“The fellow thinks he’s goin’ to have the best l’il wheat ranch in the West,” went on Stanley’s companion, pushing back his plate and lighting a cigar. “He’s got the cash to do it and—I feel forced out o’ the kindness of my heart to say it, Cal—he’s got the brains. If it wasn’t for that trustin’ little disposition of his—” he did not finish the sentence, but ended with a chuckle, a thin, mean alien sound in that convivial atmosphere.
Dorothy was the victim of a chill fear. The man was like a snake, a mean, poisonous snake that would lie treacherously still in a crevice of rock awaiting the moment to strike at an unsuspecting prey.
She thought of that horrible moment during her first trip to Desert City, seemingly ages ago, when she had flung the rock that had snuffed out the life of the rattlesnake that had threatened the life of her chum. She had acted then swiftly, unerringly, not thinking of herself, but of Tavia’s peril.
But this was another, a more venomous kind of reptile, and something told her he would be infinitely harder to deal with.
Stanley Blake was speaking now, and both she and Tavia listened breathlessly.
“You may think this fellow Dimples Knapp is easy game, Gibbons, but I know better,” drawled the hero of Tavia’s gay moments. “He may be as trusting as you say he is, but I tell you he’s got friends that were not born yesterday. And they weren’t born blind, either.”
“I s’pose you mean that snoopin’ Lance Petterby an’ his gang,” snarled the little man, and the girls started nervously. “Well, I’m goin’ on record now to the effect that if he tries any funny business, it’ll be the last time, that’s all. You hear me, Cal, it’ll be the last time!”
“Say, you poor little shrimp, will you cut out calling me by my first name? This is the second time you’ve done it in the last five minutes. Getting childish or something, aren’t you?”
The man whose name quite obviously was not Stanley Blake glanced hastily about the room as he gave vent to these irritable remarks, and Dorothy turned hastily aside lest he should recognize her profile, and so put an end to his remarkable discourse.
However, though the men continued talking and, presumably, on the same subject, it did not take Dorothy long to realize that she would hear nothing further of importance that day.