The girl laughed harshly. "Don't try that on me—you can't get away with it. I'll tell you once and for all, I despise you. I wouldn't trust you as far as I would a rattlesnake. You are the most loathesome creature in the world. You're nothing but a low-down horse-thief, and you never will be anything but a horse-thief, till somebody shoots you—then you'll be a carrion." Her eyes were blazing again, and Purdy actually winced at her words. "If you were dying of thirst I'd pour alkali dust down your throat. Do I make myself plain? Do you understand now thoroughly just what I think of you? Because if you don't I'll go on and explain——"
"Oh, I guess I git you, all right," sneered Purdy, "from what you mentioned I gather you ain't seriously considerin' me for a husban'. Well, you've had yer say—next time it'll be my turn. Them was hard words, but some day you'll eat 'em—an' when you've got 'em et, you'll sing a different tune. Where's McWhorter?"
"Lambing camp," she answered shortly, and disappeared into the cabin slamming the door behind her.
Purdy sat for a moment staring at the door, then whirled his horse, and rode away. The girl's words had thrown him into a terrible rage: "This time a week from now, you'll wish to God you hadn't spoke 'em," he muttered, and, avoiding the lambing camp, swung toward the river. "Kill me some day, will she? She meant it, too. She's a hell-cat!"
He headed up stream, following the shore of the swollen river, muttering, cursing, plotting as he rode. And so he came to the high bluff that overlooked the mouth of a broad coulee. He paused on the rim of the bluff and stared out over the raging flood. Something directly below him caught his eye, and he glanced downward. A water-logged craft, which he recognized as Long Bill Kearney's ferry boat, lay grounded against the narrow strip of sloping beach that lay between the foot of the bluff and the river. At the same instant an object lying part way up the slope caught his eye and instinctively he jerked his horse back, swung to the ground and, crawling to the rim of the bluff looked cautiously over the edge. For a long time he stared downward at the motionless form of a woman. Her face was not visible but he could see that she wore a riding costume, and a hat of approved cowboy pattern. In vain his eyes searched the beach, and the bluff, and even the river. "Crossin' on Long Bill's ferry an' the cable busted," he muttered, "but, it's a cinch she wasn't crossin' alone—an' it's a cinch they ain't no one else around—onless they're up the coulee. Maybe whoever was along got drownded—anyhow, I'm goin' to find out—an' if she's all alone—" the man grinned—"maybe she won't be so damned uppity as McWhorter's gal." He sprang into the saddle, and, after a careful survey of the bluff and the surrounding bench, headed away from the river and came to the coulee a half-mile back from its mouth at a point where the sides allowed easy descent.
Once in the coulee Purdy again headed for the river, riding slowly, with a hand on the butt of his gun. Rounding an abrupt bend, he drew up sharply. Not fifty yards from him, a blaze-faced buckskin, saddled and bridled, with a lariat rope trailing from the saddle horn, was cropping grass. His eyes surveyed every nook and cranny of the coulee for signs of the rider, but seeing none he approached the horse which raised its head and nickered friendly greeting. He loosened his rope, but the horse made no effort to escape, and riding close the man reached down and secured the reins which he made fast to the horn of his own saddle and dismounted. "Yer a plumb gentle brute," he muttered as he coiled the trailing rope and secured it in place, "Y Bar brand—that's over somewhere acrost the river." Again he grinned, evilly: "Looks like they come from the other side, in which case, providin' they don't no men-folks show up in the next few minutes er so, things looks purty favourable for yours truly. With the river like it is, an' the ferry gone, they can't no one bother from the other side, an' by the time they find out she's missin', they'll think she got drownded along with the rest. Things is sure framin' my way, now," he grinned, as he swung into the saddle and, leading the buckskin, headed down the coulee with his thoughts centred on the woman who lay on the little grassed slope at its mouth. "Be hell if she was dead," he growled, "be just my luck—but if she is, I'll cache her in a mud crack somewheres an' maybe her friends from acrost will stick up a reward, an' I'll make Cinnabar Joe or Long Bill go an' collect it an' fork it over."
Proceeding cautiously, Purdy rode down the coulee, and at its mouth, dismounted and proceeded directly to the motionless form. Swiftly he stooped and lifted the hat-brim that had pushed forward over her face, then with an oath he leaped erect and jerking his gun from its holster, glared wildly about him. But save for the two horses, and a buzzard that wheeled high in the blue above, there was no living, moving thing within his range of vision, and the only sounds were the soft rattle of bit-chains as the horses thrashed lazily at pestering flies, and the sullen gurgle of the swollen river. Again he swore. His lips drew into a snarl of hate as his glance once more sought the face of the woman. In his eyes the gleam of hot desire commingled with a glitter of revenge as his thoughts flew swiftly to Wolf River—the Texan's open insult and the pilgrim's swift shot in the dark. Here, helpless, completely in his power to do with as he pleased, lay the woman who had been the unwitting cause of his undoing! Vengeance was his at last, and he licked his lips in wolfish anticipation of the wrecking of that vengeance. The thought of revenge was more sweet in that he never anticipated it. The Texan had disappeared altogether, and he had heard from Long Bill that the girl had married the pilgrim in Timber City, and that they had gone back East. But if so, what was she doing here—alone?
Swiftly the man scanned the ground for tracks, but found none. The bootless feet of the Texan had left no mark on the buffalo grass. Only one horse had gone up the coulee—and he had that horse. Whoever had been with her when the ferry cable broke, had certainly not landed with her at the mouth of the coulee. "Pilgrim's prob'ly fell out an' drownded—an' a damned good job—him an' his horse, too—prob'ly the horse got to raisin' hell an' jerked him into the river—Long Bill, too, most likely—I'll swing around by his shack an' see if they's anything there I want. But, first off, I got to take care of this here lady—silk stockin's an' all an' the quicker I git to the bad lands with her the better—it ain't no cinch that the pilgrim, or Long Bill didn't make shore somewheres else, an' if they did they'll be huntin' her." After a vain attempt to rouse the girl Purdy led the buckskin close and throwing her over the saddle bound her firmly in place with the rope. Then, leading the buckskin, he rode rapidly up the coulee and coming out on the bench headed up the river for the bad lands only a few short miles away.