"I've been apologizing to Mr. Morse for insulting him, dad," the girl said
immediately.
Her father passed a bony hand slowly across his unshaven chin. "That's
right, honey. If you done him a meanness, you had ought to say so."
"She has said so very handsomely, Mr. Lee," spoke up Morse.
"I've been warning him, dad, that he ought to be more careful how he rides
around alone, with the cattlemen feeling the way they do."
"It's a fact they feel right hot under the collar. You're ce'tainly a
temptation to them, Mr. Morse," the girl's father agreed.
The mine owner shifted the subject of conversation. He was not a man of
many impulses, but he yielded to one now.
"Can't we straighten out this trouble between us, Mr. Lee? You think I've
done you an injury. Perhaps I have. If we both mean what's right, we can
get together and fix it up in a few minutes."
The old Southerner stiffened and met him with an eye of jade. "I ain't
asking any favors of you, Mr. Morse. We'll settle this matter some day,
and settle it right. But you can't buy me off. I'll not take a bean from
you."
The miner's eyes hardened. "I'm not trying to buy you off. I made a fair
offer of peace. Since you have rejected it, there is nothing more to be
said." With that he bowed stiffly and walked away, leading his horse.
Lee's gaze followed him and slowly the eyes under the beetled brows
softened.
"Mebbe I done wrong, honey. Mebbe I'd ought to have given in. I'm too
proud to compromise when he's got me beat. That's what's ailin' with me.
But I reckon I'd better have knuckled under."
The girl slipped her arm through his. "Sometimes I'm just like that too,
daddy. I've just got to win before I make up. I don't blame you a mite,
but, all the same, we should have let him fix it up."
It was characteristic of them both that neither thought of reversing the
decision he had made. It was done now, and they would abide by the
results. But already both of them half regretted, though for very
different reasons. Lee was thinking that for Melissy's sake he should have
made a friend of the man he hated, since it was on the cards that within a
few days she might be in his power. The girl's feeling, too, was
unselfish. She could not forget the deep hunger for friendship that had
shone in the man's eyes. He was alone in the world, a strong man
surrounded by enemies who would probably destroy him in the end. There was
stirring in her heart a sweet womanly pity and sympathy for the enemy
whose proffer of friendship had been so cavalierly rejected.