“Ye finished?” demanded Reed grimly.
“Yes,” replied Orde.
The old man cast from him his half-whittled piece of pine. He closed his jack-knife with a snap and thrust it in his pocket. He brought to earth the front legs of his chair with a thump, and jammed his ruffled plug hat to its proper place.
“And if the whole kit and kaboodle of ye starved out-right,” said he, “it would but be the fulfillin' of the word of the prophet who says, 'So will I send upon you famine and evil beasts, and they shall bereave thee, and pestilence and blood shall pass through thee; and I will bring the sword upon thee. I the Lord have spoken it!'”
“That's your last word?” inquired Orde.
“That's my last word, and my first. Ye that make of God's smilin' land waste places and a wilderness, by your own folly shall ye perish.”
“Good-day,” said Orde, whirling on his heel without further argument.
The young man, who had during this colloquy sat an interested and silent spectator, arose and joined him. Orde looked at his new companion a little curiously. He was a very slender young man, taut-muscled, taut-nerved, but impassive in demeanour. He possessed a shrewd, thin face, steel-gray, inscrutable eyes behind glasses. His costume was quite simply an old gray suit of business clothes and a gray felt hat. At the moment he held in his mouth an unlighted and badly chewed cigar.
“Nice, amiable old party,” volunteered Orde with a chuckle.
“Seems to be,” agreed the young man drily.