Page:MacLeod Raine - The Sheriff's Son.djvu/90

 "I see your business keeps you jumping," dryly commented the Irishman. "And you know best whether it's your affair."

Beaudry could have stood it better if the man had railed at him, if he had put up an argument to show why he must come to the aid of the friend who had helped him. This cool, contemptuous dismissal of him stung. He began to pace the room in rising excitement.

"I hate that country up there. I 've got no use for it. It killed my mother just as surely as it did my father. I left there when I was a child, but I 'll never forget that dreadful day seventeen years ago. Sometimes I wake in bed out of some devil's nightmare and live it over. Why should I go back to that bloody battleground? Has n't it cost me enough already? It's easy for you to come and tell me to go to Huerfano Park—"

"Hold your horses, Mr. Beaudry. I'm not tellin' you to go. I 've laid the facts before ye. Go or stay as you please."

"That's all very well," snapped back the young man. "But I know what you 'll think of me if I don't go."

"What you 'll think of yourself matters more. I have n't got to live with ye for forty years."