thing in the city. Anyway, it ain't got nothing to do with this
that I'm a tellin' you.

"She didn't seem to care nothin' at all for none of the neighbor
boys like most girls do; she'd go with them and have a good time
alright, but that was all. 'Peared like she'd rather be with her
brothers or her mother or me.

"Well, one day, when we was out on the range a ridin' for stock--
she'd often go with me that way--we met a stranger over there at
the deer lick in the big low gap, coming along the Old Trail. He
was as fine a lookin' man as you ever see, sir; big and grand
like, with lightish hair, kind, of wavy, and a big mustache like
his hair, and fine white teeth showing when he smiled. He was sure
good lookin', damn him! and with his fine store clothes and a
smooth easy way of talkin' and actin' he had, 'tain't no wonder
she took up with him. We all did. I used to think God never made a
finer body for a man. I know now that Hell don't hold a meaner
heart than the one in that same fine body. And that's somethin'
that bothers me a heap, Mr. Howitt.

"As I say, our girl was built like Sammy Lane, and so far as looks
go she was his dead match. I used to wonder when I'd look at them
together if there ever was such another fine lookin' pair. I ain't
a goin' to tell you his name; there ain't no call to, as I can
see. There might be some decent man named the same. But he was one
of these here artist fellows and had come into the hills to paint,
he said."

A smothered exclamation burst from the listener.