"When I first seen her," began the Man tentatively, "I could ha' sworn that—See here, now! Ain't thar still the leavin's of a redskin outfit up this way?"
"Why, yes," returned the other, with some compunction. "I don't talk much 'baout it—not that it's a thing to he ashamed of; but I wouldn't give the gal a handle to think herself different from any one else hereabout. The truth is, her mother's mother was pretty near to a full-blooded Ojibway—not the kind you've seen plaitin' baskets for summer boarders, but a clean, straight-backed red woman, an' she claimed descent from one o' their big chiefs. I'm English stock myself, but the wild breed mixes slow: it's in her blood, Mr. McFarlane, and sometimes it worrits me. Thar's days she won't speak nor eat, but just goes off to the woods an' makes little trinkets out o' pine needles an' bark, and then I know the fit's on her. And proud! Thar's not a man hereabout she'd lift an eye at, and one feller that wouldn't take "no" got his head split open with an oar. Sometimes I've thought that ef she was married to a strong man—strong AND kind, d'ye see?—'twould be the best thing for her."
At this the stranger, who had missed no word, leaned quickly forward, the firelight striking his firm face. With the poise of conscious power he said quite simply:
"I'm the man!"
They eyed each other a moment, Crane measuring the Man who had come, the Man inviting measurement.
"You mean—?" asked the father. He paused as if welcoming interruption, but it was not in this man's slow, sure nature to interrupt. "Tell us what you do mean!"
"I mean," repeated the other slowly, "that I'M THE MAN! I love that little gal, I want to marry her. O' course you objeck: that's natural, that's right. I like your objectin', an' I'm going to fight it to a show-down. First you'll say, `You're verruckt—crazy.' See hyar now! I've lived life, I have, and I've seen a drove o' women, hither an' yon, but not one of 'em could hold me, no more'n an ordinary slipknot could hold stuff on a packsaddle. I'm no lightweight, an' I need the diamond hitch. But to-day, when I seen Little Peachey in the scrub over yonder, why, it was different, and I knowed it right quick. Ever broke a horse, have you? Well, before you've got your lassoo coiled, the critter's eyes'll tell you just what sort o' tea-party you're goin' to have. Thar was a man once—a hoss wrangler—an' the easier a hoss broke, the more he'd mouch around an' hang his head, real melancholy and sad-eyed. The only minutes o' slap-bang-up joy that came his way was when he corralled a bucker whose natural ability to roll on him an' kick his brains out left no percentage o' chance in the player's favor. Maybe that's what I seen in Little Peachey to-day. Just now you said the wild breed mixes slow. It does: for it sticks out, waitin' for its own kind. And by that same token, blood talks to blood—aye, even without no Indian sign-language. Maybe all these years Little Peachey, settin' out on them rocks, has been a-watchin' for more than foreign countries."
"Aye, mebbe that's all right." Crane paced the floor, and his voice rose savagely: "Don't know but what your palaver mightn't win plenty o' foolish gals. But who are ye? What's your trade? Whar's your folks? Thar's lots o' rogues afoot. Do you allow I'd let the first stranger in Ragged Woods talk marriage to my daughter? What have you said? What's between you? Out with it, or I'll have you in Rockledge Jail by to-morrow morning!"
The Man who had come nodded response with imperturbable gravity.
"I like your talk," he said. "It comes straight off the hip, an' it calls for a straight answer. What have I spoke to her? Nothin'! What's between us? Nothin' but the makin's! Next, touchin' myself: Since sixteen I've been kickin' up the dust o' the earth till my home is anywhar immediately convenient. Once I had a brother in New Orleans, another in the Northwest, and another who drank himself accidentally into the British army an' died in the Sudan. We were wanderers, the lot of us. I'm Scotch-Irish, and my old mother used to claim we harked back to the kings o' some outfit I've forgotten. But blood-facts is no more proof than specimens from an unprospected claim. Friends? I make 'em everywhar: any one on the top o' the earth who's got the makin's of a man kin call me friend. Yet right here an' now I wouldn't touch the twelve apostles for an assay on my character. 'Cause why? 'Cause I hold that, just like a man lays in his own little square o' earth, so a man stands alone on his own little piece o' reputation. Good or bad, friends or no friends, it's his'n; and the Almighty files a pretty good chart of it right on his face. I want you to size me up accordingly."