“I suppose I do fear him,” she said at last with a sigh. Then her face suddenly lit up with an angry glow. “I fear him as any girl would fear the man who, in defiance of her expressed hatred, thrusts his attentions upon her. I fear him because of father’s blindness. I fear him because he hopes in his secret heart some day to own this ranch, these lands, all these splendid cattle, our fortune. Father will be gone then. How? I don’t know. And I—I shall be Jake’s slave. These are the reasons why I fear Jake, Mr. Tresler, since you insist on knowing.”
“I thank you, Miss Marbolt.” The gentle tone at once dispelled the girl’s resentment. “You have suspicions which may prove to be right. It was for this reason I asked you to discuss Jake. One thing more and I’ll have done. This Joe Nelson, he is very shrewd, he is in close contact with you. How far is he to be trusted?”
“To any length; with your life, Mr. Tresler,” the girl said with enthusiasm. “Joe is nobody’s enemy but his own, poor fellow. I am ashamed to admit it, but I have long since realized that when things bother me so that I cannot bear them all alone, it is Joe that I look to for help. He is so kind. Oh, Mr. Tresler, you cannot understand the gentleness, the sympathy of his honest old heart. I am very, very fond of Joe.”
The man abruptly moved from his stand at the side of the buckboard, and looked along the trail in the direction of the ranch. His action was partly to check an impulse which the girl’s manner had roused in him, and partly because his quick ears had caught the sound of some one approaching. He was master of himself in a moment, however, and, returning, smiled up into the serious eyes before him.
“Well, Joe shall help me,” he said. “He shall help me as he has helped you. If——” he broke off, listening. Then with great deliberation he came close up to the buckboard. “Miss—Diane,” he said, and the girl’s lids lowered before the earnestness of his gaze, “you shall never—while I live—be the slave of Jake Harnach.”
Nor had Tresler time to move away before a tall figure rounded the bend of the trail. In the dusk he mistook the newcomer for Jake, then, as he saw how slim he was, he realized his mistake.
The man came right up to the buckboard with swift, almost stealthy strides. The dark olive of his complexion, the high cheek-bones, the delicately chiseled, aquiline nose, the perfectly penciled eyebrows surmounting the quick, keen, handsome black eyes; these things combined with the lithe, sinuous grace of an admirably poised body made him a figure of much attraction.
The man ignored Tresler, and addressed the girl in the buckboard in a tone that made the former’s blood boil.
“The boss, him raise hell. Him say, ‘I mak’ her wish she not been born any more.’ Him say, ‘Go you, Anton, an’ find her, an’ you not leave her but bring her back.’ Ho, the boss, your father, he mad. Hah?” The half-breed grinned, and displayed a flashing set of teeth. “So I go,” he went on, still smiling in his impudent manner. “I look out. I see the buckboard come down to the river. I know you come. I see from there back”—he pointed away to the bush—“you talk with this man, an’ I wait. So!”