“She’s bin astin’ fer you three times. When wus you gittin’ around agin? I guessed I didn’t know fer sure. She wus kind o’ worrited, I reckon.” He paused, and his twisted face turned in the direction of the foreman’s hut. “She wus weepin’ last night,” he went on. Then he paused again, and his shrewd eyes came back to Tresler’s face. “She’s bin weepin’ to-day,” he said, with a peculiar look of expectation in his manner.
“What’s the trouble?” The question came short and sharp.
“Mebbe she’s lonesome.”
“That’s not it; you’ve got other reasons.”
Joe looked away again. “Jake’s bin around some. But I guess she’s lonesome too. She’s ast fer you.” The little man’s tone was full of obstinacy.
Tresler understood his drift. If Joe had his way he’d march Diane and him off to the nearest parson with no more delay than was required to saddle two horses.
“I’m going to see her to-night,” Tresler replied quietly. Then, as he saw Jake appear again in the doorway, he said, “You’d better pass on now. Maybe I’ll see you afterward.”
And Joe moved off without another word. Jake had seen them together, but he was unsuspicious. He was thinking of the scars on his face, and of something else that had nothing to do with their meeting. And his thoughts made him smile unpleasantly.
If Tresler’s first greeting had been indifferent, his reception, as he came over to the bunkhouse now, was far from being so. Talk flowed freely, inquiries hailed him on every side; jests passed, sometimes coarse, sometimes subtle, but always cordial. All the men on the ranch had a fair good-will for him. “Tenderfoot” he might be, but they approved his grit, and with frontiersmen grit is all that matters.