Page:The Cow Jerry (1925).pdf/68

 dishes, her eyes lifted for one sympathetic glance. "I used to hear so much about the foolish things cattle do on the range—"

"They wasn't to blame, ma'am," he corrected her with grave courtesy. "I've been turned a trick—"

Louise saw him stiffen as for a jump, his words broken off there and left hanging. Mrs. Cowgill was bringing a man into the dining-room with considerable importance; a tall, heavy-shouldered gray man, with broad red suspenders over his gray woolen shirt, a colored cotton handkerchief awry about his neck. He was dusty and saddle-soiled, but full of loud words and boisterous animation, his big voice ringing in the dining-room audible to its remote corners. He was belted with a pistol; a shaggy gray mustache dropped over his mouth.

"Excuse me, ma'am," said Laylander, going forward to meet the man under Mrs. Cowgill's solicitous convoy.

Louise could feel trouble in the air, trouble in the way the young Texan stepped out to meet this man. The new guest stopped when he saw Laylander, squaring off as if to stand on the defense.

"Colonel Withers, is it true you've sent the sheriff out and attached my cattle?" Laylander demanded.

"You seem to be posted about right," Withers replied.

They stood set, each waiting for the other to make a move, each knowing the man before him well enough to understand what a false start would bring.