"Distance lends--"

"Not in this case," he interrupted. "It's when you're right with Myrt
that she kinda hypnotizes yuh into thinking what she wants yuh to
think." He was remembering resentfully the dance.

"But to sneak away--"

"That's a word I don't remember was ever shot at me before," said
Weary, the blood showing through the skin on his cheeks. "If that
damned Myrt has been telling yuh--"

"I didn't think you would speak like that about a woman, Mr. Davidson,"
said the schoolma'am with disapproval in her tone; and the disapproval
not going very deep, there was the more of it upon the surface.

"I suppose it gives evidence of a low, brutal trait in my nature, that
you hoped I couldn't harbor," acceded Weary meekly.

"It does," snapped the schoolma'am, her cheeks hot. If she had
repented her flare of temper over the gopher, she certainly did not
intend letting him know it too soon. She seemed inclined to discipline
him a bit.

Weary smoked silently and raked up the sun-baked soil with his spurs.
"How long is Myrt going to stay?" he ventured at last.

"I never asked her," she retorted. "You ought to know--you probably
have seen her last." The schoolma'am blundered, there.