Two red spots burned like able-bodied beacons in Jerry's cheeks. She knew that she had been garrulous, that she had been talking against time, but it was maddening to be told so; the sound of her own voice had sustained her courage. Every moment that she held the attention of the late manager of the Double O counted for Beechy. It took all her strength of purpose to keep her eyes from wandering to the door of the shack. It acted like a malevolent magnet.
"Where is your horse?"
"Back of the cabin. I came here to get water for him."
"Have you been in the shack?"
"In the shack!" the shudder with which the girl turned her back upon it would have made Nazimova pale with envy. "That—that gruesome place? Rather not——"
"Then you are not curious when it comes to empty houses? You're not consistent, Pandora. Where did you get that can?"
Jerry felt as though she were under a machine gun fire of words. The man's insolence infuriated her. She didn't dare resent it for fear he would leave her and investigate the cabin. She looked down at the can she still held between finger and thumb, then at the bed of ashes beside the pool.
"Did I find it there or behind the shack?" She mused as though interrogating herself, then quickly, "Is it yours? Take it if you want it."
"You know d—ed well that you didn't pick it up outside," Ranlett exploded as he caught the girl by the shoulder; she felt his hot flesh through her thin blouse. "You've been in that shack and you've——"
"Take your hand away! Quick!" Jerry commanded, her voice hoarse, her face white, her eyes blazing.