He snorted. "I mean it," she exclaimed. "Next time you'll need to look out for yourself." He bolted from his chair. "That's the first time I ever heard anybody on this ranch take sides with the men that's robbing it--or carry a threat to this ranchhouse for rustlers." "Call it whatever you please, you won't change my opinion of you. But, of course, I'm only a woman and don't know anything." "I'm thinking you know a whole lot more than you let on," he declared. "Anyway, I wish you'd leave this ranch out of the rest of it. If you keep on 'cleaning up,' as you call it, you'll go farther and fare worse." He brought down his fist. "Not until I've cleaned out two more pups, anyway! Now, look here, Kate," he went on, "you may be fooling about this marrying, but you can bet I'm not." "Well, you can bet _I'm_ not," she returned, echoing his pert slang sharply. "Who's the man?" He flung the question at her point-blank. If she flushed the least bit it was with anger at his rudeness. "There isn't any man, and there isn't going to be any--so please never talk again about my marrying you or anybody else." She rose and left the table. He jumped to intercept her and tried to catch her hands. She let him see she was not in the least afraid and as he confronted her, she faced him without a tremor. "Let me pass!" She fairly snapped out the words. Van Horn, without moving, broke into a boisterous laugh. Kelly walked in just then from the kitchen and Van Horn, losing none of his malevolence, did stand aside. "All right," he said, "--this time." CHAPTER XXVIII A DIFFICULT RESOLVE For two days Kate burned in feverish reaction from her exposure, wretched in mind and body. Her only effort in that time was to get down to the corral and see that Bradley, acting as barn boy, should do something for her cut and bruised pony. Her father was still in Medicine Bend, and Van Horn, much to her relief, had disappeared. When she left her bed she spent the morning trying to rehabilitate her riding suit. The task called for all her ingenuity and she was still in the kitchen working on it late in the afternoon when Bradley came in. He had no sooner sat down by the door to report to Kate at his ease, than Kelly interrupted him with a call for wood. Even after he had filled the box, Kelly warned him he would have to split more next morning to get a supply ahead. "Easy, Kelly," remonstrated Bradley, in his deeply tremulous voice. "Easy. I can't split no wood t'morrow mornin', not for nobody." "Why not?" "Got to go to town." "What for?" Bradley declined to answer, but Kelly, persistent, bored into his evasiveness until Kate tired at the discussion: "Tell him what you're going for and be done with it," she said tartly. The reaction of three days had not left her own nerves unaffected; she admitted to herself she was cross.