But what place had that soft-faced cad had in her life? It was unthinkable that she had ever known him, much less that they had been upon intimate terms.
Custer went to his closet and rummaged around for a bottle. It had been more than two weeks since he had taken a drink. The return to his old intimacy with Shannon, and the frequency with which he now saw her had again weaned him from his habit; but to-day he felt the need of a drink—of a big drink, stiff and neat.
He swallowed the raw liquor as if it had been so much water. He wished now that he had punched Crumb’s head when he had had the chance. The cur! He had spoken to Shannon as if she were a common woman of the streets—Shannon Burke—Custer’s Shannon!
Feeling no reaction to the first drink, he took another.
“I’d like to get my fingers on his throat!” he thought. “Before I choked the life out of him, I’d drag him up here and make him kiss the ground at her feet!”
But no, he could not do that. Others would see it, and there would have to be explanations; and how could he explain it without casting reflections on Shannon?
For hours he sat there in his room, nursing his anger, his jealousy, and his grief; and all the time he drank and drank again. He went to his closet, got his belt and holster, and from his dresser drawer took a big, ugly-looking forty-five—a Colt’s automatic. For a moment he stood holding it in his hand, looking at it. Almost caressingly he handled it, and then he slipped it into the holster at his hip, put on his hat, and started for the door.
CHAPTER XXXIII
Custer’s gait showed no indication of the amount that he had drunk. He was a Pennington of Virginia, and he could carry his liquor like a gentleman. Even though he was aflame with the heat of vengeance, his movements were slow and deliberate. At the door he paused, and, turning, retraced his steps to the table where stood the bottle and the glass.