“Likely it will wear off before morning,” Carver encouraged, but he knew that morning would find Bart in the selfsame mood. Only years would suffice to alter the determination he had read in Bart’s face an hour past. “He’ll forget it in a day or two.”
He spoke unconcernedly to reassure the girl for she was nearer the breaking point than he had ever seen her. Her habitual self-control had broken down.
“You know he’ll never forget,” she said. “But I can’t have that—a shooting between brothers—don’t you see? Not that Noll really is a brother; but people will always think of it that way. I wish something had happened to Noll before I ever saw him—just for what he’s done to Dad and Bart. I’m wicked enough to wish him dead; he should be; he’s not fit to live. But Bart mustn’t do it. He’d never live it down.”
She spoke disjointedly, her voice high-pitched and unnatural. Carver vaulted the corral bars and laid an arm about her shoulders.
“Sho! That’ll all pass off,” he said easily. “Bart wouldn’t—not after he’d thought it over. He’s excited about it now.”
She knew that he spoke only to quiet her fears, that he himself lacked the convictions which he expressed.
“He’s not excited,” she insisted. “He’s thought it all over now and made his decision. Oh, anything but that. It’s the one worst thing I can think of. There must be some way. Honestly, Don, I couldn’t stand that after all the other things the name of Lassiter has been linked with.”
“Then we’ll put a stop to it,” he said. “We’ll just fix it so he can’t.”
She noted the change in his voice. He was no longer speaking merely to reassure her. This knowledge exerted a quieting effect. She someway had vast confidence that Carver would find a way out. Bart’s quiet insistence had terrified her but Carver had thought of some means to dissuade him.
“I’ll be riding on into Oval Springs now,” he said. “Meantime you put your mind at ease.” He drew her to him and when she made a motion of dissent he gave her shoulders a little shake. “Right now,” he insisted a trifle roughly, and she lifted her face to him.