"I gotta thank you for--for buttin' in the other day, Miss Ramona."
She laughed, quite at her ease now. Why is it that the most tender-hearted young women like to see big two-fisted men afraid of them?
"Oh, you thought I was buttin' in," she mocked, tilting a gay challenge of the eyes at him.
"I roped the wrong word, miss. I--I thought--"
What he thought was never a matter of record. She had followed him along the fence to complete his discomfiture and to enjoy her power to turn him from an efficient man into a bashful hobbledehoy.
"Father gave me an awful scolding. He said I didn't act like a lady."
"He's 'way off," differed Jack hotly.
She shook her head. "No. You see I couldn't explain to everybody there that I did it for--for Rutherford--because I didn't want anything so dreadful as that poor Mexican's death on his account. Dad said some of the men might think I did it--oh, just to be showing off," she finished untruthfully.
"Nobody would think that--nobody but a plumb idjit. I think you did fine."
Having explained satisfactorily that she had not interfered for his sake, there was really no occasion for Ramona to linger. But Jack had found his tongue at last and the minutes slipped away.
A sound in the brush on the far side of the road brought the Ranger to attention. It was the breaking of a twig. The foot that crushed it might belong to a cow or a horse. But Roberts took no chances. If some one was lying in wait, it was probably to get him.
"Turn round an' walk to the house," he ordered the girl crisply. "Sing 'Swanee River' as you go. Quick!"
There was a note in his voice that called for obedience. Ramona turned, a flurry of fear in her heart. She did not know what there was to be afraid of, but she was quite sure her companion had his reason. The words of the old plantation song trembled from her lips into the night.
A dozen yards behind her Jack followed, backing toward the house. His six-shooter was in his hand, close to his side.
He flashed one look backward. The parlor was lit up and Clint Wadley was lying on a lounge reading a paper. He was a tempting mark for anybody with a grudge against him.
Jack took the last twenty yards on the run. He plunged into the parlor on the heels of Ramona.
Simultaneously came the sound of a shot and of breaking glass. Wadley jumped up, in time to see the Ranger blow out the lamp. Jack caught Ramona by the shoulders and thrust her down to her knees in a corner of the room.