il!" he said.

For the spur with its companion had cost him twenty dollars down on the
Mexican border ten days ago and he had set much store by it.

"Little devil, am I?" she retorted readily. "You'll know it if you
don't keep on your side of the road. Look at that tear! Just look at
it!"

She had stepped quite close to him, holding out the cloak, her eyes
lifted defiantly to his. He put out a sudden hand and laid it on her
wet shoulder. She opened her eyes widely again at the new look in his.
But even so her regard was utterly fearless.

"Young lady," he said sternly, "so help me God, I've got the biggest
notion in the world to take you across my knee and give you the
spanking of your life. If I did crowd in where I don't belong, as you
so sweetly put it, it was at least to do you a kindness. Another time
I'd know better; I'd sooner do a favor for a wildcat."

"Take your dirty paws off of me," she cried, wrenching away from him.
"And--spank me, would you?" The fire leaped higher in her eyes, the
red in her cheeks gave place to an angrier white. "If you ever so much
as dare touch me again----"

She broke off, panting. Packard laughed at her.

"You'd try to scratch me, I suppose," he jeered; "and then, after the
fashion of your own sweet sex when you don't have the strength to put a
thing across, you'd most likely cry!"

"I'd blow your ugly head off your shoulders with a shot-gun," she
concluded briefly.

And despite the extravagance of the words it was borne in upon
Packard's understanding that she meant just exactly what she said.

He was getting colder all the time and knew that in a moment his teeth
would chatter. So a second time he turned his back on her, gathered up
his horse's reins, and moved away, seeking a spot in the woods where he
could get dry and sun his clothes. And since Packard rage comes
swiftly and more often than not goes the same way, within five minutes
over a comforting cigarette he was grinning widely, seeing in a flash
all of the humor of the situation which had successfully concealed
itself from him until now.

"And I don't blame her so much, after all," he chuckled. "Taking a
nice, lonely dive, to have a fool of a man grab her all of a sudden
when she was enjoying herself half a dozen feet under water! It's
enough to stir up a good healthy temper. Which, by the Lord, she has!"

CHAPTER II

MISS BLUE CLOAK KNOWS WHEN SHE'S BEAT

Half an hour later, his clo