He shifted a little to smile more directly into her eyes, and the movement caused her glance to drop to his holster. It was open. With a slow gesture—for no one, not even a woman, makes free with the weapon of another in the mountain desert—she drew the revolver out, looked it over with the keen eye of a connoisseur, glanced down the sights, spun the cylinder, and tried the balance with a deft hand.
“Clean as a whistle,” she said as she restored the revolver. “Some six-gun!” With a new respect she looked the man over from head to foot.
“Maybe under the mask,” she said, “you look almost human.”
“I dunno. Maybe.”
Her eyes wandered far away; came back to him, frowned; wandered off again.
“Can you dance?” she asked conversationally.
He broke into a deep laughter. Jac gathered as if for a spring.
“Go slow, partner,” she drawled. “Maybe I ain’t big, but believe me, I ain’t a house pet.”
“I’d as soon think of fondlin’ a wildcat,” nodded the man.
She hesitated between anger and curiosity, and then glanced around with needless anxiety lest they should not be alone.