as of a piece with
it, even in its suggestion of an unfeeling, confidant hardness.

He joined her and they paced forward. It was the first time he had
ever sought any conversation with her and she was conscious and
secretly shy. Heretofore it had been his wont to speak little to her,
to sweep an indifferent eye over her which seemed to include her in the
unimportant baggage that went to the making of the train. Now, though
his manner was brusque, he spoke simply and not discourteously of the
hunt in the hills. He had got nothing, but David had killed a
black-tailed deer, and possessed by the passion of the chase, was
following the tracks of a second. The girl flushed with pleasure.

"David's a very good shot," she said complacently, not at all sure of
her statement, for David did not excel in the role of Nimrod. "He kept
us supplied with buffalo meat all the way up the Platte."

This was a falsehood. Daddy John and Leff had been the hunters of the
party. But Susan did not care. Courant had never said a word in her
hearing derogatory to David, but she had her suspicions that the
romantic nature of her betrothed was not of the stuff the mountain man
respected.

"First rate," he said heartily. "I didn't know it. I thought he
generally rode with you or drove the wagon."

To an outsider the tone would have seemed all that was frank and open.
But Susan read irony into it. She sat her horse a little squarer and
allowed the muse to still further possess her:

"David can shoot anything, an antelope even. He constantly brought
them in when we were on the Platte. It was quite easy for him. Daddy
John, who's been in all sorts of wild places, says he's never seen a
better shot."

A slight uneasiness disturbed the proud flow of her imagination at the
thought that Daddy John, questioned on this point, might show a
tendency to contradict her testimony. But it didn't matter. The joy
of proving David's superiority compensated. And she was setting
Courant in his place which had a separate and even rarer charm.

His answer showed no consciousness of the humbling process:

"You think a lot of David, don't you?"

Susan felt her color rising. This time she not only sat squarer in her
saddle, but raised her shoulders and chin a trifle.

"Yes. I am engaged to be married to him."

"When will you be married?" said the uncrushable man.

She inclined her head from its haughty pose just so far that she could
comma