Rance puffed away for a moment or two in silence, and then with sudden determination he went on:
“I’m going to marry you.”
“Think so?” questioned the Girl, drawing herself up proudly. And while Rance proceeded to relight his cigar, it having gone out, she plumped both elbows on the bar and looked him straight in the eye, and announced: “They ain’t a man here goin’ to marry me.”
The scene had precisely the appearance of a struggle between two powerful wills. How long they would have remained with elbows almost touching and looking into each other’s eyes it is difficult to determine; but an interruption came in the person of the barkeeper, who darted in, calling: “One good cigar!”
Instantly the Girl reached behind her for the box containing the choicest cigars, and handing one to Nick, she said:
“Here’s your poison—three bits. Why look at ’em,” she went on in the next breath to Rance; “there’s Handsome with two wives I know of somewhere East. And—” She broke off short and ended with: “Nick, who’s that cigar for?”
“Tommy,” he told her.
“Here, give that back!” she cried quickly putting out her hand for it. “Tommy don’t know a good cigar when he’s smokin’ it.” And so saying she put the choice cigar back in its place among its fellows and handed him one from another box with the remark: “Same price, Nick.”
Nick chuckled and went out.
“An’ look at Trin with a widow in Sacramento. An’ you—” The Girl broke off short and laughed in his face. “Oh, not one o’ you travellin’ under your own name!”