"Being engaged signifies little in the courts of matrimony," said
the decayed-looking man with dignity. "She has decided to choose
another, and--"

Colonel Ward threw back his shoulders and faced them all with
glittering eyes.

"I'd like to see the man that can step into this town and lug off
the woman that's promised to me," he raved. "Engagements don't hold,
hey? Then you come this way a week from to-day, and you'll see Gideon
Ward and Pharline Pike married as tight as a parson can tie the knot.
I mean it!" The excitement of the moment, his rage at interference
in his affairs, his desire to triumph thus publicly over these
strangers, had led him into the declaration.

The spinster gasped, but she came to him and trustfully put her hand
on his arm.

"P'raps some can be put off by that bluff," said the man with the
swollen nose, "but not me that has travelled. I'm here on business,
and I've got the dockyments, and if there's any shenanigan, then some
one's got to pay me my expenses, and for wear and tear." He waved
a paper.

Ward leaped forward and snatched the paper from his grasp.

"It's about time for me to see what you're flourishing round here
promiskous, like a bill o' sale of these primises," he snarled.