He was about forty-five years old, very tall, very, very thin, and as straight as he was thin.  Thick, closely clipped gray hair stood up straight from his forehead.  His eyes were deep sunk in his head and a piercing, light blue.  He possessed a belligerent chin below an obstinate lower lip and a close-cropped gray mustache.  He wore a gray flannel shirt and blue denim pants turned high over riding-boots.

He watched the passing of the whiskey bottle without comment.

“Hello, Peter!” called Judith.  “Will you open the hall and let us have a dance?”

“What have you been doing to your horse, Jude?” demanded Peter, eying the panting and dejected Swift.

“Nothing!”

“Nothing!  I tell you what, the way you little devils treat your horses would draw tears out of a coyote.  Starving ’em, beating ’em, running ’em!  You ought to be thrashed, every one of you worthless young slicks.”

Curiously enough, none of the group which had shown so much temerity in man-handling the preacher now attempted to reply to Peter.  A great shaggy gray dog, exactly like a coyote except that she was much larger, now appeared in the door beside the postmaster.  A chorus of growls and whines immediately arose from the dogs congregated among the horses.

“What happened at the schoolhouse?” asked Peter abruptly.

“You’re always preaching, yourself; I suppose that’s why you didn’t attend,” grinned Scott Parsons.

“My Yankee horse is sick,” said Peter, “and I couldn’t leave him.  How did it go?”

“We ran him out,” laughed Douglas.  “We gave him a chance to give us real talk but he couldn’t come across, so we roped him and ran him.”

“I thought that would happen.  Poor Fowler!” Peter’s voice was grave.

“Listen, Peter,” cried Judith, “I want to ask you a favor.”

She mounted the steps and stood before the man.  She was as thin as he and as straight.  Peter looked down at her, still scowling.

“Now, Peter, listen!  You know I love Swift and wouldn’t hurt her for anything.”

“Wouldn’t hurt her!  Haven’t I told you a hundred times that running a horse through drifts like you do ruins ’em?  No, don’t try to soft-soap me, Judith!  When you kids want a favor from me, don’t come up with your horses dripping sweat in below zero weather.”

He jerked Sister back into the building and slammed the door.

Judith turned.  “Well, we can all go over to Inez’ place.  She asked us.”

“Who’s there?” demanded Doug.

“Nobody.  She says we can dance if we want to.”

There was a silence, broken after a moment by Jimmy Day.  “You can’t go, Maud.”

“I am going if you do!” exclaimed Maud.  “Make him let me go, Doug.”

“What’s the use of being so fussy about poor old Inez?” asked Scott.  “What harm is there in a dance at her place?”

“I don’t see why, if my mother don’t stop me, yours should stop you,” protested Judith.