ing. She guessed that he had been listening for some time, and she
also saw, before he turned his eyes quickly away, that he was
distinctly amused. Miss Langham stopped gesticulating and lowered her
voice, but continued to keep her eyes on the face of the stranger,
whose own eyes were wandering around the room, to give her, so she
guessed, the idea that he had not been listening, but that she had
caught him at it in the moment he had first looked at her. He was a
tall, broad-shouldered youth, with a handsome face, tanned and dyed,
either by the sun or by exposure to the wind, to a deep ruddy brown,
which contrasted strangely with his yellow hair and mustache, and with
the pallor of the other faces about him. He was a stranger apparently
to every one present, and his bearing suggested, in consequence, that
ease of manner which comes to a person who is not only sure of himself,
but who has no knowledge of the claims and pretensions to social
distinction of those about him. His most attractive feature was his
eyes, which seemed to observe all that was going on, not only what was
on the surface, but beneath the surface, and that not rudely or
covertly but with the frank, quick look of the trained observer. Miss
Langham found it an interesting face to watch, and she did not look
away from it. She was acquainted with every one else in the room, and
hence she knew this must be the cowboy of whom Mrs. Porter had spoken,
and she wondered how any one who had lived the rough life of the West
could still retain the look when in formal clothes of one who was in
the habit of doing informal things in them.

Mrs. Porter presented her cowboy simply as "Mr. Clay, of whom I spoke
to you," with a significant raising of the eyebrows, and the cowboy
made way for King, who took Miss Langham in. He looked frankly
pleased, however, when he found himself next to her again, but did not
take advantage of it throughout the first part of the dinner, during
which time he talked to the young married woman on his right, and Miss
Langham and King continued where they had left off at their last
meeting. They knew each other well enough to joke of the way in which
they were thrown into each other's society, and, as she said, they
tried to make the best of it. But while she spoke, Miss Langham was
continually conscious of the presence of her neighbor, who piqued her
interest and her curiosity in different ways. He seemed to be at his
ease, and ye