Winston nodded as he went on, wondering with a grim expectancy whether Courthorne had returned again. If he had, he felt in a mood for very direct speech with him. His visitor was, however, not Courthorne. Winston could see that at a glance, although the room was dim.
"I don't seem to know you, but I'll get a light in a minute," he said.
"I wouldn't waste time," said the other. "We can talk just as straight in the dark, and I guess this meeting will finish up outside on the prairie. You've given me a good deal of trouble to trail you, Mr. Guyler."
"Well," said Winston dryly, "it seems to me that you have found the wrong man."
The stranger laughed unpleasantly. "I was figuring you'd take it like that, but you can't bluff me. Well now, I've come round to take it out of you for slinging that decanter at me, and if there is another thing we needn't mention it."
Winston stared at the man, and his astonishment was evident, but the fact that he still spoke with an English accentuation, as Courthorne did, was against him.
"To the best of my recollection, I have never suffered the unpleasantness of meeting you in my life," he said. "I certainly never threw a decanter or anything else at you, though I understand that one might feel tempted to."
The man rose up slowly, and appeared big and heavy-shouldered as he moved athwart the window. "I guess that is quite enough for me," he said. "What were you condemned Englishmen made for, any way, but to take the best of what other men worked for, until the folks who've got grit enough run you out of the old country! Lord, why don't they drown you instead of dumping you and your wickedness on to us? Still, I'm going to show one of you, as I've longed to do, that you can't play your old tricks with the women of this country."
"I don't see the drift of a word of it," said Winston. "Hadn't you better come back to-morrow, when you've worked the vapors off?"
"Come out!" said the other man grimly. "There's scarcely room in here. Well then, have it your own way, and the devil take care of you!"