nd went over to where
Surbus lay huddled. Her hard old face worked with emotion.

"You shot him, did yuh?" Marthy's voice was harsh with reproach.
"What did he do to yuh, that you had to go t' work and shoot him? He
warn't your dog, he was mine! I must say you're gittin'
high-an'-mighty, Billy Louise, comin' here shootin' my dog and accusin'
Charlie and me to our faces uh bein' thieves. And your maw not cold in
'er grave yit! I must say you're gitting too high-an'-mighty fer old
Marthy. And me payin' fer your schoolin' and never gitting so much as
a thankye fer it, and scrimpin' and savin' to make a lady out of yuh.
And here you come in a tantrum, callin' me a thief right in my face!
You knowed all along who worked them brands. If yuh don't, I kin
mighty quick tell ye--"

"Now, Aunt Martha, never mind scolding Billy Louise; you know you think
as much of her as you do of me, and that's throwing a big bouquet at
myself!" Charlie went up and laid his arm caressingly over the old
woman's shoulder. "You don't want to let this upset you, Aunt Martha.
Surbus was a mean-tempered brute with strangers. You know that. I
don't blame Miss Louise in the least. She was frightened when he came
at her, and she hadn't presence of mind enough to see he was only
bluffing and wouldn't hurt--"

"Bluffing, was he?" Billy Louise roused herself to meet this covert
attack upon her courage. "So are you bluffing. And so is Marthy, when
she says she paid for my--" She stopped, confronting an accusing
memory of mommie's mysterious silence about the school money, and her
own passing curiosity which had never been satisfied. "Even if she
did, I don't know why she need throw it up to me now. I never asked
her for money. Nobody ever did. And that has nothing to do with
Surbus, anyway. He's a nasty, mean brute that ought to have been
killed long ago. I'm not a bit sorry. I'm glad I did kill him."

"Yes, I know yuh be. You're hard as--"

"I wouldn't talk about hardness, if I were you, Marthy! What are you,
right now--and always? Was I to blame for thinking those cattle had
been stolen? They're in the Cove, with your brand on. And unless you
pay Seabeck for them, you're stealing them if you keep them. It
doesn't matter who put the brand on; you're keeping the cattle. What
do you call that, I'd like to know? They're down here in the big
corral now. If you mean to do what's square, you'll take them up to
Seabeck's and e