"I'll do anything!" promised McIvor, "if you'll just keep our secret and help me to meet her again. Oh, since I have seen her and learned she still loves me I feel I could do anything—anything!"
"Hm, a meeting ain't so easy," said Meshackatee after a silence. "Miz Zoolah sure keeps a close watch. But you leave it to me, boy, and meanwhile stay away from her—I ain't the only man that has eyes. Them Texas toughs are jealous—they see you go in there yesterday—so keep plumb out of that kitchen. And the look in that gal's eyes when she see you at the well gave the whole business away, to me. You're kind of daffy now, don't notice where you're going or answer when other people speak to you, so the best thing for you is to go away a few days and let this excitement die down. Now I've got a little job, if you think you can do it——"
"Oh, I can't leave her, now!" protested McIvor broken-heartedly, but Meshackatee tapped him sharply on the knee.
"You're going to leave, see? Right now and no danged fooling. You're going over to hunt up them sheep."
"The sheep?" repeated McIvor, and Meshackatee smiled grimly as he took him gently by the arm.
"Take my advice," he warned, "and git away from Zoolah—she came almighty close to recognizing you. Now about this sheepman, Grimes, he knows these boys by sight and they can't any of 'em git near him; but that saddle of yours will tell any one you're no Texan and I believe you can ride plumb up to him. You're a stranger, see, and you can cuss out the Scarboroughs and tell him all the things they done to you; and after you've got next to him and found out all his plans—you come back here and tell me. Do that, and you'll git to see Allifair."
"Well, it's treacherous," observed McIvor at last, "but I've been that, and worse, before now. And if this man is coming in to stir up a war perhaps I can turn him back."
"This is what will turn him back," returned Meshackatee, patting his pistol, "and, believe me, nothing else. That hombre is a fighter, he comes on a-charging, and nothing but a bullet will stop him. But leave that to me and this bunch of inbred Texans—and by the way, that's Isham coming."
He pointed to the canyon down which they had come and two horsemen, riding fast, flashed around a point and came galloping across the plain.