“Ah, you thief, you false prophet!” shouted the ranchman in stentorian tones.

But Desnoyers did not quail before the insults.  He had often heard his Patron use these same words when holding somebody up to ridicule, or haggling with certain cattle drovers.

“Ah, you thief, you false prophet!  Do you suppose that I do not know why you are going?  Do you suppose old Madariaga has not seen your languishing looks and those of my dead fly of a daughter, clasping each others’ hands in the presence of poor China who is blinded in her judgment? . . .  It’s not such a bad stroke, Frenchy.  By it, you would be able to get possession of half of the old Spaniard’s dollars, and then say that you had made it in America.”

And while he was storming, or rather howling, all this, he had grasped his lash and with the butt end kept poking his manager in the stomach with such insistence that it might be construed in an affectionate or hostile way.

“For this reason I have come to bid you good-bye,” said Desnoyers haughtily.  “I know that my love is absurd, and I wish to leave.”

“The gentleman would go away,” the ranchman continued spluttering.  “The gentleman believes that here one can do what one pleases!  No, siree!  Here nobody commands but old Madariaga, and I order you to stay. . . .  Ah, these women!  They only serve to antagonize men.  And yet we can’t live without them!” . . .

He took several turns up and down the room, as though his last words were making him think of something very different from what he had just been saying.  Desnoyers looked uneasily at the thong which was still hanging from his wrist.  Suppose he should attempt to whip him as he did the peons? . . .  He was still undecided whether to hold his own against a man who had always treated him with benevolence or, while his back was turned, to take refuge in discreet flight, when the ranchman planted himself before him.

“You really love her, really?” he asked.  “Are you sure that she loves you?  Be careful what you say, for love is blind and deceitful.  I, too, when I married my China was crazy about her.  Do you love her, honestly and truly? . . .  Well then, take her, you devilish Frenchy.  Somebody has to take her, and may she not turn out a weak cow like her mother! . . .  Let us have the ranch full of grandchildren!”

In voicing this stock-raiser’s wish, again appeared the great breeder of beasts and men.  And as though he considered it necessary to explain his concession, he added—­“I do all this because I like you; and I like you because you are serious.”

Again the Frenchman was plunged in doubt, not knowing in just what this greatly appreciated seriousness consisted.

At his wedding, Desnoyers thought much of his mother.  If only the poor old woman could witness this extraordinary stroke of good fortune!  But she had died the year before, believing her son enormously rich because he had been sending her sixty dollars every month, taken from the wages that he had earned on the ranch.