"I can't now, even if I wanted to."
"Shore yuh can. She spoke to yuh all right this aft'noon, didn't she?"
"Yes, but——"
"Well, I'd given her my opinion o' things just about twenty minutes before yuh met me at the corral. So, yuh see, she wasn't mad at you. She wasn't really mad at me. I seen the twinkle in her eye all the time she was givin' me fits. Why, look here, Tom, when she says, 'Who, for instance?' I couldn't think o' nobody but you. It was impulse, it was, an' impulses are always right. Wouldn't be impulses if they wasn't.
"So there y'are. Yuh don't have to marry each other if yuh don't want to. Shore not. But yuh'd ought to give each other a whirl anyway. Yuh might hit it off amazin'. I'm bettin' yuh will, I don't care what either o' yuh say."
Loudon, divided between anger and horrified amazement, was speechless. Scotty Mackenzie was more than astounding. He was hopelessly impossible.
"Well," remarked Loudon, when he was able to speak, "yuh sure are three kings an' an ace when it comes to other people's business. Some day, Scotty, yuh'll go bulgin' into the affairs o' some party who don't understand yore funny little ways, an' he'll hang yore hide on the fence."
"I s'pose likely," said Scotty, glumly. "It shore is a ungrateful world. But," he added, brightening, "yuh'll do what I say, won't yuh, Tom? I tell yuh I know best. I've sort o' cottoned to yuh ever since I found out who yuh was an' all, an' I always did like Dorothy Burr. Here's you, an' there she is. Why, it's Providence, Tom, Providence; an' nobody has a right to fly in the face o' Providence. Yuh won't never have no luck if yuh do. I ask yuh like a friend, Tom—an' I hadn't ought to have to ask yuh, not with such a good-looker as Dorothy—I ask yuh like a friend to go see this little girl, an'——"
"An' prove yo're right," interrupted Loudon.
"Well, yes. Though I know I'm right, an' I tell yuh plain if you two don't hook up for keeps yuh'll be sorry. Yes, sir, yuh will. Now don't say nothin', Tom. Just think it over, an' if yuh want any help come to me."