The man sat for a moment as though incredulous. Then he thrust his hat back from his head, displaying the brutal ugliness of his face. Elvine observed the coarse moustache, the lean cheeks, the low forehead and vicious eyes. The lips were hidden behind their curtain of hair.
"Say, kind o' fergotten—ain't yer?" he demanded. Then the woman's perfectly fitting riding suit seemed to attract his attention. "Gee," he exclaimed, "wher' you get that dandy rig?" But even as he spoke a change in his expression came when he recognized the horse Elvine was riding. Suddenly he raised one hand and smoothed the tangle of moustache with a downward gesture. It was a gesture implying complete lack of comprehension. "Well, I'm darned!"
"You'll be more than that if you don't pass on to your work, whatever that may be."
The coldness of the woman's tone matched the light in her dark eyes.
Every ounce of her courage had been summoned to meet the situation.
But the man displayed not the slightest regard for the threat. The incredulity of his expression changed. And the change was subtle. It was perfectly apparent, however, to the woman. And she nerved herself for what was to come. An evil smile grew in the piercing black eyes, as the man regarded the beauty which, with him, was a long stored up memory.
"Say, when d'you quit Orrville way?" he cried derisively. "Maybe you hadn't a heap o' use for it when your man, Bob, got shot up. Maybe you didn't need to stop around after you got your hands on the dollars I guess he left lying around. Say, it beats hell meetin' you this way."
But Elvine was no longer laboring under the shock of the encounter. She had no longer any thought of the remoteness of the spot, or the obviously brutish man with whom she was confronted. She set about dealing with the situation with a desperate courage. "I don't know if you're mad, or only—drunk," she said, with icy sharpness. "But you're on my husband's land, and I suppose you work for him. What's your name? I need to know it so I can tell him of your insolence. Jeffrey Masters is not the man to allow his wife to be insulted with impunity by one of his cattlemen. It will be my business to see to it that he is told—everything. You were riding that way." She pointed the way she had come. "I s'pose toward the ranch house. Let me pass!"
She moved her horse as though to proceed. There was no sign of fear in her. No haste. At that moment her dignity was superb. Every word she had spoken had been calculated, and the sting she had conveyed with her information had not been overdone. She looked for its effect, which came with a dramatic change in the man's whole demeanor. His evil face lost its smile, and, in a moment, he had bared his bristling head. But even as Elvine beheld these things she understood the curious expression which he seemed powerless to banish from his ferretty eyes.
"You're Mrs. Masters, ma'am?" the fellow cried. "Say, ma'am, I'm just kind o' knocked all of a mush. I hadn't a notion. I truly hadn't. Guess I took you for a leddy I kind o' remember up Orrville way. An' the likeness is jest that o' two beans. I'm beat, ma'am, beat sore. I wouldn't have offered you insult for a farm. I'm sorry. I'd heerd the boss's wife was around, but I didn't figger I——" Then he replaced his hat, and made as though to pass on. But he remained where he was. "Y'see, I was ridin' in about last night. We lost another bunch. On'y ten cows and their calves, but I had to make a report."
"Another raid?"