A Texas Ranger | Page 2

it was at his expense. The spark that gleamed in
his bold eye held some spice of the devil.
"All right. This is your hold-up, ma'am. I'll not move," he said, almost
genially.
She was uneasily aware that his surrender had been too tame. Strength
lay in that close-gripped salient jaw, in every line of the reckless
sardonic face, in the set of the lean muscular shoulders. She had nerved
herself to meet resistance, and instead he was yielding with complacent
good nature.
"Get out!" she commanded.
He stepped from the rig and offered her the reins. As she reached for
them his right hand shot out and caught the wrist that held the weapon,
his left encircled her waist and drew her to him. She gave a little cry of
fear and strained from him, fighting with all her lissom strength to free
herself.
For all the impression she made the girdle round her waist might have
been of steel. Without moving, he held her as she struggled, his brown
muscular fingers slowly tightening round her wrist. Her stifled cry was
of pain this time, and before it had died the revolver fell to the ground
from her paralyzed grip.
But her exclamation had been involuntary and born of the soft tender
flesh. The wild eyes that flamed into his asked for no quarter and

received none. He drew her slowly down toward him, inch by inch, till
she lay crushed and panting against him, but still unconquered. Though
he held the stiff resistant figure motionless she still flashed battle at
him.
He looked into the storm and fury of her face, hiding he knew not what
of terror, and laughed in insolent delight. Then, very deliberately, he
kissed her lips.
"You-- coward!" came instantly her choking defiance.
"Another for that," he laughed, kissing her again.
Her little fist beat against his face and he captured it, but as he looked
at her something that had come into the girl's face moved his not very
accessible heart. The salt of the adventure was gone, his victory worse
than a barren one. For stark fear stared at him, naked and unconcealed,
and back of that he glimpsed a subtle something that he dimly
recognized for the outraged maidenly modesty he had so ruthlessly
trampled upon. His hands fell to his side reluctantly.
She stumbled back against the tree trunk, watching him with fascinated
eyes that searched him anxiously. They found their answer, and with a
long ragged breath the girl turned and burst into hysterical tears.
The man was amazed. A moment since the fury of a tigress had
possessed her. Now she was all weak womanish despair. She leaned
against the cottonwood and buried her face in her arm, the while
uneven sobs shook her slender body. He frowned resentfully at this
change of front, and because his calloused conscience was disturbed he
began to justify himself. Why didn't she play it out instead of coming
the baby act on him? She had undertaken to hold him up and he had
made her pay forfeit. He didn't see that she had any kick coming. If she
was this kind of a boarding-school kid she ought not to have monkeyed
with the buzz-saw. She was lucky he didn't take her to El Paso with
him and have her jailed.
"I reckon we'll listen to explanations now," he said grimly after a

minute of silence interrupted only by her sobs.
The little fist that had struck at his face now bruised itself in
unconscious blows at the bark of the tree. He waited till the staccato
breaths had subsided, then took her by the shoulders and swung her
round.
"You have the floor, ma'am. What does this gun-play business mean?"
Through the tears her angry eyes flashed starlike.
"I sha'n't tell you," she flamed. "You had no right to-- How dared you
insult me as you have?"
"Did I insult you?" he asked, with suave gentleness. "Then if you feel
insulted I expect you lay claim to being a lady. But I reckon that don't
fit in with holding up strangers at the end of a gun. If I've insulted you
I'll ce'tainly apologize, but you'll have to show me I have. We're in
Texas, which is next door but one to Missouri, ma'am."
"I don't want your apologies. I detest and hate you," she cried,
"That's your privilege, ma'am, and it's mine to know whyfor I'm held up
with a gun when I'm traveling peaceably along the road," he answered
evenly.
"I'll not tell you."
He spoke softly as if to himself. "That's too bad. I kinder hate to take
her to jail, but I reckon I must."
She shrank back, aghast and white.
"No, no! You don't understand. I didn't mean