"Shore, ma'am, fly at it. I'm a-listenin'." "Do yuh remember a certain evenin' down at the Bar S when yuh'd just rid in from Farewell with the mail an' some ribbon for Kate Saltoun?" Loudon nodded. "Well, Kate asked yuh to come out on the porch, an' yuh didn't come. Yes, Sam Blakely was there. Yore not comin' at her invite riled Kate. She allowed yuh didn't give a hoot for her, an' when Blakely proposed she took him. She was hoppin' mad with you, an' she was bound to teach yuh a lesson. "No, don't interrupt. Wait till I'm through, an' yuh can talk all yo're a mind to. Before that evenin' it'd been nip an' tuck between you an' Sam Blakely. An' you was slow. My fathers! you was slow about speakin' yore little piece! Tom, a girl don't like for a man to keep his mouth shut. If he loves her, let him say so. An' you didn't say so. "Then again, Kate was flattered by Blakely's attention. What girl wouldn't be? Tom, yuh've got to remember a girl's mind ain't built like a man's. She don't reason the same way. She can't. Then, again, every girl is a coquette. Take the homeliest slabsided critter in creation, an' at heart she's just as much of a coquette as a she-angel with a pretty figger. They can't help it. It's born in 'em like their teeth are. "An' you men don't take that into account. You think the girl you admire ain't got no right to look at nobody but you, an' that she's got to be all ready to fall into yore arms when you say the word. An' if she don't do these things yuh rise up in the air like a mean pony an' go cavortin' off sayin', 'Drat the women!' I know yuh. Yo're all alike." "But, ma'am, I----" "No time for 'I's' now. Like I says before, yuh can talk later. Well, here's Kate Saltoun--pretty as all git-out, an' assayin' twelve ounces o' real woman to the pound, troy. Naturally, like I says, she's a coquette an' don't know her own mind about the boys. None of 'em don't. I didn't. Well, times Kate knows she loves you, an' times she thinks she loves Blakely." "How did she know I loved her? I hadn't said a word about it." "My fathers! don't yuh s'pose a woman knows when a man loves her? He doesn't have to tell her. She knows. Well, as I was sayin', she's a-waverin' this way an' that, an' then along comes that evenin' you don't go out on the porch, an' she kind o' guesses she loves Blakely an' she takes that party. Mind yuh, she thought she loves him. Kate's honest. She couldn't lie to herself." "She did when she said I drawed first," said Loudon in a low voice. "I can't get over that, somehow." "Tom, at the time you an' Blakely was cuttin' down on each other Kate was excited. She couldn't 'a' seen things straight. She told me she thought yuh drawed first. I believe her--why can't you?" "But I didn't draw first."