Westerfelt's face was hard and expressionless. He avoided the lawyer's searching glance, shrugged his shoulders and smiled coldly.
"I am not engaged to her," he said, doggedly; "as far as I know she is free to—to choose for herself."
"Ah!" Bates slowly released his chin and caught his breath.
Westerfelt could have struck out the light that sprang into his eyes. "I hain't seen a bit of evidence in that line, I'll admit," went on Bates, with a chuckle of relief; "but some of the boys and girls seemed to think that something might have sprung up between you and her while you was laid up at the hotel. I reckon I was mistaken, but I thought she looked cut up considerable when you didn't come to dinner with us jest now. She wasn't lively like the rest."
"Pshaw!" said Westerfelt; "you are off the track."
"Well, no odds." Bates began to tug at his glove again. "I've come to you like a man an' made an open breast of it, as the feller said. I intend to ask her point-blank the very first time I get her alone again. The girl hain't give me the least bit of hope, but her mother has—a little. I reckon a feller might take it that way."
"What did Mrs. Floyd say?" Westerfelt started, and looked Bates straight in the eyes.
"Oh, nothing much; I may be a fool to think it meant anything, but this morning when I called for Miss Harriet the old lady came in and acted mighty friendly. She asked me to come to dinner with 'em next Sunday, and said Harriet always was backward about showing a preference for the young man she really liked, an' said she was shore I didn't care much for her or I'd come oftener."
Westerfelt was silent. He had never suspected Mrs. Floyd of scheming, but now that his suspicions were roused he let them run to the opposite extreme.
Yes, he thought, she was trying to marry her daughter off. Perhaps because she wanted her to forget Wambush, who was certainly a man no sensible woman would like to have in her family.