The schoolma’am, again feeling herself mistress of the situation, proceeded with her disciplining.  She smiled, raised one hand and checked off the questions upon her fingers.  You never would guess how oddly her heart was behaving—­she looked such a self-possessed young woman.

“I’ll begin at the last one and work backward,” she said, calmly.  “And I must hurry, for aunt Meeker hates to keep supper waiting.  No, I will not go for a jaunt over Eagle Butte way next Sunday.  I have other plans; if I hadn’t other plans I still would not go.  I hope this is quite plain to you?”

“Oh, it’s good and plain,” responded Weary.  “But for the Lord’s sake don’t take up that talking in italics like Myrt does.  I can’t stand this bearing down hard on every other word.  It sets my teeth all on edge.”

The schoolma’am opened her eyes wider.  Was it possible Weary was acquiring an irritable temper? “Second,” she went on deliberately, “I do not consider that I have been mean to you; and if I have it is because I choose to be so.”

Weary, observing a most flagrant accent, shut his lips rather tightly together.

“Third—­let me see.  Oh, that about the dances; I can only say that we women, as a means of self-defence, claim the privilege of effacing undesirable, would-be partners by a certain form of rejection, which eliminates the necessity of going into unpleasant details, and—­er—­lets the fellow down easy.”  The schoolma’am’s emphasis and English seemed to collapse together, but Weary did not notice that.

“I’m sure grateful to be let down easy,” he said softly, without looking up; his head was bent so that his hat quite concealed from the schoolma’am his face, but if she had known him longer, perhaps she would have gone carefully after that.

“As to your sneaking away from—­wherever it was—­surely, you ought to know about that better than I do.  One must go far to outdistance dishonor, for a man’s misdeeds are sure to follow him, soon or late.  I will not go into details—­but you understand what I mean.”

“No,” said Weary, still with bent head, “I’ll be darned if I do.  And if I did, I know about where to locate the source of all the information you’ve loaded up on.  Things were going smooth as silk till Myrt Forsyth drifted out here—­the red-headed little devil!”

“Mr. Davidson!” cried the schoolma’am, truly shocked.

“Oh, I’m revealing some more low, brutal instincts, I expect I’m liable to reveal a lot more if I hang around much longer.”  He stopped, as if there was more he wanted to say, and was doubtful of the wisdom of saying it.

“I came over to say something—­something particular—­but I’ve changed my mind.  I guess yuh haven’t much time to listen, and I don’t believe it would interest yuh as much as I thought it would—­a while back.  You just go ahead and make a bosom friend uh Myrt Forsyth, Schoolma’am, and believe every blamed lie she tells yuh.  I won’t be here to argue the point.  Looks to me like I’m about due to drift.”