Page:Edison Marshall--Shepherds of the wild.djvu/279

Rh kind of man than you're used to. I come from a different race. And maybe you'd better try to be a little more polite."

"And I can only tell you this," she went on as if she had not heard. "If you do leave me here, if you put one indignity to me above what you've already put by tying me up and making me listen to your talk, you'll pay for it. I'm just as sure of that as I am that I'm alive."

And the man might have listened in vain for any waver, any note of doubt in her tone. She spoke as if in infallible prophecy.

"Who's goin' to do it?" the man demanded. "Who's goin' to find out?"

"It will be found out. You'll pay, whether I live or not. It seems—almost as if vengeance is coming to you soon—right away. I can't tell you how I know. I only tell you to let me go.

"You're from the desert, José, and not the mountains, and maybe the desert lets debts go unpaid," she went on, in a clear free tone of inspiration. "But I know these forests. It seems to me I know them now—better than I ever did before. One more insult—and I tell you you'll pay."

But José laughed. Just a little, harsh note of scorn fell from his lips. He was a mountain man, but in his passion and frenzy his wilderness knowledge had deserted him. He did not heed her words. And he bent to press his lips to hers.

And at that instant the thicket behind them