"Where are the women?" he demanded, stopping short.
A jerk of the thumb was his answer.
"Gone to bed?" with something like an accusing gleam in his eye as his gaze returned to the young man.
"I believe so," replied Gwynne carelessly, as he sat down in the despised rocker and stretched his long legs out to the fire. "I fancy we are safe to smoke now, Striker. We have the parlor all to ourselves. The ladies have deserted us."
Striker took the tobacco pouch from the peg on the mantel and handed it to his guest.
"Fill up," he said shortly, and then walked over to the bedroom door. He rapped timorously on one of the thick boards. "Want me fer anything?" he inquired softly, as his wife opened the door an inch or two.
"No. Go to bed when you're ready an' don't ferget to smother that fire."
"Good night, Phineas," called out another voice merrily.
"Good night," responded Striker, with a dubious shake of his head. He returned to the fireplace.
"Women are funny things," said he, dragging up another chair. "'Specially about boots. I go out 'long about sun-up an' work like a dog all day, an' then when I come in to supper what happens? First thing my wife does is to look at my boots. Then she tells me to go out an' scrape the mud off'm 'em. Then she looks up at my face to see if it's me. Sometimes I get so doggoned mad I wish it wasn't me, so's I could turn out to be the preacher er somebody like that an' learn her to be keerful who she's talkin' to. Supposin' I do track a little mud into her kitchen? It's OUR mud, ain't it? 'Tain't as if it was somebody else's land I'm bringin' into her kitchen. Between us we own every danged bit of land from here to the Middleton dirt-road an' it ain't my fault if it happens to be mud once in awhile. You'd think, the way she acts, I'd been out stealin' somebody else's mud just for the sake of bringin' it into her kitchen.