There was a dew of perspiration on his forehead.

"She--she threw a knife at me," said Nate Samson.

"It's stuck in the shelf behind you." Thus the marshal with indifference.

"That's a.s.sault with a deadly weapon," averred Nate, freeing the deadly weapon and putting it carefully out of reach of other possibly petulant customers. "Why didn't you arrest her, Red?"

"She missed you, Nate. She'd have had to cut you some before I could arrest her. 'Threaten or Inflict a wound,' the statutes say, and she didn't do either. No."

"But she might have," grumbled the discomforted Nate. "If I hadn't dodged, she'd have split my head open."

"That's so," the marshal a.s.sented with relish. "Do you know, Nate, I'm glad it happened. I dunno that I'd have thought of it if I hadn't seen her buzz that knife at you."

"Thought of what?" fretted Nate, stopping to gather up the parcels that had cascaded over his head to the floor. "What you talking about, anyway?"

The marshal settled himself to elucidate. "I know that Bill had cut you out with Hazel and----"

"No such thing," Nate contradicted sharply, with a reddening cheek.

"No such thing. You got it all wrong, Red. I stopped going to see Hazel because it was so far and all. I--uh--I got tired ridin' all that distance."

"All right," the marshal gave in pacifically, "you stopped goin' to see her because it was so far from town. Bill started going to see her, and he went to see her right smart for a spell."

"He didn't go any more than that good-for-nothing flibberty-gibbet of a Riley Tyler or any other of half a dozen chaps," declared Nate.

"Aw right, aw right, have it your own way for Gawd's sake! If you don't shut up, I won't tell you what I think!"

"I'll tell you what I think! I think I'm a idjit to let you stop around my store alla time and fill your fat stomach to the neck with my prunes and dried peaches and sweet crackers, It would be bad enough if you took the salt fellers, but not you. Oh, no, not a-tall. Mr.

Herring has to have sweet ones!"

"I like them best," Mr. Herring said matter-of-factly. "Lessee, where was I? Oh, yeah, you had gotten wore to a frazzle by the distance to the Walton ranch, and Bill had started goin' in that direction, himself. Then this winter sometime he stopped goin' to see Hazel, didn't he?"

"She got tired of him--naturally."

"You dunno what happened. Neither do I know. But that they had a fight is as good a guess as any, and Love's young dream went bust. We all thought so, didn't we, and while we were trailin' Bill we didn't take Hazel into consideration a-tall. But what happens to-day when you run down Bill to her face. She slings a knife at you so prompt and free you almost lost four fifths of your looks. She said things too, and all going to show that they've made it up and she's in love again with Bill. Well then, if she's in love with Bill, he's either coming to see her off and on or else she knows where he is."

"Not necessarily. It don't follow a-tall."

"You've soured on the girl, that's all the matter with you. I tell you, Nate, if a girl as pretty as Hazel Walton is in love with a feller, do you think for a minute he wouldn't come to see her sometimes, or anyway let her know where he is? Why, you poor flap, he'd be a wooden man if he didn't do one or both of those things. And Bill Wingo ain't anybody's wooden man. Not that boy. He's an upstandin' citizen with all his brains and legs and arms and fingers and feet, and that's the kind of hairpin he is."

"All that's a heap interesting, but let's hear the point of the joke--if there is one."

"The point is that if a gent was to watch Hazel Walton and her traipsings to and fro, by and by he'd get news of Bill Wingo. And I'm a great li'l watcher myself--especially when there's two thousand dollars reward, like there is for Bill. It's worth some trouble. Tell you, Nate, I'm glad I dropped in here this morning."

"You're marshal," pointed out Nate. "You can't leave town."

"I ain't supposed to work all night--only day-times and part of the evening. It's a cinch Bill won't make any social calls in daylight and it's a cinch the distance from town to Walton's won't tire me out like it has you."

"Putting it that way," said Nate, suddenly perceiving an opportunity to make a little easy money, "putting it that way, maybe I'll go too."

"It ain't necessary," protested the marshal, alarmed at the bare thought of dividing a profit. "I can manage it myself."

"I'll help you, though."

"Look here, whose scheme is this, huh?"

"You may have thought of it," conceded Nate, "but she was my girl first, and I got as much right to go out there again and see her as you have, and I got as much right to that two thousand dollars as you have."

The marshal swore frankly. "I'll never tell you anything again.

Taking advantage of a feller this way. I thought you were my friend."

"I am. We'll go out together, huh?"

"We will not," contradicted the marshal. "So you can just as well stop stretching your mouth about it."

"Is that so? Is _that_ so?"

"Yes, that's so. This is my private party, and you wanna keep paws off."

"Aw, go sit on yourself!"

"Remember what I told you," the marshal said in part and took his departure.

Arrived home, Hazel unhitched and unharnessed, turned the team into the corral and carried her purchases into the kitchen and dumped them on the table. She hung up her man's hat on one of the hooks that held the Winchester, and fluffed the hair about her temples by the aid of the mirror that hung below the Terry clock her uncle had brought West with him. She had always liked the Terry clock,--from the cheerful painted pumpkins and grapes that graced the patterned top to the peculiar throbbing ring it gave on striking the hour, she liked it.

And on a day the old clock was destined to repay that liking full measure, pressed down and running over.

While she was fixing her hair, the clock struck three.

Silently she unwrapped her bundles and stored away the contents in crock and box and drawer. A tidy person, Hazel. Then, because she was still in a temper with Nate Samson, she changed her dress, donned a pair of overalls and began to scrub the kitchen floor.

"Liar!" she said aloud, sc.r.a.ping a vigorous brush under the dresser.

"Liar! I hope your old store burns up!"

So occupied was she with her thoughts and her work that she failed to hear the approach of a rider.

"'Lo, Hazel," was the rider's greeting delivered across the doorsill.

Hazel's brush stopped swishing to and fro.

"h.e.l.lo, Sally Jane," she said smilingly, supporting herself on one arm and pushing back the hair that had fallen over her hot face. "Put your horse in the corral and come on in."

"I tied him to the wagon," said Sally Jane.

Out of respect for the wet floor she jigged on her heels across to a chair and seated herself, hooking her heels in a rung. Sally Jane looked at Hazel with speculation in her eyes.

"You look mad, dear," Sally Jane said.

"I am," declared Hazel, and began to sizzle anew. "Just listen," she continued, hopping up to seat herself on the table, "to what I heard in town this morning. Nate told me--"