just as smart, just as honest, just as brave—I'll never give in an inch. But there has never been a time during all our trouble, when, if you'd only listened and trusted me, I wouldn't have helped you out. Now take that letter that I wrote you in New York—I warned you they would jump your claim! But when you didn't come and complete your assessment work, I went up and jumped it myself. I got this great scar——" she thrust back her hair—"coming down the Old Juan that night. But I did it for you, I didn't do it for myself, and then—you wouldn't take back your mine!"
She bowed her head to brush away the tears and Rimrock stared and smiled at a thought.