“If you won’t lead, I’ll have to try spurs, and I don’t like to do that, Agnes, for the sake of old days.”
“Forget the old days.”
“There’s nothing that you can tell these people about me that will lower me much in their estimation. None of them, except Smith, knows me very well, anyhow. I don’t care so much for their opinion, for I’m not here to please them.”
Boyle placed his hand on her shoulder and looked gravely into her face.
“But if I was to show proof to the land commissioner that you’d got possession of a homestead here through fraud and perjury, then where would you land?” he asked.
“It isn’t true!” she cried, fear rising within her and driving away the color of courage which to that moment had flown in her face.
“It is true, Agnes,” he protested. “You registered under the name of Agnes Horton and made affidavit that it was your lawful name; you entered this land under the same name, and took title to it in the preliminaries, and that’s fraud and perjury, if I know anything about the definition of either term.”
“Do you mean to tell me, Jerry,” she faltered, “that I’d have to go to prison if Dr. Slavens wouldn’t consent to save me by giving up his claim to you?”
“Well, the disgrace of it would amount to about the same, even if a jury refused to send you up,” said he brutally, grinning a little over the sight of her consternation. “You’d be indicted, you see, by the Federal grand jury, and arrested by the United States marshal, and locked up. Then you’d be tried, and your picture 228 would be put in the papers, and the devil would be to pay all around. You’d lose your homestead anyhow, and your right to ever take another. Then where would the City of Refuge be?”