t is the question. Can't we get at it in the proper
spirit? You belong here; you have a right to be here. And I am here
because your father wanted me to stay. I want you to feel that you are
at home, and I don't want to be continually quarreling with you. Be
mean and stubborn if you want to--I suppose you can't help that. But
so long as conditions are as they are, let us try to make the best of
them. Even if you don't like me, even if you resent my presence here,
you can at least act more like a human being and less like a wild man.
Why," she continued, with a dry laugh, "just now you spoke of being a
man, and this morning after you killed Lonesome you acted like a big,
over-grown boy. You had your arm hurt and refused to allow me to dress
it. Did you think I wanted to poison you?"

"What I thought this morning is my business," returned Calumet gruffly.
Betty's voice had been quietly conversational, but it had carried a
subtle sting with its direct mockery, and Calumet felt again as he had
felt the night before, like an unruly scholar being rebuked by his
teacher. Last night, though, the situation had been a novel one; now
the thought that she was laughing at him, taunting him, filled him with
rage.

"Mebbe you'll be interested in knowin' what I think right now," he
said. "It's this: you've got a bad case of swelled head. You're one
of them kind of female critters which want to run things their own way.
You're--"

Her laugh interrupted him. "We won't argue that again, if you please.
If you remember, you had something to say on that subject last night,
and I want you to know that I haven't the slightest desire to hear your
opinion of me. Won't you sit down?" She invited again, motioning to a
chair beside the table, opposite hers. "If you absolutely refuse to
eat, I presume there is no help for it, though even if you had dinner
in Lazette you must be hungry now, for a ride of twenty miles is a
strict guarantee of appetite. Please sit down. There is something I
want to give you, something your father left for you. He told me to
have you read it as soon as you came."

She stood motionless until Calumet left the door and seated himself in
the chair beside the table, and then she went out of the room; he could
hear her steps on the stairs. She returned quickly and laid a bulky
envelope on the table beside him.

"Here it is," she said.

As Calumet took up the envelope and tore it open she dropped int