She forced a smile, but reddened as though it were difficult for her to accustom herself to his half jesting sarcasms.
“So you’ve been busy,” he resumed tormentingly, “but not with cooking lessons! Perhaps you’ve been practising with your pretty little pistol. You know you really need a bit of small arms practice, Scheherazade.”
“Because I once missed you?” she inquired serenely.
“Why so you did, didn’t you?” he exclaimed, delighted to goad her into replying.
“Yes,” she said, “I missed you. I needn’t have. I am really a dead shot, Mr. Neeland.”
“Oh, Scheherazade!” he protested.
She shrugged:
“I am not bragging; I could have killed you. I supposed it was necessary only to frighten you. It was my mistake and a bad one.” 231
“My dear child,” he expostulated, “you meant murder and you know it. Do you suppose I believe that you know how to shoot?”
“But I do, Mr. Neeland,” she returned with good-humoured indifference. “My father was head jäger to Count Geier von Sturmspitz, and I was already a dead shot with a rifle when we emigrated to Canada. And when he became an Athabasca trader, and I was only twelve years old, I could set a moose-hide shoe-lace swinging and cut it in two with a revolver at thirty yards. And I can drive a shingle nail at that distance and drive the bullet that drove it, and the next and the next, until my revolver is empty. You don’t believe me, do you?”