Bob Hampton of Placer

"Kid," he ventured at last, turning over a broken fragment of rock

between his restless fingers, but without lifting his eyes, "you were

talking while we came up the trail about how we 'd do this and that

after a while. You don't suppose I 'm going to have any useless girl

like you hanging around on to me, do you?"

She glanced quickly about at him, as though such unexpected expressions

startled her from a pleasant reverie. "Why, I--I thought that was the

way you planned it yesterday," she exclaimed, doubtfully.

"Oh, yesterday! Well, you see, yesterday I was sort of dreaming;

to-day I am wide awake, and I 've about decided, Kid, that for your own

good, and my comfort, I 've got to shake you."

A sudden gleam of fierce resentment leaped into the dark eyes, the

unrestrained glow of a passion which had never known control. "Oh, you

have, have you, Mister Bob Hampton? You have about decided! Well, why

don't you altogether decide? I don't think I'm down on my knees

begging you for mercy. Good Lord! I reckon I can get along all right

without you--I did before. Just what happened to give you such a

change of heart?"

"I made the sudden discovery," he said, affecting a laziness he was

very far from feeling, "that you were too near being a young woman to

go traipsing around the country with me, living at shacks, and having

no company but gambling sharks, and that class of cattle."

"Oh, did you? What else?"

"Only that our tempers don't exactly seem to jibe, and the two of us

can't be bosses in the same ranch."

She looked at him contemptuously, swinging her body farther around on

the rock, and sitting stiffly, the color on her cheeks deepening

through the sunburn. "Now see here, Mister Bob Hampton, you're a

fraud, and you know it! Did n't I understand exactly who you was, and

what was your business? Did n't I know you was a gambler, and a 'bad

man'? Didn't I tell you plain enough out yonder,"--and her voice

faltered slightly,--"just what I thought about you? Good Lord! I have

n't been begging to stick with you, have I? I just didn't know which

way to turn, or who to turn to, after dad was killed, and you sorter

hung on to me, and I let it go the way I supposed you wanted it. But I

'm not particularly stuck on your style, let me tell you, and I reckon

there 's plenty of ways for me to get along. Only first, I propose to

understand what your little game is. You don't throw down your hand

like that without some reason."