“This is Bob Sumner,” he made known perfunctorily. “The son of that Texas cattleman who owned the Toreante place on Rose Hill. I believe you knew him slightly. Sumner will winter with us. You need not stutter over talking before him.” “I don’t stutter over talkin’ before anybody, far as I’m concerned. It’s _your_ funeral,” Montell retorted. Then he turned to me. “So you’re John Sumner’s boy, eh?” He sized me up with new interest. I dare say he was wondering how I came to be in Barreau’s company on the very night of his breaking jail. “Yes, sir, I did know your father. Did business with him a time or two. Mighty fine man. Seems to me I heard he died last spring. Left quite a large estate, didn’t he?” “Yes,” I answered briefly to both questions. It was not a subject I cared to discuss just then. “Too bad, too bad,” he commiserated—but whether the sympathy he forced into his tone was for the death of my father, or for me, I did not know—nor care very much. It sounded like one of those convenient platitudes that become a habit with people. He focused his attention on Barreau, however, immediately after this. “Now, George,” he said, “suppose we have a word in private, eh?” “This suits me; I’m getting hardened to publicity,” Barreau drawled. “You want an understanding, you said. I’m agreeable. I remarked that it might be well to try telling the truth if explanations are demanded.” An exasperated expression crossed Montell’s face. “Now, see here, be reasonable,” he grunted. “That there guardhouse business settled you. If you’d kept shy of that, there’d be a chance. But there ain’t. You could swear to things on a stack of Bibles—and she wouldn’t believe a word. You know as well as I do that she’s got all them old-fashioned idees about a gentleman’s honor that her mother’s folks has. You know you _did_ kill them two fellers on High River, an’ run off them Hudson’s Bay work-bulls. You didn’t have to do _that_. You can’t explain _them_ things to _her_; nor bein’ in jail. That there’s a black mark she can’t overlook. You wasn’t smooth enough, George.” “You are astonishingly frank, I must say.” Barreau leaned forward, smiling sardonically, a sneering, unpleasant smile. “Why? Would you mind explaining why you would refuse to vouch for the truth of my story if I tell her absolute facts? What have you up your sleeve?” “Nothin’,” Montell growled. “Only I ain’t goin’ to have you force my hand. I ain’t goin’ to get into no fuss with my own daughter. Besides, as I said, some of them things can’t be explained to her—she couldn’t understand. Once she found out what a hell of a time’s been goin’ on in this fur business, and that this winter’s liable to breed more trouble, why she’d be sure to take a notion to stick here by me. An’ I won’t expose _her_ to whatever might come up, for nobody’s reputation.” “Wise old owl!” Barreau sneered. “What need for this sudden access of caution? Do you think I can’t——”