Page:Frank Spearman--Whispering Smith.djvu/159

 Busied with her thoughts, Dicksie rode slowly along the upper trails until a long détour brought her around the corrals and in at the back of the house. Throwing her lines to the ground, she alighted and through the back porch door made her way unobserved to her room. From the office across the big hall she heard men’s voices in dispute, and she slipped into the dining-room, where she could hear and might see without being seen. The office was filled with cowboys. Lance Dunning, standing with a cigar in his hand and one leg thrown over a corner of the table, was facing McCloud, who stood before him with his hand on a chair. Lance was speaking as Dicksie looked into the room, and in curt tones: “My men were acting under my orders.”

“You have no right to give such orders,” McCloud said distinctly, “nor to detain me, nor to obstruct our free passage along the right of way you have agreed to convey to us under our survey.”

“Damn your survey! I never had a plat of any such survey. I don’t recognize any such survey. And if your right-of-way men had ever said a word about crossing the creek above the flume I never would have given you a right of way at all.”

“There were never but two lines run below the creek; after you raised objection I ran them both, and both were above the flume.” 135