So, though his fingers twitched, he held his hand, and presently, hearing voices in the living-room, he crept over to an open window and, standing close to one side of it, bent his head to listen.
CHAPTER XVII
THE PRIMEVAL INSTINCT
On the other side of the house Buck found the mistress of the ranch and her two guests standing in a little group beside one of the dusty, discouraged-looking flower-beds. As he appeared they all glanced toward him, and a troubled, almost frightened expression flashed across Mary Thorne’s face.
“Could I speak to you a moment, ma’am?” asked Stratton, doffing his Stetson.
That expression, and her marked hesitation in coming forward, were both significant, and Buck felt a sudden little stab of anger. Was she afraid of him? he wondered; and tried to imagine what beastly lies Lynch must have told her to bring about such an extraordinary state of mind.
But as she moved slowly toward him, the anger ebbed as swiftly as it had come. She looked so slight and frail and girlish, and he observed that her lips were pressed almost as tightly together as the fingers of those small, brown hands hanging straight at her sides. At the edge of the porch she paused and looked up at him, and though the startled look had gone, he 167 could see that she was still nervous and apprehensive.
“Should you rather go inside?” she murmured.