"Some skirt, eh?"
Laramie squirmed and with an expletive protested:
"Hang it, John——"
"No matter, no matter. I'll get it all from Belle some day. And after you get through with your wire thieves we'll tell the story of your brief romance——"
"Over my grave."
"Right, Jim—over your grave."
"John," Laramie ran on, "do you remember that song Tommie Meggeson used to sing on the round-up—a pretty little thing. It had one good line in it: 'Death comes but once, and then, sometimes—too late.'"
Belle appeared with a vegetable: "It won't keep you waiting an awful while if things go on the way they're going now," she put in grimly.
"That was a good song," mused Laramie, "a good old song." But he heard a slight sound in the kitchen and his eyes were turned toward the archway.
"Just the same that song won't keep you from getting killed," persisted Belle.