"But if he is to marry her—"
"Marry her!" repeated the gambler, while a flash, such as the gate of hell might emit were it opened for a moment, shot from his eyes; "I would kill him first; yes, and tell the girl who it was that—"
"And send them both out on the world again, to work hard for their bread, as I found them?"
"Better that a thousand times than that Annie should be made miserable, like her sister, by being tied to a worthless sot, or a heartless desperado."
"You're hard on me, Jim," whined the other. "If the girl marries this man, a part of his money will go towards paying off my debts, and setting me straight again in this house. He'll be good to her; and what's the harm to anybody? You don't want the girl—I know your queer notions of honor."
"Hush!" He sprang to his feet, and for the first time his voice thrilled, and a quick flush darkened his brow. "Not another word; but so sure as you drive the girl to this step, so sure will I tell her sister who you are." His figure appeared tall as he moved away, and his shoulders looked broad and strong as those of the man whom he left cowering in his chair behind him.
This interview over, Mr. Peyton seemed utterly oblivious of the existence of the family at the "Eagle Exchange." Mr. Davison said to himself, with an inward chuckle, that he had "gotten round Jim before, in spite of his keen eyes, and was likely to do so again;" while Annie, still and white, looked like a bird wearied out with being chased, and ready to fall into the snarer's net. Once or twice, in meeting Mr. Peyton, it seemed to him that her hazel eyes were raised to his, with a mute appeal in them; and at such times he lifted his hand hastily to his forehead, where a heavy strand of the raven hair fell rather low into it, near the right temple, as if to assure himself of the perfect arrangement of his hair.
But in spite of all of Mr. Davison's cunning and contriving, Mr. Montrie evidently made slow progress in his suit; for his visits to "the tiger" grew longer and more frequent; and soon it came to be the order of the day that the afternoons, as well as the nights, were spent in the little room across the porch. A number of new arrivals from the various mining-camps in the mountains lent additional interest to the games; and bets were higher, and sittings longer, day after day. It was impossible to tell from Mr. Peyton's unchanging face whether luck had been with him or against him; but Mr. Montrie seemed all of a sudden elated, either with the winnings he had made off "the tiger," or the success he had met with in another quarter. Whichever it might be, Mr. Peyton, coming unexpectedly upon him, as he sat in close consultation with Mr. Davison one morning, could not have heard the mountain-man's invitation to drink to his luck, for he passed straight on without heeding the invitation. Mr. Davison quaked a little before the sharp glance thrown over to him; "but then," he consoled himself, "d—— it, Jim is such a curious mortal, and, like as not, he's forgotten all about it; he don't care for the girl, no how."
The afternoon saw them again gathered around "the tiger," the man from the mountains betting with a kind of savage recklessness that boded no good to those who knew him well. He had not forgotten the slight Mr. Peyton had put on him in the morning, according to his code of honor, but was casting about in his mind for some manner in which to express his indignation.
"What do you want to be quarrelling to-day for, Tom?" asked a lately-arrived mountain-friend of him. "I see that gal of your'n this morning; took a good look at her when she went to school; and, bless my stars, if you don't know better than to grumble all the while on the very day when—"