“Thank you for protecting me from that man,” she smiled, teasing.
“Huh?” Toothpick queried dumbly.
“Oh, you men! How dumb you are!” She stamped her foot. Then, on tiptoe, she delivered a quick kiss on the nose of the astounded Toothpick and ran to rejoin her party.
Toothpick stared after her. He felt gingerly of his nose and scratched his head.
“She meant somethin’ by that. But what was it?” he asked himself, and gave up the answer.
CHAPTER III
KING OF LIARS
Tad Hicks, Windy Sam, and Kansas Jones, out of sight of the depot platform, seized the little hobo’s arms and dragged him willy-nilly behind a saloon.
“Yuh promised yuh wouldn’t drink up that cartwheel Mrs. Ransom guv yuh,” Tad Hicks reminded him.
“Aw, get out and leave me be,” the hobo said truculently, with an evident attempt at bravado.
“What’s that?” Windy roared as he tightened his grip on the arm.