"Meanin' that you keep him on the job and let me go?"
"That's it exactly. Long as he does his work well I'll not ask him to quit."
A shadow darkened the doorway of the temporary office. The Arizonan stepped in with his easy, swinging stride, a lithe, straight-backed Hermes showing strength of character back of every movement.
"I'm leaving to-day, Mr. Shields." His voice carried the quiet power of reserve force.
"Not because I want you to, Sanders."
"Because I'm not going to stay and make you trouble."
"I don't think it will come to that. I'm talking it over with the boys now. Your work stands up. I've no criticism."
"I'll not stay now, Mr. Shields. Since they've complained to you I'd better go."
The ex-convict looked around, the eyes in his sardonic face hard and bitter. If he could have read the thoughts of the men it would have been different. Most of them were ashamed of their protest. They would have liked to have drawn back, but they did not know how to say so. Therefore they stood awkwardly silent. Afterward, when it was too late, they talked it over freely enough and blamed each other.
From one job to another Dave drifted. His stubborn pride, due in part to a native honesty that would not let him live under false pretenses, in part to a bitterness that had become dogged defiance, kept him out of good places and forced him to do heavy, unskilled labor that brought the poorest pay.