Page:Caroline Lockhart--The Fighting Shepherdess.djvu/169

 "There's only one that interests me," she replied, with a touch of dignity.

"What do you want, anyhow?"

Kate's labored breathing was audible.

"Is it so that you are not going to do any more about the murder of my uncle?"

"Your uncle!" he snorted, flecked the ashes from the end of his cigar, rolled it back into place with his tongue and reiterated: "Your uncle!" Then: "What's it to you? You got off, didn't you?"

She came into the room a step or two.

"It's everything to me or I wouldn't be here. Can't you understand what it means to me—going through life with people thinking—"

"You got the money, didn't you?" he interrupted.

"What you throwing a bluff like this for, anyhow? I guess what people think ain't worryin' you."

Kate's fingers clenched, but she said quietly:

"You haven't answered my question."

He resented the rebuke, but chiefly her self-control. The bully in him wanted to see tears, to see her overawed and humble; she had too much assurance for a social cipher. If she did not realize that fact yet, it was for him to let her know it.

He brought the front legs of his chair down with a thump and thundered:

"Yes—it's closed, and it won't be opened, neither! You'd better not start in tryin' to stir up somethin', or you'll be sorry—as it is, you're a detriment to the community!"

He mistook her white-faced silence, and added with less violence:

"Why don't you fade away, anyhow—sell out and