“All right,” he said, striding away angrily. As he walked his rage deepened, and he turned and shook his fist at her, shouting, “All right, but I’ll get you yet, see? You think you’re smart, and Transley thinks he’s smart, but George Drazk is smarter than both of you, and he’ll get you yet.”
She waved her hand complacently, but her composure had already maddened him. He jerked his horse up roughly, threw himself into the saddle, and set out at a hard gallop along the trail to the South Y.D.
It was mid-afternoon when he overtook Transley’s outfit, now winding down the southern slope of the tongue of foothills which divided the two valleys of the Y.D. Pete, wet over the flanks, pulled up of his own accord beside Linder’s wagon.
“‘Lo, George,” said Linder. “What’s your hurry?” Then, glancing at his saddle, “Where’s your blanket?”
Drazk’s jaw dropped, but he had a quick wit, although an unbalanced one.
“Well, Lin, I clean forgot all about it,” he admitted, with a laugh, “but when a fellow spends the morning chatting with old Y.D.‘s daughter I guess he’s allowed to forget a few things.”
“Oh!”
“Reckon you don’t believe it, eh, Lin? Reckon you don’t believe I stood an’ talked with her over the fence for so long I just had to pull myself away?”
“You reckon right.”
George was thinking fast. Here was an opportunity to present the incident in a light which had not before occurred to him.