"Aw, explain to a tiger cat! Explain to an Apache! I tell you that girl is an Injun. She'll go with you so far, and stand for quite a little; but when she strikes fire, look out!" "Oh, very well," murmured Mrs. Hardesty and reached for a cigarette which she puffed delicately while Rimrock gloomed. It was painfully clear now--the cause of Mary's going and the embittered vindictiveness of her smile. Not only had he sat up to talk with Mrs. Hardesty, but he had brought her to where Mary had been waiting. He had actually talked love, without really meaning it, with this fascinating woman of the world; and, having an appointment to meet him right there, how could Mary help but know? He pictured her for a moment, lingering silently in the background, looking on where she could not hear. Was it less than human that she should resent it and make an excuse to go? And yet she had done it so quietly--that was the lady in her--without a word of tragedy or reproach! He remembered suddenly that she had laughed quite naturally and made some joke about his name being Mister. "What's that you say about the trains still running?" he demanded as he roused up from his thoughts. "Well, excuse me, right now! I'm on my way! I'm going back to hunt that girl up!" He leaped to his feet and left her still smoking as he rushed off to enquire about the trains. "Well, well," she murmured as she gazed thoughtfully after him, "he's as impulsive as any child. Just a great, big boy--I rather like him--but he won't last long, in New York." CHAPTER XVIII NEW YORK Rimrock Jones' return to New York was as dramatic and spectacular as his first visit had been pretentious and prodigal. With two thousand dollars and a big black hat he had passed for a Western millionaire; now, still wearing the hat but loaded down with real money, he returned and was hailed as a Croesus. There are always some people in public life whose least act is heralded to the world; whereas others, much more distinguished but less given to publicity, accomplish miracles and are hardly known. And then there are still others who, fed up with flattery and featured in a hundred ways, are all unwittingly the victims of a publicity bureau whose aim is their ultimate undoing. A real Western cowboy with a pistol under his coat, a prospector turned multi-millionaire in a year, such a man--especially if he wears a sombrero and gives five-dollar tips to the bell-hops--is sure to break into the prints. But it was a strange coincidence, when Rimrock jumped out of his taxicab and headed for the Waldorf entrance, to find a battery of camera men all lined up to snap him and a squad of reporters inside. No sooner had Rimrock been shot through the storm door into the gorgeous splendors of Peacock Alley than they assailed him en masse--much as the bell-boys had just done to gain his grip and the five-dollar tip.