"There won't be any trouble--for me!"

Her fear of discovery was so great that she would not remain out long,
but crept back into the house and up to her room. Badger, however,
lingered, staring up at the house and vainly endeavoring to think of
some plan which would enable them to overcome the violent objections of
Mr. Lee.

"I allow I am in a hole," he grumbled. "But as long as Winnie has no
notion of throwing me over, I shall not let any coyote weakness get the
better of me! Not on your life!"

He was about to leap the fence and make his way back to the campus, when
he saw a man sneak into the yard and drop down behind some shrubbery not
far from the front door. He could not make out the man's face and form
because of the darkness.

"Mighty queer, that is!" thought the Westerner, staring at the spot
where the man had disappeared. "He don't act as if he intended to try to
rustle the ranch. I reckon I'll wait a bit."

Badger had not long to wait. Fairfax Lee came down the walk from the
street scarcely a minute later.

"If this wasn't New Haven, in the great and cultivated East, I should
say the fellow is laying for Lee with a gun, or a lariat!"

As Lee came down the path, the man appeared from behind the shrubbery,
as if he had just returned from a visit to one of the side doors, and
placed himself in front of the politician. Lee stopped in a hesitating
way, and it was clear to Badger that he was afraid of this intruder.

"What are you doing here?" Lee demanded. The man advanced a step, with a
threatening whine.

"You wouldn't see me at your office, and I have come here, Lee. When are
you going to get me that appointment?"

Lee was one of New Haven's prominent politicians.

"I have told you that I can't do anything for you, Gaston!" he declared.

"But you said before the election that you'd git me a job!"

"I said nothing of the kind!"

"That's a lie!" the man addressed as Gaston fiercely asserted. "You
wouldn't see me at the office, so I've come here, and I want justice
done. You have been turning me away every day. I was right so long as I
could hustle votes for you, and now I'm dirt!"

"You are simply a lunatic."

"And you mean to put me in an asylum?" the man hissed.

"That is the appointment I'll get for you, Gaston, if you trouble me."

"I'll kill you!" Gaston snarled, drawing a knife. "That's what I have
made up my mind to do to you!"

"Stand aside, sir, and let me pass!" Lee commanded