Like a tidal wave, the girl’s anger overwhelmed her. Hell, which the proverb assures us, hath no fury like a woman scorned, raged indeed in the ungoverned breast of the girl of the ranching country. She was neither equipped by nature or training with those feminine defenses that might have shielded her. She was in a way as uncivilized as the savage woman who beats her untrue mate. All she was fiercely conscious of was her raging indignation at the imagined affront offered her by Cheerio. He, who but a short time since she had been deluded enough to believe actually loved her was now flaunting before her that hateful locket in which she knew was the picture of the woman he had come to Canada to make a home for.
Her eyes were aflame. Her anger dominated her entirely.
Crestfallen and surprised, Cheerio drew back a pace:
“I s-say,” he persisted stupidly, “I only w-wanted you to have it. It’s a n-nice old thing, you know, and——”
“How dare you offer me a thing like that?” demanded Hilda, in a level, deadly voice. “How dare you! How dare you!”
Her voice rose. She stamped her foot. Her hands clinched. It would have relieved her to hurt him physically. Surprised and dejected, he turned away, but his movement whetted her anger. Her fiery words pursued him.
“What do you take me for? Do you think I want your silly old second-hand jewellery? Why don’t you wrap the precious thing up in white tissue paper and send it across the sea to the woman that’s in it?”
At that a light of understanding broke over Cheerio. He moved impetuously toward her:
“Hilda, don’t you know that you—you are——”
He got no further, for at that moment a loud cough behind him interrupted him. In their excitement neither Hilda nor Cheerio had noted the car ascending the grade to the ranch and then circling the path. Duncan Mallison had come up the stairs and across the verandah and had coughed loudly before either Cheerio or Hilda were aware of his presence.