But with the new knowledge Tharon Last took on a light, a halo.
Men spoke in whispers about her daring. They felt it themselves.
Word of her lightning quickness with her daddy’s guns, of her accuracy, went softly all about and about, garbled and accentuated. They said she could shoot the studs from the sides of a man’s belt and never touch him. They said she could drive a nail farther than the ordinary man could see. They said she could draw so swiftly that the motion of the hands was lost.
A slow excitement took the faction of the settlers.
But out at Last’s Holding a grave anxiety sat upon Tharon’s riders. Conford knew––and Billy knew––and Curly knew more about Courtrey’s intent than some of the others. Young Paula, half asleep in the deep recesses of the house, had witnessed that furious encounter by the western door on the soft spring day when Jim Last had come home to die at dusk. She knew that the look in Courtrey’s eyes had been covetousness––and she had told José. José, loyal and sensible, had told the boys. So now there was always one or more of them on duty near the mistress of Last’s on one pretext or another. To Tharon, who knew more than all of them put together, this was funny. 78
It stirred the small mirth there was in her these days, and often she sent them away, to have them turn up at the most unexpected times and places.
“You boys!” she would say whimsically, “you think Courtrey’s goin’ to cart me off livin’?”
“That’s just what we are afraid of, Tharon,” answered Conford gravely once, “we know it’d not be livin’.”
And Tharon had looked away toward José’s cross, and frowned.
“No,” she said, “an’ it won’t be any way, livin’ or dead.”