"Buck can. I won ten dollars off Bob one time. We run a mile, an' Buck won, easy. But the best thing about Buck, he's a distance horse. He's got the wind—an' he don't know what it means to quit. He could run all day if he had to, couldn't you, Buck?" The man stroked the buckskin's neck affectionately as he talked.
Patty's eyes glinted angrily: "The stakes would have to be pretty high for you to run him, say, fifty miles, wouldn't they?"
"Yes. Pretty high," he repeated, and changed the subject abruptly. "Must find it kind of lonesome out here in the hills, after livin' in the East where there's lots of folks around all the time."
"Oh, not at all," answered the girl, quickly. "Some of my neighbors are good enough to call on me once in a while—when I am at home. And there is at least one that calls very regularly when I am not at home. He is a genius for detail—that one. Sharp eyes, and a light touch. He's something of an expert in the matter of duplicate keys, too. In any large city he should make a grand success—as a burglar. It is really too bad that he's wasting his talents, here in the hills."
"Maybe he figures that the stakes are higher, and the risk less—here in the hills."
"Of course," sneered Patty. "And I must say his reasoning does him credit. If he should succeed in burglarizing even the biggest bank in the richest city, he could not expect to carry off a gold mine. And, here in the hills, instead of burglar-proof devices and armed policemen, he has only an unlocked cabin, and a woman to contend with. Yes, the risk is far less here in the hills. His location speaks well for his reasoning—if not for his courage."
"I suppose he figures that plenty of brutes have got courage, but only humans can reason," answered the man, blandly. "But, ridin' out in the hills this way—that must be a lonesome job."
"Not at all," she answered, in a voice that masked the anger against the man who sat calmly baiting her. "In fact, I never ride alone. I have an unseen escort, who accompanies me wherever I go. 'My guardian devil of the hills' I call him, and even when I'm at home I know that he is watching from his notch in the rim of the hills."
"Guardian devil," the man repeated. "That's pretty good." He did not smile, in fact, Patty recalled, as she sat looking squarely into his eyes, that she had never seen him smile—had never seen him express any emotion. Without a trace of anger in tone or expression he had ordered the grasping hotel-keeper about—and had been obeyed to the letter. And without the slightest evidence of annoyance or displeasure he had listened, upon several occasions to her own sarcastic outbursts against him. Here was a man as devoid of emotion as a fish, or one whose complete self-mastery was astounding. "Pretty good," he repeated. "And does he know that you call him your 'guardian devil?'"
"Yes, I think he does—now," she answered, dryly. "By the way, Mr. Holland, you do a good deal of riding about the hills, yourself."