He did not admit that even to himself. He reasoned that he was protecting her because she was a stranger in a strange land and that the impulse was only kindness. But his reason in that was a conscious lie for as he stood under the stars with the cool, quiet night all about him he could hear her voice in the murmur of the creek, hear her limbs rustling her skirts in the soft sigh of wind in the trees, could feel her presence there ... when he was stark alone.... And he fought it off, fought stubbornly, coldly because he did not know, he did not know love, did not know the ground into which he was being carried. Women? He had had many but the experiences had been casual, mere surface rifflings, and he had never been stirred as this woman stirred him. It was new, entirely new, and Tom Beck feared that which he did not know. He was accustomed to talk to his horses as men will who love them and while he rode the gulches alone he would in later days reason aloud with his own roan or the HC black or bay he used. "Why, old stager, we can't take a chance like that!" he said time after time. "We've kept our heels out of trouble by playing a close game, not gettin' out on a limb, but up to now everything that come along has been boy's play ... compared to this. "If an _hombre_ took a chance with his love that'd be the limit, wouldn't it? He'd have his stack on the table, an' the deal wouldn't be more than started!" He talked over the loves of other men with those horses, earnestly, soberly. He recalled the marriages he had known between men and women who were from the same stocks, who knew none but the same life; so many were failures! And this girl, this girl of whom he dreamed at night and thought by day, scarcely yet spoke his language! But he could not argue away the disturbing impulse. He could cover it, hide it from others, hide it from himself at times, but drive it out? Never! * * * * * Tom's report to Jane after his trip to town offered no encouragement. The filing had been legally accomplished and its significance was further impressed on the girl when he said: "It's a mighty popular subject in town, ma'am. Everybody's interested." "I suppose they all think it will mean trouble for me?" "Yes, an' they're likely to be right." She shook her head sharply. "We don't want trouble, but if it does come we must meet it half way!" She leaned forward determinedly and Beck stirred in his chair. It was a gesture of delight for those were almost his very words to Hepburn when they cleared their relationships of pretense; but he said only: "That's the easiest way to take trouble on." Just then Hepburn came in with his report on his visit to the Hole. "The old fellow seems reasonable, Miss Hunter," he said ponderously. "He don't look like he's a permanent neighbor even if he has bought some cows from Webb, which I found out today. He's poor as a church mouse to begin with--" "And buyin' more cattle?" put in Beck.