The man had purposely held aloof to watch the encounter between the two women. He had been certain that the meeting would be anything but amicable and it was like other situations into which he had let Jane Hunter walk, needlessly and only to see how she would handle herself. Usually the result only amused him but today he had watched Jane bear up admirably under difficult circumstances, refusing to be angered or confused, refusing to plead yet, while retaining dignity, leaving the door to friendship open.
As Jane mounted Bobby Cole stepped back into the cabin with no word and the riders turned back on the way they had come.
"I've been wonderin'," Beck said after a time, "how this old codger rakes up the dust to buy cattle and wire."
Jane did not reply. She wondered at that, too, but there was another wonder in her mind about another, more human mystery, going back to a night of storm in the heavens and storm in hearts. How did Bobby Cole know she had turned Dick Hilton out?
As they went silently each thinking of significant things which had been revealed the girl threw back the curtain in the doorway and watched them.
"I hate you!" she whispered at Jane Hunter. "I hate you!... Because you turned him out ... because you're ... you're you."
She stood a long time watching them and with the darkness in her face another quality finally mingled: that envy again.
After a time Jane said:
"A queer creature, that girl."
"On the peck from the start!" Beck replied.