Page:The Trail Rider (1924).pdf/105

 that many of them feared for the reputation of Malvina on the spot.

"It won't stick before no court in the land, and I'm goin' to bust it wide open!" Smith declared, looking about defiantly.

Texas saw at a glance how the matter stood in Smith's intention. He had come back to discover more prosperity than he ever had been on speaking terms with before in his life; he saw ahead of him a season of ease and consequence in Cottonwood as the husband of its foremost business woman, and he believed the wedding was only a form, as far as matters had gone, that could be brushed aside.

"Ye-e-es, you'll bust a hamestring gittin' out of here, you onery, low-lived, suck-aig whelp!"

Mrs. Goodloe drew a little nearer to him as she delivered this, shaking her fist close to his sullen nose. The groom drew himself up in his chaii a little at this hopeful demonstration.

"Git out o' here, you bum!" he said.

But not very forcibly. It was too plainly weak, in fact, as if he had no confidence in it himself, to act as anything more than an enraging barb under the tough skin of Zebedee Smith.

Then followed a spry little game of hop and dodge between Smith and Mrs. Goodloe, that fair lady's teeth bared in front of him like a rampant