"I'm much obliged to you, Mr. Wood," said Lambert heartily.
"He's one of these kind of men you want to watch out for when your back's turned, Duke."
"Thanks, old feller; I'll keep in mind what you say."
"I don't want it to look like I was on one side or the other, you understand, Duke; but I thought I'd tell you. Sim Hargus is one of them kind of men that a woman don't dare to show her face around where he is without the risk of bein' insulted. He's a foul-mouthed, foul-minded man, the kind of a feller that ought to be treated like a rattlesnake in the road."
Lambert thanked him again for his friendly information, understanding at once his watchful uneasiness and the absence of Alta from the front of the house. He was familiar with that type of man such as Wood had described Hargus as being; he had met some of them in the Bad Lands. There was nothing holy to them in the heavens or the earth. They did not believe there was any such thing as a virtuous woman, and honor was a word they never had heard defined.
"I'll go out and look him up," Lambert said. "If he happens to come in here askin' about me, I'll be in either the store or the saloon."
"There's where he is, Duke—in the saloon."
"I supposed he was."
"You'll kind of run into him natural, won't you, Duke, and not let him think I tipped you off?"
"Just as natural as the wind."