CHAPTER XIV
THE SHERIFF ENSNARED
Evidently the feminine portion of the population did not agree with him. One was openly hostile—a Mrs. Garland. But she may not have been unprejudiced, for her maiden name had been Grace Hawes. For some reason—not unconnected with her manner of arrival in Badger—the married women fought shy of Hetty and kept their daughters rigidly aloof. She perceived this quickly enough—long before the men remarked it—and accepted it as she did everything else, with a species of passive disdain.
"What for do you let these here fellers get off them bum jokes?" said Lafe suddenly, one day at dinner. He was in high dudgeon. The sheriff was a regular boarder at the Fashion now, but seldom did he offer a word to the waitress, or she one to him.
"If it amuses them, let 'em do it. It don't hurt me," she said, unruffled.
"Yes it does, too, hurt you. Say, you'd ought to wear a high collar."
"You mind your own business," Hetty cried hotly and flushed to the tips of her ears.
The white, white column of her neck was always bare, for she knew its beauty full as well as did anybody else and wore her dress cut low accordingly; and Mr. Johnson had noted with consuming rage that it held the rapt gaze of the diners. Indeed, she was a strapping, fine woman. Black hair, heavy black eye-brows, blue eyes and a dazzling skin—they made an unusual combination. Hetty carried herself fearlessly erect. Her figure was full but supple, and she walked as if her body held inexhaustible reserves of strength.
He said no more then, but later broke out with the stunning declaration that waiting on table was no fit job for a lady—not with a lot of lazy loafers round, especially. His proposition was that she get out of the Fashion and go to live with the Widow Brown, who was a nice, respectable woman, and would be company for her. And the sheriff would see that she got a job of some sort. Or perhaps she would like to go on a visit to Mrs. Floyd, whose husband owned the Lazy L range. He would secure her an invitation.